Childs

It also rubs the wrong way because the feed is far from technically impeccable, especially on live events. I assume I'd be looking at a price increase when my annual renewal comes up in the fall? If so, I doubt I'd renew, even though I want to support Evolve.

I watched it on the Highspots streaming service. Not sure if it's floating around in the land of free.

Haven't thought about it in an organized way. Maybe Sabre's Evolve title win over Thatcher? Body of that wasn't as good as Ki-Sami but it really worked as a moment. I'm also still catching up on a bunch of shit. Seems impossible that a match with an Abyss run-in could be MOTY, but it's not out of the question. Everything up until that was viscerally awesome.

This was my favorite match of 2017 until the finish. Still damn close to the top. Just a violent battle peppered with a few wonderful moments of wrestling nonsense. I hope to god they run a rematch sometime this year. Ki is ageless.

I agree it's become an incredibly cliched criticism that many of us (I've done it too) whip out selectively to pick at workers we don't like. I try not to dwell on it these days. The only time it still bugs me is when it's obviously the focus of one wrestler's attack throughout the match and then the opponent instantly transitions to running around like nothing ever happened. That said, I also think wrestlers lean too heavily on the cliche of working a body part when they know it's not going to be essential to the drama of a match. It becomes the default way to pass time rather than a tool for actually building something interesting.

Once more, I can buy the kickout there, because it wasn't a "power" kick out. It was a "there's no weight on my shoulder so I'm raising it even though I'm a corpse because I'm dumb" kickout. Reigns is supposed to be a babyface superhero, and he sold his ass off throughout the match. Then he lost clean as a sheet. I don't see where the complaint would be at all. Excellent main event and chapter in their feud.

Can't wait to see how they get to the arena.

The evil baby doll room ... wow.

The material in the Observer this week was very much holding pattern stuff. Reinforced the idea of JBL as a prick who's enabled by Vince, Kevin Dunn and possibly HHH but that was about it.

Besides Sheamus and Reigns, were there other victims of the company's inability to grasp Bryan's star power? Comeback Bautista, I guess, but that was likely a short-term thing anyway. Orton didn't seem to come out of his long feud with Bryan any better or worse than he already was. Which I guess is quintessential Randy Orton.

Dave is just torching Coachman on Twitter. That's amusing at least.

I'd still say the chances of this story blowing up are low. But it could have some legs given that Mauro has at least some profile outside of WWE and that our culture is much more sensitive to issues of bullying/mental illness than it was even 10 years ago.

I don't think that's quite right, because they've "gone deep" on leagues that are much more important to their business than WWE. I think it's more what hammerva suggested which is that they don't take wrestling seriously enough to bother maintaining journalistic standards with it. And their best writers and reporters also aren't pushing to cover it.

Yep.

I just saw that and loved it. He's absolutely right. They should be ashamed of their relationship with WWE. Oh come on this is a network that has talking heads justify the assault of women from NFL players. We are really expecting them to address bullying from a company that is a small piece of their collective pie They have a messy relationship with the NFL, no doubt. But they also employ a number of reporters who cover pro football thoughtfully and critically. So far, their relationship with WWE has felt almost entirely promotional, and yet they present their "coverage" side by side with legitimate journalism on other subjects. Yes, they should hold themselves to a higher standard.

I just saw that and loved it. He's absolutely right. They should be ashamed of their relationship with WWE.

So demoting him to NXT is actually a worse message then what it looks like what is happening now? No, definitely not worse than what's actually happening. Just didn't strike me as a solution.

They should not put him on NXT. That would essentially be demoting a guy because a co-worker preyed on his mental illness. Horrible message.

Ki is fucking amazing for a guy who now works a handful of times a year. He looked great in his surprise appearance at WrestleCon as well. I don't know how he stays so sharp athletically with so little ring time, but he's certainly adding to his legend.

Dave took a much stronger stance going after JBL and the company's bullying culture in this week's issue.

That was fine. They did what they could with it.

So is Taker going to formally retire at the end of this?

Rock promo anyone?

They obviously had zero faith in them to work an involved match. But as a minimalist bombfest, it was perfect.

Great opening if nothing else.