Matt D

Obviously WWE just released Nigel to mess with Tony. (This is a joke).

I'm looking forward to seeing FTR getting back in there with Toa. They had a really fun Elevation match last year:

After hearing the Helwani interview with Khan today, here's what I think the ROH mindset is: He feels like he needs to build the brand up with WBD, to establish it in their eyes, to put some star power behind it, to show that it can make money. My guess is that yes, it's because he wants another hour of TV and seems to think that this might be the best way to do it, but even more than that, he has the library and it's relatively huge compared to the AEW library so to get over the brand with the suits, he could potentially get a better deal on streaming the library. I could be wrong, but that's what I'm thinking now.

Jay is there to lose. He’s there to put guys over in competent, competitive matches. Guys like Nese and Lethal are important so that every match isn’t one where neither guy can lose. Occasionally you get matches like that but they can’t be every match. He’s on so often because people need to beat him so much. That’s not the role you want Miro or Kingston in.

It wasn’t great to show the Jericho ambush during the handshake in the package right after the Moriarty ambush during a handshake but the show started off well past that. I love that the crowd went from 50-50 to 90% for Yuta by the end.

Good draw for Page this month. RUSH and Moxley are maybe the two best people on the roster to push him hard, give him no air, and tamper down on his bullshit match structure ideas. He should have a good month. I'm kind of fascinated to see what Cage vs Wardlow will look like as a cold match. We've seen Wardlow showing off the agility a bit more lately and that's basically Cage's deal, for good or ill. I ALMOST think that it's there to be a set up for Joe vs Cage maybe? Remember how we felt like Yuta and Garcia were going to do everything they could to steal the show a few weeks ago. Same deal with MJF and Yuta. That's the mentality that gave us the technically sound but kind of empty Darby vs MJF match from earlier in the year, but this has more heat and history behind it, so we'll see. MJF is going to want to help get Yuta over the next hump while still going over strong. It'll be a real test of both guys and I hope they nail it. Women's match has to overcome whatever the hell happened last week. It definitely feels like some random Team BAD vs Team PCB 2015 Raw women's match, which is not a good look. Everyone in it is good though, so it should be solid. Main event is all about the turn one way or the other. Does Tony feel like he really, really needs a hot program going into Canada? Does he realize Jericho will be over as a face no matter what and decide to run with babyface Garcia in the long turn? I think what I'd do is have Yuta lose valiantly earlier in the night (due to, let's say, interference from Firm member Moriarty) but get pissed off that Danielson wasn't there for him and turn on him at the end of the night to join with Jericho to heat things up. Basically, this really, really needs to be a good show. But there's no reason why it shouldn't be.

I got a treat for you guys. Not only will I post my comments on last night's Dark (not a treat), but I will also post our friend DEAN's as well, just to counterbalance some of the mood as of late. DEAN: Me:

Now I want to see Rush vs Kingston.

Philly crowd didn't even pop for Dalton Castle's entrance. Maybe they shouldn't go back there for a bit.

They had done a start/stop already on the mask back in February when guys like Starks were using it to blind him and it looked like they'd have him lose it.

Honestly, I’m into it, but I think they’re leaning dangerously hard into the Brodie’s memory stuff if 10 is losing.

Crossposting my Rampage thoughts from DVDVR:

I've been spending a lot of time with 86 Inoki and really Inoki in general over the last year as I went through every 86 match and went back to fill in a bunch of holes (like his four week series with Abby in 82). I'll post some things in spoiler tags. I've been writing everything up at DVDVR as they're not reviews that stand up as well to scrutiny. Here's my sum up of his 86 that I actually had written on Monday of this last week: Said 82 series with Abby: The hour match with Brody The Spinks match: A Murdoch singles I really liked: and Inoki vs Fujiwara

The lights go out. They don’t come back on.

I thin it's less the Bray and more the teasing. There hasn't been any intrigue in WWE TV for years. No mysteries, no "Who did it" since Bischoff tried to have someone run over Roman Reigns and it got killed in a couple of weeks, right? Wrestling fans love surprises. The entire Monday Night Wars era was built on who would jump next and who would join the NWO next. So there are almost weekly returns right now and the interactive mystery thing.

He’s more marketable intellectual property than Ethan Page or whoever? They send him to do radio spots because morning DJs know who he is. People who might be interested in a wrestling video game but haven’t followed wrestling since 02 know him. It does make sense even if maybe you don’t like or prefer it. They already have the people who want to play as FTR on board. They’ll gripe but they’ll buy the game anyway. Maybe they’ll even pay more for DLC to use their favorites and you can fleece hem twice.

This is the most important thing and the biggest loss. There’s no one else that can carry the torch. A few years of it being a counterweight to the Elite would have made so much difference.

Last third of that was a bit of a mess, but no one there cares and nor should they.

Good way to sell a ROH TV show.

BTW, this is probably the combo card that I'm most excited about since starting to watch AEW around a year ago, more so than any PPV. So many guys I like in situations I like and none of the guys I don't. (They're all hiding in the battle royal on Friday or suspended or injured). So it's not just that I like the highs, but there are just zero lows for me when there are usually 2-3. Here's what I wrote up on tonight's matches for DVDVR: FOR THE VACANT WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP - Jon Moxley vs. Bryan Danielson They already had a match where they really went at it. I'd like to see Danielson try to drive this one more towards being a "title match" and force Moxley down onto the mat instead of having a match where blood and violence is the end goal. Actually, look, here's the deal: Danielson says he wants the title because he wants to wrestle in title matches as title matches are the most exciting. Moxley says he wants the title for all that it represents and he wants to be given the ball to take the shot. The two of them need to get together and figure out what those two competing forces and visions and character drives looks like and build a match out of that. I don't know what that would look like but it sounds amazing to me. FOUR WAY MATCH FOR THE INTERIM WOMEN'S CHAMPIONSHIP - Toni Storm (c) vs. Serena Deeb vs. Athena vs. Dr. Britt Baker, D.M.D. Four ways are not great but there has been pretty good agenting lately. I think Davari might have been getting credit for some things? What makes this interesting are the characters/wrestlers involved. Britt brings the style, but there's a ton of substance with Storm, Deeb, and Athena. Deeb is one of my favorite wrestlers to watch this year. Athena's been tearing it up save for the Jade match. It's the only multi-person match on the show so it lets them get a bit more leeway with certain spots. I'll probably be more into single interactions and some of the alliances/betrayals/etc., than the overall match as a whole. 4-ways are more about the moments than the big picture most of the time. FOR THE RING OF HONOR WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP - Claudio Castagnoli (c) vs. Chris Jericho It's Jericho's career year and he's stacked the deck with yet another match. I'm curious how he goes at this one. With Eddie, it was the King's Road style. With Moxley, it was outwrestling him. With Danielson, it was getting outwrestled and having to rely on desperation moves or capitalize on a mistake. Presumably he's either going to lean into some aspect of ROH or he's going to have to work from underneath against Claudio's strength. FOR THE ALL-ATLANTIC CHAMPIONSHIP - PAC (c) vs. Orange Cassidy I haven't seen their previous encounters, but this is more heated than you'd expect given the sneak attack. Personally, I'd like to see Cassidy try to bewilder PAC instead of outwrestle him, but this will probably play out like some of the big 2022 Cassidy workrate heavy matches. I liked the idea that Kip was keeping PAC off balance for the first half of their All Out pre-show match. PAC has to keep the belt leading to the Ethan Page match in Canada though. FOR THE AEW TAG TEAM CHAMPIONSHIP - Swerve In Our Glory (Lee / Strickland) (c) vs. The Acclaimed (Caster / Bowens) They have to figure out how to build on the last match, amp up the drama to make it think that Acclaimed aren't winning, then have the Acclaimed win. It's really as simple as that. Given just how good the PPV match was and how many tricks they utilized, I have no idea what the detailed way to do it should be. It depends a bit whether Lee and Strickland are going different ways after this or not and whether you want to build to a split. If not, I'd really lean hard into Keith Lee this time and make him a wall that the Acclaimed have to somehow get over even as Strickland shoots arrows out from behind it.

If he can still go, I have a great gimmick to build on the “steel” thing:

They’ve been abusing the five count for years.

I am so sorry you had to sit through that Beefcake vs Bass match, my friend.

It's Chucky again.

I thought he was doing ok until he started on about star ratings. There's a way to do that but this wasn't it. This on the other hand is a lovely piece of business