Coffey

It would be awesome to start seeing more WWE wrestlers coming out & challenging the ridiculous independent contractor bullshit to be honest.

Am I crazy or does it feel like MLW, ROH & iMPACT! are all three in trouble as promotions? All the news that I keep hearing about each that comes out doesn't exactly come off as positive. Low pay, bad contracts, bad ratings, the backstage Bully Ray & Beautiful People shit, low attendance, etc. iMPACT! apparently just lost Scarlet Bordeaux. MLW has the Twitter drama with Court Bauer, David Starr & Brett Lauderdale. ROH is dealing with the fallout of losing The Elite, the drama from the Bully shit & bad attendance. It's not looking good for some of the Indy promotions in the U.S. with AEW on the horizon. Smaller promotions like Wrestle Circus are going to be fine but would it surprise someone if by the end of 2020 MLW, ROH & iMPACT! were all gone? Between AEW getting on TNT & WWE signing up everyone to slap down in NXT (or NXT UK) it feels like the Indie scene in the U.S. is changing dramatically. There's a lot of non-WWE options for workers right now but I think the landscape is changing & the more people that come out talking about bad contracts that they're locked into, having to work second jobs, working for minimum wage, working an extra day for free and whatnot... it's a bad look.

So Tony Schiavone is coming back in the summer? Are we going to get a 2-man commentary booth of Tony Schiavone on play-by-play and Jim Cornette on color commentary in 2019? If so, I'm here for it. https://mlw.com/2019/06/19/tony-schiavone-returns-to-the-broadcast-booth-this-summer/?fbclid=IwAR3YbgvQNxBbm2LGpzYicjn84Xaf6ZMjmp9pbvbxd1CXljDofqBbkltnRv4 The article says that Schiavone returns alongside Rich Bocchini but I'm holding out hope for Schiavone/Cornette.

They should put Seth back in the IC division. He kind of thrived there. Push Andrade & Rusev to the main event & try something new. Get the titles off of Kofi & Seth 'cause they don't work as top guys. Tried it, it didn't work. Get out. Bryan is good. Brock even though he's only around part time is at least interesting when he shows up because you never know what is going to happen. Roman needs more work because he's just kind of there right now. They should try to salvage Braun again just to try to make him a monster to be toppled, ala Earthquake or Kamala. Push Elias. He was getting pretty over there for a bit. It doesn't matter if he's not great in-ring, you need people that get a reaction. McIntrye, Corbin, Dolph, Shane don't work. Especially at top or close to the top. Not Owens, or Zayn or Miz. Not New Day. It's all boring & tired. Have Samoa Joe start choking people out or something. He's US Champ but you gotta make him a bigger threat. He cuts good promos too. Stop trying to do comedy & tone back the women (without Ronda).

I went ahead and made a thread for the G1. It deserves its own thread. I don't know if Loss will wanna merge any posts but just wanted to give the heads-up. It's gonna be fun this year.

What are the matches that you're looking forward to the most? Who do you see winning the whole thing? Who is coming out of each Block?

There are some posts on the last page of the Current New Japan thread in the Megathread Archive about the G1 Climax but I think it deserves its own thread. Going to be a barn burner this year. A Block: Hiroshi Tanahashi, Kota Ibushi, Kazuchika Okada, Will Ospreay, EVIL, Sanada, Bad Luck Fale, Zack Sabre Jr, Lance Archer & KENTA B Block: Juice Robinson, Tomohiro Ishii, Toru Yano, Hirooki Goto, Jeff Cobb, Jon Moxley, Tetsuya Naito, Shingo Takagi, Jay White & Taichi Pretty stacked. They did a good job with the blocks, too. You have some money matches in the A Block & you have new & interesting matches in the B Block. Then they have guys like Yano & Fale in there to switch things up so it's not just a bunch of workrate matches. I'm really digging the line-ups. There's definitely some matches that catch my eye. Anything having to do with Jeff Cobb or Shingo, in example. I'm also curious on who is going to win it all this year. I want to say they're going to pull the trigger on Ospreay but it might be too soon & NJPW seems to wait awhile longer than most before trying things. Jeff Cobb Vs. Jon Moxley is going to be interesting. I'm really looking forward to Shingo Vs. Naito. You know what you're going to get with Tanahashi, Ibushi & Okada, so some of the intrigue there is gone for me but you know the matches will be good. Curious to see how KENTA looks nowadays, healthy & away from NXT. <Opening Day> Saturday, July 6th (Local time): American Airlines Center in Dallas TX, the USA ・Saturday, July 13th: Ota City General Gymnasium in Tokyo ・Sunday, July 14th: Ota City General Gymnasium in Tokyo ・Monday, July 15th: Hokkai Kitayell in Hokkaido ・Thursday, July 18th: Korakuen Hall in Tokyo ・Friday, July 19th: Korakuen Hall in Tokyo ・Saturday, July 20th: Korakuen Hall in Tokyo ・Wednesday, July 24th: Hiroshima Sun Plaza Hall in Hiroshima ・Saturday, July 27th: Aichi Prefectural Gymnasium in Aichi ・Sunday, July 28th: Aichi Prefectural Gymnasium in Aichi ・Tuesday, July 30th: Takamatsu City General Gymnasium in Kagawa ・Thursday, August 1st: Fukuoka Citizen Gymnasium in Fukuoka ・Saturday, August 3rd: Osaka Prefectural Gymnasium in Osaka ・Sunday, August 4th: Osaka Prefectural Gymnasium in Osaka ・Wednesday, August 7th: Hamamatsu Arena in Shizuoka ・Thursday, August 8th: Yokohama Cultural Gymnasium in Kanagawa ・Saturday, August 10th: Nippon Budokan in Tokyo ・Sunday, August 11th: Nippon Budokan in Tokyo ・<FINAL> Monday, August 12th: Nippon Budokan in Tokyo

MLW is fun but they're not good top to bottom. There's a lot of hit or miss. Including with the roster. Usually, from what I've seen, there will be one good act or hot match & then another either right before or right after that just bores you to tears. Gringo Loco is a good example. That guy is never going to do anything for me. I just kind of zone out when he comes on screen. And he often gets 10-15 minutes.

I like the Damien Priest name. OK, I'm not positive what has or has not aired yet, so to be safe I'm going to put this next part in spoilers.

Where can I find old wrestling merch? Specifically that ROH Takeshi Morishima Backdrop shirt that he had during his ROH Title run. Or the Muta in Car shirt.

And it seems to grow with each passing week as WWE continues to shit the bed with their shows & chase off more fans. It's amazing how it feels like they're either pretending to not care or genuinely have no idea how to try something new. It's just the same shit, every week.

I too also enjoyed the 205 Live finish because it was different. Amazing how something as simple as a close-call count out can feel so different when everything else in WWE is so stagnant.

They should go all-in on Tony Nese looking like Scott Stapp from Creed. Book him as a self-centered asshole that can't even give credit to his band mates & pretend to be a good dude & singing about Jesus while getting toasted & cheating on your wife. Everyone hated Creed, so he would be such a dastardly heel! This is a sarcastic post.

Chad Gable's new look, with the tan, better physique, new haircut & new gear... makes him look a lot like Brad Maddox. I actually think he stands out less than when he had the singlet and headband. I wonder if that Gallagher/Gable match ended with the planned finish. If so, kudos to them making it look so real.

It's funny because I think Jack Gallagher is the strongest in the entire division but most people just talk about him in passing while singing the praises of others. He's not chopped liver out there! Dude is a star. Of course, I don't think 205 really even needs to exist. Guys like Jack Gallagher, Chad Gable or Tyler Bate should be stars anywhere, regardless of their size. And I say that as a self-professed fan of hosses.

To bring this back to Pro Wrestling The KISS Army started in Terre Haute, Indiana. The city I was born. Also the same city where Shawn Michaels won his first Intercontinental Championship Title. Fun fact.

That fifteen minute opening, or however long it was, pretty much sums up why WWE is currently so trash. Baron Corbin, Sami Zayn, Seth Rollins & Kevin Owens. Just fuck off. A bunch of geeks. Not interesting whatsoever. Never going to have a money promo. Never going to have a match I care about. Just interchangeable dweebs that kill TV time for the sake of killing TV time. No star power or charisma. No drawing ability. And completely clueless as to what good wrestling even is. But I'm sure they'll kick out of twenty finishes, shake off their selling to get their shit in & hit some fucking floatover superplexes and apron powerbombs and shit. Fuck off.

Well, they've not put the world title on Corbin... yet.

This is one of my biggest issues with modern pro-wrestling & one of the things that worries me about AEW. Especially since Dave Meltzer & I seem to be near polar opposites on what good professional wrestling is.

Kudos to that fan because "Tramp Stamp Trio" is a money line! Too bad a worker didn't say it on an actual show.

I refer to this as early ROHitis. Some of those shows, especially after Joe, were exhausting because every match was trying to be Match of the Night & it was just too much. The first match was trying to be the main event. Every match was full of false finishes & 2-count kickouts of finishers & it was just too much. The card of a show needs to tell a story as much as a match individually needs to tell a story. Coincidentally, there's quite a few ex-ROH guys on the current WWE roster... AEW:DON good example of what I'm talking about: Cody/Dustin was the old school bloody match, Lucha Bros/Bucks was the move/spotfest match, Jericho/Omega was the name value main event match, etc. Those early ROH shows are like if every match on DoN was trying to be Bucks/Lucha Bros. Which was my same prob. with TakeOver last weekend. It can't just be matches in a vacuum, regardless of if a match is good or not. There has to be stakes. The stakes are what make people care. Because it's not about just getting people to ooh & aww for this match, they need to want to see what comes after too. WWE right now has a lot of guys where you think "Oh, he's pretty good" but it doesn't go beyond that. Like here's a question: what is Ricochet's gimmick? He's literally just ex-NXT guy that is acrobatic. That's it.

Wait...

Bray Wyatt's first feud will tell us everything we need to know about how serious WWE are about him this time around. If they slap him with someone like Matt Hardy or whatever, he's dead in the water.

Yeah, I've been following that story today as well. Feels like the biggest wrestling news of the day. But I'm also waiting for more information because that fan feels to me like he's really leaving some information out to paint himself in a prettier light. Not like the solution is ever to take him backstage to intimidate him, if that happened. Just kick him out... but still.

Well, you'll be happy to know that she's returning to RAW tonight again as an on-air character! Because the dastardly Money in the Bank briefcase holding Brock Lesnar dared to not announce when he was cashing it in so he has to be punished, or something.