NintendoLogic

The Kane feud was indeed shit, but this specific point is incorrect. Bryan never abandoned Brie and only ran from Kane to try to get her to safety. When they were cornered, he stood his ground and fought back. Really though, the booking of Bryan in WWE was a comedy of errors. Remember that the only reason he got the title run in 2014 was because they had to retool Wrestlemania after Punk walked out. Even then, it was only so he could be the sacrificial lamb to feed to Lesnar at Summerslam. The Yes chants were indeed huge, but getting WWE to acknowledge that was like pulling teeth. He was in the World Series parade and they never even mentioned it on WWE TV. When he came back, they stuck him in feuds with fucking Big Cass and the fucking Miz. Before you knew it, he was dead in the water to the point they had to turn him heel to salvage him. Honestly, the only time I'd say he was booked reasonably well in WWE was during his run as The Planet's Champion. That's why I'm more unfazed by Becky Lynch returning as a heel than everyone else seems to be. Given WWE's track record, they likely would have fucked her up to the point where they'd have to turn her heel eventually anyway. They might as well just cut to the chase.

Big Dog gonna have to eat his words about Punk not moving the needle.

So is she denying that she's fine or that creative has nothing for her?

Bianca was resonating until Becky squashed her like a bug. Top stars win matches in 30 seconds, not lose them. As for Becky, she would've been dead in the water eventually anyway since this company can't book babyfaces for shit. The fact that they had to turn Daniel Bryan heel says it all.

I could see Vince selling if they make him an offer he can't refuse. As Dave has said, he's at the age where he has to think about the financial well-being of his grandchildren. Of course, they're set for life by any reasonable standard, but the McMahons (and most extremely wealthy people, for that matter) are far from reasonable. Also, being a billionaire on paper and having that much in liquid assets are two different things.

To be honest, I'm not sure Bray Wyatt the cult leader was actually better than the Fiend. His matches were just as bad unless he was being hidden in Wyatt Family six-mans, and his promos were even worse. Nothing but interminable incoherent rambling. He does have value as a merch mover, and Windham Rotunda obviously has a lot of unique and off-the-wall ideas. The question remains whether they can be channeled in the service of compelling wrestling matches and storylines. We do have the Matt Hardy precedent. The Broken Matt stuff went over like a lead balloon in AEW, so they retooled him and made him a far more effective act.

According to PWInsider, Sasha is expected to be unable to perform. Yet here they are hyping it as if it's a done deal. Blatant false advertising is pretty far down on the list of shitty WWE business practices, but it isn't something people should simply shrug their shoulders over. I hope they replace her with Carmella or Zelina just so I can see the live crowd lose their shit. They'll likely set a record for CM Punk chants in both volume and duration. By the way, they should put the belt on Cena. WWE needs a champion who can actually draw.

I watched the video of Punk's entrance that AEW uploaded to its official YouTube channel this morning. In the recommended videos sidebar, I saw "Seth Rollins gets covered in the horrific darkness of a Broodbath" from last night's Smackdown. You couldn't ask for a more perfect encapsulation of the difference between the two companies.

Punk going full Jordan.

To this day, people chant for CM Punk at WWE shows. Nobody chants for Roman Reigns at AEW events.

It should be remembered that TNT is vehemently opposed to surprise debuts for obvious reasons. After Sting made a surprise debut at Winter is Coming, they told AEW to never do that again. The diehards may know the score, but there are plenty of people who would likely tune in to see Punk who don't fall into that category. I'm sure there'll be some kind of official announcement even if it's only on Twitter.

His name comes up a lot in discussions of best technical wrestler, which for a lot of people is synonymous with best wrestler period.

Saying Dave never speaks well of Charlotte when he's been carrying water for her for years (remember when he insisted that adding her to Becky/Ronda made for a better story?) is almost as ludicrous as accusing him of being in the tank for AEW when he did a radio show with a guy who implied the company conspired to cover up a COVID death.

http://puroprogramtranslations.blogspot.com/2018/11/article-traces-to-nowhere-takeshi.html Here's a translation of that article. A very fascinating and sad story. In the comments, the guy who translated it said that he doesn't know where Morishima is now or what he's doing, but he does know that he's doing well.

All the credit in the world to Christian for being able to rein Omega in and produce an excellent match. It's obvious that as long as Omega is AEW champion, he won't be losing his other titles to anyone other than AEW-contracted talent, so I expect Andrade to beat him at Triplemania tonight. I guess I'm one of the few who has fond memories of Hayter's first AEW run. She struck me as a rich man's Bea Priestley, so I'm glad to see her back. I would have preferred for her to come in as a challenger to Britt rather than a lackey, though.

The latest Observer mentions that other than CMLL lifers like Atlantis and UG, the only thing keeping their top stars around is the New Japan connection, which both pays well and gives them greater international exposure. But with the roster increasingly depleted, New Japan might decide it's not worth being unable to use guys like Pentagon and Fenix because CMLL would veto it. If the New Japan/CMLL relationship weakens, more of the top guys will go independent and try to get more bookings in the US. The issue also reveals that WWE was in talks to buy CMLL a few years back. It doesn't give an asking price, but it says the deal fell apart when CMLL wanted the arenas they owned to be part of the deal and WWE didn't want to own so many older arenas. The truth is, those buildings are by far CMLL's most valuable asset. In fact, I'd go so far as to say they'd be nearly worthless without them, like WCW without a TV deal.

I was pleasantly surprised that they didn't have Britt heel on her hometown crowd. If it was WWE, they would have had her come out in a Ravens jersey and blow her nose with a Terrible Towel. Truth be told, I can't think of a compelling reason to not make her a full-fledged babyface, especially if she's going to be a long-term champion. Turning heels who become popular with fans by having them do the things that got them over to heels instead of babyfaces is like Pro Wrestling 101.

It seems to me that UG was completely in the right in that case. There's no justification for leadership of a union, even a toothless company union, belonging to a family by birthright.

They may look good by normal person standards, but this is Vince we're talking about. Recall that he was initially hesitant to sign Gail Kim because he couldn't fathom the idea of someone being attracted to an Asian woman. He relented after JR informed him that Asian porn was a thing.

Well...so much for Ogogo being the true babyface.

Quite a few dominoes have fallen today. First, CMLL announced that the Nueva Generacion Dinamita have left the company and the titles they held (trios held by NGD and middleweight held by Cuatrero) have been vacated. Soberano Jr., who still works for CMLL but hasn't wrestled for them since getting hurt in May, accused Ultimo Guerrero of killing the company. Dragon Lee said he'd see Soberano soon in ROH while Rush congratulated the Dinamitas on leaving and said CMLL did nothing for the wrestlers who caught COVID. It should be noted that Cuatrero is/was dating Sofia Alonso while Forastero married Ultimo Guerrero's daughter, so I can only imagine what things are like behind the scenes. As you can see above, longtime lucha observer RobViper has been saying for a while now that CMLL was in the middle of a UWA-esque death spiral. The company's economics are such that it's almost literally impossible for them to go out of business, but this isn't a good look for them at all.

Fiend/Orton getting booed out of the stadium at Mania should have put an end to arguments that there's a silent majority of Fiend superfans who need to be catered to. Having something that appeals to a rabid niche is fine, but not if it's an active turnoff to the audience as a whole.

Ideally, foreign objects in wrestling should be limited to items that would naturally be at ringside (like chairs and tables) or can be concealed on a wrestler's person (like powder or a roll of coins). I'm also willing to accept certain gimmick props like Cornette's tennis racket and Sgt. Slaughter's riding crop. The use of stabbing implements is a hard line that should never be crossed. Even in a no-DQ match, the goal should be to knock your opponent out, not exsanguinate them.

So Doudrop lost after being distracted by a winking doll. Cool.

It never fails to amuse me how just about everything he said in this promo, which at the time was just delusional heel ranting, ended up being prophetic.