J.R.'s Family Bar-B-Q

Mr. Ross, I was wondering if the WWE ever thought about bringing in special guests like Kenta Kobashi, Toshiaki Kawada, Mitsuharu Misawa and other legends from Japanese wrestling promotions, just to show the fans on this continent a different type of wrestling, I collect New Japan, All Japan & Noah wrestling DVDs, and I have to say the wrestling in Japan is outstanding, I thought some U.S. fans might appreciate a different type of wrestling from time to time. Thank you. Albert.

Dear jr im a worker or wrestler as ilike to call it .I would like to thank the wwe for taking the show back to wrestling . i for a change sat down and enjoied raw and ecw. i think making the matches old school is great .it bring back the reality of working a body part .i love that i my self use the cross face chicken wing . i love to work the arm and neck and then slap the i the cross face chicken wing .any way i live in mississippi and i work for the battlezone wrestling .its a small out of the way wrestling show in maggie ms we work hard to put on a good entertainig show .if you ever have a talent scout in the area please send one .well thank you listening to me ramble on .your friend logan

I suspect there to be a lot of smoke coming from that grill tomorrow. May the whole Ross family have a blessed and very happy Independance Day! *Say a prayer for our troops* Jamie P.

JR, One of the most talented and very funny, wrestlers were released from the WWE a couple of years ago... Ernest "The Cat" Miller.Is there any chance in him being brought back? My friends and I, are always watching his videos on youtube. He is extremely enter- taining.

J.R. -- I did not know in what discussion to place this comment other than this one. I am a long time wrestling fan since my days in high school (late 60's and early 70's) watching the likes of Superstar Billy Graham, my all-time favorite Wahoo McDaniel and even Ric Flair in the old AWA days when they came to a local high school gym. I, like everyone else, have been trying to make some sense of the tragic event(s) of last weekend. The only thing I can come up with is this. My prayers go out to Nancy and Daniel and their extended families and my prayer for forgiveness goes out to Chris Benoit. As I watch and listen to the so-called experts talk their way through the various news shows we must all remember the only things we will know for certain are the following. We will know how all the victims died and what were, or were not, in their systems when they died. Anything beyond that is pure conjecture because all witnesses are not with us. Several people, so-called wrestling fans, are commenting in certain sites and blogs Chris Benoit should "rot in hell." I will agree Benoit's actions are despicable and those of us who are parents of children of any age will not understand or be satisfied with the answer to our question "Why?" However, a comment or judgment like that is not ours to make. That was decided when Chris showed up at St. Peter's gates last weekend. We'll have to wait until each of us shows up at one place or the other before we know for sure. Thanks for reading. Keep up the excellent work.

Wonderful commentary there at the WWE site,for I feel very sorry for you having to suffer through Paris Hilton's interview on Larry King(as well as anything[or anyone]that appears on the Fox News Channel),for I never bother to watch television nowadays.

JR, I loved your column. Unfortunately I watched most everything that you watched and I wasn't even under water. Put on a good show this week in Dallas and lets all get back to wrestling. The hell with the media. Take care.

Hey JR just wanted to say you are absolutely right about how awful the Mainstream Media is at reporting stories about things they usually have no clue or real facts about of course the worst three offenders being Nancy "Clueless" Grace, Geraldo "Mustachio" Rivera and Bill "Pompous Ass" O'Reilly. Instead of focusing on the real tragic lost of a family and honoring the victims and their families they instead choosed to turned it into a smear campaign against Vince McMahon and WWE which is just shameful and disgusting! Of course they focused alot of time on the stories cause they knew it would get big ratings and I agree bringing in ex WWE stars like Joanie Laurer and Debra Marshall and some other people who haven't been in the company for more than 5 years to speak out is ridiculous since all they wanted was their 15 mins back in the spotlight and offered no real insight whatsoever. Only Chris Jericho and Bret Hart were good at speaking about the person behind the wrestler and the kind of man he was since they knew him personally and professionally as a friend and not at pointing fingers and blaming like everyone else has done. Thankfully I don't watch these news programs at all so I stay clear of the BS. Of course the Entertainment Media is just as bad constantly talking about Paris Hilton and Linsday Lohan so it stinks both ways. Anyway JR, thanks for letting me voice my opinion!

Hey Jim, Im a long time wrestling fan and as you can well imagine i was deeply shocked at this incident. I only heard of it following rumers on Monday. I stayed up untill 1 a.m. when RAW was shown on sky T.V. and for the past few days i have been glued to the whole stoy unfolding on the net. I am at an end to even contemplate a reason for this. Chris Benoit was without a doubt one of the most professional men on the show and i know from many of my friends younger brothers that this man was a role modal of perserverence and belief. So you can well imagine how it has hit them. What i would like to draw your attention to, and in a way i know you will pass on the word through the WWE ranks is the coverage of the incident in the U.K. While a huge distance away from the home of the WWE as you know there is a huge following growing this side of the pond, and naturally enough the media has jumped on the bandwagon of any story they can twist. Since tuesday morning i have read and heard everything from "being high" to "mad on steroids" to the downright sick. one daly paper even posted the headline "wrestling superstar kills wife and child with own wresling move". now im not gonna start explaining what i find wrong with that...... I will leave that to your good self and anyone else who cares. I managed to get a look at the web cast of Vince McMahons interview on the Today Show and i believe he admirably admonished the scandlous coverage in the media in the states. However, sadly i feel that this was not enough to help the cause over here. I honestly feel that Vince McMahon needs to address the public across the atlantic, simply to ensure that the WWE's image is not perminantly tarnished and that the media will not distroy it. finally getting back on point i would like to entend my deepest sympanthys to all at WWE, superstars and staff alike. Chris Benoit in my opinion was the best technical wrestler in the WWE today, and it is unfortunate that the proud, distingushed and indeed hard fought career of such a brilliant wrestler has been tarnished and any hope of future recognition (i.e. WWE Hall Of Fame) has now ended. Thanks for taking the time for reading this comment and my thoughts are with all involved.

J.R., Truly great column that was spewing truth from every orifce, but I find Cowboy Clint Eastwood better than 'The Duke' in all honesty! (I hope this can't trace were I live, like with that wikipedia thing, gulp...) Im trying flippant references like you, but yours were better honestly... That line about comparing O'Reilly to the Monday Night Wars (I assume DVD) was a classic! Although on matters unrelated to this, I sometimes agree with Mr O'Reilly (Help!), but not this. Of couse, anyone can blatantly see that the media is villanising pro-wrestling and having a certifiable field day with this tragedy, apparently the coverage is garening big ratings. The ultimate irony is that Vince would kill for this mainstream coverage in any other way... I must be honest and say that Iam a little concerned with the number of dead wrestlers, but PERSONAL RESPONSIBILIY (Billy Graham was spot on) is key, if wrestlers wish to take enchancemnts, who are we to tell them not to? I can see the other side of the arguement, however, being the aforementioned high death rate (but only 5 contracted by wwe). What side of the fence are you on J.R.? You take a very humerous, satirical take on the news-media coverage, what do you think of the wrestling websites coverage of said events? Generally, they and wwe need to be acknowledged for the way they have handled this. I truly respect you sir and how you have dealt with this. On a lighter note, hows the restraunt coming along? Actually, that was a pun because dining at J.R.'s sounds like it would make you heavier, not lighter, due to the tasty food that I must remember to order one day over here in Australia, well, not a plate of BBQ, as that would be akward, more like some jerky which I have been hearing so much about, but I digress... God bless you Sir, Johno

Thanks JR. Your colum brought a much needed smile to me in the UK

Hallo J.R., i'm very sad about the Benoit tragedy, even german newspapers brought it. In fact it's true american media is sick (my opinion). Maybe the whole culture is going down (not only yours, mine too). But who cares? Nobody. And thats the problem. Enough. I'm looking forward for Monday Night Raw in Dallas, Tx. Hope it will be a great show. Grüsse aus Deutschland.

JR, I was searching for some info on Chris Benoit on WWE.com and they have taken almost everything off. While I understand what he did was wrong - he is still one of the greatest superstars ever in wrestling history and should be treated with more respect than to be thrown out with the trash. Business is Business. I hope Vince puts out a best of Chris Benoit DVD set. People died, yes - benoit is a murdered - yes. But let us never forget the great person he was...not the monster he became. Celebrate the great man.

What gets me the most is the misifromation the media gives. Like on the Nancy Grace show the other night she asked Bret Hart if he thinks Benoit was depressed about getting demoted form the Horsemen to RAW. Ok makes now sense at all. Then the all think on FOX News whne they said Sensatinal Sherri was killed the same day as Nancy Benoit and that Kevin Sullivan might be behind this cause he worked with them both in WCW and was the "boker". Then the whole thing that it was "roid rage", so sick in tired of that one. Like you and many ppl said lets wait for the toxicology report to come back beofre we jump the gun. All the damn mainstreem media wants is ratings, they did alot of this when Owen Hart died also.

J.R., I live in Tulsa, OK, and with all the rain, I am losing signal on my satellite so I can't even watch "The Duke!!" Oh well smackdown is on now and I have a tricky question... How is the demise of Mr. McMahon gonna play out now that he has exposed himself? Personally, I know (assume) that he was gonna come back Machiavelli style. Also, how does one who is in broadcasting school later become an announcer like yourself?

Good stuff. I'm not getting all this rain either. We haven't had a dry day in Tulsa since the winter. Every day, rain rain and more rain. Everythings so green up here its painful to look at. Some neighbors across the street have wood shingles and grass stalks are starting to sprout out of their shingles from grass seed thats gotten blown into the shingles over the years. And I live right on the Arkansas near downtown so every time the thunder rolls I go out on the porch to watch the river level right near Zinc "lake" to make sure I'm not going to wake up swimming tomorrow morning. I didn't bother much with the TV though myself. In my opinion Joanie Laurer and Deborah Marshall are probably the two least qualified individuals to be discussing this whole debacle. Joanie is a great woman but to see her trying to talk on TV and lecture people about drug use was a bit disingenuous. And Deborah was hardly a Puritan herself. Billy Graham was the only person on Hannity and Colmes making making any sense and of course, because he was, they kept cutting him off. Overall the people that have put the best face on this situation have been Chris Jericho on Nancy Grace, he was really professional and very succinct and intelligent in that interview...and surprisingly Lex Luger. Just really gets under my nails that the media is pulling up old personalities with grievances against the business and people in it to be so called "experts" in the Benoit tragedy. Like Deborah is unbiased? Please. When she said "Had I come forward sooner I could have saved Nancy and her little boy"....I almost threw up. All I saw out of Deborah was A-G-E-N-D-A. Again just comes down to what I said before. Sad day when the news is putting on a circus and the wrestling carnies are trying to report the news.

JR Great column. Very funny. Methinks your good friend Mick Foley had it right when he subtitled his second book "And the real world is faker than wrestling." Keep on chugging, Sir. Your words and thoughts are appreciated by me and many many others.

JR BRAVO I LOVE U and this business JR, PLease tellme the WWE is going to be ok and VINCe isnt going to have to step down. I know I am being a typical drama queen chick LOL BUt i luv this business my son whomn I havent let him watch till MONday, ( he just wants DX BACK ) . I am extremely worried by what this guy at new york post is saying about past 15 yrs he has gone after the WWE and what could happen. I love agian what you guys do and all u do is to entertain you are not babysitters the media is going out of control PLEASE SAY THE WWE IS GOING TO MAKE IT WORRIED FAN FOREVER MOLLY MOM OF 2 in Portland OREGON PIPER COUNTRY LOL

Just as a strange question, what is your favourite john wayne movie? because i always end up watching my dads favourites (Rio Bravo & she wore a yellow ribbon.)

Hey J.R. If you have the TV on long enough you'll soon realize (as I have) that the commercials are more entertaining than the programs much of the time. My advice - spend more time with your lovely wife, and stick with the John Wayne movies!