sek69

Pre show is doing an amazing sell job on the Team Taz vs Sting/Darby match.

Lance is the exact guy I'd suspect would be upset about such a thing, so it's oddly poetic.

I mean it's not *bad*, it just comes off like Vince just watched Coming2America. To me it was just something that was distracting from what was an amazing gimmick change. It is interesting to see someone doing a militant African gimmick in a major pro wrestling fed though, I will say that. Even the Nation didn't get to go that far. *edited to add* I suppose my main concern is this gimmick being done in a place like WWE, which has never been known for handling culturally based gimmicks very well.

Only in wrestling could there be a series that has an episode about XPW and have it not be the most fucked up one of the season (that would be the Grizzly one).

This is so reminding me of people debating who was going to show up on Nitro next in the 90s and I love it. I genuinely missed this shit.

I was all in on Apollo's gimmick until the accent. It's coming off way too much like Jamaican Kofi to me. Yes it's different in the sense that he's actually Nigerian, but its like.....eeeeh.

How can anyone dislike Kenny? He's such an amazing douchebag heel.

Also maybe WWE shouldn't be doing a gimmick where Apollo is claiming he actually speaks with an African accent when they did one of those great 24/7 type documentaries on him that showed him very much not speaking like that behind the scenes and what not. Plus I saw more than a few "wow Vince really is racist" comments on Twitter after that.

Apollo out here with the military dudes from Public Enemy.

Breaking news from Smackdown: Daniel Bryan is awesome.

At least there's something happening in wrestling worth looking forward to.

I mean, Angle would fit the bill in terms of huge star. I just don't want to see him anywhere near a ring since it looks like he's tempting fate any time he does it now. The last thing AEW needs to to be a wayward home for broken down wrestlers. That's WWE's job.

It's the mindset in Japan, they still have that "make your dates" mentality that the territory guys used to have. You do every show unless you're completely incapable.

He's said he wants to wind down as an in ring performer and as stated he's on the creative team for Smackdown. As much as I would like to see it, he's pretty much WWE 4 life at this point.

I always just assumed Motoko was the bad cop like JR/JJ Dillon/Johnny Ace would be for Vince. Everyone loved Baba so someone had to be the bearer of bad news.

Sure, fine the wrestlers for thigh slaps, but do nothing about the seizure inducing camera work that seemed designed to capture every one in detail. WWE, everyone.

So your argument is that he will be in every Hall of Fame except the one that places merit on drawing ability, which is the primary metric of the whole mega star thing. OK. Got it. If Edge and Christian as a duo were to show up I think that would satisfy everyone's expectations, but that obviously isn't going to happen. However, if he turns out to be the surprise guy in the ladder match (which would fit based on his legacy) I would have no problems with that. I just can't see Tony, man of the people that he is, really thinking he can hype up Christian as a mega star signing and it not coming off as a disappointment.

How is he? Unless you're talking about the WWE Hall of Fame where the only criteria is if Vince is pissed at you or not? Tony's out here talking about a mega star and you're shocked people don't consider CHRISTIAN to fit that bill? I mean, I've said before I like the guy and think he's great, but has anyone ever said "I'm going to buy this ticket/watch this TV show/ order this PPV so I can see Christian"......I don't think so.

Yeah part of this announcement is that whoever it is was signed to a long term deal. They aren't signing away any of New Japan's top guys when they just opened the door.

We did, there was an invasion of porn bots and all new accounts were highly scrutinized for a while.

Not to beat a dead horse, but Tony's comments on AEW's podcast sure don't sound like a guy bringing in someone like Christian:

Yes, one advantage of Sammy "that doesn't work for me brother"-ing going to Impact is that now it adds extra intrigue about what he's going to do next.

I dunno, I hear women in WWE talk about Nattie like she's Wrestling Jesus (I don't get it either, but it seems to be their legit feelings) so it seems an apt comparison if a lot of people look up to Christian too. Not understanding why fans would feel disappointed on a heavily hyped reveal turning out to be a largely career midcard (as a single) guy because he's respected by the boys comes off as real "inside the bubble" stuff, no offense. I would be excited to see him get a run in AEW, or anywhere for that matter. He has a lot to offer as a worker or even as an agent somewhere. He definitely would be an asset in any company that can use him properly. I just don't see him being an acceptable payoff to something like this. It's like if your parents drop hints they are going to get you a PS5 for your birthday and they end up getting you a really nice tool set instead. It's still a good gift, arguably more useful than a PS5, but you're still going to feel disappointment because it's not what you were led to believe.

Like a lot of women in WWE really view Nattie as an influence and mentor and I respect that, but that doesn't mean I wouldn't be disappointed if another promotion hyped up a big debut and it turned out to be her. By all accounts Christian is a great guy and is a great wrestler who never completely got his due as a single due to Vince's weird hang-ups, but he is absolutely not the guy you want to hype up a big surprise reveal around if you don't want people to call you TNA.

Really? They have Big Show out on TV using his AEW debut to hype up another person coming in, state it's a HOF worthy person, and "it's not who you think" to basically say it's not CM Punk, and you don't understand why people would be let down if it was CHRISTIAN? I mean I like the guy but that would be extremely disappointing if you're out here dropping hints that it would be a megastar level guy. It would literally be a LOLTNA moment since TNA did the same thing with him. Plus "guy you thought would never wrestle makes a cameo in the Rumble" several levels below "hyped up debut on a major PPV show".