Coffey

Raven Vs. Kaz Hayashi on a random episode of WCW Worldwide on a Sunday was one of the better sprints I ever watched. A show that most people didn't bother with, so I'm all for random matches that have a chance to exceed expectations!

I will be watching live tonight. I got caught up on Dark & Elevation. Trying to have my finger more closely on the pulse as it pertains to AEW. Looking forward to when they can have big crowds again because I miss the rabid atmosphere. Selfishly also because that hopefully means at least some semblance of return to normalcy from this pandemic & the hideousness that has been the last year plus. Where I live, I'm still not eligible for the vaccine because I'm under 40. Even if I were vaccinated & masked up with distance between myself & others though, I would not go to any sort of indoor (or outdoor for that matter) gathering of mass people. I know that UFC is planning it soon & that Wrestlemania is apparently going to have a crowd? That just sounds like asking for trouble with another outbreak to me. I don't even think it's so much of a political thing as much as it's a greed thing at this point. This pandemic to me has shown how much more corporations value money over public health. Anyway, John Silver Vs. Darby Allin could be fun!

For what it's worth, I would have been 100% against The Big Show coming in had it leaked before it happened. That being said, at least thus far, he's been great on commentary. Now, if he gets in the ring & starts taking up TV time from others, my stance might change, but I like him on commentary so far. Your point stands about the difference between the talents though. Same reason I'm against Jeff Hardy.

It won't be long now! Miro is gonna fucking feast on this jobber.

I'm just catching up on Dark now. Red Velvet seemed to have a lot more upside than Big Swole. Also, Jade Cargill has an incredible look but no idea if she's any good. I assume she's green/a rookie. I love the Varsity Blonds. They're a lot of fun. Powerhouse Hobbs seemed to have potential as well (although he reminded me of Ice Train) & Ricky Starks' finish was nice. Kamille would be a huge get. Abadon to me just comes off as a worse version of Su-Yung. Interesting look for that Ryzin' preacher dude. Looks like someone that The Sinister Minister would manage.

I'm gonna talk about the roster a bit. I've been getting into AEW more lately & have pretty much abandoned WWE entirely at this point. I saw Matt Hardy making a tweet yesterday that he misses wrestling with his brother. My first thought is that AEW should not only not bring in Jeff Hardy but if given the chance, let Matt Hardy go too. He can go back to WWE or whatever if he wants to wrestle with Jeff again. The last thing AEW needs is someone like Jeff Hardy. Jeff was one of the "big" names along with Angle, Sting & Christian that "jumped" to TNA. AEW have already brought in Christian & Sting... Speaking of Sting, I think his in-ring days should pretty much be over. If they want to use him as an on-screen authority figure or something, sure, I guess. He still has name value - it's freakin' Sting - but he's not a main eventer anymore. He would be better in a role like that than giving Tony Khan an on-air character. Seems like right now they're using him to elevate Darby Allin some but it was at the expense of Starks & Brian Cage. Still feel like along with Jake Hager that Matt Hardy was probably the signing I disagreed with the most for AEW. Thankfully they didn't try to bring in Zack Ryder full-time. I was listening to a Jim Ross podcast, that was about a year old, maybe longer now & he said the big name he would want to bring in the most was Jack Swagger/Jake Hager. Oof. Jim Ross, Jake Hager & Matt Hardy would probably free up a bit of money! Money which could be better used on people like La Sombra & Thea. Honestly, Jim Ross has been around pro-wrestling for so long he has to be an asset but it should be in a backstage role. On-air, he feels dated. I know about his wife's unfortunate passing & his comments about commentary giving him something to do but he's just not even on par anymore, let alone above average. I'm sure he wouldn't want the stress of a job like talent relations again & honestly, I'm not sure I would want his mentality in charge of it at this point anyway but he has to be doing something other than commentary, imho. I know TNT wanted him to start but the shit isn't working. He's the worst of all of them & was even surpassed by Paul Wight honestly. Justin Roberts & Excalibur still come off as memes to me. Excalibur works pretty good with Taz my issue is they do a lot of comedy on commentary & then Taz tries to play a hardass serious guy with the Team Taz shit. It's like shooting himself in the foot. Also while I'm fantasizing, get the Best Friends, Gunn family, Colt Cabana, Matt Sydal, Joey Janella, Luther, & Kip Sabian out of there. My goodness. I haven't seen Nakazawa in awhile but he's still listed on the roster. It might be time to abandon the Shawn Spears experiment if he fails to get any reaction whatsoever again in this new faction as well. Unless there's someway they can get Peyton Royce to give his ass some charisma. Orange Cassidy is at least over even if I don't get it. Christian is fine. He's a good hand & can have good matches but he's not a top guy & shouldn't be. Same way I feel about PAC. AEW has a ton of talent, even guys like Angelico whom don't get talked about a lot I'm a fan of. They have fresh stars in the likes of Darby Allin, Jungle Boy, MJF, Ricky Starks, Wardlow, & Sammy Guevara. They have a few solid tag teams with Santana & Ortiz, FTR, & Young Bucks. For like the mid-card/TV title area the likes of Adam Page, Cody, Lance Archer & probably Miro for now. They have some great talkers in a guy like Eddie Kingston or some of the manager vets like Arn, Jake & Tully. Some pretty good women with Thunder Rosa & the likes of Riho, Shida & Britt Baker getting good reactions/over. Nyla Rose is improving & actually comes off as a threat. Tay Conti seems to have a ton of potential. Still have Fenix whom is one of the better high flying babyfaces in the world right now. Jericho is still a big name & looks to be winding down some, which is good. He should take a backseat & not be the focus now. Moxley is a big get for them & I like how Omega has been going lately. Scorpio Sky should probably go solo & AEW could ditch Daniels & Kazarian. Pentagon can be a good, dangerous heel if he would stop half-assing it & just trying to get his shit in. He was great in Lucha Underground but ever since he's been coasting on Superkicks & hand signs to the point that he's now just annoying. I don't know what's going on there. Think he got the impression he could just do the bare minimum & stay over but he's getting passed by... almost the whole damn roster at this point. The Good Brothers are the shits. I know they're technically Impact wrestlers but they're eating up way too much time on AEW TV. The Dark Order still stinks but they have had some funny moments lately & John Silver is getting over in the comedy role to be honest. I think Luchasaurus has a lot of talent but that gimmick is the shits. I don't really know enough about people like Ethan Page or Private Party. I don't know who The Acclaimed or Top Flight are. If someone like Tommy End or Jeff Cobb is available, they would be good gets for AEW but I don't think they need to be thinking about people just because they're available especially if they worked in WWE. Like bringing in Erik Rowan for the Brodie special was great but it was the right decision to not sign him. I would focus more on people that haven't been overexposed on WWE TV. Like try to get people from Mexico, ROH, MLW or that. Specially people under 35. I have no idea what contracts are like elsewhere but getting someone like a Deonna Purrazzo or Jordynne Grace could help the women's division a lot. It's also for the best if AEW specifically steer clear of any... social media liabilities. You can't use guys like Marty Scurll or Jay Briscoe. Maybe they could get an Alex Hammerstone or Salina de la Renta. @El-P mentioned Alicia Atout in the MLW thread today, how has no one signed her? Maybe I underestimate the contract status of places like Impact, ROH & MLW but I just assume you get them with more money, like MJF. I think they need some top of the card help so they need to elevate a couple names up & honestly, they could use more solid tag teams. I feel Fenix should just be solo all the time at this point & not bother tagging with Pentagon anymore. The roster is getting there & is shaping up nicely but they have a lot of dead weight right now. I get they need to have people to work Dark & Elevation now but I don't think it's a top priority to have a b-team at this point. There's nothing wrong with letting your talent like MJF, Wardlow, Britt & Darby get more reps in on those shows to get better. I turn forty this year. I've been watching wrestling for over thirty years. My tastes are pretty well defined at this point. I know that the in-ring style in AEW is not going to be like the Harley Race or Terry Funk days of NWA or like Stan Hansen in Japan & I understand that & get that. I wouldn't ask for that with 2021 eyes anyway. But I do feel like they've been trying new things lately & seeing what works & what doesn't. One thing that I hope going forward is that they start to make gimmick matches more rare. Every card doesn't need multiple gimmick matches & they will seem like a bigger deal if they're built to & made more special. Anyway, just wanted to provide some content to get a discussion going & more people talking. Need some more activity around here! A few potential questions. Who do you think AEW should part with? Which talent from my post do you agree or disagree with? Who do you think AEW should try to acquire? Who would you build the titles around? What changes would you make to the commentary, if any? How do you feel about Dark & Elevation & the people that are currently working those shows?

Well, apparently WWE granted him his release & Dave is saying he doesn't even have the standard 90-day no compete clause. Which, La Sombra would be a huge get for AEW but it begs the question: is it time for AEW to consider releasing some talent? Do they really need 40 jobbers for filling up AEW Dark duty? There's just not enough TV time to go around.

It could be something as simple as Batista's schedule is already busy on the day of the Hall of Fame so he can't make the ceremony, or it could be something like Batista turning it down because of CoVid-19 protocol & too many positive tests in WWE. It could be anything, really.

Yeah, they have some Indy stuff on there now. Evolve, Progress, ICW, wXw, etc.

Denzel's friend.

How much longer do we have to pretend that Edge is a top guy in the league with people like Austin or Rock? This shit is painful. He surprise return at the Royal Rumble was great but if I knew it was leading to all of this shit, I could have done without that moment. Best things the dude ever did involved a ladder & he's had neck fusion surgery. Can we stop it?

When she hurt Kairi & then in the same match, people saw Becky go out of her way & damn near break character/gimmick/kayfabe to help her, I think that's when a lot of people turned on Charlotte. That was not a good look for Charlotte, for sure.

Who knew NXT having multiple Co-Vid outbreaks & news reports of Vince McMahon being furious about how the talent isn't taking it seriously wasn't pro-wrestling related. It is very relevant to pro-wrestling. It's literally impacting Wrestlemania the biggest wrestling show in the world. Maybe we shouldn't try to brush it aside, like many do with the pandemic.

Bobby Lashley Vs. Drew McIntyre & Braun Strowman Vs. Shane McMahon is certainly not how you get me to give a fuck about Wrestlemania. Let alone a 2-day fucking sixty hour sumbitch or however long that shit is supposed to be now. Jesus. It legit feels like WWE only has one star right now, that being Roman. That's not to say there's not people all up and down the roster that I enjoy but it's going to be hard to sell a show with no top guys. Especially when they already had Edge of all people win the Royal Rumble.

Put Kacy Catanzaro's name on that list too.

I think of Jungle Boy in AEW like I did Mikey Whipwreck in ECW. If they ever do an angle with the underdog overachieving, he's the guy to do it with. The Giant has been more than solid on commentary thus far as well.

Will the new AEW Dark Elevation also just be a part of the AEW Dark Megathread, or should it receive its own thread? It premieres tonight.

The big difference between the bully comparison is that as an adult, if you punch someone in the face, you have to deal with real world consequences, like assault & battery charges. As a child punching a kid in the nose, you're just getting a detention.

Molly Holly going into the WWE Hall of Fame doesn't really correlate to Sable being snubbed by the WWE Hall of Fame. I don't think Sable's exclusion thus far somehow discredits Molly going in. That's just the WWE Hall of Fame as a whole. Koko B. Ware, in example, pretty much has his name come up every year when someone else doesn't get in. "Well, Koko is in, so..." I'm happy for Molly & also think Sable should go in as well. Also because her name was brought up earlier, I have no issue with Torrie Wilson going in either.

The tribalism - which I'm also very guilty of myself - is a big hinderance to my professional wrestling enjoyment anymore. Part of it is because of social media but everything becomes this side against that side. From the jump, it wasn't "Oh, look, new promotion, that's cool!" It was WEDNESDAY NIGHT WARS: AEW VS WWE - DYNAMITE VS NXT. CAN AEW COMPETE WITH WWE??? It's the Jim Cornette, Cult of Cornette & Brian Last against all the people that dislike Jim Cornette. It's the Dave Meltzer fans Vs. the Dave Meltzer critics. Or the Eric Bischoff fans Vs. the Eric Bischoff critics. Or Brian Alverez, or whomever. Everything is having to pick a fucking side. Why do we have to pick a side at all? There's whataboutism every fucking day. Have you ever tried to read the Twitter replies on Thursday when Alvarez posts the ratings for Dynamite & NXT? The comments are just full of "WWE did this" & "AEW did that." Like, who the fuck cares? Can we just watch & enjoy wrestling? When did it become more about tearing down what others enjoy instead of just being excited about what you like? It's really hurt my interest & enjoyment of wrestling, especially modern, present, current, still-on-the-air wrestling.

I had a big long diatribe ready to be written about why I want to see AEW succeed & why I'm on board with them but ultimately, it was a lot of words to basically say that AEW still has goodwill because they're new & WWE has spent the last two decades killing all of my expectations for that company as a whole. I think it's also why I was more willing to give NWA Powerrr a chance & want to love MLW. I was using Nikki Cross as an example, due to how she was good, fun & got over lately only to basically fall off of TV when they decided to make Alexa "Miss Fiend". I could write pages on just the women in WWE & how WWE made me care about women's wrestling to then only turn around & treat a lot of them as a waste of time & effort. All the people that I seemingly enjoyed & wanted to become invested in, like Nikki, Becky, Ronda, Asuka... they take a back seat (or left) to the likes of Lacey Evans, Carmella & Nia Jax & it just got to the point where I became indifferent to that too. AEW Revolution had some misses, yes, and I do think that it damaged them. However, that was really the first time that I have felt that way about AEW. In the past, there's been some disappointment but that wasn't on the company as much as it was the expectations of the fans: like C.M. Punk not showing up. But the shows, the actual shows that are on TV, are still fun to watch. WWE is a chore to watch. Even the PPVs drag on because more than half the card I don't care about & the other half the card WWE themselves don't care about. Yet, they won't let anyone leave to go elsewhere so they just have this giant mega-roster of people sitting in catering

I don't know if there's a catch-all thread, but there's been some mentions of it in the past. I'm on there as @Skelemania & Loss is @PWOLoss

I remember back-in-the-day, guys in JCP (I think?) were mad that Baby Doll was dating Sam Houston because in their company, Baby Doll was like a top valet to the top stars & in WWF, at the time, Sam Houston was a jobber. I don't remember if it was Dusty or Tully... but it was someone in that circle. Sometimes I think about how Vince McMahon would be petty enough to still think about that & hold a grudge about it to this day. "My guy isn't a jobber, goddamnit! We create superstars in the World Wrestling Federation!" So when I think of Andrade leaving with Charlotte staying, or Vega leaving with Black staying, I always randomly think about Sam Houston.

Aww, I didn't know that. That kind of legit makes me sad.

I was under the impression - from what I have read, mind you, I have not heard it - that what Cornette was saying was making a reference to the couple of Kip & Penelope on AEW as being similar to like a middle school boy and his slutty girlfriend. Which I guess that is the same thing as saying she's slutty but with all the other nonsense Cornette has spewed, this one seems pretty inconsequential & I'm surprised it sparked the outrage it did. I'm more surprised that people on AEW keep engaging with him. What will Penelope, Kip or Miro get from calling Cornette out on Twitter or Twitch? It's just going to drag them down to his level & make them look worse by association. It's a bad look for them & for AEW. They should all just ignore him, in my opinion. Everyone that is still actively involved within pro wrestling should. After the NWA debacle, just let Cornette be the angry old man that rants to his cult. A comparison that I'm sure he'll hate, he can be the Tucker Carlson to his audience of Fox News viewers & the rest of the people will just ignore that channel. Even if Cornette says that he's working or playing a character or whatever the fuck, I find it almost ironic that he has basically become the pro wrestling equivalent to what he claims to despise in politics. He is the hateful, close-minded, stuck-in-the-past bigot.