Doesn't Lio have a bit of a bad reputation anywhere he goes? Kinda like Low Ki, good in the ring but so many people that have worked with him are quick to tell you what a prick he can be.
Imo Lio just calls a spade a spade and gets crap for it. I think it’s only really been WWE where he got that rep, otherwise he and Tony Khan seemed on great terms until today (what with his whole premature retirement schtick earlier in the year and all). I haven’t heard anything about the indies he’s worked for but I may just be unaware of any complaints.
I don't mind Lesnar winning, he's easily the most over attraction in the company (even including Reigns). I just hate that they couldn't even protect Big E by having Rollins or Owens eat the pin. With Big E taking the L, and the Lesnar/Lashley stare down after the match, it's clear Big E is going to get the Kofi treatment and be back in the mid cards next week. So obnoxious.
That said, the match was good and I DO want to see a Lesnar/Lashley match (especially if it's saved for Mania), I just with WWE had a literal ounce of self awareness when it comes to the wrestlers they choose to push. Don't even put Big E in that role if you weren't behind him, makes a literal no sense.
Anyways, watched an actually-good pro wrestling event tonight along with Day 1, and 1) Effy rules, 2) Jeff Jarrett returned to attack him (which I'm so-so on but whatev, could be fun), 3) Scotty 2 Hotty has no business still being as good at wrestling as he is, and put on a wonderful hardcore match vs. Joey Janella tonight, and 4) GCW fudging rules. That Hammerstein Ballroom show is going to be awesome.
I wonder what Fox thinks about Lesnar going to the other network now? I don't mind Lesnar winning, but I really hope he's not back to the once a month appearances again. He was doing good showing up every week leading up to the event.
More WWE cuts incoming, this time just people on the NXT side of things. This has to be like one big slap in the face to HHH.
William Regal Scott Armstrong Dave Kapoor Road Dogg Ace Steel Ryan Katz Sarah Cummins George Carroll Hideki Suzuki Timothy Thatcher Danny Burch Cathy Corino
I wanna know what kind of voodoo magic the NXT UK dudes are using that makes Vince and Nick Khan completely forget about them when it's time for budget cuts. I assume it's because they're not under full-time exclusive contracts.
And Matt Striker was let go from Impact Wrestling.
Looks like the firing spree might be over. I edited the post to add more names. I'm surprised Samoa Joe survived. HHH wanted him back after the last time he was released, but he clearly has little power now in the 2.0 era.
I know it is extremely unlikely to happen, but I wouldn't mind if Hunter, Regal and Shawn (maybe Road Dogg too) pooled some of their money together to get in on whatever becomes of ROH and just get to have fun without any involvement of Vince, Prichard, Kevin Dunn, etc.
Yah that was fudging gross. But thankfully word going around is that it “isn’t anything he can’t come back from.” Good vibes to him, the pop when he returns is gonna be massive.
On a more positive note, Page/Danielson II was great stuff.
Wouldn't be surprised to see her drop the belt to Deonna tomorrow in that case. If she does, it'll just be like any other nostalgia Rumble return.
If she doesn't, I'm baffled WWE is acknowledging a company outside of their own. Absolutely wouldn't call that a "forbidden door" scenario but would still be neat.
Yeah I do expect her to lose tonight, but maybe they'll do something to surprise everyone. The last I had read was Deonna is set to do Title vs TItle against ROH Womens champ Rok-C on a future episode of Impact. Mickie is technically not under any sort of full-time contract with Impact Wrestling anyway.
I hope they have a couple more uncontracted names show up in the Rumble match just for the hell of it, kinda like how in the 90s there would be random dudes from Japan or Mexico appearing in the Rumble. You know they had no shot at all in winning and probably 99% of the viewers had no idea who any of them were (myself included). Not sure how likely that is to happen during a pandemic though.
Fan cam of the Bret Hart vs Ric Flair ironman match at a house show in 1993. I wish a better quality version of this was on WWE Network. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ZoxGc1CIqc
Yeah a defining moment for both those guys, setting HBK off on his career, and Marty..well, we know. It's fun/wild looking back at things I grew up just after, or during, and watched. Sometimes I forget and I'm like 'holy crap'. I remember being a kid and thinking the Nation of Domination was REALLY hurting Ahmed Johnson, I ran to my mom in shock and disbelief that they were attacking him. When he turned and went NoD, my heart sank. I felt like that famous gif that has the angry girl from the WWE crowd some years back. As an adult, looking back and watching matches I'm like "wtf did I like Ahmed Johnson so much for?"
> As an adult, looking back and watching matches I'm like "wtf did I like Ahmed Johnson so much for?"
I think we all have those moments. One I can think of for me is Test. Haven't worn it in years, but I still have my "I Love My Testicles" t-shirt from like 20 years ago.
More trouble for Tammy Sytch -- aka WWE Hall of Famer, Sunny -- who was arrested this morning in New Jersey for allegedly unlawfully possessing a weapon and making terroristic threats, TMZ Sports has learned. https://www.tmz.com/2022/01/13/wwe-legend-tammy-sy...
So you thing Adam cole and his compatriots would be a good feud against the elite of young bucks and omega when omega comes back and would aew think about doing this
I do believe wardlow will be breaking up with mjf. The fact the storyline has tension being seen in the episode of dynamite this past week
Missed final segment of dynamite thought as a whole it was pretty good
Didn’t like the Serena deebe segment but perhaps it’s possible the opponent might be stepping away for awhile from. Aew I forgot wrestler’s name though
I've been watching old episodes of SmackDown from early 2002, starting right around when the nWo came in. I forgot what state they were in (maybe Virginia) and Ric Flair got a big pop when he came out, then the camera pans the crowd to show all the "Wooo" signs, and then this guy (on the bottom) got a chuckle out of me.
LOL WWE JUST HAD WALTER CHANGE HIS NAME TO "GUNTHER". This coming after WWE trademarked the name "Gunther Stark" a while back, only to be met with backlash because Gunther Stark is a famed NAZI COMMANDER. So classic WWE logic - drop the "Stark" (that I'm sure they trademarked with absolutely NO prior knowledge of the historical figure lol) and give the name to WALTER, Austrian powerhouse with a built-in superiority gimmick. Not at all obvious or anything. Totally not ANOTHER nationalistic heel, this time named after a literal, real-life Nazi.
Words cannot explain how fudging lame or how fudging tone deaf this is. Or on top of that, just how fudging GOOFY it is to have a dude with a NAME, you know, like ALL of us have, just suddenly announce "oh no actually I'm Gunther" ON THE MIC like it was some big revelation.
Some apologists are already claiming "he probably just didn't want to 'sign over his name' to WWE so chose that name." Which isn't accurate off the bat because if I recall, the reports stated that WWE trademarked the name before WALTER made his decision to become a regular on NXT. But also, just on a surface level, WWE could choose NOT to threaten to own someone's character and likeness as a literal prerequisite for signing with them. The folks who sign to WWE, keep their ring name, and make it out on the other side are fudging LUCKY ducks. There's no excuse for WWE's treatment of "intellectual property", especially when they're willing to go to literal court in attempts to keep rights to people's REAL birth names (Cody Rhodes, Chelsea Green, etc).
Anyhow, sorry for the rant, but WALTER is his name and WALTER will remain his name. Fudging GOOFY crap.
To me it just looks extra dumb because he has already appeared on TV as Walter. It isn't like that hasn't happened before (Chavo Guerrero becoming Kerwin White for example, or Michael McGillicutty becoming Curtis Axel), but I dunno, wrestling fans just need something to complain about.
edit: I guess I could word that last sentence better, because it damn sure isn't limited to wrestling fans. I've never watched The Walking Dead or Game of Thrones, but those fan bases were f'n loud when the writers go in a direction the fans didn't want.
Or it's entirely justified to "complain" about a stupid decision considering WWE has made several recently that completely threw great talents off their rails.
Chavo and Axel were literal character/gimmick changes. They came after a period of downtime, or as a heel turn. Walter literally grabbed the mic and said "the winner is GUNTHER!" as if it was supposed to mean anything.
It's okay to acknowledge fudging terrible booking when it happens, WWE isn't going to disappear if one does.
Yes, it is okay to acknowledge it. I'm just saying this was only a name change. Nobody has seen anything further or given it a chance to play out before the whining begins. Name changes happen across the entire industry for decades, it isn't new.
When I talk to my Japanese friends about pro wrestling (not just NJPW but some of them follow Western companies too) they have very little to complain about because they don't take it so serious, they know it's just entertainment. If a match wasn't good, they will say so and that's the closest they will get to complaining. When I told them about Walter's name change one of them jokingly compared it to when a video game gets its name changed when ported to a different region.
edit: I guess what I am trying to say is if Walter's NXT run is a flop, it's because of how he was booked, nothing to do with what name they gave him. Dolph Ziggler is one of the stupidest names anyone could have been given, but he made it work for him.
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