El-P

Well, it was not weird to me, but I've watched SCU do their stuff on BTE forever now, so...

It's kinda funny to see reaction of people unfamiliar with stuff you're familiar with. Basically, every town SCU go is the worst town they've ever been in. They are over as fuck, but unlike the NAO or, gasp, Nzo & KKass, they are terrific workers (even Daniels at his age is still excellent) and they are the perfect opening act to start a show hot. Drunk Randy Orton > not drunk Randy Orton

Does anyone has trouble to connect to the board lately ? It's crazy slow for me at times.

Of course she had to get involved. She's a classic valet and she's part of the act. Bitching about that would be like bitching about Sherry getting involved in a Randy Savage match. And honestly, the Stephy comparisons that come up regularly have to stop (generally speaking, not pointing at anyone one in particular). Brandi did not inherit a company because she's daddy's girl. She's a worker, she hustled alongside Cody to get where she is. And if we're talking about talent, she's a terrific promo anyway and like I said, she's been a classic valet like you don't see anymore. The Stephy comparisons are ill-fated and honestly, kinda feel like misogynic to me (since we don't hear anything about Cody "booking himself like HHH" for instance, nor do we hear anything about Omega or the Bucks or Chris Daniels, when they all are company officials like Brandi...)

Hopefully. And I'm absolutely part of this. I watched more or less the last three weeks of NXT, just to "prepare myself" to this week, and honestly I'm not gonna keep watching. It just doesn't interest me, it still totally feels like WWE to me (despite talent I like a lot). With AEW no in full effect, I have less than zero reason to force myself to watch anything I don't really like. Agreed. It could get very interesting politically speaking if Trip's NXT on TV ends up being a failure.

Finally took the time to watch the show. Marked the fuck out for Tony, who looks great (DDPY in effect) and I can't imagine how he must have felt, 18 years after that grim last Nitro. Some mentioned how relatively restrained the show was and I agree and it is exactly what it should have been. They are here for the long haul. Introduce characters like Guevarra, SCU, Britt Baker, MJF, shot some angles to build to the next PPV and some long term storylines, have a feel good moment (Riho winning the women title, which I did not expect, like I did not expect Nyla to be that good considering how green she has looked thus far), have a heat moment (the final angle), have a surprise that is not like the biggest thing ever (Jake Hager "from Belator"). So many people not even seen thus far that are gonna make their TV debut in the weeks to come. Riho & Nyla kinda stole the show, as the crowd was kinda quiet at the beginning and going crazy at the end. Love me some Riho, she's the perfect underdog. People who think she's not credible have not watched enough joshi. She's their Cuty Suzuki. Hager, well, at least he looked better and more significant than he pretty much ever did. He still has that "deer in the headlight" void kinda look, but I'm gonna give him the benefit of the doubt. If they can make me care even one bit about him, that'll be a feat. PAC looked terrific. MJF is gonna be such a star very soon. Dustin is not retired yet ! The tag-team tournament has a bracket (so unlike WCW) ! So much fun. I have all intentions to enjoy this ride a whole lot.

Except it's a mistake to consider the RAW audience as the core fanbase for "pro-wrestling". It's the core audience for WWE. Thus far, it's been showed with PPV buys overlapse (or lack thereof) between audiences that AEW fans mostly aren't watching WWE.

And this marks the first time since Nitro beat RAW sometime in 1998 (Hogan vs Goldy at the Georgia Dome ?) that a WWE program has been beat in the ratings by opposition. And it wasn't even needed. Well done Vince. Talk about damage control and backpedalling. I wonder if HHH would want to switch some people from that pissant company with anyone of his NXT guys now... Anyway, I did not expect that at all. But it is pretty awesome.

It is. It's been a long long time since I have enjoyed (and hell, even listened at this point) an episode of Brucie's podcast, but this one was a return to form. I suppose the topic was refreshing for Bruce and it's quite an interesting one. The ending is kinda depressing though, with Yoko going through his weight issues until his death. But yeah, even if you have thrown the towel a long time ago, like me, give this one a listen.

To the pay window, baby. (well, he's doing night club business in Vegas, so I guess that's conducive to taking pic with hot girls)

Not on my part there isn't. There is hope AEW will succeed, and by that I don't even mean "beat WWE in the ratings", I just mean being able to exist on a large scale and provide a true alternative for both pro-wrestling fans who aren't WWE fans (aka me, for instance) and workers. But the idea that the WWE and its predatory tactics could take a hit (which sadly in this context means NXT "failing", whatever that means since they are only on TV as a counter program) is indeed appealing. So it's less NXT than "an element of the WWE machine". I mean, the state of mind of many, me included, is "Let us have something else to watch for fuck's sake." Of course, I could live with IMPACT and be happy about it, like I was with LU, but a larger scale alternative is a breath of fresh air.

It must be nice for the NXT guys & girls to know the ONLY reason they got on TV is to fuck around with fellow workers who are only trying to make a good living.

Jack Swagger would be quite a HUGE letdown. He sucked the life out of the last season of Lucha Underground, he brought zilch to whenever he appeared in MLW during the first Fusion shows. If that's the case, then he'll be the Elgin of AEW, except Elgin actually has some terrific matches with the right opponents. Please, don't. He's a vacuum of charisma and a "decent" at best worker.

I would LOVE to see Salina end up in AEW. Hell, I'd love her to end up in IMPACT. From the Lucha Underground people, I agree Drago would be really cool in AEW. So would be Marty the fucking Moth. Where has he been anyway ? Of course, if you can't get Salina, you could get Catrina, in a totally different role and character. AEW should definitely tap into that latino audience that WWE has always been clueless about. Well, I guess I won't be able to watch Dynamite until tomorrow night. Hopefully this topic and the rest of the board has not melted until then. Not gonna lie, pretty damn excited.

Three strikes and you're out. The Dallas tapings really were no good. Mance Warner vs Jimmy Havoc was a really lame comedy garbage brawl, typical Havoc stuff, with mostly a poor use of the Bunkhouse Brawl aspect of the gimmick (they got back to using chairs, ring bell and those damn wood board in no time). I will give Havoc credit for stuffing his own head into a pumpkin, which aws funny, but apart from that, I was not into it at all. And I'm not hard to entertain as far as garbage matches goes. At this point Warner has dropped even lower though. Gimmicky from A to Z, he hasn't delivered jackshit unless paired against excellent workers, annoying promo to boot. At least Havoc looked decent in a straight wrestling match in AEW and was quite ok in the insane three-way brawl. The post-match going full gore was kinda odd after a match involving hays and pumpkins. I noticed Salina wasn't at those tapings. Her presence being reduced to nothing surely did not help that series of show. The neverending matches between #Injustice, whose gimmick is beyond stupid (they basically feud against the *referee* over being checked) and awful zero-personnality indie spot monkeys like Gringo Loco & Air Wolf are just fast forward material. I enjoy Tim Thatcher, but I would love to see him in IMPACT or AEW instead. With Dynamite beginning this week, I'm afraid I'm gonna throw MLW to the woodpile, this show has not delivered anything worthwhile to me in eons.

Come on, everyone knew LAX were gonna be Jericho's partners. Enzo & Cass would have got a huge collective groan from AEW's fanbase, for sure. I have no idea why these two guys names pop up regularly here when talks of some surprise comes up. If they made a misstep somewhere, it's the way they introduced LAX after the ladder match. It was not needed then and the "two masked guys attack the top teams" had been done before by the very not exciting Dark Order already, so it seemed like rehash. LAX showing up with Jericho would have had a much cooler effect to me.

NXT has been a magic trick. It's relatively easy to play "great booker" when all you have to do is play around with indy guys with reps and put together a bunch of dream matches and program who don't have to draw anyway and when you have access to deep pockets which you don't have to answer for. Basically, Trip has been playing with a toy-WCW for years now. Meanwhile, NXT hasn't really developed much during that time. Corny & Davis running OVW in the early 00's was a successful developmental territory. NXT has been a playground for rich kid. TNA, ROH and in a wider sense the indies have been developing talent for the current WWE in the last 10-15 years. So yeah, it will be really interesting to see if NXT doesn't work quite as well what it means for Triple H in the long run. Can you picture Paul Heyman taking over WWE in five years ! (EDIT : considering what I saw of yesterday's show while browsing through it today, probably not. That Rusev/Lana/Lashley angle was hot garbage straight out of Russo 1998 aka Val/Terri/Dustin)

Cuck angles = #creativegenius

Hey, RAW is "almost live" here too (and in English to boot), so here am I checking out the Fuck-AEW Era (for a few minutes, it's LATE already people). That brand new giant screen turning into a ramp is pretty cool looking. Those pyros got some Saudi money. The announcing is better than NXT's thus far, because no one is screaming dumb shit in my ears. Rey looks like he's five years older than his son. Brock looks gigantic. Wellness policy anyone ?

Don't be shy, say what you really mean !

Let's put it like this. CM Punk coming back to WWE : whatever. They all come back eventually. If Jeff Jarrett came back, anyone can. CM Punk doing a Saudi show, yeah, now that would be a bit depressing for those who thought the guy had any principles at all (well, of course, technically, WWE can afford anyone including Punk because of the Saudi money, mostly, so...)

They'll pop a huge rating. And make sure their current crop will look like complete non-stars and have no chance in hell to sustain it the following week. All of this because there is some actual other pro-wrestling on TV.

She was wearing at least one in TNA as late as 2009, yes.

FWIW, I watched Victoria in TNA when I was doing my whole TNA watch project stuff and she did not look very good at all. Sloppy, limited, you name it. She was badly exposed next to the TNA girls of the time. So the idea that she came off as a real talent in WWE then tells you all you need to know about their women division.

Meltz mentioned that Kushida probably makes a lot less now than he would in NJPW if he had not left. So yeah, going to NXT to work in front of 400 people in Full Sail for average pay doesn't always seem like the greatest career move unless you're a desperate WWE fanboy or someone who is sure to get to the top once called on the main roster. With NXT becoming its on "opposite" brand, "being called up" may not be as garanteed as it was before. And then again, how many people got totally wasted once thrown into the main roster ? So yeah, Taven taking the fat ROH money probably is the best thing for him on all front. Big fish small pond big money less dates to work. What's not to love ?