dorfus malorfus

Honestly Jarrett beating Fenix in his first defense would automatically make Double J the AEW version of the Miz...the stooge the fans INSIST has X-Pac heat but in reality they'll cough up their hard earned bread each and every week to see if he gets creamed or not. (also watching TSN impatiently with the sound off...are there always fistfights in Nascar now???)

For the love of god let this be the title change

Yeah all due respect to the recently departed but it's sad when the most I can say for Vincent is that at least he doesn't also talk in a fake, barf-inducing Looou-eee-zee-anna accent as another more famous race cosplayer did.

Wtf I didn't know she was married to Scurll!! Fack she was always my favorite too. Sad she's decided to stand by him given her pubic persona of speaking out against the mistreatment of women in wrestling. *Edit* on the flipside it doubly sucks that Deeb and Kendrick are not above the laws of decency in AEW's eyes while Ospreay and Saraya clearly are. Guess you have to have a sufficient amount of clout before TK takes umbrage with your hateful behavior/associations.

I think he's climbing Mount Everest the same way Backlund was running for president tho

Yeah as much as I like Julia I don't think anybody should be beating Stat right now except maybe Willow. I'd rather Willow beat Saraya tho and then we have the two most likeable babyface champs ever in StatLow.

I loved that JR line too. What was the worst QAnon Whiff of the week? When Kelly started talking about Jericho and Sammy a full minute before they actually went to the video package?

This is how I misread it too! I thought it was slang for people who like a certain wrestler i.e. "count me in as a member of the Richard Slinger Club!", but I couldn't think of anyone whose name or catchphrase references Chili.

I thought so too, on both counts. Her and Brody as a little clique-within-a-faction feels right to me. Also was I just not paying attention before or has Hart put on a lot of muscle mass recently? I don't recall her looking quite so cut in the Anna Jay streetfight.

My issue with White and why I usually tune out during his matches is his approach to character work, specifically his idea that "the more I do the better it is", so that it ends up just distracting from the match itself and turns the focus to getting himself over even when he's on the defensive. It's like when people say Christopher Nolan movies are "deep" when they're actually just crammed with superficially dense bro-intellectualisms that don't add up to much -- White's matches are full of sneering heel mannerisms and slithery body manipulations that only serve to celebrate how gifted he is at performing gestures rather than his ability to have a compelling wrestling match with another human being. Again, personal taste factors into these things. MJF's entire matches are crammed with stuff like this but to me he treats heel work in such an exaggerated, archetypal way it never feels self-congratulatory the way White's "subtle" decisions do.

My hope -- and I think there's a realistic chance that this will happen -- is that their acting and promos are so pretentious and cringey that the moment MJF starts goofing on them on Wednesday to hype the ppv match the fans who aren't already annoyed by them will have a collective "hey wait a minute, these guys DO suck!" moment.

Wasn't Anna Jay wearing a title belt last night too??

Ricky said something to a heckler at another show somewhat recently (I think it might have been at a PPV when he was still teaming with Hobbs??). I wish I could remember the exchange but I'm betting someone here has a sharp enough memory to fill us in.

It does occur to me as I begin to doze off that they were also building to Moxley vs Starks so maybe now the plan is to have Starks go over Fenix so he can lose it back to Moxley...in which case I could see them wanting his first big defence to be against Danielson so he has some momentum before facing Moxley...in which case I guess it wasn't overly counterproductive for him to lose tonight. Wheeler broke up the handshake too so Starks going through Fenix, Yuta and Danielson en route to Moxley would make for a good build (again, this is all assuming Moxley isn't going to be out for a long time). On that note: no mention of Fenix being champ on the show tonight, and he's in a tag match on the ppv. Wonder if they're going to do something wonky and have the title held up (would be hard to kayfabe strip him of the belt since he won clean and was announced as champ). Finally two thoughts about the show tonight: 1) I always assumed CJ had a Russian accent in real life so her interview was jarring.. 2) The video package for Santana and Ortiz was surreal. Two guys who have been off tv forever, hardly ever did promos or got a push in the year before they disappeared, suddenly back and having a bloodfeud via twitter and austere vignettes.

Yeah the G1 this year is a perfect example of what I'm griping about. Would have been the perfect opportunity to strap a rocket to somebody and have them dethrone SANADA. Instead, none of the rising stars even made it to the semis.

I was thinking this also, especially since I assume Danielson and Okada are having a rematch at WK (or some other time soon). Obviously Tony Khan loves 90s AJPW as we all do and should, and I could see how on paper it might be tantalizing to book like Baba and beat the younger talent forever so that it's a huge deal when they finally do get big wins over the top guys. But AEW's roster is unwieldy and people come and go a lot so it doesn't really allow for the super-structured hierarchy Baba built in the 90s (plus as moving as a lot of Baba's hardluck storylines were they got taken to the extreme in Noah where nobody new ever really got the trigger pulled on them until Misawa passed away and Go and Sugiura (who was an older guy by then anyway) became the guys for awhile). I dunno, I think it's a big problem. I don't really want to see what happens when Ospreay gets signed and then you have both him and White never taking losses while people like Darby and Guevara and Starks and Swerve and the Acclaimed can lose whenever it's convenient.

I think someone fleeced TK on the idea that Starks won't get over unless Danielson keeps murdering him so that the fans "respect" him. Which is pretty pathetic since he was already super over. This would have maybe been an idea to try on Sammy or Jungle Boy and even then they both lose all the time so I wouldn't risk it. I was 100% positive Danielson was going over at the ppv but now I'm wondering if they're giving Sabre the win and wanted to protect Danielson? Which would be dumb af anyway since he could lose his next 50 matches and still be a credible challenger for any title.

Hmm that was a good show but I don't understand why they keep beating all their young guys. Gotta save all those protected spots for ex-NJPW gaijin I guess.

Kingston vs Shibata would be a great excuse to start unifying all the ROH belts before gradually phasing out the brand.

Maybe Fenix is like Ron Burgundy with the teleprompter; if Jon Moxley tells him do something, he HAS to do it, no matter how stupid or career-threatening it is.

I just saw Shanky is 32. Damn if I didn't always assume he was like 19 or something. Surely there's a place somewhere in this business for a giant with a baby face.

I like that breakdown of the roster from Mace and Monsoor. Is Rollins generally known as antisocial backstage? He always seemed like a weird annoying dude even before the dumb Jared Leto character but I've never really heard of anyone within the company having issues with him.

Do we know if they are likely done with office cuts? Maybe I'm naive or maybe it's just wishful thinking (or both) but I keep waiting to hear that Bruce Pritchard is finally out for good. Just seems like a guy who's a threat to anyone with more seniority than him and an out-of-touch nuisance to everyone else.

It's also not like there is no very recent precedent for handling these incidents well. Moxley himself just backed away from Hangman when he got knocked out, and Jay White couldn't cover Adam Cole fast enough and end the match without any further bumps when he realized he was KO'd. What's doubly frustrating is that logic would dictate these are intuitive reactions -- something's broken so I better not touch it/something's on fire so I better put it out and then we can assess the damage. Not "the pile of burning family photos just told me to add some more gasoline before putting them out because the fire looks cooler that way so I guess I better do what it says."

There's no money in it for him but for years now I've wanted to see Ziggler go to AJPW. Just seems like his meat & potatoes style would mesh well with Miyahara, Aoyagi and Suwama, and he'd probably get a TC run or two out of it, not that I think that means something to him.