An Evening of Choreographed Violence

My wife got me two tickets to the WWE Supershow for Valentines Day, so that's where we went last night -- 110 miles to the MCI Center in Washington D.C. to witness 4-1/2 hours of professional wrestling. I've been a closet wrestling fan for many years--merely for the entertainment of it all -- so this was an opportunity to validate.





The show was a TV taping for "Smackdown" at 6:45pm and then went live for "Monday Night Raw" at 9pm. Our seats were quite good -- we were next to the runway that the wrestlers walked to the ring. We were also near the "stage set" and as a result, next to all the pyro they set off during the show. A little loud perhaps? I've been in rock bands for years so my hearing can take it, but my wife would flinch every time they set something off. I will say that the heat of the pyro flames got pretty intense -- now I know how the guys in KISS must feel...

A few observations:

1. Wrestling fans like beer. Everyone around us was drinking beer. Including a girl that was seated next to me. After drinking 4 beers and falling over the seat in front trying to get out of the row to get even more beer, she disappeared, never to return. But not before flopping in her seat so that her elbow cracked hard into mine, causing my forearm to hurt for the rest of the show.

2. Wrestling fans like cellphones. Camera phones to be precise. Since we were near the runway, everyone came running over whenever the wrestlers would make an entrance or exit, all pointing their little camera phones and snapping away. All for a crappy-resolution blurry photo to prove they were there. I wonder how stupid it looks to the wrestler, seeing all these people just holding their cellphones up in the air. Hey Verizon, there's a good ad idea for you. Of course, there was also the guy in back of us who was gabbing away on his cellphone all through the evening. Dude, why are you on your damn PHONE??????

3. Wrestling fans like to bond. Everyone was intent on touching a wrestler as they walked by. Thus the squeeze at the runway railing all night. One guy was able to get Ric Flair's sweat on his hand, and in a rite of male bonding, high-fived his buddy to share that special perspiration.

4. Wrestling is much better on TV. They juice up the audience sound on TV, and get all the good closeup shots -- something sorely lacking at a live event. Half the time, the action was on the other side of the ring and we had to watch the "Titantron" screen to actually see what was happening. Hey, wait a minute -- we paid big money and drove 220 miles roundtrip to watch a big TV???

5. Wrestling fans like beer. Did I already say that?

All in all, it was an experience. Getting home at 2am and then having to get the kids off to school in the morning and go to work was not too fun though. But I went to a live wrestling show and lived to tell about it. ;)