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WWE Madlibs. Just bookmark this and reuse it for every signee.

Rest In Parmesan

The FBI in ECW is one of the all-time best ridiculous gimmicks. I used to love them unfurling the Italian flag with Tommy "Wildfire" Rich's face in the middle of it. Their promos at Philly landmarks associated with our vast Italian-American community were also the stuff of legend.

That is very interesting. I actually kind of hope it's true. I remember reading that a decision had been made that AEW were not going to hand out any more mega contracts, and I remember thinking, "That's good." I'm pretty sure that AEW is a fun place to work, a place where the "workers" are respected and allowed creative input and people mostly get along and are cool to each other. Pro wrestlers who sign with AEW don't have to put up with some of the absolutely harrowing bullshit that is ingrained in the WWE culture, They don't have to put up with the crazy travel schedule (presumably, after Covid...) They have much more freedom and independence. I'm sure that (for a lot of people but definitely not for everyone) working for WWE is physically, emotionally, mentally, and most of all spiritually draining. WWE should pay more. A lot more. It's a hard job with lousy hours, crippling expenses, and (for some) horrific working conditions. WWE have insane amounts of money, it would be suicidally stupid to get into a series of bidding wars with them (even of you also have insane amounts of money). AEW's men's divisions are all stacked. They have a ton of good cruiserweights, heavyweights, and tag teams. They have been able to build up a bunch of under-the-radar guys into people that fans like us can't wait to see. I'd like to see every good young wrestler in the world sign with AEW and get that treatment, but there really isn't enough room on the card to fit everyone if that happens. The women's division is not stacked, but I'd guess the plan is to wait until more Joshi wrestlers can safely make the trip over. I'd argue that they might be just as well off finding and developing young talent rather than trying to scrape up any available big-name or big-reputation female worker. Let the people who'd prefer to go to WWE for a bigger payday go. If they make it there. good for them! If they get used badly, lied to, cut, buried or whatever... be there waiting with that same "less money but much better working conditions" offer you made before. i'd argue that AEW, for now, is better off in a lovable underdog role. I'd argue that there are not a whole lot of wrestlers out there who will "move the needle" more than the people they can develop themselves. I'll bet that in five years we'll see more great and very very good pro wrestlers making the jump from WWE to AEW than the other way around. A lot more. AEW's doing great. There should be no sense of rush w/r/t them taking the next step(s). Let "...the idea of being with something new and fresh, and a contract where you can still work indies and do your hustle but it's all on the side and you keep it all" be the carrot. Develop the wrestlers that believe in you and that you believe in. You'll end up with a roster stacked with great wrestlers who love pro wrestling.

I’m with you 100% on that. I support her choices, but as a fan of hers, this sucks.

"Emphatically refused..." Cool. Suspend him until next July.

Exactly. One angle or match per week, if that, is all we're getting out of this division. It's ridiculous. I'm only counting Dynamite, which, as their flagship, is fair. You can't say "this is a serious women's division" and, outside of not doing bra and panties matches, treat it as flippantly as WWE treated their women's divisions of the past. I mean look at this shit: Nyla Rose signed Vicki Guerrero as a manager, then the two of them sat in the crowd for what feels like months Abadon had a hot Dynamite debut and then was never heard from again until she was set for a match this week. Diamante and Valez won that women's tournament, were booked on Dynamite for I think the ensuing two weeks, and now are doing nothing. I felt like they leaned too heavily on Japanese workers from the start, and should have been signing and/or developing US talent the whole time. Once travel restrictions were in place, they seriously needed to start coming up with a new plan for the division. It was on shaky ground to begin with. Do you mean to tell me Riho, Yuka Sakazawa, and Freddie Mercury Cosplay Lady were that scary talented that the whole division collapsed around them? This is a company that made do during the worst of a nationwide lockdown, yet they can't pivot to a decent women's division after losing a few people? No, this speaks to priorities more then anything. Everything else just feels like an excuse at this point.

Man, what will Twitter do without racist, code-switching, MAGA Road Dogg tweeting about dumbass conspiracies? I guess the countless others will just do the work for him. I'd like to imagine Bronson Reed beat the fuck out of him, but I give that a 0% chance of happening.

When I got my son a PS4, I hooked it up and ran the updates the night before. The next morning I woke him up with the empty box wrapped, with a little weight inside. He got excited not knowing it was empty. I said, "here let me go set it up on the TV". He handed me the box and I chucked it as hard as I could across the room. I think that was the closest my kid almost came to yelling "What the fuck!" Good times.

I get wanting to have a contract structure but the women's division is pretty much so bad that it is time to think about abandoning it if they don't get some actual wrestling talent. Signing good wrestlers to carry that division is a must. Deeb is fine but she's more a solid supporting vet than an ace. All the signs point to Rosa going to WWE for reasons already mentioned and it frustrates me that TK won't offer her more than NXT has (unless it's not a money thing then fair enough. I could see her wanting to work with the far more talented group of women after she had some struggles even with Shida). They should have a list of names they will break the bank for and near the top should be very good to great women wrestlers like Rosa because that is the company's biggest need. I fast forward through or place my attention elsewhere during most of their women's matches because they are generally green wrestlers that should be honing their craft on the indies. I saw a minute or so of Anna Jay's squash on Dark and man... This has been a talking point for too long and they have done little to rectify it. I'm losing what little hope I had for the division.

C.O.P.S was my fav cartoon as a kid. I have all the comics still in mint condition!!! Long arm, turbo 2 tone, Dr. Badvibes, Berzurko, Ms. Deamenor. What a great show.

This. Thank you. AEW is not afraid to book a tournament where the final is damn near a foregone conclusion. The TNT title tournament was Cody/Archer start to finish. Booking that is expected and makes sense is not a bad thing. Watching something develop, putting things together, and having it pay off logically is really satisfying. It's why people like mystery novels.

Nice.

Does Road Dogg work with the NXT crew? Based on his recent dust-up with Shane Helms, I get the sense he’d fit the bill.

I'm kind of surprised they never paired Koko with Rooster.

I love that the Security people are just like "well, we asked..." as if they couldn't, you know, remove him like security are supposed to do. Or call the cops in and have him removed. FWIW, he did wear a mask at least part of the time on the field during the celebration. But, yeah, touching the trophy and all that... he deserves a really, really long suspension.

I will argue that a big time women's division is not a huge need for AEW, especially with the depth of men's talent on the roster. Yes, you may lose a little bit of good PR as the progressive American wrestling company, but outside of getting a Sasha/Becky/Bayley/Charlotte level women's wrestler, AEW's progress will be based on a men's wrestler getting super hot (to make the jump from Strong #2 company in North America to challenging for #1). The women's division is the one thing that WWE has objectively handled fairly well over the last few years, but that clearly has not stemmed the tide in their overall decrease in popularity. Also, good women's wrestling was the one thing that TNA did consistently well, and again it did not seriously move the needle. Even when AEW gets the third hour of television, there is still of plenty of men's talent on the roster not regularly featured on Dynamite that could benefit from the increased exposure compared to Dark (for example, Santana and Ortiz have not been featured on Dynamite since their awesome street fight against Best Friends that boosted their popularity). AEW having a perfunctory women's division (cannot drop it all together) is probably the best thing for now until they can actually get one of the aforementioned big names to switch over (best chance for that is likely Charlotte, especially with WWE's treatment of her husband Andrade). Also, AEW in general probably can hold off on any big hires for now, with the potential exception for Rush and Dragon Lee. Plenty of depth of the men's roster across the board, but I do think that Rush and Dragon Lee are talented enough to make a difference with that.

They have no reason to participate, as they have already proven "brand superiority" last year, scoring more wins than Raw and Smackdown combined.

I'm with you with regards to maybe putting the division on hold, but then you'll get a bunch of people bitching and moaning about it. More than any big signing like Archer or Miro or Cage, I wanted TK to back up the Brinks truck to any good to great women's wrestler. Like you said, break the bank of those women. The weird thing is that anyone that is a good to great women's wrestler with any amount of personality is going to immediately stand out more in AEW than they would in WWE or NXT. However, you have women going to Impact, which has about no viewership and there's no way Impact can beat AEW in terms of money. Part of me wonders who is in charge of talent relations for the women's division. Is Christopher Daniels in charge of all talent? I know Kenny was handling the booking of the women's division, but I don't even know if he's doing that now and if he's in charge of any hiring of women. In any case, I think they almost need to bring in someone specific to handle the women's division that has something of a large budget to work with. AEW has the money, sort of, they have the ability to give women exposure, so just fucking do it already. At some point you have to stop missing on Rosa, Purrazzo, or any women in WWE who have a contract about to run out and stop settling for complete unknowns. The moneyball comparison is incredibly apt.

Yeah, I’ve certainly tried to be patient with the young female wrestlers and understanding that a lot of AEW’s plans for the division have gone sideways for reasons beyond their control, but if Khan is really serious about this division, then there comes a time when you have to put your money where your mouth is and invest in it. Thunder Rosa seemed like a must-get to me, but this isn’t even an isolated incident. They whiffed on Deonna Purrazzo recently, too, and she’s been terrific on Impact. Those two would’ve gone a long way toward making this a functional division, as opposed to an ongoing experiment in determining if Moneyball works in wrestling.

Considering how they've covered up Keith Lee's disgusting adipose tissue, it's really commendable that this fat fuck Adam Cole gets to still wear short tights.

I don't think anyone but Quasimodo should be doing this move: Pay off to that weird Quasimodo move: Big revenge elbows by Leduc:

I loved everyone looking around waiting in all the usual spots where you see someone interrupt a wedding only to shrug it off when nothing happened. Impact has been really creative the past few months, and I've definitely been enjoying it.

Well shit it still is October, so here's Onryo, who was influenced by this guy

This is the Jets we're talking about. There's no reason they can't pick first in 2021 AND 2022.

I'm just going to point out that Peyton chose not to turn pro rather than be drafted by the Jets. Don't think it hurt him much.

I saw Jinder Mahal three times during his indy run between WWE stints, so I'd say it's a three-way tie between all of those shows.

Vs.

Have they ever given a look at people like Solo Darling, the Sea Stars, Nicole Savoy, etc? Gimme Darling as a pint sized powerhouse out-muscling Nyla. Priscilla Kelly made a couple appearances and was on the JeriCruise, so obviously there is some interest there. There's lots of talented female wrestlers in the US that would go a long way to filling out the roster, but they seem content on waiting it out for the joshi wrestlers and partnering up with Billy Corgan (which would be fine if they also manage to get Allysin Kay and Marti Belle in).

He's Your Papi!

AEW PPVs are available on DVD now.

I still have this one It is definitely not in mint condition

Thunder Rosa is 34 and (I believe) has a son who is middle or high school age. As a parent, I can't blame her for taking a WWE offer if it's worth more than AEW -- you have a downside guarantee and can bank some of that money into a college fund for your child, as well as save additional cash down the line to improve your day-to-day (I recall her holding a flash merchandise sale to pay for car repairs not too long ago). She would be sacrificing time at home (and would presumably give up rights to the TR gimmick and take down her merchandise sites), but it may be worth it in the end for she and her family. One thing I do wonder is if she still wants to dabble in MMA fighting. AEW seems OK with it in regards to Jake Hager, but the WWE may put the kibosh on that.

2017 doesn't. Why the fuck should 2020? Dodgers all goddamn day, my dude. I was 10 years old, going apeshit in my living room with my Dad in 1988. Today I got to do that with my sons. What a fucking excellent day. Manfred getting motherfucked is outstanding, and it seems like he is either hammered or stroking out.

...and Death Yama-san

Leyla Hirsch makes her Dynamite debut tomorrow tonight, against Serena Deeb in Deeb’s first NWA Women’s Title defense.

The Dodgers win in 6! First World Series Championship in 32 years. I know this year will have a Big asterisk* next to it, but I don't care. The Ray's put up one hell of a fight and are a great team.

You know it's going to happen because of the title of the video, but the anticipation is so immense!

Yeah - I think Chris Evans ended up being my actor of the decade This, Snowpiercer, Cap. Heck I even tossed The Losers on my ballot somewhere near the back

Quasimodo vs Gilbert Leduc: Yes, Quasimodo. I love fakeout trips: Quasimodo's deal was that he was a monster, but more of a skulking sort than a behemoth. He had a lot of skill actually: But he also did this insane move:

I may be wrong, but I always thought that Lex started going out with Liz after his marriage went to the shitter after the Sting disclosure that's being discussed.