Hi, hello & welcome to News From Cook’s Corner! I hope you all had a happy Valentine’s Day and got to spend it with somebody you love doing something enjoyable. Me, I spent most of it with people I don’t care for doing something that’s very difficult to enjoy. So don’t worry if you spent the day single & alone, you weren’t the only one even if it felt like it.

Those of you that have known me for a while know that the simple act of finding a mate has been similar to the quest for the Holy Grail. Barring a few brief intermittent stretches over the years where I’ve found someone not immediately repulsed by me, life hasn’t exactly blessed me in the romance department. This used to be the source of most of my depression, and I’ve written countless “woe is me” screeds into the voids of the Internet.

Fortunately, this doesn’t bother me as much anymore. I have other sources of frustration to occupy my time these days, and at this point I value the time I actually get to spend alone. Finding a girlfriend would merely cut into my alone time, and that’s not something I wish for at the moment.

So while I’m sure this all comes off as incredibly depressing to outside observers, know that the moments I get to write about these things are happy ones.

I might not be blessed with love from a soulmate or something like it, but I am lucky to have people that appreciate me enough to click on my words on the pro wrestling and other things. Whether it’s for the first time or for the thousandth time, it’s something I appreciate greatly.

Even if I do have to yell at y’all sometimes. And I will later on here because people are doing things to warrant it. Regardless, I still love you guys.

Enough of the mushy crap, let’s get to the news!

Who Got Vengeance?

I was unable to watch NXT TakeOver: Vengeance Day live. Then I got home & the Daytona 500 was on, so I watched that instead. Apparently it was a good show though, at least in the eyes of those that always give TakeOver a perfect score. Let’s look at some of the highlights:

Dakota Kai & Raquel Gonzalez won the Women’s Dusty Rhodes Tag Team Classic

The right choice here. Gonzalez seems to be on the verge of big things, and Kai has deserved to win something big for a long time now. I would not mind them winning the Women’s Tag Team Championship.

Johnny Gargano defeated Kushida

Apparently this match was Johnny TakeOver doing Johnny TakeOver things. You either really like it or really don’t. I’m not a fan of Dexter Lumis kidnapping Austin Theory, as I try to forget that Dexter Lumis exists.

MSK won the Men’s Dusty Rhodes Tag Team Classic

Talk about having a rocket strapped to you. Trey Miguel might be regretting doing the right thing for his family at this point. Today I learned that MSK stands for Must See Kids, so there’s that.

Io Sharai retained the Women’s Championship

I expected Io to retain, though I would have probably preferred either Toni Storm or Mercedes Martinez winning. Toni was working pretty stiff tonight, as this spot shows:

Damn 2020 Table #NXTTakeOver pic.twitter.com/yRfYaQ2qXi

— Wrestling News World (@wnwnews) February 15, 2021

That table was scared of her!

Finn Balor retained, but he & Kyle O’Reilly got superkicked by Adam Cole

Ol’ Pete Dunne gets put on the backburner while Adam Cole Bay Bay re-inserts himself into the title picture. See, this was a large part of my problem with the Cole/Pat McAfee feud to begin with. I never really bought Cole as the babyface people were trying to tell me he was. A leopard never changes his spots, and Adam Cole is just better as a cocky heel.

Sounds like a solid night of action that I’ll try to watch at some point when there isn’t a NASCAR race on after midnight.

Trouble in AEW/Impact Paradise?

You had to know it would happen eventually. This AEW/Impact working relationship was always destined to meet a bump in the road. Somebody wouldn’t play ball, people would get annoyed. Its wrestling.

That somebody, according to Fightful Select, PWInsider & everybody else is Sammy Guevara. See, Sammy was going to do some work for Impact, which would air during his self-imposed absence from AEW after quitting the Inner Circle. However, Sammy wasn’t thrilled with the creative he was given. After some back & forth between Sammy, Don Callis, Scott D’Amore, Tony Khan & Chris Jericho, Jericho told Sammy to head on home.

The word is that AEW isn’t exactly happy with Guevara at the moment, which would be understandable. I’m a big fan of Sammy’s, and he seems like a guy that’s deeply invested in his character. He has an idea of what he should be, and if Impact sees him differently, there’s going to be a conflict. However, I hope that Guevara doesn’t get a reputation of being difficult to work with. He’s a very talented kid, but there are plenty of talented kids that could be pushed over him.

Apparently, the plans for Sammy went to Black Taurus. This seems odd to me, mostly because Sammy would be a terrible fit with the Decay group. If that was the idea, I don’t blame Sammy for balking.

WrestleMania Weekend Returns

You might remember this. Back in the pre-pandemic days, independent wrestling promotions would flock to wherever WrestleMania was being held and hold shows in the same metro area. Made sense, as WrestleMania would annually draw north of 50,000 wrestling fans to a city. (This is a conservative estimate, the number’s probably higher but I’m factoring in local wrestling fans & WWE’s tendency to announce numbers for entertainment purposes.) Most of the people traveling for WrestleMania are hardcore wrestling fans aware of wrestling outside of WWE, so it’s good business sense for these independent promoters to try & cash in off of that.

WWE is planning on having fans at WrestleMania, so independent promoters are making plans to cash in off of them. Game Changer Wrestling announced that their Collective Remix would be coming to Tampa on WrestleMania Weekend. They have four shows scheduled on April 8, four shows scheduled on April 9, and four shows scheduled on April 10. Most of the band names you’re used to, like “Joey Janela’s Spring Break”, “Josh Barnett’s Bloodsport” & “Effy’s Big Gay Brunch”. I’ve never actually seen any of these shows, but they’re very popular.

GCW is also bringing back the Acid Cup for two shows in honor of the late, great Trent Acid, who would have made a million dollars if he was a year older. Came around one year too late for ECW to push him. Poor bastard.

Should be a fun weekend of shows. But of course, there’s more! IWTV is running their own series of shows, which they’re calling a Showcase of the Independents. Beyond Wrestling is the main draw here, there’s four shows scheduled on April 8 & 9 & three on April 10. I should note that one on April 9 is “Event To Be Determined”. I have no knowledge of anything going on there, but I wouldn’t be shocked if Mike Quackenbush has a CHIKARA show for us. Tough to say, but this seems like the perfect time for Quack’s friends to hide his return under the rug and hope we don’t notice.

Apparently, the folks behind GCW & IWTV had a falling out, and there’s a dispute over who holds the rights to previous GCW events, so the result is both groups holding a ton of shows on WrestleMania Weekend. This all seems like a bad idea to me. I’ve been wrong before, so maybe all of these shows will have healthy crowds that produce enough revenue to make everything worthwhile. I hope I’m wrong, for the sake of all the indy wrestlers that will travel to Tampa to work these shows. But I’m just not feeling too optimistic about any of this nonsense.

I mean, I just read in the Wrestling Observer where a promoter in Florida passed away after a stroke that was covid-related. Apparently two other people on the show got the healthy version of the covid. Like, what are we doing here? I ask this question every day on multiple occasions. I still see people on my Twitter wishing they could move to Florida, since they’re social creatures. Good luck is all I can say. I just don’t understand any of it, and since I already ranted on it last week I really don’t want to do it this week too. However, people just really aren’t getting the part where maybe if they stay in a general area and wear a mask occasionally they won’t die or make other people die. Unfortunately, most people care about the first part and don’t care about the second.

So, expect another covid boost of infections & deaths in the weeks after WrestleMania. Unless all of these folks travelling to Tampa get vaccinated. Highly unlikely, in my view.

Lauren Lane-Boebert?

Much to the annoyance of many readers, I tend to do some political talk in these columns. I can’t help it. As much as people want me to stick to sports, politics has also been one of my interests for most of my life. I don’t claim to be an expert even if I’ve studied the field…if I was an expert, I’d be able to get some type of political gig. I’m not, and I’m not.

One of the things that I’ve always found interesting is the background of these people sent to Washington to represent their fellow citizens. Where do these people come from? How do some of these odd personalities that make it to Congress somehow end up getting elected?

I understand that a lot of it has to do with the letter of the party listed to their name. Many voters don’t put any more thought into it than that. It still amazes me how some of these people get through the system.

There are a number of recent arrivals that boggle my mind. One is new Colorado Congresswoman Lauren Boebert. Boebert’s main claim to fame, and the issue she apparently got elected on, is her unflinching support of the Second Amendment. Boebert carries a gun wherever she goes, which makes some of her colleagues feel uneasy. Understandable, I’d be worried if an extremist who constantly talked about how evil I was had weapons at their disposal at all times they were around me too. Especially if they were involved in giving crazy rioters updates on my location.

So why am I talking about this? Turns out, Boebert allegedly has a connection to the world of pro wrestling! Last week, some online dots were connected and it was discovered that Boebert’s mother has claimed for years that her daughter’s father is none other than “Sweet” Stan Lane of the Fabulous Ones & Midnight Express. There was even a paternity suit filed back in 1990. Lane was cleared at the time, but the lady claims that science is better now or some such thing.

@willmenaker apparently Lauren Boebert's father is a former professional wrestler named Stan Lane and her mom has been trying to get him to acknowledge her existence for years. there are comments from her mom on this video dating back to 12 years ago https://t.co/vulLmVOc7M pic.twitter.com/3ku4jPJ4tu

— … (@panda4bernie) February 10, 2021

As it turns out, the timeline would fit. Lane was working the Florida territory when the congresswoman was conceived and born in the state. Given Stan’s social life at the time, nothing can really be ruled out there. I don’t know his political affiliation, so it’s hard to say how Lauren’s current career affects his feelings about things. For his part, Jim Cornette was flabbergasted and wondered why Stan couldn’t have fathered a Democratic congresswoman.

Oh, by the way, Lane & Boebert’s mother are also allegedly cousins. I’m not sure why somebody would want to claim that their cousin is the father of her daughter, but there’s a whole lot going on with Boebert’s political career that I have no explanation for.

Thanks for reading, everybody! Until next time, keep your stick on the ice.