Zakk_Sabbath

"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."

Sad for everyone but Shannon Moore, that poor guy's been sitting next to the phone flipping through the book of DILLIGAF for 15 years waiting for this

Bold prediction (and I must stress, this is not necessarily something I'm clamoring for): this segment somehow ends with Mercedes coming out to tell the Bucks that 'CEO' isn't just a clever nickname, and she's their new boss. And so that leads us to some too- cute, petty bullshit segments where she's saying stuff about glass, calling Collision 'her' show, etc. - you see where I'm heading.

For real. I figured he was gonna be a long term prospect/project like a Nick Wayne/Billie Starkz/Top Flight/etc.

I tried to make the sojourn happen but real life got in the way, so I'm bummed to say I have to join you all on IWTV. Hope you all have a fantastic time, and even if I can't be in the house, I'm still looking forward to putting faces to some of the names in the crowd. Cheers again to those who put this card together - incredibly special.

Yeah, so like Tech said, he's a young man ... right...?

This one is the biggest WTF for me - she couldn't have cost *that* much. I guess in the end, Bobby Cruise just had better hips?

Completely agree on the second point re: the title, and I *also* think a blood feud between the two would be great! I just think it's not gonna be as good as it could've been if their alignments were swapped - it's nothing against MJF at all, I think he did the best he could with what he was given during his reign (cue a second Hangman comparison) - I just simply grew tired of him as a babyface. Doing Hogan's shit at Wembley was the shark jumper for me with that, I think. Similarly, while I enjoy Cole as a heel more than I enjoy MJF as a babyface, I'm a little tired of him as a heel too, I think because so much of his current act is already-treaded-ground from NXT. And really, the Devil stuff sucked. It just did. The quicker they can move on from that, the better IMO. But dude, if they could find a way to make it happen in the inverse - like If MJF gets the Kingdom to fuck on Cole, and says 'they were working for me all along' or some other Russo-retcon-type shit? Hell yeah, I'm in.

That's a great point. I was thinking of like, Undertaker going down to OVW in '02 to beat up David Flair in the lead-up to Mania that year, but forgetting that he was already a heel - that's my bad. You may very well be correct that it could garner a babyface anti-hero reaction (in which case, I suppose mission accomplished if they wanna keep him babyface and stay the course?) In re-framing my post through your lens I do kinda now realize that some of the 'heel terrorizing' I was referring to could have just as easily been rebellious-babyface-stuff ripped from something like the Austin/Vince story in the '90s - so you're on the money.

Honestly, dude, I was gonna say similar, but didn't want to hurt the feelings of anyone still holding out for a blowoff - that's why I opened my last thing with "If this *has* to be done..." Yes, they sold some shirts, and held down the fort at a very tumultuous time for the upper card/main scene, but I have zero desire to go back to it. I'd posit that if TUK didn't have such a heavy TV presence currently, most of the rest of us probably would've forgotten about it too.