Dolfan in NYC Posted June 12, 2023 Posted June 12, 2023 Today, Roman Reigns passes CM Punk's 434 day reign as WWE Champion. And since WWE counts the Universal title as equivalent or the same belt depending on the sentence, he's 9 days away from passing Pedro Morales' reign. Next stop after that is Bruno II, which is next January. (Hogan I is next summer.) In the meantime... it actually appears that Roman is going to DEFEND the title! At a house show! Enjoy your week folks.
Eivion Posted June 12, 2023 Posted June 12, 2023 Surprising. I figured if he defended at house shows it would only be the big and/or rare ones like the upcoming shows in Mexico.
Dolfan in NYC Posted June 12, 2023 Author Posted June 12, 2023 5 minutes ago, Eivion said: Surprising. I figured if he defended at house shows it would only be the big and/or rare ones like the upcoming shows in Mexico. Guessing this one is marking it as the final defense before catching Morales. 1
odessasteps Posted June 12, 2023 Posted June 12, 2023 Too bad he couldn't break that record on the Puerto Rico PPV. 1
DragonZombie Posted June 13, 2023 Posted June 13, 2023 Replica of the WWE Women's World Championship. The word Women's is above the World bar.
Eivion Posted June 13, 2023 Posted June 13, 2023 New Women's belt is fine. Kind of wish WWE would go more for different designs like they used to. Dom/Cody for MITB feels kind of odd, but I don't dislike it. The Cody/Miz match built into something nice. Skipped around the Becky/Zoey segment. Was just not feeling it. Becky/Chelsea afterward was decent enough. Priest/Riddle was good and had a surprisingly clean finish given the Priest win. Thought Imperium's post match beatdown on Riddle could have been much more. Just felt uninspired though it at least annoyed the crowd. Ricochet/Reed was solid up until the dq finish. Kind of like them building tension up between Ricochet and Nakamura going into MITB though it feels weird to have it based around Reed since he won't be in the match. The Balor/Seth segment went a bit off the rails with the crowd hijacking so much of it to sing Seth's song. I kind of felt sorry for Balor. I do like them basing this around Balor and Seth's history over the Universal title and where it left them after the inaugural title match. Raquel/Shayna was a match. Kind of short and pointless though nothing bad per say. Gable/Erik was more of a segment to show off Maxine's training with Gable paying off. Sami/KO vs. Gunther/Kaiser was damn good as expected and the only match that really managed to get the crowd completely engaged. 1
The Natural Posted June 13, 2023 Posted June 13, 2023 (edited) 4 Edited June 13, 2023 by The Natural 1
The Natural Posted June 13, 2023 Posted June 13, 2023 Kevin Owens' losing his shit makes me chuckle. 4
EVA Posted June 13, 2023 Posted June 13, 2023 Man, I gotta catch up on these Imperium/Sami&KO matches for the last couple Raws. 2
The Natural Posted June 13, 2023 Posted June 13, 2023 Sami Zayn: "Where's baldy at?" Adam Pearce shows up. Kevin Owens: "There he is." 2
Iron Moose Posted June 13, 2023 Posted June 13, 2023 (edited) 14 minutes ago, The Natural said: Sami Zayn: "Where's baldy at?" Adam Pearce shows up. Kevin Owens: "There he is." It would be preferable for your contributions to include context or insight, rather than merely an image or a transcription. In this case, the humor of the exchange relies on knowing that mere seconds before it, Zayn and Owens were berating Imperium and wondering where Giovanni Vinci was. (Vinci was attacked backstage last week by Riddle, and his absense meant a less frequently-teaming combination of Imperium against Zayn and KO. ) Edited June 13, 2023 by Iron Moose
Greggulator Posted June 13, 2023 Posted June 13, 2023 In what has already been a HOF-level career, Kevin Owens is only just now starting to give us his best work. Him getting mad and addressing wrestling tropes at the same time is so friggin' funny. He almost got Gunther to break. KO/Sami doing this type of stuff (they're both naturally really funny goofballs) after playing such big roles in the WWE's attempt at a deserved Emmy nod with The Bloodline is a great pivot for them both. It's also great because Sami gets to linger in the background doing a more pure babyface act, which works well since he's the most over babyface the company has had in a really long time. The tag division rules and they've made it such a hugely important part of the shows very quickly. I still think after some distance that Roman/Sami might be the best WWE match in history. It's so good that I haven't even rewatched it yet because I can't bare to see the heartbreaking ending. But that led to the awesome Sami/KO reunion and the main event match at WM against The Usos (in another elite elite elite level match) and now Sami/KO are just behind Roman and The Bloodline as the most important acts in the company (because they got that rub.) Now that rub is giving Gunther even more of a rub while also helping his Imperium goons get main event TV time and also getting Riddle back in the mix. It's really just helping lift every tide at once. And it's also producing non-stop great matches with really great character work and segments. (I didn't see last night's match yet but I'm guessing it's a Free TV Match of the Week contender.) 2
Craig H Posted June 13, 2023 Posted June 13, 2023 3 hours ago, Iron Moose said: It would be preferable for your contributions to include context or insight, rather than merely an image or a transcription. In this case, the humor of the exchange relies on knowing that mere seconds before it, Zayn and Owens were berating Imperium and wondering where Giovanni Vinci was. (Vinci was attacked backstage last week by Riddle, and his absense meant a less frequently-teaming combination of Imperium against Zayn and KO. ) The fuck? 7
NoFistsJustFlips Posted June 13, 2023 Posted June 13, 2023 4 hours ago, Iron Moose said: It would be preferable for your contributions to include context or insight, rather than merely an image or a transcription. Or you could just skip over it / ignore that member. If you feel those posts aren't useful, start your own board and make that a rule? Idk man seems like a weird thing to make policing one of the forum's favorite members your gimmick. 3
Iron Moose Posted June 13, 2023 Posted June 13, 2023 (edited) Y'all are right, I was out of line there. Sorry, @The Natural. It might be a general sense of joylessness at things outside the scope of the board, but I thought Gunther and Kaiser were both a bit off in the main last night. (Chelsea-Zoey too, but they're going for different things) I post-hoc rationalize this as them not having tagged with each other without Vinci in a long while, but it was a bit jarring when Graves, for example, told us to watch for a double-team and it just turned out to be Kaiser kicking someone in his corner while Gunther ... stood a few inches away, in the same corner. I guess the hallmark of the plausibly-post-Vince era is more benefit of the doubt to the talent. Edited June 13, 2023 by Iron Moose
Eivion Posted June 14, 2023 Posted June 14, 2023 (edited) Lee/Ali/Bate vs. Schism was good. Dug the brawl starting out and how it stayed a bit of generally chaotic match with the tension between the teams having been built over the past few weeks. The finish with the head ref coming in to stop the count on the wrong man was unexpected. Don't dislike the idea of it though I would have liked it more had they shown the ref around already to catch the tag. Tbf I may have just missed it. Bron's segment was fine though I'm not happy with the match happening on a normal episode of NXT. Feels like something they should have used to push Bron to the main roster. Them doing it next week on Raw with Seth's open challenge having already been issued would have made far more sense. Aside from one minor botch I thought Cora/Thea was decent stuff. Not big on Dana being in NXT, but she does feel like she works better here than she does on the main roster. Hopefully she finally shows something. Kind of digging the weird relationship Thea has built up with Gulak and Dempsey as her trainers though I also want none of them to turn from their face/heel dynamics. Frazer/Mensah was good. Action was good and it had a nice sense of urgency at various times. I assume Dar was legit injured for them to take the Cup off of him this way. hate to see it end like this for him. Hopefully they still have him around doing stuff with the Meta-Four while he heals up. They have a nice dynamic. Dabba-Kato vs. Axiom & Scrypts had some neat stuff though it will always be weird to do a handicap match where the faces are the 2 on 1. Was nice to see Garza and Carillo show up post match. Them vs. Axiom and Scrypts should be fun. Enofe/Blade was pretty darn solid while it lasted. Thought it was one of Blade's better showing with the crowd really getting behind him. Roxanne/Tatum was nice and a good showing for tatum all around. Roxanne calling out Blair post match was good to see. Ilja/Corbin was good. Corbin looked good in control, and Ilja displayed his usual constant passion in trying to survive and persevere. Finish felt a bit off with Bon coming down, but it did its job in helping Corbin get the win while protecting Ilja somewhat. Edited June 14, 2023 by Eivion 2
Iron Moose Posted June 14, 2023 Posted June 14, 2023 Really liked this episode overall. Glad that Dyad / GYV are regularly getting time for fun and occasionally-unhinged tag bangers. Surprised that Ivy's issues with Ava weren't continued. Ambivalent about Bron getting Seth while Melo gets Corbin. It also points to a bit of a potential issue on alignments -- right now we have Melo, Wes Lee and Nathan Frazer, which is a lot of good guys with gold (and Tiffany feels like she's on the cusp of not being booed all that much). I was initially a bit wary of the Thea/Cora match, because the story of Thea learning mat work from Gulak and Dempsey wasn't represented in the action, but then she recovered really well from not hitting the flip in the ropes and ended up winning with a sub she's never done before, so I felt good about it overall. Enofe/Blade was fun, but I felt like they rushed the talk at the end a bit. Both Enofe/Blade and Roxy/Tatum had some really good, clear limb work in setting up grapples - in E/B it was on one of the sunset flips, in R/T it was on the Russian Leg Sweep. Roxy/Tatum actually clicked for me in a way that other Roxy matches haven't -- Paxley's timing on some of the cutoffs was really good, and Roxy's awareness (in her rope-running and her dive) came through. She works least for me when she's doing a sequence, and I really liked, for example, that Tatum pushed her off before she could go too deep into her clubbering forearms. I really don't care for her handstand-headscissor thing, though. With that said, there was a lot of zoom in the post-match promo and the Pop Rox didn't look good, so I'm kind of worried Tatum is hurt? 1
DragonZombie Posted June 16, 2023 Posted June 16, 2023 (edited) WWE Payback https://corporate.wwe.com/news/company-news/2023/06-16-2023 From the link above "PITTSBURGH TO HOST WWE® PAYBACK ON SEPTEMBER 2 Tickets On Sale Tuesday, June 27 STAMFORD, Conn., June 16, 2023 – WWE® (NYSE: WWE) today announced that WWE Payback will take place Saturday, September 2 from PPG Paints Arena in Pittsburgh. It marks the first premium live event to emanate from Pittsburgh in five years. WWE Payback will stream live exclusively on Peacock in the U.S. and WWE Network everywhere else. Tickets for WWE Payback go on sale Tuesday, June 27 at 10 a.m. ET via https://www.ticketmaster.com/. To learn more about registering for pre-sale opportunities, please visit: https://www.wwe.com/wwepayback2023-presale-registration. In addition, WWE Payback Priority Passes are available now through exclusive partner On Location at https://onlocationexp.com/wwe/payback-tickets or by calling 1-855-346-7388, giving fans the opportunity to purchase ticket packages before they go on sale to the general public. The WWE Payback Priority Passes offer fans the chance to be ringside for every exhilarating moment, including premium seating, pre-show hospitality with WWE Superstar appearances, ringside photo opportunities, exclusive merchandise and more." The last Payback was on Aug, 30th 2020. Edited June 16, 2023 by 赤い竜
nofuture Posted June 17, 2023 Posted June 17, 2023 If they're not printing up WE OUT shirts right now, I don't know what we're doing here. 3
Greggulator Posted June 17, 2023 Posted June 17, 2023 Oh my god. What an incredible segment. I knew it was coming, but Jey was so magnificent in his part that I jumped from my couch when he pulled the trigger. All-time segment. Man, Roman fell back so hard after the double kick. 4
Greggulator Posted June 17, 2023 Posted June 17, 2023 Why isn’t Jey Uso an actual actor? Jey is so far above and beyond what anyone else in wrestling can do with the acting part of the show. He’s just this singularly unique talent. Did anyone else ever get their start in an angle like Jey getting beaten into submission? I can see every wrestler ever saying “hell no” to doing that and understandably so. It is so impossibly hard for a wrestler to come back from looking so weak. And if anyone tried, trying to play that role is so far beyond what almost any wrestler ever can pull off. Jey is just so gifted. One of the great parts about The Bloodline — I know that the product is the brainchild of Roman and Paul with some help from writers, but from the different interviews they’ve done, it is really clear everyone involved has been really collaborative. They have also really limited the amount of people who are in the story (and not just feuding with Roman) into the most talented performers in the company from the acting/character aspect — Sami and KO. But they and probably a few other people realized early that Jey was at a whole different level and built a three year story around it. They were hinting at this even in October when Jey said “I don’t give a damn about The Tribal Chief” when he was doubting Sami. What a story. What a great performer. 5
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