@BucketofJustice Yeah, I just disagree entirely on literally everything you said other than they could have built up this match a little earlier. But yah, otherwise I just don't agree with you. But it's pointless to argue wrestling these days. All subjective, we all have what we dig and don't dig.
I agree with that. Nothing will suit everyone, but I'm glad there's so much of it out there. Also, there's always good in the bad stuff and bad in the good stuff. It's all perspective.
Pretty cool video. Rockstar wanted to make an ECW game, but they just needed to wait for Grand Theft Auto to take off because they knew it was gonna be a hit. Unfortunately ECW couldn't wait and Acclaim approached them and already had the money to offer. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C3S_JgpYFIk
Allegedly, Vince wants to return to WWE, thinking he got bad advice from people when the scandals came out and everything would've blown over if he stayed. I hope he stays the hell away. WWE has been so much better without him. Also, new allegations and a lawsuit from a returning allegation happened... so I hope his genetic jackhammer keeps him busy forever and he can't come back.
Vince McMahon coming back, even if he didn't undo all of the changes Triple H made for the better in his absence, just might be enough to get me to stop watching. The company's stock dropped just from that news yesterday, and it hadn't even been confirmed yet, that should be all it takes to tell you he's not wanted anymore.
Tony Khan is probably breathing a sigh of relief at that news.
This has to be great news for Tony Khan. AEW has great matches, but crap booking and it's been that way for most of this year. Great matches is always a good thing, but if it was the most important thing then RoH would've been flourishing for years and wouldn't have been sold off twice and we wouldn't have had to suffer through Chris Jericho: the Ocho. Tony needs to delegate a little bit more, and not delegate to his EVPs.
If Vince returns, and I don't know the law or anything but the amount of stock he still has leads me to think he can do whatever he wants, that company is in so much hot water. I'd also imagine the SEC would also get all up in that ass about it as well.
Mandy Rose getting released is some bullcrap, if you ask me.
Allegedly Mandy had been asking for her release for a while and wants to get out of the business. She most likely took a significant pay cut when sent down to NXT last year because she was unwilling to get vaccinated when the company was allowed to start hitting the road again and I guess she thought this was an easy way to recover some of that.
Do I have someone blocked in here? Or am I just missing the context as to why Vince not returning to WWE would be a relief to Khan? Admittedly feel like I'm missing something, cause I feel like Khan would relish in the infamously out-of-touch McMahon returning to WWE.
Meanwhile, I am gonna touch on the "crap booking" criticism for a sec. Obviously not intended to be an argument, I just type too much. But to be fair, ROH didn't flourish because they never got the backing to allow for that. Sinclair Broadcasting did nothing with the brand, so brand awareness was bottom of the barrel. It was a mistake to sell to them back in 2011. There's a reason Khan promoting the brand on a legitimate TV network has resulted in the 3 most-watched/ordered and most-attended ROH shows in the company's history. They were never going to receive a legitimate TV deal based on that alone, but I just don't agree that their reliance on great wrestling is the reason it didn't reach its potential. AEW's ratings and buyrates have either grown or stayed steady over their few years on TV, and WBD have praised its performance several times - so they're in no trouble, and have only reached the level they're at based mostly on great matches as opposed to consistently spectacular booking. I only mention all that because I enjoyed Jericho's ROH title run and the various ROH segments that'd pop up on AEW TV. In fact, I have no idea why people are so adverse to it - if Khan had never bought the ROH brand, we'd still have the same roster, same matches, mostly same stories. The general wrestling style didn't change, so it really is just the fact that the three letters "ROH" appear on programming and I'm not entirely sure what the issue is there, but folks have criticized it so oh well. Either way, I don't feel there is any true way to measure the quality of Tony Khan's booking in any objective way unless they start hemorrhaging their audience as opposed to growing it - so I don't think he NEEDS to start delegating right now (but totally respect anyone who feels otherwise). I mean, I wouldn't MIND seeing him delegate to other bookers, but I also don't have any HUGE issues with his booking thus far so can't say I'd care either way. I at least appreciate that he either nixes or vastly changes angles that aren't connecting with audiences.
All that said, enough folks have been critical of 2022 AEW so I may be in the minority here, I just don't feel they're in "creatively bankrupt" territory or are in any danger of overall failure.
ANYHOW, I'd also be pretty shocked if McMahon returned to WWE and really, really, really hope that doesn't happen. WWE is still working its way out of what actually WAS a creatively bankrupt era and I'd hate to seem them dip back into it. Also Mandy Rose getting released for being naked on the internet is a little goofy. I mean, I get the reason they did it, but don't feel it should be a fire-able offense in the first place. If she wanted out of her contract, more power to her, but in a world where the Usos can drive drunk and still be awarded title after title, this seems like a silly reason to terminate somebody.
This old debate again, WCW/nWo Revenge vs WWF No Mercy. Who ya got? Personally I haven't played either in a long time, but I can't recall Revenge doing anything better than No Mercy, feature or gameplay-wise. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yusGhCkQ6jc
Yea I think gameplay wise No Mercy wins hands down. It really comes down to what roster do you want to play with. I loved (love) them both. Such good memories with WCW vs NWO World Tour. I called around to every babbages/kaybe toys in the Charlotte area trying to find one in stock. Spent $85 on it and assuredly got my moneys worth with how much I played it.
Edit: really hope this AEW game lives up to my hype and brings back this classic wrestling gameplay style
I love both. I had more fun with friends when we played Revenge. No Mercy was a better game, in my opinion. Revenge will win for me now, and maybe later when my mood is different No Mercy may win.
I think AEW's game will be a decent foundation, but it won't be very good. Kind of like TNA had a solid foundation with their first game, and hopefully AEW will get to build on it where TNA was unable to.
Also: I played way more WCW/nWo Revenge as a kid than No Mercy for some reason. I was always a WWF kid back then, so maybe Revenge was just available at my local rental spot. But I love that game and for nostalgia purposes alone, I'd probably choose Revenge.
I remember very vividly thinking it was weird how up to date the game was for the time it was released. It released in October 1998 (yep, I googled it) and it had the Wolfpac and Sting had the red and black and they had Wolfpac gear for Macho Man and I think Goldberg was even the World Champion.
WWF War zone had guys in it that weren't there for like 8 months before it came out. Apparently Acclaim devs fought to keep them in when WWF wanted them out (for obvious reasons). That game was great for its time, but everything they did from Attitude to Legends of Wrestling was bad. I really... really... really wanted that series to work. Those games all felt like a good foundation for something grander, but never got to realize 1% of that potential.
Guess AEW is doing their first show here in Seattle next week. Want to go but kids don’t get out of school till 3:40 and the show starts at 4pm, assume to hit the east coast live at 7
I soured on No Mercy because I had one of the glitched carts that deleted your single player progress. It also have pretty bad slowdown in some instances.
WWE could not have presented a more boring episode of Raw if they actively tried. The opening promised a show that they didn’t deliver, instead opting for 2 filler matches that did nothing to progress the Bloodline story. The main event was a good match that ultimately resulted in a flat finish for the episode overall. Mia Yim was used as a scapegoat to protect the other ladies involved in that match. Alexa Bliss was OFF big time, and the Wyatt stuff is really, really bad.
This is not how I wanted the Triple H era to start, but my fingers are still crossed.
Taking Wednesday off for NJPW Wrestle Kingdom 17. On the East Coast, so I’ll need to nap after work on Tuesday so I can be up by 1:20 AM for the start of the show. Despite that, veeeeeey pumped to watch.
I'll probably try to download Wrestle Kingdom tomorrow. I don't want to have to sit at my PC all night, I'd be more than willing to subscribe to NJPW World if they'd finally put the freakin' app on Roku already.
> I'll probably try to download Wrestle Kingdom tomorrow. I don't want to have to sit
> at my PC all night, I'd be more than willing to subscribe to NJPW World if they'd
> finally put the freakin' app on Roku already.
>
>
I guess it works real well on Xbox One’s browser if you have one. At least that’s what I’ve read.
I just have my laptop hooked up to my giant TV right now. Gonna have to hope my 2 1/2 nap that I woke up from at 8:30 is enough to suffice until the morning haha. No way I’m missing Ospreay/Omega live (unless I pass out and/or away).
It was flat for me. I thought her hair looked dumb as hell. I imagine the attention to detail was exquisite and props to whoever did it, but not for me.
Her hair was stupid looking, and the one move they did was a little rushed, but I’m more just excited for the possibilities it opens up. An actually good wrestler getting to actually wrestle without constraints is always good to see. I dunno if you watched it as it aired, but it was also just cool to see happen live. It was a legit moment. She got a huge pop when she entered, despite the WWE internet diehards who are downplaying it because the Japanese-speaking audience who were legit told to only cheer in 20-second spurts didn’t react belligerently for every single sentence of her promo like US fans would.
Anyhow, I doubt any match this year tops Omega/Ospreay. A near perfect match if I’ve ever seen one. And Okada/White was fantastic as well, especially the last 10 minutes or so. The last sequence was out of this world good.
Overall, even with the somewhat short matches in the undercard, Wrestle Kingdom set an extremely high bar for 2023.
I didn't watch live. I don't have New Japan World. I have enough streaming services as it is.
I hope the possibilities she has set the world on fire. It's always great to hear stuff like a good wrestler being able to wrestle without constraints like they have in WWE, but we'll have to wait and see what happens. It could be great, or it could flop.
Alls I need are good matches. That’s all I’m hoping for, and the landscape is huge.
If you ever feel like borrowing my NJPW World or ROH Honor Club login, let me know. You helped me get into this type of wrestling with our old ROH DVD trades haha. Totally down for sharing, and that goes for anyone else in the thread too. If yall feel like watching some good stuff, let me know.
Apparently the FTC are looking to do away with non-compete clauses in contracts. I wonder if this will affect WWE/AEW too, or if they can just change the wording around to bypass it.
Fire Pro Wrestling World is on sale for $10 in the PlayStation Store. I bought it last night. I've owned it on Steam for years (since it was in Early Access) but haven't played it yet. I'm much more likely to play it on console (though I was hoping for a Switch port but I guess it's not happening). https://store.playstation.com/en-us/product/UP4774...
Never played these, do they have control schemes like the N64 games, the modern 2k games, or different than both? I've been waiting for more news on the AEW game but still haven't seen a solid release date yet.
Fire Pro is way different than other games. You can't just spam moves and whatnot, and it's not like the old 16-bit WWF games where you just need to wear an opponent out. The gameplay is molded around building an actually good MATCH, the way a wrestler would. So you need to start with "light" moves, and build to the bigger stuff and then finishers. It actually incorporates wrestling "psychology", which is real neat. I love that they grade matches afterwards.
Fire Pro World is a great game, but all FP games have a definite learning curve. Button mashers need not apply.
There's a heck of a learning curve with the strikes in particular, mostly due to its isometric viewpoint. It's still really good, but it'll take a bit to get there.
Vince coming back to sell it... I don't know. I can see him saying now that he's back in power, he doesn't need to sell it and he can make it the best it could ever be. He has shown that while he can be a good businessman, he can also be inept. Look at the DirecTV thing from a ways back, or how it came out that the last time TV rights came up that he got more money when he was removed from the negotiations. I can also see the FCC or SEC or whoever it was investigating the accusations last summer getting back up in their ass about everything. I guess we'll see what happens.
What I recall reading a few weeks ago, I think the intended plan is for NBC to end up eventually buying the company, but were waiting for Fox's deal with SmackDown to end in 2 more years so NBC can snatch it up and be home to all WWE programming.
From this tweet I just read it says "Vince said unless he has direct involvement as executive chairman of a strategic review, he won’t approve a sale or any media-rights deals"
Would his stock allow him to veto that kind of thing? I know he's majority owner and all, but would he have to approve since he doesn't "hold any power" in the current power structure?
There's way more questions than answers. This is just starting. This could really suck.
Edit: well nevermind me. He's already back on the board. I didn't think it would be that quick. Still, way more questions than answers.
Kinda weird that the company's stock dropped when the original rumor of Vince wanting to come back started making the rounds, but it went up 16% today now that he actually is back.
Ehh the market is fickle. Going down is a good time to buy, especially with talks of a sale that could increase revenue. Although with Vince in on it I’m sure it will be a cluster fudge. People think he is a great businessman, but he hasn’t really made great decisions since 05. The pandemic was a very good event for him, basically WWE was the only sports on tv and he was getting a lot of eyes on the product. But that was just situational.
I know I'm not big into wrestling anymore myself, but i figured I'd let you guys know that a buddy of mine from High School I hung around with is now getting paid to present wrestling related articles and he's done a fair amount of interviews with professional and independants alike. Give him a look or maybe you've heard of him. His name is Bob Colling and he runs https://wrestlingrecaps.com/
This still sucks. I cried some. Kind of emotional right now to be frank. I can’t explain why.
I’ve thought about Jay a lot for the past couple of days. Cool story… I met Jay and Mark in 2004. I went to the RoH show where AJ Styles became the Pure Wrestling champion. The Briscoes wrestled the Backseat Boyz for the RoH Tag Team titles. It was great! I met them after the show when they were leaving. It was just a quick deal but they were cool. I was grinning ear to ear.
I remember more about that trip now. It’s not important now. Jay Briscoe is important now.
Yah I've been pretty much nonstop thinking about him and his family. Never got to meet him, but I was lucky enough to get to see him wrestle live five times.
Jay & Mark Briscoe vs. Kevin Steen & Steve Corino (ROH Tag Title Classic II - 2010) Jay Briscoe vs. Roderick Strong vs. El Generico vs. Homicide (ROH Defy or Deny - 2011) Jay & Mark Briscoe & Bully Ray vs. Dalton Castle & The Boys (ROH Best in the World - 2017) Jay & Mark Briscoe vs. Jushin Thunder Liger & Flip Gordon (ROH/NJPW War of the Worlds Night 1 - 2018) Jay & Mark Briscoe vs. FTR (ROH Death Before Dishonor - 2022)
Jay put his all into each of those matches (and really any match he was in), even when they weren't the marquee match of the night. I still can't believe I saw the dude face Jushin Liger, that's so surreal to me. I mean the match was just a low card match with no real story but still, how wild. And of course seeing the second match in the immediately-legendary trilogy vs. FTR will always stick with me. I'm happy that I got to experience that, probably the best match I've ever seen live (if not one of the best I've ever seen, period). Guy could work with legit anybody and get the most out of them.
Gonna miss him a lot, and miss The Briscoes as a tag team in general. Feel awful for Mark and the rest of his family.
Here's one of my favorite Jay Briscoe matches, coincidentally vs. Mark Briscoe at ROH Fifth Year Festival: Finale. Just about the only match I can think about that deserved the finish it got. Hearing the small smattering of disappointment transform to thunderous praise within seconds is great. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=28--GlSE9SA
Weird, Meltzer had just said earlier today that the network didn't want Mark Briscoe on TV. Glad they changed their mind and saw it was unfair to keep him off of TV for comments he didn't make. I'll be tuning in for that match for sure.
Yah Meltzer is infamous for being right and wrong in equal parts haha. But it is possible Tony Khan just got the network to get the frig over it and change their minds. No reason Mark shouldn't be allowed to wrestle regardless.
About time WBD weren’t being butt-holes about it. Jay said something really, excessively dumb. He owned it, apologized, and by all accounts became better for it. That’s all anyone should be asked to do, and it shouldn’t have been held against him like it was ever since. I don’t know if I’ll be able to watch, but I’m super happy that it’s happening.
It was a fine show. Some fun stuff. Some terrible crap. Was glad Imperium didn't get the Revival treatment and get beat down by elderly-DX, but also wish they won that 6 man match. The cage match stuff was fudging stupid, no excuses there. Bray Wyatt is not hitting at all the way I hoped he would have. Otherwise it was a normal Triple H-booked Raw - not much substance, not much to re-watch, but fun enough to pass time.
Kinda bored of DX using that "we're old" shtick again after just using it a few months ago. I wonder why Hornswoggle isn't around for these little DX reuinions? That was by far the worst version of DX, but fans who are young adults now were kids/teens during that era and that's probably the version of DX they'd have nostalgia for.
lol (horn)Swoggle is a little sarcastic crap and I love him. He shows up on the Major Wrestling Figure Podcast shows with Matt Cardona and Brian Myers a lot. I'm sure he'd show up if WWE asked, but he also seems like he couldn't give less of a crap nowadays haha
Welp, that main event was about as sad as I expected it to be. Great showing by Mark Briscoe, can't imagine how hard it was to go out there tonight. Kudos to him and AEW, that was classy.
I just got Sling TV back and I had to DVR Dynamite since I wasn’t home. I watched one of the Jay Briscoe videos on YouTube and I was emotional, I’ll admit. Without spoilers, is it a good tribute show? Did they do right by Jay this week?
> I just got Sling TV back and I had to DVR Dynamite since I wasn’t home. I watched
> one of the Jay Briscoe videos on YouTube and I was emotional, I’ll admit. Without
> spoilers, is it a good tribute show? Did they do right by Jay this week?
It wasn't a full tribute show tbh, most of it was just Dynamite. But boy did Mark Briscoe deliver in that main event. It was 100% a great tribute to Jay, and the ending of the episode itself got me weeping. It was so cathartic to see Mark do his thing in there, I appreciate the hell out of that. Great match too, for what it's worth.
It looks like the (free) ROH Jay Briscoe Celebration of Life show that they filmed after Dynamite last week has been released. This was a last second show that they put together on the fly a literal day after Jay passed.
Partway through Dynamite. The Jay Briscoe video was great. I couldn’t give less of a crap about the rest of this show. So much nonsense and wasted potential.
Edit: up to Mark and Jay Lethal. So good.
Edit 2: Perfection from AEW from the Lethal entrance to the end of the show. Exactly what needed to happen.
Headed to Charlotte in a bit for Vengeance Day. If the Carmelo vs Apollo Crews match is half as good as I'm expecting, it will have been worth it for that alone. Of course looking forward to the main event too just being a mark for steel cage matches.
Wes Lee vs. Dijak: The crowd was pumped for this match and it was a great way to open the show. Wes Lee is way more over than I realized. Though I am a bigger fan of Dijak I wasn't disappointed in the outcome. You could see Dijak's finger was messed up before they showed a close up of it on the big screen. Gross.
Kayden Carter & Katana Chance vs. Kiana James & Fallon Henley Kayden and Katana work great as a tag team, though I could never get behind the "party girl" type of gimmick they were given. It just seemed forced. Good match overall, don't really care about the two broads that won though, even though I watch it every week it feels like I barely know them.
Apollo Crews vs. Carmelo Hayes: My personal match of the night. In a way kinda glad it didn't go to the third fall because that's just way too predictable, but also disappointed it didn't because I could've watched these dudes go for another hour without getting tired of it. Trick Williams was getting some laughs on the outside. As soon as that big dude came in at the end (which despite sitting across from the entry way I had never spotted him coming down the aisle, it was like he appeared out of thin air) I knew his purpose was to turn against Apollo because the feud with Melo was ending here.
The New Day (C) vs. Gallus vs. Pretty Deadly vs. Chase U: I had a feeling The New Day wasn't retaining here. As expected they were super over with the crowd and probably the loudest pop of the show (not counting Booker T when coming out for commentary and HBK giving a little pre-show speech to the crowd). I'm still beyond tired of them though. Chase U is also unbelievably over and I don't know why. The whole gimmick is corny to me, but apparently people like it. I'm just not sure how they'll get that to work on the main roster, assuming they get called up together. Thea Hail has so much freakin' energy though, and when she screams I'm sure people in the nosebleed section could hear it. Pretty Deadly got some of the loudest boos of the night when they put that commentary table back together and apologized to Booker T and...whoever that other guy is, I forget his name. That was classic heel work. Gallus wins the titles and honestly I don't think majority of the crowd was even familiar with them.
Roxanne Perez vs. Gigi Dolin vs. Jacy Jane: The crowd was pretty hot all night, up until the ending of the previous match and about halfway through this match. It felt like nobody cared until the Toxic Attraction broads started to turn against each other, then the crowd got into it again. The crowd really wanted to see someone go through a table, but the way it happened in this match was too predictable. Not a bad match I suppose, but easily my least favorite of the night. I'm a fan of Roxanne and I like her little backstory that she's been working at getting this far since she was 13. But I feel like her big title run happened sooner than it should've. Like, it only happened because they needed a new champion to replace Mandy Rose and since Roxanne was already number one contender it wouldn't make sense to choose anyone else. I'm glad she's champion and all (and I'm sure she is too) but with a few months more build up it could have been an even bigger moment for her.
Bron Breakker vs. Grayson Waller: Man, I was disappointed when it was announced the match had to be won via pinfall or submission and not by escaping the cage. That's not a real mf'ing cage match then! That only disappointed me because I like cage matches (moreso even than Elimination Chamber or Hell In a Cell) and now the only two I've gotten to see live (this one and a decade ago saw Balls Mahoney vs a local indy guy) it's like the cage was only there for decoration because you couldn't win by escaping. I was pulling for Grayson Waller even though I knew he wasn't winning. I started out as a big fan of Bron when he originally debuted, but I'm getting a little tired of him. I don't know what else is there for him to learn by remaining in NXT.
It looked to be very close to a sellout crowd, it might have even been. I hope this means they take the show on the road more often. I know it's back to just being treated like a developmental brand again, so they could only fly out who was going to be used on the show and that's why we didn't get any dark matches (was hoping for some kind of appearance by The Schism or Wendy Choo).
Some of these guys are beyond "developmental" at this stage. If Carmelo Hayes isn't one of the post-WrestleMania call ups from NXT this year, then someone needs to have a talk with Shawn Michaels because that dude is ready to become a star now. Trick Williams might not be, but that shouldn't hold back Melo from making the big boy money on the main roster. I heard dudes behind me saying they hope he gets called up and paired with Hit Row to replace Swerve, but fudge no that's a waste of his potential and if anyone needs more time in developmental it'd be the remaining members of Hit Row because they were just riding Swerve's coattails anyway. Melo > Swerve, don't argue that because there's no changing my mind.
> Did Paul Heyman just try and credit Dusty for training Kevin Owens?
>
My volume was low, but I only heard him credit Dusty for training Reigns. That much is true and I dug them integrating that into the story if Reigns isn’t gonna show up on Raw until after EC.
But to be fair, as Samoa Joe once said, “you never really stop training”. It’s possible that Owens learned a few valuable lessons from Dusty during his time in NXT. But yah, I wouldn’t consider him Owens’ “trainer” per se.
Yah it’s wild how they built that Mania match with a single promo… I imagine the Reigns/Rhodes stuff will pop into full gear after Elimination Chamber and that oughta be good stuff if they build off the foundation Heyman set up here.
He’s been going off like this about MJF for a few weeks. I thought it was just a work - folks have been calling for an MJF/Kingston title match for a while. Some folks even wanna see him dethrone MJF eventually (I’d pop), but I dunno. Seems pretty legit haha.
Of course, so did “Brawl Out” and that’s looking more and more like a work with each passing week.
Rewatched a few matches from Dynamite earlier. Danielson/RUSH, MUF/Takecrapa, Elite/Fox&Top Flight. Holy fudge. Dynamite blows any other weekly wrestling show out of the water right now, with 0 doubts.
Well, AEW has been surpassing their network’s standards to the point that they keep expanding their TV deals (new one in Australia via ESPN just this week) but also… who the frig cares? Our job as fans is to watch what we enjoy. That’s where the job ends. Wrestling fans seem WAY too hung up on ratings and numbers and the overall statistics. I said Dynamite blows any other wrestling show out of the water because it’s a good show with great wrestling featured consistently. That’s all. I’ll let the execs worry about how many fans it brings in and continue to enjoy the product put out until it gets bad haha
Jericho left WCW because of the old guys at the top staying there at the expense of the young guys. He’s now the old guy on top. He didn’t like how guys like Hogan had their friends around like Beefcake, and he has Hager. Jericho hated people that were two faced and spoke out of both sides of their mouth, and he loved working with Punk but he called Punk a cancer and said he should go away.
That’s my opinion anyway, based on what I’ve seen.
I think that was Seth Rollins that said that about CM Punk. Though I guess Chris Jericho certainly could have said it too, CM Punk was known to be a bit of a twinkie backstage even on the indies pre-WWE wasn't he?
> Jericho left WCW because of the old guys at the top staying there at the expense
> of the young guys. He’s now the old guy on top. He didn’t like how guys like Hogan
> had their friends around like Beefcake, and he has Hager. Jericho hated people that
> were two faced and spoke out of both sides of their mouth, and he loved working with
> Punk but he called Punk a cancer and said he should go away.
>
I think the "cancer" bit is part of the work. There's no doubt in my mind that they've known Punk would be coming back to AEW for months, but also knew the buzz surrounding the whole All Out situation was keeping him on everyone's mind so they rolled with it. Same thing happened with MJF and the whole contract dispute situation last year. It may have been born of a real life scenario but they're just doing work at this point. Jericho wouldn't have made that post if AEW was truly trying to distance themselves from Punk, and the Bucks wouldn't keep dropping hints on BTE.
As for the WCW comparisons, I don't see them quite the same way. I mean, I get it. He's the "old guard" now, but unlike those folks in WCW, Jericho isn't hogging the main event scene every single week and has actually put over the younger talent. That, and the dude can still go in the ring with the best of them, even if he's a step slower than he used to be. And to be fair, Hager doesn't take up nearly as much real estate on the card as all the dudes Hogan had tag along to WCW with him. For as little as I care about Hager, he's miles better than Beefcake or the friggin Nasty Boys haha
> I think that was Seth Rollins that said that about CM Punk. Though I guess Chris
> Jericho certainly could have said it too, CM Punk was known to be a bit of a twinkie
> backstage even on the indies pre-WWE wasn't he?
>
Jericho apparently said it directly to Punk and then told the locker room that Punk would never return to AEW. I don't buy it for a second though. Somehow an "insider" was close enough to Punk and Jericho to overhear him calling Punk a cancer but literally NOBODY has any solid details on the brawl at All Out? Doesn't add up.
Punk was known as a twinkie to Vince McMahon, Triple H and Ryback, notoriously three of the biggest twats in the history of pro wrestling haha. I think he only had heat with Kevin Steen while on the indies, but that hatchet was apparently buried a long while ago. And then of course Colt Cabana, but that came after his WWE days. There are guys like Powerhouse Hobbs, FTR, Wheeler Yuta, etc, who have talked openly about how much of a help Punk has been to them since joining AEW so he can't be all bad I suppose.
I personally think AEW are just leaning in to the whole "Punk is bad" reputation because it'll make it that much more wild when he returns. I could absolutely be wrong, but I think we've just been getting worked for a while here.
I was thinking the same thing when Fox paid them 5 Billion just for SmackDown, but apparently they get their money's worth out of it. It's got a loyal audience that will tune in on Fridays which is typically the worst night you could be on (previously I don't think Fox has had anything good on Fridays since the days of X-Files), 53 episodes per year including Tribute To The Troops, good ad revenue and they get to promote their weekend sports crap for free.
Vince's best days of booking a company are long in the past, but as a businessman he knows what he's doing.
If WWE sold for $8 billion, this is roughly what key people in WWE would make from the sale - • Vince McMahon: $2.5bn • Stephanie McMahon: $170.8m • Linda McMahon: $50.3m • Kevin Dunn: $24.2m • Nick Khan: $13.8m • Frank Riddick: $10.9m • Paul Levesque: $8.3m
These numbers are according to WON. It's interesting to see that Shane and his wife aren't even listed.
This crowd was hot tonight. That reaction for Sami reminded me of Hulk Hogan's return to SmackDown 20 years ago, where the ovation went on for so long they had to cut to commercial break.
I see people were complaining about the audio jobbing before Sami even got to speak. It's because the crowd was chanting "Fudge You Roman" (it wasn't getting muted on the stream I was watching)
Michael Cole ripping Top Dolla is one of my favorite things ever. Top Dolla looks brittle as fudge, kinda like an inked up egg with Kevin Nash knees and a strong breeze would knock him over.
What do you guys think comes from this Elimination Chamber tonight? The Bloodline stuff was one of the best things to happen in a long time, and for that I think Sami deserves his WrestleMania moment out of it. But so does Cody. But I'm a lot less interested in seeing Sami vs Cody (if Sami were to win tonight). Are they going ahead with one undisputed championship for the foreseeable future (which I would prefer)? If not, why not just have Roman defend one title on each night of WrestleMania?
Crowds like this help make an already good show even better. Ya gotta love it. For far too long when Vince was still in charge we'd only get crowds like this once a year at WrestleMania, but now they're getting pretty consistent.
edit: These guys did some pretty sick bumps in this match. Doesn't matter that it's for a B title on a B level "premium live event", they gave it their all. I really was hoping for Montez to win it, but his big push is supposed to be coming after WrestleMania.
May have been a predictable card top-to-bottom but still a real good show. There was never any chance of Sami winning but I think what they did worked real well and it was satisfying to see Zayn and Owens truly work together a bit again.
Now I’m watching NJPW Battle in the Valley, Mercedes Mone vs Kairi. Mone is doing really great, which isn’t really a surprise. She entered with a Hana Kimura homage which was awesome to see.
My stuff came in! I got my old school WWF logo light and it’s great, but I think I like the Billy Gunn shorts better. They’re short, too. My underwear is longer than them, so I get a weird Van Dam look when I wear them haha. I hope my Tweet shows up here. Otherwise I’m not sure how to post the pictures.
I dunno. I legit hated the match with Danielson, and I saw him in a few RoH matches and they were miserable to watch too. I’m all for giving a guy a chance again but I’d rather watch WCW in 2001 than Rush right now. Maybe he’ll grow on me over time.
That Danielson match ruled so hard, so I can’t imagine you’ll find anything else from him you’d like. Only stuff I disliked from him was his feud vs PCO…. but, ya know, PCO.
Yeah I know. PCO and match quality aren’t usually in the same sentence. Took him forever to find a half decent character. Too bad he couldn’t coast off stealing Bret Hart’s jacket for 25 years.
Damn that sucks. Hoping the best for him. I remember seeing him live when I was like 9 at a random indie show in my home town’s armory. He was still in ECW at the time, so he was classic jeans and plaid Stevie. Wrestled through the crowd and all. Oddly enough, that show was headlined by Goldust vs Val Venis in the middle of their 1998/1999 feud. Probably trying to grow some chemistry for their PPV matches.
Dominic Mysterio looks like someone let the air out of Brutus Beefcake when he was like 20 years old. I’m also digging the Art Barr vibes, particularly in the mullet area.
Bully Ray looks like Alex Jones now. I can’t unsee it.
I hope we get a Judgment Day Demon Finn Balor at Wrestlemania.
I really want Cody Rhodes to win at Wrestlemania. But I also don’t want to see Roman lose. I love that I feel conflicted about it all.
This is the best main event storytelling WWE has ever done. Ever. Usually the matches work and the story sucks or vice versa, and sometimes both are good, but this is next level stuff. I don’t want to see it end, but it also feels like it’s going to end soon.
Carmelo Hayes better be main roster bound. That guy is too good to stay in NXT much longer.
AEW has amazing matches. They can tell good stories, but they haven’t doing a ton of that lately. The blood needs to end. It’s way too much and way too often. Save it for PPV when you can make money doing it.
Saw a couple of clips of Rene Dupree lately. He looks weird. He still sucks too.
Ricky Starks is a fudging star. Make him a star and don’t leave him off TV for a month after a big win.
I hope WWE doesn’t sell. But it appears it will. Comcast NBC Universal or Fox makes the most sense to me, mostly NBC because they already have so much money tied up with WWE now.
Edit for this one: WWE needs to continue focusing on the women’s division. They’re usually just as good as the men. I also want to see more from AEW in the women’s divisions. Saraya can go away again, though. So can Sarah Logan.
> Carmelo Hayes better be main roster bound. That guy is too good to stay in NXT much
> longer.
Agreed and I can't wait for the inevitable "5 star banger" (as the kids on the street say) he and Montez Ford will no doubt put on if given the chance.
> AEW has amazing matches. They can tell good stories, but they haven’t doing a ton
> of that lately. The blood needs to end. It’s way too much and way too often. Save
> it for PPV when you can make money doing it.
Yeah it really devalues it when it is done so often. Make it mean something. You don't look "tougher" because you're bleeding in every match you do, Mox.
Melo and Tez would be… holy crap I don’t even have words for it.
Blood used to be a big deal because it happened so infrequently. Now it’s in the opening match and multiple times a night. It needs to end. Mox is the biggest culprit, but if he were to lighten up on it someone else would take his place and do it in the first 12 seconds of a match.
I will never care about blood in wrestling, personally. Ever. I hope Mox bleeds on his way to the ring one of these days just for the hell of it. Folks are very quick to forget Flair did the same crap for like 2 decades and is currently regarded as a legend (and legendary perv ahh cha cha). I'll take blood in a match over Omos or Theory in a match haha
Yall watching Revolution on Sunday? The card looks friggin great and there is a LOT of buzz about a possible Punk return. Not expecting it, but it'd be pretty fun.
AEW World Heavyweight Championship: MJF (c) vs. Bryan Danielson in a 60-minute Iron Man AEW Women’s World Championship: Jamie Hayter (c) vs. Saraya vs. Ruby Soho AEW World Tag Team Championship: Gunns (c) vs. The Acclaimed vs. Jay Lethal & Jeff Jarrett vs. TBD AEW World Trios Championship: The Elite (c) vs. House of Black AEW TNT Championship: Samoa Joe (c) vs. Wardlow Jon Moxley vs. Hangman Page in Texas Death Match Ricky Starks vs. Chris Jericho with JAS banned from ringside
Christian/Jungle Boy will probably get added, and I imagine there will be TBS title and All Atlantic title matches too, unless they run some angle with Orange/Best Friends against The Firm.
Also, the new ROH show starts this Thursday on Honor Club. I'm very much looking forward to that.
Yes, Flair is absolutely guilty of it too. The only time I was ever a fan of his was as a kid during his original WWF run, but that's more because they paired him with Heenan and Mr. Perfect. He didn't overdo it with blood then though, so can't really say it ever bothered me.
I'll likely be skipping the PPV as well, or at least most of it. Might keep a stream open in a minimized tab as background noise though.
I dunno, if a match is good a match is good. There can be no blood, there can be tons of blood. Just makes no difference to me and think it’s weird that this is suddenly an issue in the general US wrestling fandom when it’s been happening for years (just not in WWE). But whatev, to each their own.
When it comes to Revolution, I overall vastly prefer that show’s card to what Mania is shaping up to be. But I’ll be watching both because both will feature some solid wrasslin.
I definitely agree if a match is good, it's good. Can't argue that. Having or not having blood isn't going to affect my enjoyment of a match, but it can make for way more memorable, dare I say iconic moments (examples being Steve Austin in the sharpshooter, Foley at Royal Rumble '99 (I respect him for being the type of idiot that only bleeds hardway) or Eddie Guerrero wearing "the crimson mask" against JBL). The matches would have still been good without the blood, but the blood is what most remember them for. I feel like that's what Moxley is perpetually chasing after.
He could try bleeding on the way to the ring if he wants. It worked for Sandman. Mox could go one step further and just casually step through the curtain and no-sell the fact he's already bleeding. They could make that an alternate attire in the upcoming game, just have him start the match pre-bladed.
Yah I feel you, wonderful examples of some top notch blood spots. That fudgein Eddie blade job is brutal and will always be vivid in my mind. I remember watching that one as it aired and I felt legit lightheaded haha
I just don't necessarily know if Mox is "chasing after" anything in particular though. Whether it was his pre-WWE days in CZW, or his stuff with GCW/Bloodsport, or his stuff in AEW... the dude just likes to bleed when he wrestles haha. He did it in bingo halls with no national attention (still does), so I'm not sure if he's chasing any particular "iconic moment" or anything like that. I think he's just trying to reestablish what the old school territories did constantly/what the worldwide wrestling scene has never stopped doing. He's had plenty of iconic matches that are iconic because of the match itself, not the blood he lost (even when he definitely lost that blood).
To be honest, I do sorta think this idea that blood should solely be a tool for adding "drama" has been perpetuated by WWE and their hardcore fanbase solely because they've been the USA's "industry leader" for so long and because they've used blood so sparingly (even when they allowed it). Which I understand, they need to in order to keep the particular corporate sponsors they have and make the money they've made so when it happens it's a "whoa" for anyone watching... but blood has been a part of wrestling since the start. I can't fault Mox, or any other wrestler going today, for using it when they're allowed to or going for it a lot. In most real-life fights, blood gets spilled. MMA proves that, so it's a nonissue to me personally.
But yah, all that said, I can understand why some folks would rather not see it. Wrestling isn't real fighting after all. I just personally think it's fine, can take it or leave it, and wouldn't hold it against any wrestler or promotion for using it.
WWE absolutely did not perpetuate the idea that blood is only good for drama. That was the thought process basically everywhere. World Class and Crockett and Verne and Portland weren’t bloodbaths all the time. Not going to bat for them one way or the other, but blood being just something that happens instead of something that’s built to doesn’t make sense. Ric Flair bled buckets when the situation called for it, until he used it as a crutch when his physical skills deteriorated. Same for most everywhere until ECW popularized blood all the time.
I’m not saying blood should be outlawed. It should be something that has meaning and makes the wrestlers and company money, not just used on an opening match on Wednesday because a guy feels like it. If blood was still viewed as special, ratings and metrics all over would reflect it. They don’t. Blood and Guts is awesome. Put it on PPV where it’ll draw and not a Wednesday to maybe pop a 1 week thing.
How can blood, or anything really, be special when we see it all the time?
WCCW and Crocket and NWA ABSOLUTELY had a ton of bloody matches. Obviously not as often as nowadays, but there also weren't as many high-risk stipulation matches back then. But it certainly wasn't as out of the ordinary as you're suggesting. ECW was nowhere near the first promotion to normalize bloodshed as a constant. Maybe here in America, which was my point, but it wasn't nearly as rare elsewhere in the world. Just about any major Japanese promotion did it literally all the time. Mexico. Europe. Puerto Rico. Other US territories. Literally everywhere did death matches/strap matches/cage matches and a LOT earlier than ECW changed the "E" from "Eastern" to "Extreme".
I friggin LOVE the Austin/Hart match and Austin's bloodshed 100% added to that match without any doubt... but hold that match in Japan in the 90s and the blood that was shed would be absolutely nowhere near the topic of conversation.
Obviously WWE wasn't the first to perpetuate the idea that blood is "only good for drama", but that also wasn't the point I suggested. My argument was that blood can be used without it needing to be this BIG DRAMATIC DEMONSTRATION, considering that's what happens when people ACTUALLY fight and has been used in wrestling for years and years, and that it's WWE's modern product that has perpetuated this idea that blood absolutely NEEDS to be saved for "dramatic moments" above all else and should be frowned upon otherwise. That's just not true. WWE's hardcore fan-base has recently started to run with the misconception that blood HAS to be saved for "drama". That narrative literally only gained so much momentum as soon as AEW made it clear that blood was a non-factor for their programming, that it just happens. Before AEW started, SO many people were clamoring for the Attitude Era and "real hardcore" matches to make a return... suddenly that undying desire has magically disappeared. It was a literal non-issue for so long, but is now suddenly a major factor in what folks criticize AEW/Mox/GCW about.
All that aside, it's been "normalized" here in the states for decades now. There have been countless great, dramatic matches that used blood and often while sharing the card with OTHER great, dramatic matches that used blood. This "AEW uses blood too much" narrative is weightless in the modern day wrestling landscape and is absolutely a result of the product WWE has put out for the past 2 decades or dorks like Cornette, Bischoff and Prichard using revisionist history to make a point on a podcast.
Apologies if that came off a little fiery, I didn't mean it to but am now seeing how much I actually typed haha. I appreciate the actual conversation and not just little sarcastic blurbs. I've spent faaar too much time on pro wrestling Twitter and the whole "blood" thing just seems like a bullet point all the excessively anti-AEW folks post whenever they need to reach the quota for the day & I'm just over all the over-analyzing of pro wrestling these days. My bad buds.
The first segment of this Orange Cassidy vs Big Bill match is real good, a very good way to run a “David vs Goliath” match. Orange is the perfect character for this type of match because he has “avoiding” moves baked into his repertoire.
Mox cut a wildly good promo to hype his match vs Hangman that was aired tonight while he was bleeding a ton from last week and I’ll tell ya what, it did add to the drama big time haha
Anyhow, here's JR trying to answer his cellphone while the commentary team was on camera last night on Rampage. Note his expertise as he does so above his headset. I'd say it was sad if it wasn't so gosh darn funny.
I just got my pre-order in for WWE 2k23 on PlayStation 5. Anyone else getting it? I've heard good things about last year's game, but ultimately decided to skip it. This will be the first one I've bought since WWE 2k16 (I'm not counting that WWE 2k Battlegrounds game, in fact let's all just forget that ever released), so I'm looking forward to seeing how much they've changed things up since then.
Don't ask why I decided for this to be the first PS5 game I pay the full $70 for instead of waiting for a price drop. Like the previous games of the past 15 years (or however long it was since the series was rebranded as SmackDown vs Raw) I expect to just play through whatever story modes there are and then mess around with CAWs for a month before I never touch the game again. I never mess with the online multiplayer in these games.
Does the AEW game have a release date yet? Have any sites written up any recent previews on it?
I got WWE 2K22 and legit have only played GM Mode as that was the main reason I got it. It’s limited (even after the updates) but still a fun enough time (when save data doesn’t corrupt). I’d have played more Universe mode if it weren’t for those save issues happening all the time, wiping out any downloaded wrestlers/arenas/shows. If there are any significant changes to GM Mode in 2K23 (and the data issue is resolved), I’ll probably pick it up eventually.
2k22 was first wrestling game I got in like 10 years. I enjoyed it but still hated the controls. I’ve been patiently waiting for AEW to give a release date. Supposed to mirror controls from N64 games. I also like that they don’t plan a new game every year but just a yearly update. As long as reviews are decent I’ll get that.
Revolution is easily show of the year so far, even topping Wrestle Kingdom. By a wiiiide margin. Top to bottom, great stuff. May even be AEW's best showing period.
That MJF/Danielson Iron Man Match is probably the best of that gimmick. Tough to beat Brock/Angle but I think it did.
> 2k22 was first wrestling game I got in like 10 years. I enjoyed it but still hated
> the controls. I’ve been patiently waiting for AEW to give a release date. Supposed
> to mirror controls from N64 games. I also like that they don’t plan a new game
> every year but just a yearly update. As long as reviews are decent I’ll get that.
>
During the media scrum last night, Tony Khan said the game is finished and a release date announcement is coming soon, but he couldn't spill the beans just yet. Apparently it won some award at a festival or something. The graphics aren't super impressive but I'll be able to look past that if the gameplay is good.
@BucketofJustice have you had a chance to watch the first episode of ROH on Honor Club? I thought it really felt like ROH of old, just with that Orlando studio sheen. The Zack Sabre Jr vs Blake Christian match was probably my favorite from the show. ZSJ feels like if Danielson and McGuinness had a baby conceived via wrestling match. Guy’s great.
>> 2k22 was first wrestling game I got in like 10 years. I enjoyed it but still hated
>> the controls. I’ve been patiently waiting for AEW to give a release date. Supposed
>> to mirror controls from N64 games. I also like that they don’t plan a new game
>> every year but just a yearly update. As long as reviews are decent I’ll get
> that.
>>
>
> During the media scrum last night, Tony Khan said the game is finished and a release
> date announcement is coming soon, but he couldn't spill the beans just yet. Apparently
> it won some award at a festival or something. The graphics aren't super impressive
> but I'll be able to look past that if the gameplay is good.
Probably talking about the Best Sports/Racing Game' Award At Gamescom 2022. It has been at the beginning of every trailer. Just read that community creations possibly won't be an aspect of the game despite what has been said is a robust CAW system. That is disappointing if true. They keep talking about the mini games and from what I've seen so far they seem goofy and pointless. I just hope that the controls are tight, the animations are good, and it has enough of a CAW system to keep me engaged.
> @BucketofJustice have you had a chance to watch the first episode of ROH on Honor
> Club? I thought it really felt like ROH of old, just with that Orlando studio sheen.
> The Zack Sabre Jr vs Blake Christian match was probably my favorite from the show.
> ZSJ feels like if Danielson and McGuinness had a baby conceived via wrestling match.
> Guy’s great.
I haven’t. I hope to watch it tonight, since my Sling subscription is gone so all I have access to is Smackdown through my antenna. I need to figure out how to get it on my TV, but if I can’t then I’ll at least have the iPad.
Two of my pals are there live tonight. Looks like they stacked this show. Which is good, because Raw has been about as interesting as me peeing lately.
> I got WWE 2K22 and legit have only played GM Mode as that was the main reason I got
> it. It’s limited (even after the updates) but still a fun enough time (when save
> data doesn’t corrupt). I’d have played more Universe mode if it weren’t for
> those save issues happening all the time, wiping out any downloaded wrestlers/arenas/shows.
> If there are any significant changes to GM Mode in 2K23 (and the data issue is resolved),
> I’ll probably pick it up eventually.
That sucks. I remember that happening a lot with WWF No Mercy back in the day. It felt like every other week I was having to recreate my CAWs all over again.
I was lucky enough to not get a copy with that save bug.
As usual, the Bloodline stuff was captivating tonight, even though it bordered on telegraphed to the point Stevie Wonder saw it coming. They also need to stop the stupid crowd sweetening bullcrap. It’s as bad as it’s ever been.
I dug most of the Bloodline angle tonight but Cody was not the dude I wanted to make the save. Thought it would’ve been nice for the Sami/Owens reconciliation to happen tonight since they won the ROH tag titles in Boston back in 08, but I figured WWE wouldn’t harken back to anything like that (especially nowadays). It also ended way too abruptly, no time for the angle to breathe. But still good stuff mostly.
> That sucks. I remember that happening a lot with WWF No Mercy back in the day. It
> felt like every other week I was having to recreate my CAWs all over again.
Yep. This is why I never played No Mercy a lot after playing World Tour, Revenge and Wrestlemania 2000 to death. I had a first print run with the data glitch. Once it erased my career progress, I never played it again.
"A new wrestling game which serves as a love letter to the classic wrestling games of the late 90s. Ultra Pro Wrestling is a sandbox game that encourages players to create/edit their own wrestling superstars, promotions and events. Fight for the UPW Championship Title in ranked online matches or play through a multitude of match types in a deep and dynamic single player career mode."
They’re clearly reusing AKI animations here. From the grapple to the entirety of that Falcon Arrow. It looks like trash and I hope it doesn’t go anywhere.
I'm honestly barely interested in wrestling games for the actual gameplay these days. I like the booking modes like MyGM or Universe. I still have a save on Extreme Warfare Revenge that I revisit all the time, solely because I enjoy the booking side of things more. Fire Pro Wrestling World has a pretty neat promoter mode too.
Also have Wrestling Sim on Steam and Total Extreme Wrestling but haven't really gotten into either of those yet.
Yeah, this is gonna sound so nerdy, but with the WWF games on N64 (not sure if the WCW games had the feature, but their CAW mode was nowhere near as detailed anyway) I feel like I had spent almost as much time simulating matches between CPU characters as I did actually playing the game myself.
My friend had a wrestling sim on his PC called TNM 7. I was jealous of that because I didn't have a PC of my own but he'd let me book shows when I'd visit. When I was at home I'd book my own shows and simulate the matches in the game, write down the results in a notebook and I'd also write out descriptions of the matches (any noteworthy spots) and promos to hype up the next event. I wish I still had that notebook just to look through it now for craps and giggles, but I tossed it out 9 or 10 years ago when packing up for a move.
The guy that made TNM is now a German commentator for AEW and Impact Wrestling.
Yet for some reason the GM modes in the WWE games, I never really bothered with them. I never even looked into them to see what features they offered, but I had always just assumed they were a half-assed effort at those late 90s/early 2000s wrestling sim apps on PC. I'll give it a try in WWE 2k23 instead of dismissing it so easily this time.
I like the YouTube videos that people upload where they give every title for one wrestler and then sim an entire year to see how many titles the person has at the end of the year.
That match between Charlotte and Shotzi last night has people talking...for the wrong reasons. The match was subpar, something Shotzi is no stranger to since being called up to the main roster. She's just been really sloppy.
Is it weird to say I like Shotzi and I even like Corbin, but I can't recall the last match either of them were involved in that I actually looked forward to?
Corbin’s fine but has been booked like butt, Shotzi is not good unfortunately. That said the folks honing their criticisms down to the speed of those Charlotte/Shotzi sequences should need to prove that they can run literally any distance in order to be taken seriously.
Shotzi is green. No pun intended. She could’ve used more time on the indies/NXT before being called up. Her entrance is cool, but that’s about where the good ends as far as I can tell.
Baron Corbin has been booked like crap for years, and will continue to be booked like crap. Ever since he lost that money in the bank title shot in like a minute, he hasn’t been taken seriously. He’s good, but he’s boring, and not taken seriously. It won’t get better for him.
According to ol' Sapp it's actually nothing to do with him being unhappy with creative, it's "an undisclosed physical issue."
But still, as long as he is capable of walking and talking (which is 99% of what he does these days), they should use him at WrestleMania in some capacity.
Yeah, I was disappointed (as I assume everyone else was too) when it was announced Brock would face Omos instead of continuing something with Lashley or even Gunther after their little showdown in the Rumble match.
How the heck did someone like Omos even get to bypass NXT anyway? He clearly needs it more than anyone that's actually on the NXT roster right now.
They haven’t done anything cool with him since he returned, so I hope there’s something down the pike. Lashley and Gunther also sounds great. Then again, Gunther and most people sounds really great.
Speaking of wrestlers that just disappeared, what ever happened to Aliyah? She's another one, like Shotzi, that might've been called up too soon (even though she'd been in NXT since 2016, she had more than enough time to be ready for the main roster). After a brief and forgettable run with the tag titles with Raquel Rodriguez late last summer, she was injured but has been cleared to return since December. She's also not very active on Twitter lately, other than RT'ing fans that say they're waiting for her return.
She’s been around a few years. She got in because she’s hot, and she’s worked to improve but it hasn’t gone very well. She’s one that I’d allow the contract to expire. If she’s not improving now, she never will.
I'm not false, see, it all stops tonight. See @BucketofJustice, you can wear any Halloween costume you want to, but you know and I know that you're only half the man that I am - and I have half the brain that you do. But week after week - you've tried to make me look like a jackass - but it stops tonight.
That tease at the end of Dynamite was a fudgein masterpiece. It cut off too early and didn't allow any breathing time, but the visual of The Elite sliding in to help protect Hangman was fudging awesome. Elite vs. Blackpool Combat Club is going to be so fudging good.
Fine. You wanna promo, I’ll start at the top. There ain’t no better than this.
You know they say that all men are created equal, but you look at me and you look at you and you can see that statement is not true. See, normally if you go one on one with another wrestler, you got a 50/50 chance of winning. But I'm a bucket of justice and I'm not normal! So you got a 25%, AT BEST, at beat me. Then you add probably PizzatheHutt to the mix, your chances of winning drastic go down. See the 3 way at GTZ, you got a 33 1/3 chance of winning, but I, I got a 66 and 2/3 chance of winning, because PizzatheHutt KNOWS he can't beat me and he's not even gonna try! So Jaw, take your 33 1/3 chance, minus my 25% chance and you got an 8 1/3 chance of winning at GTZ. But then you take my 75% chance of winning, if we was to go one on one, and then add 66 2/3 per cents, I got 141 2/3 chance of winning at GTZ. Senor Jaw, the numbers don't lie, and they spell disaster for you at GTZ.
A lot has changed in this WWE 2K23 since the last game I played, 2K16. I'm not even going to bother playing it online, I know I'll just get my ass kicked.
I'm liking the Showcase mode, but what is the deal with having to blur so much stuff out? Any FMV clips showing the ref and/or commentary team, their faces are all blurred out, as are certain t-shirts and signs in the crowd (that I can understand, but not the others). In the few matches I've played of Showcase mode also, there is no commentary in the matches, just generic rock music playing throughout while you play.
I think Brock is way too beefy these days to pull off the SSP without risking a similar fate as WMXIX (or worse). However, that would 100% make a match vs Omos worth it.
I saw a clip on Twitter where Alexa Bliss was a guest on The Masked Singer. I've never watched that show and her being on it isn't enough to make me want to change that, so that isn't what this post is about. But what I noticed was the on-screen graphic when she was revealed that said "Five-time WWE Women's Champion" and that just made me think back to when being a five time champion was actually a big deal. But now it feels like when you sign with WWE these days, five title reigns is the least you'll get. I can recall only one of Alexa Bliss' five title reigns.
Bret Hart was a five time WWF Champion. "Stone Cold" Steve Austin was a six time WWF Champion. The Undertaker and Shawn Michaels had four title runs each. Booker T of course five time WCW Champion. That feels like nothing now, compared to the Randy Ortons, John Cenas, Triple Hs and Charlotte Flairs of the modern era. For the longest time from 2002 - 2017-ish, HHH, Cena, Orton or Roman (as a babyface) as champion meant I automatically wasn't looking forward to the main event of the next PPV.
With Triple H in charge, it sure seems like he is in favor of longer, more meaningful title runs. Asuka's 510 day title reign in NXT is a good example, it was excellent and certainly more meaningful than all of Charlotte's 3,281 runs with the women's titles on the main roster (okay, that's an exaggerated number...but only slightly). Who knows how much longer it could've went on for if she hadn't gotten injured? Gunther is doing his best to make the IC title relevant again. Bianca Belair makes a damn good champion herself.
So my question is, how do you guys feel about the longer title reigns, and how long is too long? For example, I feel like I would've been happy with another year of The Bloodline stuff, but I accept it is time to get the titles off of Roman and The Usos. I'm fine with how the tag titles are going to play out, but for the other, Cody wouldn't have been my first choice, but I'm fine with him too because it still makes sense and the crowd will eat it up. It'd take some phenomenal booking to make me want to sit through a 2 years period of Cody being on top though. But he also can't drop it too soon or it'd make his entire story feel like it was all for nothing.
I don’t think the length of the title reign means as much as the quality of the wrestler, matches and booking. Not a lot of people remember how long Bret Hart was champion during each reign, but the matches were nothing but quality. We all remember Diesel had a year long reign but the matches were hit and miss, mostly misses. Ric Flair was one of the greatest World Champions of all time for a reason. John Cena had just as many reigns, but he’s not in the same league. Short title reigns can feel like forever too, like stupid ass Jinder Mahal in 2017.
GUNTHER having a long reign doesn’t make the IC title important. The quality of him as a wrestler, the quality of matches and the quality of booking is what makes it important. Miz didn’t really hold onto it forever, but he made the title important.
Austin Theory looks like he’s holding that US title for awhile and it means something. Dean Ambrose held it forever and it didn’t mean anything. The least important title for the least important member of the Shield.
Lol gotta throw a big yikes at that last line ol’ Bucket. Solely because I don't know how one measures the importance of stable members. They were all booked well at times, poorly at times, yet all carried on and rose to be top guys. I'd say they're even if I had to. Subjective opinion aside, of course. If I'm sharing my favorite: IT'S MOX BABY (and was even when he was Ambrose, being booked like butt by McMahon).
But otherwise I agree for the most part. I enjoy long reigns if they’re booked strong and the matches are good. I do usually hate when titles get hot potatoed though. In that regard, length can help illustrate the importance of a title. I don't necessarily feel Theory is making the US title seem all that prestigious or important though. The match with Cena will help that, but otherwise he just sorta floats around with it. Reigns on the other hand has made the Undisputed World title(s?) seem like the biggest prize WWE has to offer once again (finally), and the Usos + the current storyline have done wonders to rejuvenate the tag titles. Let's hope that continues post-Mania.
Anyhow, ROH Supercard of Honor card looks fudgein stacked. Gonna be a good Mania weekend, boys.
ROH World Title - Claudio Castagnoli (c) vs. Eddie Kingston ROH Tag Title "Reach for the Sky" Ladder Match - Lucha Bros vs. The Kingdom vs. Top Flight vs. Aussie Open vs. RUSH & Dralistico ROH Pure Title - Wheeler Yuta (c) vs. Katsuyori Shibata(!!!) ROH TV Title - Samoa Joe (c) vs. Mark Briscoe ROH Women's Title - Athena (c) vs. Yuka Sakazaki AAA Mega Title - El Hijo del Vikingo (c) vs. Komander ROH 6-Man Tag Title - The Embassy (Brian Cage, Toa Liona & Kaun) (c) vs. AR Fox, Metalik & Blake Christian
Yeah, I left out Ric Flair in my list because his title reigns are combined through multiple companies (and WWE doesn't even count them all in their canon or the number would be higher).
What I meant with Gunther, his in-ring work being great as well as the booking helps make the title relevant, definitely. I'm not convinced Otis could be pulling off this kind of reign. Good booking is important and is the key to how I could tolerate Roman being on top for 2 years. He's still not very good in-ring imo, but because he has been so good at playing a cool heel it helps make it easier to overlook that. Now if only Vince had the balls to pull the trigger on a Cena heel turn in the late 2000s...
With Bret's title reigns, the lengths of his reigns weren't as important because he wasn't defending the title on Raw every week or on monthly PPVs (I think they only started doing a PPV every month in 1999). But each title win was memorable and meant something. Can't really say that for Alexa Bliss (just using her as an example, I don't blame her for it because she has no say in the matter) whose 5 title runs happened in much less time than Bret's whole WWF run as a main eventer. Charlotte as well, will beat her dad's record while not being an active wrestler even close to the amount of time he was doing it full time for. If her title reigns were longer, meaning there'd be less of them, they might mean something. As of now, she is I think at #14, and according to cagematch stats, 6 of her reigns were less than a month long, 3 were less than a week (2 of those were MITB being cashed-in on her immediately after winning). For her, imo she needed fewer and longer title reigns.
I wasn’t saying Ambrose/Mox is the worst of the 3. At that time, the US title meant practically nothing and there wasn’t as much focus on him as there was on the other two as tag champs even. He was the least important member of the Shield at that time. If you want to see that as something else, OK I guess.
> I wasn’t saying Ambrose/Mox is the worst of the 3. At that time, the US title meant
> practically nothing and there wasn’t as much focus on him as there was on the other
> two as tag champs even. He was the least important member of the Shield at that time.
> If you want to see that as something else, OK I guess.
No, don't be so hasty, I just didn't understand what you were saying... which is why I said I wasn't sure how one would measure importance. It seemed like you were saying overall, as in the long run. At the time, sure, he was booked to be the least important in Vince's eyes (for whatever reason) despite easily being the most over. Never really understood their apprehension with just getting behind the dude until they had to neuter his character and have him talk to plants as a face and/or wear a goofy gas mask as a heel. The self destruction that took/takes place in WWE always baffles me.
Imagine how much better the main event of WM32 would have been if they just had Triple H either a) lose the Rumble to Ambrose, or b) drop the title to him at Roadblock the next month? Built-in Shield story, a guy the crowd actually wanted to see in the main event, etc. But instead Triple H holds his "star power" above upward mobility for the younger wrestlers and slots himself in, and it's easily Top 5 worst Mania main events of all time, at THE worst Mania of all time (imo) and only served to make the audience even more anti-Reigns at the time.
Apparently after last night's Episode 4, all the taped ROH matches have aired. There will obviously be a live Supercard of Honor next week, but I'm wondering what happens from there. A short break to get more tapings done? Or a longer break until we get closer to whatever the next "big event" they plan to do, with another batch of 4 episodes leading up to that?
I wish they'd book out college gyms and concert halls again like back in the day to get that old school ROH vibe back a little. I've really dug the episodes they put out but ROH, to me, will always be a little less polished than it is these days (and has been since like 2014ish).
Anyways, Charlotte just cut a promo and turned on the crowd after getting blatantly put off by “what” chants. Looks like we’re getting a heatless heel vs heel Women’s title match as the main event of Night 1. Yep, Vince is back in creative.
If they don’t reroute to have the tag title match main event Night 1, that will be very goofy.
I saw it as a baby face promo that failed. She reacted like any normal person with a story to tell would. Whether she’s suited for being a baby face is a whole different story, and the answer is clearly no.
Well yah, it was supposed to be a face promo but she practically pulled a “you people” with that brick line. She reverted back to a heel because, like you said, she’s not well suited as a face. The crowd wants to boo her, so ultimately it’s gonna feel like heel v heel at Mania. That + the lack of build makes that match being a main event a joke (even though it’ll probably be a fine match).
They certainly dragged that out until the last second but that was an effective segment with Rey finally popping Dominik and confirming the Mania match. Good stuff from them tonight.
This has been the least hyped I've felt for a WrestleMania in years. The Bloodline stuff has been good, but I dunno, maybe not good enough to carry the whole event on its shoulders.
Still am hyped to a degree though. Gonna spend the whole weekend doing nothing but watching rasslin'.
> This has been the least hyped I've felt for a WrestleMania in years. The Bloodline
> stuff has been good, but I dunno, maybe not good enough to carry the whole event
> on its shoulders.
>
> Still am hyped to a degree though. Gonna spend the whole weekend doing nothing but
> watching rasslin'.
>
>
Yah that’s what I do too, watch old/other graps to get in the mood. I haven’t been truly hyped for a Mania in a long while but usually always end up having a good enough time with the pals I watch with.
As good as the Bloodline stuff has been, it really is this IC Title triple threat I’m most looking forward to.
I’m hyped for Mania. It’s going to be good. I do feel like something is missing, though.
After the Usos attacked Sami and Kevin, Jey is still glaring at Sami like he might be right. Jey still being conflicted is great, and while part of me wants Cody to win, I also think that Jey fighting Roman is the ultimate payoff.
Ultimately, I’m loving the way it’s going for the most part. Way more options for what can happen, and way more intriguing options than there’s been for anything in WWE in forever.
Andre Battle Royal confirmed for Smackdown next week, and both Lashley and LA Knight are in that match. If that's the extent of their Mania weekend, that's pretty lame, so I'm hoping they initiate some sort of quick angle to get a singles match added to the main Mania card.
Anyhow, other than that, I think the card is pretty much finalized (except for the teams in the women's 4-team tag match). I updated the prediction thread with the full card (as of right now) and the 10 bonus questions. I doubt many folks will be predicting but it'll at least be fun for those of us who watch regularly.
Lately I've been craving some old ECW circa 1997 and will probably watch some of that next weekend. I just hope NBC doesn't make them butcher the audio during certain crowd chants.
in the meantime I'm currently going through 2003 era SmackDown and am currently up to a few weeks before WrestleMania 19. The shows overall are still pretty good, minus the cringe bra and panties matches, and nonsense like Al Wilson and Dawn Marie.
Yah 2002-2004 had some pretty great wrestling, the roster was awesome back then. Other than those classic cringe moments, I’m sure you’ll find some gems in there.
Every once in a while I like to watch old PPVs synced up with the “What Happened When” podcast with Tony Schiavone and Conrad Thompson that correspond with the show. Can get juvenile but sometimes it’s fun to hear the Tony’s opinion of some of the shows he called back in the day. Been doing that a bit for Mania season.
I'll say this: while I still think there are far better matches for Lesnar at this year's Mania, the segment between he and Omos on Raw last night did go a long way toward getting me at least marginally excited for the match. It's kind of refreshing to see Lesnar playing the underdog role and being the one who needs to retreat as opposed to his opponent. I don't expect the match to be great, and hope it's still just a short Lesnar-style match, but it'll be nice seeing him be the one trying to take his opponent off his feet as opposed to the opposite.
Why are FTR to the point of leaving if they can’t beat the Ass Boys? Didn’t they come back like 2 or 3 weeks ago or something? How did this happen? What did I miss?
> Why are FTR to the point of leaving if they can’t beat the Ass Boys? Didn’t they
> come back like 2 or 3 weeks ago or something? How did this happen? What did I miss?
The Ass Boys refused to grant them a title shot under any circumstances until Dax put their AEW careers on the line. The Gunns kept getting involved with FTR during the FTR/Briscoes feud so this had been lingering. I think they’re playing off FTR’s “will they/won’t they” go back to WWE contract situation.
OK. I’m pretty sure FTR are locked up with AEW contract wise so I would be surprised if they lost. If they lost and then went to RoH, that would be good for that roster but be a severe downgrade for them I think. Then again if they’re not locked up then doing this for their way out makes sense and that tweet Dax put out with a WWE paper in the corner makes a lot more sense. Seems like they rushed a career vs. title match since they came back not long ago, but I haven’t been the best at keeping up with AEW so probably wrong about that part.
I wouldn’t necessarily consider it a true downgrade for FTR to end up in ROH, after all they were the previous ROH tag champs for months, but yah it would definitely be a slight step backwards for that same reason.
I guess FTR’s AEW contracts are legit up in April, and Dax is constantly tweeting about their status and future without actually revealing what the plans are. So there have been all these rumors swirling about whether they’ll re-sign with AEW or not since like January. Either, yah, this is a good way to write them out of AEW by putting a newer team over on their way out, or it’s just a good opportunity to capitalize on all the buzz surrounding their contract status.
I expect they’ll win the titles and stay in AEW now that red flags are popping up everywhere that would suggest McMahon has a tighter grip on WWE’s creative than anyone’s letting on. I don’t think they want to wind up in clown suits with giant clocks around their necks lol
It would be a downgrade. Go from being very over on national TV to on a taped every so often TV show behind a paywall. That’s a downgrade, no matter where they are in RoH. I don’t think that they’d be playing contract stuff up in AEW, without being locked up. That would be dumb, so maybe TK would let them do it for some dumb reason. I don’t know about Vince being back in charge of creative or helping with it, since the second that’s confirmed the government will be all over that, but yeah being dressed like Doink 2023 wouldn’t be my first choice haha
I just don’t see it as a downgrade, especially when you consider that the rosters are interchangeable anyways. Claudio, Joe, Yuta, Briscoe, etc… they’re all technically ROH and don’t feel like they’ve been downgraded whatsoever because they can all still appear on either show. Obviously if FTR’s AEW contracts expire, they wouldn’t be signing EXCLUSIVE contracts to ROH. They’d still be able to swap wherever, whenever, depending on the booking.
And they’re not really playing any contract stuff up directly ON AEW programming, Dax just talks about it on his own (maybe too much). Khan famously doesn’t get involved in how wrestlers go about their outside ventures or social media presence the way WWE does (for better or for worse) so Dax is free to drop teases either way all he wants. That’s why no one knows the legitimate reason for the titles vs career match - is it just AEW catching wind of internet buzz and playing a little inside baseball, or are FTR actually planning on taking off in April? But I agree, I don't see them taking off anytime soon.
As for ol’ Vincent Kennedy, there are major red flags that were reported on just the other day. Apparently shows are suddenly being rewritten day-of far more than ever since Triple H took over, certain gimmicks are being eased back toward the direction Vince wanted them before stepping away, and apparently there has been a “Mr McMahon’s Office” sign backstage every week for a while. Heck, they even reshot a promo recently to remove the word “wrestling” from it. Not saying they’ll ever come right out and admit he’s in charge again, but Triple H even already acknowledged that he gives input so its possible he's doing that more often nowadays. Which would be fudging terrible considering Vince is trash garbage. Though I’ll admit WWE has only been slightly better, VERY slightly better, with Triple H in charge. Don’t know how one can watch the Wyatt crap, or the Women’s division in general, and consider Triple H all that great a booker haha
I dunno if that's fair to suggest Triple H isn't a good booker. We've already seen that he is (peak NXT years of 2014-2019 say hello). Unfortunately In his current role I think the people most disappointed are the ones who thought he'd instantly make Raw and SmackDown feel like those years of NXT black & gold era or something. The only way he'd have been able to do that is if he pulled a Vince Russo and did a "reboot" of the entire company. Otherwise, there ain't a booker on the planet that could've washed the stench of Vince off the product in 9-ish months or however long he has been in control now. Instead he was placed in a role where he's pretty much "playing with someone else's toys" so to speak.
I can't argue about the Bray Wyatt stuff being pretty lame since his return, which is especially disappointing because he was given more creative control over it than last time, and they even hired that dude from Marvel to work with him on the White Rabbit stuff. That could also just be because maybe Wyatt isn't the creative genius he was once thought to be.
Admittedly, NXT was a lot better booked, you’re right. But Triple H, at this point, has had enough time to course correct from Vince’s vision far more than he has. To his credit, the Mysterio angle is all him and that’s finally been getting entertaining, and he seems to be sticking the landing with Bloodline (even if that started with Vince). But just about the entire rest of the card for most shows is still on the dull side imo. Just seems like more of the same, with slight improvements in some corners of the shows.
Wyatt can take some of the blame for his stuff too, I guess he has a bit more control over his character, but at the end of the day, it’s still the booker’s call to allow him to have that control. The buck stops at Triple H. And to be fair, I highly doubt it was Wyatt’s idea to cripple any mystique his character or the Uncle Howdy angle had by booking a neon, glow in the dark Mountain Dew advertisement for one of his first PPV matches back. Silly decisions like that, or having Lashley arbitrarily body Uncle Howdy right off the show, leans a lot more “classic WWE booking” than anything else.
I haven't touched those modes yet. I played through Showcase mode and started up one of the MyRise modes. When did MyRise become a thing? It's its own little original story mode and is pretty cool so far, they tell you to play through it multiple times to see how all the possible choices can play out.
No major glitches that I can recall, just a couple of slight annoyances, things that should have been fixed in the PS2 era but are still happening on PS5 for some reason, like setting up a table in the corner and then I Irish whip an opponent into it but he kinda clips through it, or another example was Steve Austin pulling a ladder out from under the ring and then dropped it in front of the apron and just starts walking back and forth unable to just step over it to climb back into the ring until I went out of the ring myself to lure him away from getting caught up by the ladder.
I don’t understand why some people is saying that Vince is there and is in creative. Whoever is starting needs to stop being dumb. It might seem like it sometimes, but people are quick to forget a few things. First, WWE’s DNA is full of Vince. Like, the company and him are synonymous and have been for decades. Second, Triple H learned under Vince. While he obviously likes other stuff too like Crockett and whatnot, Vince taught HHH and even if other people also taught him things, it was all done in WWE. Third, Nick Khan went out and said Vince wasn’t in creative. That absolutely 100% has to be the truth, because he’s a company officer and if he’s lying then that has serious SEC implications written all over it. Especially since they’re in sale mode and Vince was ousted because the dangling dingle dangled too much and the NDAs were found, there’s no way Vince should endanger any of that. He has billions to make.
No, the booking isn’t perfect, but there’s no way that WWE would have a paradigm shift in philosophy because HHH took over. He still has work to do, like with the women in general and making most of his rehires seem important, and making anything not Bloodline-related matter more. But, what’s hitting right now is fantastic. I hope after we’re done with Mania, we see some improvements.
Nick Khan also said there were no fights in the stands for the past 15 years in an attempt to make WWE seem all shiny and nice despite there being one in Boston a few months ago. He’s a yes man, and has been caught in lies numerous times. Same with Vince. Same with Triple H. Again, Triple H literally already admitted that Vince has input in his creative, it’s really not hard to believe that the shady dude who has a history of playing by his own rules may be doing the same thing right now. He’s obviously not back in any official capacity, but he is confirmed to be there weekly, it’s nowhere near out of the realm of possibility that he’s pushing Triple H toward his desired booking. Dude already changed the WWE bylaws via SEC filing even after stepping down, he’ll do what he wants regardless. As long as they don’t come outright and officially give him the job, they can do whatever they want.
To Pizza’s point, we saw how Triple H can book when Vince isn’t pressing him with NXT, there’s likely a reason it’s so wildly different now. Thankfully it’s not as bad as when Vince had full reign, but it’s mostly just dull. Again, just my opinion, but for my money, The Bloodline stuff is the only truly fantastic thing about WWE right now. Some of that is actually competent booking for once, and some of that is because it’s being compared to the turd Vince has squatted out for the past decade, so anything would look like gold in comparison. Even the Sami/KO stuff depended on a segment hawking t-shirts on the road to Mania, so there are still some whiffs even in that angle.
I also hope it steps up more after Mania, but I feel like people have been saying that for months. “I’m sure after SummerSlam Triple H will pick it up”, etc etc. He’s had enough time to start steering it that way, but so far he’s only been riding the Bloodline angle with a few decent storylines sprinkled underneath it. I just want it to be better, but if you’re digging it now, that rules. Folks should watch what they enjoy.
On the OTHER side of the wrestling pond, speaking of good faction-based angles, the Elite-reunion vs Blackpool Combat Club story is getting real spicy. Danielson just officially rejoined BCC and helped out with a beatdown on Omega. I’ll never boo them, but the official heel turn seemed to work well on the live crowd. They got a bit of heat there.
AEW NEEDS to fudgein inject some life into this Outcasts feud. Every week it’s the same deal. Saraya, Soho & Storm try to spray paint their opponent, then the face ladies come out to stop it. Having Hayter involved helps a bit but they need to progress this crap, the current shtick getting old.
Pretty good episode of WWE 24/7 going behind the scenes of WrestleMania 38 on Peacock now. I’m glad they’re keeping the 24/7 series going, always dug that one. I think “Day Of” (or whatever it was called) was good too.
> Pretty good episode of WWE 24/7 going behind the scenes of WrestleMania 38 on Peacock
> now. I’m glad they’re keeping the 24/7 series going, always dug that one. I think
> “Day Of” (or whatever it was called) was good too.
>
> I miss Rivalries and WrestleMania Rewind.
I used to like watching these types of things when WWE was still its own separate Network app, but since the Peacock merge I barely watch any type of stuff like that anymore. I need to get back into it.
The worst thing about WWE on Peacock is the breaks they put in every single show. Even PPVs. Whether you pay for the ad free version or not, there’s these weird black breaks put in every so often for no reason. Ruins the flow of the shows, especially since I pay the $10. I don’t like them at all.
With all these big names gathered in one place/city, I hope WWE used this opportunity to record (or setup agreements for future recordings) of stuff like Table For 3. Stacy, Trish and Torrie can do one (with Lita in a booster seat or something), maybe Muta, Nakamura and Asuka, just let them speak in Japanese and subtitle the whole thing. Konnan, Rey and Dom Dragon Lee could do one.
Dang, The Pebble is thick in all the right places. I didn't realize this would be a pre-show match because they haven't been doing those. Kind of a waste of a debut because she hardly did anything.
Lashley posted another tweet video last night telling somebody to step up and face him at Mania, so I’m expecting a Lashley match on Night 2 to round that card out to 7 matches like Night 1.
Bron Breakker could take that spot after dropping the NXT title today. LA Knight is the safest bet. And I mean, I guess there is a chance Bray or Howdy answer it, but that’d make the last couple weeks seem like wasted time.
First I can recall hearing these types of things about Rick Steiner. I wonder how many other seemingly "nice dudes" from those eras really weren't nice at all. image
@PizzaTheHutt He’s a known bully and piece of crap. Check out Bischoff remembering the first time he met him:
On seeing Steiner in the locker room for the first time: “So I go into this room, this big room where the guys are dressing. And I see both Steiners, Rick and Scott, have a referee. And for the life of me, I’m not sure who it was. I wanna say it was Nick Patrick, but I could be wrong. But anyway, they had this referee, and they had him duct taped up like a mummy. They had duct tape around his mouth, his hands were duct taped to the sides of his hips and his legs. His feet were duct taped together. And he was buck-ass naked and had a pencil stuck up his ass. And I thought, ‘Wow. This is gonna be a hell of a gig.’ [laughs] That’s my first recall of the Steiner Brothers. And I’m sure the referee, whoever it was, whether it was Nick Patrick or whoever, must have done something that the Steiners found worthy of some sort of Steiner Retribution. But they tortured him. It was, all I wanna say, in good fun for those who were watching. [laughs] Who knows what he did to deserve such a response. I’m not sure, I didn’t see it. I just saw the aftermath, and I thought, ‘Man. I’m gonna be really careful around these two guys.'”
Unhinged old boomer douchebags, and they made light of literal rape. Wrestling locker rooms must have been a nightmare back in the day.
Rick Steiner definitely fell into the same thing that a lot of others did where they could say or do whatever because they were good wrestlers. We all heard the stories for years and it didn’t really matter until he treated Gisele Shaw like a piece of crap yesterday. I’m glad he was removed from the signings he was supposed to do this weekend. Somehow, he’s on a school board too.
We’ll see what happens. I’d think they would still at least have to fulfill the Peacock deal, but we won’t know until it happens. I do wonder if they’d announce it tonight during Mania, to get ahead of the story. They do like to try to do that kind of thing.
Nick Khan did recently say something about potentially returning to a PPV model a few days ago.
"He said WWE would be open to moving premium live events to a pay-per-view model, similar to how marquee UFC cards are offered on ESPN+, offering a hypothetical that if Peacock offered five-times their current rights fees but wanted to sell PLEs at an upcharge to justify, WWE would listen. Khan did say WWE doesn’t want to price fans out of the product, however. He cited the availability of $25 tickets for WrestleMania as an example of their desire to make sure everyone can afford to be a part of the WWE experience."
I can safely say that if they go back to PPVs and keep the monthly model, I’ll exclusively be ordering maybe WrestleMania and Royal Rumble. Won’t be dishing out PPV prices every month by any means.
I’d also wonder what/if the turnaround time from live to on demand would be in that case. Like, if it’s 30 days like Raw and Smackdown are, or 3 months like HonorClub or whatever the case may be. Not gonna spend the money on the PLE if it’s available a week later.
Eeeeyep, WWE is officially no longer a family-run operation... and they inked Vince McMahon for a 2-year contract. Great.
I reiterate my worry about PPV prices. UFC PPV prices got astronomical when Endeavor took them over. If WWE follows suit, I can't imagine I'll be bothering to get too invested in the product anymore considering there's not a force on this planet that could get me to pay those prices for WWE shows.
Vince then said he won't "be in the weeds" the way he was before, but that his role would be saying "yes or no". Meaning he'll still have final say on what gets pushed through creative. And THAT suuuuuuuuuuuuucks. He used the same "weeds" phrase when he was apparently handing creative over to Bischoff and Heyman 4 years ago, and we all know how that turned out. He was on the headset giving feedback for both nights of Mania. All this lines up with reports that Vince was pushing to keep the titles on Reigns through Mania, likely to have a "proven" asset like Reigns as the top guy through the selling of WWE. Triple H will apparently remain as chief content executive, aka Vince's fall guy when the going gets rough.
I wonder what it means for the wrestlers now and what kind of benefits will they get that they weren't getting before? Like, they are real employees now, right? No more hiding them under the "independent contractors" bullcrap?
I just saw on Twitter this will be Brock Lesnar's first match on Raw since beating Tommy Dreamer in a Singapore Cane match on July 22, 2002 and his first tag team match since 2004.
> 17 minutes into RAW, and no wrestling.. over/under # of matches is like 4.5 at this
> rate lol
Apparently the production crew have received two updated call sheets since the show started. That tidbit + a mere 5 minutes of wrestling in the commercial-free first hour certainly smells like ol’ Vinnie Mac.
Yeah Vince is right back in charge. Seriously… fudge this noise. I admit that I had high hopes and of course, Vince had to come back and be the guy running it all again.
worst Post Wrestlemania Raw ever.. no surprises (is Matt Riddle really a surprise?).. The only interesting thing was Brock turning on Rhodes.. I guess someone from Smackdown will challenge Reigns now (Please be Gunther).
Yah, as corroborated by a bunch of folks, Vince was indeed running TV last night. I saw one report that suggested the new call sheets the production crew and wrestlers received during the show cut out 2 women's matches to allow more time for Triple H's promo and Omos vs. Elias. It apparently impacted roster morale in a big bad way.
It also looks like Bayley's on her way out of WWE, if she's not out already. There were apparently a few wrestlers who said they'd "walk" if they saw Vince in control again, and it seems she may be one of them. After Mania, she tweeted that "even the most romantic love stories come to an end. Bye" (or something along those lines), and when Kai/Sky had their tag match last night, there was virtually no mention of Bayley by commentary or anywhere else on the show. Obv that may just be a "for the time being" thing, but the red flags are there.
Rough stuff. I don't understand his insistence to run creative... the dude had to have seen how well WWE was doing the past year or so and the good will they were finally starting to rebuild with the audience. Not that this is breaking news or anything, but there's definitely something wrong with that guy's brain.
There’s also a video circulating of Rollins in the ring last night, leaning on the ropes as producers are explaining something to him. His segment was cut from the show after he already made his entrance. This explains that whole awkward segment where he comes out, has the crowd do the whole music shtick, and then just… nothing happened.
Yeah, RAW was pretty terrible last night.. There was what, 2 matches in the first hour and they were terrible matches. I hope McMahon isn't sticking around, he hasn't been a decent booker for YEARS... I'm probably gonna watch Smackdown this week but if nothing really comes to some sort of next phase, I'll just read up on the recaps each week.
Typically, RAW after Wrestlemania has had some AWESOME moments in the past: Awesome debuts, championship changes, and the crowds were just awesome... (remember when the crowd kept singing Fandango's theme throughout the whole night?)
Last night, no crowd interaction except in the beginning (Reigns sucks... really?? that's the best you got?), NO debuts and a returning Matt Riddle?? Bleh, such a let down after a pretty great Wrestlemania 39.
I bet over the next few weeks we will see a lot of people not shown on TV and ultimately either granted their release or just let go do to 'budget cuts'..
Yeah that just did not feel like a typical post-Mania crowd. We go from "Fudge you Roman" chants two months ago to half-assed "Roman sucks" chants.
No NXT debuts either (though I think last year they were saved for the post-Mania SmackDown).
Riddle is back, but who knows for how long? He has been told one more screw up and he's gone.
Grizzled Young Veterans asked for their release, allegedly because they know WWE does a Spring cleaning of the roster after every WrestleMania and they didn't want to be lost in the shuffle where suddenly there's a bunch of free agents available on the same day when non-compete clauses are up. But Meltzer says he hasn't confirmed they were granted their release yet while others say they have.
The crappy part of this merger thing with Endeavor is the guy in charge doesn't want Vince to leave. He is clearly looking at it from an outside that thinks Vince still has a lot of name value and not paying attention to the numbers they were doing without Vince.
On top of that, even if they looked deeper into Vince’s role, Endeavor/Ari Emanuel let Dana White remain with UFC after literal video footage of him beating his wife surfaced, so Vince is safe from all the awful bullcrap he carried out. He’s back in full, and WWE’s quality is gonna suffer in a big bad way.
Ari Emanuel doesn’t know crap about wrestling. He sees a guy who brought WWE to record business and wants that guy in charge. He doesn’t care about scandals, as PizzaTheHutt said with Dana White slapping his wife being on tape.
As fans, we’re fudgeed. We’re gonna get a crapty WWE again.
I'd never pay to go to a RAW or Smackdown taping ever again as long as vince is running it.. in the 3 hours of 'TV" yesterday, there was less than 1 hour of ACTUAL wrestling, and half the matches were garbage (Omos/ELias, even the main event was trash). I'd demand a refund..
They gotta keep that momentum going at SmackDown on Friday, because Vince don't give a crap about NXT or The Bump and I doubt anyone will have even brought that to his attention. Gotta do it at the shows he will actually be at.
Eh he’s not gonna care either way. Dude has a sociopathic way of just accepting that people hate him and reveling in it. He literally got outed as a sex offender and then grew a sex offender mustache before appearing in public again, cmahn.
Plus most folks who go to Raw or Smackdown either don’t pay close enough attention to this sort of thing, or they’re the types who do that corny bowing motion whenever he shows up. Real weird.
I only caught bits and pieces of Dynamite. I wonder how they plan to setup Wembley Stadium. It'll be a big crowd I'm sure, but I can't see it being a sellout.
Apparently AEW is more popular than WWE over there, especially after the whole NXT UK talent raid, so who knows? But yah I doubt they’ll get 90k, but I’m certain they’ll draw enough to get most likely their biggest gate to date.
Also Nigel McGuinness is like a legend over there, and he just got his #AllElite graphic along with Jay White last night.
Try to round up Will Ospreay & Mercedes Mone, maybe Okada & Ibushi, see if Punk is willing to do business by then. Drew McIntyre’s contract is up sometime this summer too, and who the heck knows what’s going on with Bayley. They could really go all in (pun intended) and put on a card that’s worth going out to see.
I hope to see the constantly teased Danielson vs ZSJ match, personally.
At one point even TNA was big over there. I don't know how AEW does it, but TNA are on a free channel that was available to anyone with a TV while WWE was on Sky Sports which was behind two separate paywalls.
Went to Smackdown in Portland and it was a good time. They had 3 dark matches with 1 before the show (Tegan Nox vs. Sonya Deville) and 2 after (Austin Theory vs. Dolph Ziegler, Matt Riddle vs. Solo Sikoa).
Yeah, that was legit heat. At one point you could barely hear him over the crowd. Not many can pull that off these days without resorting to insulting the local sports team or something.
The Triple H announcement was a disappointment. Way to over-hype and under-deliver. It felt like how when Tony Khan is constantly hyping up a big announcement on Dynamite and then it turns out to be nothing special at all.
As far as this week's announcements go, running Wembley Stadium in a country where AEW is more popular than WWE > announcing the inevitable annual WWE draft, in my opinion. I honestly can't remember the last time I was actually disappointed by an AEW announcement tbh, but I know to tempter my expectations with pro wrestling. In most cases, Khan's announcements are objectively big steps for the company (which is usually all he promises), even if they're not necessarily the most surprising announcements for the audience. But I never expect him to announce he signed Brock Lesnar or booked a show on Jupiter or anything, which is what I feel like the majority of the arbitrary AEW-detractors on the net are expecting whenever this situation comes up.
But yah Dom got fudgein wild heat last night, ya love to see it. I don't know if it's 100% legit heat, or a bit of "go away" heat, but it's heat nonetheless. I've been sold on him since his Mania match vs Rey, which is saying something because I was sick of seeing him in any capacity as recently as the Royal Rumble. They finally got him to a spot where he's a believable heel, it'll be interesting to see his career trajectory from this point. All the stuff at Mania this year, + the Bad Bunny/LWO inclusion, has finally made Judgment Day seem worth the watch. Smackdown was overall a far better show than Raw, even if it did still seem to just be treading water. I can't put into words how sick of the Bloodline interference shtick I am. Great wrestlers involved and they put on great performances with what they've got, but this week has done nothing to stifle my opinion that the Bloodline story as a whole has jumped the shark. And randomly placing Riddle into it isn't helping any.
Rampage + Battle of the Belts were solid shows last night, even if nothing really happened to set the world on fire. I do wish AEW would focus a little harder on making Rampage must-see like it was during its first few weeks. It needs to be live every week and they need to carry the stories through Friday night, not just on Dynamite. Though the whole Hook/Ethan Page+The Firm angle is featured a lot, and that seems to be the case with some new Embassy/Swerve stuff this week. So hopefully they're moving back in that direction.
> As far as this week's announcements go, running Wembley Stadium in a country where
> AEW is more popular than WWE
That's an announcement that could have easily been done on Twitter though, same like the Draft announcement. Dynamite obviously isn't airing live in UK, which the announcement was a bigger deal for that market than over here.
Also, AEW is only more popular in that it gets a lot of viewers for being on free TV. That's the key. As Meltzer put it, WWE is still more "popular" in every other metric over there, such as they get 6 times more Google searches over there than AEW does. Not to take anything away from AEW, but it's far from a situation where they reign supreme over there.
> That's an announcement that could have easily been done on Twitter though, same like
> the Draft announcement. Dynamite obviously isn't airing live in UK, which the announcement
> was a bigger deal for that market than over here.
AEW airs live when it airs live, so they're going to make an announcement of that stature at their earliest live convenience. A tweet just wouldn't make as big a splash as a segment on a live episode of TV would. Either way, it's a huge announcement for the company itself whether the US fans directly benefit from it or not. It was a perfectly fine announcement to make in a 2 minute backstage promo on TV, especially with Wembley being the stadium in question. Far more warranted than Triple H getting a 5 minute entrance and then another 10 minutes to pat himself on the back, all to announce something that fans already knew happened annually.
>
> Also, AEW is only more popular in that it gets a lot of viewers for being on free
> TV. That's the key. As Meltzer put it, WWE is still more "popular" in every other
> metric over there, such as they get 6 times more Google searches over there than
> AEW does. Not to take anything away from AEW, but it's far from a situation where
> they reign supreme over there.
>
I'm aware of all that, I guess when I said "popular" I should have said "gets more eyes weekly" than WWE, which will most likely lead to AEW selling the amount of tickets they want to sell in a new live market - which was really my primary point. I wasn't trying to suggest they "reign supreme" or anything like that. Of course WWE will generally have a higher popularity ANYwhere in the world in 2023 due to being a conglomerate that has existed for 70+ years as opposed to AEW that has only been around for 4. That's longevity for ya.
That said, there's a valid reason Sky wasn't willing to outbid BT Sports when the time came to renew their relationship with WWE: the ratings while on free TV at the time of their contract ending didn't warrant the asking price. There were rating declines leading up to the change while still on Sky (which can also be attributed to other shows in other countries, not just WWE). Either way though, the ratings for WWE on BT Sports can't be what either side of that deal were hoping for considering they're not only viewed less than AEW, they're legitimately dwarfed by the number of folks watching AEW weekly. Any way you shake a stick at it, WWE can't be making the money in BT Sports subscriptions that they likely would've been making if there wasn't a legitimate alternative like AEW. So to your point, yeah, the free TV aspect is obviously a reason why so many more people watch AEW weekly, but that just goes to prove that a large number of folks in the UK are perfectly content watching AEW over WWE when push comes to shove. Which is good for AEW, and again, helps justify a two minute announcement for that audience considering so many folks watch it.
In other news, what do yall think will happen with Drew McIntyre? He was apparently planned for Smackdown last night and was supposed to appear at an autograph signing but was pulled from both. I guess he and WWE aren't on the same page, money and creative-wise. I still figured they'd use him until his contract runs out but who knows?
If you were in charge, would you go all out to keep him or do you think it's okay to let him walk? Personally, I'd want to keep him. He's a legitimately great wrestler AND big muscle beef boy, which is what WWE loves. Plus he held the company up as champ in the most trying times during the pandemic, and never got his chance to shine with the belt in front of a live crowd. I'd still like to see him get that chance before he leaves.
