Despite losing to Auburn last week in overtime, Louisiana Monroe is already my favorite college football team of the season. Except, and this is just a minor gripe, it’s so hard to find any picture of Warhawks cheerleaders. It really shouldn’t be a chore to find pictures of attractive college football fans on the Internet. Or maybe I’m just getting too old for this sh*t.

NCAA Football: Baylor at Louisiana-Monroe – 8 PM ET on ESPN

Nothing against Baylor, but I’d love to see ULM rebound and get back on a winning track. I just love underdog stories. Perhaps it’s because I’m a fan of a program that was considered an underdog for so many years but never actually did anything about that. College football is frustrating.

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Sorry, not that one.

WWE Smackdown is airing a live special tonight, and by request I’ve decided to set up an open discussion thread so we can laugh about it/share our thoughts on Katy Perry: The Pepsi: The Movie. Tonight’s hype blurb:

Every time SmackDown goes live, it comes with its share of surprises – just picture Mick Foley’s holiday celebration or the many WWE Legends who showed up for the recent SuperSmackDown LIVE: Blast from the Past. Couple this with the fact it’s The Great American Bash – appearing on Syfy for the first-time-ever – and that this particular show falls on the day before Independence Day and the fireworks are sure to fly.

Lest the WWE Universe forget that it was on that very holiday when future WWE Hall of Famers Edge and Hulk Hogan once teamed up to win the illustrious World Tag Team Titles. What could be the next monumental happening to come out of this earth-shattering television event? Who might show up to be part of it? There is already the mega announcement of The Great American Bash 20-Man Battle Royal main event – featuring a stunning list of Superstars including WWE Champion CM Punk, Daniel Bryan, John Cena, Alberto Del Rio and Big Show and World Heavyweight Champion Sheamus. (via WWE.com)

If you’re looking for the Best And Worst Of WWE Raw column, you can either scroll down the page slightly or read that here.

As a bonus for those of you who are hanging out with us tonight, a click of the “like” button and a share on Twitter will unlock our spectacular July 4th Ryback FEED ME MORE badge. Just be sure to participate in the show discussion and it’ll be yours. If you can figure out a way to unlock two of them, that’d be better than one.

So yeah, have at it. It’s time to talk greatness, America, and bashing.

Pre-discussion questions:

1. Who’s winning the battle royale? Who do I have to blow to have Derrick Bateman win? He loves America more than anybody!
2. The over/under on Teddy Long tag matches is set at 2. Over or under? Remember that Raw had at least 70.
3. What’s your favorite Great American Bash-related match or memory?

Photo credit: WWE.com

Photo of John Cena Attitudinally Ajudsting Kane at the top of the world’s tallest building instead of FROM the world’s tallest building not related.

On tonight’s show: Executive Vice President Of Talent Relations and (Still!) Interim General Manager Of Raw Mr. John Laurinaitis brings on some guy named Shawn Michaels to deliver a message to Triple H. What that message will be, and whether or not Shawn will superkick a moose upon delivering it, remains to be seen.

- Poll of the week: The Raw discussion threads and Best And Worst reports have created a nice little community of wrestling fans at With Leather, so here’s my question … if I presented a similar open discussion thread for Smackdown, would you participate? Pros are “Daniel Bryan is on it more” and “more time to talk to your Internet wrestling fans”. Cons are “taped show” and “shouldn’t we be doing something better on a Friday night?”

- Yes, I have seen that pic of David Otunga at the Grammys. Yes, it is going to be its own Best tomorrow.

- That thing where you have to reload the page to see the comments that’ve been added is being addressed by our tech guy, and should (should) be resolved by next week’s thread. Sorry. I appreciate your clicking, though.

- Secondary poll question: Are we gonna get the Funkasaurus tonight, or are we supposed to forget he exists?

Not that underpants Sheamus posing with a racist midget would do anything to keep you reading, but stay with me.

Tonight’s Best and Worst Of Smackdown Live-Blog starts up about 15 minutes before the show, so be there beginning at 7:45 EST for the festivities, which involve at least 15 minutes of me recapping the end of something on SyFy and pleading with you not to make Golden Corral Chocolate Wonderfall jokes. This is the last report I’ll be a part of until next week’s Smackdown live-blog, as blog regulars Bill Hanstock and Justin O’Connor will be filling in for me on Best And Worst Of WWE TLC 2011 and Best And Worst Of WWE Raw 12/19 respectively, so be around and hang out and chat with me and convince me I couldn’t easily be replaced by a wrestling joke-making robot. “Triple H is at it again. What a clown.”

You can set a reminder for the event, check out some info about commenting and get a free picture of A.J. after the jump.

UPDATE: Tonight’s special guest will be none-other than John Canton of The John Report. That’s huge. Don’t miss it.

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Wait, already?

It seems like just yesterday we were wasting two hours making jokes about the Golden Corral Chocolate Wonderfall and here we are again. WWE is switching up their normal “tape Tuesday, let everybody read what happened Wednesday and Thursday, air the show Friday” schedule and airing Smackdown live on Tuesday night. Man, we haven’t even gotten to Raw yet.

Anyway, Destiny will be at school while this is on so my good friend Justin O’Connor of Progressive Boink fame will be sitting in as my co-host. That guarantees 100% less Chocolate Wonderfall discussion and 100% more of me letting him type whatever he wants because he’s hilarious. If you’re watching the show, have to miss it and want to keep tabs on what’s going on or just want to shoot the sh*t with some folks that love pro graps, be sure to give yourself the little CoverItLive e-mail reminder and be back here Tuesday night at 8 PM EST for the festivities.

And in case you were wondering, yes, you can stick anything into the Chocolate Wonderfall.

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In case you missed it last week, we’re solving the “how can I do a Best And Worst Of WWE Smackdown report when With Leather doesn’t update on Saturdays” problem with a weekly live-blog of the show hosted by yours truly and Destiny, and probably LastTexansFan if he keeps beating me over the head with how funny he is in the comments every five seconds.

Our first attempt went pretty well, and we’re hoping to build on that this week. If you’ve read the spoilers (or been forced to skim over them as lightly as possible like I was) you’ll know what an emotional roller coaster we’re on tonight, so I’ll need you and as many people as you know to keep me from having a nervous breakdown. The live-blog starts tonight at 8 PM EST and will feature a 15-minute-or-so pre-show where I try to figure out how to use Cover It Live. The only thing I ever used it for at FanHouse was live-blogging Indians games, and even I didn’t read those.

After the jump you can set up a reminder for the event.

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