Dude, you shouldn’t be here.

You couldn’t have gotten here by way of drdarindavis.com. If you went that route, you would have ended up at the new hosting location, where you were supposed to go in the first place.

Everything should be working using the URL, so no need to hang around here on WordPress.com anymore.

This location will not have any future postings.

Head on over to drdarindavis.com, Jabroni!

I should have probably posted this yesterday, but I didn’t think I’d have as many hiccups (and that nobody would notice).

I’m in the process of moving to another host, so for the short term you’ll be redirected to the previous location at the WordPress.com site.

Continue to bookmark and use the drdarindavis.com URL and it will point to the new location soon.

For those who subscribe to RSS, I’m hoping you won’t need to change your subscription information, but for right now the feed is not active.

I’ll post an update when things are completed.

As some of you may have seen around the net, Ric Flair is an official spokesman of the North Carolina Education Lottery. He’s more than a spokesman, really. They designed a scratch-off game based on his character.

Ric Flair Wooooooo! Scratch-off Game

The “Ric Flair Wooooooo! Scratch-off Game” (at least now we know the correct number of ‘o’s is exactly seven) went on sale Sept 22nd 2009. You can win up to 16 times on one ticket, which is in reference to Flair winning a World Heavyweight Championship belt that many times. There has already been a $100,000 winner as of last week.

Take a look at the snapshot of the lottery poster, and the commercial airing in North Carolina at this site.

The tagline is “More Fun Than a Figure-Four Leglock“. Of course, Flair’s signature hold for the 35+ years that he wrestled was the figure-four leglock, so that part makes sense. The part that confuses me, however, is that there are a long list of things that are more fun than a figure-four leglock. They haven’t exactly cornered that market. In fact, anything that doesn’t cause you pain is probably more fun than the figure-four leglock.

In the nearly five years that I was in professional wrestling (and even if you count my battle royal participation earlier this year), I remember being in a figure-four exactly once. I wrestled Dan Burdick, Jr. in a VFW or American Legion in Coon Rapids, MN, and he put me in one. Even though I’m not a fan of scratch-offs, I’m guessing it would be more fun than that.

During that same time period, I never put an opponent in a figure-four leglock that I recall. Probably in wrestling camp, but not in a public match as far as I know.

I used to like to use a figure-four headlock, though. It was something that not many people were using and I thought it was more interesting than just the standard reverse chinlock. It also didn’t trigger the “smart” marks to chant “rest hold”, like they would whenever they saw someone apply the chinlock.

Outside of professional wrestling matches, I have put several people in the figure-four leglock on several occasions. The last one I can think of was after a wedding reception. My friend Tim was the best man in the wedding and was wearing a white tux. I put him in a figure-four leglock in the parking lot outside a bar in Superior, WI. Good thing he paid the two bucks for the extra tux insurance– though he would have needed it anyway with all the barbecue sauce he got on the front of it.

Come to think of it, that was pretty fun. I think I might have changed my mind about scratch-offs after all. Wooooooo!

What do you do when your guest host gets booed by 80% of the audience?

The WWE is continuing to try to insert themselves in the talk show circuit (see WWE + Talk Show = Raw), by booking celebrities as guest hosts on their  live Monday Night Raw program. If you’re a celebrity with something to plug, you’re in. The guest host usually does some kind of schtick, and the WWE bends over backwards and kisses their ass. WWE “Creative” writes the whole show around them and sets up some matches that the guest host pretends to book on the fly. Since the host is expected to be well liked, the WWE gets more viewers and the celeb gets to plug their wares to a different type of audience.

Except this week.

This week’s guest host was the Reverend Al Sharpton. Reverend Al was there as part of his tour to promote literacy among minorities. Noble cause, sounds good so far.

But Raw was broadcast live this week from Albany, NY, and apparently Albany doesn’t really like Sharpton. Not even a little bit. And did I mention it was live? No chance to “sweeten” the audio to tone down the chorus of boos. Just have to run with it I guess.

Jeremy Piven was the only other guest host I can think of that was booed, but only after he turned “heel” during the program. That was planned, and the crowd reacted as planned.

For a typical talk show, the audience gets in for free, provided that they win the ticket lottery or get in line for standby tickets. They are mainly there to see the host.

The WWE fans paid money to see wrestling. Considering that in the first hour and 14 minutes of the program there were only two wrestling matches, they had a lot to be angry about besides Sharpton.

This whole WWE Monday Night Raw guest host idea (where they have a different guest be the “general manager” of Raw each week) seemed like “stunt casting” to me. Other than a little media attention, I couldn’t really see what the WWE was getting out of it. On top of that, the guests weren’t necessarily fans, but celebrities that just happen to have something to plug. Freddie Prinze, Jr? Seriously? What has he been in lately (other than Scooby Doo and Sarah Michelle Gellar)?

I wrote about it a little over a month ago (Raw Guest Hosts Not About Ratings?) but until I saw an article in Variety it wasn’t clear what they were trying to do. According to the Variety article, the WWE has basically inserted itself into the talk show circuit. If you’re a celebrity with something to promote, after you’ve been on Leno, Letterman, Conan, and Fallon, you head on over to Raw to get in a two hour plug.

My first reaction was that it seemed brilliant from a marketing and ratings standpoint. They may be reinventing or creating a new genre even.

From the article:

“We wanted a different way to get our product out there and talked about,” Stephanie McMahon, WWE’s executive VP of creative development and operations, told Daily Variety. “Tying us in with celebrities in Hollywood raises our awareness and gets a variety of people talking about us, which is always a positive place to be. Hopefully it will translate to new viewers.”

“They have something to promote, and we have the platform they need,” said Chris McCumber, USA Network’s executive VP for marketing and brand strategy.

Outside the ring, WWE is gaining considerable exposure, with ESPN having heavily covered [Shaq] O’Neal’s appearance on “Raw.” Clips from the show were played when [Jeremy] Piven and [Seth] Green did interviews on yakkers like “Live With Regis and Kelly,” “The Tonight Show With Conan O’Brien” and “Late Night With Jimmy Fallon.” Wrestlers are also getting invited onto the shows as a result of the tie-in with Hollywood talent.

Given how successful the guest hosts have been, WWE plans to continue having them appear on “Raw” at least through the end of the year, and possibly up to WrestleMania 26 next March.

But after thinking about it a little more, it seems like only a short-term strategy.

Sounds like Raw ratings are up, but the problem is the product they are putting on is crap, mostly due to how they’ve been tailoring the program to the guest.

They are getting more people tuning in than they normally would (ratings up 10% at the time of the article), and some of those people would not normally watch wrestling, but they are tuning in to watch a turd sandwich.

“Hey, thanks for tuning in. This programming will be worse than what we would show on a “normal” week, but we hope you still like it and will continue to tune in after we abandon this ratings stunt.”

Raw is supposed to be their flagship show, but their ECW and Smackdown programs have better content. What’s their strategy for keeping an audience after the guest host thing ends? They run the risk of losing nearly all of the new viewers and some of their old fan base.

A while back I gave a little background on how I started using the proctologist gimmick (Birth of the Doctor). I said that it started out as just a one-time thing, but then I ended up doing it for the rest of my time as an active wrestler. Well, that’s sort of true. The exception I can think of is one time at a county fair out near Litchfield, MN (I think).

The promoter was the “Iron Duke” Jim Mitchell. He had come down to the Sharkey/Fox wrestling camp a week or so earlier to scout out some talent for some of his upcoming bookings. I believe I wrestled Mitch Paradise in a match in camp while Mitchell was there, but that wasn’t who I ended up booked against.

At the event, the ring was set up in the grandstand of the fair. High fences around it prevented people from seeing in without paying. I don’t know what the charge was, but it was something above whatever it cost to get into the general fairgrounds. There was a decent crowd, and many of them were kids.

There were a few motor homes set up for us to use. One of them was a place for the boys to change, and the other was the “front office”, where the promoter could do his business, and maybe feel a little more like Vinnie Mac.

Mitchell was in the RV, and would send for the workers one at a time to talk to them. I think we might have gotten our payoff then also. It was at a fair, so it was a guaranteed show. That meant there was a guarantee of how much money he would get from the fair’s event coordinator. It didn’t matter if two or two hundred people showed up, the pay was the same. The more people the more likely you’ll be able to come back, of course.

“I’m putting you against Judge Jesse. You’re on third“, Mitchell said.

Judge Jesse was from Wisconsin. I had heard of him, but hadn’t met him or seen him wrestle. I was pretty sure he was a cruiserweight, so the gears started turning. Mitchell was probably still talking, but I was already tuning it out while thinking about the upcoming match.

Let’s see… if he’s a cruiserweight, then he’s probably smaller than me. That means I should be able to do some different suplexes tonight since I’ll be able to power him up without killing myself. And I’ve got a few counters in mind that maybe he can pull off…

“…Oh, and you can’t do the doctor thing tonight“, Mitchell said.

I snapped back into consciousness.

“What?..“, I said.

“You can’t do the procto thing“, Mitchell said.

“Why am I just hearing this now? Why not?“, I said.

“This is a family show“, Mitchell said.

“But I don’t actually do it”, I said, “I just take the glove out and go toward the guy. The crowd fills in the rest in their heads.“

“I don’t care. There are kids here“, Mitchell said.

“The kids won’t know what I’m doing unless they already know what I’m doing“, I said.

Yes, the old debate about what is and is not appropriate for children. My argument was that if it’s over their heads, then it’s okay. I haven’t taught them anything new because they don’t understand what just happened. They only way they would get it is if they already knew it, and again I’m not teaching them anything new. The counter argument is usually that if they don’t know it they will end up going to ask their parents about it, who will then be in the uncomfortable position to explain what happens when Daddy goes to the doctor’s office.

“You’re not doing it. That’s final“, Mitchell said.

Knowing that I was on the losing side, I gave in.

“What about the rest of my gimmick? I don’t really have anything else with me.“, I said.

“Tonight you’re a dentist. If you want to pull out a glove and stick your fingers down Jesse’s throat, that’s alright with me“, Mitchell said.

“A dentist?“, I said.

“A dentist“, Mitchell said.

We went out and started the match, with me as the face. Toward the end of the match I put on the glove, got Jesse in the corner, climbed to the second rope, and stuck two fingers into his mouth. A few seconds later the ref came over and started giving me a five count to break the “hold”.

I don’t remember if it was before or after Mick Foley started doing the “Mandible Claw” in the WWE, but people didn’t seem to know how to react. They probably never announced me as a destist on the way to the ring. You see a guy in hospital scrubs and you figure he’s a doctor. Or maybe a male nurse?

A special mention should go to Jesse, who had to have a glove that had been used in probably half a dozen matches (and stuffed down the front of my tights) shoved into his mouth for the better part of ten seconds.

When the match was over, one of the kids in the crowd asked me why I stuck my fingers down his throat. I think I ended up saying something like, “I was grabbing for his tonsils“, but I really wanted to say, “I don’t know kid. It didn’t make sense to me either.“

Gee, I hope the kid didn’t go home and ask his folks about it.

Seems like having a different guest host on WWE Monday Night Raw each week is not about ratings, and not just as a cover for not choosing an official general manager. Sounds like more than a coincidence that everyone just happens to be on in time to plug their latest project.

Maybe I’m just stating the obvious here, but the way wrestling sites write about “guest host” and “ratings” together, it seems like they’re assuming that it is just a ratings game.

While Shaq and Seth Green may have caused a ratings bump, ZZ Top surely must have caused a ratings drop for their segments. Not because people don’t like their music, but because of how terrible the pre-taped (supposedly “live”) segments were during the show. Their music would play (minus the vocals), and they seemed to have trouble deciding whether or not they should pretend to play guitar at the same time, or just acknowledge that it wasn’t live music. Thanks for showing up guys- oh… you’ve got a new album out this week? Really? What a coincidence. Oh, and Seth your new season of Robot Chicken is starting? Guest host Jeremy Piven (and the little Asian dude with him) has a new movie coming out? Wow, thanks to everyone for taking time out of your promotional tour to stop by our little wrestling show.

I like Piven’s performance in the HBO TV show Entourage, and I will say that having a host “turn heel” was a novel approach, but an auctioneer couldn’t have mentioned their movie more times in two hours than these two guys did.

I’m curious what kind of $$$’s were exchanged for what is somewhere between an infomercial and product placement (too bad Billy Mays wasn’t still available). Probably worth it to the WWE financially (in the short term) even if the ratings suffered . A little publicity from the mainstream press maybe (yes, Monday Night Raw is still on Monday nights folks). But how many weeks can you do this before pissing off your audience?

Any predictions for who will be the next few guest hosts? If I took the time to scan the release calendars for upcoming films and CDs I could probably hazard a guess. They already announced Sgt. Slaughter will be coming out of the back office to host next week. I smell G.I. Joe’s kung fu grip, though I wonder why they wouldn’t have done that on opening week (the new G.I. Joe movie opens on Aug 7th).