The Outsiders' Edge

(The Following is an e-mail interview I conducted with the great Coach Ben Wade from Survivor Tocantins and Heroes vs. Villains. If you’d like to hear my dad answering these questions while channeling the spirit of the dragon slayer check out my 2 hour World Cup preview spectacular. )

Coach’s answers in bold. Be sure to visit his website

The Dragon Slayer is a man of virtue and posseses the warrior spirit.

JPK- Hello Coach, I appreciate you taking the timeout to answer a few of my questions. First of all, prior to your involvement in Survivor: Tocantins and Survivor: Heroes vs. Villains did you undergo any sort of training regimen to prepare yourself physically or mentally for your time in the game?

CBW- The first time I went to Tocantins I worked out, but all in the wrong way. I was doing heavy weights and an hour of cardio. WRONG. Worst thing you can do. Survivor is all about sprint spring jackass all over the place. So the second time (whats the saying? First time shame on you, second time shame on me) I trained like a warrior. I knew what to expect. I worked out three times a day, sprinted on the sand, weights, swimming, and then I would sit down exhausted and work out a puzzle. That’s the key.

JPK-How did you become a part of the Survivor franchise? Did you decide to apply and audition for the show on your own, or did family or a group of friends get the word out about you?

CBW-I sent in a tape with an application. My coaching staff was asking me to apply for a show, the soccer players wanted me to go on the bachelor, and one thing let to another and voilla

JPK-Did you find it more challenging to play the game in Survivor: Tocantins where all the contestants were total strangers or in Heroes vs. Villains where many of the contestants already had relationships with each other coming into the game?

CBW- Tocantins was by far better because we all had a fair shot. It was a lot of getting to know people and fencing mentally every day to see who you wanted to go with. On an all stars the fate of some are decided before they even walk on the first challenge.

JPK- During this past season, you like many others were extremely critical of Russell. Now that you have had the chance to look back and see the way he played the game from a different perspective, has your opinion of Russell as a person and as a competitor changed at all?

CBW-I respect all competitors and if you read my interviews you will see that I have lightened up in terms of other people and my opinion of them

Good to see that Coach and the Evil One are back on the same page

JPK- I agreed with your vote of Parvati as champion for Heroes vs. Villains. Do you think it is fair that Sandra won solely because she was not Russell or Parvati?

CBW-Life is not fair. Survivor, without question, is atrociously not fair. I think that the strongest should win, and the most noble, but that just doesn’t happen sometimes. Its frustrating but you gotta learn to deal with it

JPK-It seemed like in the Survivor: Tocantins season you spent a great deal of time sharing your tremendous survival experiences, such as the awesome getting captured by pygmies story. Did you make a conscientious decision not to be as forthcoming about your past experience in the Heroes vs. Villains season or were they mostly edited out?‘

CBW-I told a story every single night. I think if I had gone farther they would have shown them more. I love telling stories they are part of what makes me me.

JPK-You seem like a very spiritual and philosophical person. Are there any particular authors or works of literature that were particularly important in your philosophical development?

CBW-Shantaram is the best book I have ever read. A Voyage Beyond Reason isn’t a slouch either I love all philosophers, because there is something that you can learn from each teacher if you just open your ears to hear, your mind to mold, and your body to breathe it in (I just made that up, literally in five seconds)

JPK-Are there any particular lessons you learned on Survivor that have changed your approach to soccer coaching or working with symphonies?

CBW-Be true to your self no matter what

Walk the way of the noble warrior even when everyone around you does not

Don’t take yourself so seriously

You can admit wrongs and defeat

Be more humble

JPK-In your work as a Maestro with the Susanville Symphony, I’m assuming that you primarily work in the work with the classical music medium, however on the Survivor Ponderosa show, we saw you Courtney and J.T. delve more into the rock and roll/ electronic dance music side of things, coming off that experience do you expect to spend more time creating and performing rock music?

CBW-I would love for a producer to come along right now and say lets record your band. I like creating, whether it is the character of the dragonslayer or the classical music of a symphony or the rock and roll of a band.

JPK-Are there any coaches in soccer, or any other sport, that influence your philosophical and day to day style of coaching?

CBW-No. I look to people outside of soccer to be my mentors because although some people say soccer is life, life is not soccer and you must branch out of your own world to truly see.

JPK-Since you are a collegiate soccer coach, do you follow the professional game at all, and do you have any prediction on who will win the 2010 World Cup?

CBW-Look for Ivory Coast to make a strong showing. I think that England might look good, and if Argentina coach gets it together than maybe we will see something good from them too.

Coach + Drogba could equal World Cup gold for the Ivory Coast.

JPK-Coach, now that Survivor Heroes vs. Villains has wrapped up, are you exploring any other potential acting or reality television roles for the future? America needs more Ben Wade.

CBW-I just wrapped up filming a movie called Isabel, filmed by the Ketola brothers in Maine. I have a supporting role there. I am also staring in the movie 180 www.180film.com that is filmed this summer. Both movies will be out later this year or early next year. Another door is opened and Im kickin it in.

JPK-Now finally Coach, do you have any future plans to head back down to South America and kick a little Amazonian pygmy ass?  I think it’s time you got a little pay back.

CBW-HAHA That’s a good one. I have always wanted to go back and kick some ass down there but the time for retribution has passed. I am now more the peaceful warrior than the vengeful ahole.

Don't piss off the half pint pygmy.

Welcome back everybody. It has been a very long time since I’ve been by the Edge. Far too long. My Flyers are in the Stanley Cup Finals, Lakers-Celts is shaping into a good series, and the World Cup is days away from starting.

I want you to know that I will be doing a radio show this Wednesday night at 10PM EST with my buddy Johnny Moorhead who is a soccer expert. Listen to us here. We really want your calls.  We will break down all the groups, and share the teams, players, coaches that you must look out for during the tournament. I promise no gratuitous Diego Maradona cocaine jokes. Besides our World Cup chat, I will be revealing the contents of my exclusive e-mail interview with the great Coach Ben Wade from Survivor. Coach was my favorite contestant from the last season on Survivor. He wasn’t able to make the radio show, but he was kind enough to take part in an e-mail interview with me. The Dragonslayer was in fine form and it will be quite entertaining.

Coach: Part Man, Part Myth, Part Dragon Slayer

I will reveal my final 4 for the tournament which includes one CRAZY, IDTIOTIC, PSYCHO surprise.
I’ll be back in a few days with the Coach interview, NHL and NBA thoughts, and World Cup.

Well thanks for returning to The OE’s coverage of the biggest sports event of the year. Earlier this week I shared my thoughts on the epic Shawn-Taker match. That has been a bit of a minor hit in the internet world, and today I would like to share my observations on the rest of the WrestleMania 26 card.

It was a solid show. I’m not going to sit here and say that it will be forever on the consciousnesses of the wrestling fan’s mind like Mania X-7 or something ridiculous like that, but it was an entertaining way to spend 4 hours.

Here is a run down of the card:

Yoshi Tatsu won a 26 man dark match battle royale. Nobody except the live people saw it, so I can’t really comment. Seeing as how he hasn’t been on Raw the last two weeks since winning, it clearly was a career changing moment. He is a fine man.

The show began with a long ass video package talking about how special WrestleMania is. Thank you WWE. I’m already going to be sitting in a chair for 4 hours watching the damn show, I don’t need to be reminded about its specialness.

Miz and The Big Show defeated R-Truth and John Morrison in a 3 minute nothing match that would have been better at a house show in Piscataway, New Jersey then the biggest wrestling show of the year. There was nothing special here. It ended with the usual “Big Show punching a guy in the face while the refs were turned away” finish we have seen 4356 times the past 10 months on Raw and Smackdown.

"What's Up?" Not your popularity among fans.

The WWE tag team situation really sucks right now. I don’t want to sound like Rick Pitino but, “The Steiner Brothers aren’t walking through that door. The Hart Foundation isn’t walking through that door. The Rockers aren’t walking through that door.”
Can The Mexicools at least walk through that door?

After that amazing exhibition in professional grappling we were greeted by the lightly anticipated three way between Ted DiBiase, Cody Rhodes, and Randy Orton. That sounded a little gay. However to be honest, DiBiase and Rhodes would probably be more recognizable to the general public if they had spent the last two years in gay porn than wrestling. Lets just say there is probably alot of homosexual men and frustrated housewives who would have rather seen those two “get swallowed by The Viper” than the actual match.

Moving on.

This match had a horrific build in the lead up to Mania. Rhodes and DiBiase should have formed a tag team called Mind and Matter. Nobody pays much mind to Cody Rhodes, and Ted DiBiase Jr. doesn’t matter at all. In the weeks leading up to Mania Orton was presented as a half face/ half heel which = zero reaction. The other two guys have been jobbers throughout their entire alliance with Orton and this feud did nothing to change that perception.

It was actually a pretty good match. Orton won with an RKO on DiBiase after punting Rhodes in the head. The action was pretty swift, and the people were really into Orton as a babyface. I have no idea why because the pre Mania Raw crowds could have cared less about him, but the Mania hardcores were completely into him as a face. The crowd stood up when he was about to hit the drapping double DDT on the other two guys like he was Hulk Hogan hulking up for the Atomic Leg Drop.

Randy Orton's reaction to reading the gay porn soliloquy.

Up next was MITB. It was a solid match, but did not feature the suicidal hilarity of most years. I imagine this was a result of the new emphasis on wrestlers’ health due to Linda’s stupid Senate campaign. Having someone like Shelton Benjamin getting injured from falling from a 10 foot ladder through an announce table onto Matt Hardy would probably look bad.

There really wasn’t anything too memorable here except for Kofi Kingston creating a pair of stilts from a broken ladder. That was pretty creative, but wasn’t exactly death defying or anything. There were 10 men here. Thinking back to this match a few weeks later, I have no memory of 8 of them.
Jack Swagger won after taking a hilariously long amount of time to unhook the briefcase from hanging hook. Time just completely stood still during this moment. It took Swagger so goddamn long to take the briefcase down, Stephen Hawking could have made a run in here. Swagger is now the champion on Smackdown. He has already jobbed twice to Randy Orton since winning MITB. I expect that to be the norm of his glorious title reign.

In the next match HHH defeated Sheamus clean in the middle of the ring with a Pedigree. I don’t really want to talk about this match because the result sickens me, but Hunter looked like he had been sleeping in a tanning bed for 9 straight days coming into this match. I wish he had just stayed in it.

Up next Rey Mysterio Jr. defeated CM Punk in a really good 6 minute match. This bout would have been better if they took away the stupid 5 minute pre-match video package and just given the guys more time in the ring. Rey came out in his stupid Mania super hero costume. He was dressed like one of the Na’Vi from Avatar. Yes, because I would definitely wear ring gear that pays homage to the Na’Vi tribe while engaged in a fight defending the blood honor of my family against a hated rival. I love CM Punk’s Straight Edge Society. That group has 5 members if you include Luke Gallows, Serena, CM Punk and the two bald men attached to Serena’ chest.

I didn’t really understand why Rey won this match. I would have loved to see him have to be a memmer of the Straight Edge Society. Plus, they are continuing the feud. Booking 101 says you have the heel win the initial matchup of a long feud so that the fans will pay to see the face get his revenge. Based on the results of the Cena, HHH, and Rey Jr. matches, Booking 101 is no longer a part of the WWE cirriculum.

Following Punk-Rey we go to witness a strange beat down 13 years in the making. With the exception of Shawn vs. Taker, Bret-Vince was my most anticipated match going into WrestleMania. It was just surreal seeing Bret out there on Raw the last few months and competing at WrestleMania after some of the comments he gave on my show back in January of 2009. Check out www.blogtalkradio.com/elevationradio to hear my interview with The Hitman.

Coming into this match, I knew that both men were going to be severely limited physically. Vince is now 64 years old, suffers from back pain and was never a great ring technician to begin with. He has had alot of good street fights through the years, but age has to be catching up with him. Bret is 52 years old, coming off a stroke, severe concussions that ended his active career, and a right knee replacement. That being said, both men actually did very well performing the physical elements of the match. Vince did a great job of selling and taking a massive beating, while Bret looked very good throwing on the sharpshooter, and hitting elbow drops, and some of the other basic offensive things he used to do during the early days. It was good seeing Bret get out there and receive a little peace and closure in his life through this match and his recent reconcilation with Shawn Michaels, however the match itself was put together in such a strange, backwards way.

Bret came to the ring first after a massive pop. Vince then came out and informed Bret that the match was now a lumberjack match and it would have a special referee. Vince than revelaed that the lumberjacks were all of Bret’s brothers, sisters, and member of the Hart Dynasty. The special referee was Bruce Hart who had been doing a stellar impression of Bernie Lomax from “Weekend at Bernie’s” throughout the previous night’s Hall of Fame induction ceremony and the beginning stages of this match. I think the aviator sunglasses were welded onto his face. This was a pretty interesting surprise, but it was kind of dumb when a minute later Bret revealed that actually, he had met with the Hart Family beforehand and that The Hart Family was actually on his side and had  created a unified front against Vince.

Alright, I understand pulling a fast one on Vince, but shouldn’t this surprise had been revelaed during the course of the match instead of beforehand? Just too much going on at once. So of course the Harts than turned on Vince and created what was basically a 1 vs 15 handicap match. I’ll be honest, it is kind of hard to cheer for a 64 year old heel getting beaten down by an entire family. This almost became a retirement match for Vince when he took a brutal bump from an off the rope Hart Attack administered by Tyson Kidd and Harry Boy Smith. After getting beaten on by the family for awhile, Vince then hid under the ring and pulled out a tool of some type and caused the Hart Family to back away like he was holding a thermal detonator like Leia when she was dressed as a bounty hunter in Return of the Jedi.

Vince then hopped in the ring and proceeded to get beaten down for a very, very, veeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeery long time by Bret. The beating included all sorts of elbows and kicks, and a crowbar. The worst part was when Bret hit Vince close to 20 times with a single chair. If it was any other performer taking a beatdown like this, they would be over to a Rock like level as a babyface, but this was Bret v. Vince, so the people weren’t going to start booing The Hitman and cheering Vince. Finally, after a ton of chair shots and teases that resulted in kicks to the man area Bret finally clamped down the Sharpshooter and we got the moment we had all been waiting for. Vince tapped out and The Harts all had a group hug. I wanted to give Vince a hug after this match. It was just booked so backwards and the psychology sucked. People want to see the face get beaten on forever and then have the heel get beaten in the end. They’d rather not see a 15 minute face family on heel beat down. Apparently Vince wants to retire the Mr. McMahon character so he wanted to go out by getting the holy hell beaten out of him. Whatever. People just wanted to see Bret hit the Sharpshooter, not the Vince McMahon vanity project. That was just strange to watch. Its good to see Bret is back in good health, but that was just weird.

I like Bret Hart's jeans in this picture.

Chris Jericho then defeated Edge in a very good singles match. Jericho did a fantastic job of working over Edge’s torn achilles. This match reminded me of alot of the older matches I saw on my Bret Hart DVD this week. I was watching some great singles matches from Bret against the likes of Ted DiBiase and Ricky Steamboat. I love watching the old time, slower paced style of one guy targeting the other’s specific body part and doing everything possible to work over that particular area. It gives the match a great story and makes every move feel important and logical. This is unlike today where most matches are clearly heavily scripted out and are basically Move A followed by Move B followed by Move C followed by the finisher. My favotie spot in this match was when Jericho worked over the achilles by putting Edge into a half Boston crab. Y2J got the victory after hitting Edge with the title followed by a kickout. The finish really caught me off guard. I guess I am just used to the typical WWE Mania finishes of the face kicking out of the heel’s finishing move and getting the victory. However, unpredictability can be good if done correctly. A very deliberate, retro early 90s WWE match. I’ll take a well worked story over a spot fest 8 days a week,

Following Edge-Jericho there was a horrific multi-woman tag team match. It was horrific. It is amazing how bad the female workers in TNA and WWE are at wrestling. They all look hot and a few are decent here or there, but the total divas’s division is filler. Gone are the days of Trish vs. Lita.
The final match for this review is Batista vs. John Cena. The two big men actually had a much better match than I was expecting. It was a little clunky in points, but had a nice mixture of athleticism and strength. The finish came when Cena was able to reverse a Batista bomb into a STF which caused Big Dave to tap out. Batista and Cena aren’t quite Kurt Angle-like ring technicians, but they are really good at all of their signature moves. All of their major moves are also super over so the crowd is always into their finishes. The five knuckle shuffle into a spine buster was another sequence of this match that I enjoyed. In a perfect world, Dave would have won this match. He has been the best heel in the company since turning last year. His promos and outfits have all been fantastic. The build for this match was tremendous, and the two giants  definitely lived up to the hype.

Batista may have lost to John Cena, but he is forever a bad ass.

You can read my review for Shawn-Taker in the entry that is just below this one.

Well folks, it seems like every year around this time I have a talk with my friends about how awesome Shawn Michaels is at WrestleMania and how his future performances can’t possibly match the masterpiece we have just seen. Well folks, it seems like every year around this time I am made to look like an idiot.

Shawn Michaels and The Undertaker put on a match for the ages at WrestleMania 26 that was pretty damn close, if not better than the all time classic the two legends threw down at Mania 25. They are the two best in-ring story tellers alive today. I suppose Kurt Angle also belongs in the conversation, but he just doesn’t have the canvas you need to create a true masterpiece in the rinky-dink confines of TNA. From now on when friends or family bug you about why you follow pro wrestling, this is the match you must show them. The match last night had so many amazing moments. My favorite sport was the hellacious moonsault when Michaels (45 by the way) launched himself off the ropes into the air and landed onto a prone Undertaker who was stretched out on the announcer’s table. The impact of the crash destroyed the table and caused me to nearly take a bump on my basement floor because I was so blown away. Another great, little simpler moment, was when Shawn was able to reverse the Undertaker’s Hell’s Gate gogoplata submission into a pinning predicament. I actually thought there was a chance the match was going to end on that quick little reversal.

If this is really the end of Shawn Michaels' career, wrestling is going to suck.

Another thing that made this match feel so “big” was the stipulation of streak v. career. You actually felt like something was on the line, unlike most years where The Undertaker winning at WrestleMania feels like a mere formality. Please, did you really think the likes of Mark Henry, Ric Flair, Edge, Batista, The Big Show and A-Train actually had a chance in hell of winning? I actually predicted that Shawn would win going into the show. I thought the combination of everyone in the world knowing Taker was probably going to win plus it would create a natural storyline for Taker-Shawn III at WrestleMania 27. This little bit of uncertainty made all the near falls seems really important, because there was a little voice in the back of my mind saying “This Sweet Chin Music might actually be it.” But it was not to be. The match ended in a great sequence where Taker hit a tombstone pile driver that everybody thought was the end of the match. However, Shawn kicked out and The Undertaker said “What the hell do I have to do?” He then stood up and lowered the straps on his ring gear and looked ahead with an empty look in his eyes and implored Michaels to stay down. You could tell he wanted him to stay down. However, Shawn used the Undertaker almost like a railing and grabbed onto his chest and hoisted himself up while trying to keep his balance. Shawn than shocked Taker by doing the deadman’s throat slash gesture and smacking Taker right in the face. This enraged The Undertaker and led to him hitting Shawn witha  jumping tombstone. 1, 2, 3 bell rings, match over. It was amazing. The two men embraced after the match and Shawn Michaels went away taking in the adoration of the fans with a relieved look on his as he entered the next phase of his life.

I expect we will be seeing the steely glaze of The Undertaker at WrestleMania for years to come.

Its amazing the performance these two athletes were able to give despite all the physical issues plaguing them. The Undertaker must be in terrible pain since he is dealing with constant hip and knee pain. He has had several hip operations in the past few years and will probably get a full replacement like Konnan sometime soon. Shawn missed 4 years of his career due to severe back problems and also has to be hurting in his knees and legs. The Undertaker did a masterful job of selling a bum knee after coming down awkwardly on it while completing his famous “Old School” rope walk maneuver. Hell, for a few minutes I thought he had actually severely injured it until Michaels started going after it as much as he did. It was still a great performance by The Undertaker. Who knows, maybe there was some reality in all that limping? The combination of grit, craziness, excitement, mastery, fear, desire, and uniqueness made Shawn-Taker II one of the greatest matches to ever come down the pro wrestling pike. Its scary to think about a WWE without either of these performers. Where are our great matches going to come from? What performers are going to be able to draw out such an emotional response from crowds in arenas and at home? Will there ever be a match this good in the WWE again? I don’t know. Time is the only way to find out, but right now all we can do is sit back and thank The Undertaker and Shawn Michaels for laying it all on the line one more time. If this is truly Shawn Michaels’ last match, (Its wrestling, people) thank you for a magnificent career. From your early work with the likes Marty Jannetty, Bret Hart, and Razor Ramon to the modern stuff with Kurt Angle, HHH, Chris Jericho, John Cena, Ric Flair, and The Undertaker, you have blazed a trail that will be unmatched for decades to come. Your Mania matches with Flair, Razor Ramon, Chris Jericho, HHH and Benoit, Hart, Angle, and the two with Undertaker will be remembered until the end of time. Its been a hell of a ride.

Thank you for everything Mark Callaway and Michael Hickenbottom. The Dead Man and The Sexy Boy have created more memories and kicked more ass, and entertained more fans than almost anybody in this industry.

You two are the masters.

Shawn Michaels: Forever Awesome.

Thanks for stopping by everybody. I will offer my thoughts on the rest of the WrestleMania 26 card later this week. Come back to hear my thoughts on Vince-Bret, Batista-Cena, Edge-Y2J and everything else that happened in the biggest sporting event of the year.

Long old column this time round. Sorry about that. I also need to say sorry for the ridiculous amount of time since the last London Chronicles turfed up here. You see, I try to get them out every other week except in the last 6 weeks I have given up sleeping, leaving the house, smiling and bathroom breaks due to a ridiculously busy spell working. Without a word of a lie, I thought that it had been 2 weeks since I last updated ya’ll about what was going down in the hood, yo. Instead, it has been a month. I’m sorry, I’ll do better and if I see you at the bar I’ll get you a drink. Anyway, that is enough humility for one evening. Shall we progress? We have an awful lot to get through today…

It is well known that the English apologize through the medium of sorrycats.

The Table Don’t Lie

I’ve long said that, based on my vast experience playing Football Manager (my current game is in 2034 with over 26 day’s playing time logged…), the last 10 games of the season are when you decide your fate. The first 10 are a gauge of where you are, the next 18 are just trying to stay afloat and then with 10 to go you see who you are fighting with. With that in mind, lets have a good look at all the battles.

The race for the title comes down to Manchester United, Chelsea and Arsenal. Currently, Chelsea are out on top with 61 points, one more than United and three more than Arsenal. Right now who wins is anyone’s guess. Chelsea may be in the lead but are struggling, United may be hot on their heels but are completely riding the genius that is Wayne Rooney and Arsenal have been struggling but are about to come into an easy spell of games. Honestly, although I backed Chelsea a few months back, this has now gotten too close to call. This will come down to the last 3 games, with all 3 teams still in it.

The battle for forth place and the final Champions League spot, too, is still up for grabs. Currently Spurs and Manchester City are tied with 49 points, although City have a game in hand. One point behind them is Liverpool and four points behind are Aston Villa. I have to admit, Liverpool have done an epic job of getting back into the battle but I think that the climb may have taken too much out of them. Sadly, Villa too look like they may slip away once again after doing the same thing last season – getting close then not being able to win at the business end of the season. End of the day, this should come down to Spurs, Liverpool and Man City and, much like the title race, it will be a last 3 game decision.

In the relegation zone, Portsmouth are so far gone they have asked for their ‘balloon’ payments to be given out early. For the other two drop-spots, though, there are 7 teams within 4 points of each other. A couple of wins here or there, a few injuries and unlucky losses, and any of them could find themselves back in the Championship. Once more, in one of the closest Prem seasons ever, we won’t know who is going down until the magical 3 games to go marker either.

The battles may be established with 10 or 11 games to go, but the winners and losers are far from decided here.

Chelsea Players Can’t Keep It In Their Pants

Chelsea has traditionally been one of those clubs a bit like the Dallas Cowboys teams of the early 1990′s – yeah, they get up to an awful lot of mischief but very much behind closed doors. They only do it to let off a bit of the steam that being a dominant force creates. Well, recently their dominance has dropped off a bit and their mischief has turned into full blown scandal.

In the last few weeks, there have been two Chelsea players caught playing away from home – John Terry and Ashley Cole. Both of them, though, under different circumstances.

Let’s start with Ashley Cole, who I should point out I cannot stand. I can’t stand the fact that he said things to a ref, things that I don’t think even the free-loving Senior Elevation would let me repeat, during a game which was on a gameday used to promote fair play. Also, I cannot stand the fact that he said in all seriousness that he felt ‘physically sick’ when he found out Arsenal were only going to offer him £60,000 ($110,000) a week base salary. Then, he couldn’t understand why the entire British public, who based on the average wage would take about two and a half years to earn what he turned his nose at for a weekly pay packet, turned against him.

Anyway, he also has this to come home to. The lovely Mrs. Cheryl Cole.

I can't believe I've taken this long to post a picture of Cheryl Cole.

Yeah, I know. Personally, I’d never leave the house if I was married to her. But, still he was caught sleeping around. The thing is, Chelsea don’t particularly care that Cole was sleeping around. What they care about is that he was doing it on team time, getting aides to sneak girls into his hotel rooms before away matches. Apparently, that crime has cost him between £200,000 ($350,000)to £400,000 ($700,000) in fines (depending on who you trust) and may even get him sold to Barcelona or Real Madrid in the summer. Thing is, with Ashley Cole, that is just one guy being a complete and utter blithering idiot.

What John Terry did, though, was much much worse. I’m not usually one to be serious in any way, shape or form but frankly I don’t really want to make fun of JT’s fall from grace. Basically, the story goes like this:

First things first, John Terry is married with two kids. Keep that in mind as you read on. One day, all of the papers get into a tizzy because it turns out that Terry had tried to gag a story that was going to be published by The Sun. Everyone then wants to know what it was, and it turns out that what he tried to keep secret was that he was having an affair. Not a one night stand or sending some flirty texts, but an actual pre-meditated affair. Then it came out that the affair was with a French underwear model – Vanessa Perroncel. An affair that lead to her falling pregnant, and Terry paying for an abortion and giving her some hush money. Oh yeah, did I mention that Perroncel is actually the ex-girlfriend of Terry’s former best friend and Chelsea team mate Wayne Bridge? Oh yeah, did I mention that she is also the mother of Wayne Bridge’s child?

As soon as that stuff hit the fan, Terry was stripped of the England captaincy by Fabio Capello (which was duly handed over to Rio Ferdinand) and all sorts of rumours started to spring out of the woodwork, many of which are just scuttlebutt and I won’t repeat here. A quick Google, though, of what Terry has been up to should open your eyes a bit more.

To begin with, Terry seemed to be doing an excellent job of compartmentalising his life. His play, which had been drab all season, actually picked up a bit and he seemed motivated to just throw himself at football. That lasted for about two games. Since then, he has single handedly cost Chelsea about three games (that I can think of off the top of my head) and been a complete and utter liability. John Terry is in meltdown. Although publicly his wife forgave him after about a week, I’m sure all too many of us know that you cannot forgive that kind of stuff that quick.

Right now, John Terry needs to get his act together fast, and for two reasons. The first is that Chelsea are looking vulnerable as ever, have a few injuries around the team and have a few players suspended after their nightmare 4-2 home loss to Manchester City. The second is his England future may hang in the balance.

Fabio Capello has in no uncertain terms made sure that everyone knows that they are playing on his team based on form alone, not intangibles such as how much they earn and how many endorsements they have. John Terry may be a great leader, that is something I will never take away from him, but right now he is one of the worst central defenders in England. With the likes of (off the top of my head) Ryan Shawcross, Jonathan Woodgate, Garry Cahil, Matt Upson (despite a wobbly start against Egypt last night), Joleen Lescott and Phil Jagielka all gunning for World Cup places, along with wiley vetrans such as Wed Brown and Senior Elevation’s favourite Sol Campbell, Terry needs to show over the last 16 games or so of his season that he is still a quality centre back.

Another ‘upside’ to not taking Terry is that it means England could take Wayne Bridge. Bridge pulled out of the England squad for the friendly against Egypt because, basically, he could not stand the thought of being on a team with John Terry. Ashley Cole is currently England’s stand out number one left back, but he has a broken ankle and is in the fight of his professional life to get fit in time to go to South Africa. One setback and he is not making the plane. Wayne Bridge, who also hilariously snubbed John Terry’s handshake when his Man City side beat Chelsea 4-2 the other day, would then become more valuable than John Terry based on the two players’ current form.

No matter what way you look at it, John Terry has fucked up something fierce. The next 12 weeks or so will be the biggest in his life.

Portsmouth FC, We Hardly Knew Thee

Where to begin… Portsmouth look like they have fought off a winding up order, that would have seen them be put completely out of business (i.e. no relegation or anything, just disappear off of the map) but are still going to go into Administration. For any of you who don’t know, allow me to elaborate what that means.

Administration is when a business is so riddled with debt and unable to turn a profit, it can either voluntarily or by order of the courts be put under the control of a special kind of accountant – an Administrator. Their sole job is, in this instance, not to think about on the field success or the club’s needs or jobs or anything like that, they have to strip away assets, slice the wage bill and do anything in their power to pay off debts and get the business back to a somewhat normal state. I’ve actually worked for no less than three companies who have gone into administration and let me tell you something, it sucks.

Without a word of a lie, this was the conversation I had with an Administrator when I was last laid off from an office based role -

“So, how would you justify your role here?”
“Well, the last marketing campaign I ran only had a budget of £7,500 but I managed to bring in a total of £115,000 worth of investment, saving saving £11,500 worth of commission being paid out as the leads were generated in house. Oh, and did I mention that I did all of that with just a £7.5k budget?”
“You’re fired.”

Okay, they didn’t get all Donald Trump on me right then and there, but still the point remains the same.

Anyway, Portsmouth are in Administration as this special accountant person tries to strip away at the wage bill and assets and stuff in order to make Portsmouth FC once again a viable business. Except, seeing as this is Portsmouth, they can’t even do that right. The UK Government has ordered the Administrator to stop what he is doing as apparently he is just a friend of the current owner (I’ve lost track of who the fuck owns that club right now) and is only there to help him get his money back. An Administrator has to be impartial, you see. So you can’t just appoint your mate to go in and sort it out.

Look, I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again – Portsmouth are a rotten club up top. Their players play with so much heart and passion it makes the whole thing actually kind of tragic, but it really does show that no matter how much those on the pitch are willing to lay on the line in order to help a cause, those who sit in the boardroom eating prawn sandwiches are willing to cock it all up again.

Aaron Ramsey, Ryan Shawcross and the Tackle Of Doom

Take a look at this video (Warning: It is not pretty)

Eurgh. Yucky, right? That video is of Stoke FC defender Ryan Shawcross breaking the leg of Arsenal’s attacking midfielder Aaron Ramsey. It does not make for pleasant viewing. Still, and I know this will probably come as a shock to you, I have an opinion on it.

After it happened, Arsene Wenger went on and on about how his Arsenal players are targeted for rough treatment because they are perceived as a physically weak team. He said that the fact that three of his players – Diaby, Edu and now Ramsey – had had their legs broken in sickening fashion over the last 3 years was proof.

Sorry, Mr Wenger, that isn’t what happened up there with Shawcross and Ramsey. What happened between those two is an absolute tragedy.

Ryan Shawcross is just 22 years old. Ramsey is only 19. Both of them are at the very beginning of their careers and both of them, hopefully, have another 10 – 15 years left playing good football. I’m a big fan of Ryan Shawcross (he is the linchpin of my Fantasy Football defence) and, just as Stoke manager Tony Pulis repeatedly said, that kid does not have a bad bone in his body. You want to see a tackle where someone went out to deliberately injure someone, go see what Roy Keane did to Alf-Ingre Haaland. Keane ended Haaland’s career on the spot, and then said later in his autobiography that is exactly 100% what he wanted and intended to do. All Ryan Shawcross did was get just upfield enough with the ball to be in slightly unfamiliar territory and, when he saw an Arsenal player go for it after it had gotten just out of his reach, try and kick it. The shame was that that player was the lightening fast Ramsey, who had been able to move the ball on and so instead just got a kick in the shin for his troubles – a kick hard enough to shatter his leg.

When Shawcross saw what he had done, he was in tears. That is not the way that a man reacts after he has set out to deliberately hurt another man. It is an absolute tragedy for Shawcross, as that moment will haunt him for the rest of his life, and it is an even bigger tragedy for Ramsey as his career will now hang in the balance. Sometimes players bounce back from broken legs. Sometimes they don’t. Either way, two young careers were irrevocably changed that day. That is all that really matters in the end.

Manchester United Clearly Fellated Their Bank Manager

I wonder if that section title will make it past Senior Elevation’s Red Pen Of Editing Doom? Oh well, let’s hope…

search Google for "happy bank manager"

Just weeks after announcing that they owed the banks over £700m, Manchester United have announced that they now only owe just over £500m. Don’t get me wrong, that is still an absolutely ridiculous amount of debt, one which is still skirting close to the $1bn mark and one that is enough to buy an NFL franchise\build a new stadium\pay for a night of passion with Olivia Wilde\etc. but it is at least smaller.

Despite the reduction in debt, though, Manchester United fans are still hell bent on removing the Glazer family from office. There are currently two movements with their aims set on achieving this.

The first is a fan movement. Whenever you watch United on the telly, you will see a number of fans shunning the traditional red colours of the club and instead sporting Green and Gold scarves. The Green and Gold, you see, were the colours of Nuneaton Heath, the team who morphed into Mancester United about 100 years ago after (this should sound familiar) running up debts and needing to be rescued. Although this movement will only really serve a purpose as a very prominent show of discontent amongst the United faithful, it will at least keep the topic hot.

The second movement is where United fans hope change will actually come from. A group of prominent Manchester based businessmen (much like those who transformed Nuneaton Heath into Manchester United all those generations ago) who call themselves ‘The Red Knights’ are looking to buy the club. Now, the Glazer family have said that they just plain and simple won’t sell but the cool thing here is that if The Red Knights table an offer, the Glazer’s are legally bound to sit down and listen to it. Amongst the numbers of The Red Knights are the likes of Goldman Sachs accountants and millionaires, so these guys mean business. This will be a story that could be interesting to play out.

Quickies

Now, time for a few quick stories that don’t deserve their own headings, but still who I think should be covered.

Firstly, in case any of you did not see the Manchester United vs AC Milan match in the Champions League a few weeks ago – watch it. It is a perfect summation of everything that is right with European football as two styles collided in spectacular fashion.

It looks like Liverpool could be saved from themselves by an unlikely source – Juventus. Apparently, Rafa Benitez is wanted mainly by Juventus, but also a few other prominent continental clubs, to take over as manager. This would be fantastic for Liverpool as quite often Rafa is the main problem with that team – his style of football tactics and coaching are perfect for the European game. However, as anyone will tell you, The Premiership is a different kettle of fish entirely. Rafa has been in charge for long enough to prove that he will not win The Premiership and the contract he is tied down with means the club can’t afford to fire him. Having another team poach him away is an ideal solution.

Finally, for the first time in about 712 years the Football Association saw some sense and quickly shot down proposals to use a Playoff system to decide the 4th spot for the Champions League. Good for them. The point of The Premiership is that it is a league – there is no need for a knockout post-season as every club in England already gets at least 2 knock out tournaments a year to enter. As soon as you start throwing a knockout tournament for the 4th Champions League spot, you might as well start doing it for the 3rd Relegation spot as well. It could have been the start of a very slippery slope and all just to get some extra TV revenue. Happily, though, for once the FA’s integrity could not be bought.

England Squad For South Africa

I’m going to start sliding these in here from now until the World Cup, mainly just for me. You’re more than welcome to read them, though. I’m going to start laying out who should be on the pitch for England’s opening World Cup game on the 12th of June against the good old US of A. It’ll be fun, I promise.

Joe Hart – Hart is definitely the best English goalkeeper around at the moment, except he has zero meaningful international experience. Capello will be faced with a tough choice here – go with James or Green and have an experienced, albeit beatable, option or go with Hart who has no experience but has been a brick wall for Birmingham this season.

Wayne Bridge – Bridge is picked here by default. I really think that with everything going on in Ashley Cole’s private life, namely the fact his marriage is as good as dead, his rehabilitation from injury will seriously suffer. That could well mean that Bridge is the automatic replacement.

John Terry – Terry will find his form and him and Bridge will sort things out like men do. They will sit on opposite ends of a table with a bottle of scotch each and not leave until they have at least come to a workable arrangement.

Rio Ferdinand – Is the England captain. So, yeah… d’urh!

Glen Johnson – The only serviceable right back England have.

Aaron Lennon – Capello is in love with Lennon’s speed, and is willing to look past his questionable final product. He’ll start up the right, although share time with Sir David of Beckham deep in games.

Frank Lampard – Like it or lump it, Fat Frank is deeply entrenched in England’s centre. He ‘aint going nowhere.

Gareth Barry – For some reason known only to Fabio Capello, Gareth Barry is worthy of a spot in the middle of England’s team despite the fact he can’t pass, can’t shoot and can’t tackle. He is, in all fairness, very good at annoying people from Birmingham though.

Steven Gerrard – Barry in the middle means Gerrard will be plonked out on the left of midfield again. Left midfield is the one position that England has always struggled to produce at, as shown by every England manager in the last 10 year’s decision to just stick Gerrard out there, probably wasting the international career of a very talented attacking midfielder.

Peter Crouch – I don’t care what his club stats say, how much game time he gets at Spurs or if Defoe is actually outscoring him. Play this man for England. He scored 2 goals against Egypt on Wednesday night and is the leading single-season goalscorer for England. He gets goals at the International level so for the love of god play him. There is one slight downside, though, and that is that some referees in major International tournaments give free kicks against him whenever he tries to head the ball as he is so fucking tall his elbows automatically go in other people’s faces.

Wayne Rooney – Assuming that he doesn’t break his foot (it is a well known fact to all those who know it well that the most important player for England before a World Cup breaks their foot), he will not only be the star of England but also the entire tournament. Written off as either someone who had hit a glass ceiling or, even worse, been a disappointment, just last year, Rooney has thrived since Cristiano Ronaldo left United for Spain. He, along with Evra and Giggs, is the heart and soul of Manchester United and will now have to carry England on his young shoulders as well.

Well, that is all from me. I promise I won’t leave it so long next time. Blame the evil bastards who expect me to actually do work on time. I do.

The Predator is a great American.

March 2, 2010
Host: Elevation
Guest: Don “The Predator” Frye

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/elevationradio/2010/03/02/elevation-radio-with-don-frye

Don’s website: www.donfrye.com

Elevation Radio was proud to be joined by Don Frye, the rambunctious Charles Barkley of MMA last Tuesday. The Predator was in amazing form and shared many interesting tales, opinions, and memories from his legendary pro wrestling and MMA careers. Don offered his thoughts on a variety of topics including his long time friendship with Dan Severn, being a college wrestling teammate of Randy Couture, taking the MMA world by storm when he won the tournament at UFC 8 in a combined time of just over three minutes, how retirement is treating him, acting in movies like Public Enemies and Miami Vice, thoughts on forming a reality show with Gary Busey, his legendary mustache and so much more.

Here are a few highlights:

Don’s memory of facing WWE Hall of Famer Antonio Inoki in his retirement match before 75,000 people at the Tokyo Dome and the crazy aftermath:

“They had Muhammad Ali show up and light the torch like the ’96 Olympics in Atlanta, it was a great celebration to be a part of….after someone’s career of thirty years, who was the top athlete in the nation (Inoki), you’re supposed to give him you know a 30, 45, 60 minute retirement match, something to say goodbye to the to the crowd…about two minutes into the match I broke his ribs. You know, two or three ribs, hell 30 year career, ended in 4 minutes. So I ruined that right away. I thought he was going to have the Yakuza wipe me out you know, so I was telling my wife goodbye. We made it out and got to the airport, we were boarding got on the airplane, you know, and snapped my belt, let out a big sigh and grabbed my wife’s hand, petted her in the hand, and then I felt a tap on my shoulder, and I look up and the stewardess says ‘There’s a phone call for you outside.’ And I went ‘s***’, so I walked outside to pick up the phone and it was Inoki. He says ‘Hey, I wanted to thank you for the match.’ I felt that ‘oh man, I’m going to die’, but that’s how much power that guy had. He stopped the whole international airport to make a phone call. “

The Predator on the difficulties of being in a faction with Ken Shamrock in New Japan Pro Wrestling:

“You know Ken and I, they put us together as kind of a gang, you know, where we would be a tag team, a disgruntled tag team, and you know have more hate towards each other than our opponents, and that would prevent us from winning and we would eventually after the match get into a fight, and that was the whole storyline. That’s what happened. Hell, they (NJPW) called me up and said ‘Do you want to do the job?’ I said ‘why?’ ‘ Well, Ken Shamrock doesn’t want to do the job, (Keiji) Mutoh doesn’t want to do the job, the other guy doesn’t want to do the job, and now you don’t want to do the job. I said ‘Hell, I don’t give a s***, if somebody’s gotta do it, I’ll do it. That’s why I ended up doing the job and that kind of wound up biting me in the ass because the last 5 or 6 matches I did over there in Japan, they had me jobbing out. You can understand, its hard to decide who is going to do the job and who is going to go over, but in the fan’s mind they want somebody strong. The biggest mark is in the locker room in pro wrestling. Generally the person who runs around saying that is the biggest mark, because they’re trying to get everybody else to go their way.”

Frye’s memories about the time he and the WWF had a meeting regarding the Predator joining the promotion:

“Back in ’97 when I was fortunate enough to train Scott Ferrozzo for his fights, Scott and I had a contact with WWE. We went up there together, interviewed together, and apparently they didn’t like our attitudes you know. Scott was a used car salesman, and he walked in there with a used car salesman attitude you know, and I was pretty full of myself at the time. Those boys (The WWE), they don’t want somebody coming in there with their own idea, they want someone who is going to rollover and do what they tell them to do…….they keep everyone the same. The cookie cutter formula. That way they keep the son-in-law(HHH) on top.

Visit www.blogtalkradio.com/elevationradio to hear way more from Don including his memories of his legendary fight from PRIDE 21 with Yoshihiro Takayama, the potential creation of a Masters Division for older MMA legends, dealing with dishonest MMA promoters and much more.

Also check out John’s interview with the likes of Bret Hart, JJ Dillon, Dan Severn, Frank Shamrock, Vince Papale, Cullen Jones, Ivan Koloff and more!

Well folks after months of frustration and aggravation, February and March has proven to be a powerful time for Elevation Nation.

Fresh off the greatest all around show in Elevation Radio history with Jamaican bobsled legend Devon Harris, I will be joined Tuesday March 2 by UFC and PRIDE legend Don Frye.

The recently retired Frye was the winner of the tournaments at UFC 8, UFC 10, and Ultimate Ultimate 96. He also had a storied career in Japan, including an illustrious run with PRIDE.

He holds career victories over:

Ken Shamrock
Tank Abbott
Gilbert Yvel
Gary Goodridge and many more.

His legendary fight with Yoshihiro Takayama is regarded by many MMA fans as the most exciting of all time.

Frye-Takayama slugfest

He is also a Japanese pro wrestling legend. He was the last opponent of Antonio Inoki. The match had an attendance of 70,000 people.

He was a college amateur wrestling teammate with Randy Couture.

Besides fighting, he is involved with acting and has made appearances in Public Enemies, the Miami Vice movie, and Its Always Sunny in Philadelphia.

Also Don Frye is a modern day John Wayne. He is a complete nut just like his close friend Dan Severn and will not be afraid to express his political views, thoughts on being a badass and much more.

Check it out at: www.blogtalkradio.com/elevationradio

Don Frye: The greatest American of all time.

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