Zakk_Sabbath

Dude if you told me this was a line from like an early '80s Dr. D promo id have totally believed it. That's tremendous

Thanks a ton for this - truly looking forward to this data being twisted later on by bad actors. "Actually, UFC, NXT, Raw, and Smackdown are four different promotions so really AEW is #5 not #2 if you think about it"

I made this after Rampage the other week but forgot to post it

I think you cracked the code: the rampant transphobia is only occurring because of AEW's highly lauded sports-based presentation, it's confusing the hicks into thinking they're watching MMA. If only we'd left the rankings in storage poor Nyla wouldn't be catching strays rn

Ok you totally see what my brain did there, right? Apologies for the confusion! (For the record, I also wouldn't have hated this, either). That was a great one, but the one where he ends it with "Who the fuck am I?" after that dumb Jinder/twitter thing was awesome. He reminded me a ton of Taz in that one, back when Taz would close ECW TV with one of those alone-in-a-dark-room-rocking-the-towel promos. Tangentially related: part of me was waiting/hoping for a Tazmission on Jericho right there, it seemed like we were a split second away - to the point I was wondering aloud whether Ex would go with the old "KATA HAJ IME!!" call

I mean, I guess I do have to admit it's both nice to see them all featured, and it's also a logistical way to spread them out a bit more among all the different shows in different denominations so I'd be fine with it from that standpoint, but I've always been steadfastly of the opinion that it would be sacrilege to split them up.

This one has bum out heat with me. I hope Trent runs in to tease a spear and they all hug instead, and say "Just kidding, we devised this scheme to get TV time so we could ask the Acclaimed/Bullet Club for a shot at the Trios titles" and then it's never, ever brought up again.

It was around two months after that right before the pandemic

Screw that, what are they gonna do, fine a bajillionaire? I'd have her wrestle Toni at the top of the show for the women's title and win by DQ just to prove a point.

"It's about regulating wrestling" is this decade's "It's about ethics in journalism"

Death Taxes Me and you shitting on Sunday PPVs

I only gave the trophy cause we don't have the emote where the lil guy is smiling upside down and melting because he's currently on an endless call where these words are all in heavy, heavy rotation to the point of parody

When did the rest of the world hear about stuff like the Flair/Veneno PR switches? I read it in Flair's book as a high schooler but I'm sure it had to have come up in an Observer or something prior to that

I'll second this, I really enjoyed every interaction between them in that one, and both of em certainly made the most of their time. I thought Buddy got tore up for real on that one corner bump I'm super looking forward to the Taz-led Hook/Jericho meeting because there's a non zero chance Taz legit drops some gems like this during it

I had a similar thought recently re: Dynamite's new graphics package looking quite NXT 2.0-like in some aspects, particularly the 'paint splatter' logo on the LED guardrails. ETA: I find myself landing somewhere between Dave and Kevin on this one. I agree w Dave that it's not the hottest angle (and the backstage promo on Rampage with TUK and KOR was pretty butt...) But I certainly think the match will be good-to-great, and like Kevin said, I definitely don't mind a little more bang for the bucks.

I'm calling it now that this one steals the show. I'm an NJPW casual-at-best kind of guy, I'll watch the 1/4 dome show and other big ones if I'm awake to catch them, so I haven't seen like hundreds of Okada matches or anything, but I've been wanting this one since they ran the PAC/Kenny Iron Man at one of the early shows - I think (hope) these two end up having similar chemistry out there; with PAC leaning a little more toward my personal taste in strikes than Omega, I could see myself enjoying this quite a bit.

Hard agree - I'm super looking forward to some freakish feats of strength involving Claudio and Hobbs

Re: WWE schedule talk, I didn't see the presser so I'm not sure if there was any opportunity for it, but it would've been nice if whoever was given that answer by HHH asked a follow-up about that schedule being at least partially responsible for killing hundreds of performers in the '80s and '90s

I had this conversation with my partner last night - she has a strong psychology background and is of the opinion that it was aired purely to stir shit over at WWE. It sounded conspiratorial at first, but her thinking was, someone's eventually going to bust Punk's chops about it "the wrong way" or mention it on TV without clearing it ala Hangman, and it'll lead to the whole thing blowing up (yet again). I don't necessarily know if that kind of foresight was legitimately put into it, but once she laid it out I could totally see it. YMMV Edit: @GodfreyI meant to quote you for the above also but I can't format well on mobile so... I had a similar thought but saw a clip yesterday of Dave/Bryan indicating there was a separate, unaired incident. That said, in the aired footage, we do see Punk lean over the monitors to say something we can't hear - so that could be anything from "You're a clown, I quit" to "I'm going to murder Trevor Lawrence in his sleep" (I mean obviously not, but my point is - we can't hear, and have no idea)

Not to pile on and be a negative Nancy, but I really wasn't able to pinpoint this until you mentioned it, so I think it bears emphasizing: two crucial things missing from the early AEW recipe - moreso than rankings, Cody Rhodes, the friggin' tunnels, whatever - are the advance announcement of matches (sometimes two or more weeks ahead) and perhaps more importantly, more frequent cliffhanger-type endings. I'm not advocating for burning cash on constant shock debuts or anything like that, but it's gotta be more than Excalibur running down Rampage after a pin from time to time. Dark Order beating down Cody, with Brodie smashing the title and Anna Jay first becoming the Queenslayer on Brandi, Don Callis arriving and bringing Kenny over to Impact, having the Good Brothers and KENTA show up. Things like that

I thought we were going to get it at the first one and kept waiting for that moment on Collision where Nigel's just finally had enough and finally stands up from the desk. It's gonna be awesome when that goes down. Side tangent: It's like the one thing they could do that would completely redeem moving the booth to ringside IMO, as I'm a bigger fan of the old setup (I grew up a WCW guy and think it's a nice piece of visual variety to have a third "location" in addition to the ring/ringside, and the back).

I was actually considering the idea that Danielson goes over here with a rematch later at Wembley, but I'll say, @Just Adam Bay Bay's idea of putting the title on Ospreay there kind of intrigues me more now (much to your chagrin ). Its a not-so-fun conversation (maybe better suited for another thread) but if live gates are going to continue to drop stateside, it might behoove TK & Co to take a page out of the mid '90s Vince playbook and start doing more frequent European tours (the upcoming Canada run may have even been plotted with something similar in mind, who knows). Having a Brit on top with the title certainly wouldn't hurt attendance should they go that route.

After a day of simmering, this is where I am sort of landing. I didn't love it, but I don't think it was this big 'fingerpoke of doom' thing folks are making it out to be. If anything, I think it was kind of more out of the 'Billionaire Ted' playbook, or as mentioned earlier today, the little people dressed as Bret after Montreal. I think in large part, the negative reaction is probably amplified by the airing of the Wembley footage having seemingly negated Copeland's promo from the week before about moving on, and also Ospreay taking aim at HHH minutes later - the totality of those things had a greater effect than any one on their own, IMO.

We're on to Dynasty.

"Team: Just a reminder that the pizza party in the break room is for Smackdown employees only."