In case you didn't see Kyle "Shrub" Busch and Joey "Sliced Bread" Logano's appearance on "WWE Monday Night Raw" last night, here are a few highlights:
• Chris Jericho started the show with some fine usage of the words "mirth" and "jocularity."
• In the midst of an argument between Jericho and the Big Show, Busch and Logano announced their presence with authority by doing dueling burnouts in the parking lot of the HSBC Arena, then driving into the building to thunderous applause. See the entrance at the 5:50 mark of this video.
• Busch put on his bad guy hat and aligned himself with Big Show, who apparently went Benedict Arnold during a hyped pay-per-view show Sunday night. Booing ensued. (Busch is used to that.)
• Logano called Big Show out for being "weak." Busch replied by calling Sliced Bread "young and dumb," then dropped the line of the night: "We're in the city of Buffalo [huge cheers]. A city that hasn't made the playoffs since Hulkamania [boos]. And you bring T.O. in? What's he done? Next thing you know, we're going to be singing 'O Canada.' [more boos]"
• Then Logano invoked his right as guest co-host by declaring Big Show would have to fight Triple H -- aka He Who Was Wronged Sunday Night. Then Busch decreed that Jericho would have to match up with someone whose name Kyle proceeded to mangle three times: Kofi Kingston.
• There was more, including the unveiling of a third race car with a tatted-up Randy Orton on the hood. Orton himself admired the car in a very physical manner, easily the most uncomfortable moment of the night.
• Later in the evening, Kingston made like Michael Jackson in the "Black or White" video and drove Orton nuts by remodeling the car with his keys, a crowbar and a bucket of orange paint.
• Nearly as uncomfortable as Orton rubbing up against the car was the next segment, when Busch and Logano had a (too) long acting scene with Jack Swagger.
• For a more detailed play-by-play of the wrestling stuff from someone who actually knows what he's talking about, check out the recap from The Wrestling News Page. The Charlotte Observer's Jim Utter also made the trip up and posted a couple of photos with his write-up.
• Next week's Monday Raw guest hosts? Ozzy and Sharon Osbourne.
Passing the Buck
Jimmie Johnson's win at Charlotte two weekends ago was his 46th career Cup series victory, moving him into a tie for 13th on the all-time wins list. He's tied with Elzie Wylie Baker Sr. Thankfully, Baker shortened that to Buck.
I've been getting a lot of questions from readers about Buck, wanting to know whether he was ever anything other than Buddy's dad and why he deserved to be on the list of 25 finalists for the NASCAR Hall of Fame's first class. You asked, so here you go:
Buck Baker was a milkman turned occasional bootlegger turned race car driver who participated in NASCAR's first Strictly Stock (now Cup series) event in the summer of 1949, held in his hometown of Charlotte. (He finished 11th out of 33.) Buck won 46 Cup races, back-to-back NASCAR championships in 1956 and '57 (as well as Martinsville wins each year), and was the series runner-up in '55 and '58. He started two races during that inaugural '49 season, then, after easing into retirement later in his career, came back to make eight starts in 1976. "Just to prove I could still do it," he said. In case anyone doubted him, he shut them up by finishing sixth at the toughest track on the circuit, the Darlington Raceway. He was 57 years old.
After finally retiring as a driver and car owner, he spent his time rooting for son Buddy (aka Elzie Wylie Baker Jr.) and running the Buck Baker Racing School, which still operates and was the first school to put a kid named Jeff Gordon behind the wheel of a stock car. I'd say that worked out, wouldn't you?
Before his death in 2002, Baker told me that he "lost a helluva lot more races than I won," but the man never lost a party or a punch line. During NASCAR's 50th-anniversary celebration in 1998, I interviewed Baker after he was named one of the sport's 50 greatest drivers. I asked him for his best Darlington story, and this is what he told me:
"We was running down there one day, and it was hot as hell, so I tried to rig a drink bag behind my seat to put some beer in. Well, that didn't work. It just sloshed the hell around and got too foamy. So instead I filled up a thermos bottle with tomato juice and stuck it under my seat.
"Well, I wrecked the car all to s---. Turned it over and everything. That thermos bottle broke open and that tomato juice got all over me. I had on white coveralls, and it just turned them red. Well, the safety crews run up to the car, and there I am hanging, and that juice is all over me and running out of the car down the track.
"The first guy that got to me about passed out. He turns and screams to other ones, 'Oh no! The sumb---- has done had his head cut off!'"
Throttle linkage
• Doug Demmons of The Birmingham News checks in with Chrissy Wallace, who hopes to race against her father, Mike, this weekend at Talladega.
• My man Ben White of the Lexington (N.C.) Dispatch and NASCAR Illustrated says Juan Pablo Montoya has officially entered the realm of NASCAR's elite.
• Dustin Long of Landmark Newspapers takes a look at whether NASCAR should have thrown the yellow on the last lap at Martinsville.
Ryan McGee
