sek69

Part of being a good teacher is being able to deliver criticism in a instructive way and not just a "do it right, asshole" way. By all accounts Dusty was a guy who was able to do that, and you can see in how the people who were around then speak about him shows how valuable they considered him. Of course a lot of that probably did come from the fact that he clearly gave no F's about corporate BS, as evident from the time he went off script and pie-faced Steph in mid promo on TV that one time.

It really only seems to work in Japan, and even then being a junior is something you graduate from if you have any star potential. In US wrestling having weight classes turns into a way to marginalize smaller guys and show they aren't good enough to hang with the big guys since we had 40 years of WWF/E teaching fans that you have to be a big guy to be a star. In theory it works in Mexico, but there's not really much size disparity in lucha. You have big folks and everyone else is pretty close in weight/size. Plus it's really only CMLL that has weight classes and part of that is because That's The Way It's Always Been Done and they forget about half the weight class championships they have unless someone holding one of them quits the company.

I'm guessing Gargano is going to have to make some hard choices soon, since pretty much everything in his tweet as changed since that time. The office is different, the product he believes in just got mercy killed, and Candice is pregnant so he won't be working with her for a bit. Plus the one time he appeared on Raw he looked like a lucha mini in there with the main roster guys.

Cage is 6 foot and Mike Tyson is 5'10, so he would have been taller. Miz is 6'2 so he is taller but hardly dwarfs the guy. Especially considering Cage is probably at least two Mizes wide.

So Ciampa has been vocal about not wanting to move to the main roster since his repaired neck probably wouldn't be able to take the abuse (and he's probably not wrong), but why has Gargano been around so long?

Nattie really hasn't been the main focus of any push. She was either the valet for Harry and Tyson or going along for the ride because the company wanted to reward Tamina for getting a surprising ovation at Wrestlemania.

Now to be fair, my main exposure to Cage prior to AEW has been in AAA where he does tower above most of the people there.

Cage is as wide as he is tall, and jacked to boot, which gives the illusion he's taller than he really is.

Pro wrestling is just a series of things that used to be no doubt match enders/something no one else was doing then everyone starts doing it. Been that way since wrestling has been a thing, I remember Muta coming over on excursion and doing moonsaults in the 80s when no one else was doing it but Lanny Poffo (and being a jobber he didn't bust it out that often). Plus it's always going to be more impressive when you see superheayweights doing flippy stuff.

Holy shit Montez turning 180 degrees mid air on that splash.

I suppose having Becky go full douchebag Conor mode is one way to make her heel turn stick,

Bringing out Trae Young in MSG is some master level trolling, I love it.

Watching now, the opening segment was so great. I saw someone mention that Brock's new look makes him look like Bryan Danielson with the super mushroom from Mario and I can't unsee it now.

Not to mention she might have had family there to see her, being in NYC and all.

I figured something was up when Zelina posted what I assume was her gear for the night with the caption "nevermind" followed by Liv and Carmella both posting "..." so it looks like another high morale moment for the 'E.

Nothing is more pure uncut WWE than having a themed show to wank themselves over being the first show back after 9/11 then having to cut a match for time involving someone directly affected by it.

One good thing about Brock being Brock is he won't be around enough to get overexposed on TV.

In ring, not much, but that probably only proves more how important her backstage role is. In a company where everyone is on edge and stressed out having a Nattie on the roster is probably the only thing preventing people who lean on her from having a breakdown.

The irony of Cage is that WWE would probably be the best place for him, but his one distinguishing characteristic (being cartoonishly jacked in an era where that is rare) won't be able to pass the Wellness test. They only turn a knowingly blind eye to the tip top main guys, and even if they would do it for him, it gives the company an easy way to fire him if he becomes too much of a hassle for them ("oops you seem to have failed this test we somehow never caught you on before").

Yeah you guys aren't wrong in pointing out Page could easily get lost in the crowd, but considering they probably have two major long term angles tied to him (his title chase and the Dark Order deal) I'm confident he'll be okay. I'm guessing soon TayJay will run out of patience getting the Dark Order to stop fighting each other and get Page to help them heal like they helped him. Hangman's speech to the DO could be the greatest babyface promo ever if they do it even halfway correct.

Yeah Tessa seems to rub everyone around her the wrong way, so all the racist stuff became a convenient cover for people to pass on her without having to say it's because she's an asshole who pisses everyone off. The PC is a flop because it produced wrestlers for NXT and not the main roster. All those NXT people we like flopped because they spent all their time working to be the ideal of Hunter's Private Indy Fed and then Vince would see them on his show and be like "wtf is this bullshit?". Of course things designed to appeal to hardcores in NXT instead of appealing to the old man running the big show aren't going work. All those folks being set up to fail should be a war crime.

SRS stated Bronson Rechsteiner's NXT name will apparently be Rex Steiner, which is kinda brilliant since his dad's ring name was just his last name phonetically written. Him carrying that tradition on is neat.

I would posit Trish gets more props from the hardcores because she was very Not Good when she started, but put in the work and improved to a decent enough level which was almost unheard of in the Divas Era. She wasn't an amazing worker but she came off like second coming of Toyota compared to all the bikini models she had to work with.

Shocked that someone who was openly having an affair and rubbing his wife's face in it is an insecure shithead (/sarcasm). I always heard grumblings around here that he was a shithead when he was Sterling James Keenan on the indies here, but I figured it was just sour grapes over him making it to WWE. The more that comes out about him the more I realize that wasn't the case.

Cage is actually pretty good in AAA. He's great as the big dude who can catch all the dives and hit some big moves himself. Plus he does the Thanos gimmick in those Marvel themed matches which fits him perfectly. That's probably the best place for him IMO.