7th- 14th News (maybe *spoliers*)

[Stephanie McMahon's sidekick!]

Update on the 4-Horsemen Returning, McMahon Meeting

- To put an end to some rumors, the WWE is in no way planning on bringing back the 4 Horsemen angle which was reported earlier. The thought was tossed around in WWE management meetings, but was later s Rubbishped due to several different Issues, One of the issues being, if the 4 horsemen were brought back it would ultimately not be the same, the only remaining original 4 horsemen in WWE are Ric Flair, Arn Anderson, and Chris Benoit. WWE would want some of the original members in the group, obviously Benoit is on the SmackDown! roster and Arn Anderson is way past his wrestling days. So it looks like the angle of the 4 horsemen being brought back won't happen anytime soon.

- The rumor going around the Raw locker room is that Vince McMahon is planning to meet with the wrestlers before Monday's show in Montreal. The wrestlers are under the impression that Vince is going to blame them for the company's recent struggles. A number of wrestlers are heading into the meeting with chips on their shoulders because they feel the writers should be taking the bulk of the blame. More on this story as it comes along.

[Stephanie McMahon's sidekick!]

Jesse Ventura/Fidel Castro, NWA-TNA News; more

- Minnesota Governor Jesse Ventura told reporters that he discussed pro wrestling with Fidel Castro during his recent trip to Cuba. "The first topic the president wanted to talk about was wrestling," Ventura said last Friday. "So clearly President Castro is somewhat of a wrestling fan." Ventura added that Castro was curious how wrestlers take bumps without getting hurt.

- The NWA-TNA website announced the following matches for next week’s show: Sonny Siaki vs. Jorge Estrada, Jeff Jarrett & Bruce vs. B.G. James & Hermie Sadler, Chris Harris & James Storm vs. Rick Michaels & Chris Michaels for the NWA Tag Titles, Syxx-Pac vs. A.J. Styles for the X Title (not a ladder match as Don West mistakenly stated last night), and Ron "The Truth" Killings vs. Curt Henning for the NWA Title. The website also advertises Brian Lawler, Norman Smiley, Ace Steel, and Ron Harris for next week's show.

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Huge Meeting To Be Held Before RAW On Monday

The following news is derived and re-written from PWTorch.com:

A fairly huge meeting is scheduled to take place prior to RAW this coming Monday in Montreal involving the entire RAW roster.

The rumor going backstage in the locker room between the boys is that Vince McMahon is going to blame the wrestlers for the company's recent downturn in business and stale quality programs week after week.

A great deal of the wrestlers are going into the meeting with chips on their shoulders because many are in agreement that if anyone should take the blame, it is the writing staff for being unconsistent and failing to produce a product the viewers are wanting.

Most wrestlers feel the current roster within WWE is among the best Vince McMahon has ever had in the entire history of the company.

It should be interesting to see if Triple H and Undertaker take part in speaking at this meeting. While the last meeting of this magnitude was put together by the road agents, not the management, if Triple H and Undertaker are involved in lecturing the boys, needless to say, it will cause a lot of unnecessary friction amongst the locker room. Many are still talking about the meeting in the past where HHH and Undertaker lectured the guys for not working hard enough, to this very day.

[Stephanie McMahon's sidekick!]

WWE Signs New Wrestlers, NWA-TNA News, & More

Expect WWE to sign three new Cruiserweights in the next few weeks. One will likely be James Maritato, formerly Little Guido in ECW and XPW. Jim Ross, among others, were impressed with his work at the RAW and SmackDown! dark match tryouts he received last week. Another could possibly be Spanky who you may have heard of through the Ring of Honor promotion, or back when Shawn Michaels trained him at the Texas Wrestling Alliance promotion. Some say Ultimo Dragon could possibly be the third, but I would highly doubt it.

Matches confirmed for next Wednesday's NWA-TNA pay-per view include Ron "The Truth" Killings vs. Curt Hennig, Sonny Siaki vs. Jorge Estrada, Syxx-Pac vs. A.J. Styles, Chris Harris & James Storm vs. Chris & Rick Michaels, and Jeff Jarrett with Bruce vs. BG James and Hermie Sadler. A quick note on the tag-match, Bruce, known to some as Kwee Wee from WCW, others as The Funkster From WWA, and some as Allen Funk from WWE developmental system, will be on Wrestle Zone Radio this coming Monday for an interview.

[Stephanie McMahon's sidekick!]

Nicole Bass vs. Joey Buttafuco, SpongeBob/RAW

-Howard Stern is still talking about Nicole Bass on his show. Apparently, he' hyping her November 15 match with Joey Buttafuco. He says that Bass has a powerful punch but no stamina at all. He also said that just because she wasn't that much to watch in the wrestling ring doesn't mean she can't box. They also noted that both Howard Stern and Gary Dell' Abate were close to being subpoenaed in her recent court case with WWE.

-This weeks cable rankings for basic networks are (top 6):

1. NFL Football: Baltimore vs. Cleveland (Sunday, 8:28 p.m.), ESPN, 4.8, 5.11 million homes.

2. Baseball Division Series: N.Y. Yankees vs. Anaheim (Friday, 8 p.m.), ABC Family, 3.9, 3.34 million homes.

3. "SpongeBob SquarePants" (Saturday, 9:30 a.m.), Nickelodeon, 3.0, 3.23 million homes.

4. "WWE Raw Zone" (Monday, 10 p.m.), TNN, 2.9, 3.13 million homes.

5. "WWE Raw" (Monday, 9 p.m.), TNN, 2.9, 3.08 million homes.

6. "NFL Prime Time" (Sunday, 7:30 p.m.), ESPN, 2.8, 3 million homes.

WWE RAW was beat out by Baltimore vs. Cleveland, Yankees vs. Angles, and SpongeBob Squarepants. WWE's ratings sure aren't what they used to be.

[Stephanie McMahon's sidekick!]

Triple H on Radio Recap - RVD, Booker T, Flair, More;

HHH called into the Hillman Morning show on 107.3 WAAF in Boston this morning.

Here's a quick recap of what went down.

Talked about some local political races as the station broadcasts in New
Hampshire

Mentioned that this was his first day at home in two months

Put Booker T way over and also put over RVD and Kane as people he will
most likely feud with in the upcoming months and said that all three are
the future of the business

When asked about Ric Flair and the possibility of starting up the 4
Horsemen again he replied "last time I check it would be a mathematical
impossibility to have two people be the 4 Horsemen"

When asked about his threesome in the shower last week on Raw and
weather Flair joined in he replied "again that would be a mathematical
impossibility as it would then be a foursome. Plus I think Space
Mountain was closed for repairs, something was wrong with the rail."

He was asked if he was in the movie Young Guns and he said no but it was
funny because X-Pac gives him a hard time about that character all the
time.

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Boxing Champion Lennox Lewis To Take On Brock Lesnar In WWE?

I have it on good authority that the world boxing champion, Lennox Lewis, who recently had a multi-million dollar pay-per view match with Mike Tyson that grossed more than any WrestleMania in pay-per view sales, is in discussions with Vince McMahon about working a wrestling match for WWE.

As the story goes, Vince McMahon is offering Lennox Lewis around £5 million to work a wrestling match against WWE champion Brock Lesnar at No Mercy in February of 2003.

Lennox Lewis is said to be a huge wrestling fan and not totally against the idea, but when contacted, the Lewis camp declined to comment on the issue.

[Stephanie McMahon's sidekick!]

4 New No Mercy Matches, Rock In Guiness Book Of Records

Source: Various

-- Thanks to reader roadrunr for the following:

"Brock will be signing autographs on Friday, October 18 at 4pm at the Mall of America in Minnesota.

www.mallofamerica.com/moa/servlet/SMTMall?mid=369&pn=PRME&frame=main&id=61037&rs=0"

-- Thanks to reader Chris Watson for the following:

"I thought I would let you know that the Rock is in the 2003 edition of the "Guinness Book of World Records", as he was paid the most money ever from a debut starring role in a major motion picture (The Scorpion King)."

-- And finally, it is now heavily rumored that the two undercard matches for No Mercy will be Rob Van Dam vs. Ric Flair and Chris Jericho vs. Booker T.

It is also likely that The Un-Americans will feature into a match, most likely involving Christian, and that we will see Trish Stratus vs. Victoria.

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Undertaker's Mistress Revealed, Torrie Wilson/Smackdown Notes

If you watched Smackdown last night, you are aware that Brock Lesnar introduced a woman known as "Tracy" who claims to be Undertaker's mistress. After digging through some information about her, it appears that she is a B-Movie actress who has appeared in numerous porn flicks, with the real name of Tracy Dali.

Readers from Detroit are sending in notes that Smackdown will be preempted in that area next week. It will air on 10/20 at 8 PM, competing with the No Mercy PPV.

Torrie Wilson was named today's "Sunshine Girl" in the Toronto Sun. This is not the first time Torrie has received that accolade.

[Stephanie McMahon's sidekick!]

Major Problems In The Past Few WWE SmackDowns

During the past few weeks there have been many backstage mistakes during WWE Smackdown Tapings, and many scenes have had to be retaped, this is very bad for WWE, meaning that the wrestlers on smackdown aren't really rehersing what they are suppost to do, and are messing up.

At this past Tuesday's SmackDown! tapings, they were forced to reshoot about nine of their backstage segments. Which is A LOT of mess ups, and WWE officials were not to happy with it.

Meaning that pretty much EVERYTHING that was shown between matches last night was retaped after Smackdown! tapings, for instance the scene where Paul Heyman/Brock Lesnar & their mystery guest were shown backstage, and other backstage scenes.

Vince is reportedly a little upset with this, and called each wrestler that had a mistake and asked that they practice their segment more, beforehand. He has been repeatedly telling the writing team and road agents that he wants new ideas and concepts instead of grabbing recycled storylines from the past.

[Stephanie McMahon's sidekick!]

Huge Update On Brock Lesnar vs. Lennox Lewis

(PLease Credit Dave Of Wrestling Observer For The Following)

WWE and Lennox Lewis's people have had at least 2 meetings over the past 2 weeks regarding the boxer possibly taking on Brock Lesnar sometime in 2003. No deal has been reached and the only thing that has been agreed upon is to continue discussions.

At this point, it seems to be a longshot that a deal between Lewis and WWE can be reached. The main reason for this is that Lewis demands that the fight be a total shoot. While WWE does not have a problem with that, the problem comes up in regards to the rules. With Lewis being a boxer and Lesnar being a wrestler, how the rules are set up will go along way in who will actually win the bout.

The original date that was talked about was WWE No Way Out next February, but that date has been axed due to the Lennox Lewis/Vitali Klitschko Heavyweight Title fight being pushed back to February 1st. The date now being discussed is No Mercy of next year.

Traditionally, a match of this magnitude would happen at WrestleMania, but if it happens, it will be a shoot and Lewis would not want to fight Brock just 1-2 months after defending his Heavyweight Title against Klitschko.

The Lewis camp started talks with a $7.5 million dollar asking price.

Vince McMahon is said to be extremely excited over the potential Lewis/Brock shoot fight, but again, for now it seems unlikely that both sides will be able to work out a deal.

[Stephanie McMahon's sidekick!]

Update On WWE Attempting To Sign Wrestlers

Its rumored that WWE is now currently looking around in other wrestling promotions that have been prospering as of late and from even UFC talent.

As many of you have read, WWE has been searching for more and more ways to increase their ratings through special storylines and gimmicks over the poast few weeks, and even as reported earlier WWE has been in negotions with hopeful cruiserweight canidates, like Ultimo Dragon, "Little Guido" and more. They also have been working a deal to bring in OVW stars.

Well it looks as if WWE is now searching even deeper in the ranks of promotions such as UFC, XPW, NWA-TNA & other wrestling promotions. Many of the UFC wrestlers, WWE shouldn't even attempt negotions with, as WWE is thought upon as "wuss" wrestling, and their stars enjoy the intense battles that they perform in.

But WWE has been looking to possibly bring back Ken Shamrock for a while now, and over the past few weeks have been attempting to get a meeting with him. WWE has also been attemtping to contact with XPW talent such as Juvi Guerrera, Angel, Chris Hamrick, Shane Douglas & Smokey Charmichael. Its unknown if there will be anything made between them & WWE, but WWE has infact been trying to draw up some sort of deal. They also have been in talks with superstars out of other promotions, and plan on bringing a few stars from Indy federations in for Dark Matches soon.

[Stephanie McMahon's sidekick!]

Vince McMahon Unhappy With Smackdown Overall

Its been well documented that Vince McMahon is not happy with how Smackdown! has been going, he has been doing everything within his grasp to bring in action, but its said that even Vince himself is growing old with the current story lines and he is looking for storyline writers from other promotions or from anywhere to help bring a new edge to Smackdown!.

Vince is also unhappy with having to retape some of the backstage segments week after week, and this past week there had to be NINE backstage segments retaped due to mess ups & other problems that are unknown at the time. This is a high for WWE, as they have never had to retape that many segments before.

Vince has had his storyline writers working around the clock to produce some sort of trades among Smackdown & Raw that will benefit for the both of them, and at this time it is only known that there could be a trade for Jeff Hardy going to Smackdown and Edge coming to Raw, or possibly Christian going to Smackdown and Matt hardy coming to Raw. This would help out the Tag Team Division on both sides, as all this would realign 2 former explosive tag teams in Edge/Christian & The Hardyz.

Smackdown! may have had a higher rating this week then last, but Vince feels last weeks show was a lot better then this past weeks, but it does not concern him that much as he is really only concerned in ratings, but he feels that it may have just been a fluke because of RAW Roulette on Raw this past Monday, and fans thought that Smackdown! would try to step up and out do Raw.

[Stephanie McMahon's sidekick!]

HHH To Take Part In 3 Upcoming Non-WWE Shows

As I earlier reported, Triple H will co-host the Mr. Olympia contest next Saturday (Oct. 19).

But even before that, the Game will be making a variety of appearances in preparation for No Mercy. See the World Heavyweight Champion on the "Best d**n Sports Show Period" Wednesday at 8 p.m. ET/PT on Fox Sports (rerunning late night; check your local listings).

Then on Friday (Oct. 18), the Game will appear on "The Wayne Brady Show." Check your local listings for time and channel in your area.

[Stephanie McMahon's sidekick!]

WWE Magazine: Kurt Angle/Brock Lesnar News, Lita; more

- The following is a preview of the November 2002 issue of Raw Magazine:

Cover: Rob Van Dam - Mister Monday Night - RVD Rules On His Own Terms

Poster: Ivory (Both sides)

Fantasy Warfare: The best women of their respective eras - Lita and Alundra Blaze - collide.

The Ultimate Battle: Put Brock Lesnar and Kurt Angle together, and who would have their hand raised in victory?

King of Cool: Rob Van Dam's breakthrough in WWE came on his own unique terms.

Giving Back: Ivory perpetuates her own considerable legacy as a Tough Enough trainer.

The Raw Interview: The look and the name are the same, but Shawn Michaels is a changed man.

Three Minutes At A Time: It's rosey days indeed for partners and cousins Eddie Fatu and Matt Anoai.

Reconcilable Differences: Dustin and Terri Runnels remain friendly for business and for their daughter.

HUGE Rock Stars: Fozzy's no joke! Go backstage with Chris Jericho and his fast-rising heavy-metal band.

Proud and Passionate: Legendary former WWE champion Pedro Morales still radiates an inner fire.