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Strange Things In Wrestling This Month for April 2017 with Marc Madison

By Marc Madison • Published 5th May 2017
TJR Wrestling

Welcome to the latest edition of Strange Things In Wrestling This Month with Marc Madison. Already, the bi-weekly (ish) version of this column, which tackles things that happened during that time frame, put the trash away like Duke the Dumpster Droese (because he’s a garbage man, get it?). This monthly edition highlights things that weren’t included in the last couple editions of Strange Things In Wrestling This Week; maybe because they weren’t deemed significant enough to make it a focal point of a column at the time but picked up steam…or maybe we just forgot. However, we don’t want these other stories to never to be talked about (even if someone else WAS talking about them!) because we want to bring them to the forefront! Showcase the best, worst or even questionable qualities because they stand out. Here, we’ll dive into a handful of different things, stories whose strange nature is something that should be featured.

You can anticipate something outside normal online wrestling culture when it comes to this (generally) monthly edition, just like the bi-weekly (ish) edition. We may focus on a tweet from a wrestler, an image, a scenario, a match, or even a storyline, This month’s edition includes a strange name for an upcoming pay per view, a dance by an NXT tag team, a wrestler receiving a push and fans not understanding why, online bickering amongst potential in-laws, and former WWE stars that won’t let bygones be bygones. Without further ado, here are Strange Things In Wrestling This Month for April 2017.

Great Balls of Fire?

There is nothing wrong with nostalgia. It’s evident with wrestlers who dress and look as though they are still in the 1940s. We often hear about technical wrestling savvy wrestlers whose ability to provide highly competitive matches makes them like they are George Hackenschmit or Lou Thesz or even Bruno Sammartino. This is a time where whatever was old has become new again, at least some of the time. And many know the song ‘Great Balls of Fire’ by rock legend Jerry Lee Lewis. He also covered Chuck Berry’s ‘Johnny B. Good,’ a song title that inspired the name former WWE superstar Marc Mero used while in WCW when he was known as Johnny B. Badd.

Lewis’ song is a really catchy song, and in fact probably sold really well and earned acclaim as one of the most popular songs in the world…nearly 60 years ago. When the powers that be at WWE decided that the Badd Blood pay per view was going to be renamed Great Balls of Fire, they probably hoped for a more favorable response from the public. We aren’t sure why the name of a song older than most of the wrestling audience became the choice for a pay per view name, but we presume that Jerry Lee Lewis will become part of the WWE Hall of Fame to commemorate this choice! Or not. In any event, it actually could have been worse; they could have named it Macarena, but no one would think about bringing that back again…hmm

Jinder Hindering running wild?

We can be a rather cynical group. Fans want our favorites to win and want them on top. We don’t want our heroes to have to job, but then don’t want others to be held down. We want new options, but we become immediately critical of those options. Here in Canada, we have a fast food chain known as Harveys. Their slogan is something to the effect of…make your meal the way you want it. Kind of like how Burger King used to say have it your way! And wrestling fans want to have it their way!

When JinderMahal became the new number one contender for the WWE championship, the response was, well, mixed at best. Many fans were openly critical of the fact that someone who hasn’t been successful during the majority of his time in WWE is now being elevated to not only a featured feud but competing for the WWE championship on a special event! Some speculation that has circulated has been how the company has been very pleased with his work ethic and commitment. Now, we aren’t calling this choice strange, we actually are calling the reaction by fans strange. Is it hard to take him seriously after losing as much as he has? It is. Does that mean that could change? It could. It’s actually pretty amusing to see how many fans are disappointed with the choice of him being elevated. Is Jinder Hindering becoming the latest twitter trend? It may be leading into his match against Orton. #JinderHindering

Scott Steiner really shares his dislike about WWE and Triple H

Holla if you hear him? I think fans can certainly hear him hollering without question. This former WWE and WCW star decided it was important to share his disdain for a certain corporate member of WWE. In an interview with Power on Youtube, Steiner completely lets loose with his disdain for his former employer. He dropped a few statements such ‘F*** the WWE. There aren’t two bigger d*****bags than Triple H and Stephanie’.

It isn’t the first time Steiner has shared his anti-WWE stance, as he shared a few other less than flattering opinions of Triple H in the past. Much like any hornets nest, it won’t bother you unless you poke it with a stick. It didn’t take very much poking in this instance, as even the subject of WWE was enough to get Big Poppa Pump started. The man who often joked about how little he thought of RicFlair was equally critical of the statue that was unveiled during Wrestlemania week. However, maybe he isn’t a fan of bronze.

The point is, we get the impression that if he and Triple H were the last two people on earth, and there was a cup of water, Steiner would rather spill the cup or drink it than share it. He is perfectly fine being on his own, and won’t apologize for his thoughts about his former employer. Does that mean they won’t be visiting each other, during the holidays either? I can’t understand why, though. Everyone loves a McMahon fruit cake, don’t they?

DIY does the Macarena…why??

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XCf0ElnrrbE

One of the most talented tag teams in WWE are the former NXT tag team champions, Johnny Gargano and TomassoCiampa, AKA DIY. They are known for being just as amusing outside the ring as they are skilled inside it. During the last month, fans may have seen images of DIY and former NXTrivals The Revival standing together with an odd hand gesture, calling themselves #TooSour, a clear parody of The Bullet Club/The Club/nWo’s ‘too sweet’. They are so good at simply having fun that we really shouldn’t be all that surprised by what they do. In fact, when Gargano and his wife, independent wrestler Candice LaRae, got married at Disneyworld,Gargano and his groomsmen put together a completely choreographed dance routine to that big hit by 90s boy band The Backstreet Boys, ‘I Want It That Way’.

The problem is that some things should be off-limits, like what was once the ‘forbidden dance’ the Lambada. Most recently, DIY went in a direction that made many that grew up in the 1990s shake their heads. What many would call one of the most forgettable parts of that decade was the rise in popularity of the song and dance ‘The Macarena.‘ We here at TJRWrestling appreciate nostalgia as much as the next guy or girl, but honestly, that song and dance, so often used at weddings today, was something we’d like to forget about the decade. Unfortunately, Ciampa and Gargano brought it back.

Alberto El Patron and Ricky Knight agree to disagree about…eggs

It has been a very busy time for the former WWE and United States champion Alberto Del Rio. Now firmly a part of Impact Wrestling, Alberto has traded in his Del Rio for his El Patron. Many fans know how active has been in his quest to talk down anything and everything that is WWE, in particular, Triple H. However, that doesn’t mean he should be getting into arguments with what may be his future father-in-law. However, instead of El Patron firing the first shot, it was Ricky Knight, father to current WWE superstar Paige, who did so, with a tweet stating, ‘I’m being nice and sending you a care package for Sunday 14th may @PrideOfMexico you will need it after the match on Saturday 13th may’. Knight is alluding to a match between him and El Patron.

Knight could be simply kayfabe his displeasure at El Patron and his daughter’s relationship. However, it was easy for El Patron to bite back a couple of days earlier when Knight said that El Patron couldn’t beat an egg; he replied by stating ‘I don’t need to beat my eggs. Your daughter does it for me #sisisi @RickyKnightWAW. ‘Ouch. For the sake of the match, the exchange between these two does help the build. It also manages to blur the lines a bit between work and shoot. What we never found out, though is how El Patron likes his eggs. Sunny side up? Scrambled? Poached or Over easy?

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So ends this edition of Strange Things In Wrestling This Month with Marc Madison. It is said April can come in like a lion and go out like a lamb, but whoever said that probably didn’t take professional wrestling into account. Who knew that across the wrestling world, we would see such stories as fighting among future in-laws, tag teams bringing back a dance that really should have been forgotten, and former employees sharing their ongoing dislike for their place of employment?

As per usual, we featured some odd and unusual suspects, and social media played a major part in many of the stories. We could have talked about other things that caught our attention, like a certain commentator who may or not is guilty of bullying, but why do that? We are above that here with our Strange Things In Wrestling series! We hit you with the hard-hitting facts!...or at least land in close proximity of being remotely hard-hitting, or with a curve, potentially a slider. What were we talking about again?

For Strange Things In Wrestling This Month, this is Marc Madison saying, see you at the end of May, or we may not?…see what we did there?

…….Nah, there is a pretty good chance we’ll be back next month.

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