It's the first full week of May, History wise! I don't have that much to say up here, but I have plenty to say after the History. Let's see... I'll do my Triple H impression, I might comment on David Arquette, I'm talk about Phil Mushnick, and I'll preview next week. But first...

BRAVES UPDATE: The Bravos are 19-6 (20-6 if they win tonight... the game starts at 10:05 and there's no way I'm staying up until 1:00 during exam week) and are dominating all of baseball with the best record in the big leagues. Oh yeah... there's a franchise record 14-game winning streak (15 if they win tonight), too. AND there's a L.A. fan trying to moon John Rocker... which makes you wonder which one's the crazy one. The week ahead has a 10:35 game Wednesday night (I despise games from the West Coast), an off day to watch SmackDown! on Thursday, a three game homestand against the Phillies, and then the first two of four games in Miami against the Marlins.

1998 - ECW's Wrestlepalooza was live on PPV from Marietta, Georgia, in the Big Bossman's favorite arena... the Cobb County Civic Center. Looks like there was a pretty cool last two matches... TV champ RVD and Sabu went to a 30-minute time limit draw, which must have been an awesome match. ECW champ Shane Douglas defeated Al Snow in the final match. Also on the card: The Blue Meanie & Super Nova d. Tracey Smothers & Little Guido ... Justin Credible d. Mikey Whipwreck ... Tag champs Chris Candido & Lance Storm d. Balls Mahoney & Axl Rotten ... Tommy Dreamer & The Sandman d. Those Damn Dudleys (D-Von and Buh Buh Ray) ... Bam Bam Bigelow d. New Jack. Meanwhile, to continue the trend started last week, Booker T regained the WCW TV belt from Chris Benoit in Savannah. The day before, Benoit won it in North Charleston. The day before that, Booker won it in Greenville. The day before that Benoit won it in Augusta. Hey, we aren't done yet!

1997 - Satoshi Kojima & Manubu Nakanishi won the IWGP International tag belts from Riki Choshu & Kensuke Sasaki. Thankfully, this is in print and I don't have to spell names on my own!

1995 - The Great Muta won the IWGP heavyweight title from Shinya Hashimoto. On that same card, Sabu (you might have heard of him) won the IWGP junior heavyweight belt from Koji Kanemoto.

1993 - Perish the thought of this, but Jerry Lawler actually lost the USWA heavyweight title in Memphis... TO PAPA SHANGO! Hey, Lawler loves the voodoo man now!

1992 - The Steiners won the WCW World tag titles from Arn Anderson & Bobby Eaton.

1999 - Jos LeDuc dies of lung infection in Fayetteville, GA, at the age of 55.

1998 - On Nitro, Fit Finlay won the WCW TV belt from Booker T.

1992 - You knew it was coming... Jerry Lawler won the USWA heavyweight belt (his 12th) from Kamala in Memphis.

1986 - Year three in the David Von Erich Memorial Parade of Champions card! The big match... Kerry & Lance Von Erich along with Steve Simpson defeating The Freebirds for the World Class six-man belts. Also on the card: Kabuki d. Mark Youngblood ... Kabuki d. Jerry Allen ... Steve Simpson d. Kabuki (if he won, Kabuki would have had one more match against Chris Adams) ... Texas champ Brian Adias d. Steve Regal (a real man's man) ... Chris Adams & Brickhouse Brown d. John Tatum & The Grappeler ... The Missing Link & Iceman Parsons d. One Man Gang & Gen. Shandor Akbar ... Bruiser Brody d. Terry Gordy in a barbed-wire match ... Sunshine d. Missy Hyatt in a mud wrestling match ... World Class champ Rick Rude d. Bruiser Brody.

1985 - Wrestling journalism pioneer Dan Shocket died of cancer at the age of 35.

1931 - In Montreal, Henry DeGlane won the NWA World title by DQ (no, I don't know how) from Ed "Strangler" Lewis.

Birthdays - It's Scott Armstrong's (of the famous Armstrong brothers... CURSE! CURSE! CURSE!) birthday.

1997 - The WWF gave us one of those "up close and personal, revealing" interviews, with a talk with Goldust. Get this... he revealed himself as Dustin Rhodes! WOW!

1996 - Retired wrestler Ray Stevens died of a heart attack in San Fransisco at the age of 60.

1990 - Jerry Lawler won the USWA heavyweight belt (his sixth) from Jimmy Valient in Memphis.

1985 - The second David Von Erich Memorial Parade of Champions was held in Irving, TX, just like the first. The main event was Kevin Von Erich going to a double-countout against NWA World champ Ric Flair. In the match I would've liked to have been in, there was a two-ring battle royal, with the winning team getting $100,000 and the wrestler who gets the winning pin getting a Lincoln Continental (OK, so I would want a different card). Anyway, The Von Erichs & The Freebirds d. Rip Oliver, Chris Adams, Gino Hernandez, Kamala, One Man Gang, and Steve Williams in that match, with Kevin pinning Williams. Also on the card: Mike Von Erich d. Rip Oliver ... The Midnight Express d. The Fantastics in a two-ring match (with Tommy Rogers vs Bobby Eaton and Bobby Fulton vs Dennis Condrey) to win the vacant World Class tag belts ... Kerry Von Erich d. OMG.

1904 - George Hackenschmidt was recognized as the first NWA heavyweight champ (at least by 'PWI' standards) as he defeated Tom Jenkins.

Birthdays - Happy b-day to Hiroshi Hase!

1995 - The Sheik, still active at age 70, had a heart attack while getting into a cab in Tokyo. He made a full recovery.

1984 - The First Annual David Von Erich Memorial Parade of Champions was held in Irving, Texas. The main event was a classic, with Kerry Von Erich winning the NWA World title from Ric Flair. The World Class six-man titles changed hands as well, with more Von Erichs - Fritz, Kevin, and Mike - defeating The Freebirds. Also on the card: Johnny Mantel and Kelly Kiniski went to a draw ... JYD d. The Missing Link ... Iceman Parsons & Buck Zumhofe d. The Super Destroyers ... Kabuki d. Kamala ... Butch Reed d. Chick Donovan (I'd hate to be a guy named Chick) ... Chris Adams & Sunshine d. Jim Garvin & Precious. Meanwhile in Green Bay, Crusher & Baron Von Raschke won the AWA World tag belts from Crusher Blackwell & Ken Patera, who then went to McDonald's and... oh, never mind.

1921 - Stanislaus Zbyszko won the NWA heavyweight belt (or a variation of it) from Ed "Strangler" Lewis.

Birthdays - Hardcore birthday... Brian Knobs! Zzzzzz...

1989 - 'Cause they loved us, the NWA gave us the "Music City Showdown" on PPV from Nashville (not Seattle... or Orlando... or whatever the top music city of today is). It looks like the big match was Ric Flair winning the NWA World title from Ricky Steamboat in a 31 minute match. The last match on the card, though, was U.S. tag champions Eddie Gilbert & Rick Steiner defeating Kevin "Bookerman" Sullivan & Dan Spivey. Michael Hayes also won the U.S. title from Lex Luger and The Road Warriors won the tag titles by DQ from Oklahoma's boy Steve Williams & Mike Rotundo, due to the titles being stripped from W&R when Sullivan & Spivey attacked the referee. Also on the card: The Great Muta d. Doug Gilbert ... Butch Reed d. Ranger Ross ... Dick Murdoch d. Bob Orton in a bullrope match ... The Dynamic Dudes d. The Samoan Swat Team (for those keeping score, Shane Douglas pinned Fatu... that's right, Rikishi) ... TV champ Sting d. The Iron Sheik.

1988 - Tatsumi Fujinami won the IWGP heavyweight title in a tournament final against the man they call Vader.

1974 - Jimmy & Johnny Valient win the WWF World tag team titles from Tony Garea & Dean Ho (no relation to Don Ho... or Hoku... or Haku).

Birthdays - The original Kamala celebrates one today, sadly without the Rev. Slick.

1999 - WCW/nWo Slamboree was live on PPV from St. Louis' TWA Dome. Kevin Nash won the World title from DDP. Gorgeous George wore this little cheerleader outfit and beat Charles Robinson (Lil' Natch). There were two other title changes, with Rick Steiner winning the TV belt from Booker (with the T) and Perry Saturn & Raven winning the World tag belts in a three-way against champions Kidman & Ron Misterio, Jr. and Chris Benoit & Dean Malenko. Also on the card: Konnan (ugh) d. Stevie Ray ... Bam Bam Bigelow d. Brian Knobs ... U.S. champ Scott Steiner d. Buff Bagwell ... Roddy Piper d. Ric Flair ... Greenberg and Sting went to a no-contest.

1988 - Jerry Lawler won the AWA World title from Curt Hennig. For some reason, everytime I type "Memphis" (which is where this change took place), I think of that Comedy Central special where Andy Kaufmann is singing "I'm the king / I'm the king / I'm the king of Memphis, Tennessee." I don't know what the significance of that is, though.

Birthdays - Now THIS is a birthday to get the cake out for... it's Bastion Booger's birthday!

Time to do my Triple H impression! Remember last week when I said I was going to write for The Wrestling Critics? You never saw that. Basically, I decided that if I'm going to have material on more than one website, I want each site's material to be totally original and I don't have time, patience, or enough opinions to write another whole column on a regular basis (remember when The People's Column was weekly... point taken). So basically, it's just here on [slash] and anything I write for my own website. Sorry for those of you looking for me to expand my horizons. Besides, it looks like I'll be on a local newspaper staff this summer and that's another thing I'm going to have to write original stuff for! I can only spread myself so thin.

Just think... I wrote last week's special People's Column BEFORE I found out that David Arquette was going to win the WCW World title. In a way, I can see what WCW (and pro-WCW people) are talking about when they say this is no different than Vince being WWF Champ or Stephanie being Women's champ. Well, it kind of is... Vince and Stephanie are both in the wrestling business. Both are regularly part of WWF TV, with them on television at least twice a week. Arquette on the other hand... well, hey... he was in a movie about wrestling! At least the WWF didn't put the world title on Zeus!

Mushnick rants on wrestling, part 582... in the current TV Guide (with Bryant Gumbel on the front), Phil donates the corner of his weekly "Sports View" column to wrestling. And I quote: "This column's position on pro wrestling -- that the violence and obscene language and sexual acts help desensitize its many young viewers -- has inspired hundreds of dissenting letters from readers age 8 to 18.. Most are loaded with fanatically hateful and wildly profane words... while insisting that I've got it all wrong." For someone who doesn't like wrestling, Phil sure does write EVERY OTHER COLUMN ON IT! For the rest of you who get TV Guide in your mailboxes, agree with me on this... isn't every one of Mushnick's columns negative? The column that this little rant goes along with is about the dishonesty of golf broadcasting. The guy is so desperate for columns that he's writing about GOLF BROADCASTERS! I can't even name a golf broadcaster and I live in the Golden Isles, home of numerous golf courses and Davis Love, III! Can the guy even write a positive column? Why does he write on stuff that he doesn't like? He mentions his kids in his current column as well. I feel for them... they must see so much of that horrible professional wrestling, because he obviously spends a lot of time watching it to get ideas for the column of the week. It must pain Phil so much when he sees sports "good guys" like Wade Boggs or Nomar Garciaparra sitting ringside on a WWF program. I feel soooo sorry for him. I can't totally knock TV Guide... Neve Campbell has a picture (even if small) in an article. By the way, in this whole, entire paragraph, not once did I used hateful language or even mild profane words.

Why does Phil think that wrestling desensitizes the youth of America? I started watching wrestling on the very night of WWF SummerSlam 1991. Let's see, I would have just finished fourth grade. I have never gone around and shot birds constantly at people or cursed out any of my superiors or anything to that effect. Phil doesn't realize this, but most people do realize the difference between what happens on Monday nights and what happens in real life. We know that the Big Show's daddy being dragged around a cemetary is fake and we know not to do it. We know that it's wrong to go and shoot birds and pour beer on your boss. Girls know that just because Rena Mero has fake boobs doesn't mean they have to go out and get implants, too. I just hope that Phil doesn't let his poor kids watch "The Simpsons"... man, they'll go rotten then. Homer drinks constantly, Barney... you know, Bart swears, and so on. I hope they never see "Ren & Stimpy" when it returns to Nickalodeon this summer. Oooh, Ren farted... it's OK for us to do it, too! God forbid if they ever even come close to seeing the Three Stooges... wow, Larry just hit him with a frying pan! Let's go hit daddy with a frying pan, he'll be OK! The point I'm trying (in a round-about way) to make is simple... parents, not some sports writer, should decide what's right and wrong for kids to watch. My sisters are ages 11 and 8 and have been watching wrestling with me for years - with parents' permission - and never swear or do anything they see on TV. My eight year old sister's favorite wrestler is The Rock, and she knows to not go around calling people "roody poo" and telling them to lick a llama's anus. It's all up to the parent's upbringing...

Did I get off on a rant there or what? Wrestleline is trying to win me over by having Neve as a poll choice. Go now (if the poll is still up) and vote for Neve as the person to beat up David Arquette.

NEXT WEEK (5.10 to 5.16): The first ever In Your House, one Cold Day in Hell, one No Mercy, one Hardcore Heaven, and lots more! See you then!