Kurt Angle, who actually won a Gold Medal in the 1996 Olympics, opened the show with the Angle Invitational, where he challenges the local “Hometown Hero” to a match. If they can survive three minutes in the ring with him, they win his medals. So far, Angle has yet to be defeated. Would tonight be any different? Does the Rock love pie? Because Angle’s Cleveland opponent was none other than Eugene, general manager Eric Bischoff’s “special” nephew. Eugene is something of a wrestling savant, meaning he knows every move of every wrestler in the history of professional wrestling. And the TV schedule for Judge Judy no matter what city he’s in. Eugene managed to throw Angle out of the ring with just ten seconds left, and Kurt couldn’t make it back into the squared circle in time, meaning Eugene now has Angle’s Olympic Gold Medal, which, no doubt, is already covered in drool.

Viscera was up next in tag-team action. His partner? A midget named Cloacas. Viscera (or “Big Vis” as he’s known today) used to be scary in an evil way. Now, he’s scary in a “sweaty fat man in a velvet sweat suit” way. If you’ve ever wondered what happened to all of Al Sharpton’s old track suits, wonder no more: they’ve been repurposed into one Big Vis love glove.

As I said, Big Vis teamed with a midget. Do you remember how funny it was on Seinfeld watching tall, lanky Kramer roll around on the floor with Mickey, his vertically challenged acting partner? Yeah, Vis’ match was like that, only less sophisticated. Still, it’s hard to go wrong with a midget. If only they’d been able to figure a way to add a monkey and a couple of boobs (apart from the Heartthrobs, that is) to the mix, it’d have been Man Show heaven.

Tonight was also the much-hyped “Battle of the Bands” between John Cena, the current rapping World Champion (and by that, I mean he’s a world champion who raps, not the world champion rapper), and former world champion Chris “Y2J” Jericho’s metal band, Fozzy.

Cena is just the latest in the long line of successful white rappers to emerge from the WWE. He kind of reminds me of Mark Wahlberg in his Marky-Mark Calvin Klein days, except Cena didn’t get his big break because of his older, boy-band brother. NKOTB 4VR!

Anway, Cena came out, and to quote Randy Jackson, he did his thing, dawg. Jericho’s band Fozzy then refused to play, supposedly because they felt the Cleveland crowd was biased toward Cena’s crew, and thus not giving them the respect they deserved. In reality, however, it was because the band suddenly realized their singer was actually a professional wrestler named Y2J.

After a brief backstage bit ‘o banter between Bischoff and Carlito “Caribbean” Cool (I just love saying that name), the Heartbreak Kid (aka Shawn Michaels) came out, yammering on about his upcoming match with Hulk Hogan. (Yes, that Hulk Hogan.) I wish I knew more about these two old-timers, but my grandfather’s been dead for years, so I couldn’t call him up for the back story. My bad. (Well, actually it’s my grandpa’s bad for dying, but who’s counting.)

Time for little A-R-E-T-H-A, as Shelton Benjamin, who a few weeks back lost his Intercontinental Title to Carlito “Caribbean” Cool (see!) was put in a handicap match against Snitsky and Chris Masters, ostensibly for disrespecting Bischoff. Shelton lost when he couldn’t escape from Masters’ signature move, the Master Lock. (When I was a kid, we called this hold the Full Nelson, which just shows how much more cleverer the WWE writers are than a bunch of 8-year olds.) Just to drive the lesson home a little further, Masters refused to unlock the Master Lock, until the 7 ft, 500 lb giant, Big Show, came down and picked it. (See how I worked all that “lock” humor in there? Try the veal.)

Also, the RAW Diva Search is still going on. This week, they had a hot dog eating contest. As funny as seeing a bunch of stripper-wannabes yummy down on some hot dogs was, it paled in comparison to hearing Jerry “The King” Lawler carry on about watching a bunch of stripper-wannabes yummy down on some hot dogs.

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Posted by on July 27, 2005 10:55 PM