POST IT NOTES
**This week’s edition of Rewind-A-Raw can be downloaded from the site with Wai Ting and I going through Monday’s episode from Cleveland. Plus, we discuss Eric Bischoff’s comments about his release from WWE, New Japan’s U.S. plans for 2020, the injuries to La Parka and Xavier Woods over the past two days, and we take your feedback at the end of the show.
**A new edition of Rewind-A-Wai will be out tonight for POST Wrestling Café members. Wai Ting and I will review the June 30th episode of WCW Monday Nitro from 1997 featuring Raven and Curt Hennig appearing, Kevin Nash destroys Rey Mysterio, the promotion for Bash at the Beach, a promo involving Ric Flair with two models and a mannequin, Steven Regal vs. Hector Garza, Chris Jericho vs. Juventud Guerrera, and a look at all the news stories going on during this week in 1997.
**This is the last call for submissions for our Rewind-A-Dynamite theme song contest. We are going to go through all the entries on Wednesday night’s show and select the winner.
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WRESTLING NEWS
**The latest edition of the 31 Thoughts podcast with Jeff Marek & Elliotte Freidman features an interview they conducted with CM Punk in Chicago. The interview focused heavily on professional wrestling and his complicated relationship with it. He explained the Stanley Cup tattoo he got when the Chicago Blackhawks won the Stanley Cup in 2013 during his time off after WrestleMania 29. Punk explained how he destroyed his knee (he had surgery in late 2012 and was brought back to TV quickly for a TLC match of all things) and worked through ‘Mania season with the two matches against The Rock and losing to The Undertaker at ‘Mania. He said he wanted to be off until SummerSlam but was brought back in June because the Payback pay-per-view was in Chicago and they wanted Punk against Chris Jericho for that show. He said the time off in 2013 planted the seed that he knew he needed to get out of there and culminated with his exit the night after the Royal Rumble in January 2014.
Marek shared a story of Roddy Piper once explaining why he would take his time walking to the ring instead of following others that raced to the ring. Piper told Marek that it forced the announcers to talk about him for that length of time and get him over to the audience at home while Piper could also estimate the size of the house for his payoff. Punk followed that story by stating:
He was one of the smarter guys than I ever, fortunately, got to talk to. I don’t think enough people in the wrestling business today look at the business from that kind of perspective. I think a lot of people are there doing something they saw someone do on television, it’s why it feels ‘washed’, it feels repeated. I bet Piper also did that because nobody else was. If you run everyone run to the ring, what’s the opposite of that? That’s how I thought when I was in WWE. I did a lot of things just because nobody else was doing them even if I didn’t do it. I didn’t throw a lot of kicks in the indies, but I went into the WWE looking at the landscape of ‘nobody is throwing kicks, so I’m going to do that’. I don’t think I did a springboard in Ring of Honor, but I got to WWE and nobody else is doing that. Moves at the end of the day don’t mean shit but if you can pick three things that you do differently than everybody else you stand out and the entrance is a perfect example of that.
On today’s performers stepping outside the box on television in WWE:
I don’t know if anybody is bold enough to do things outside of the box because if you do that it has to be good. You can go out there and instead of doing what everybody else does where they walk out to the top of the ramp pose, they walk halfway down the ramp and pose, they get to the bottom of the ramp and pose and then to steps and they pose and everyone gets on the ropes and they pose and they get in the ring, face the hard camera and dance or do their pose, it’s like just ‘yeah I get it, why isn’t there anybody going, everybody is doing that I’m not going to’. It would get everyone in that building ‘Hmm, that’s different’, whether they know it or not it’s subconscious. But if you step outside that box you have to be confident enough in your abilities to know what you’re doing is good because if it isn’t good, you’re in trouble. If it’s good, no problem.
On whether there is a spot today for CM Punk in professional wrestling, mainly WWE:
Looking at it objectively and trying to put myself in somebody’s shoes, yeah, I absolutely think there could be. Just knowing how many people that they hired to micromanage everything and have agents and producers and this, this, that. I think the best thing I was ever at; my greatest tool was my mind because I was never the most athletic, I certainly wasn’t the biggest. I imagine myself in baseball terms as a ‘five-tool player’ but I just tried to tell the best stories and use my brain.
Punk added that he will be getting a future tattoo in honor of the late Harley Race. There are some great stories involving Race, Punk’s love for Mitsuharu Misawa, Akira Taue and All Japan in the ‘90s, and more.
**Dorian Roldan of AAA spoke to the Caliente outlet regarding the status of La Parka. Roldan noted that he came out of surgery on Monday in stable condition. but the following 48 hours would be vital. He was treated for an injury to his fourth vertebrae following a dive to the floor on a KAOZ event at Arena Coliseo. La Parka’s feet clipped the middle rope and he crashed to the floor and hit the guardrail. He lost feeling in his hands and legs but was said to have regained the feeling prior to his operation on Monday morning.
**Scott Fishman of TV Insider spoke with Matt & Nick Jackson on the early success of AEW Dynamite as well as the challenges of their scheduled and balancing their home life, the injury to Luchasaurus last week and how that affected the show, and also discussed the viewership figures over the first three weeks with Matt Jackson stating:
I heard the expectations were possibly in the 400 or 500,000 range. The fact we crossed a million was great. I think opening we expected a big number. I don’t know if we expected the number, we got in 1.4. Of course, a week or two after there will always be a drop. We expected that.
If we can keep around a million, we’d be thrilled. That would be amazing. We’re such a brand-new thing for them. The next week is tough with Major League Baseball, NBA coming up. We understand that. This whole thing is a whirlwind. We are thrilled right now. And of course, you think about the other wrestling playing that night. And you want to best them, and the fact we are is great. We are also not taking that for granted because they have a great show too. Right now, we have one step foot forward and think about our brand, our television show and making it the best we can make it.
**Here are the matches for tonight’s edition of AEW Dark from the tapings in Philadelphia last week with Excalibur and Taz on commentary:
*Cody, The Young Bucks & Dustin Rhodes vs. CIMA, T-Hawk & Private Party
*Joey Janela vs. Brandon Cutler – this was supposed to be Marko Stunt’s match but he was swapped into the tag match after the injury to Luchasaurus
*Nyla Rose vs. Leva Bates
**The third episode of NWA Power will be released tonight at 6:05 pm eastern on the promotion’s YouTube and Facebook channels. The episode is titled “Twilight of Tim Storm”.
**Due to Xavier Wood’s injury, Tuesday’s WWE show in Brisbane featured Kofi Kingston & Big E. teaming with Buddy Murphy against Randy Orton & The Revival. The show was headlined by Roman Reigns defeating Erick Rowan.
**Drew McIntyre was named the final member of Team Flair for the Crown Jewel match joining Randy Orton, Bobby Lashley, King Corbin, and Shinsuke Nakamura taking on Roman Reigns, Rusev, Shorty G, Ali & Ricochet.
**Impact Wrestling has a two-hour “This is Impact” special running at 8 pm eastern on AXS TV tonight. The special will serve as an introduction for new viewers and features the following matches that were taped prior to Bound for Glory on Sunday:
*The Rascalz vs. Dr. Wagner Jr., Aero Star & Black Taurus
*Madison Rayne vs. Shotzi Blackheart – Blackheart just signed a WWE deal, which was revealed at the last EVOLVE card after it has been reported online by Casey Michael|
**New Japan has a card in Fukushima on Wednesday with a Super Junior Tag League match with El Phantasmo & Taiji Ishimori taking on Rocky Romero & Ryusuke Taguchi. There is an off-day Thursday and Friday’s card has a tournament match with Will Ospreay & Robbie Eagles vs. TJP & Clark Connors.
**ROH begins its Honor United tour of the U.K. this Friday with shows in London, Newport, and Bolton. A six-man scramble match has been added to Friday’s show involving Matt Taven, Dalton Castle, Kenny King, Rampage Brown, Silas Young, and Hikuleo.
**PWA in Australia is bringing Jushin Thunder Liger to their next major card on December 14th at the Factory Theatre in Sydney. The event takes place three weeks before Liger’s retirement.
**Vampiro has canceled his Lucha Fight Club card in Las Vegas that was scheduled for November 2nd. He has also stated that he is putting his wrestling school “on hold” without any specifics addressed.
**As of Tuesday afternoon, here are the top five WWE videos from Raw that were posted on their YouTube channel as an idea of had the most interest in clip form: Cain Velasquez attacks Shelton Benjamin (nothing came close to this), Rusev at the restaurant, Seth Rollins vs. Humberto Carrillo, Street Profits over The OC, and Rusev on The King’s Court.
**The WWE stock had a drop on Tuesday and closed at $66.75.
**Taya Valkyrie turns 36 years old today.
**Kurt Angle won his first WWF championship on this date in 2000 defeating The Rock in Albany, New York at the No Mercy pay-per-view. The pay-per-view went head-to-head both in the New York market and being broadcast against a World Series game between the New York Yankees and Mets in the subway series. It worked out to be a transitional run with Angle holding the title until February when it bounced back to The Rock in time for WrestleMania. This pay-per-view did very well based on Steve Austin’s return match after neck surgery against Rikishi after returning to television the month prior.
**Here is editor Shaun Ryan’s latest work promoting this Saturday’s match between Jordan Devlin and David Starr for the OTT championship in Dublin at National Stadium:
MMA NEWS
**The UFC has lost part of its heavyweight main event for next month’s card in Moscow, Russia. Former champion Junior dos Santos has withdrawn from the fight with Alexander Volkov, which was first reported by RT Sport in Russia. MMA Fighting added that dos Santos is suffering from a bacterial infection in his leg and been hospitalized for the past week while undergoing two procedures to drain and remove the infection. The Moscow event takes place Saturday, November 9th from the CSKA Arena. The main card will air in the afternoon for North American viewers.
**Following the news of dos Santos being removed from the fight, ESPN’s Brett Okamoto reports that Greg Hardy will step in to fight Alexander Volkov. Hardy just fought this past Friday in a fight that was initially ruled a unanimous decision over Ben Sosoli and later changed to a no contest. In between rounds two and three, Hardy asked for permission to use his asthma inhaler and was given incorrect information and used the inhaler, finished the fight and later it was ruled a no contest. This is an enormous step up in competition for Hardy, who had his pro debut in June 2018 and is 5-1 with 1 no contest. Volkov is the former Bellator heavyweight champion with a 30-7 record going back to April 2009. Volkov has won six of his last seven fights and is coming off a KO loss to Derrick Lewis in October 2018, which was a fight Volkov was winning and got stopped with 11 seconds remaining in the three-round fight.
**Chris Weidman posted an update following his first-round knockout loss to Dominick Reyes. Weidman said he has no plans of retiring and found it difficult to hear that sentiment from so many when a win over Reyes may have earned him a title fight with Jon Jones. He acknowledged a long layoff, two major surgeries, and a jump in weight divisions as factors that played a role in the outcome and appears healthy to get back in the gym immediately. He did not address where he wants to compete and whether he will continue at light heavyweight. Weidman struggled at times to make the middleweight limit and personally, I’d like to see him fight again at light heavyweight as fighting Reyes wasn’t the ideal opponent to be testing yourself at a new weight class. Weidman has only won one fight since losing the middleweight title Luke Rockhold in December 2015 and there will be enormous pressure on Weidman for his next fight.
**Todd Martin wrote about Friday’s outcome between Reyes and Weidman in his column for Sherdog.
**Bellator 231 is Friday night at 9 pm eastern on the Paramount Network and DAZN and is the promotion’s first of back-to-back nights in Uncasville, Connecticut. Below are the fights on the main card:
*Frank Mir vs. Roy Nelson – they fought in May 2011 with Mir defeating Nelson by decision at UFC 230. Mir has lost his last four fights and Nelson his last three, so both desperately need a win. They also badly need to do a number on Paramount and would be a stronger argument for either to be retained by Bellator than even a win would do.
*Phil Davis vs. Karl Albrektsson – Albrektsoon is a Swedish fight with an 8-2 record and fought for RIZIN in the past, including their 2017 World Grand Prix tournament where he lost to Jiro Prochazka
*Ed Ruth vs. Jason Jackson
*Bec Rawlings vs. Ilara Joanne – This is Rawlings’ debut with Bellator and her first fight since April 2018. She lost her last four fights in the UFC to Paige VanZant, Tecia Torres, Jessica Rose-Clark, and Ashley Evans-Smith
*Craig Campbell vs. Kevin Ferguson Jr. – Ferguson Jr. is the son of the late Kimbo Slice and has a 3-2 record. He last fought in October 2018 where he was stopped by Corey Browning.
*Jake Hager vs. Anthony Garrett – Garrett is a 4-2 fighter that has competed for Shamrock FC out of Kansas City. He’s had two fights this year with a stoppage over Cesar Gutierrez and is coming off a loss to Jordan Mitchell back in June. Obviously, Hager is the big favorite and they are grooming him rather than throwing him into the deep end of the heavyweight mix, by design.
**The following night, Bellator 232 is at the same venue with the main card exclusively on DAZN at 10 pm eastern with the following fights:
*Rory MacDonald vs. Douglas Lima in the final of the Welterweight Grand Prix and for the welterweight title
*Paul Daley vs. Saad Awad – Awad is taking this fight on less than a week’s notice after Sabah Homasi was injured. The two will fight at a 175-pound catchweight.
*Patrick Mix vs. Isiah Chapman – Chapman is a late replacement for Dominic Mazzotta due to an injury
*Javy Ayala vs. Vitaly Nemkov
*Nick Newell vs. Manny Muro
*****
RAR 10/21/19: The Street Prophet, Eric Bischoff Speaks
John Pollock and Wai Ting review WWE Raw featuring the return of Kevin Owens to the brand and the in-ring debut of The Street Profits.
https://www.postwrestling.com/2019/10/22/rar-10-21-19-the-street-prophet-eric-bischoff-speaks/
*****
BOUND FOR GLORY POST SHOW
John Pollock and Nate Milton review Impact Wrestling’s Bound for Glory pay-per-view with Brian Cage vs. Sami Callihan for the Impact title, Ken Shamrock vs. Moose & more.
https://www.postwrestling.com/2019/10/21/impact-bound-for-glory-post-show/
*****
TRMPS #10: Race to Witch Mountain
On this edition of The Rocky Maivia Picture Show, Nate Milton celebrates October by reviewing Dwayne Johnson’s scariest movie to date, Disney’s “Race to Witch Mountain”! Featuring guest hosts Davie Portman and Daniel Perry.
https://www.postwrestling.com/2019/10/19/trmps-10-race-to-witch-mountain-2009-w-davie-portman-daniel-perry/
*****
RASD 10/18/19: Team Hogan’s New Captain, Bayley Speaks
John Pollock and Wai Ting review Friday Night SmackDown on Fox featuring the announcement of Hulk Hogan’s new Team Captain at Crown Jewel, Bayley explains her new demeanor, and Shorty Gable receives an even shorter name.
https://www.postwrestling.com/2019/10/18/rasd-10-18-19-team-hogans-new-captain-bayley-speaks/
*****
BWE 10/18/19: wXw World Tag Festival, Breed Starrcave, Progress Chapter 96
Martin, Benno & Jamesie are back to review wXw World Tag Festival, Breed Wrestling In A Cave and Progress Chapter 96. Andy Ogden is back with his regular segment “Going Undergraps” discussing Tidal & Schadenfreude.
https://www.postwrestling.com/2019/10/18/bwe-10-18-19-wxw-world-tag-festival-breed-starrcave-progress-ch-96/
*****
Cafe Hangout: NJPW parent company buys Stardom, Corey Erdman talks Patrick Day
John Pollock and Wai Ting discuss this week’s news including NJPW parent company Bushiroad’s acquisition of Stardom. Boxing analyst and commentator Corey Erdman join us to discuss the unfortunate passing of boxer Patrick Day.
https://www.postwrestling.com/2019/10/17/njpw-parent-company-buys-stardom-corey-erdman-talks-patrick-day-cafe-hangout/
*****
upNXT 10/16/19: USButed Era
Braden Herrington and Davie Portman are back to chat all about this week’s WWE NXT featuring Pete Dunne vs Damian Priest, Keith Lee vs Dominik Dijakovic in a Number 1 Contenders Match & more.
https://www.postwrestling.com/2019/10/17/upnxt-10-16-19-usbuted-era/
*****
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