MoS

double post

I get what you are saying, so please believe me when I say this is not an attempt at disrespecting you: it is an attempt at disrespecting only Jay Lethal: he is mid and unlike OC, he has never shown any charisma or proven he can get over on a major league national level promotion, unless he is doing tired Ric Flair imitations in front of the original, who is reacting appropriately and making the entire segment as worthy on his own strength, not the pretender's strength. Like him or hate him, OC has organically proven that he has got over in a major league on a national level with his charisma and presence, and is a legit TV quarters draw, someone who pops up interest in PPVs like the NJPW supercard, and all of this is apart from being a merchandise pusher; he just pops ratings in a way Lethal just is simply not capable of despite months of him being promoted - his match was the only one on the Death of Dishonour card that was promoted, even the FTR-Briscoes II was not that promoted.

I know and understand that tonight was just a transitional episode of AEW TV, just setting things up for next week, but in the larger context of wrestling, with everything happening in respect of Hunter coming back and treating this as basically a Wrestlemania week, it really, in my opinion, seemed ill-advised to present such a weak show given in mind this particular context. Especially, symbolically, given everything that's happening and will happen in WWE with Hunter in charge, having one of your OG stars in Orange Cassidy get beaten clean by a mid ROH guy like Lethal just doesn't sit well for me. I don't think this was the week to do it, transitional and setting up episode (and for Wardlow's challenge admittedly, but there were other ways his challenge could have been booked) or not, given the larger context of what is happening in wrestling.

Urgh, Christian v. MATT HARDY. Hope the latter gets squashed and killed. He has had way too many favourable booking results for me to be sure though. He is a channel-changer for me.

Also, there are some inconsistencies in cumulation and record-keeping of the different opponents, particularly their number of headlining main events against Hogan. The overall picture doesn't change, so it is not a material difference, but nevertheless, for some nerds, if we look closely, there are some differences and inconsistencies in the overall record.

Had Verne started promoting in San Fran and the NorCal territories when Hogan was still there in AWA? I always thought that Vince was the first promoter post the glory days to promote there, using Andre the Giant to break the open market, several years after Shire's territory had passed away. Salt Lake City was a bad town for Verne, so he would not have spent too much time in that region, even in 1983 when he had Hogan. Don't know if Verne used Hogan at all in his forays to the West Coast, but Hogan did draw immediately for WWF in that region - pretty much the day he headlined on the West Coast for the first time - so maybe WWF just took advantage of Hogan's burgeoning drawing power on the West Coast due to Verne to achieve that?

You mean, in 12 hours? Do you think this gives credence to Bruno's theory - and even Ole's - that Hogan could not have worked as a weekly/monthly draw, playing to the same audiences repeatedly? If so, what explains his monstrous AWA success, given that was very much a territorial system. The early to mid-80s are such a fascinating period, before 1988 when WWF and Hogan truly became the only national players in town in the USA.

Last week was one of the worst booked Dynamites in history, and this week was one of the best booked Dynamites. The Starks-HOOK-Hobbs thing was masterful from start to finish, there was further progress on Hangman and the Bucks (and I don't even like Elite melodrama, but it sells and I far prefer it to generic ROH/NXT emulation like TK was doing recently) and Jungle Boy showed us all that he can cut great promos. Moox also cut an all-time promo, but Mox cuts all-time promos every week, so that should not be much of a surprise.

I stand corrected then, but I will say this: Limp Bizkit's music doesn't age too well...unless you slap it on an Austin-Rock video, in which case it suddenly slaps and just becomes perfect

This is interesting, because in his retirement speech, Shawn Michaels gave credit to some "kid named Adam", hence my reference to Adam the video guy. Not sure what the breakdown of roles was in that department.

Not very in touch with American pop culture scene of the early 00s, but I sometimes think Limp Bizkit got famous - or at least, maintained their fame - because of WWE. No way they become as famous as they did without WWE just deciding that LB was their band

Dragon is back! him v. Garcia should bang hard

This has to be the best "history/legacy of WWF" video package in history, right. 2000s WWE video packages used to be seriously next level. Dunno when Adam the video guy retired or lost his touch, but it's just not the same now

Really glad this has happened, just so fans who acted like Vince was the only issue and Hunter would save them all and usher in another wrestling boom can once again get a massive shock as creative still sucks and things don't get better Rea

More and more wrestlers should be standing up to promoters if they feel they have been hard-done by, and it's a good thing that we are seeing more of it since the emergence of another major league promotion.

Following from the feedback that we have received in these discussions. This would easily be the biggest story to hit pro wrestling since news about the Gold Dust trio disbanding in the 1930s. So what do we think? Personally, I think that even if he is gone, nothing will change materially. HHH and Stephanie are way too versed in WWE philosophy. I think it will be worse, actually, with many pretenders trying to stake a claim to his throne. Nevertheless, this is definitely the biggest story in our circles since Vince himself decided to launch Wrestlemania, nearly 40 years ago. I mean, are Hunter and Steph really that different?

The man really is a DVDVR shitposter at heart lol despite all his money and power, he just can't resist

I mean, when has that stopped powerful men from retaining their power. I didn't see any indication from the last few weeks that he felt pressured enough to do this. The man was appearing on live TV and apparently said "Fuck them" backstage about the allegations after one of his segments on SD a few weeks ago.

That main event booking honestly bummed me out. Kingston unable to win after Jericho called him a loser, and then "getting his heat back" by throwing Jericho into the spider web, was a very modern WWE-esque way of trying to take the easy, cheap way out, and benefited none of them. I don't like faces whose gimmicks are that they just can't win the big ones. It puts a very firm midcard ceiling on them. Eddie Kingston is not Tommy fucking Dreamer.

There have to be more mainstream news articles coming. This retirement is out of nowhere, and Vince always said that the only way he would cede control is if someone was ruthless enough to stab him and snatch it

Barbed wire "everywhere" match?? Why are Americans so obsessed with sharks btw? Also, I cannot recommend this enough - https://www.tvinsider.com/1052065/aew-fyter-fest-dynamite-eddie-kingston-chris-jericho/ Eddie Kingston, How I Met Your Mother fan and general comedian

Dynamite kept steady in 18-49 and lost minimal total viewers, which is a great sign for it. I think it really goes through peaks and valleys, in a very cyclical way, and after a rough last couple of months, AEW seems to have upwards momentum again. I think a fresher focus on angles and storyline-based segments is really helping. It feels more like episodic television again, and not a weekly assortment of indie matches. Also no longer relying on "OMG someone DEBUTED!!" and "OMG backstage attack!!" is helping the booking

I think Christian also does it in a more organic, better delivered way. MJF can look like he is running off some lines he had memorised backstage after googling "best insults ever"

@ohtani's jacket love having your input here, you are absolutely great, but I also need you to account for New Zealand's spineless showing against England in this test cricket summer lol. You guys are the world champs, this was not supposed to happen. The last thing I need in my life right now is England winning a world championship.

I KNEW you would object, but I swear, my reasoning is also this! I feel like in an environment that was more supportive and suited to his strengths and didn't fuck up his booking the way WWE did, he would genuinely be a GOAT contender. His athleticism is ridiculous, and he has also shown a brilliant ability to grasp pro wrestling concepts on his way to the top. Honestly, the biggest failure of Vince McMahon's creativity is not easily making Roman one of the top babyfaces of all time. He had none of Cena's weaknesses, his ceiling was so much higher. As it is, he never came close to reaching that, imo, as for me, undoubtedly, Cena will be comfortably above him now in GWE rankings cuz of what actually happened, as opposed to what the potential was.