Couldn’t sleep so I started SS. I cannot believe they threw away the history between The Bar to have Sheamus win a spot on the SS team via interference against his old pal Cesaro. Sheamus is heel, and in WWE that means any previous relationship is void. Silly.
That said, the Men’s SS match has been entertaining so far, and Becky/Charlotte was VERY good. Not a bad show so far, despite the awful buildup.
What was the deal with that whole gold egg gimmick? During the backstage segments I could barely understand a word Vince was saying (it has been that way for the past couple of years, his voice is so low and gravelly now), so I gave up trying to make sense of any of it and would just check my phone or something whenever he came up on screen.
You've probably read about that fan that hopped the rail to attack Seth Rollins last night, just a crappy situation overall because the dude is clearly "not all there". If this stuff is true with all the screenshots being leaked from his social media, apparently this goes back to 2019 where he was scammed/catfished by a fake Seth Rollins account online that screwed him out of hundreds of dollars and got his girlfriend arrested when she tried to cash a fake check that the scammer sent.
> Anyway anyone excited about the so called nxt 2.0
I still watch every week. Some of the changes weren't for the better (I dislike how the announcers have to keep plugging what's happening on the main roster, I swear they weren't doing that before), but the actual in-ring product is still solid. I'll keep watching until it's not.
RAW, SmackDown, Dynamite, I usually just keep on as background noise. But NXT, thanks to Peacock, I can watch when I want to so that is pretty much the only weekly 'rassling show I will sit there and pay full attention to.
You know wwe can be better than what they are doing. I’m not gonna rsstate what has been said but if the company wants to put out a trashy product then let the true wwe fans watch the junk
There’s a reason why ratings change every week based on who watches what
I just feel aew is doing a better job than wwe
I understand some stuff has to be scripted to a point
Problem is as long as Vince is in charge wwe product will decline. And if you get unhappy talent then things start to trickle down from it
To be fair, ratings for the business in general are in the crapter. Not enough people care anymore.
My expectations with NXT moving to a different night was that it and AEW would both reach 1 million viewers or close to it. NXT hasn't reached 1 million yet but while AEW has, they're not doing it as consistently as I hoped (I think only once or twice since Punk's debut). Both shows are usually getting what they already were during the Wednesday Night War, neither has grown much at all without having to share a time slot anymore. It seems the fans had already made up their mind which "side" they were on when they were head to head.
Ratings are all relative now, it isn’t the 90s anymore. It all depends solely on what the networks want. Fox and USA have openly been upset with WWE’s performance (being such an established brand for so long brings certain expectations). Meanwhile TNT is very happy with their not even 3 year old program’s performance considering it’s already comparable to WWE’s (which is sorta wild).
I just think having split brands at time ago was a good and fresh creative idea
I just think maybe it’s time to junk the idea
If talent is appearing on both shows because of certain script aspects go back to having two general type of shows
That was the initial idea
Having drafts for both brands is one thing. Being successful and purpose execution has been flawed
Releasing people just because you wanted them not to be on rival company when signed in the first place is a bad excuse of financial business
Here’s what I would do if I was in charge Feel free to comment
1. Keep nxt as a developmental show for developing talent it’s almost a clone of aew dark
2. Ditch main event matches and make a recap best of the week programming show
3. You want to separate talent into brand shows get rid of some of the backstage interviews and skits it’s pointless to keep doing the same skits with same talent
Have interviews in place of either before or after the matched
Yes I know your gonna say there doing that but is it productive necessity.
Again just my opinion Again part of it is the scripted writing
In aew they don’t have prewritten promos which wwe needs to quit doing
You think nxt talent aren’t going to be the only ones complaining.
Anyway you either like my ideas or you just don’t bash hard them just my opinion
> I just think having split brands at time ago was a good and fresh creative idea
>
> I just think maybe it’s time to junk the idea
I'm sure I've said this in here before because I always say this when this topic is brought up, but the original 2002 brand split was a good idea and they executed it well. If you wanted to see Cruiserweights you had to watch SmackDown (or Velocity, which for a while was known between my friends and I as "The Paul London Show" because he was killing it every week on there). If you wanted to see the Womens title defended, you had to watch RAW. I preferred how they did it in the beginning where there was one Undisputed World Champion who had to defend against challengers from both brands and the same for the Tag Titles.
Eventually it started to feel a little watered down when they added a second set of tag titles and another world title. And now it's even further watered down, because both shows look and feel exactly the same, except one show is one hour longer and has a title that random dudes that creative has nothing better for will chase after for some reason. I do give credit to Heyman when he was "in charge" (quotations used because in the end we know Vince is the one in charge of everything) of RAW's creative. The Mexican dudes were getting much more TV time, so were guys like Ricochet and Viking Raiders, and that seemed to come to a halt when he was removed from his position.
The Brand split has been fairly meaningless for a long while now unfortunately. It's even worse because each year it seems like they draw attention to the fact that split isn't really relevant, thinking that'll make THIS year's draft special mean something more.
It's silly. I agree it did work at one point for a few years but they definitely effed up with it in recent years.
And on the subject of AEW Dark - I don't look at that as "developmental" and I don't think AEW does either. Sure, in some sense it "develops" a character's win/loss ranking and allows them to build their character up more, but it's not a show meant to showcase talent who are only "developing" their talent in general, which is what NXT 2.0 seems to be stepping into the realm of. On Dark and Elevation, they have actually competitive matches between wrestlers who are well know on the indy scene without pulling the WWE crap of pretending they never existed before they got on the card. The commentary notes their histories and all that good, normal stuff. They don't treat them like complete unknowns, even if they are rookies. That said, Dark is definitely a place for signed AEW talent to pick up obvious wins against these other wrestlers and build up a record, regardless of their histories.
My issue with AEW's YouTube shows are they are just used to pad out wins/losses (which is good, at least they're not just making up numbers like WCW did for Goldberg's streak) but majority of the matches are so short that I find them hard to care about.
15 matches on the most recent episode and 11 of them didn't even last 5 minutes. Most of them don't even break a sweat by the time they're over.
I haven't watched or read results from NXT yet but I don't think Gargano is done. He might just need some time off while his wife is pregnant, similar to Seth taking time off last year for Becky.
He made it very clear he was at least done with NXT, but I’m skeptical he lands anywhere but the WWE main roster. Different from Seth, Gargano’s contract actually expired so it isn’t just time off but he could obv re-sign. He said his only focus right now is on February when his kid is born.
Punk with the mega heel heat in MJF's hometown tonight, immediately justifying him going to AEW. The first 5 minutes of #AEWDynamite alone justify it. There's no way even MJF's hometown would have been THAT hot for him without the promo-heavy feud that came prior to tonight. A nice reaction probably but a "hero's return" response? No way - that's what a properly-built feud with an iconic wrestler results in: wrestling stars. And Punk immediately reverted to his heelish tendencies in his promo to play to the crowd, though maybe focused too hard on the whole "local sports team" thing. Still, he played a convincing heel vs. MJF's hometown and it was a very entertaining and interesting segment. Wonderful stuff.
I’m sure there are plenty of potential buyers out there, if the price is right. Just seems Nick Kahn is trying to angle the company into a more sellable position lately.
Well if Jeff really declined their offer of rehab, good riddance. He refused it back in 2003 also and was released then too. This dude has a long history of drug and alcohol abuse and has seemingly convinced himself that he can overcome these demons on his own, but he clearly can't.
It's disappointing because he still has a fanbase that cares about him (the NYC crowd at Survivor Series made that known). I know a lot of fans will use this as an opportunity to rush to social media "oh I can't wait, he's gonna go to AEW and reunite with Matt", but if he's refusing to get help would it even make sense for him to be on AEW's radar? Nobody wants a repeat of that incident in TNA.
Not gonna lie, sorta hate that “good riddance” take.
If you EVER cared about the man, you should absolutely still care about him - probably more now than ever. An addict doesn’t decide to be an addict. Yes they made the initial choices that led them down a particular path, but the dude has a disease. This is a legitimately tragic situation and we should look at him as a human first, wrestler messing up his career second.
Sincerely I wish he took the rehab, but his chemical balance is clearly out of whack. That sucks. Hoping the best for him.
Yeah, I could've worded that better. But I understand why they would choose to release him (still waiting for their official announce about it on either Twitter or WWE.com). He's putting the safety of others at risk by showing up intoxicated to a workplace where you need 100% trust in your fellow workers.
I agree that it sucks that he declined the offer for rehab. But if Scott Hall and Jake Roberts can kick their bad habits, there is hope for him too but he just needs to realize that he has already proven he can't do it on his own.
I'm still wondering if he was indeed fired, or if it's just a suspension because he failed wellness? When the hell was the last time someone was suspended for failing their drug test anyway? I believe when he left in 2010 he was just days away from WWE announcing his 3rd strike on the wellness test, but he was lucky his contract expired so they just dropped making a public announcement of it.
ROH Final Battle 2021, very possibly their last big show, is awesome so far. I’m still getting caught up.
There’s a six-man tag match halfway through the show, and the guys involved included the following sequence (which pays homage to a bunch of prominent ROH wrestlers and it was so fudging cool):
-Brody King performs the Muscle Buster to Eli Isom (for Samoa Joe) -EC3 performs a WILD Lynn-style Piledriver to Brody King (for Jerry Lynn) -Homicide performs a Pepsi Twist on EC3 (for CM Punk) -Taylor Rust performs a Cutter and a Lariat on Homicide (for Homicide himself, with the moves he used to help win him the ROH title vs Danielson in 2006) -Rocky Romero hits Taylor Rust with the Sliced Bread #2 (for Brian Kendrick) -Tracy Williams performs the Jawbreaker Lariat on Rocky Romero (for Nigel McGuiness) -And then Tracy Williams locks in the Cattle Mutilation on Rocky Romero (for Bryan Danielson) -Tony Deppen performs the Top Rope Double Stomp on Tracy Williams (for Low Ki) -Eli Isom performs the Helluva Kick and the Top Turnbuckle Brain-buster on Tony Deppen (for El Generico/Sami Zayn) -After a small sequence, Homicide hit Isom with his move the Cop Killa (which is what he finished Danielson with at Final Battle 2006)
The crowd didn’t figure it out until the last few moves and were pretty fudging useless for a lot of the show but for people who actually watched pro wrestling outside of WWE for the past few decades, this was awesome stuff. The rest of the show so far has been entertaining as hell too, you can tell they feel like this is the last hurrah. This spot was just so friggin cool.
...debuted in fudgein ROH. So wild. No idea if this is a sign of ROH’s imminent return down the line or if it just means him, EC3, and the others involved in the segment will move on elsewhere as a pre-established faction. If ROH DOES return in Q2 of 2022, which is what they insinuated with the “hiatus for Q1” terminology, bringing THAT guy in is a big fudging get.
Yeah I was surprised to see him there. Reminded me of when Rhyno was there around a decade ago. Their styles are not what I think of when I think ROH. Or at least what I used to think of ROH before I stopped following it.
I get videos from "The Hannibal TV" recommended on YouTube quite a bit and they're usually interview videos. I didn't know he actually was a wrestler. Turns out he nearly murdered a ref at a show last night and even put it on his YouTube channel. Some people are claiming it's a work (the fact that the ref bladed, and he put this on his own YouTube channel makes me think it might be), but others are convinced he went into business for himself. One of the other refs have commented online saying none of what happened there was planned at all and the reason why nobody from the back came out to stop it sooner was because they didn't have a monitor setup back there for anyone to watch was happening in the ring. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4TnId77_wVU
Also, RIP Jimmy Rave. Mega underrated wrestler during his time and really had a rough go of things toward the end of his life. At least he's not in pain anymore.
Classic 2005 cage match - Jimmy Rave vs. CM Punk. Dude was great.
> Well if Jeff really declined their offer of rehab, good riddance. He refused it back
> in 2003 also and was released then too. This dude has a long history of drug and
> alcohol abuse and has seemingly convinced himself that he can overcome these demons
> on his own, but he clearly can't.
>
> It's disappointing because he still has a fanbase that cares about him (the NYC crowd
> at Survivor Series made that known). I know a lot of fans will use this as an opportunity
> to rush to social media "oh I can't wait, he's gonna go to AEW and reunite with Matt",
> but if he's refusing to get help would it even make sense for him to be on AEW's
> radar? Nobody wants a repeat of that incident in TNA.
At this point he probably needs pills to recover from the moves he is expected to perform. Swanton at age 50? He isn’t Terry Funk.
I also feel bad for the wrestler taking the swanton from a 50 year old Jeff hardy (I’m not sure about his actual age but I’m guessing late 40s/early 50s)
> watching or watched dynamite why an hour for a match between page and danielson.
Because they're great wrestlers and can keep an hour long match interesting. This match has been friggin awesome.
Hour long matches are commonplace in the indies (and back in the NWA/AWA territory days). Danielson has some of the most legendary hour draws in ROH history.
I will say I wish Page went to the hour limit and beat him at the last second, but it ended as a time limit draw. Which still rules, but would probably mean a BIT more if Danielson/Omega didn't go to a half hour draw a few months ago. However that just leaves the door open for a Page/Danielson rematch down the line. Great long-term booking from AEW, which seems to be their strong point.
Anyone watch Young Rock?? It's amazing how similar the wrestlers are to their real life counterparts.. They have Andre, Samoas, Iron Shiek, Macho Man, JYD and last night's Xmas episode they had Elizabeth and Mean Gene.. It's crazy how much they look alike (even the oldest 'Rock' looks a lot like him')
I haven't seen it yet, but I've been meaning to check it out on Peacock. Nick Khan's sister is co-creator of that show. I didn't realize that until I looked it up a week or so ago when The Rock posted a pic of the three of them and talking about how they grew up together in Hawaii.
Anyone pick up that Action Arcade Wrestling game? I see it's currently on sale for under $10 on PlayStation 4, but I was thinking of waiting until next month for the Switch release. But I've seen a couple of people mention that the Create-A-Wrestler feature requires you to use a PC or something and not the console itself?
Probably the same as Fire Pro. Consoles block off community-created DLC, so no chance of downloading wrestlers under a different trademark. On PC community creations are tolerated.
Yeah and today, the day after all these breakouts have been reported on, WWE has decided Covid testing is no longer required. What a fudging garbage company. They had to remove these wrestlers from the Day 1 event due to Covid, so instead of getting more dedicated to helping stop the spread of the virus, they just make it so no one needs to be tested. From this point on, you can almost guarantee at least one roster member will have Covid at any given time, and WWE just doesn't give a fudge. They're going to allow their performers to work while sick and claim ignorance due to a lack of testing, meanwhile putting everyone in the locker room, as well as fans interacting with them, at risk.
Think its time for WWE to head out to pasture, personally.
Too much of the talent are okay with keeping their mouths shut as long as they're getting paid well. Very few are willing to speak up until after their contract is up or they're released from it.
Apparently several roster members have spoken up on this issue, both in the past and after this recent mandate. Not that it should be up to them to speak up, WWE should take incentive. They just don’t care.
I wouldn’t say they’re “okay” with it, those who remain quiet probably just don’t want to be fired. WWE hanging job security over their heads is BS too.
Little fact I read on Twitter earlier: With tonight's NXT being the final live show of 2021 for WWE, this marks the first year since 1990 that The Undertaker has not made a single appearance on TV.
Looks like Toni Storm has been released. I wonder if there are more cuts coming or if she just requested it?
edit: Also was reading up on the whole COVID testing thing. It's not that they don't test anymore at all, it's just no longer mandatory. It's basically how the the NBA and NFL does it too. Not that I agree with it.
Yeah but you know it’s just so they can get around pulling wrestlers for testing positive. And doing it in the literal middle of a huge breakout within the company makes that all the more obvious. Just about the most foolish decision to make with a new variant rampaging all over the world, and that goes for other sports leagues making the same stupid mistake.
i been paying attention to AEW lately instead of WWE.
I'll just read up on WWE news just for giggles just to see how bad and stupid the product is becoming.
Its laughable, over at AEW theres no internal disorder for the most part within the company. Quite sad for WWE whats going on. Its like they fallen from grace as a good positive promotion to work for.
Omos was advertised to be facing AJ Styles on Raw this past Monday, but he flew home early. I wonder what that was about? From what I've read by people who were there, the night before at the MSG house show he and AJ put on by far the worst match of the night. Letting Omos skip NXT and go straight to main roster was probably a mistake.
All i can say is am puzzled with WWE and how they are doing things at the moment.
The bookings have gone south
lesner vs reigns isn''t gonna help the cause unless they have an over the top story idea. Which in my opinion is preaching to the choir at this point
Few years ago they wanted to listen to the fans, they were changing the company and product for the fans. The fans are themselves(writers, vince and other higher ups)
As far as i am concerned i'm glad i dont spend hours watching the current wwe product
> As a long time lurker of this thread, please stop.
>
> Sincerely,
> Everyone
i'll stop the bashing and only post good thoughts on wrestling
its just that i have watched WWE for years since wrestling challenge / main event when i got hooked on them and amazed how the company product has become since i started watching
>> As a long time lurker of this thread, please stop.
>>
>> Sincerely,
>> Everyone
>
>
> I was wondering where the heck you've been.
>
Been working a bunch. 1000+ hours of OT this year, 900 last year. Don't have much time to game anymore so haven't been trading.
I have been going to AEW and IWC (where Wardlow and Britt Baker got their start) shows and meeting wrestlers at cons (Steel City Con in Pittsburgh.) Met and got autographs from Darby, Britt, Sammy Guevara, Chris Hero, Orange Cassidy, Dustin Rhodes, and probably more I'm forgetting over the last few months.
> Its laughable, over at AEW theres no internal disorder for the most part within the
> company.
It's not all sunshine and rainbows over there. Around a month ago Kiera Hogan said she felt "lost in the shuffle". Look at Big Swole saying a big reason why she left was the lack of diversity in the company, and then Tony looking like a douche with his response of "I let Swole’s contract expire as I felt her wrestling wasn’t good enough."
Just because I don't crap on WWE and praise AEW in every post doesn't mean I'm not a fan, it just means I'm not jumping on the bandwagon. But poor Tony can't handle any criticism of his company. Did you see him spewing off at Fox News on Twitter a week or two ago? It's become a meme at this point. AEW is doing well, but doesn't mean they're invincible.
Yah lol TK made himself look like a dork today. Just don’t respond to something like that imo.
But AEW is still roughly 40x better than WWE currently, and that’s not a bandwagon thing. It’s just a better show and the majority who work there seem happy, which is absolutely not something you can say for WWE. I’m in contact with Shane Hagadorn, former ROH wrestler and current AEW writer, and believe me - it truly DOES seem to be rainbows compared to reports on WWE’s backstage.
Tbh lately, I’d say it’s more of folks leaving the WWE bandwagon than folks joining the AEW bandwagon. Folks who dislike AEW don’t just start liking them to spite WWE... they just stop watching wrestling. That’s been WWE’s detriment on the industry for decades now, people get put off by their show and write all of wrestling off. Sure, TK made a stupid tweet... still hasn’t done half the crapty garbage WWE management has, especially lately. It is a wide margin between the two companies.
That said, TK pissed off a few of his own workers. Lio Rush is being vocal about it. Difference is, it seems he’s allowed to voice his opinion while working for AEW, yet was immediately fired from WWE for doing something similar. If he leaves AEW, it’ll probably be his own decision this time.
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.
Again, 1) there are literal Nationalistic implications behind the name change, which is worth criticism regardless of how your Japanese friends feel, and 2) just the way it was pulled off was terrible and out of nowhere. There's no justifying a random name change after a match when it's literally just switching from one first name to another. Without the blatant Nazi undertones, it's STILL goofy as crap.
But I mean yah, they did it for no other reason than to give an Austrian strongman a Nazi's name.
I do love the "just let it play out" argument that I constantly see on the internet though - as if something can't just be bad from inception so we need to give historically incompetent WWE writers a little more time to prove why it's so bad before we're allowed to criticize it.
Silliness. It's bad. It's not "whining" to say so.
And I mean, not to beat a dead horse here, but how could it EVEN "play out" in any real way to make a random first-name change be more than what it blatantly is on a surface level? It's them changing a name from one... to the other. What story line is going to justify that in any credible, logical way to make it "better"?
"My name is Gunther now, like my dad's before me. He was from SPACE!" I dunno, it's just a real stupid, boneheaded move for a guy who's already well-established both in and outside of the WWE bubble.
And yes, I'm aware it's all for entertainment. It's not a REAL issue, which is why I'm dogging on it in wrestling thread and not protesting in the streets about it. But on a relative scale, it's worth criticizing.
Lol also pretending people’s “intelligence” is insulted for pointing out how dumb a decision it is. No one’s doubting Walter will be fine, but it’s objectively fudging stupid. No real way around that, sorry.
Helms is still the man though, he’s a good follow on Twitter. Gotta remember that he’s paid by WWE tho, and with all the releases, I’d tow the party line too.
I'm not disagreeing that it was a stupid decision, very few would. But way too many idiots on Twitter and elsewhere are legit mad about this and seem convinced the dude's career is ruined because of it. It's not. Walter is the type of dude where I don't care what they call him, his in-ring work can speak for itself.
One of the things I've tried doing is limit who I follow on Twitter that has a clear bias towards one promotion over another (with an exception of I follow an account that mocks AEW fanboys and to balance it out I follow an account that does the same for WWE fanboys, just to have some humor in my feed but I know not to take their opinions serious on anything).
Watch AEW last night pretty good in most aspects loved the Cassidy and Cole match the best didn’t catch last match ending with sting and Allen wrestling though
Pre show for The WRLD on GCW (pretty much GCW's first "WrestleMania") starts in a few minutes. Here's the full card. Omly $24 on Fite.tv... definitely gonna be worth it for anyone who's bored tonight.
Here's the card:
PRE-SHOW
Pabst Blue Ribbon 6 Way Scramble Match Alex Zayne vs. Dante Leon vs. Nick Wayne vs. Ninja Mack vs. Jack Cartwheel vs. Grim Reefer.
Pabst Blue Ribbon Kickoff Battle Royal Entrants: TBD
THE WRLD ON GCW MAIN SHOW
GCW World Championship Match Jon Moxley (c) vs. Homicide.
ROH Original World Championship Match Jonathan Gresham (c) vs. Blake Christian.
Open Challenge Match For The GCW World Tag Team Championships The Briscoes (Jay Briscoe & Mark Briscoe) (c) vs. Opponents TBD.
Grab The Brass Ring Ladder Match Winner Can Challenge For Any Title At Any Time Alex Colon vs. Tony Deppen vs. Lio Rush vs. Jimmy Lloyd vs. Jordan Oliver vs. PCO.
Singles Match Matt Cardona (w/Chelsea Green) vs. Joey Janela.
Singles Match Jeff Jarrett vs. Effy.
Singles Match Allie Katch vs. Ruby Soho.
6 Man Tag Team Match Bandido, Laredo Kid & ASF vs. Gringo Loco, Demonic Flamita & Arez.
PLUS: Appearances from Pollo del Mar, ‘Hoodfoot’ Mo Atlas, Cole Radrick, G-Raver, “Spyder” Nate Webb, Juicy Finau, Shane Mercer, Ruckus, Steve Scott, Psycho Clown, Dustin Thomas, B-Boy and more.
I decided to watch Royal Rumble 2002 just for the heck of it. I will never not pop when hearing Mr. Perfect's theme hit, and the fact he made it to the final 4 that year. Overall one of my favorite Rumbles of all time along with Rumble 2001 (probably nothing will top '92, but that's mostly just nostalgia talking).
Dunno if any of you keep up with NXT UK but next week will be Blair Davenport vs Meiko Satamuro for the NXT UK Womens title in a Japanese street fight. I'm looking forward to that.
2002 is one of the best Rumbles of all time, as is 1992. And honestly, 2020 ranks among the best too, with the early Lesnar domination, his elimination, Edge's return and McIntyre's win.
On WWE Network couldn't you just choose to watch individual matches when you searched for a show? I would gladly watch all of the past Rumble matches if I didn't have to fast forward through the rest of each show leading up to them on Peacock.
I'm really hoping Asuka returns and maybe Kairi being a surprise entrant. I know Kairi just opened up her own gym in Japan and is not interested in moving back to the US, but maybe she'd agree to a one off appearance.
Can't complain about drawing Rhia Ripley but no surprise with who WWE had win bot the men and women's rumble. WWE is pathetic, no wonder talent goes elsewhere.
> Can't complain about drawing Rhia Ripley but no surprise with who WWE had win bot
> the men and women's rumble. WWE is pathetic, no wonder talent goes elsewhere.
One of the worst RR I've seen in a while.. Woman's > Men's
Mens: No real surprises, crapty celebrity appearances, the Kofi botch and the last 5 guys remaining: Bad Bunny, Shane O'Mac, Riddle, Brock, McEntyre.. Really WWE?
The Edge/Miz match was lame as hell..
Brock/Lashey: Everyone saw the swerve coming as soon as the ref got bumped...
Even the women’s match was pretty dull IMO. Mickie James with Hardcore Country entrance was awesome….but they had to spoil it be announcing it before hand.
Reigns/Rollins was great but a crap ending to protect Rollins and make Reigns look weak. Shield entrance was a nice touch.
Also not sure why Lesnar needed to win the Rumble. Don’t rematch clauses still exist or did they drop that in their screwy universe logic where guys can just demand a title shot? Lesnar getting screwed already sets up that storyline. Should’ve let Big E or Drew win if the plan is for one of them to face Lashley.
I liked the Rollins/Reigns ending, helps continue the story between the two guys and it’s honestly one of the only good stories WWE has bothered to build.
> I liked the Rollins/Reigns ending, helps continue the story between the two guys
> and it’s honestly one of the only good stories WWE has bothered to build.
>
> Otherwise yah, pretty average show.
How do you see the story continuing? If Brock is facing Reigns at wrestlemania, does it just mean Rollins loses at the next PPV to Reigns or they'll visit the feud after wrestlemania?
To be fair, Brock has a built in story with both men already - we can't forget WrestleMania 31. I think either they keep Rollins in the mix and book a proper Triple Threat for Mania instead of an impromptu Cash-In Triple Threat. OR they simply treat it like all the best feuds in WWE's history - simply book the Rollins/Reigns rivalry the way they've done with several successful rivalries - book it as on/off feud while (hopefully) staying consistently good. Think Rock/Austin, Taker/Mankind, HBK/HHH, list goes on. All these rivalries are only so strong because they started, then stopped, then started again, then stopped, then started again. That way every time they hooked up, it was actually interesting and worth watching.
I think either of those could work but of course, WWE is certainly capable of absolutely destroying any good will they gain with fans so they could just poo poo all over it. Definitely a possibility.
Oof, I gotta disagree with "crapty celebrity appearances". I'll give you that for Johnny Knoxville, but I guess at least he got physical in there unlike Drew Carey 20 years ago. But Bad Bunny, gimme a break, the dude is in there bumping around as much as the actual full timers. I won't listen to his music but he got my respect after last year's WM appearance. He legit spent months training for that crap, it wasn't just him showing up for a payday or free publicity (as if he needs it). He raised the bar for what I expect when celebrities get booked in a high profile match.
I wanna know how Kofi's spot would've played out this year had he not botched it. These Rumble matches are planned out down to every little detail in advance, I'm glad they didn't just pretend both feet didn't hit the floor even though we clearly saw they did.
Supposedly there's a lot of heat on Shane O'Mac. Plans for the Rumble were changing throughout the day and he insisted he should be one of the last men eliminated. He had Seth Rollins in it at one point. Lots of people going to Vince to complain which lead to everything getting scrapped again.
@theJaw I can see them revisiting Rollins Reigns in the future, but I don't get why they even booked the last month the way they did.
Why put the Belt on Brock, only to lose at the rumble and then win the rumble? Brock already was feuding with Reigns and he didn't need to win the belt at Day 1.
If your theory is right, Rollins is going to disappear from the title picture/Reigns feud? It's honestly their best story line. I also don't want go see another triple threat main event. They've done this far too often and honestly diminishes the value of winning the rumble.
Same thing with Ronda Coming back. She didn't need to win. Have her show up after Becky's match, then have her tear down the wens division leading up to mania and basically forcing a match. Have someone else win the rumble to actually build another wrestler up.
I think everyone is sick of seeing the same handful of guys going after main championships over and over again... Reigns, Rollins, Lesner, Lashey, Big E.. give us some new blood already.. it's getting stale IMO..
> I think everyone is sick of seeing the same handful of guys going after main championships
> over and over again... Reigns, Rollins, Lesner, Lashey, Big E.. give us some new
> blood already.. it's getting stale IMO..
I agree with that (except for maybe Big E). But yeah, the Rumble match itself needs to be booked differently, imo. I want the winner to be someone that hasn't already had multiple world title runs in the past. This match needs to be used to elevate someone new, or else it feels pointless. They have a year to decide on one talent that hasn't been to the main event yet but that people can get behind.
Of the last 5 Rumble winners: Brock Lesnar, Edge, Drew McIntyre, Seth Rollins, Shinsuke Nakamura. I'd argue that Seth, Edge and Brock did not need those wins. It just doesn't feel as special to see someone get a guaranteed title shot for a title they've already held multiple times. Nakamura's win was special (though how they booked him after that wasn't). Drew's was too, even if you saw it coming a mile away. Riddle was (allegedly) supposed to have won this year's and I'd have preferred that over Brock.
> Supposedly there's a lot of heat on Shane O'Mac.
It must've been true. He's gone from the company. I guess it could've been a combination of how he booked the Rumble and the utter flop that Raw Underground turned out to be, maybe Vince thinks he's got nothing to offer on the creative side of things.
As much as i been chirping at wwe for various things
vince did the right by letting shane go
in wrestling business especially when vince is involved if there is backstage heat from individuals more times than not they will be let go.
However what gave Shane the right to put his ego power in play to try and get attention when he was booking, I mean he been gone for how many years now before coming back.
The raw underground was a failure if the company wanted to showcase talent just stick to the old NXT before NXT 2.0
> Brian Kendrick vs Jon Moxley tomorrow on Dynamite. I'm looking forward to that.
Welp, that match isn't happening. An old video from 2011 has resurfaced of Brian Kendrick saying some really stupid crap. Tony Khan has removed him from tonight's card.
Yah saw that. No loss. Great talent in ring but I’m fine with not giving anti Semitic folks work. Didn’t realize he was like that. I have the shoot DVD he and London did years ago and he seemed cool enough then. Oh well.
Looking forward to see if they can pull out a surprise replacement or if they’re gonna give the spot to a roster member.
Damn Mox vs. Yuta was great, glad they gave it to a dude who could use some legit spotlight. Great showing from Yuta. And the combo of Orange Cassidy & Danhausen at ringside is never going to be a bad thing in my eyes.
Chyna vs. Chono. Took until today for me to find out Chyna worked Japan intergender matches (also worked Tanahashi and a few others). Pretty fudgein stiff. Not a classic or anything but definitely makes me appreciate her more, very much an underappreciated wrestler.
> I mean why leave something you help create and now you want to be in wwe again
I doubt it was completely his choice. If reports are to be believed, there has been friction between Cody and the other EVPs for months now, and Tony Khan also came out recently and said "with all these great wrestlers joining, I won't be able to renew every contract". Even Cody has come out and said that they're not as tight as they used to be. Feel like this all sorta stems from that stuff.
If he's not getting along with them as well as he once did, WWE is really the only other option to provide for his family with a paycheck anywhere near what he's been making, so you can't really fault him. I don't have faith WWE will book him well, but he'll probably get a nice little program or two at the start. That is, if he even goes to WWE - we still don't know.
Also wouldn't surprise me whatsoever if this is all just a work.
205 Live is dead. Tonight begins that spin-off show for NXT they were planning before the pandemic ruined everything. NXT: Level Up is being taped tonight.
It should have been nuked a long time ago when half the remaining cruiserweight roster was let go. For like the past 6 months the show no longer was just about cruiserweights anymore, they should have renamed it even if just temporarily.
Looks like WWE is doing a Saturday Night's Main Event in April. But no mention on if it's going to be televised or streaming on Peacock, or just a specially branded house show. https://www.wwe.com/saturday-nights-main-event-0
My 4 year old wrestled his first 2 matches last weekend. He went 1-1. The point is, after his loss, he stopped to raise a hand to the crowd like he just lost a loser retires match. He had this solemn look on is face and addressed all four sides of the arena haha. It was epic. He held the crowd in the palm of his hand for about 5 minutes haha.
So what are the odds lesnar wins vs reigns at wrestle mania. I smell a rat theory where lesnar wins but by disqualification of heyman helping him. Maybe I wrong but I don’t see the heavyweight belts being unified at this point
I'd say in all likelihood, Lesnar will win. WWE has made it clear they don't care to build new stars when it comes to moving the title from one guy to the other so they aren't saving a Reigns loss for that, and Brock has been built as a mega-face in this feud so it'd make sense for him to be the one to end Reigns' super long title reign.
That said, it SHOULD be Reigns. They should stick to Reigns until this "Head of the Table" shtick wears off and they've done a surprisingly good job of keeping it strong since he returned as a heel.
Desperately hoping for a reunion with Chris Hero (formerly Kassius Ohno for you WWE folks) so they can once again be one of my top 5 favorite tag teams, Kings of Wrestling. Their ROH run in 2010-2011 is thing of legend imo.
Vince is going to be on Pat McAfees show and there's a rumor they're going to have a match at WrestleMania. lol I want to see this happen actually. lol
I like Pat, but I don't know if he's capable of leading Vince at his current age through anything more than a 5 minute comedy match. If anything maybe he could set up something with Austin Theory, even though they're on different brands we know WWE only cares about that when it's convenient to them.
WWE is promoting the Lesnar/Reigns match as a unification match now, so brands may not even matter at this point unless they just plan on having the unified champ show up on both shows.
Tbh I always wanted that to be the case over the "two world champions" thing. If someone's the world champion, have them be THE world champion and work programs on both shows, brands or not.
Yes, the one Undisputed champion was the way to go. I liked that about the tag team titles too back in the original brand split, but especially now it's not like they really have enough tag teams to really justify two separate titles.
But if that is what they end up doing, I don't expect Brock to win. He's on a limited schedule (even though for the past few months you almost wouldn't know that) so it might be asking too much out of him to have him be on both shows defending the title, unless he drops it the next month at Backlash.
BTE has made silly jokes about Cody's "departure" for like 3 weeks now. Makes me feel like this whole thing is a work big time. This week the Bucks shot footage in front of WWE headquarters in Stamford and then Tony Schiavone "interviewed" for the EVP job, and last week the Young Bucks had an intro where they were misdirecting the viewers into thinking that they were going to talk about Cody leaving but it was really all about the airlines losing Matt Jackson's shoes lol. Then Cutler is like "this isn't about Cody?" and they ask "what's going on with Cody?"
Like... obviously anything could happen, but these videos seem to confirm that the Bucks and Cody are at least still on joking terms, and it seems like a weird thing to do if Cody was really going to WWE. But we'll see how it pans out.
Found the Walmart exclusive Sting figure today just chilling, sweet!
Things I'm randomly thinking about lately, and I say this as an AEW mark. I love Page, was there for his win at Full Gear, it was one of the best storyline culminations. HOWEVER, things seem like they simmered since then. We don't see him doing much every week, he did have the fun matches with Danielson, he did beat Archer, and he's got Cole coming up, but compared to Jericho/Mox/Omega, the "World Title" feels a little less....visible? Maybe I'm just being picky.
The Mox/Danielson angle has been so cool, really love the promos and the build up. Moxley is on another level back, sober. Also, Jade has grown on me quite a bit. Yeah her matches aren't too clean, but I'm giving her the benefit of the doubt there. She's improving every week, she's got the goods for the long haul I think. Wardlow? Is he going to be a superstar? Is this a flash in the pan popularity? How can AEW manage to get both him and Keith Lee over in that ladder match at Revolution? Just fun random things I've been thinking about. Also- MJF got me hooked on using the word "Mid" for a lot of things for fun
So to be fair, the AEW World title, even on Jericho/Mox/Omega, never consistently "headlined" shows other than the PPVs. So when it shows up midway through a Dynamite, it's to be expected. Imo it's just that Hangman is the least "proven" of the 4 AEW World champs so far, you know? Like... he's the first "homegrown" guy to win that title... dude never even won the ROH World title. So their treatment of the AEW World title, which has never been as "spotlighty" as it could have been, sort of does a disservice to Page. He's still putting on incredible matches (better than any Jericho or Mox had as champ tbh), but they now need to shift to making the World title storylines THEEEEE storylines, you know?
Otherwise: -Mox/Danielson is prob the most interesting thing on the show right now. I do like the Page/Cole (and all the Elite) stuff too. Mox is looking great out there. -Jade rules. Took her a while, but she OWNS the spotlight when she's out there even if she's not as good in-ring as she's DEFINITELY going to be. -Wardlow is well on his way for sure. The pop when he finally turns on MJF (Revolution?) is going to be insane. If he's just a flash in the pan right now, they can ignite that flash into a full-on superstar explosion if they play their cards right. -As much as my gut reaction tells me otherwise, Wardlow doesn't need that ladder match win more than Keith Lee. Give Lee the "brass ring" and build him that way, get him back to the superstar status we all know he should be at right away. Meanwhile keep letting Wardlow simmer until the natural status he'll gain from the story they've been building with MJF. -And MJF fudging rules haha
> So to be fair, the AEW World title, even on Jericho/Mox/Omega, never consistently
> "headlined" shows other than the PPVs. So when it shows up midway through a Dynamite,
> it's to be expected. Imo it's just that Hangman is the least "proven" of the 4 AEW
> World champs so far, you know? Like... he's the first "homegrown" guy to win that
> title... dude never even won the ROH World title. So their treatment of the AEW World
> title, which has never been as "spotlighty" as it could have been, sort of does a
> disservice to Page. He's still putting on incredible matches (better than any Jericho
> or Mox had as champ tbh), but they now need to shift to making the World title storylines
> THEEEEE storylines, you know?
>
> Otherwise:
> -Mox/Danielson is prob the most interesting thing on the show right now. I do like
> the Page/Cole (and all the Elite) stuff too. Mox is looking great out there.
> -Jade rules. Took her a while, but she OWNS the spotlight when she's out there even
> if she's not as good in-ring as she's DEFINITELY going to be.
> -Wardlow is well on his way for sure. The pop when he finally turns on MJF (Revolution?)
> is going to be insane. If he's just a flash in the pan right now, they can ignite
> that flash into a full-on superstar explosion if they play their cards right.
> -As much as my gut reaction tells me otherwise, Wardlow doesn't need that ladder
> match win more than Keith Lee. Give Lee the "brass ring" and build him that way,
> get him back to the superstar status we all know he should be at right away. Meanwhile
> keep letting Wardlow simmer until the natural status he'll gain from the story they've
> been building with MJF.
> -And MJF fudging rules haha
Good points, I think I was just so used to seeing Kenny out there almost weekly, or at least it seemed that way. Not necessarily wrestling, but always popping up, walking out, whatever it is. Maybe I got spoiled by Kenny, but yeah it is good to share the TV time when the roster is jam packed. When Page is out there, he's on point.
Also- I think I saw a list of top 10 AEW matches of 2021, and Pac was in a good percentage of them lol, the dude can wrestle
Edit- and back on Wardlow, the BOO's when Spears told him NO MORE POWER BOMBS! was epic. Wardlow gets some of the biggest crowd reactions right now, totally deserves it too.
@akfa Hell yah, they are teasing the crowd SO well with Wardlow right now. Spears is doing a lot to help that out too... every time he comes in to "steal the spotlight" and hit a dude Wardlow just destroyed with a chair is genius, with Wardlow's "dude wtf" reaction each time. It's going to be so satisfying to see him murder the Pinnacle lol
PAC should be world champ anywhere he goes. I honestly don't expect him to win the AEW title any time soon but if there's one dude I'd say is underrated in all of wrestling, it's PAC. I still remember the match I saw with him vs. Matt Sydal on a UK ROH card that fudgein blew me away. He's only gotten better.
Also, Page is on the show consistently, but admittedly they haven't made the title programs the centerpiece of the shows the way they did with Omega. On that note, I agree they need to step it up. Page is legit one of the top 10 in the world right now, and they need to show that off more. Going back to my own experiences, I watched Adam Page vs. Frankie Kazarian in a BRUTAL strap match live when ROH came to my area for Best in the World 2017 (also witnessed Cody win the ROH title that night), and my god, Page was untouchable on that card. He is such a great wrestler and AEW did great with him up to this point, and is still doing right by him, but they definitely do need to add a little extra "oomph" to his reign. I think this feud with Cole is designed to do exactly that.
Vince on The Pat McAfee show today (slight delay, Vince is still on his way to the studio). I have a feeling it ends in a blowup, because none of Vince's yes men can tell him Adam Cole already did that. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oFjMuAiFiZ4
lol yah. Not watching but this is likely gonna lead toward a Mania angle... just hope they give Vince a proxy like Austin Theory or something. McMahon should 100% not be wrestling in 2022.
Also WWE terminated its agreement with its Russian broadcaster today. I'd like to praise this decision, but it's likely just due to the US sanctions. If Vince gave a fudge about injustices, he wouldn't be accepting money from a government who has been waging war with Yemen for like 7 years.
Still, it's the correct move. Unfortunately, the sect of the Russian population who believe nothing is the matter because their government control the narrative will likely start to figure crap out a lot quicker when they realize the rest of the planet is just about done doing business with Russia at the moment.
Some buzz going around that Cody Rhodes is going to spearhead ROH, some assuming as the "figurehead" or as just one of the top guys as presented on TV.
If so, not only could they pull off the "two brands blatantly owned by the same entity" situation that WWE originally wanted when they acquired WCW (that then ultimately turned into Raw vs Smackdown), but they would have also pulled off one of the most wild works of all time.
Apparently internal sources at WWE leaked that up until Dynamite aired, they believed Tony Khan had only bought a Japanese tape library that wasn't NJPW, and that they were caught off guard when the announcement was made. There have been some claims lately that WWE wanted the ROH tape library to help create documentaries for stars like Rollins, Owens, Zayn, etc. If AEW/ROH/Khan orchestrated this whole Cody Rhodes thing as a work, and have it tie into the ROH situation... that'd be legendary.
This is just stuff that I've seen theorized about with Sean Ross Sapp sort of playing into it with a cryptic tweet, so who knows what the actual plan is... but this would be wild.
Yeah, I read Cody and possibly Regal being put in charge of ROH and that it'd be used almost like AEW's version of NXT or something like that. I wonder if they will take advantage of the Honor Club service
https://tkag3000.com Tony Khan Announcement Generator 3000 Are you Tony Khan? Are you in need of an announcement for tonight's show? Well worry not! With our patented 'Tony Khan Announcement Generator 3000' you can now generate announcements at the click of a button!
In an announcement that WON called 'The most, um...shocking announcement I've ever heard. This changes everything. Wrestling will NEVER be the same after this.', Tony Khan announced that Ryback is All Elite! Fans embrace in the crowd as this is truly an emotional moment.
Was browsing through YouTube last night and this popped up in my recommendations. I had never heard of this game before. Even with how bad it looks, I still kind of want to play it just to say I did.
@PizzaTheHutt check out this book “Wrestling with Pixels”. I dunno if the color version is available in print anymore (it was a kickstarter) but it is available digitally/on Kindle.
There are tons of games I’ve never heard of in there, pretty fun read.
So is Sting now the best in-ring performer in their 60s ever? I am trying to remember decent matches from guys in their 60s and I can't think of any. I wouldn't be surprised if either of the Funks, Jerry Lawler or Bob Orton has better matches, but anyone else that age I can recall actually seeing was awful.
He might be. I know back in 2009 Ricky Steamboat had a good match with Chris Jericho, but I don't know if he was in his 60s at the time, maybe mid-to-late 50s. The match itself was pretty safe though, Jericho protected Steamboat well and Steamboat knew his limits and that this wasn't the 80s anymore. After that he even worked around 15 more matches at house shows that as far as I know have never aired anywhere.
Yeah Steamboat was in his 50s when that happened. So I suppose Sting is the best now. Terry Funk had some decent outings in his old age but was super limited for obvious reasons, Sting seems to move much more fluidly.
Sammy/Scorpio was great. To theorize on the Wardlow/MJF thing, I know Wardlow said he didn't want to waste any more energy on MJF, but I expect MJF to screw Wardlow out of his TNT Title match next week (considering Scorpio just won it). I don't see AEW making Scorpio a one-week transitional champ and even though Wardlow won the ladder match at Revolution, I think MJF screwing him over would be the right move. I expect it to be a straight up DQ... MJF (and maybe Shawn Spears too) storms the ring with a chair and just blasts him to make the ref call for the bell. That way you keep the strap on Scorpio but also give a good reason for Wardlow to want another TNT title shot down the line. That's how I'd do it at least.
I liked seeing Jeff, and I LOVED that he came out to the old school WWF Hardy Boyz theme, but it makes him look a little silly that Sting and Darby came out first. Why wouldn't he have run out earlier?
That Jericho split was great. Tony Khan mentioned that when Omega returned, he's liable to start up a Trios title division. I imagine this was a good way to create a trios with Kingston, Santana & Ortiz for whenever those titles show up. Meanwhile Jericho and Hager will probably eventually enter the tag title scene now that bigger stars like Danielson and Mox are getting thrown in there too. Really seems like AEW are starting to build their tag division as another "main event" division, which has always seemed like their plan.
The Jericho part really threw me for a loop (love when that happens), when 2.0 was attacking but mostly leaving him alone I was like, "why are they so gentle with Chris?".
Side note- Chris looks freaking amazing. He's really obviously gotten pretty dedicated with his diet, he looks 5-10 years younger.
I'm very happy to be in Wardlows World. He killed that promo. Love this dude.
They did a good job of establishing Jericho's "neck injury", so 2.0/Garcia would only focus on him a bit cause he was already "hurt", and focus their attention on Eddie. Obv that was just a set up and all but I thought it was a nice little detail... sorta like "we need to focus on the healthier guy, don't worry about him", but then obviously it made sense why that was really happening.
And yah Wardlow can talk, whoda thunk it? Big fan of that dude.
He broke his neck, posted a video to Twitter about it. He can move all his fingers and he says he still has the strength, but the doctors tell him he broke his neck. That sucksss.
He posted another video today saying that 2 cervical vertebrae were fractured but that there was no damage to his spinal cord and no need for surgery. So pretty much a bone break that can heal back to normal more-or-less as long as it's not fudgeed with. About as lucky a break as one can get in that situation, thankfully.
So heck, who knows? Maybe he can be back by the Rumble.
Welp, now according to Fightful, an experienced doctor has gone over Big E's neck injury and says it "should be career ending". So that's a fudging bummer, but no one seems to be sure at this point.
I actually turned off the stream off halfway through this Edge promo and didn't watch the rest of the show.
These types of promos of "longtime babyface turns heel and cuts a promo insulting and/or blaming it on the fans" is so f'n played out and I didn't want to sit through another one. It's been done hundreds of times before and been done better. I kinda feel the same about Eddie Edwards' recent heel turn too.
I at least appreciate that they're trying something different with Edge, even if it's not hitting home for me perfectly. It would have been very WWE (aka very easy) to just keep him the "Cinderella story" face for the rest of his career.
But that new "you think you know me" intro is corny and the song itself isn't anywhere near as memorable as his other. But I suppose that's the point, strip the heel of anything the fans would cheer for.
Definitely looks weird but could be a lot of fun. I'll give it a go, neat concept.
Tbh I'd like a pro wrestling RPG that isn't as "glamoured" up as that and treated as a legit story, and maybe without the real life legends, but whatev. I'll take what I can get.
25 years ago today, the promo that I credit as launching the Attitude Era. This promo was one of those moments I'll never forget since the night it happened. It was so unlike the type of promo you'd expect from Bret and was one of the first moments to make me question "surely this can't be scripted, there's no way they could get permission to let him speak like that and not bleep it out". Ironically though, one of my pet peeves is when wrestlers curse in their promos just for the sake of it and with no purpose behind it. Like, I feel this promo means a heck of a lot more than majority of the ones in old ECW where it felt like they were overusing profanity just to be edgy. https://twitter.com/OTD_in_WWE/status/150445543338...
Mike Johnson is saying Cody and WWE have come to an agreement. I hope it was no more than like a 3 year deal or something. I never was a big fan of him, though I also don't dislike him or anything. If the whole AEW thing never happened he never would've made it out of their midcard, but hopefully he gets better treatment now.
Been following this Cody stuff for a few weeks now so I was expecting that. The reported plan is to have Rhodes vs. Rollins at Mania.
Been a fan of Rhodes since the Legacy days, dug the NJPW/indie run he went on, got to see him win the ROH title live in Plymouth MA, and thought his absolute best work was in AEW.
That said, I truly don't have faith that WWE will keep him "on top", or even all that relevant, but it at least gives me a reason to watch WWE (which have become few and far between). It just seems like unless you're one of the World/Universal title picture mainstays like Brock or Roman, you're likely to just be thrown around to random spots on the card with no real chance to build momentum. Most of WWE's on-air roster seem to just be going through the motions, with the common "main eventers" seeming to be the only ones who ever have any actual direction (and even then it's slight). I hope they use him correctly, but I don't expect them to for any extended period of time.
Inb4 Rhodes loses to Rollins at Mania. If they put Triple H over fudging Sting, I wouldn't be surprised whatsoever. WWE loves to "bury" the competition, even if, in Sting's case, that competition hasn't existed in 20 years.
Pretty neat find, WWF Super Slams ripped from VHS to DVD. It's a burned Region 2 (UK) DVD but I mainly snagged it due to the packaging. I used to own this VHS when I was a kid and vividly remember the box and the nice professionally-printed recreation DVD label here is a nice touch. The tape itself was a compilation of matches filmed from various different shows, which seems so strange in hindsight but I never minded it back in the day. I know they'll never re-release this as an actual DVD and it's not on Peacock's WWF Coliseum Video section, so I don't mind a burned disc given the packaging. I don't have a VHS player, but do have a means of playing Region 2 DVDs, so I figured this was worth the $9 left on a Visa gift card that it cost me.
I had a similar VHS as a kid that featured Jarrett vs. Razor in a singles match, but I can't find any evidence of its existence for the life of me. Starting to think I just made it up.
I had such a great time at Dynamite last week in San Antonio! The crowd was awesome! Wrestling is so much fun.
As far as Cody goes, the more time has went on after he left AEW, it makes sense that he's going to WWE. Legacy is a big part of his career obviously, and if AEW isn't going to pursue the all out war that he supposedly wanted, then it makes more sense for him to make even more of a history with the storied Rhodes name. No hate from me, nothing but respect for the guy, and I hope he can finally do in WWE what he probably always wanted to. As it is right now, if his career ended, his time in WWE wouldn't be all that great, so maybe he sees this as a chance to right that wrong, and has the ability/power to influence that a little bit. Best of luck to him, I hope that happens!
can't wait to watch dynamite tomorrow as i was busy last week and couldn't watch ir.
@theJaw -you called it correctly MJF interfering in the match. To be honest i had that gut feeling as well. Very rare to have a championship switch hands on consecutive nights for a major title.
I dont call the wwe 24/7 title a real title. To me its just a comedy skit booking to break the staleness of the shows.
> I dont call the wwe 24/7 title a real title. To me its just a comedy skit booking
> to break the staleness of the shows.
Yeah, that 24/7 Championship turned out to be nothing like what I thought it'd be. When they announced the 24/7 title three years ago I think I had posted in here what I thought it would be used for was mostly for house shows because pre-pandemic house show attendance was pretty low for a little while there and I think part of that has to do with people knowing the odds of seeing a title change hands at a house are very low (especially if it's not MSG) and I thought this would be used to change that and add a little humor to the shows. Instead it doesn't even get defended at house shows, and most of the title changes happen in pre-recorded segments or on skits that end up on YouTube.
24/7 title consistently makes up the majority of the most obnoxious segments on WWE TV from what I've seen. It's really time to drop it... but I suppose it does get folks unlikely to get a spot otherwise on the show so, whatev I suppose.
What do you guys think of Ric Flair's recent comments?
“Bryan Danielson is no AJ Styles. Not even close. Bryan Danielson is very good but he’s no AJ Styles. C’mon. It’s a big stretch to say Danielson is in any way better than AJ Styles.”
I feel like the two of them are at totally opposite points in their career. Daniel Bryan was not ready to "settle down" so to speak and he's on a second wind right now. I feel AJ Styles, while certainly has had some good matches in his WWE run, I feel like he signed with them to wind down. Nothing in his WWE run has blown me away and I've been saying for years that for the casual fans that never seen him before his Royal Rumble debut, they don't know what he was once capable of and probably think he's overrated when people talk about his past accomplishments.
Okay is wardlow taking time off or is AEW trying to be the new wwe fudging their talent His booking is ridiculous . MJF keeps him from winning a title to proceed with a possible. Then all of last night MJF fires him but only to pay him to keep away from the ring
Gotta be Honest aew is starting to fall in the trap wwe is in, Granted the other parts of dynamite was okay. I missed the latter half hour at best
Speaking of wwe the same ole no this match belongs on this day not this day has McMahon grubby little hands on it
@lazarro It's a story line, you don't really think Wardlow is gonna stay home right? Also, to be fair, it isn't necessarily "fudging their talent" to have them sit out a week or two. Distance makes the heart grow fonder and if Wardlow does miss an episode of Dynamite or two, it'll only make the crowd's reaction when he randomly shows up that much more memorable.
> I assume it’s leading to a match where Wardlow earns his freedom from MJF. Kinda
> like that storyline WWE did with Shawn Michaels and JBL.
Definitely gonna be something like this. Either way, the MJF/Wardlow feud is now well under way, MJF having him escorted out of the arena is just the first step in it. After all, McMahon used to have Austin "arrested" and carted off Raw like every 2 weeks, so there's a precedence in the world of wrestling for these things haha
Yeah once Wardlow gets to powerbomb him, the crowd is going to go INSANE! Then he's going to powerbomb him like ten times while the crowd chants one more time. Going to be so sweet when the payoff hits
I enjoy what he did with NXT and if I could personally thank him for that I would. But I'm not too sad that he's retiring. Not to sound like a dick, but I kind of wish it would have happened a long time ago (he hasn't wrestled since 2019 anyway, and it was at a house show in Japan). Lets just say it has been a long time since I've looked forward to a Triple H match.
I'm happy he retired as now there will be no more obligatory "Triple H match" at every single big event (they haven't been super interesting for years), but I'm very unhappy for the circumstances he had to retire because a "Triple H match" every ONCE IN A WHILE could be fun. Just a bummer to be forced into that situation due to a health scare, but as long as he keeps healthy, that's all that really matters. He was a great wrestler for a time, an awesome heel for years, and had a heck of a career - even if he was apparently pretty douchey for a fair amount of that career. I'll miss his work to an extent, honestly.
Not counting his true final matches (both occurring on house shows), his final 3 TELEVISED matches (all PPVs) were:
Triple H & Shawn Michaels vs. Undertaker & Kane (Crown Jewel) Triple H vs. Batista (WrestleMania 35) Triple H vs. Randy Orton (Super ShowDown)
Varying degrees of match quality aside, the wrestlers involved in those 3 matches sure are fitting for the final matches of Triple H's career. All of them had pretty profound impacts on Triple H's career & vice versa. Kane to a lesser extent, but even he was involved in the angle at WrestleMania XV that kickstarted the heel run that would project Triple H to the WWE title scene, & Triple H was also the guy Kane lost his mask to (& yeah, there's the Katie Vick crap too). All in all, couldn't think of 5 other dudes who would make more sense to end Triple H's career, even if the circumstances weren't always the best (lookin' at you, Crown Jewel).
I'm glad he kept himself out of the limelight and didn't force himself into any matches involving NXT. But on the other hand, I think it should've been done at one point. I don't know with who (maybe it could've worked with Ciampa since he stayed loyal even though he apparently didn't want to go to the main roster) but putting over someone just before they head to main roster would've meant something.
So many of the people that passed through NXT are paying respect on Twitter, including guys like Regal.
edit: Everyone except Ryback apparently. But he's a piece of crap anyway.
Anyhow I’ll be watching NXT & the HOF after their live broadcasts on Friday because I’m 100% opting to check out ROH’s return show, Supercard of Honor XV. First ROH show booked by Tony Khan since he bought the company, and he (as usual) promises a surprise or two. On top of this already impressive card, the possibility of seeing ROH legends like Punk, Danielson, Daniels, or even Samoa Joe himself back in an ROH ring are high. Worth the watch for that alone, but this card is also pretty nice.
ROH World Title Unification Match Jonathan Gresham (c) vs. Bandido (c)
ROH Pure Title Match Josh Woods (c) vs. Wheeler YUTA
ROH World Tag Team Title Match The Briscoes (Jay Briscoe & Mark Briscoe) (c) vs. FTR (Cash Wheeler & Dax Harwood)
Singles Match SW3RVE vs. Alex Zayne
Singles Match Jay Lethal vs. Lee Moriarty (w/Matt Sydal)
Interesting quote from Meltzer because there's been some talk about Cody possibly backing out of his match at WrestleMania.
“Depending on who it is, it better be somebody good because…everyone expects it [Cody Rhodes] and they kind of have to deliver it I suppose. If it’s not him, it’s his choosing, it’s not theirs. They believe it’s him. They believe that’s the guy. If for whatever reason he backs out because he’s going to back out, I don’t expect that to happen, but I know people close to him who do so what the hell. We’ll have to see how it plays out.”
On the other hand, WWE did just release new Dusty Rhodes merch.
Any of you guys mess with Pro Wrestling TV? I've downloaded it but haven't checked anything out yet. It's supposed to offer lots of content for free (ad-supported). It can be watched via your web browser: https://video.prowrestlingtv.live
Neat @PizzaTheHutt I’ll definitely give that a look.
Meanwhile - fudging let’s gooooo, Samoa Joe is back in ROH! So amped, Supercard of Honor XV was legit a great show. Bandito vs Gresham was a masterclass, Yuta vs Woods was great, and FTR vs Briscoes was a legit 5-star. Awesome, awesome show.
Anyone watch the WWE "Evil" mini-series on Peacock? I haven't watched pro wrestling since the Attitude Era but I really enjoyed that series. I had no idea Roman Reigns had gone through so much with cancer outside the ring and also how much the fans hate him. I also found Ric Flair's story interesting as he really "lived the lifestyle" he portrayed in the ring.
FTR vs. Young Bucks from Dynamite is an AEW Match of the Year contender. Incredible.
Topped this past week only by FTR vs. The Briscoes from ROH Supercard of Honor a few days earlier, which is just a Match of the Year contender in general.
FTR are putting out the best work of their entire career. 2 incredible matches within a 5 day span. If you're sleeping on them, pls don't.
He got injured a while back but returned briefly to wrestle Danielson in a tournament way back in October I think (when I believe Orange Cassidy got hurt, but can't remember). He's been nursing his injury for a bit but he just re-signed with AEW at the beginning of March so I expect he'll be back soon.
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