By Shane McKinley, Torch specialist

"Your best success is my worst blunder
Y'all living trendy on pennies
I cop plenty Fendi"
-"We Make The World Go Around" by Nas

So, yeah. How's Monday Nights War II going? Two weeks in and TNA is already throwing up the "well, lots of people watch it on DVR and on the Internet" white flag. Seems like we're going to have to wait a while before this battle between WWE and TNA becomes a credible one. God bless TNA for giving WWE competition, but TNA is bringing out Kevin Nash vs. Scott Hall type of stuff. Come on now.

-I enjoyed Raw with Stone Cold hosting. No goofy-ass Hornswoggle segments and loads of good wrestling. Every bit had a purpose in pumping up WrestleMania. Mania this year is sponsored by Slim Jim, but there is sure nothing slim about the storylines and feuds. Heck, HBK vs. Taker II even has its own Johnny Cash theme song.

Is Stone Cold Steve Austin "The Greatest Of All Time?" Michael Cole was dropping the "G.O.A.T." label on ol' Stone Cold. And the censors sure did their job of saving little kids around the world from hearing Stone Cold say the "ass" word.

-Quick channel change to Impact: Ric Flair is currently chain sawing his own head and spilling buckets of blood while screaming, "THIS IS TNA!" Sure is, Nature Boy. I think you wanted to bust yourself open during that Raw Sendoff, but Arn Anderson stopped you.

-I strongly enjoyed the interaction between Stone Cold and Cena. You see, Stone Cold gave Cena his HOF ring and then Cena grew super powers and...wait, that's nonsense. Stone Cold's looking good these days, with him doing direct-to-DVD movies. Yup, he's doing Jesse Ventura's shtick, but hey, at least there's a good chance that I'll watch a Stone Cold movie. Austin might get bored with movies and start to enter into politics (I'll rather take a drunk wrestler than a sober
Eric Massa).

-Sheamus wipes out Raw's resident woodland elf. The Scottish Ronald McDonald pumps up Triple H, saying how great he is. It's somewhat hard to take Sheamus seriously when his mouth opens with that funny accent.

-With March Madness, we can see directly who moves up and who is out. In WWE NXT, the competition is a way lot more hazy. Do NXT rookies succeed by how many Twitter followers they get?

-Chris Jericho wants to drink some Steveweisers with Stone Cold after the show. That will make TMZ happy.

-Here's Kelly Squared vs. Maryse! Woo! You know, if Vickie Guerrero doesn't show up in this bit, then I will...oh wait, here she is. Seems like another diva filler match at WrestleMania to be a buffer. Hey, I don't mind Team Plain Girls vs. Team Mean girls. How about some Beth Phoenix love and have Santino be the guest ref? While you're at it, can you somehow nab Awesome Kong?

-Speaking of hiring people, I'm thinking of hiring C.M. Punk to sing "Happy Birthday" to my niece's 8th birthday. I'm sure that will go over well.

-The dud of the night was the cold announcement of Legacy a-explodin' at WrestleMania. Randy Orton, doing his best zombie impression, talks about Cody and Ted. Their triple threat match is a hard sell. For many months, WWE has pumped up Orton as a psychotic hell-spawn while sorta-kinda pushing Cody and Ted as credible. Jerry Lawler dropped the line that the WWE Universe "feels for Randy Orton." Yeah.

-Triple H vs. Randy Orton III: Even Quieter.

-Great to see Gorgeous George to be inducted in the WWE HOF.

-Also, it was great to know that finally, finally, The Hart Foundation did get some love from WWE with Bret Hart back. Well, "love" is subjective. If getting killed by Undertaker and remaining stuck in The Never Ending Cryme Tyme Feud is "love."

-The only thing worth of value in the Batista vs. Kofi Kingston match was that Batista bled. Of course, the ref put on his rubber gloves and got that damn white towel ready. Batista refused the towel and WWE refused to do close camera shots of a busted open Batty. Dave knows how to play heel. Meanwhile it was a sad night for Kofi. Like "after the match Kofi went backstage and nobody talked to him" type of sad.

-Very well done show. While Trips vs. Orton lagged, the ending with Vince and Bret was pretty darn cool. They righted the Vince-Bret ship and it will be interesting to see what tricks Vince has up his sleeve for their WrestleMania match.

(credit to image3.examiner.com, wrestlingunfolded.com and garywill.com for pics).

Email is mckinley.torch@gmail.com

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