Shane McMahon meets with Dana White, Lesnar sick

According to my top secret inside sources, Shane McMahon recently had a meeting with UFC owner Dana White. McMahon recently resigned from his father's company, World Wrestling Entertainment, and rumors have circulated in recent years that Shane is interested in starting or working with a mixed martial arts promotion. Could it be that he aspires to carve out a niche in the world of sports and entertainment that deviates from his father's vision? He would actually be following more closely in his father's footsteps, as Vince McMahon Jr. transformed his own father's more traditional wrestling promotion into the glamorous sports entertainment product of today. Dana White declined to comment publicly about the meeting.

In other news from the mixed martial arts world, former WWE champion and current UFC Heavyweight Champion Brock Lesnar was recently hospitalized and is suffering from the disease diverticulitis. The disease forms small pouches in the digestive system and will require surgery. Dana White reportedly stated that Lesnar may never fight again. Brock's jiu jitsu trainer, Rodrigo Medeiros, had a much more optimistic outlook, predicting that the champ will be back in fighting shape within six months. Medeiros said "the heavyweights can stop laughing and get ready to start crying because the champion will be back soon".

Sean Mooney Hired By WWE!

It must be the economy, or maybe 80s nostalgia. According to my sources, WWE are unhappy with their current announcers and plan to take make changes, including the rehiring of Sean Mooney. Mooney is best remembered calling matches alongside the late Lord Alfred Hayes on many of 1980s WWF's Coliseum Home Videos.

Here's a video of Mooney and Lord Alfred calling a 1988 match between "The Million Dollar Man" Ted DiBiase and Tito Santana:

Listen, You Pencil Neck Geeks!

Ever since the success of Mick Foley's 1994 autobiography "Have A Nice Day" proved that there is a surprisingly large public interest in wrestling books, the floodgates opened and the books have been pouring in. In addition to Foley, I've read books by Bret Hart, Chris Jericho, and The Fabulous Moolah just to name a few. But while Hart and Jericho's captivating retrospectives have received a lot of well-deserved positive press from the wrestling media, there is an overlooked gem about which I've heard barely a peep. It is the story of the Hollywood Fashion Plate, "Classy" Freddie Blassie. Blassie and co-author Keith Elliot Greenberg guide us through Blassie's incredible story which also functions as a history of professional wrestling itself, from the carnival side shows of the 1930s to the modern world of Vince McMahon and World Wrestling Entertainment. We meet many other colorful characters along the way, including such Blassie disciples as "The Rockabilly Rasputin" Johnny Legend, former intergender champion Andy Kaufman, and believe it or not, Regis Philbin, who chose Blassie for his first ever guest on television. Blassie was fond of saying that Regis was nothing before Freddie Blassie, a statement which Regis admits is not entirely without merit. The best thing about the book is that it is written with the same grouchy wit with which Blassie was famous for speaking. We are also treated throughout with firsthand accounts of Blassie's exploits from the aformentioned Johnny Legend and Regis, as well as Vince McMahon, George "The Animal" Steele, The Iron Sheik, and Nikolai Volkoff. Here are some samples of Blassie's wit and wisdom:

On modern wrestling:

Today, the few of us who are still alive from that era debate over whether wrestling was better back then. Some give you this bullshit speech, "In my day..." But when they look back, they're only remembering guys like Lou Thesz. They forget about all the boring matches they had to watch, and all the shitty wrestlers who never drew a nickel. And they ignore people on today's WWE roster. I'm convinced that, in a shoot, Chris Benoit would beat 90 percent of the guys I've seen. Brock Lesnar was the NCAA Heavyweight Champion in 2000, and Kurt Angle a gold medalist in the 1996 Olympics. How much better can you get than that? With all deference to Lou, if Kurt had been around in 1948, he might have been the one who held the NWA title for all those years.

On "Nature Boy" Buddy Rogers:

Rogers was a fuckin' prick, and a lot of the wrestlers hated him. In 1962, Karl Gotch and Bill Miller beat the shit out of him in a dressing room in Columbus, Ohio. I heard that Rogers had to flee in a jock strap, nursing a broken hand. If you ever had any dealings with that son of a bitch, you'd understand why Gotch and Miller were driven to violence. There was nobody worse.

On his novelty radio hit "Pencil Neck Geek":

To this day, people bring it up all the time. About a week ago, a fan was telling me, "I was just listening to 'Pencil Neck Geek'. Boy, that was a great song." I thought, "Jesus Christ. This guy is stuck for an answer when you say hello." A great song? Shit. I still haven't learned the words to it.

On Andre the Giant:

Although I liked Andre, I found him revolting...On my birthday one year, he insisted on throwing me a celebration. We went to this narrow diner, where there wasn't a lot of room to move around, with a bunch of the boys. The waiter brought the food out, then Andre went up to the door, held it shut, and let out a big fart. Everybody was choking. And Andre was laughing his ass off. "Eat, eat", he was saying. "Do you think it smells nice?" Needless to say, I lost my appetite. When we left the diner, Andre was still gloating over his rib, and handed me a piece of cake. "You forgot to finish it," he chuckled. "Ho, ho, ho." "Ho, ho, ho, your balls," I said and threw the cake in his face.

Listen, You Pencil Neck Geeks! by Freddie Blassie with Keith Elliot Greenberg was published in 2003. The Classy one passed away later the same year.

Jim Cornette Blasts Republicans And Joey Styles

Wow, I wouldn't have guessed Cornette would be such a diehard Barack Obama supporter. I would love to see a debate between Cornette and Rush Limbaugh on Larry King or Meet The Press. I guess they could invite Joey Styles too. WARNING: Video contains adult language. A lot of it.

The Masterpiece To Make WWE Return

According to my sources, former WWE Superstar "The Masterpiece" Chris Masters has signed and new contract with the company and is slated to make his return to television in the near future. Masters was released from his original WWE contract in November 2009 after failing to pass a drug test for the second time. Since his release, Masters wrestled for independent wrestling promotions in the United States, Japan, Australia, and New Zealand. I have a couple of friends living in Portland, Oregon who are big fans and are sure to be crying tears of joy at this news. They know who they are.

Jose Canseco Destroyed In Debut MMA Fight

Former Major League Baseball player and former VH1 star Jose Canseco lost his first professional MMA fight against humongous Korean fighter Hog Man Choi. Canseco lost the fight by knockout in 1 minute and 17 seconds. The referee stopped the fight during a barrage of fists from Choi to Canseco's head while the two fought on the mat. Canseco was then helped from the ring by his celebrity poker player girlfriend Heidi Northcott. He didn't just lose, he lost bad.

Here's a video of the entire fight from TMZ:

A Mark's History Of Shelton Benjamin

"The Gold Standard" Shelton Benjamin is one of the top wrestling stars in the world. With his bleached blond hair, his cocky swagger, and raw wrestling ability, he is like Dennis Rodman, Little Richard, and Abraham Lincoln all rolled into one. The South Carolina native won Amateur wrestling championships in high school and at the University of Minnesota where he often trained with future UFC Heavyweight champion Brock Lesnar, and boasted an impressive win-loss record. He then competed for Ohio Valley Wrestling, before being brought into WWE by Olympic gold medalist Kurt Angle along with Charlie Haas as part of Team Angle.

At Angle's side, Benjamin and Haas battled The Big Show, Chris Benoit, and Los Guerreros among others, before splitting off on their own and forming The World's Greatest Tag Team. The duo held the WWE tag team championship belts under both names. The two split up when Shelton Benjamin was sent to RAW as a result of the WWE Draft.

Shelton began his singles career with momentum. He claimed victories over top RAW stars like Triple H and battled Chris Jericho, Christian, and Gene Snitsky over the Intercontinental Championship before beginning a sudden, unexpected losing streak. This prompted Shelton's Mama, an actress who played the title character in the short-lived TV sitcom Theia, to appear and accuse her son of "going soft". With Mama Benjamin in his corner, Shelton's fortunes began to turn around.

Mama Benjamin claimed to be in poor health and would sit at ringside in a wheelchair. Some speculated that her claims of poor health were exaggerated due to the fact that Shelton would sometimes wait for the referee to become distracted and then KO his opponent with Mama's large steel oxygen tank. Shelton would then finish his opponent off with his patented T-Bone Suplex much to the satisfaction of Mama Benjamin, who would then pop up out of her wheelchair for a victory dance. However, it seems that Mama Benjamin's health was truly ailing, as she departed WWE soon after.

Most recently, Shelton has been appearing on WWE's Friday Night Smackdown, fighting over the United States Championship against stars like Montel Vontavious Porter, R-Truth, and John Morrison and has become known for stealing the show with death-defying aerial attacks in WWE's Money In The Bank Ladder Match, which has become an annual part of Wrestlemania.