Being a happy wrestling fan is like being politically moderate. It makes sense on paper, but Jesus, everyone around you has fallen off the deep end. To the right you have Pro Wrestling Republicans, the people who describe themselves as “smart” but can’t stop telling you who got the biggest pops, the people who can’t send in match results without editorializing about burials and “going home” and whatever other lingo they picked up from DVDR this week. To the left you have Pro Wrestling Democrats, apologists who think we should all just sit back and enjoy the wrestling for what it is, people who don’t understand why you’re taking this so seriously because the only thing good about wrestling is colorful characters and finishing moves. Both sides love the Undertaker.

And that brings us to Wrestlemania 27, one of the most talked about shows in recent memory. No, not that happy kind of talking like when the Nexus attacked and something violent and wonderful was happening in wrestling. No, that sad kind of sighing talk like when Nexus existed in any and every other week.

I’m going to go through this in order, and try to keep my wits about me.

[images (mostly) courtesy of MGFanJay @ DVDR]

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It’s not horribly unusual to see odds listed on certain events in television programming, like who might win “The Bachelor” or whether or not Don Draper is actually gay (Oh please…please…), but I did a double take when I saw that Bodog had set up money lines on Wrestlemania 27. The premiere event in pro wrestling is scheduled for this Sunday in Atlanta, and features the return of Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson as guest host and the appearance of Snooki of “Jersey Shore” fame in a six-man tag team match. And I guess some of the gays will be there, too.

The odds are listed in full after the jump, but the only one I could really take if you put a gun to me head is Triple H +600 over The Undertaker. It’s true that Mark Calaway’s character has never lost at WrestleMania (even defeating Triple H at WM 17 in 2001), but one has to wonder whether or not Triple H, who literally has an office in WWE headquarters as an executive senior advisor, will get his comeuppance.

And yeah, it’s all predetermined, but nobody walked out of Avatar screaming, “You know those big-assed blue people were fake, right?” Because that would have been very not cool. Read the rest of this entry »

World Wrestling Entertainment responded to criticism of having John Cena call somebody gay for a laugh by teaming with the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation in an anti-bullying campaign. So, of course, it makes perfect sense that announcer Michael Cole would use Twitter to call his co-worker a faggot and receive no punishment!

That’s exactly what happened on Saturday morning, when Cole, who has seen an upswing of face time since turning heel and screaming about himself for two hours every Monday, responded to a tweet from fellow announcer Josh Mathews with the F-bomb. Cole quickly deleted the tweet and apologized, citing “being a character” as the reason for the taunt.

“I apologize to any and all who were offended by my tweet toward young Josh Mathews … It was obviously not meant the way it was taken.”

How was it meant to be taken? Well, let’s take a quick look at the history of homosexual tolerance in pro wrestling.

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The second installment of the With Leather Adjectives and Adjectives Athlete Tattoo Contest comes to a close with two major realizations: One, that pro wrestlers have the worst tattoos ever, and two, that I probably could’ve made this a little easier. Apparently, Harley Race is too esoteric for most people. Wrestler Tattoos 2 will just be 30 pictures of Undertaker’s SARA neck tattoo, and everyone will win a shirt!

But we did manage to have a winner (guessing 27 correct out of 30), so it’s time for the big reveal. If you see a guy and you don’t recognize the name, spend a few minutes on YouTube or Wikipedia learning about them, about who they are, and watching some of their matches. Unless of course you didn’t know who Shannon Moore was. If that’s you, please, don’t spend any of your life’s time researching Shannon Moore.

Click through and see who you missed. If you’re that guy who won, brag by doing crotch chops and saying The Rock’s catchphrases in the comments section.

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Uh, okay, well, that’s great and all, but not exactly what we meant when we said “stupid wrestler tattoo challenge.” But that’s pretty well done, you got Hogan’s wrinkles perfect. Oh, I’m sorry, that’s where your back tried to escape itself.

Today’s With Leather contest featuring Fabulous Prizes is the newest Mega Gallery to combine badly tattooed athletes with crudely photoshopped question marks: the pro wrestling exclusive sequel to last week’s Athlete Tattoo Trivia Challenge. Here’s the rub. You click through the gallery and try to identify the ink-having fake fighters you see. Challenge yourself and try not to use Google. Or do, I’ll never know. I picked wrestlers from all levels, from around the world, past, present and (in some cases, debatably) future. Anyway, write down your answers in a handy list and clandestinely e-mail them to me at infernaldinosaur@gmail.com. Yes, I am an adult with a Legend of Zelda G-mail address. Did you think I was gonna be cool BEFORE you clicked on my pro wrestling Internet blog?

On Friday at noon Eastern Time, I will tally the scores and the Top 3 scores will get a very special prize – a limited edition first print With Leather t-shirt courtesy of our very own Burnsy. And you’ll enjoy that shirt, because I got a job writing here and they won’t even give ME one. Try not to spoil the answers in the comments section if you can help it. I know if you’re a wrestling fan you might not know what “manners” and “functional society” are, but give it your best go.

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The Best and Worst of Raw 3/21/11 offers up the best (meaning the highest quality to be found in a given activity or category of things) and worst (most faulty, unsatisfactory, or objectionable) of the March 21 edition of WWE Raw. Brandon Stroud is a syndicated advice columnist whose weekly column, The Best and Worst of Raw 3/21/11, is featured in over 250 newspapers nationwide.

In my continuing efforts to revive the career progress I was making before FanHouse turned itself into a roll-over ad with a 1000 x 1000 image of Tiger Woods on the front and a link to somebody’s Listverse at the bottom, With Leather proudly (cough) welcomes The Best and Worst of Raw to its schedule. For those of you who were familiar with FanHouse Pro Wrestling, you’ll recognize the column as the only sane, literate place to read about fake fighting on the entire Internet. If you weren’t one of our readers, please enjoy this enormous block of non sequitur paragraphs and jokes you will barely understand.

Long story short, I love pro wrestling, and it is a hard, hard thing to love.

Worst: HHH Cerebrally Assassinates Wakefulness

In case you missed it, here is a transcript of Triple H’s promo from Monday night:

“Y’know, Undertaker, nobody has ever beaten you at Wrestlemania. But in two weeks, at Wrestlemania, I will beat you, Undertaker. Undertaker, let’s get one thing straight… you are going to lose. I am going to beat you, Undertaker, at the Wrestlemania event in two weeks. So next week, Undertaker, I want to bring you out here and explain that in two weeks, Undertaker, I will beat you at Wresltemania.”

Who is he wrestling, and when exactly is this “Wrestlemania” you speak of happening?

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