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This is kind of surprising, Taz doesn't seem like the kind of guy Russo would normally be into.

We should take a moment to appricate what a tough bastard H is. From finishing a match with a torn quad to working pretty much the whole match here with a torn pec....dude must not have any pain receptors.

Looks like Triple H is going to need surgery for whatever injury he got today, so maybe a silver lining from today will be no plodding WM "instant classic" match.

Well considering he did basically the same match for 40 years he kinda did wrestle like Ric Flair! (I kid, I kid) Like I said before, the first time you see an Abby match it is quite an experience. The problem is that it's like a really great magic trick you can only do once. Once you get past the initial shock of "wow he's carving that guy up", it's hard to not notice that there's not much else there.

I wonder if someone else was supposed to win, and had second thoughts about being associated with this show/possibly being used for future SA propaganda. Also I'm all for them turning this show into a farce as some form of meta-level piss take.

I guess this means Brock signed another deal, which if that's the case we might need to move him past Kevin Nash in the "most money for the least work" Hall of Fame rankings.

I like how the last one was clearly tacked on at the last minute, as if Jim Herd just happened to open the phone bill while writing these down.

The first time I saw an Abby-Brody brawl (in World Class) I did in fact think it was pretty cool. However every time I've seen him since it was the exact same match. He seemed to draw big in most of the places he went so I can't argue he wasn't any good business wise, but it's not much of an argument one's favor of not sucking when you only have classics with two of the best brawlers and two of the best wrestlers of all time. Most of us could have excellent matches vs the Funks and Brody (probably not Sheik, but then if you're cool with him just stabbing you for 15 minutes maybe).

Every year in NK they have a big festival where everyone is basically marched into the big stadium to watch the government sponsored show. They made a point to get Inoki because A: they know he's a giant mark for himself and B: his mentor was Rikidozan who was from NK and was (probably still is) one of their national sports heroes.

I'd go with Abdullah myself. Every match was just him waddling around and stabbing people with a fork.

I watched it. It was better than I was expecting a Wagner/Jarrett match in 2018 to be, but that's damning with faint praise for sure. Scarlett Bordeaux showing up in the 4 way women's match and in the main event running interference was one of those surprising-but-not-really-when-you-think-about-it moments considering AAA and Impact are besties again. Blue Demon Jr's heel turn was obvious from outer space, but in the end the right guy won. It came off as giving Wagner a big win to build for Triplemania next year with Park, but Park peaced out on them because he doesn't get along with Konnan. Apparently he gets along with Dorian Roldan which means the big match is still at least theoretically happening, but who knows.

To be fair, if WWE is really all about introducing the Saudis to American culture to break down barriers, I can't think of anyone who personifies 2018 America more than Hulk Hogan.

So it looks like Hulk's going to be the "host" of the show now, wonder if that means the New Day will opt out of going.

Obviously there's no way he would have known what would happen almost exactly a month later, but that's a "holy shit in retrospect" moment.

Looks like the new official WWE Branding is to call it "Crown Jewel: A Global PPV Event" based on them calling it that every time it was mentioned on Smackdown. But where on the globe is it happening? Like evolution, it's a mystery.

It would make sense for Jeff to be the one to lose and get "fired" in order to finally get the time off he's needed for a while. And yes, Charlotte has been outstanding in her role in the feud despite the terrible miscasting. It's funny... for all the annoying PR and narrative building, having to women get served ass backwards creative and still going 'fuck it, let's get it over and make it work anyway" is more #EqualityGoals than anything.

I'm sure I have thought about it more than they have, I did like Becky's line of "I was going to do it without you (the fans) but you decided to come with me". I'm just always afraid the company is going to come up with some stupid shit to force the narrative they want.

Something just occured to me......does WWE think having Becky call herself "The Man" is going to generate the heel reaction they badly want for her? I could see them being so far up their own asses that they would think having a woman refer to herself that way in the Age of Female Empowerment in Sports Solely Created By Stephanie McMahon would make fans boo because they're all about WOMEN POWER.

Not to mention this is the best possible opportunity to toss the "independent contractor" BS back in their faces if/when they try to pressure people into going.

It was on Smackdown because Bryan turned down going to Saudi Arabia.

I love how Shayna can get the crowd to buy in to all her moves. Every match has a spot where it seems like the crowd thought she tore someone's arm off legit.

The funniest (by which I mean not funny at all) part of all this is that wrestlers have never had more power and have never been more afraid to use it.

ProWrestlingSheet is announcing Renee Young will be making the trip to Crown Jewel as part of the broadcast team. It would be funny if they did a callback to the Prime Time Wrestling episode where Gorilla and Bobby pretended they were broadcasting on site when the show was taped in Paris. Bobby kept threatening to leave the booth to help his men and Gorilla claimed he had security keeping Bobby from leaving.

The Saudis probably requested him to be there, and WWE probably never thought Company Man John would say no to it. As far as Bryan, taping the match at the PC was something kicked around but not the final decision.

Pretty sure he was going to get at least the "monster built up for Hogan to conquer" push, but IIRC he found out he had cancer almost immediately after he debuted.