Monday, September 29 – 1:47 P.M. (CT)

-As Jim Ross would say, business is about to pick up. WWE was out of the country last week and TNA didn't have any television tapings, which made for a bland week in pro wrestling news. However, with ECW switching time slots, Mick Foley making his first appearance in a TNA ring, Smackdown's big move to MyNetwork television, and the WWE No Mercy pay-per-view on Sunday, this should be a newsworthy week.

-I waited a long time for WWE to hold a Raw taping in the Twin Cities. And now that they are, I can't help but wish we were getting the Smackdown crew. I enjoy the Smackdown show so much more than Raw these days and I'd much rather see the Smackdown and ECW tapings.

What's worse is that tomorrow night's Smackdown taping features the loaded lineup for the MyNetwork Television debut. Just like football, Green Bay gets the best of Minnesota again. It just never ends.

I hate to sound so negative, but I'd rather be at the Impact Zone in Orlando tonight. It would be cool to see Foley's first televised appearance in a TNA ring, and Thursday's Spike TV show should be a newsworthy event.

Having said all that, I am looking forward to seeing tonight's show live. I missed WWE's last two or three stops in the Twin Cities due to work commitments and/or back problems, so it will be fun to catch of the WWE experience in person again. I just can't shake the feeling that I'm about to sit through a two-hour infomercial for MyNetwork TV with some final hype for No Mercy sprinkled in.

As I've mentioned before, Rich Twilling will be flying solo with the live coverage of Raw tonight, and I'll be back tomorrow with the Raw Hitlist, plus a blog and audio update with my on-site perspective of the show. You are welcome to send a paragraph or two of your thoughts on the show to dotnetjason@gmail.com.

-As if the 162-game baseball season isn't long enough, the Twins and White Sox might have to play a 163rd game to determine which team wins the American League Central Division on Tuesday night. The Sox were scheduled to start their makeup game against the Tigers to determine whether the playoff game is necessary a few minutes ago, but, you guessed it, it's raining in Chicago. The wait continues to crown a division champion.

Dot Net reader Greg Blair explained the odd facial hair bleaching that I mentioned in my blog yesterday. "Regarding the players with the bleached facial hair, one of them is Juan Uribe and the other is Bobby Jenks.

"This bleaching thing started because Nick Swisher convinced more than a few players to dye their facial hair pink on mother’s day to show support for the fight against breast cancer, and then blue on father’s day, to show support for the fight against prostate cancer. Swisher lost family members to cancer, so that’s his prime charutable cause. Once this was done, they bleached the facial hair to remove the excess dye. Why they didn’t shave is beyond me."

Thanks for the update, Greg. I hope the rain in Chicago today somehow causes the peroxide to seep into their pours and causes them to play poorly today. I'm not cold enough to hope for any long-term damage, just enough to get the Twins into the playoffs. All joking aside, that is a good cause, but I'm with you in not understanding why they didn't just shave it off.

-I don't even want to talk about the Vikings loss to Tennessee. I picked the Purple to win out of loyalty, but I saw this loss coming a mile away. The Vikings and Titans have similar teams with ancient quarterbacks, mediocre wide receivers, and strong defenses. The big weakness the Vikings had going into this game was coaching. I'll take Jeff Fisher over Brad Childress any day of the week.

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