The 2004 year in review would look rather silly without any quotes, so, to kick off a new year in style, here's a new column.

I've been thinking about writing another column for awhile now, but really, not very much has been going on. Maybe one news item of interest a week, if that. There was that stupid list of the who the WWE considered marketable, or something, that got everybody all riled up for like a day. There's been tons of stupid rumours about possible Wrestlemania XX matches (my favorite being a possible return of Mideon!!!), but most of those seem to have been shot down. Sometimes Goldberg is on the verge of getting fired, and other times he is getting along with everyone backstage and happy in the WWE. However, there really is some news today, so lets get on with it.

Stop me if you've heard this one before

Stolen from 411, who stole it from somebody else:

According to 1wrestling.com's Dave Scherer, Brian "Spanky" Kendrick gave notice to WWE at last night's SmackDown! tapings. It is not known how much longer he will remain with the company, and his resignation was apparently due to his lack of a push since his debut. The locker room is responding with shock and awe.

"SHOCK AND AWE!!!!!" AHAHAHAHA! That's wonderful! I didn't see that wherever I read this before. hahaha. Oh lord. I'm sure Undertaker is both shocked and awed at this news. Shit, I bet Vince McMahon always got Spanky confused with Paul London or Nova (is he still working for WWE in OVW or something?) anyway.

Anyway, some later updates went on to say that he's gonna' be working in Zero-One. Over at World-One's website, they have the following:

Pro-Wrestling ZERO-ONE contacted Pro-Wrestling WORLD-1 last week to inform them that "Crazy Monkey" Jun Kasai will not be able to make the debut WORLD-1 tour due to a personal commitment that he must make. We hope for Mr. Kasai to return to the United States very soon. This will lead to some changes in the lineups for WORLD-1. WORLD-1 has replaced Jun Kasai with "X", who will shock WORLD-1 fans on February 6, 7, and 8. Who is "X"? You are going to have to come to Pottstown, Deer Park, and Fall River to find out! Fans will not be disappointed.

Well, I'm probably not gonna' be anywhere near Pottstown, Deer Park or Fall River in the next few years (although I think I was in a truck stop in Pottstown once), one can guess that the "X" will be Spanky. It's a shame that Kasai is off the card, as he makes it a habit to rock socks off, but Spanky ain't a bad replacement.

Anyway, I'm very supportive of Spanky's decision, and wish more of the guys who are getting wasted on Velocity (and HEAT, to a lesser degree) would do the same thing. I'm sure that Zero-One or RoH don't pay as much as the WWE, but I doubt that Spanky's taking that big of a pay cut, if at all. Plus, he can make his own schedule now, and he doesn't have to get suqshed by A-Train or whoever ever three weeks when Vince Mcmahon remembers he exists. Godspeed young Spanky. Enjoy NWA: TNA when you get there, and enjoy jobbing to Jeff Jarrett all the time.

I got really bored with this

And I really didn't write much yet. There's some other news out there, but not a whole lot, really. Here's a breif rundown:

Paul London isn't listed on the Smackdown roster page yet. Spanky was on it, but isn't anymore, for somewhat obvious reasons. Maybe Paul should be calling Steve Corino soon as well.

The RAW writers apparently want Edge to come back on their show. It seems that they don't have enough talented mid card guys to not come up with any ideas for. Actually, I don't think Edge is all that talented, and if they don't plan on teaming him back up with Christian (which is a bad idea), then it would be best if they kept them on seperate shows. There's also talk - wait a minute.

Possibly a spoiler under here

That's better. There's also talk of having Benoit move to RAW, after he wins the Royal Rumble, as he would go after the RAW title instead of the Unified title. I'm not quite sure why this is, so I really don't buy it. I also didn't believe that the WWE would really think signing a one-legged wrestler was smart, so I'm not the best on accurately predicting what will happen. Anyway, I guess moving Benoit to RAW isn't that bad of an idea, but it still doesn't make sense. It'll make for some possible new feuds, but they never blew off the Rhyno/Benoit feud by God!!! I was actually looking forward to some matches between those two. And they hinted at Benoit vs. Lesnar, which has a lot of potential. So, yeah, they probably will move him to RAW then, so he can feud with Jericho for another 5 years. We've never seen that before!!!

That probably wasn't a spoiler, but this definitely isn't

Every site is talking about upcoming talent cuts. They've been mentioning this for a few weeks now, and the only cut is some ref, so I don't know when they'll be coming. Anyway, everybody throws Tommy Dreamer and Kanyon's names around, but what about Zach Gowen? Talk about a stupid signing. I would expect him to be one of the first to go. Then probably Tommy Dreamer and Kanyon, and then a whole lot of other, talented, young guys.

This is taking forever, and not really going anywhere, so let's get onto the end.

A Very Sad Loss

For those of you who don't know, Ubermonkeys has announced on the message board that he might be giving up on recapping HEAT, and moving on to bigger and better things. No, not recapping RAW; not recapping anything at all. Amazing. I just properly used a semi-colon while writing about someone writing about wrestling. At least, I think I used it properly. Anyway, back to Boobermonkeys. He came in to WV when we were in our darkest hour, and leant us just the support we needed. I sure as hell wasn't gonna' recap HEAT. Hopefully this won't be a permanent retirement from the site, or from rebeaking in general. He may be drawn back by the piled of cash, the fast women, and the occasional email from an irate Hardy Boyz fan. Ubermonkeys: He cursed a lot, made a lot of references to shitty sitcoms and enjoyed Old Country Buffet. We'll miss you.