The Thread Killer

Watching the post show press conference. It’s brutal. (These softball questions are just comical. These “reporters” HAVE to be paid plants.) Anyhow…Tony Khan is finally addressing the ROH TV situation. Basically, he couldn’t get a TV deal with WB/Discovery…so the TV show is going to be on the Honor Club streaming service but PPV’s will be separate from that and won’t be available to stream until 90 days after the event. He’s doing a lot of babbling about New Japan working with ROH too, but no details.

I assume whatever kind of TV deal they got won’t be involving Warner Brothers Discovery, since he put the tag straps on Dem Boys and they’re banned. Rumor has it it’s some sort of streaming deal. Overall, that was a very good show but in my opinion it peaked with the Tag Title match. Quite honestly, I’d be perfectly fine never seeing Chris Jericho on TV again. It has nothing to do with his personal life or his politics, or whatever else. I’m just over the guy, I used to consider myself a pretty big fan, but I’m getting really tired of his act.

That tag match kind of took the steam out of the crowd, a little bit. That’s one of those matches that it’s practically impossible to follow up. The Main Event seems to be finally waking them up a bit. Pity it’s a Jericho match.

Man…the ring crew changed that canvas fast!

That was fucking nuts.

LETS GO!!! You always know you’re going to see a bloodbath, when the participants are wearing their brand spanking new white tights.

There is the Army/Navy game and a UFC show tonight. Plus isn’t there an NXT show tonight as well?

You are absolutely right about that. Look at the Swerve/Lee vs. Taylor/Griffey match. They did a great job of quietly explaining all the different story lines going into that match, with the history between Lee and Taylor, while recapping the issues with Lee and Swerve. That match was way better thanks to the commentary then it would have been without it.

I have to be honest, as soon as I saw it was time for Brian Cage and The Gates of Agony, for me it automatically became time for a pee break, to take my dog into the backyard, and then give him his dinner. I came back inside just in time for the brawl with Top Flight and 2.0, and I am not concerned that I missed anything.

It’s hardly a technical masterpiece but for my money this Swerve in our Glory vs. Shane Taylor Promotions match is a lot of fun.

The consensus I am seeing on Twitter is that Dralistico was supposed to kick out but didn’t do it in time…so rather than pretending he did, the ref went ahead and counted three. I have a hard time believing Fox & Christian were supposed to win that, especially in that fashion.

Something definitely got seriously fucked up there but I am not sure what. Those guys did not look like they were on the same page for the entire match, and a bunch of stuff got screwed up, but something went very wrong with that finish.

I missed the whole Preston Vance unmasking deal…no Rampage here. So at first I was: “Who the hell is that dude with Rush?”

That entire pre-show was great. Gran Metalik vs. Jeff Cobb was a lot of fun.

It’s his life, Darby can do what he wants. I appreciate him basically killing himself for our entertainment. But you would think he would take a serious look at the way Matt Hardy hobbles around the locker room and can barely move, and understand that is definitely in his future… if not worse. But I don’t understand the mentality of those daredevil types. Ever since Misawa died, it makes me a lot more uncomfortable watching guys do physically risky stuff in the ring. Especially because it is easily possible to have a great match without doing that kind of stuff. But as @Timbo Slice pointed out, Darby has been doing that stuff all his life. If he wasn’t doing it in AEW he would be driving his bike off a roof or something.

I was enjoying the build up to the feud between Miro and The House of Black and was really looking forward to Miro vs. Malakai…but that didn’t happen because of Black’s injury and then Miro vanished into the Tony Khan Booking Bermuda Triangle.

FTR/BRISCOES III BITCHES

Exactly. I don’t think TK should take the World Title off MJF yet, it’s way too soon for that. But I really hope Ricky’s push doesn’t evaporate after next week, although I suspect it will. I am really starting to doubt if TK has the ability or attention span required to juggle multiple storylines at once. Unless they involve Daniel Garcia and/or Wheeler Yuta…in which case his attention to detail is unmatched.

Man Starks was on fire there, damn. He knocked that out of the park. You never get to hear great passionate sounding promos like that in WWE. The format might be similar. but AEW has it all over WWE when it comes to segments like that.

That Battle Royal spot where Jungle Boy dropkicked Brian Cage in the back, who then very slowly kind of threw himself over the top rope? That was fucking terrible. Cringeworthy.

I am really hoping that Tony Khan doesn’t make us wait any longer than tonight to find out who FTR are defending against on Saturday. I am also hoping The Briscoes will be getting a match with somebody as well. I am also a little bit afraid that it won’t be a straight up Tag Title match. I am hoping we don’t end up seeing a 4 way or whatever. I would just like to see the remainder of the ROH show finalized tonight, considering the damn show is in less than 72 hours.

Strongly disagree, but I am admittedly partial to his in ring style.

I think Regal loved the character based stuff he has done throughout his career. I think for a guy who is known as a great technical wrestler he has a vastly more open minded opinion of the “sports entertainment” aspect of Pro Wrestling than most other “technical” guys of his era. He gets how important that is. But I think if you asked Regal to choose between being an on screen character and working as a coach and helping develop talent behind the scenes, he wouldn’t even bat an eye before jumping at the coaching job. I think he wants to share what he knows, and he’s going to have a vastly greater chance to do that in WWE. Plus he gets to work for his friend, and with his son. The guy is a pro, through and through. He’s not going to have a negative word to say about AEW once he leaves, nor should he. His run there was successful in its own way. It was a great opportunity for him to work with his old friends. But it’s pretty obvious that if he had known when he got fired that Vince was going to be out and Triple H was going to be coming back in (in charge no less) there is no way he would’ve ever taken the job with AEW.

So Tony Khan made it official today during the ROH media call. Regal did have an out clause in his contract, and he asked Tony Khan to exercise it so he could go back and work as a coach in WWE, and Khan allowed it. Sounds like the only condition is that Regal cannot appear on WWE TV as an on screen character for the entire year 2023. I guess one of the factors leading to Regal asking to go, was that he is just working in AEW as an on screen talent, whereas in WWE, he will be working as a coach. His son Charlie Dempsey/Bailey Mathews was one of the talents who survived the closure of NXT UK and is now on the NXT roster, and Regal apparently cited that as a big motivation for wanting to go back to WWE to help bring his kid along. It is pretty obvious from listening to Regal’s podcast that his passion is for coaching not for being on screen. So now that Vince is gone, it makes all the sense in the world that he wants to go back where he will be most useful.

I haven’t watched MLW in years, but I just read the unfortunate news that Richard Holliday has Hodgkin’s Lymphoma and is in the middle of chemotherapy. That’s very sad news. Back when I used to watch MLW, he, MJF and Hammerstone were the highlights for sure. Even if he manages to beat this, being able to work again after that kind of debilitating illness is a long, tough road back…if it is even possible.