C.S.

Your first statement is erroneous, but your second statement is worthy of celebration. Yes, please, indeed. MAMMA MIA!!!

"Hardcore" fans and a "subset" of fans are the two groups I would worry the least about pleasing if I'm Tony Khan. For every Thread Killer who will kill the thread and stop watching, there are a dozen more who aren't going anywhere. Ever. No matter what. Mauro is the best pro wrestler commentator of his generation, has legitimate sports credentials (something that's supposedly important to AEW, depending on the hour of the day), his passionate delivery would instantly make everything in AEW feel like a much bigger deal, and his outside gigs would give AEW much-needed exposure if he promotes them (but even if he doesn't, boxing or MMA fans following him on social media for those sports would also see his AEW posts and might be curious enough to check it out). It's not happening though. TK has hired a million and one commentators since the first Dynamite, and none of them have been the pride and joy of British Columbia. That's probably for the best, honestly. With Mauro's mental health issues, the unchecked immaturity that exists in AEW probably wouldn't be good for him. Even without mental health issues, AEW's utterly infantile environment has been disastrous for several wrestlers already.

Not sure where this Minoru Suzuki hate comes from. He's a fun attraction to trot out every few months. I loved the whole Murder Grandpa shtick when I saw first it, and he's far more over than most of the generic international and/or indie talent they feature without any backstory or explanation. As for Mike Santana, 99% of wrestling audiences would be dead if a gun was held to our heads and we had to correctly guess his first name. Granted, the same is probably true of Oritz. I literally have no idea what that dude's first name is either. I guess not Tito?

Unless/until this happens, the other thread remains fine IMO.

Sad news. Only 56. I always liked his team, Fire and Ice, with Scott Norton. DDP broke the news on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/officialddp/posts/926184742208798

I had no idea Mahabali Shera was in TNA. I read spoilers for the tapings, and...

Damn, now you figured out that I made a typo when I signed up - I meant to make my PWO username J.S. Seriously though, Mauro calling Smackdown in general, and Okada in particular, is the stuff wrestling dreams are made of. I still don't understand how Tony never offered Mauro the bag to call Collision in the brief time that show actually mattered. Update: Just saw this on Facebook.

Well, he's not the one who left money on the table by refusing to work with other people to capitalize on the situation (which, yes, was partly of his own making). That'd be The Young Bucks and Kenny Omega.

I'm glad Ivy won. Sarah Logan has had more chances than Dana Brooke and has done less with all of them.

Fair point, but the Cuban gimmick was actually Scott Hall's idea because he rightly assumed Vince had never seen the movie "Scarface" and rightly assumed again that the kids watching the WWF at the time hadn't seen it either. In any case, The Rock and Haku were presented as family members while their different backgrounds were still acknowledged, so this wouldn't be a stretch at all. Fun aside: Tama Tonga blocked me on Twitter because he blasted J.R.'s NJPW commentary on social media instead of being a MAN and talking to him personally, and I was critical of that. So fuck him. You know he's adopted, because there's no way such a soft crybaby bitch could ever come from Haku's loins.

Season 5 will include: Chris Adams Kurt Angle Buff Bagwell Brutus Beefcake Harley Race The Sandman Black Saturday

I'm quoting AJ himself. That's how he described it in a WWE Network interview with Stone Cold. Then again, he also thinks the earth is flat and gets taken aback whenever someone mentions his fans in "the gay community?!" so maybe you have a point.

All I actually said was: 1. TNA is not a major league promotion. Sorry, but it's not. It never has been, and it likely never will be. Does that mean it's bad, not entertaining, etc.? No. But it's not WWE, AEW, or even NJPW in terms of reach, credibility, etc. Those are basic facts. Again, there's nothing necessarily wrong with that. I'll expand on this point later on in my post. 2. I was responding to the silly outrage that Moose would be putting over Nic Nemeth. I probably was too dismissive of Moose, so I'll own that, but should TNA not sign and push Nemeth? That's crazy to me. This is hardly Val Venis or The Nasty Boys showing up. No, I don't watch TNA anymore. Every time I have, it has been a profoundly disappointing experience - including when my boy Christian was there on loan from AEW and became once again the greatest TNA World Champion of this or any other era. TNA, to me, has always felt like a company with an identity crisis throwing shit to the wall to see what would stick. Even when there's a solid run of shows, it always felt like one downturn away from another disastrously disorganized "new era" or whatever. At some point, I just threw in the towel. Watching old matches in a vacuum is fun though. (The Pluto app used to have a specific channel that ran old TNA matches 24-7 - I'm not sure if that's still there.) But I still like to keep track of what's going on with TNA. It sounds solid now, but I had a friend (another lapsed viewer) who ordered the PPV tell me it was perfectly fine but nothing about it motivated him to keep watching. That's kind of how I felt when I dipped back in during the Christian-Omega stint. You'll probably think I'm being dismissive by saying this, but I'm not. If they're happy being "a big fish in a small pond" (and yes, that's exactly what they are), more power to them. They still get to practice their craft, express their art, and presumably make decent money doing it while having time for their family and other interests. In terms of quality of life, it's not a bad tradeoff. But if it were me, I'd want to eventually go to the "big leagues" - NJPW, WWE, etc. - like AJ Styles did. AJ's reputation rose when he moved on from TNA, bet on himself, and ended up on top in bigger promotions.

IIRC, Bobby Heenan infamously called him the best Mexican wrestler of all time on that show. I love me some Tito, but come on, with the wealth of amazing luchadors WCW had at its disposal, that felt like a real "Ok, Boomer" moment decades before the phrase was coined.

Since you mean me, I'm sure you're not someone who would shit all over a wrestler despite not being familiar with their work. Oh wait... The irony here is astounding. Anyway, my thoughts on Dana Brooke is that she's a hard worker who I think can thrive if given a real chance. She will never be confused with Molly Holly, Serena Deeb, or [insert your favorite "good worker" here], but is clearly passionate. Like @sek69 and I were discussing, TNA Is the perfect place for wrestlers like this to get a refresh and glow-up. Will it work with Dana? Who knows. The name and gimmick seems questionable, but it's hard to judge based on one five-second appearance. I think you'll find that Dana is "perfectly fine."

I wasn't going to keep posting in this thread, but since I got a notification that you replied, I'm taking that as an invitation. Anyway... No, no, I definitely realize TNA has improved by leaps and bounds from its Russo/Dixie days. I was probably too harsh referring to as a fourth-rate promotion, or whatever I said. But it's definitely not what I'd consider a "major league promotion." That's not a knock on TNA or its talent, just a fact of life. In terms of reach, it's not WWE, AEW, or even NJPW. TNA, like you said, is a welcoming place for people to refresh their characters and then move on to something bigger. It typically isn't a career destination or a goal - even though I'm aware some wrestlers consider it as such and keep renewing their contracts. I don't want to use the old "big fish in a small pond" chestnut because that feels really dismissive. Instead, I'll say if those wrestlers are happy there and feel creatively fulfilled, more power to them. But for the other 95% of wrestlers, TNA is like an airport and they're just passing through. I think that's probably a plus for the viewer, because there's always an influx of new talent and most of them don't stick around long enough to get stale. Kind of like what NXT was at first.

I don't have "WWE brain" - which you very well know - but okay... I'll take @Autistic Dragon's advice and step out of this thread, even though his assumptions about me are baseless. No, I didn't enter the thread with the express purpose of "shitting on TNA" or whatever. I like to read various threads, and sometimes I respond. Nothing more to it than that.

My bad. TNA ratings are on fire with Moose and they have a major TV deal because of him. Yup, huge star, the biggest, Dolph will get a major rub sharing the ring with him. Oh wait...

No matter how much you all like TNA, it's a fourth-string, fourth-rate promotion whose "glory days" - if they ever existed - were at least a decade and a half ago. By that metric, Dolph Ziggler is absolutely a perfect signing for them. Yes, Dolph was an "over the hill curtain-jerker" in WWE, but he still has something to offer a smaller promotion and can definitely still "go." However, if you think Dolph is putting over a nobody like Moose, I don't see that happening - unless "putting over" means Moose looking good in a competitive loss to a real star. That will happen. Dolph will bump his ass off like a pinball for Moose, but in the end, Dolph will win and Moose will lose.

Was he the brother who got snubbed by WWE in the movie Fighting with My Family?

To be fair, you probably put way more thought into this dipshit's post than he did.

To be fair, this has been Drew's character for years. He called out Randy Orton during their feud for not helping him out. He even called back to that in this promo by excusing away Randy's lack of leadership on account of his "demons."

Responses to Toddler Tony's embarrassing tantrum. Yes he does. Jinder shouldn't have responded, or dragged an innocent party - Hook - into it, like TK did to Jinder. But TK brags and babbles about ratios. Well, he just got ratioed by both Graves and Jinder.

I don't know... I thought it was fine. Drew threw enough minor "bombs" Punk's way. Will this be remembered a month from now? Probably not. But Drew - like Seth - doesn't exactly have the most "exciting" speaking voice, and this was really a Drew promo, with Punk getting minimal response time.

Wish I had known this before. I might've subscribed and watched WK. I mean, I still could, I guess, but I know what happened. Isn't that his gimmick with American wrestlers though? Didn't he do the same to Jungle Boy, or am I thinking of someone else?