Oscars Kill Wrestling: Just Ask Mickey Rourke

Mickey Rourke was all set to take on Chris Jericho one on one at Wrestlemania, until pressure from his handlers forced him to back out.

Rourke's people discouraged the star of the movie The Wrestler from participating in Wrestlemania because it might hurt his chances at winning an Oscar. HUH?

Does that make any sense at all? Hey Mickie, take this role portraying a wrestler. It'll be great. You'll get in shape, go through every range of emotion and you'll make the best comeback ever. This is a great movie and an even better opportunity.

What's that Mickie? You wanna go where? Wrestlemaina? And do what? Wrestle? No, no, no, no, no. Absolutely not. You can't go and wrestle. How would that look, you portraying a wrestler and then going out there and trying to actually wrestle?

In my opinion that is the most ridiculous concept ever. It was okay for Mickie to portray himself as a wrestler as long as he doesn't actually do it. It's not that he portrayed Timothy McVay and then went out and tried to blow up a building. He went from playing a wrestler to trying to wrestle.

That should send a huge message to old Vinnie-Mac, as hard as he's trying to get the WWE into the main stream, and he has, it is still not accepted.

Despite having one of the longest reigning TV series, it's still looked at as the armpit of television. What does wrestling have to do get the respect it deserves?

The WWE has made several attempts, including winning a couple of TV awards, but it will take a lot for wrestling to get out of the shadow of steroids scandals, cartoonish characters and wrestlers with limited acting ability (err Shelton Benjamin on the mic).

It's sad how there's a double standard in Hollywood. And even with multiple movies produced by WWE Films, they've yet to be supported by the silver screen.