accidentally deleted my earlier tweet. Rock and Brock each sign 1 year deals. WM28 did 1.9M buys. WWE was targeting 1.5M — Gus Ramsey (@GusRamsey) April 3, 2012 I would be incredibly skeptical of that number.  To say the least. Not to mention it generally takes at least a few weeks to get prelim numbers. Still, if so, go Rock.   Edited to add:  Dave made a quick comment on the WON board that Ramsey probably misheard 1.09 million, which would be a much more reasonable number.

Hey Scott, Two quick questions about your rating of last night's Hell In A Cell match between Undertaker and Triple H:  (1.) Would that match have been ***** without Shawn Michaels as the special referee? and, (2.) If so, was HBK's performance the most influential of any referee in history?  No disrespect to Taker or HHH, but it seemed like HBK was nearly as important to the match as the two combatants because of the emotion he displayed.   Well last year there was no Shawn and it was ****1/2, but I don’t tend to rate matches based on the referreeing job anyway.  So for question, I’d say yes.  As for the second question, I’d say Earl Hebner probably will hold the record for a while yet. 

The SmarK Rant for WWE Wrestlemania XXVIII Live from Miami, FL Your hosts are Michael Cole & Jerry Lawler

Wrestlemania XXVIII Date: April 1, 2012 Location: Sun Life Stadium, Miami, Florida Attendance: 78,363 Commentators: Michael Cole, Jerry Lawler America the Beautiful: Lillian Garcia As I wrote out that title, I almost started shaking. Today is Wrestlemania Sunday. In less than two and a half hours, the show is going to begin. This is the day that we as fans wait for all year long. Everything ends tonight and at the same time, everything begins. You all know the card by now, but for those who might forget, the main event is John Cena vs. The Rock, Once In A Lifetime (until ratings go down and we need a rematch). Let's get to it.

Long time reader 5th time emailer blah blah blah Random question that might either be smart or ridiculously Russo-esque dumb... With Lesner and Batista in Miami this weekend... and Rock needing to beat Cena to be the best of all time - a la Austin 01 any chance you see Rock recruiting Lesner/Batista to help him win and forming their own version of the Part Time NWO? Then you got Cena railing the locker room against "all these part time guys taking your spot" Just for shits and giggle CM Punk could play the Sting role at Summerslam thoughts... Scary enough, I was thinking along similar lines, although my thoughts were more Dave Hall and Brock Nash laying out Rock so that Cena wins.  Cena is MAD and we get the Bash at the Beach redo at Extreme Rules (or later) with Team WWE against the Part-Timers, where Cena is revealed as the third man and tells all the fans to stick it.  Cena/Brock/Batista as the mega-heel stable against maybe Punk/Jericho/Orton...

How surprised are you that the WWE were able to pull this Cena/Rock match off? They actually were able to build a match one year out into this huge mega super event. Typical WWE don't even think one week in advance, let alone plan something a year away and actually pull it off pretty damn successfully. I know it's Cena/Rock and there is no way they could have screwed it up, but they deserve some credit, don't they? Yeah, some, but they didn’t really BUILD anything over that year.  They happened to announce it a year ago, then forgot about it completely for months, then had them teaming up at Survivor Series for no reason, and then finally starting building the actual match 6 weeks out.  Justin Shapiro had a great analogy, where the writers are high school students assigned a paper 6 weeks away and so they’re like “Well we’ve got 6 weeks to study and prep for this” and basically do nothing for the first 3 weeks before suddenly realizing that it’s due in 3 weeks and nothing...

The SmarKdown Rant – 03.30.12 Taped from the same place as RAW. Your hosts are Josh Matthews & Matt Striker (because Michael Cole is at Axxxxess, you see)

Chris Jericho was featured in an interviewed by BetweenTheRopes.com today. Here are some of the highlights. On how this WrestleMania feels different than previous WrestleManias: "I figured this out earlier; this is my tenth WrestleMania and there's only been two (matches) that I've been involved with that I felt had the potential to be the show-stealer. One was with Shawn Michaels at WrestleMania XIV and this is the next one. So, you can never say for sure what's going to happen and there's a lot of big matches on this show. I just think -- with the story line and the chemistry and the work style that we have and the anticipation from the fans -- that are match has the potential to be a very special one. "So, I'm excited about this WrestleMania. Not that I'm not excited about every WrestleMania, but this has a little bit of a special twist to it." On what fueled his return: "[The] time and going against C.M. Punk. I was fi...

Bret  Hart  had an interview with Rob McNichol for  The Sun 's podcast  One Sided Ring . He gave his predictions on the top four matches of Wrestlemania and had some interesting thoughts on Cena vs Rock, including him saying he wouldn't be surprised if Cena turned heel. We've talked about Cena turning heel since 2007.  If Cena was going to turn heel, this would be the best place to do so. The Rock being screwed in his hometown would start a possible riot. It would be nearly as crazy as when Hulk Hogan turned heel.  The WWE has been foreshadowing his heel turn a bit with his more edgy character and him sounding like Stone Cold Steve Austin's when he was telling the Rock "I will do ANYTHING to win" Lastly, i t would explain why they're trying to make the match 50-50 and that is so Cena has fans to turn on.  If Cena turned heel, the product would become  more interesting.  The most complained about thing about the  WWE is its by-th...

Brock Lesnar  is in negotiations with  WWE  to appear at Sunday's WrestleMania  XXVIII pay-per-view event at Sun Life Stadium in Miami, Florida. The odds of the three-time  WWE  Champion appearing at show are 'more than 50/50.' Source: Pwinsider.com I'm all for Lesnar coming back to the WWE. The WWE has lacked a  dominant  big man since Umaga that could put on great matches as well. At his peak, Lesnar was one of the best big mans in wrestling. He understood how to work as a big man, stay in character during his match, tell a story, and still put on an entertaining match....which is all very rare for a big man, especially in this era of wrestling. It will be interesting to see what he'll do at Wrestlemania if he shows up. I've heard rumors of Rock vs. Brock Lesnar at Wrestlemania 29, so it's possible that he screws Rock out of his match against John Cena.   I also wonder if Vince McMahon has the grapefruits for Lesnar to do a "I'm be...

Hey Scott, Thanks again for participating.  I just posted the feature on my blog.  Hope you enjoy it.  Thanks again! http://acaseoftheblog. blogspot.com/2012/03/true-or- false-4-with-scott-keith.html   No worries.  Hopefully I can destroy your blog as well. Since we're on the topic of the big show, let's do some predictions!

On Friday at Miami Beach Florida at 8 o'clock est, Dragon Gate USA will have its one time only 1.99 PPV.  This is what the card looks like thus far:  Main Event #1 – Open The United Gate Title Match CIMA & Ricochet defend vs. Chuck Taylor & Rich Swann Main Event #2 – First Time Ever Dream Match Low Ki vs. PAC Main Event #3 Masaaki Mochizuki vs. Akira Tozawa Special Challenge Match Masato Yoshino vs. Rich Swann Stable Shootout Match #1 - Street Fight Sabu & Jon Davis vs. Arik Cannon & Pinkie Sanchez Stable Shootout Match #2 - Fox Picks Callihan's Opponent Sami Callihan vs. BxB Hulk Stable Shootout Match #3 - Callihan Picks Fox's Opponent AR Fox vs. Uhaa Nation I think this is a good idea by Gabe Saposkly. It gives wrestling fans an opportunity to try and see if they like the product. I for one have tried out DGUSA and realized it's not my cup of tea because I feel as if too many spot-fest matches becomes overwhelming after a while.  That said, i...

 When Stunning Steve had hair, he looked like a goofball. Sure, it worked at the time due to his heel persona, but never would've fitted the Stone Cold character. The shaved head on Austin fitted the gimmick and made him look more badass, although the same cannot be said about Undertaker. It's uncommon for a guy look more badass with long hair, but Undertaker looked a lot more terrifying with the long hair. He looks like a creepy old man, similar to the Family Guy character Herbert, and completely out of shape in this picture. Hopefully, he does something with his look prior to Wrestlemania and/or WWE does a good job with makeup to make his appearance more intimidating and got back into shape because if he looks anything like he does in this picture, Baldtaker is going to be difficult for fans to take seriously. Plus, it will be interesting to see how Taker calls spots in the ring. After all, for most of his career, he's been used to his hair hiding him talkin...