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

It is great to get back to Norman, Okla., after one of the more challenging road trips in recent memory that included sitting in the lovely but talented Indianapolis Airport for approximately nine hours, Wednesday, with much of that spent watching the World’s Strongest Man hibernate in a chair built for someone the size of Hornswoggle. Henry’s snoring was epic and many folks took photos of him sleeping during our long weather-related delay. Bottom line, as “Stone Cold” would say, is that Mother Nature is undefeated and likely to stay such. It took me more than 14 hours to get from Indy to OKC on Wednesday. I know, poor me.

The Joe Louis Arena was rocking on Sunday night on what I thought was a very solid night of WWE action especially in the ECW, World Title and WWE Title bouts all which had memorable significant elements.

The final six to eight competitors in the Rumble match, which I had the pleasure of broadcasting with my fellow Hall of Famer Jerry Lawler, hope you liked the old band playing one more song together but don’t get used to it, really hooked me into the match. Then, the final four were especially intriguing and became the highlight of the Rumble match along with the surprise entry of RVD who looked excellent as usual.

Oklahoman Jack Swagger wrestled in his first title bout on a WWE pay-per-view and was dominant in the end, in defeating Matt Hardy (more on him later) to retain the ECW Title. Swagger seems to be the young cornerstone of which ECW GM Teddy Long is building upon and Swagger certainly doesn’t need a rally towel to get noticed.

The John Cena vs. JBL World Title Bout seemed to center as much around Shawn Michaels as it did the two participants both of whom HBK has defeated in the past. I can understand HBK’s financial angst as I just met with our accountant and some of our stock funds died a natural death in ’08 to the tune of significant losses. Losses that equated to more than I annually earned early in my career. World’s Champion John Cena is a bull and his use of the STF is good stuff and reminds me of two items. One, Masa Chono utilized this maneuver to win many bouts in Japan back in the day and event further back in the day Lou Thesz, who won his first NWA World’s Title in 1937, used the STF at times as well. Once Thesz hooked then-wrestler Paul Boesch, who became the promoter of wrestling in Houston for years, in the STF near mid-ring and told Paul that was far as Paul was concerned the ring ropes “were at least a mile away.”

Did you know that the Cena-starred “12 Rounds” was filmed on location in Louisiana? I find that to be a wonderful thing considering that the folks in one of my favorite states as far as wrestling is concerned are still recovering from Hurricane Katrina. I love movies like “12 Rounds,” and from what I can tell our man Cena kicks butt in this one which has some unbelievable special effects.

Also at the Rumble, Jeff Hardy had a SmackDown administration stacked deck against him in his first PPV, a WWE Title defense against the husband of the SmackDown General Manager with the plan apparently to do all that could be done to make sure Jeff left without the title. That plan did not work, but who could have seen Jeff’s own brother doing the dirty deed with a steel chair in the No Disqualification Match? The whole scenario made me ill and the way Jeff Hardy was treated at the Royal Rumble was an embarrassment and uncalled for. Jeff is still likely the most popular superstar in WWE, whether the management of SmackDown wants to acknowledge it or not.

Bottom line, there wasn’t a champion in WWE hotter than Jeff Hardy before Jeff was robbed in Detroit.

Read the rest of J.R.'s column at WWE.com »