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JR's Blog: Tribute 2 Troops Tonight..TLC PPV Predictions...new, Legends Roundtable..FCW Trip..Taz..Thanks for Shopping with Us!

Posted: Dec 19th 2010 By: CMBurnham

Quick blog with a few random thoughts before leaving for Houston for WWE's TLC this Sunday night.

The recent trip to Tampa was productive. Wednesday's promo class is always one of my favorite exercises. Dusty Rhodes, WWE HOF'er, conducts this all important class which lasts about two hours with the students doing extemporaneous promos usually ranging from a minute to 90 seconds on a variety of topics. In today's sizzle laden presentation of the genre, being able to verbally express one's self is imperative to make it to the very top level within the biz where the biggest earnings potential resides.

I conducted a class on financial planning for the group on Wednesday prior to them going to Orlando for a live event.

So many great, wrestling stars of previous generations who earned significant monies are still living check to check and doing what they have to do to make ends meet largely because many of them did little or no financial planning in the early part of their career. Some noteworthy stars back in the day were even reluctant to file their income taxes much less attempt to pay them. Not filing one's taxes is inexcusable and extraordinarily irresponsible. The US government will work with any one on paying off one's tax bill but not filing is indefensible.

Living larger than life, indulging on too much bling, making expensive, personal relationship mistakes and not understanding that the 'big money' doesn't last forever has been the down fall of some of the biz's greatest performers. We need to break that chain and better prepare the next generation of what lies ahead and how to navigate potential, troubled waters.

As always I will not go into to many specifics regarding the FCW talents but suffice it to say that I feel that the future should be bright for WWE with the nucleus of talent who are still learning their craft and refining their skills.

BTW I like all 6 talents that are competing on NXT and feel that each of them has the chance to be relevant on one of the WWE rosters int he future if they continue to improve and work on all aspects of their game. Staying hungry and focused would be good places to start for each of them.

My work in FCW and hopefully in other areas of scouting for new talents is something that I enjoy and it provides me an opportunity to give something back to the biz now that my weekly broadcasting run has ended.

The FCW crew, lead by Steve Keirn, is dedicated to their craft, work hard and are all doing a really solid job in attempting to develop the young talents who all have various levels of product knowledge and natural aptitude for the genre.

I hope that you will check out the Tribute to the Troops on NBC tonight. Check your local listings for the one hour version. The two hour version airs on USA next Wednesday night and both shows are in prime time.

We've updated the Q&A's here on the site as of Saturday afternoon. Check 'em out.

Sounds like old friend Taz has come up with an intriguing idea to train wrestlers who have a couple of years experience on how they might get to the next level of their careers. I like the fact that the classes are small which really allows for hands on treatment and training. Check out http://www.teamtaz13.com. If you are serious about getting your career moving then I would certainly give Taz' new Dojo legit consideration. I wish Taz well on this endeavor as he's a natural born 'coach.'

Hoping to get to 100,000 Twitter followers by the new year as we are close to 80,000 the lat time I looked. Help us out @JRsBBQ.

It's been really rewarding to see that so many corporations and small businesses have used our website store as a source for gifts for their employees this holiday season. Hopefully, we will earn some new customers when those folks try our products.

TLC predictions from afar:

Kane won't retain the World Title with 3 viable adversaries to contend with in the Fatal Four Way TLC championship bout. Edge is my favorite to win it but Alberto Del Rio winning wouldn't shock me.

Not sure how he will 'get 'er done' but Miz will retain the WWE Title or so I feel against Randy Orton. I might be wrong but it seems as if Miz' unlikely journey is just getting underway. If Miz isn't the WWE Champion come WM27 I'll be surprised.

John Cena won't lose to Wade Barrett in a chairs match. At least my Main Event Mustard is on Cena.

King Sheamus or John Morrison in their #1 contenders ladder match? I like Morrison to win but might just be wishful thinking as my rational is that Morrison should be able to navigate the ladder issues better than the larger Irishman. In any event, this match should be really good and physical. Both athletes are hungry and have discernible upsides.

Seems like Vickie Guerrero could be the deciding factor for Dolph Ziggler to retain the IC Title against Jack Swagger and Kofi Kingston in the Triple Threat ladder match. The outcome of this one is a head scratcher to me and if any of the three won it wouldn't totally shock me. Hopefully the IC Title in the coming months will garner more focus.

The Divas Table match is unique but I don't expect it to last long as Natalya and Beth Phoenix seeming are too much of a physical challenge for LayCool which likely means that the bad girls win. "Bad Girls Win! Bad Girls Win!"

I assume that Michael Cole, the voice of WWE, and WWE Hall of Famer Jerry Lawler will comprise a part of the broadcast team but I have no idea who will joining them. Will it be CM Punk, Josh Mathews, Matt Striker or Todd Grisham? Who knows, WWE might use a 4 man booth to make the show sound really different.

TLC is ripe for injuries to befall competitors because when inanimate objects such as tables, ladders and chairs are involved in high risk bouts the chances for bumps, bruises, and more, obviously go way up. Plus, one can also assume that the 'oneupmanship' that exists in a competitive environment will raise the bar on PPV Sunday evening as well. I expect lots of crash and burn moments Sunday night.

I have enjoyed traveling to Houston for years and hope that some day that WWE can buy the Paul Boesch Houston Wrestling tape library from Valerie Boesch and family. Broadcasting with Paul, who had the most classic and ample sized of wrestler's cauliflower ears, and having to share one, stick mic while broadcasting from ringside was quite an experience as I was young and was perceived by Mr. Boesch as somewhat of a threat to him when, in fact, I learned from Paul and respected him a great deal. Old school wrestling people, especially from Mr. Boesh's generation, and later for that matter, are often very untrusting individuals thanks to years of being conned plus doling out some eye rollers themselves.

Watched the most recent Legends Roundtable last night on WWE On Demand with the subject being "Underachievers and Overachievers." Mean Gene was the host and the panel consisted of Ted DiBiase, Sgt. Slaughter, JJ Dillon and yours truly. The WWE production personnel does an amazing job of utilizing some classic tapes from their expansive library to enhance the conversations. hat's off to the production/TV staff for another job well done. I hope that you check this show out as it debuted this past week as I understand it.

Remember that we don't ship to PO boxes at this time nor do we plan on doing so in the future....we've been zoomed out of too many orders by people who say that they didn't receive their order from their local, post office.

If you live outside the USA and want to order our products here's how you do that: go to http://www.wweshop.com and check out what they can do for you. They stock our Original BBQ Sauce and our Beef Jerky.

Speaking of Tribute to the Troops, I met two Green Berets in Tampa Thursday night and had a great time listening to their stories. These men are true, American heroes and one of them has been a Green Beret for 32 years and is only in his early 50's. Talk about being a man's man plus he is one of only 5 Samoan members of the Green Beret in the military. Those two gentlemen love what WWE does for the Armed Forces and I will assure you that they will be watching NBC Saturday night. BTW I felt pretty safe hanging around those two, legit badasses who are both stationed in Hawaii.

Thanks for supporting our efforts in our on line store on this site. Again, if you haven't tried our new, Main Event Mustard please do and doing it in 'The Sampler w/ Mustard' isn't a bad suggestion. Your business is a blessing to us and we appreciate it I can assure you.

Boomer Sooner!

J.R.