LAW
LAW Feb. 3 Update - Football Update With Special Anniversary
John Pollock / February 3, 2013 - 5:38pm
**Tonight on The LAW we are live at 11pm EST with Dan “The Mouth” Lovranski, Jason Agnew and myself chatting all of the big stories from the past including Brock Lesnar’s return to television, the state of The Undertaker for WrestleMania, TNA announcing they will be going on the road permanently and much more. We want to hear from you tonight at 1-855-591-6876 and locally in Toronto at 416-870-1050 discuss any topics you would like and we will also hear from Dave Meltzer of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter chatting all of the major news topics. Tonight is the return of the monthly LAW round table with former WWE creative team members Alex Greenfield and Court Bauer chatting with myself about last weekend’s Rumble and the WWE plans going into WrestleMania. Tune in tonight at 11pm EST on TSN 1050 Toronto, The TEAM 1410 in Vancouver and online live here on the website.
**The Raw tapings are in Atlanta, Georgia tomorrow night with Brock Lesnar set to appear on the show while The Rock will not be in the show and is one of the few episodes of Raw he will miss until WrestleMania. The Smackdown tapings are set for Jacksonville, Florida on Tuesday night.
**Impact Wrestling did a 1.16 rating and averaged 1,580,000 viewers on Thursday night on Spike TV and peaked at 9pm with the Bully Ray reinstatement angle with Hulk Hogan, Brooke and Sting.
**Dave Meltzer has a great piece on the MMA Fighting website breaking down the pay-per-view business of 2012 for professional wrestling, MMA and Boxing and throws a curve ball to the “pay-per-view business is changing” argument TNA provided for their recent format changes.
**Ric Flair was at one point planning to attend UFC 156 last night as he is town for a number of autograph appearances with Mike Tyson but didn’t make it to the show.
**UFC lightweight Bobby Green celebrated his win over Jacob Volkmann last night by leaning his head down as Bruce Buffer announced him as the winner and then shot his head up and spit out the water in his mouth in a direct copy of Triple H’s entrance.
**As Wai Ting and I guessed this past week on Review-A-Raw the plan is to pair Tensai and Brodus Clay together as a dancing babyface tag team. They were trying it out this weekend at the live events and will likely make it to television tomorrow night.
**Kid Kash (David Cash) announced on Twitter that he has been released by TNA and will be taking independent bookings.
**The XFL debuted on this date in 2001 on NBC and UPN for their first and only season. The WWE announced the formation of the league in January 2000 with a one-year build to the season debut. There was lots of criticism during that year with Vince McMahon attacking the NFL (the “No Fun League” he dubbed it) and foregoing training camps with some rule modifications (no “free catch” rule, the scramble instead of the coin toss). The first weekend was a huge success and did solid numbers on NBC but was a case of diminishing returns with each week dropping and hitting historic lows on NBC by mid-season. The novelty wore off very quickly and they got so desperate for any kind of publicity that they promised to take you into the cheerleader’s locker room during halftime and presented an actual “dream sequence” on the telecast, manipulated a feud between color commentator Jesse Ventura and one of the coaches and it became train wreck television without the spectators. NBC was unwilling to take any further losses for a second season and wasn’t going to provide a broadcast platform and the only other option for the WWE to continue the league was to broadcast it on UPN, whose big demand at the time was they would provide a slot for the XFL but Smackdown would be reduced to 90-minutes and the WWE saw the writing on the wall and pulled the plug in April of 2001.
**This week on Review-A-Wai we will be joined in-studio by Toronto based comic Dylan Gott to review ECW Wrestlepalooza 1997 (which was a pretty historical show in ECW history) and you can post your feedback at http://lawradio.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=shows&action=display&thread=2464.
**Tickets for the Impact Wrestling taping on March 14th at the Sears Center in Chicago go on sale this Friday. It will be a double taping as they do the live March 14th show and then immediately afterwards will tape the March 21st edition of the show.
LAW MMA UPDATE
**The MMA Report’s UFC 156 post show is up on the website with Jason Agnew and I recapping the entire card from last night and taking your phone calls at http://fightnetwork.com/news/36200:the-mma-report-ufc-156-post-show/ and it is also on iTunes by subscribing to The MMA Report with John Pollock.
**Here are the complete results from UFC 156 last night at the Mandalay Bay Events Center in Las Vegas, Nevada in front of an announced crowd of 10,275 and a live gate of $2,437,000:
*Francisco Rivera over Edwin Figueroa by TKO at 4:20 of Round 2
*Dustin Kimura over Chico Camus by rear-naked choke at 1:50 of Round 3
*Isaac Vallie-Flagg over Yves Edwards by split decision (29-28, 28-29, 29-28)
*Bobby Green over Jacob Volkmann by rear-naked choke at 4:35 of Round 3
*Tyron Woodley over Jay Hieron by KO at 0:36 of Round 1
*Evan Dunham over Gleison Tibau by split decision (29-28, 28-29, 29-28)
*Joseph Benavidez over Ian McCall by unanimous decision (29-28 all)
*Demian Maia over Jon Fitch by unanimous decision (30-27 all)
*Antonio Silva over Alistair Overeem by TKO at 0:25 of Round 3
*Antonio Rogerio Nogueira over Rashad Evans by split decision (29-28, 28-29, 29-28)
*Jose Aldo over Frankie Edgar by unanimous decision (49-46, 49-36, 48-47) to retain the featherweight title
**The following $50,000 bonuses were handed out after the show last night:
*Fight of the Night – Jose Aldo Vs Frankie Edgar
*Knockout of the Night – Antonio Silva (narrowly edging past Tyron Woodley for the bonus)
*Submission of the Night – Bobby Green
**The main card was average and the preliminary fights probably over delivered in terms of expectations going into the show. I scored the main event 48-47 for Aldo with Edgar taking the final two rounds with the debate centering around the third and fifth rounds. I could not score that third round for Aldo considering the significant damage he did with the push kick to the face and in the fifth Edgar controlled the round and Aldo hit a big leaping shot near the buzzer and wasn’t enough to outdo what Edgar had done all round. Edgar needs some wins now at whatever division he settles on (his coaches would like to see him down at 135 but like he did at lightweight he is competitive with the top guy in the division and probably beats 90% of the guys at either division but is shut out of a title shot for the immediate future).
**There were six underdogs that won on the card and obliterated my picks as I only went 5/11 on Saturday night.
**The UFC has one weekend off and then return on February 16th with the UFC on FUEL card from London, England, which is one of the most solid cards in recent memory and I am really looking forward to that show, which is headlined by Renan Barao Vs Michael McDonald for the interim bantamweight title. The following weekend UFC 157 takes place on February 23rd from Anaheim with the big Ronda Rousey Vs Liz Carmocuhe fight.
**UFC president Dana White stated at the post fight press conference that Anthony Pettis sent him a text message stating he wants to drop to featherweight and fight Jose Aldo right away rather than wait for the lightweight title shot later this year.
**There was an irregularity with a post fight drug test from the UFC on FX 7 card on January 19th in Sao Paulo, Brazil. The “a” sample came back irregular and they have tested the “b” sample (typically a formality in that if one sample shows a drug the other will as well) and will announce the result on Monday but Dana White did state it was not Vitor Belfort’s test in question. Belfort defeated Michael Bisping in the main event of that card last month.
****
THE MMA REPORT – UFC 156 POST SHOW
(John Pollock and Jason Agnew recap the UFC 156 card and take your phone calls)
http://datav3.fightnetwork.com/blog/36200.mp3
*****
REVIEW-AN-IMPACT – February 1st 2013
(John Pollock, Wai Ting and Nate Milton chat Impact in the U.K., TNA on the road, Superior Spiderman #2 and more)
http://datav3.fightnetwork.com/blog/36173.mp3
*****
THE MMA REPORT W/ JOHN POLLOCK – January 31st 2013
(Featuring: MFC president Mark Pavelich, Loretta Hunt of SI.com, UFC 156 Picks)
http://iphone.tsn.ca/tsnpodcasts/THE-MMA-REPORT-JAN-31-2013.mp3
*****
REVIEW-A-WAI – WWE Royal Rumble 2008
(John Pollock and Wai Ting review the Rumble from Madison Square Garden plus Dave Meltzer from The LAW that night in 2008)
http://datav3.fightnetwork.com/blog/36096.mp3
*****
REVIEW-A-RAW - January 29th 2013
(John Pollock and Wai Ting review Raw from Las Vegas with guest Arda Ocal chatting Brock Lesnar's return and more)
http://datav3.fightnetwork.com/blog/36079.mp3
*****
THE LAW – January 28th 2012
(Dan Lovranski, Jason Agnew and John Pollock recap the WWE Royal Rumble, Dave Meltzer stops by and lots of your calls)
http://datav3.fightnetwork.com/blog/36054.mp3
*****
Contact John Pollock - john@fightnetwork.com / @LAWradio / @iamjohnpollock
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