KawadaSmile

If we are mentioning Bam Bam, we gotta give Bossman a shout-out, too. Dude was busting out picture perfect crescent kicks and was very agile. Goldberg doing a backflip against Glacier OUT OF NOWHERE will forever be one of my favorite spots, and he also managed to suplex Big Show which ins incredible. Another dude who I find rather underrated in this aspect is Johnny Stamboli. Dude legit shoulder pressed Umaga, and later on lifted Rikishi, which is legit one of the most absurd spots I've seen in wrestling, taking purely feats of strength into consideration. Pound for pound, you'd have to rank Tyler Bate up there, too. He is fairly short but not only he does some incredible aerial moves (although not as gracefully as someone like Neville or Ricochet would) and is really strong.

Match #5 - Deonna Purrazzo vs Priscilla Kelly: It did one of two things right, which was to showcase a bit of Deonna's mat-based skills, but Priscilly was such a non-factor in this that this could be just a demonstration. Match #6 - Zeuxis vs Aerial Monroe: Ugly, ugly start. Just a disjointed mess through most of it, but there are shining moments in this where you can deduce that this was a particuarly off night for both of them. As much as a Spanish Fly being an actual finish is nice, Zeuxis winning was 100% the wrong decision. Match #7 - Kacy Catanzaro vs Reina Gonzales: First off: yay 2/3 of the Riot Squad! Liv is great. Anyways, Kacy might be a prodigy at this considering she's got not even 1 year of experience, and this match was really, really dope. Both need polishing, but Reina with her size advantage and nice offense, as well as Kacy's naturally underdog physique and absurd spots made for an incredible David vs Goliath. Good stuff. Match #8 - Ashley Rayne vs Mercedes Martinez: Look at the Unidsputed Era, what a bunch of proud boys-looking motherfuckers. Hate them (but good wrestlers, tho). Mercedes had some great offense, nearly murdering Ashley early on. Nice comeback spots by Ashley, and that flash pin attempt late in the match was a nice moment. Still nothing really incredible. Overall, worse episode than last week's but still had some nice moments.

Also worth mentioning: Bianca Belair. Incredible, incredible athlete. Can do 450º splashes and crazy powerlifting moves. Just the bEST.

Doug Furnas was ridiculous, too. Dude was strong as shit and had incredible leaping skills. Best dropkick in the business.

Bryan being eliminated early, as well as other, more over wrestlers being systematically taken out, like Wyatt at his most over and Dean Ambrose, by Corporate Kane and Big Show at his coldest of all people, made the crowd snap. Things were never the same afterwards.

They should've done that with Baron Corbin instead of just going straight to the haircut and posting the process on twitter.

Well, I'm sure NJPW would kill to have a guy of his caliber as the top heel.

Something oddly fascinating about a broken down Jeff Hardy being the one to get the most out of a broken down Nakamura regularly.

He's one of WWE's best workers right now, if not THE best worker, manages to work on a multitude of settings and roles, improved on the mic enough to be considered a good promo, and carries himself like few others do. While he isn't a mainstream star like Cena - and very few are - he is one of the most popular stars in the world. One could consider him one of the wrestlers of the decade and wouldn't be wrong. Very few did so much in so little time, in terms of actual ring work.

Lio Rush being Lashley's manager is a genius move. It would rock if they were a tag team, too. Lio rocks and I like Lashley. Power/speed dynamics are usually great. Win-win here, too!

Nikki countering the Eclipse into the Rack Attack II would be great. Basically she could have a great match with just about anyone in the Women's division today. The fact that she throws the meanest clotheslines and elbow strikes is just the cherry on the cake of greatness.

I'm ALL IN for weekly Nikkisawa bangers like this.

Kicking things off with Ziggler's record scratch is ridiculous.

At least right now on the pre-show panels he can get dunked on by Booker T and it is going to be great. Also he can maybe get back to the backstage interviewer role which is where he had his best moments. A win-win to me.

Renee in the commentary team full time!

Obviously, we are in a different time period than from 20, 10 years ago. We don't have stars like Hogan, Austin or Cena to carry the company and drive them to boom periods, but they are also in a situation where their finantial side is steadily growing regaradless. While that may look like a safe situation, they still have to be smart enough to keep business going at that rate, or at least to keep it on a steady place - therefore, while they don't have the drive to risk it all, they still have to make decisions about what is going to make them more or less money. They didn't *need* to sign Ronda Rousey, but they *wanted* to because she is a mainstream name and can give them more money. I seldom get the feeling that "things don't make sense anymore". Some decisions may seem stupid, and sometimes they are, but it seems to me that most of them are linked to money-making decisions and shares, stocks and whatever, and, much like the fanbase, the market can be very fickle. Recently we had four months were they seemed to be "stuck" with Lesnar as champion, and while that didn't really hurt them, it kinda looked like they would make more money if were things different. We have the right to criticize them for making stupid decisions, but not like it's going to hurt them financially - it's more like they aren't optimizing their ability to make money. For instance: they should be criticized for the Saudi Arabia business (although that could lead to a more political conversation, as KSA is allies with the USA) from a moral standpoint, and they even may seem as hypocritical or may generate a conflict of interest with their corporate progressive stance and the reactionary views of that country, but financially they were brilliant, as it was a crazy good deal for them. So: Yes, it is worthwhile to criticize them to a certain degree. Not creating new stars is something that can absolutely hurt them in the long run, as much as they say that "WWE is the draw", you still have to give people more than that, and building stars to a Seth Rollins/Ambrose/Rusev tier is a must; with that said, the sheer number of people saying things like "Roman isn't over" or "push Sandow" don't really understand how the business works - you can criticize them for not giving us an alternative, but not for pushing Roman, as he IS a star and does make them more money than others would.

A Brazilian presidential candidate just got stabbed during his campaign, few days after saying he was going to gun down the opposition. This has nothing to do with wrestling but sometimes I feel like even the most outrageous booker couldn't come up with stuff this harsh.

Jeff Hardy vs Daniel Bryan is very tough for me. Hardy has that style (both in appearance and in in-ring work) that is just too influential to just write him off. Even if he never got a big, big push due to his own actions, I think he was bigger than his actual push. Which is not to say DB doesn't have a significant historical importance, specially in the wake of his Road to Wrestlemania 30 and all of what that entailed. But Jeff being influential to an entire generation, if not more than that is just too big to overlook.

So, first episode aired. First off, Michael Cole is just amazing when he's not micromanaged by Vince. Everybody should know this, but it bears repetition. Dude might legit be the best ever. Anyway, the first match involves Tegan and I feel sad already. Shame. Match #1 - Zatara (Chile) vs Tegan Nox (Wales): Zatara is quite good at being this deceptively vile heel. Curbstomps, hair pulling withouth remorse, nasty submissions... got Tegan quite over as this face who just came back from injury, and she herself is great. Good, yet simple stuff. Match #2 - MJ Jenkins (USA) vs Rhea Ripley (Australia): Rhea looks like a million bucks, and MJ's Jimmy Hart version of Crazy in Love rocks. This was more energetic, and by God, Rhea is intense 100% of the time, it's so good. No way she doesn't become a big deal. Jenkins has a nice babyface fire, I like her. Quasi-squash, but good enough to see potential in both of them. Match #3 - Lacey Lane (USA) vs Vanessa Kraven (Canada): Both very cool entrances, and a nice David vs Goliath dynamic. Kraven was the standout in this match, and Lacey, despite needing some polishing (as her mistake early on when trying some fancy stuff showed), also looked very good, considering her experience. Nice dynamic but very short. Match #4 - Killer Kelly (Portugal) vs GOD, also known as Meiko Satomura (Japan): Cole is fucking HYPED for Meiko - who wouldn't? They kicked each other's asses and it was very, very sweet. Satomura is a top 5 wrestler in the world, and damn if she didn't make Kelly look good. Cannot put Satomura over enough, my goodness. Overall, nice episode.

Folks were debating about this subject in quite a few threads, so I decided to make one, as it was suggested by other users. What do you think about his push, matches, his current role in the WWE and what to they have in store for him????

I got to second both of those points. Loss made the Lynch/Austin comparison on Twitter IIRC, and after this interview, it couldn't be more appropriate. She is just so good and has this immense cool, badass aura which not many can convey. Great, great stuff - and with the content of Charlotte's promo, there might be a double turn coming soon, but the characters staying the same. Miz has been great for like, 8 years already? It's crazy to me how much shit he got up until recently. I can recall people on wreddit (yeah, I know) saying that Ziggler was carrying the feud, and some people close to me still say he's not that great. Those same people would rank TWGTT over the Usos so it doesn't phase me. There are very few segments he's in that aren't worth watching, because he is just so entertaining.

This talk of Braun being a babyface always confuses me. Even when he killed the entire tag team division, or during the build to his triple threat match against Kane and Lesnar, and even against Balor at point, he always came across as a massive asshole, even when doing shit like being in disguise. That's not mentioning him bullying KO into "quitting". Don't get me wrong, he's still one of the strongest booked guys in forever and his powerslam is one of the most protected moves around, but turning him as a definitive heel is far, far from a bad decision. And besides, he is a good heel. For once I feel like they have a clear direction, instead of running in circles due to Brock's reign of terror. Also at the "strong babyface" talking point: although I joke about AJ being an idiot in his feuds, you cannot say he is not booked strong. Dude prevailed over everything and everyone they threw at him and went toe to toe against Lesnar - in fact I would say he looked stronger against the Beast than basically everyone not named John Cena or Goldberg. We just saw last night, while Joe got the upper hand in sneak attacks, AJ faced him head-on and got the upper hand.

I'm optimistic about this because she also was the best performer at Summerslam. I think that it was like Bliss mentioned once, I believe: she doesn't *need* to wrestle like faces do, even when she *can* do so. Bumping and stooging and getting cheap shots in is the essential part. Maybe the title reign, which was good for her to show her personality and captivate people, could be seen as shackles of some sort. And TBH she showed potential in her feud against Nikki. I'm a stan.

If they book this just as a stepping stone to HBK/Taker at Wrestlemania next year, and make Hunter get his win in the process..... they are geniuses. Carny geniuses, but geniuses nonetheless.

Carmella as a face could work. Her performance against Charlotte last week has shown that - she can have explosive and energetic offense, can garner sympathy, can talk. I'm betting on her to be a Top 10 talent by 2020, honestly. She is money.