Greggulator

I would say that the Wall Street Journal's reporting led to Vince McMahon being taken down from the monopoly he controlled for decades twice. Vince only found a way to worm his back way into power because of the pretty singular way he built the company's voting rights when they went public decades ago. But there's a very strong case to be made that the woman doesn't attach her name to a lawsuit without the reporting that came out earlier. This was through the Wall Street Journal, which is owned by Rupert Murdoch, Linda ran for Senate as a Republican and worked in the Trump Administration, and Vince gave a lot of money and is personal friends with Trump himself. So, yes, I think companies and billionaires still can get taken down. How Enron unfolded was also largely because of the press. There's a great book about how the Wall Street Journal reported on Enron. One of their energy industry reporters read their quarterly earnings report and listened to the call. There are all kinds of footnotes in those documents and it takes a really trained eye to know what jumps out. She saw some weird footnote that made it look like the company lost nine figures worth of money, and they were trying to separate it out from the rest of the accounting. She and another reporter made some phone calls and it turns out that the company's Chief Financial Officer was cooking the books and had all of these side deals and etc. A few other people were onto it earlier than that (I think The Street maybe) but the WSJ has a lot more teeth. The Wall Street Journal's reporting also to the collapse of Theranos (the Elizabeth Holmes company.) One of their reporters caught word that they were making up results, and it went on from there. Rupert Murdoch was one of the investors in Theranos (he kicked in $125 million). She went to him to try and have stories about Theranos killed. He stood to lose that money if Theranos blew up... and the WSJ still reported on Theranos. The people who served on the Theranos Board of Directors included former Secretary of State George Shultz, Henry Kissinger, eventual Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis, the CEO of Wells Fargo and David Boies (one of the most powerful lawyers in American history.) I've often joked that Bloomberg is possibly the most far-left magazine in the country. I'm only partly kidding. They have a big profile on their cover this week of the union head from the auto companies. I only skimmed it -- but it's pretty glowing. They hold people to account all of the time. And they're owned by Mike Bloomberg, obviously, who made his billions by creating THE most prominent computing terminal system in financial history. He's totally hands off with his reporting. The NYT and Washington Post have tons of great reporting that led to some kind of change, too. There's just an insane amount. And so many regional papers -- even though they've been gutted financially and in terms of newsroom staff -- have put spotlights on local jerks in recent years. The FTX collapse largely came because of CoinBase, which is the niche trade publication covering the crypto industry. But the NYT did a lot of early crypto reporting a few years ago and put a big spotlight on a lot of that industry. There's a Netflix documentary about these crypto goofs the NYT brought down. Print journalism still absolutely works. I don't watch any TV news. That's a whole different animal. But the best print journalists out there still get a lot of results.

I have never been a big fan of Drew but he has been really good this past heel turn. Last night’s stuff with Punk was some all-time great heel work. “I prayed for this to happen to you” is one of the funniest heel lines and one me and my friends will be using from now on. DIY/Judgment Day was fantastic. I loved the pre-match walk-and-talk segment. Quick, different presentation. That match had a lot of great build and I thought a bunch of times we were going to see an out-of-nowhere title change. The Cody/Seth stuff was a great curveball. I was not expecting it. I think we might actually get that if we end up with Roman/Rocky. And if that is a thing on the table (excuse me), then they absolutely have to do it and figure out a different story for Cody. You don’t have the biggest movie star in the world in a wrestling match too often. And you still have Cody/Roman for another time, too. Kofi/Gunther was so good. It was just a smart match that followed the simple TV match template — dominant heel does vicious and mean stuff early, babyface sells it like death, babyface makes his miraculous comeback, you get the end. But when you have two of the best to ever do it (and Gunther’s at that level), it’s special. Gunther’s “brutal” stuff actually looks like it does a great job protecting everyone. I’m sure it hurts, but it looks like pretty safe. Kofi is just absolutely great at putting everyone’s stuff over, and he also has the equity from his HOF resume to be able to lose matches and make whoever beats him look better, even when the guy is on the rear of a lifetime. I really liked Becky’s short promo. We are getting there with Becky and Rhea. I also liked Bayley’s promo and the subtle look of wordy from Iyo.

The injuries really opens up Rhea and Becky to steal the next few months. I am so excited for that feud and match.

Also, the notorious time he "died" on-air and it sent their stock price crazy.

This and the CNN article have a TON of merit. There is so much insane stuff that both Endeavor/TKO and WWE put in what they reported to the SEC. I wrote this before. Sorry if I'm just saying these things again. 1) Vince's payoffs came out of the WWE's piggie bank instead of this own checkbook. Because of that, the WWE had to go back and tell the investing public: "Hey, we lied to you about how much money we made over the years. We made less because we didn't know Vince paid hush money with company revenue." That's the single biggest no-no in publicly traded companies. That's essentially what Enron did (albeit more complicated and for a lot more money.) That's what led to the reported grand jury sniffing around Vince right now. And grand juries can go into all sorts of directions, so something like what was included in the lawsuit could end up leading to criminal charges. (That's not my area of expertise -- there could be limits on what can be presented to a grand jury, but who knows.) Oh, I also forgot about the whole illegal campaign contributions thing. 2) One of the things companies have to disclose to investors are the "risk factors" that could cause the company material harm. A lot of these are just common sense -- an oil company could end up having to pay a lot of money if an oil well blows up. Endeavor/TKO and all of that listed Vince McMahon himself, as a board of director, as a risk factor because of the possible negative publicity and all of that. That's just completely insane to see that. It definitely opens up a lot of questions like "why did you keep this guy around?" and "what did you know about what Vince did to this woman?" Who knows what the hell was in Vince's personal agreement when he sold the company. But if he sold the company and can be fired (or forced to resign), then they certainly could have found a way for him to not be the chairman of the board with the ability to name other people to the board. That's just insanity. But, hey -- the company owns UFC, which employs Dana White to manage guys who get paid to fight in cages. I don't follow UFC at all but that seems like it's a pretty fertile breeding ground for horrible human behavior. And the CEO of Endeavor is Ari Emmanuel, who was the basis for Jeremy Piven's character in Entourage. What does that say about how much they take company culture seriously? (Oddly, the WWE also listed Vince as a risk factor -- but saying that his sudden death or incapacitation could be detrimental to the company's business. I've never seen that anywhere else, either.)

Subscribe to your local newspaper. That is the best thing to do. The newspaper industry has been absolutely gutted for all kinds of reasons. Almost every good reporter starts off at a small newspaper (or the local news desk at a bigger regional paper) — even if they end up at a really big daily or magazine or end up like I did in niche financial trade publications. Off the top of my head since I read a lot of sports writing — Zach Lowe of ESPN started at a small daily in Connecticut (even with a Dartmouth diploma.) Bill Simmons wrote local sports for the Boston Herald, which is not nearly as prestigious as “Boston” would make you believe. Adrian Wojnarski worked for the Fresno Bee and then the Bergen Record (where a bunch of my old colleagues/friends ended up — they said he was a really good guy.) It’s grueling work. Out of college, I routinely worked 60 hours a week writing things like “This guy grew a really big cucumber in his backyard” to “Debate ensues over how deep the new school swimming pool should be” for a bunch of weekly small-town suburban newspapers. I also had to take photos, so the layout m, open the Mail and even at times deliver the newspaper I also wrote. Those subscriptions go a really long way in helping develop good journalists since you literally have to do everything. And I think the most I made doing this was $28,000 a year. Poverty wages. Local news reporting is also really friggin’ taxing emotionally. One of my old colleagues/friends worked at the small newspaper in Connecticut headquartered s few miles from Sandy Hook. She knew a bunch of the parents who had kids who died from stories she wrote beforehand. She had to quit a few months after because she could not handle anymore memorials/events/etc. I got freaked out the one time I ever covered a murder because I went to the crime scene — a distraught mother freaked out and killed her newborn. That sent me straight to a therapist. The best editor I ever worked for was David Mamet’s roommate in college — my editor was an awesome writer, but he was a severe alcoholic and womanizer and went through a few marriages. I found my niche writing about business and finance. I was the “business reporter” at a small newspaper in Massachusetts. That was mostly writing about new tourist trap businesses or covering real estate planning commission meetings. I went to this traveling seminar in business journalism that a university put together. I learned from there that niche trade publications for different industries have stability. I also learned how to write about publicly traded companies — where to find the documents and what they meant. I actually used the WWE to help me “train” because I actually knew what the WWE did, and it is a really easy business to understand. So whenever I read about “wrestling journalists” it makes my skin crawl. A few are good with breaking some things like injuries or whatever like Dave and the other ones who are legitimate. The Wrestlenomocs guys are good with some things I’ve read but I have seen some of the more “finance” stuff they have written and they don’t quite get it. And that’s absolutely fine — this stuff is hard. I have to look up terms and definitions all of the time, and I have a lot of experience and was about halfway done with a MBA before I had a kid instead. And I also do not think I wold be a good wrestling reporter because you need all kinds of reliable sources and do you really think the wrestling world has those? But most anyone who says they are a “wrestling journalist” is absolutely not.

They aren’t journalists. I doubt any of them have ever worked at any outlet outside of Wrestling Newz420 or whatever. I don’t think any of them ever worked for a local newspaper or news website or anything. Meltzer was at The National (this old daily sports newspaper that was really well regarded) but even he puts out so much speculation as “news.” I am an actual reporter. It’s an actual affront to me when these people say they are “journalists.” They’re not. They get emails or have Twitter conversations or pass things off from something they saw on Reddit. Remember before the company was sold that some goof reported that Saudi Arabia was buying the WWE? It took about five minutes for that to unravel. Or when all of these people were reporting the WWE was being sued for possibly selling the company to the Saudis (when those types of lawsuits literally happen anytime any publicly company makes news, and real business news outlets don’t report on those unless they have absolute serious merit and they very rarely do.) Now, keep in mind with the stuff that came out this week — no one “broke” it. A public lawsuit was filed. That’s all public information and anyone can get it. The WSJ had a head’s up it was coming out most certainly since they had a photo layout on the website and were the first to report it. But that’s not “breaking” news. That was just reporting what was in a lawsuit that was filed. The original hush money stuff the WSJ reporter? That was news the WSJ broke from a Pulitzer Award winner. This is all an educated guess — but I am guessing the reporter on the original Vince stuff heard about the absolutely awful things in the lawsuit. But he couldn’t print them unless he could verify that happened, and he couldn’t verify what happened. But once the lawsuit was filed, then the WSJ can report on it. (They also had a different reporter writing the lawsuit story from last week.) The “what can you actually verify” thing was actually really huge when the whole “Trump was caught with Russian prostitutes and Moscow is blackmailing him” thing came out. A lot of outlets had been sitting on it for weeks because the source of the material was a former spy who now gets paid to collect dirt on politicians. Nobody ran with it unless they could verify the lurid details — and everyone was being extra careful because it’s something involving the president of the United States. Then Buzzfeed of all places decided to say “Trump did this, according to something a political ‘researcher’ found” and all hell broke loose. But, please. These people are not journalists. They have no idea what journalism means or entails.

Kofi/Gunther tonight! I am expecting this to be fantastic. What a great pairing — one the all-time best underdog babyfaces against possibly the best big man technician and a great smug heel on the run of his career. Good build I. The feud, too.

Exactly right. Did other people know? Yeah, probably. Do we know who? Do we know what they knew? Absolutely not. Trying to say (enter whatever name here) isn't going to lead to anywhere good.

I thought it was a really fun show. I mean, it's the Royal Rumble? The Woman's Rumble was excellent. On top of all of the really big moments, I came away thinking that the woman's division can now fill a Rumble where the worst entrant is "not too bad." Even someone like Shotzi has an awesome entrance, presence and at least one good splash. The top end of the women's roster has been great for about a decade now. The lower end is now a really solid group of performers. I also came away really impressed with Becky Lynch. I know I'm not breaking anything new about her being a generational talent and performer. But she had so many awesome little moments sprinkled throughout this -- like when she was in awe watching Jade toss out Nia (the woman standing in Becky's way for years now) and her elimination. The way they're setting up Becky's Last Stand against Rhea has been fantastic -- where Becky has to see if she still has her mojo or if this new generation has passed her. The two of them together have some real "lightning in a bottle" energy where I can see us clamoring for that to be a WM main event. I'm also elated that Bayley won. It sorta blew my mind that she's never had a singles match at WM. Nobody deserves a big WM singles match more than her. I'm pretty sure Bayley has to be the GOAT WWE Woman's Wrestler now. I don't know if we even have a Woman's Rumble match without Bayley/Sasha tearing down the house at NXT. Those two showed not just women's wrestling as a serious entity but you could build a promotion around women's wrestling as your main feud. Bayley was the best babyface of her era. She's had so many great moments on the main roster. Her and Sasha carried the promotion during the pandemic and right after. She hits it out of the park even when she's taking a step back from the starring role. We're really lucky to have her. I'm also happy Cody won. I was not into Cody at all when he arrived. He's won me over. Great babyface who connects with the audience. It hit me watching the final two men end that this was somehow a perfect way to end a week in wrestling that literally changed everything. Cody started the first rival to have any legs in years and came back to win WWE. He beat CM Punk, a guy who made his name as a truth-teller and a black sheep and -- despite the many many many things that can be said about Punk -- has bitten the hand that feeds him a bunch of times. It was a great exclamation point to the chapter in the book.

Look — We all know it’s a gross company. But keep in mind that what came out is a complaint. There is a lot of really damning stuff in there about Vince and Laurinaitis. But assuming you know the identity of anyone else who may have known is a really big reach.

Also: Remember this is a grand jury that subpoenaed Vince related to the hush money payments and especially the part where the WWE violated the laws about disclosing how much money you made to the public. (As in: Vince paid off women with company money, and the company misstated how much money it made as a result.) But those types of grand jury probes can go in all sorts of different places. There absolutely could be criminal charges at some point.

That complaint was really damning. Usually complaints are just words and what is alleged. Sometimes there are some pictures or something. Putting text messages out like that absolutely sealed the deal. The other thing in the complaint that was interesting is how easy it pointed to Brock. The other people who knew things but not sued all had things like “Corporate Officer #4.” They put Brock out there on blast. No attempt at anonymity at all. Her attorneys are really interesting. The woman taking the lead in the press is named Ann Callis. She ran for Congress as a Democrat a few years ago and was a judge in Illinois. I have no clue if she and her firm have done sexual harrsssment claims. But their website talks about all the class action damages they have won against really huge companies. (“We represent everyone who ever smoked a cigarette and now we are suing Philip Morris for $10 billion.”) The “actual” lead attorney is a corporate attorney from Connecticut — he does things like “I represent this big company against this big company.” I am guessing they needed the Connecticut attorney since he’s in the Connecticut bar. It also helps if you have a Connecticut attorney who probably knows (or knows people who know) the judge and the lay of the land. Callis is based in St. Louis. I forget how it works in terms of how you can represent people if you’re not in that state’s bar exam. But such an interesting mix. Usually, you will see an attorney who specialize in workplace discrimination law handle a case like this. You don’t see corporate attorneys or class action firms take on cases like this. I am so curious as to how this woman picked them.

I can think of $5 billion reasons.

I have said it before — the Wall Street Journal has had arguably their best reporter working on the WWE story. The guy won the Pulitzer for breaking all of the Trump/Stormy Daniels news. The editors aren’t pushing back on writing about a company that just scored a $5 billion deal with Netflix.

This whole thing is at a different level than just “normal” sexual harassment due to power imbalances — a CEO promising a woman a job and promotions in exchange for sexual favors. That’s really bad on its own. And Vince’s story was really bad from a “basic financial law” POV when you consider that the hush money came from the company checkbook instead of his own. Because that’s just pure greed at that point. But this is alleging sexual slavery. It really is. The excrement component is terrible but kind of overlooked is the part where Vince was hitting her during “roleplay.” Also: It’s not like you go from “using the power imbalance to prey on women who work for me” to “shitting on a woman’s head during a threesome” without some really gross progression of that along the way. Like… how does Vince approach his personal trainer or John Laurinitis and ask them if they want to do what’s in the lawsuit without it happening before? Especially since Vince is in his 70s. I think it’s really likely that more stuff comes out from other women. The only reason it hasn’t is because you absolutely cannot blame anyone who does not want their name out there for whatever awful things Vince did. The woman who filed the lawsuit is beyond brave. She attached her name in a lawsuit where she revealed the most possible degrading things. All of this is just insane.

If you're talking about the "celebrity doctor" -- all signs point to Dr. Phil. If true: Vince forced the woman he was sexually harassing into seeking mental health treatment with Dr. Phil.

Here's the lawsuit itself. I read it -- it's even more fucked up than what the articles are writing. (Especially one part about Brock.) https://s.wsj.net/public/resources/documents/WWE_complaint.pdf So the legal stuff in the lawsuit the lady 1) There's a law called The Speak Out Act. According to the filing, the Speak Out Act means NDAs are unenforceable if the sexual harrassment/etc. violates federal law. Essentially, the Speak Out Act makes and NDA null-and-void. (According to what her lawyer says. I have no idea.) The lawsuit also says the NDA itself was poorly constructed ("too broad") and wouldn't even allow her to tell anyone she even worked for the WWE. 2) She was under duress and unfairly pressured to sign the NDA. 3) Human trafficking is alleged because McMahon was traveling across the country when he was saying insane stuff to her and/or showing people her photos/etc. while traveling around and had others fly to Connecticut to "meet" her. Also, since McMahon and Laurinitis used fraud and coercion to lead her into what she's alleging. 4) Human trafficking is also alleged because the company financially benefited because Vince offered her to Brock when he was negotiating a contract, and that a lot of WWE bigwigs knew about all of this and didn't do anything to stop it. (Note: I have no idea at all about what human trafficking laws actually say or not. Just explaining the complaint itself.) 5) Negligence (The WWE didn't do anything to stop this.) 6) Battery (According to the lawsuit, Vince hit her a few times during one of their encounters, along with a bunch of other awful things.) Also: I said above things like "According to the lawsuit." That's drilled into me as a reporter. You'll notice that across anyone writing about this today (or any lawsuit.) That's because none of the allegations have been proven yet. So, the reporting on it is going to be completely objective and just report what's in it. But as a wrestling fan -- man, this is so gross, and I hate that I watch this stuff.

Nah. Netflix released its quarterly financial report that day and had its phone call with the analysts who cover the company. Companies always release big news on those days, especially when they know they did well financially. I doubt that anyone at Netflix even knew this was coming.

The Toni Storm segment was wrestling ridiculousness at its absolute best.

I am not a media industry expert (despite working in the media) by any means. But my early thoughts: 1) $5 billion over 10 years for Raw and overseas things is insanity. I think that shows Netflix had to pay a giant premium (up their bidding price) to get Endeavor and the like to hand over the show to a streaming platform and not keep it on a basic cable network. I know there is cord cutting and etc., but a lot of people have Hulu or whatever to essentially watch cable. That is essentially though $500 million for 52 episodes of Monday Night Raw and international broadcast. I have no idea and don’t have time to look up how well international broadcasts do for the WWE. But if you factor it in just for Raw — Netflix is paying $9.6 million to air every single episode of Raw. 2) I saw Netflix has an out after 5 years. They also can extend for another 10. I have no idea if that extension would be at the same price or if there would be a negotiation. But Netflix is hedging it’s risk on both ends — it can cut bait if this doesn’t work, and it can avoid a bidding war if it doesn’t. 2A) Why would the WWE not want to have another bidding war for Raw in a few years? Because Netflix is paying them $9.6 million to broadcast a single episode of Raw. Take the money and run. 3) Can wrestlers please become full-time workers? The people getting paid from this are going to be company executives with stock options and big Wall Street investors. (Technically any investor but you get what I am saying.) Do the WWE guys still pay for their own travel? And health insurance? They should be in SAG or something already. They literally risk their lives every week and man none of them are getting anything close to their fair share.

From what I was able to watch tonight: Edge is not my guy. I am not interested in The Cope Open. But it serves something more important — a really good veteran gets to have matches with guys like Dante Martin and Lee Moriarity and that’s pretty invaluable. I wish they had some kind of circuit or house show because there is so much talent with the real young bulls of AEW but development is tough. But having an 8 minute match with Edge is going to be a well-organized match. I am sure before the match Copeland is sitting down with whoever he is facing, putting the match together, and explaining why the match is being put together that way. And after they go over like a few dozen times how it was executed. The Thunder Rosa match was fine. It was exactly what a returning match should be. Her opponent looks cool. I am so ridiculous invested in The Bang Bang Scissor Gang. I don’t remember when we have seen a really big group like that? Especially as faces? I was expecting it not to happen. I hope they stick with it because all of those guys have a lot of charisma and are fun acts. Toni Storm is the best. Best character in wrestling right now. Danny vs Buddy was expectedly good. A very smart match that had excellent usage of their seconds, leading to a great brawl and set up for a match. I am now watching Roddy Strong and Matt Sydall and calling it a night even though I really want to see Eddie/Ortiz vs. BCC

There’s probably some combination of trains and buses you can take but I can see that easily lasting longer than your flight. There are probably a few van services or something that can bring you. Not sure if the costs but here is one: https://www.kinglimoinc.com/our-services/personal/airport-shuttle-service-gloucester-county/airport-shuttle-service-williamstown/ But, yeah, you might get stuck renting a car. Williamstown is probably 30 minutes or so from the airport without traffic. Also, where is the event being held at specifically? “Williamstown” is pretty far spread out and overlaps with a lot of zip codes.

It didn’t feel work-shooty to me. Like it touched on a few things outside of kayfabe but they used it to douche it up like quality heels. It wasn’t something like Punk blurring the lines with Adam Page referencing Colt Cabana. Was more within the grounds of kayfabe.

Hook looks like every dipshit high school athlete I saw at LA Fitness when I had membership. It’s a very current look. But he does not look like a guy who is listening to Bandsplained or going to retro indie sleaze nights. All the hipster stuff in early 00s New York was in Brooklyn. There are books written about this. LCD Soundsystem clones were not playing shows at the last dying days of Coney Island High or the other bar at the corner. That was more pop-punk and power-pop dorks playing in front of their friends. (Source: It me.)