Outside the Box #23
Had a hard time watching RAW this past week? My bad. Instead of giving you
one legit reason to watch, that being to look for me in the crowd with my
"1Wrestling.com Matt Zylbert" sign, I forgot to mention that I was
going. In any case, a totally unspectacular show, but at least the Stevie
Night HeAT tapings (aka the real reason I paid $48 for my ticket),
were good with the GM himself in the main-event. Unfortunately, you couldn't
really see me or my sign. Even worse was that at the tapings, I did not get
to see the famous Flying Babakanoosh Brothers (aka any pair of jobbers) that
Al Snow likes to praise every week. Hey, they're must-see Steve-ie!
And yes, I realize I said pretty much the same thing in today's 'five-star'
Velocity Report but hey, I'm so nice, I say it twice. Just like Jakked/Metal
was the show so nice, they named it twice, but that's a totally different
story. Hello all and welcome back to my mom's favorite weekend wrestling
column. As always, I am the awe-inspiring Matt Zylbert, and THIS is the
column that raises the BAR for originality. In this week's journey...
Outside the Box, we actually won't be going too far this week, as we'll
discuss the unfortunate release of Brian "Spanky" Kendrick.
First of all, if you've been living inside a rock the entire week, then you
obviously don't know what I'm talking about. Spanky requested to be released
by the company earlier this week so that he could return to wrestling
in Japan, where he has enjoyed much success. In WWE, he was really never
given a fair shot and took advantage of every little opportunity he got, but
that still wasn't enough to soar him as a Smackdown mainstay, the show he
truly deserved to be on every week.
If you're not a reader of this very column (How could you not?), then you
obviously don't know that Spanky won [tied for first] the 2003
Matt Zylbert Velocity Wrestler of the Year award and, along with Paul
London, the 2003 Matt Zylbert Velocity Tag Team of the Year award, as voted
on by the readers of this column. Spanky was also close in some other
categories (Velocity MVP, Cruiserweight), but I guess this wasn't enough for
him to stay. It's evident to me that the fans, including myself, are big
fans of Spanky, but due to his limited success, who could blame him for
leaving? It's not his fault that he was never really given a chance.
Spanky is, or now I should say was, one of the most talented guys
on the entire roster, yet was stuck on Velocity every week. I like to
believe that's not a bad thing, but for wrestlers as gifted as him, they
should be in a much better position. After all, why should Spanky have to be
on the "B-Show", while other, less-talented overrated performers,
get to be on Smackdown every week? The obvious negatives of this are:
1. No more Spanky. I think I speak for everyone when saying we're going to
miss him... a lot. Even with the not-so-greatest of opponents in
singles matches, Spanky still looked good, and having been trained by Shawn
Michaels, showed many signs of him in the ring in terms of quickness and
talent. All of his matches ranged from pretty good to excellent, and the
de-push down to Velocity he got several months ago was very undeserved.
Imagine if they let that Smackdown feud he had with John Cena develop. And
who could forget his WWE debut against Kurt Angle?
2. No more of the team of Spanky & London. This team was REALLY starting
to catch fire towards the end of 2003, despite doing some jobs to the FBI,
but were having great matches left-and-right, and reminded me a lot of the
Rockers, in that they had similar moves, looks, and style. If given more
time, Spanky & London could have easily climbed to the top of the ladder
by the end of 2004, but unfortunately, we won't get to see that happen. At
least, in their final match together, we got to see them against the World's
Greatest Tag Team on Velocity in a really tremendous match, but
given more time and bigger circumstances, I can sense an at-least four-star
match.
Believe it or not, as horrible as this is, there may be one positive thing
to come out of this. Other wrestlers may follow and realize that they don't
need to be in WWE. Guys like Sean O'Haire, Ultimo Dragon, and Kanyon, who
are all talented than the majority of the roster, yet get nothing, may
follow Spanky and go work elsewhere for basically the same pay, while
also obtaining much better position. These talented mid-carders may get fed
up and leave, which should send a sign to Vince McMahon (Unless he's still
laughing like a 12-year-old when King yells "Puppies!") that they
deserve MUCH better treatment.
For example, why is Big Show the United States Champion when A)He can't
wrestle, B)He's never even defended the title, and C)He's out of shape. Why
can't a REAL talent like Kanyon hold the belt? He deserves it.
Why do more people know who Bradshaw is rather than Sean O'Haire? WHY?
Not that I'm encouraging these people to leave because if something like
this were to indeed happen, Velocity could become a nightmare. Bradshaw
becoming a Velocity mainstay is like telling me Chris Leary would be returning
to do voice-overs. Oh God, kill me now.
All I'm saying is that each worker should just do what's best for him.
Another example: Why should Matt Hardy have to put up with being
squashed by Goldberg when he could be main-eventing? Hell, I read he jobbed
to Spike Dudley at a house show this weekend. Spike Dudley!
No offense to Spike, but Matt deserves much more.
Then again, this is WWE: Home of Mis-Used Talent. Think you're good? Join us
and we'll make sure you're not!
And I'm Matt Zylbert, you may go back inside the box again.
I know it's hard to look at Spanky's departure as a good thing, but this
actually may become a significant turning point in terms of where the actual
mid-card talent goes. Spanky may even be sort of a pioneer. I know I'm one
of many people to say this but I honestly wish Spanky continued success in
Japan, and hope that he does return to Velocity in the future. It just won't
be the same on Saturday nights/Sunday mornings without "Sir Spanksalot,"
to quote WWE's elite play-by-play man Josh Mathews.
With another Outside the Box column in the archives, this is Matt Zylbert
wishing everyone a great week, and I'll see ya next weekend with the next
report and column. Peeaaace. See yieuuuu!
Matt Zylbert encourages you to e-mail him with any feedback, comments,
thoughts, or question at BigShot5021@aol.com.
He also can't believe that Carolina is beating Philadelphia, and that he has
actually gone a few weeks without mentioning his boy Marc Loyd... there goes
that streak.
