##### ###### ### ########## ########## ########## #### ## ########## ########## ########## #### # #### ######## ##### ##### #### ## ##### #### #### #### #### ### #### #### #### #### ############# ######### #### #### ########### ######### #### #### #### #### #### ######### ######### ### #### #### ######### ######### ### ## #### ######## ######## ## # #### =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- ## =-=-=-= H + O + T + L + I + N + E #1-900-325-IIWF =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= 29 June 1997 ----------------------------------------------- [click] --------------------------- OPTION #1: The Dross Report --------------------------- Howdy, folks, and welcome to the IIWF Hotline! You've reached the Dross Report update for Sunday 29 June, 1997, and I'm Tim Dross, coming at you from the IIWF Express bus as we prepare to take the Coronation Clash Crusade Tour to New York for its penultimate stop. It's been a roller-coaster tour, folks, no doubt about it, but perhaps the biggest surprises came last night as the Coronation Clash Tournament itself got underway with eight first round matches, live from the jam-packed Gund Arena in Cleveland, Ohio. Possibly the biggest bombshell last night was the elimination of two of the hottest favourites to go all the way and win the whole shebang: Creed and Lord Byron. Creed was first to fall, being pinned by comrade Ike Sampson after Lord Byron clobbered him with his brass-topped cane, and the red-gloved rookie later returned the favour, hitting Lord Byron with that devastating "Goodnight, Farewell, Amen" flying powerbomb from the top turnbuckle and allowing Ronnie Paris to score a sensational pinfall and end the longest winning streak in IIWF history. Up until last night, Lord Byron had won every single one of his last thirteen singles matches, dating back until his only clean pinfall defeat in the IIWF -- which, ironically enough, came at the hands of Creed. It seems that the careers of these two superstars are inextricably linked, a fact recognised by both men last night, as they prepared to lay it all on the line in less than two weeks at Coronation Clash. In an announcement that rocked the world, it transpired last night that Creed and Lord Byron will meet in the Fleet Center on July 12 for the third, and final, time -- it's going to be a "Loser Leaves Town" match, folks. Absolutely unbelievable. On the one hand, we have Lord Byron, a long and distinguished career in federations worldwide, collecting belts and trophies at every step along the way, culminating in the prestigious IIWF Intercontinental Championship, which he has held longer than any other competitor -- in fact, his reign, of some 117 days to date, is longer even than the duration of all three of Tiger Claw's IC title reigns added together. On the other hand, we have Creed, the rookie who hit the IIWF at the end of last year, and quickly established himself as one of the most impressive competitors the IIWF has ever seen, fighting no less than a dozen wrestlers on the same night when he took on the role of self-appointed sheriff for an edition of IIWF Saturday Night, and scoring victory after victory over top-flight competition. However, when Creed turned his attention towards the Intercontinental Championship, sparks were bound to fly, and fly they have. Creed was severely injured at the hands of the European Alliance, and has only recently stepped back into the squared circle following the rehabilitation of his knee. But upon the announcement that the Coronation Clash tournament would be for all the marbles, he declared a ceasefire in his war with Byron in order to focus on taking the IIWF World Championship back to Oakland, a goal declared to his mother as an eight year-old boy. But Byron wasn't going to stand for that -- and made sure that Creed wouldn't even get as far as the Fleet Center. So now we must face the reality that one of these two men will walk out of the arena on July 12 the Intercontinental Champion -- and the other man will never set foot in an IIWF arena ever again. The stakes are as high as they could possibly be, folks. Both of these competitors have achieved a great deal in their tenures in the IIWF -- but both could go on to so much more. It may be a tremendously exciting prospect, watching these two men fight for their very careers, but to my mind, when the smoke clears, we will have witnessed a very human tragedy: the end of the career of one of the brightest stars in the whole wrestling world. For now, let's turn our attention back to the rest of the tournament brackets. It was a hard night for the representatives of the IIWF's affiliated promotions, NLWP and ESWP, with all four of their competitors falling to their IIWF opponents, in varying degrees of controversy. I understand that acting IIWF President Steve Owens has fielded some pretty heated telephone calls from the agents and promoters of the NLWP and ESWP, who are not at all pleased at the way in which their superstars were eliminated from the tournament. In any case, there were also upsets on the IIWF side of things as the "Showstopper" Simon Lebec fell to Mad Dog Watkins, and then ensured that Marty Warnett wouldn't make it to the Sweet Sixteen either, costing him his match against Cleveland's home-town hero, "Real Deal" Luke Steele, who put in one of his best performances since winning his IIWF contract last December. But some of the favourites in action last night did indeed survive the perils of the first round, as Brody Thunder and Deathbringer safely progressed to the Sweet Sixteen. This Saturday Night, the IIWF hits the intimate Manhattan Centre in downtown New York City, where hometown heroes Tony Starks and Dirt Dog Unique Allah, the current IIWF Cruiserweight Champion, will be in tournament action. We'll also see some of the most eagerly-anticipated of the first round matches. The Syndicate, who have been silent since their drubbing last Saturday Night in Landover, Maryland, face up to a tough conflict of interests when Casey James goes up against Tiger Claw, and Genesis -- about whom more in a moment -- face a similar dilemma as Highwayman battles Nightwing. Requiem will meet Scott Rogers, Billy Shakespeare will face "Sychosys" Joe Petrow, and in the biggest match of the entire first round, Chris Quigley will square off against old nemesis Otto Verhoeven. The bad blood between these two superstars runs very deep indeed, and this encounter could well steal the show next Saturday Night. But back to the action last night, and another brutal so-called "punking" administered by the pack of dogs known as Genesis. Requiem assisted Derek Mota to victory over the ESWP's Firestarter in controversial fashion, and then offered Genesis membership to the self-proclaimed "heatseeker" of the IIWF. Mota was having none of it, and launched a blistering verbal attack on the "cartoon characters" of Genesis -- and received a blistering physical attack for his trouble. Having already wrestled a gruelling match, Mota was brutally battered by both Requiem and Highwayman, the latter executing his dreaded "Daylight Robbery" twice on Mota, and apparently damaging his neck. Deathbringer and Serge Annis made the save and drove Genesis from ringside, but the damage was done. Mota was stretchered from the ring, and spent the night in Cleveland's General Hospital. I understand that, luckily, there has been no vertebrae damage to his lumbar region, and his neck was not seriously damaged in the attack, although he is under medical instruction not to wrestle again before Coronation Clash on July 12. Unfortunately, Derek Mota does not strike me as the kind of man who'll be happy to sit at home for the next two weeks, while Genesis run around crowing about their latest hospitalisation -- but for his own sake, let's hope Mota does stay in Canada and not risk his career in the name of vengeance. Okay, folks, that just about wraps it up for this week's update. Don't forget to call next Sunday night for another Hotline update, with all the latest backstage news and rumours. Until then, this is Tim Dross, saying: so long, and thanks for calling! --------------------------- OPTION #2: Soundbite Speaks --------------------------- Well, morons, long time no rant. Can you believe that acting IIWF President Steve Owens hauled me into his office in Portland this past Tuesday when Dross and I flew in for the special Coronation Clash brackets show and demanded that I record a hotline segment this week? I nearly hauled his ass right out of the fifteenth-storey window right then and there, but the offer of another zero on my pay packet persuaded me otherwise. What the shyster didn't tell me was that the zero would come _before_ the digits, and not after them. Still, I've got a scoop on Mr. Owens that'll teach him to play games with the Soundbite. Dross, Morton, that other guy who does the Friday show, and the rest of the announcing team are all under the thumb of the suits, and they've been told not to talk about the ongoing litigation brought to bear on the IIWF by former Intercontinental and Cruiserweight Champion, Steve "the Fury" Kowalski, who has been kept out of IIWF action since he was suspended at Birthday Bash. But the "Soundbite" doesn't fear the petty fines handed out by the suits. So here goes. Kowalski has hired the best lawyers money can buy, and he's going to take the IIWF to the cleaners. If what the Fury alleges is true -- and, dammit, I'd trust the Fury with my own sister, if I had one -- then Owens is dirtier and more crooked than a hotel suite after one of Becky LaRue's famous all-nighters. According to the Fury's counsel, Owens is a manipulative, power-hungry executive who deliberately set up the whole Cruiserweight division scam and even went as far as demanding that Kowalski attack the head of the Special Concerns Committee, Poutine Janois, a few months back, in an effort to discredit the tenure of his boss, IIWF President Dan Spreadbury. Now, whether the attack on Dictator Danny by Brody Thunder at Birthday Bash which put the esteemed President out of commission was part of the plan has yet to be proven, and that two-bit Texan cowpoke hasn't been implicated in this case so far, but it all seems rather convenient, if you ask me. From what I understand, the IIWF is looking to save its sorry ass by seeking an out-of-court settlement in this case, but when I caught up with the Fury on the phone earlier this week, he suggested that the IIWF wasn't going to be able to meet his demands. All indications are that the IIWF's legal eagles are going to try and get this case settled within the next seven days, and another meeting has been set up between the two counsels for Monday morning. If you ask me, it looks rather like the IIWF is ready to cave in to Kowalski's demands -- which smacks of an admission of guilt. Watch this space, morons, because this could be big news. I had the misfortune of checking into a motel in Cleveland this past week, and catching up with some of the activities of the rival organisations who continue to eat the IIWF's dust as it continues to roar towards total domination of the wrestling market, not only in North America, but all over the world -- on a sidenote, IIWF programming is now weekly transmitted in sixty different countries worldwide, and is translated into nearly as many languages; I wonder what "Shoot, Soundbite! Shoot!" is in Japanese. In any case, left on the sidelines recently was the two-bit fed whose announcers attempted to spread scurrilous lies about the wrestling career of yours truly, and who raised eyebrows around the wrestling world with their poaching of IIWF has-been "Painbringer" Billy Sexton some months ago. Rather appropriately, [BLEEP] has thrown in the towel. I wonder where the Armed Farces are going to wrestle now? Whatever happened to the self-proclaimed "Superstar" Stud Stetson? Driven from the IIWF by his own mediocrity, Stetson and valet Lace -- who was always the only reason for watching that big putz in the ring -- were lured by the bright lights and big mouths of the "loop" leagues, but despite putting the bad-mouth on the IIWF in his debut, the cheap heat dissipated faster than Troy after a puncture, and Stetson became just another also-ran in the land of the has-beens. Speaking of also-rans, the man -- and I use the term loosely -- once described as the "franchise" of the IIWF, former World chump Dan Kauffman, has been showing up just about anywhere he possibly can in the past few weeks. From [BLEEP] to [BLEEP] and, most recently, [BLEEP], it appears that the "Lame Duck" is willing to prostitute what's left of his rapidly diminishing talent to anybody with an open cheque book. Far be it from me to suggest that Kauffman is in bad financial shape, but I cannot honestly believe that even a man with such a famous lack of discernment would compete in these bush leagues for the love of the competition. Money talks, baby, and Kauffman seems to be listening right about now. One of Kauffman's buddies, the brain-dead "Jackhammer" J.P. Steele, one half of newcomer tag team, The Nightriders, called the IIWF front office in Portland from Cleveland towards the end of last week, just two days after making his tag team debut on the War Room, and asked to be let out of his IIWF contract, on which the ink was hardly even dry. This moron, who is only just removed from his rookie year, has already retired once to marry his somewhat bovine valet, Annie Steele, nee Mack, and I can only imagine that it's the little lady who's wearing the pants in that relationship. What's the betting that the, uh, lovely Annie doesn't like the travelling schedule, and wants to drag J.P. back to that Michigan hell hole, River Valley to raise a horde of rugrats? In any case, IIWF officials flatly refused to terminate The Nightriders' contracts after only a single match, and told Steele that he'd have to stick it out. They did, however, grant the duo temporary leave to return home for the rest of the Coronation Clash Crusade Tour. We'll find out just how motivated The Nightriders are to succeed in the IIWF's tag team ranks when the whole roadshow returns to Portland after Coronation Clash at the end of July. Well, that just about wraps it up from me for this week. Until I next feel like gracing you all with my words of wisdom... bite me! 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