Jesse Ewiak

I mean, I'm sure it's a very good match, but it's the It Girl of the moment vs. a joshi wrestler. If it wasn't getting highly rated on Cagematch, than that'd just be proof it was an absolute disaster.

Well, what's Jericho definition of getting somebody over? Let's ask Eddie Kingston or the members of the BCC still in AEW about that.

I'd rather watch somewhat cringy NXT 2.0 promos (and guess what, 90% of pro wrestling promos are cringe-y, the only different between cringe-y NXT promos and cringe-y AEW promos are the wrestlers are thinking of the cringe) than another pointless Just Signed Indy Guy vs. Just Signed Indy Guy in a 20-minute match with 15 kickouts.

I wouldn't say they don't see Sasha as a star - it's that the positives of Sasha don't ourweigh what they see as her negatives, when their other top stars don't have the same negatives. I mean, you could argue that almost every woman on the roster has gotten the same run of shitty booking that Sasha has gotten and they haven't reacted the same way. She may be even right, but if everybody else is a team player, you'll be seen as a malcontent. Plus, for most of the past few years, whether it's been actual injuries, getting upset at booking, or other more mysterious stuff, she's almost been as gone as much a she's been on TV. Also, to be blunt, Sasha should've known better, politically, than to put over who the WWE likely sees as her replacement in a main event match at 'Mania.

It's absolutely hilarious that AEW fanboys spent months trying to create a scenario where ROH would be on HBO Max, because of this insane idea that anybody at WB would be interested in 20 year old DVD's of old ROH shows to be put on the service right beside House of the Dragon or Euphoria, but instead, Tony has to basically do the old ROH system, but worse.

Taking the belts off a new, hot young team and basically stopping their momntum dead to put the belts back on an established team because they need the belts seems like a very Vince move.

Danielson's job as a professional wrestler is to engage in angles and matches that draw as much money as possible. At the moment, his lack of ego is making him bad at his job.

Got in a fight with a friend of the top star who's closer to the owner. Notice said friend of a top star was in a main event w/ Bryan Danielson while Eddie's jobbing to a guy whose done nothing special in his career, ever? I say all that as somebody whose on the low end on the Internet of thinking Eddie Kingston is anything special, but compared to Ethan Page, he's freaking Dusty Rhodes.

It's easy to be on the morally pure side when the things you support are niche enough nobody of note really cares (and yes, any non-WWE wrestling on the global scale is, niche.) Your random favorite indie band isn't going to be asked to do a concert for a random sheik like Beyonce or Rhianna either. If the SA gov't game a damn about AEW, Daddy Khan would have Tony accepting that check after taking away his Adderall prescription until he did so. It's pro wrestling - there are no moral people in this business in the long-term.

Muta doing Muta shtick and Nakamura doing Nakamura shtick for 12 minutes will likely be more entertaining to me than 80% of weekly supposed bangers on TV.

All the following things can be true - 1.) The AEW locker room is kind of a mess, because nobody respects the money mark. 2.) CM Punk is the biggest asshole in this specific situation. 3.) The Elite were kind of dumb to go talk to Punk at that point, even w/ legal with them. 4.) Jericho will always take the opputunity to get himself over. So, I think when looking at all the available evidence, the fact the Elite will come back in the next few weeks, and Punk will get to go back to complaining about the Blackhawks on Twitter is the correct result, when in the long-term, both groups being off TV, and focusing on Danielson, Moxley, MJF, etc. as your top guys would be the correct result. Oh, and getting Starks and Miro back on TV regularly, as opposed to treating Yuta & Garcia like they're the next biggest stars in wrestling.

I mean, you're in the camp that we can't criticize Punk for his actions because he's a sad boy because people might've thought the reason that Khan had to be talked into keeping Cabana is just maybe, people took the not out there position that the guy who he signed to a huge money deal didn't want the guy he had a huge falling out with, including a lawsuit over, in the same company as him. But, I get it - the new view of the Internet wrestling fan is all a wrestler has to say is mental wellness and you can't criticiz them for anything they do, regardless of their actions or their actual talent. Well, as long as that wrestler is somebody the Internet likes. If not, you can say, extrapolate one dumb tweet from a decade ago into somebody being a conspiracy theorist, because you don't like they're getting pushed strongly. Again, from the outside, I find this hilarious because every side is terrible. The Punk side, the Jericho side, the Elite side. I only believe that the Elite story is closest to the truth, because it's the one that makes the most sense from the actual personalities of everybody involved. Punk has been a touchy grouchy asshole since the early 2000's, the Elite brought the head of legal with them to talk to Punk, and then everything happened and Jericho took the moment to take back the locker room. None of that seems out of step with reality, as opposed to ya' know, the Elite viciously going after Punk's dog and trying to get into a shoot fight backstage.

As somebody who dislikes both Punk & The Elite, I believe basically nothing coming from Punk, because his description of The Elite doesn't even match up to what my view of them, as somebody who doesn't like them. While on the other hand, the Elite's descriptions of Punk's action lineup to everything I've heard about him for close to twenty years. Plus, if it was actually true about the dog, that would've been leaked the moment it happened, not a month later when Punk is probably looking for a bigger buyout from Papa Khan.

I've consistently said that if you're going to have Bray as this type of character, he needs to wrestle 3-4 times a year tops, and have a bunch of henchmen for babyfaces to run through. Also, since despite no evidence I can see, people continue to argue he's a good promo, he can also take some losses as opposed to what he did as The Fiend.

A reminder - contract tampering does not actually really exist outside of sports leagues who have made agreements with each other. You can get hit for contract tampering in the NBA because all 30 teams and the players have agreed not to do so. Legally, Triple H could wait outside the door of whatever arena AEW is at next and ask everybody when there contract is up. He just can't tell them to to do anything to illegally break their contract.

So, when the good billionaire wants to limit worker's rights to work where then they want, we have excuses for it. The actual reality is Tony Khan's AEW contracts are just as company-friendly as WWE ones are, as we've seen with various workers not getting the OK to work various indies, it's just that Daddy Khan hasn't told Tony to stop spending money yet. You either believe wrestlers are independent contractors allowed to come and go as they please, or you believe people should follow their contracts. There is no difference between Andrade wanting out and Mustafa Ali wanting out, outside of the fact you have more sympathy for Ali's plight. That's it. There is no such thing as a good boss - only a boss that's being good it's best for his bottom line, or his own personal feelings. Ask Lio Rush or Big Swole.

1.) WWE got billions because there was competition for their product, because they're still outrunning the bear of falling TV ratings. OTOH, there's been exactly zero talk of any competitive bidding form other companies, even form more pro-AEW sources, which at the point, why should WB Discover, especially under new ownership, offer them more money? I'm not saying AEW will get kicked off TNT, but the question is, will they get an appreciably bigger deal than they're currently getting, when there's no reason too? The problem for AEW long-term isn't getting kicked off TV, but being seen the same way TNA became seen as to non-wrestling people who buy advertising - the show where all the people who washed out of the Major Leagues (ie. the WWE) end up, as opposed to actual opposition. 2.) I mean, Survivor Series basically sold out and Rumble just sold 20,000 tickets on the first day, along w/ numerous great attendances for RAW and Smackdown, which all started before Vince left. Yeah, part of the reason is they're hitting the same four places over-and-over (hyperbole, folks), but also, while say, Seattle is doing well (5,000 out of 7,000 as of a week or two ago), it's not the super hot seller you'd expect from AEW's first trip to Danielson's home area. I'm not claiming "AEW IS DOOMED" but I do think it's clear that at the initial hot period of "Fuck WWE" energy has dissapated and a combination of questionable booking decisions and plain ole' logistical issues have hurt the company - I think somebody upthread had a great point that if you got to a RAW or Smackdown, everybody who is important on that roster is going to be a part of that show, even if it's not a match, while seemingly with Dynamite, it's a crap-shoot among the top people whose going to be on TV - like, we can bash Vince all we want, but if you told somebody a few years ago that Andrade would only have the silly low amount of show on the main TV show he's on, everybody would be guessing that's a Vince booking decision. I also think the whole rankings thing made Tony afraid of actually booking anybody at the top of the card to lose (outside of Danielson, who I wouldn't be shocked at this point if he's be OK to jobbing too Brodie's kid), because the fanbase also has been made to despise any kind of non-clean finish.

The basic issue with "AEW being a strong #2 promotion that only appeals to hardcores" is well, what we're looking at right now - the hardcores can only buy a ticket to a show so many times until even they get burned out when you visit multiple times in a short time period, that hardcore audience isn't really growing which makes you look less valuable to TV networks in the long run, etc. TV Networks at a certain point, just like any other business, want to see growth, and eventually, they may be fine paying something for AEW, but not as much as people that claim to know about wrestling economics have been stating for the past year. I'd also push back against the idea that there are no casual fans - I'll die on the hill that the actual number of people that pay attention to wrestling in the US (since that's what we're talking about when we're talking about ratings and such - 50 million people watched WM in India after all) is about the same as the 2010-2011 era. It's just people aren't watching on cable for 2 or 3 hours a week, but instead, paying attention via the Internet, Youtube, etc. There's a reason why WWE has one of the most viewed YT channels. Plus, again, since moving to Peacock, WWE consistently is doing much better numbers Y2Y for their big events. The reality is more people are watching the big 4 PPV's than probably ever before, and even in the US, I wouldn't be shocked if WrestleMania for example, actually has more viewers after it's first week than the highest rated Smackdown of the year because of the brand name. As far as specific booking goes, I think it's just also true that Tony like any other booker has favorites, and it's just those favorites aren't clicking in the same way as other possible younger guys that could've been pushed, that maybe aren't Tony's Guys. Like, this isn't the best analogy, but Yuta & Garcia are pretty much the indy version of all the over 6-feet blandly good looking guys we saw in the WWE for years before the indy infusion - they're the 'type' the booker wants, but they don't the inherent intangibles the other guys with that look actually have, that the booker thinks they can just cut 'n' paste. Randy Orton and Bryan Danielson are both stars for a reason, and you just can't copy it. I do think there's an argument that the initial AEW audience was basically there for high budget PWG (to really simplify things) and that's part of the reason for some unhappiness about the changes in rosters and pushes recently, but that was never going to be a product to last for a while, plus a lot of that roster is frankly, getting old and paying the price for all those PWG-style matches. That's not even getting into the fact that just maybe, we're finding out that "creative freedom" is a nice buzzword, but sometimes, you need to overrule your wrestlers, either because the story they're telling is moving at a snail's pace or because they're a dork who doesn't realize their a top guy who needs to be pushed like a top guy (hey, Danielson!) instead of being in pointless matches against lower-card guys, etc.

Justin Trudeau is currently PM of Canada.

To use a Bill Simmons turn of phrase, Hulk Hogan politicking stories are in the Tyson Zone for me. You can claim about anything when it comes to them, and I'll believe them.

People just wanted a top guy who looked like the chubby dork they happened to be, they're also upset Gunther isn't treating his name change as the personal Vietnam it seems to be for so many people online.

Pretty sure Roman is fine being the main guy on the #1 wrestling show in the world, main eventing stadium show after stadium show, (including if Chicago wasn't Chicago when it comes to weather - Wrigley Field could easily be a baseball stadium they sell out in no-time for a Rumble all for it being an AEW "city"), and does it all while actually being respected by other wrestlers, including members of the AEW roster, as opposed to being seen as a broken down bitter crank. If anything, I'd argue the true Twitter opinion is pretending that Punk has had anything close to the past year Roman has, outside of the niche. What Punk (and Bryan & Cole's signing) showed is there were people maybe interested in their comeback to wrestling, but everything else or the booking, judging by the ratings refusing to get past their first show, turned those people new fans off. Maybe on a pure ROI-level it worked becaus of merch and ticket sales, it was a positive, but I'm old enough to remember when Punk was comparing himself to Nash & Hall after he debuted.

Again, there doesn't even have to be anybody telling anybody anything, but a bunch of wrestlers doing the simple math and looking at what's in front of them. Hell, Punk didn't have to say anything, because Tony was likely planning to send Cabana into the Phantom Zone before perhaps Elite members or other people on the roster, seeing what was going to happen, argued against it. After all, Tony deciding to appease his favorite new toy before he has to say anything about it is I guess, "making a decision without Punk's input," in a way.

It's undoutably true that Punk (and to a lesser extent, Danielson & Cole) brought some eyes in when they debuted, as seen by the ratings directly after they debuted. The problem is, whether said booking was the wrestler or Tony's idea, the booking of those big stars after they came in pushed those new people away, so AEW is basically back where they are before Punk, Cole, and Danielson showed up. People wanted Punk vs. Omega, Punk vs. Moxley, Punk vs Jericho, etc., not Punk wrestling a bunch of lower card guys until freakin' February (yes, Punk vs. Darby was a bad idea for Punk's 1st big match - it was fine for his 2nd big match if you wanted to set it up), and even with Danielson, after initially starting off w/ Danielson vs. Omega, he was wrestling midcarders on TV for weeks. Then again, I'm still the guy that thinks Moxley should've beat Jerich for the title on the 1st Dynamite and gone from there.

I mean, at the end of the day, Vince was the boss, Tony is a money mark.