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I also did not see that coming, but I like them throwing a curve ball like that in a match that seems like a foregone conclusion. It seems the obvious path is a Bianca/Iyo/Rhea triple threat but at this point you can't rule out any possibility

Except Verne and Bock weren't the biggest stars in Hollywood in 1985. This is the most star power they could hope to have on a Mania card since Stone Cold seems content being a full time cat dad on Instagram.

To be fair Travis Scott was probably pretty amped to be doing an angle with the Rock and Cena and got too carried away. I agree that Cody probably told him to "make it look good" if ya weeeell. Honestly for as much as you could quibble about it, this was the biggest heel turn since Hogan just for the "you never thought this guy would be a heel" factor. Yes I know Hogan was a heel in his first pre Hulkamania WWF run but that hasn't been canon since 1984. Plus with the Austin turn it made zero sense that after years of him and Vince trying to murder each other they would just suddenly start working together. Cena and Rock had their program but it wasn't a years long blood feud. Another thing to consider that as shocking as Hogan's turn was, the payoff was a Starrcade main event with Sting that was "botched" by fast counts not working for him brother. Followed by years of him putting anyone under age 40 in their own box away from any hope of getting over. The Cena turn is going to lead to 2 generational icons facing the guy who's the face of the current generation in a match that, unless disaster strikes, will probably blow away business records.

I thought for sure Cody was going to accept Rock's offer and go full Homelander against Cena to set up him winning #17 at Mania....never in a million years did I think after all these years we'd finally get the Cena heel turn. Well played Trips, you got me!

Oh man, COPE/Jay/FTR/Willow vs the Death Riders in an Anarchy in the Arena match is gonna bang so gd hard.

I know they don't have any obligation to do it, but if I was TK I'd just let Fenix go at this point. Unless something happened that was kept super quiet, he clearly has no interest to ever return to AEW willingly and we all know WWE is just counting down the days until his deal is up. I know you don't normally want to just serve up a guy like that on a silver platter to your competitor, but paying a guy who clearly wants to be elsewhere to sit home and do nothing is some "jilted ex who can't accept its over" type shit.

40. Khan was furious with Nemeth. Khan believes that Brooks left AEW because of Nemeth. I hope the lawyer that wrote this didn't tear anything with that reach, holy shit.

Rock and Cody as the new Two Man Power Trip would be some good shit

I loved the post match interview backstage where Will was saying he was on another level and Kenny was in the background making a "this fucking guy" face. Planting seeds and I'm here for it.

Also with all due respect to Melo, Oba Femi is HIM

Je'von Evans putting in another good showing at Vengeance, odd choice for Page to go over but that's how things go in the slower paced HHH/HBK era I suppose. He still looks like he's going to be money in the not too distant future.

Apparently the issue was they wanted to get him on TV so fast they didn't get a chance to complete the usual paperwork they do to be able to license the name. At least per Fightful WWE was just erring on the side of caution and he's still being referred to as Ricky Starks internally.

I get it from WWE's side that Ricky Starks has been off TV for a long time, so starting him in NXT at least for a little bit allows them to reestablish him to folks.

Also interesting that not as if WWE cares that much about the indies, Starks just won the Defy title this past weekend and they are pretty close with AEW.

All valid points, but the crowd chanted his name and the announcers acknowledged the crowd knows who he is (even if they didn't say the name themselves), so having him come back with a name from that Key and Peele skit with the football players would be a level of stupid we really haven't seen post-Vince.

I hardly recall Malakai even having that many singles matches, he was almost always in trios or teaming wit Brody King. The whole Ricky Starks thing is weird, the only thing that makes sense to me is that they seem to be wanting to cut ties with anyone who was friends with Cody....except of course MJF who started a program with Dustin of all people.

Luchadores, especially ones who are top guys, know all the tricks to malicious compliance the promoters they want to get away from. Not that I've seen anything specific to Fenix to suggest he'd do that, but they have an entirely different view on "professionalism" in Mexico. There's really nothing stopping someone like Fenix from basically telling Tony to GFY, since worst case scenario he could go back to AAA and be a top guy there in the unlikely case WWE would suddenly not be interested in him. (not to mention there were those ominous sounding tweets from Fenix heavily suggesting some fuckery went down behind the scenes with AEW)

If its not 50, it's most likely not too far off. They have tons of folks at the PC who have either never been on TV or nothing more than Level Up type shows.

He was the victim in the DV case that got Jake Atlas fired from AEW back in 2022. She wrestled as Bea Priestley (which i think is her real name) prior to WWE and formerly was with Will Osprey.

Getting billions from Netflix, mostly.

The entire job of a wrestler is to get over. Some do it by being awesome in the ring, some do it by being a top notch promo, and sometimes a guy just connects to the audience. All are equally valid IMO. Even if someone isn't your cup of tea, if it's over it's over.

As soon as Scott's kid gets into the biz we need him and Bron vs the Creeds as soon as humanly possible.

Drew was the most vocal, but it is sounding like a lot of folks were pissed at LA Knight getting involved in his elimination sequence. Drew felt he was trying to get himself over in the middle of Drew's next program being set up, and the most charitable explanation would have been "he just got in the way" which is a bad look for a guy who's been around as long as he has.

Zelina suddenly being sent to Smackdown makes me think that's where Mr Black is going to show up at very soon.

Heyman sells better with his facial expressions than 90% of the roster do in the ring, and I'm not even saying that as a knock on the roster he's just that damn good. One thing that stood out to me, well two things actually: one was how WWE is a thousand times better booking babyfaces in the Hunter Era and two there weren't any entrants that were just filling a spot. Michael Cole even mentioned at one point when there was 6-7 people left that any of them could be a WM main eventer and he was right. (I guess technically IShowSpeed was filling a spot but at least that served a purpose in its own way)