AEW - NOVEMBER 2023

[Elsalvajeloco]

DAMMIT YOU BEAT ME TO THE CONDOMDEPOT.COM REFERENCE! I was halfway through my reply when yours came up.

That's my greatest disappointment coming from the 2015 fighter sponsorship ban (other than fighters losing out on money obviously). We no longer get to see the aforementioned Condom Depot, Jesus Didn't Tap, Mike's Seafood, Nate Diaz supporting whatever Chevy dealership was in Stockton, etc.

Now that said, knowing how some of the current roster is in bed with the conspiracy theory mongering (ex. child grooming....looking at you Holly Holm) to being anti science and evolution (Bryce Mitchell), I am glad they cannot just bring anything in the octagon to advertise for free. If you want to talk about that in your post fight interview before Daniel Cormier or whoever eventually cuts you off, then fine. However, the UFC should not be your platform for bullshit like that.

[Cobra Commander]

the one UFC fighter I followed on Instagram only for her to get into Onlyfans (and get released from the UFC) was certainly a decision... just came to mind since if they had those sponsorships now, there'd be OnlyFans (and whatever the AAA equivalent to OnlyFans is) sponsorships

[Elsalvajeloco]

1 hour ago, Cobra Commander said:

the one UFC fighter I followed on Instagram only for her to get into Onlyfans (and get released from the UFC) was certainly a decision... just came to mind since if they had those sponsorships now, there'd be OnlyFans (and whatever the AAA equivalent to OnlyFans is) sponsorships

In boxing, OnlyFans and all the clones of OnlyFans have replaced like Azad Watches and Mitsubishi Motors as the main sponsor for fighters. Add in Fashion Nova as well. It's weird.

Then again, I remember a time when it was all the black "urban" brands (FUBU, Enyce, Rocawear, Phat Farm, DaDa, etc.) and also guys selling placement on their backs with giant temporary tattoos for GoldenPalace.com. I also remember when known menace to society as well as to himself Ricardo Mayorga was sponsored by either Girls Gone Wild or some knockoff of Girls Gone Wild. Good times, man.

[Matt D]

I am morbidly curious what happens when Flair gets in front of the wrong (right) crowd. They booed Hogan's name pretty big a few weeks ago. There was a surprise pop for Flair first time out since no one was expecting it but a month or so in...

@NoFistsJustFlips, you seem to have a different idea of Flair's current mental acumen than the rest of us do.

[Phantom Lord]

I read that Arn Anderson didn't resign with AEW so any interaction between him and Flair won't be happening here.

Honestly I'm torn on this signing. I mean I like Ric Flair. But the thought of him doing anything physical scares the hell out of me. It would be nice if there was an old school booking committee and Flair was maybe part of it because Tony I think is out of ideas that he gleamed from playing EWR. But I don't want to see Flair try to take a bump, bleed, and God help us take any of his clothes off on live television.

 

[Octopus]

5 hours ago, Elsalvajeloco said:

Wait wait wait...do people know how sponsorship works?

I’m pretty sure if AEW thinks about drinking they’re supposed to call Flair?

[Casey]

50 minutes ago, Phantom Lord said:

It would be nice if there was an old school booking committee and Flair was maybe part of it because Tony I think is out of ideas that he gleamed from playing EWR

Mansoor & Mace were TEW booking earlier on Twitch, that good enough?

[DreamBroken]

2 hours ago, Phantom Lord said:

But I don't want to see Flair try to take a bump, bleed, and God help us take any of his clothes off on live television.

All Elite Wrestling's Ric Flair recently sat down with Marc Raimondi of ESPN. When asked if he was going to do another last match now that he's part of AEW, Flair said that he's up for it, but the company won't let that happen.

"But I'm trying to think of anyone who's anywhere near my age that hasn't had knee replacements, shoulder replacements, hip replacements, and I don't have any of that and I don't hurt. I'm not real flexible because I've torn my rotator cuff three times, but I don't hurt, that's the key. So what the hell, they want to throw me through a table? I'm up for it."

[Leonidas]

What do you think of the idea of a Collision world championship? 

An increasing issue they have in AEW is that there are so many championship-calibre stars that are idling around in cul-de-sac feuds because there is nowhere higher for them to go. MJF is having an all-time great run and looks to be continuing his turn with the belt until at least Adam Cole is healthy or until this 2024 contract storyline comes to fruition.

Miro, Hobbs, Malakai, Andrade, Samoa Joe, Bryan Danielson, Ricky Starks, Christian, Wardlow, Darby and many more could be vying for a world title or having a turn with it. Whether Bryan or Joe wants to have the belt is neither here nor there as I am a proponent of a belt having prestige, by having such names win it thus increasing its prestige further when a Jack Perry or Kyle Fletcher wins it in the future. I think it could be important in the future to say someone like BD or Joe were your brand's champion, not to mention Joe deserves to win a major world title at some point in his career.

[SturmCRF]

I think that's the worst possible thing they could do, they shouldn't be finding another major thing to copy from modern WWE.

If anything, they should move their one World Title around a lot more. Distinguish themselves from the endless title runs that the competition has comitted themselves to, give those guys you mentioned a shot.

Move back towards a more sport like presentation where the belt can change hands without months of storyline foreshadowing, and the focus is on the actual match, not who's friends with who and who might or might not run in.

It's not what they will do, but it'd be great if they did.

[ExcellenceofAirPollution]

There's already too many titles, but there's definitely too much talent kinda aimless with no direction too

It would be solved by going back to more of the "real sports presentation" they used to talk about.  They should have stuck with the win-loss records and standings.  Too tough to track it/book it?  Bullshit.  Also, do more tournaments for title shots, do a G1 style round robin, young lions, whatever.  Also need more organic personal issues between wrestlers to give them a reason to fight, it doesn't have to be super sports entertainmenty.  But if you need to do, "he stole my sponsorship!" that's fine.  And related to that, more of an emphasis on the pay windah in regards to wins/losses/title shots.  It's pro-wrestling.  It's pretty fucking simple.

[JLowe]

51 minutes ago, ExcellenceofAirPollution said:

There's already too many titles, but there's definitely too much talent kinda aimless with no direction too

It would be solved by going back to more of the "real sports presentation" they used to talk about.  They should have stuck with the win-loss records and standings.  Too tough to track it/book it?  Bullshit.  Also, do more tournaments for title shots, do a G1 style round robin, young lions, whatever.  Also need more organic personal issues between wrestlers to give them a reason to fight, it doesn't have to be super sports entertainmenty.  But if you need to do, "he stole my sponsorship!" that's fine.  And related to that, more of an emphasis on the pay windah in regards to wins/losses/title shots.  It's pro-wrestling.  It's pretty fucking simple.

I agree with some/most of this, but losing Dark/Elevation made it harder for them to shine someone's won-loss record up with a bunch of YouTube matches. I did kind of like Wade Keller's idea of a tournament where you can't participate if you've already held the world title or had a title shot. A G1 would be pretty awesome too and could maybe culminate in an International Title shot (although to be honest the open challenge aspect and weekly defenses aspect was part of what made OC's run so amazing).

The Internet (tm) wants more women's matches, and I think having women's tag title belts is long overdue. Have a tournament, and then commit to having two women's matches on a show (let's just say Rampage because I don't think they'll ever do that on the "main" shows) with one of them being a tag match, and have the belts be defended at least once a month. 

[FourPostMassacre]

7 hours ago, DreamBroken said:

All Elite Wrestling's Ric Flair recently sat down with Marc Raimondi of ESPN. When asked if he was going to do another last match now that he's part of AEW, Flair said that he's up for it, but the company won't let that happen.

"But I'm trying to think of anyone who's anywhere near my age that hasn't had knee replacements, shoulder replacements, hip replacements, and I don't have any of that and I don't hurt. I'm not real flexible because I've torn my rotator cuff three times, but I don't hurt, that's the key. So what the hell, they want to throw me through a table? I'm up for it."

Those last two sentences are hilarious.

[Technico Support]

18 hours ago, TheVileOne said:

According to Fightful's report, AEW sources said the main motivation was merchandising opportunities with Ric Flair, including general merch, video games, and action figures.

Maybe they can get into some sweet corporate synergy and have HBO Max relaunch Tales from the Crypt with Flair hosting.  Even longtime fans of the show would be hard-pressed to tell the difference.

17 hours ago, Cobra Commander said:

as for what Flair could do while under a contract... former ballplayers who become special assistants to the GM don't necessarily have to do anything public-facing so if Flair could have the occasional coherent piece of advice or observation of what he notices on TV, that's probably not bad as long as the energy drink people pay most of his salary.

I feel like the wrestling business has changed so much that someone who started wrestling a half century ago and whose heyday ended 30 years ago (if we're being charitable) is probably out of touch and doesn't have much to offer. 

16 hours ago, porksweats said:

My issue isn't with signing Flair to AEW, my issue is with them making his energy drink the exclusive energy drink of AEW. You'd think they'd want to hitch their wagon to something like Ghost or Monster.

I have nothing to add here except Ghost is delicious.

4 hours ago, Leonidas said:

What do you think of the idea of a Collision world championship? 

 

God no.  One world championship.  If you have two world titles, you have none.  If Collision needs a "top belt," then put the TNT title on someone who is at least upper midcard and build that belt back up around them as a Collision exclusive.  There's no brand split or authority figures, so they'd need another kayfabe reason.  Maybe the network asked to make the belt exclusive, I don't know.  But that's a better idea than watering down your current world title.

[Cobra Commander]

22 minutes ago, Technico Support said:

I feel like the wrestling business has changed so much that someone who started wrestling a half century ago and whose heyday ended 30 years ago (if we're being charitable) is probably out of touch and doesn't have much to offer. 

If MJF tears a suit off of Jay White, we’ll know exactly who pitched that idea. But idk, maybe Ric will remember something that was done 45 years ago that nobody else remembers that’ll seem like something novel. I mean, probably not but still.

Or they’ll bring in Ziggler to do a full-on Ric Flair tribute act as Ric Nemeth.

[TheVileOne]

The honeymoon period of AEW ended with the CM Punk era. Tony Khan no longer has that sense of freshness and newness that AEW used to have. There’s a clear lack of creative direction outside of a few things here and there. He has no idea what he’s doing with ROH, and the best thing Tony can come up with is getting over the hill veterans under contract and paying tons of money for licensed music. 

[Casey]

Pretty sure they were doing record business with that Punk era up until his first blow up, so, like, what’s your point?

[Elsalvajeloco]

7 minutes ago, Casey said:

Pretty sure they were doing record business with that Punk era up until his first blow up, so, like, what’s your point?

We are gonna find out that all of Vile One's posts have been AI generated, and we're going to feel silly.

[Stefanie Sparkleface]

8 minutes ago, Elsalvajeloco said:

We are gonna find out that all of Vile One's posts have been AI generated, and we're going to feel silly.

I already feel silly on a day to day basis, so I assume I'm just going to feel sillier.

[NoFistsJustFlips]

16 hours ago, Matt D said:

 

@NoFistsJustFlips, you seem to have a different idea of Flair's current mental acumen than the rest of us do.

Lol not at all. Since his health problems he's become a shell of who he was as a speaker. Most often now he's kind of a mush-mouth and can't stay on target for a million dollars.

Even still, there's value. It might end up with 50% trainwreck segments, but that other 50% could have some solid character growth for AEW talent.

 

For instance this makes more sense than Big Show & Mark Henry signings at least.

Edited November 3, 2023 by NoFistsJustFlips

[Cobra Commander]

Edge/Copeland idea: would it make him look bad as a babyface if he announced that he had a limited number of spears left in his career and he’s gonna save them for Christian and his allies, meaning that if he actually wrestled someone outside of that group during the Christian feud, he’d use different moves to finish.

This idea is less about Edge’s long term health and more about how his spear kinda stinks and that he could probably credibly hit his DDT on most of the AEW roster.

[zendragon]

On 11/1/2023 at 8:29 AM, Zakk_Sabbath said:

Lots of interesting food for thought here from Wade:

https://www.pwtorch.com/site/2023/10/31/keller-i-hope-that-tony-khan-had-ten-important-announcements-tomorrow/

I would say figure out what the hell ROH actually is and separate it from AEW (except for BOTB), I'm generally in favor of lots of titles instead of people fighting over shampoo or what ever.

Lights out should be regulated to HOB gimmick and nobody else should step on it

I generally prefer Collision to Dynamite most weeks but 5 (and sometimes 6) hours of programing a week is quite a bit to keep up with, I would not have a Collision world championship but pick either the TNT championship or the International championship and feature it on that program (do the same for the trios)

Let the women have more time on Rampage and use that program to build around the TBS title

I would prefer 4-6 PPVs a year and the themed Dynamites be treated like Clashes or Saturday Night Main Event (only time you got to see Hogan wrestle) in theory this means more long term storytelling but usually the PPVS seemed to get booked a week out

Enforce the tag rules please

don't sign anyone if you don't have a clear cut plan in place for them

Have Dark Order recruit Abadon so we can get video packages of John Silver and Evil Uno trying to teach Abby the ways of humakind

Have the acclaimed feud with Christian Cage "Luchasaurus give me a beat!"

Have Rush go after Cage's TNT title and attempt to defend the honor of fathers everywhere

 

 

[StretchMediatedHypertrophy]

1 hour ago, zendragon said:

I would say figure out what the hell ROH actually is and separate it from AEW (except for BOTB), I'm generally in favor of lots of titles instead of people fighting over shampoo or what ever.

This. Having lots of titles is the worst way to book, except for all of the others.

The thing is though, I don't think you can really see ROH as anything much than NXT for AEW - and the thing about NXT is that noone is really paying for it except live tickets for PLEs. I just don't see why you're going to pay for a sub-AEW when there's already 5 hours of AEW programming a week. I have no idea how you possibly square that circle. But the one thing that is hilarious to me is that the one belt they have that's unique is the Pure Title and Shibata barely defends it.

People will hate this idea, but ROH should just have weight classes and then you have differentiation. And hoss matches. I would just make all singles title matches pure rules tbh; it has never really stopped anyone wrestling their style that I've seen - except ppl who punch a lot maybe but who is that really thesedays except Orange Cassidy?

Edited November 3, 2023 by StretchMediatedHypertrophy

[Godfrey]

I love weight classes. Sometimes I wonder what a cruiserweight division with PAC, Darby, Strong, Kyle O'Reilly, and Fenix as the top contenders would be like

[zendragon]

problem is most of the roster aren't much over 200lbs either. I what I could see is if we go back to having the TNT being the HOSSWEIGHT belt then you could have INT. Belt unofficially being the semi-X-division belt where you have the smaller men having fast paced high flying matches.

I also wish they would say "Paul Wight is VP of Competiton"   (in kayfavbe) and have him be your Jack Tunney so we don't have to hear TONY KHAN HAS MADE IT OFFICAL over and over. But I guess Tony like's seeing/hearing his name so every one knows he's running the show