Welcome to my debut column on slashwrestling.com. I'd like to use this column to both give you an idea of what I'm "all about" and to vent some pent up thoughts about this past month.

Before I begin, I would like to send my condolences to the family of "Gentleman" Chris Adams. He was a great athlete with a real gift for entertaining the fans. The wrestling community just lost one of its best.

First off, I am from Long Island, NY. Now, Long Island is one of the most overlooked hotbeds of wrestling in the world, mainly due to the fact that it is kind of sandwiched in between NYC and Stamford, CT. However, one just has to look at some of the names that came from LI to understand that wrestling is indeed big there. Both Dudley Boys (and Big Dick) are from LI, the legendary Mick Foley is from LI, even Helen Hart, mother of the Hart clan was raised on Long Island. Chris Jericho was born on Long Island, Chris Chetti and Taz(zzzzzz) have roots on the Island as well. I could go on and on with names...hell, we even have a weekly public access backyard wrestling promotion to call our own! Yes, wrestling is huge on Long Island, and nowhere is it bigger than in the squared circle I call a home!!

I am 23. I have followed wrestling fan since I can remember. I have been a die-hard hardcore fan since 1988. I was old enough to remember Rock n' Wrestling in all its glory, yet young enough to have been able to truly mark out for it. I have vivid recollection of the last 2 wrestling booms. I have watched all the great promotions of the last 20 years in their glory and, well their inglorious times as well. From the classic AWA, NWA, and WCCW to flops like ICW, UWF(the Second coming), and AWF to the new blood promotions of the 90's like WCW, USWA, GWF and ECW. I was even fortunate enough to see some AAA. Through it all of course, was my favorite promotion, the WWF. Does all this wrestling viewing make me some kind of expert? Absolutely not. Does it make me a loser? I prefer the term "delusional sociopath". The one thing you can say for sure is that it makes me no more and no less than a fan. That's what I'm hoping to do, bring the voice of the fan back to the internet. I like wrestling. I like writing. So this will be the marriage of the two. I hope you will enjoy the ride.

Now for some quick thoughts weeks too late:

I can't understand how some people have been giving the WWF heat (not HeAt) for what I refer to as the "Smackdown after." Of course, I am referring to the Smackdown after the Trade Center bombings. Here's the facts:

The WWF had already postponed their originally scheduled event on Tuesday.
There was no way out of Texas (I'm not talking about the '98 the PPV) anyway.
The show occurred 2 days after the tragedy.
The show occurred after President Bush stressed the need to return to normalcy.
WWF NY had been feeding and supporting police, fire and rescue workers involved in the recovery efforts.

Just finished watching RAW. Quick thoughts on that:

They had better turn Jericho full fledged heel here. Not some half-assed tweener crap or some "he has animosity for the Rock" deal, full fledged "Stinko Milenko" mode.
The Regal turn was kinda predictable but very well done!!
Austin seemed kinda sluggish tonight. I'll bet he has the flu. He had all kinds of mucus coming out of his mouth at the end of the show, too.
This IC title reign they are giving Christian is just what he needs to prevent being 'Marty Jannetied". Excellent work by the WWF in that regard
Funny promo by Stephanie McMahon-Helmsley.

Overall, I thought it was an awesome edition of RAW, with some nice shakeups and advancement of story lines.

Well, that about does it. Sorry it was so long, but thanks for reading and let me know what you think. My goal is to actually get good at this, so feedback will be much appreciated.