April 2024 Wrestling Talk

[dragonzombie]

WWE news 

State of the art production facility 

https://corporate.wwe.com/news/company-news/2024/04-10-2024

 

https://www.wrestlinginc.com/1558900/wwes-dwayne-the-rock-johnson-received-over-9-million-tko-stock/

[Elsalvajeloco]

1 hour ago, twiztor said:

wasn't trying to clear Paul. whether Paul was working or earnestly believes what he said, i couldn't care less.

i just liked your wording and turned it into an irreverent standalone statement on DFW.  those never fail to amuse me.

You're easily amused.

Nuff said. 

You know what? I like that. Going trademark that.

[odessasteps]

Don’t recall seeing this here yet

 

[Elsalvajeloco]

....What is this argument over?

Also, you gotta get into that WWE press conference. Paul Levesque may say something that enriches your life. You never know.

[BloodyChamp]

Is that Michael K Johnson from StrictlyECW? He’s still hacking it out there or here or wherever? 

[zendragon]

4 hours ago, Elsalvajeloco said:

....What is this argument over?

Also, you gotta get into that WWE press conference. Paul Levesque may say something that enriches your life. You never know.

It’s like when that guy with the Seahawks had to do press or get fined… how often is something of note ever said at these things anyway 

[odessasteps]

‘Both teams played hard” 

[BloodyChamp]

Beastquake might be my favorite run ever 

[ReiseReise]

All the criticism of HHH's statements confuses me, wasn't Ospreay quoted that he signed with AEW because it enabled him to spend more time with his family in the UK? A WWE deal probably would not have allowed for that, no matter how many times he actually wrestled. 

[Elsalvajeloco]

26 minutes ago, ReiseReise said:

All the criticism of HHH's statements confuses me, wasn't Ospreay quoted that he signed with AEW because it enabled him to spend more time with his family in the UK? A WWE deal probably would not have allowed for that, no matter how many times he actually wrestled. 

How that relate to being about the grind though? Also, again, I dunno you want to do that when elevating work life balance is very much a corporate thing. If Jade Cargill was like Gunther and some woman living in Europe, they probably would have signed her even if it meant that they had to figured out a way to be with her family when she wasn't on TV. They're definitely not going to tell female talent, "well, yeah, you can't see your kids". That will get you all the bad press if people found that out. And not everyone is going to do the buy your own bus thing for travel purposes.

Matter of fact, Paul was a casualty of what Bischoff called the geographical undesirables seeing as Paul was living in the Northeast (New Hampshire or maybe near Boston) and everyone in WCW pretty much was living in Atlanta. He obviously wasn't going to move to Atlanta even though everybody chose to do that. I am pretty sure guys like Regal and Alex Wright moved there. Was Paul not about the grind since he didn't want to relocate? And that's when he was a single guy with no kids and as Nash and others in the Kliq pointed out had no bad habits and was focused purely on wrestling. No, it just made more sense for him to sign with WWF when a fair amount of the shows would be local for him, and he could drive with the boys everywhere else.

Hasn't Ospreay talked about suffering mental health issues in the past as well? If that is part of alleviating those issues, I am not sure why a booker or promoter would find fault in that unless you're outright saying you don't believe in that stuff like that. I don't think that is something someone from WWE would be against especially post sale. Maybe I am not aware of a certain culture within the company. I dunno.

[ReiseReise]

I don't criticize Ospreay in his decision, I just think the statement HHH made isn't anywhere near as bad as people make it out to be and seems absolutely in line with what seemed to be Ospreay's main factors for his decision. If someone would give me the same or better pay for less work with me having six to maybe eight more years to go earning money at this level, I would 100% go for it. Totally with Ospreay on this. 

I would not expect my employer to go "He decided against us because our conditions were way worse" though, not even internally. 

[Elsalvajeloco]

8 minutes ago, ReiseReise said:

I don't criticize Ospreay in his decision, I just think the statement HHH made isn't anywhere near as bad as people make it out to be and seems absolutely in line with what seemed to be Ospreay's main factors for his decision. If someone would give me the same or better pay for less work with me having six to maybe eight more years to go earning money at this level, I would 100% go for it. Totally with Ospreay on this. 

I would not expect my employer to go "He decided against us because our conditions were way worse" though, not even internally. 

I think the complaint is the whole less work angle. How many days is Ospreay working compared to the average WWE wrestler? He's working 2-3 days a week compared to the average WWE worker working 2-3 days a week. How is that less work? There is no hard brand split in AEW either. 

[Godfrey]

To correct my earlier post, WWE's upcoming European tour does seem to have more dates a week to take advantage of being over there so there are still going to be periods when they have to grind it out a little. I just listened to his rebuttal promo and I think it's more that Ospreay doesn't want to water down his work to do it more often, it's a different approach to wrestling entirely from WWE and if he went there right now they would be like oil and water

Edited April 11 by Godfrey

[Elsalvajeloco]

9 minutes ago, Godfrey said:

To correct my earlier post, WWE's upcoming European tour does seem to have more dates a week to take advantage of being over there so there are still going to be periods when they have to grind it out a little. I just listened to his rebuttal promo and I think it's more that Ospreay doesn't want to water down his work to do it more often, it's a different approach to wrestling entirely from WWE and if he went there right now they would be like oil and water

I think each brand does about two international "tours" of 3 days each. That's 6-8 days out of 365 days. Will Ospreay isn't going to make that up by doing shots in RevPro or wherever? Did I miss something? Did he go into semi retirement?

Shit, they use to do 2-3 weeks of tours overseas. However, because of TV commitments, they have to come back. Now, they shooting the TV before the PLE in that same venue. So I mean, they're reducing travel.

[Infinit]

Tremendous. 

 

[Elsalvajeloco]

The man did exhume his parents after all. You can't expect much from him.

[SirSmUgly]

1 hour ago, Elsalvajeloco said:

The man did exhume his parents after all. You can't expect much from him.

You can't help but expect this sort of anti-social behavior from a guy known as Unabomb. 

It was either be a below-average mayor for a small Tennessee town or hide out in the woods mailing nail bombs to computer sellers. Whatever you think about the guy, he probably chose the best possible option out of those two. 

[Cobra Commander]

Alicia Fox working a match this month made me think of a gimmick/storyline idea for AEW (which wouldn't necessarily only work for Alicia Fox)

Basically the gimmick/character/storyline of a former WWE person who shows up in AEW who doesn't get the red carpet "look who we have now" treatment, and then uses that as the "bulletin board material" to be a heel.

This being AEW, the main issue would turn out to be "you didn't tweet a graphic saying I was All-Elite when I arrived" or something that most people wouldn't give a crap about.

[Curt McGirt]

13 hours ago, Elsalvajeloco said:

Was Paul not about the grind since he didn't want to relocate?

He wasn't about the grind UNTIL he got about the WWE Grind. Cause that's the only grind that matters. 

[Godfrey]

6 hours ago, Elsalvajeloco said:

I think each brand does about two international "tours" of 3 days each. That's 6-8 days out of 365 days. Will Ospreay isn't going to make that up by doing shots in RevPro or wherever? Did I miss something? Did he go into semi retirement?

He may not make those up. I did more searching and I forgot he billed his last RevPro match as his goodbye to the indies and so far he hasn't signed up for New Japan again (although that could change) so his schedule might only be one match a week at the most and more likely one every two weeks or so. That's pretty different from 3 dates a week minimum. So I may have misrepresented how similar the schedules were in my previous post, that's on me

To answer your question, I think from Triple H's view Ospreay did go into semi-retirement

[colonial]

I believe Osprey mentioned after leaving New Japan FT was that he would be open to working from time to time with NJ depending on his schedule. I read that as he wouldn't work full tours or tournaments, but could work, say, the January 4 show or something like Dominion.

[Elsalvajeloco]

Just now, Godfrey said:

He may not make those up. I did more searching and I forgot he billed his last RevPro match as his goodbye to the indies and so far he hasn't signed up for New Japan again (although that could change) so his schedule might only be one match a week at the most and more likely one every two weeks or so. That's pretty different from 3 dates a week minimum. So I may have misrepresented how similar the schedules were in my previous post, that's on me

To answer your question, I think from Triple H's view Ospreay did go into semi-retirement

...except he didn't. I get you're not saying that, but again, that's pretty bizarre especially when WWE doesn't structure their contracts AFAIK where you have to hit a specific threshold of matches. I am guessing there are obviously injury clauses in there. If he were with WWE, he probably working a similar schedule of doing an interview one week on TV and wrestling the next week rinse repeat. When you only have five or six matches per TV show, how many people are wrestling EVERY week? So if you're not wrestling on TV every week, that leaves the two house shows. For majority of the year, it's the supershows which include both brands. How many people are working those? 15-20 people? It can't be that many. 

That hardest week of the year is the last week of the year and that's after an entire week off. You might have to wrestle a whole four times. Sounds like backbreaking work.

 

[Elsalvajeloco]

I will leave it at this since Paul's response is strange anyway you slice it: My whole belief is Paul is just pissed he lost out on these two guys who he thought it would be obvious they would be swayed to sign with WWE. They have all the perceived momentum, and they were able to bring a bunch of people into the fold since Vince left, came back, and then left again. He felt he needed to come up with an excuse to why he lost out on two major free agents to a lower tier company. IMO it's like a fanbase of a sports franchise who reads the rumor mill all offseason they're going to land some big name free agent, negotiations break off, and then another team signs them away out of nowhere. Then that same fanbase that was excited about these game changing players all of a sudden didn't want those guys in the first place. 

I would have been really impressed if Paul just said, "Sucks we didn't get them. Hope that works out for them, but we feel would have been the better landing spot and provide better opportunities. We feel our roster is still stacked with or without them. Best of luck." No shade necessary and you can still big up WWE.

[Octopus]

So what you’re saying is you like Triple H?

[Elsalvajeloco]

30 minutes ago, Octopus said:

So what you’re saying is you like Triple H?

Like might be too strong a word. Way too strong. However, I do respect him enough to believe he is smart enough not to be totally insulated in the wrestling bubble. That and if he plans to be the next wrestling czar winning hearts and minds and probably from a PR standpoint be the anti-Vince McMahon, he doesn't have to say shit like this. I feel like he's trying to navigate both trying to respect and honor Vince but also tow the "Vince is no longer associated with WWE" line. He's not going to win that war. He would do better trying to establish his own legacy totally separate from Vince. He doesn't need to check his "What Would Vince Do" bracelet every 10 minutes.