El-P

A thought for Dave Meltzer, who thought he could just lay back and enjoy Briscoes vs FTR this week-end.

Remember Trip just got back as the EVP of Talent Relations. Shit is crazy.

You mean, out of nowhere when there's an inquiry about him using millions of company money to shut off women employees whom he had sexual intercourses with ? I mean, out of nowhere kinda sorta.... This.

Damn, one minute too late ! Bye bye, we hardly knew ye. Can we get an entire Dark Side season now ?

Jade Cargill is still only one yeah and a half into her career. For all the talk about improvement, she is now visibly stagnating because she works a match every other week. They won't be able to work the streak gimmick forever either so as to protect her. And she doesn't need to be protected as much as she needs to *work* and get mileage on her pro-wrestling experience. Watching some Stardom lately did some people no good in my perception of some US women wrestlers. There's a debate about is it good or not to start training super young but you know what, Riho works circles around pretty much every woman in AEW (and knows how to get herself over to boot), and some of those Stardom girls who are like 19 or 21 (AZM, Starlight Kid) and have been working regularly for years are just on another level completely. That's what Jade Cargill, Tay Conti or Anna Jay would need, one year working in Japan, day in, day out. I bet you they would come back much, much better.

Excalibur is vital to the product. He's not only really good (he has his flaws), but he's the one who knows the product inside and out, and has the current pro-wrestling culture to call it the right way. Schiavone is the old guy enthousiastic about the current product aka the anti-boomer. And really, he's really good at actually learning about current pro-wrestling (he knows the name of the moves, he knows guys for having worked with them back in MLW), as opposed to JR who's the boomer (sooner) announcer of the bunch, cool as a legend and efficient in spots, but grumpy enough to be like an annoying drunk uncle who doesn't get what the hell TikTok is. Taz is the best color guy in the biz (he was really good in TNA too although at times he was just brought down by the overall product and atmosphere) and I'm glad he's been used more. They should really stick to a variation of a three men booth. Jericho has overstayed its welcome on Rampage for a while now. No idea who does the announcing on Dark anymore, but needless to say I still have no idea why the fuck they hired Paul Wight for. Nor Mark Henry.

After watching the last few big Stardom shows with both Tam Nakano vs Natsupoi matches and the awesome Saya Kamitani vs Starlight Kid title match (Kamitani is getting better and better, great babyface performance here, and Starlight Kid is just ridiculous, she's what, 21 ?), the biggest match of the week-end, the Summer and really the year thus far to me is Syuri vs Tam Nakano. Nakano has low-key been one of the best worker in the world these last two years, she would sure deserve a run with the red belt.

I mean, there's not much more they can do and Jericho has to lose the last match, he just has to (he actually lost the very first, which was the jumpstart point). Still, at this point they have way overdone the barb wire gimmick already, this match did not pop a rating at all. We're reaching the point of desensitization, and it's probably not the time to re-do the most extreme gimmick, especially when the last occurence did not exactly went well. Brody King should be getting the push Wardlow is. He's about a hundred times better in every aspect.

Yes. She did fine too. She absolutely would be a welcome addition. You know who did mighty fine when they switched guest announcers every week on Dark ? Shawn Spears. But AEW doesn't need another goddamn announcer, least of which Mauro.

NXT UK really is a great place to work. https://www.fightful.com/wrestling/former-nxt-uk-referee-artemis-pay-big-issue-i-took-pay-cut-being-teacher Former (French) NXT UK ref explaining she never earned as little money as she did working WWE. Fuck, she was earning more as a teacher, and that was probably not very much (not enough anyway).

Tyrus is *worthless* and he's got a track record as a sex pest. That has to be an angle. Then again, Billy Corgan. Aldis little stint as cosplay NWA champ has run its course for a while now. When he showed up in IMPACT to team with his wife he looked like some random dude and not a star at all. In *IMPACT*, where they manage to make everyone shine on their own level, whatever it may be. He had his moment of hype and glory with All In, mostly because of Cody, but this ship has sailed, there's no hype whatsoever left with the NWA. Honestly I wouldn't be surprised to see Aldis eventually get hired by WWE as an agent, since he's always been a Jarrett guy.

I mean, like I said I actually thought he was different announcing that IMPACT match last year. So I would be willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. Still, I would most probably shout some well thought out "Niiiiiiiiiiiiiiique !!!!!!!!" if it actually happened. I'm already not happy about Schiavone being cut down on Dynamite. Moving Taz in is a good thing, but if someone has to be cut down, it's JR.

Please, don't. I thought he was much more tolerable when he announced that big match in IMPACT with Omega, way less annoying than he was in WWE, but please, don't. That would hurt my enjoyment of the product QUITE A BIT. And that's the last thing I need right now (I still enjoy most of it a lot, but there are also some stuff I would gladly do without).

Nothing reeks more of "old school pro-wrestling" than Flair's last match being promoted by basically a predatory loan shark who bought his way into da buziness (and ended up getting married to it) and makes shitload of money through podcast adds for limp dicks pills, balls shavers and charlatanesque hair miracle.

Conrad turning the latest episode of the Jarrett podcast into an angle to promote the match was amazingly awkward, switching between mostly worked stuff and a little bit of actual podcasting about Flair. On a pro-wrestling context, made no sense whatsoever, like the worst Russo in 00 stuff. Conrad "working" is extremely cringe too. In some ways, it's admirable how Jarrett getting a podcast with Conrad led to working his way into Flair's last match. The guy is a GOAT-tier carny worker.

Hopefully he comes healthy and in good spirits. The Elite back together is really the best thing that can happen to the company right now. That, and focus.

The numbers will be very interesting on this one, as it's almost a meta on AEW itself. The context has changed from when AEW started. There isn't a need for more great-match heavy promotion on the market, there's already too much wrestling, and great wrestling available every week on a mainstream level. This ROH PPV basically is the third AEW PPV in a row, with by far the lesser mainstream appeal and everything focused on basically "Hey, great matches", down to the fact they can't even have the Briscoes, arguably the biggest selling point of the show, on TV at all. And really, despite having run some angles (none of them very good, gotta be honest, back to back "partner betrayed" angles to build two matches really was super uninspired), most of the people on that PPV aren't stars on AEW TV (FTR and Claudio being the exceptions). I don't see the upside of using the ROH brand at this point, but this certainly looks like it can be a great PPV from a match standpoint. But what hasn't been lately with AEW ? So yeah, the numbers on this one will be interesting for sure, including what kind of audience is interested in it.

Completely embarrassing boomer takes of "Flair at 73 works circles around Will Ospreay or Kenny Omega" will certainly be a part of this, it's a given. That is, if Flair doesn't actually ends up having some heart attack or blows out a hip or something. Honestly I would also book Tommy Dreamer to piledrive Charlotte while we're at it, while Jay Lethal looks in disgusts, doing his best Randy Savage impersonation... Then Titus O-Neil aka Carpet PR Guy can do a promo about pro-wrestling being for everyone or something to close the show. Maybe it'll go down to Jarrett pulling out his "Doesn't work for good ol' Double J" card before the show . Undercard is cool. Main event has got very morbid curiosity appeal.

Now that they use Parker Boudreaux on Dark, I really want them to sign Scarlett Bordeaux and put her with him, just so every announcer gets totally confused as to how to pronounce their name. They have no shot whatsoever on getting them right. French prononciation nightmares for anglo-saxons right there.

Not crass at all to have a 73 years old guy bleeding all over himself. I predict he gets the huge guitar shot, bleeds buckets, Charlotte for the save with a ball shots to Jarrett. Something like this.

So, the irony is in FULL SPEED with the teaming along Jay Lethal. The whole "I carried the Horsemen" bit on Conrad's podcast actually has a resolution inside the ring now. Damn Jarrett indeed. Plus, basically AEW/WWE interpromotional match. This is pretty wicked. A tag match means he can be protected, so I guess there's this.

Big time Randy the Ram energy from that pic. The guy wants to try and die in the ring it seems. Plus doesn't he have a broken foot already ? If it ends up being against Jay Lethal it's so ironic for several reasons (two of them fun, one not so much). But anyway, escalation of commitment right there. The undercard actually is pretty cool, but really now, this isn't a good idea at all.

Look at this, I'm off the board and news because I'm way not in synch these days and want to avoid "rassslin' matches and angles" spoilers, and this shit is going down. I'm soooo grabbing a beer and watching the world collapse right now. Even some of the most powerful end up facing consequences at some point. Hopefully it's this time for good ol' Vinnie Mac. And yes, that has to be the tip of the iceberg too. Get on with the full-on exposé and let's have us some mega Dark Side of the Ring specials on Vince next year.

I dunno. He's been in AEW for three years now. He hasn't improved a whole lot to me in term of his in-ring work thus far. He's 34 years old. It's not like he's even at Batista's level when he was good. So I don't think there's a huge progress margin unless he really figures out something different. To me as of now he's like the best Adam Bomb ever or something.