Stiva

No idea about US TV but AEW have finally hit their stride where the excitement around who may be coming in and the work they’ve done in establishing guys underneath is all coalescing into a great product. Not to mention that a lot of the guys are becoming better big-stage TV workers and 2020 could be an all-timer year. Also, Broken Matt Hardy leading The Dark Order against Drunken Adam Page could lead to some pretty great segments.

I have watched Dynamite, spoiler free, every week since it’s inception and the one week I look at the results ahead of time, I spoil Jeff Cobb for myself. Lesson learned.

I'll make an early prediction that Cena teams up with an actor in one of the semi-mains.

The Cody match on the PPV is probably going to involve a ton of bells and whistles; Wardlow and Dustin are definitely going to be involved at the least so I’m not sure you can judge MJF too much on it considering he’ll more than hold up his end of the bargain when it comes to nailing the interference and heel spots. What is clear about him is that he understands the core aspects of pro wrestling so clearly that when the in-ring work does catch up, he’ll be fantastic. I am slightly worried about where he goes post-Cody though since his entire run in the promotion so far has been defined by his presence in Cody’s orbit. It would be easy to say that he’s Moxley’s first challenger for the title but I’m not convinced Jericho should be losing it for a while yet. At least not until they finally run the Inner Circle/Elite War Games match.

It was wild seeing this advertised on BT Sport during the Premier League games today. I guess part of the WWE deal involved BT also showing the XFL in the UK.

Wyatt/Goldberg is such a shitty match up when Samoa Joe/Goldberg is right there. And the promos would be so much better.

That final segment was masterful; Cody Rhodes is an absolutely incredible babyface and the escalation of his support was great. Handing the 9th shot off to Wardlow was a nice touch as a final attempt to get Cody to give up but no, he's powered through it by his newly turned wife. I am very hot and cold on the in-ring product on these shows but they really do have a great average when it comes to nailing the angles, especially the big ones on top. It's going to be down the road but whenever MJF is World Champ and Cody is persuaded to finally challenge for the belt, it's going to be fantastic.

Say what you will but #FUCK is a great hashtag.

NXT UK seems like the kind of place you could get away with running a 20 minute, unproduced WALTER/Thatcher match and have Vince not notice. Fingers crossed.

Hopefully Braun is in the Big Show position where, one day, with the right booking, he can be rehabbed and turned into a top monster again. If Show can come back from the impression business, Braun can recover. It's probably helpful that nobody even remembers him teaming up with a 10 year old, to be fair,

The USO’s are a little stale these days but they had a run of about 5 years where they were just about untouchable, I’d say. The initial heel run was a fantastic freshening-up.

I agree with most of the points but I'm hoping that in the next couple of weeks, the angles and build ramp up as they did with Full Gear. But yeah, a real wheel-spinning show but NXT was largely the same, I thought. A bit of a calmer week after the frenzied couple of months. I will say that Moxley's Nick Fury eye-patch is a fantastic visual and may actually be contributing to his overness; a dude with an eye patch dispatching heels with a baseball bat is so great.

Orton is frustrating precisely because he can have moments such as Monday littered amongst long spells of mediocrity. This would be a perfect time to go on a Punting Tour 2.0 but I could see why they wouldn't want him going around kicking people in the dome.

We got the awesome dance to MVPs music, at least. I also popped for him saying "Who's this big fella?!" when he saw Keith Lee.

I can understand people hating the Brock section but I loved it. It felt like every guy coming out was someone who had been fantasy booked against him at some point and each encounter was a little microcosm of what they could do. It all built to that fantastic Drew elimination and really, he had to win after that or else it was basically the Maven spot 20 years on. And yeah, Charlotte winning was the lamest thing imaginable but they already book her like she's some kind of living legend, she was going to win a Rumble sooner rather than later.

Yeah, someone jobbing in the first match and then winning later on is an infuriatingly common booking idea of theirs and it's really annoying. Luckily, this doesn't have the double shitty whammy of the MITB briefcase but yeah, Roman gets screwed against Corbin and then eliminates Morrison and The Miz during the final 3 to win the Rumble.

You really have to respect the invention in some of these match-ups. Inspired thinking.

I'm in the Facebook group but turns out this is a much cleaner resource. Thanks to everyone listing things to save me the trouble of making my own, god bless you all.

I am far more on board with Matt Hardy leading The Dark Order than Scurll, to be perfectly honest.

Combined with Cody missing that week where the NXT show was super stacked, it's fair to say they've learned their fair share from HHH and Dusty.

I thought the bookends of this show were really fun but the middle really did drag. Jericho ragging on Elvis was fun but he should have really picked a worse band than The Beatles to counter with. It feels like Jericho would have said Ratt were better and bigger than Elvis but it doesn't matter. The women's match has been covered but where the hell did Dr. Luther come from?! I'm not doubting their talent spotting but it seems like the last two pick-ups have been Billy Gunn's kid and Luther when Mercedes Martinez is getting hoovered up by WWE.

Rey and Andrade have such astonishing chemistry, damn.

They’ve released the Memphis legends being “honoured” next week and Dave Brown’s name is on the list. If he’s not on Dark, then something has went wrong.

The Elite looking strong, an MJF promo, Dustin looking for revenge, Darby Allin looking strong, Baker pinned, Nyla being put over strong, nice use of characters in the backstage interviews and a renewed focus on the PPV build. PWO books Dynamite?

Dude is a genius. Popping the question straight after a wedding angle so they don't do it with him and Charlotte.