** On a recent edition of The WrestlingINC Daily podcast, former NXT U.K. talent Jazzy Gabert joined the show. Jazzy recently requested her release from WWE and during the podcast, she opened up about what led to that decision. While speaking about her time on NXT UK, Jazzy stated that the money in NXT U.K. is not that good.
“This is also the thing, I just came out of the injury, right? And before my injury, I was in so much pain. I guess I was walking around with this really bad neck for a while but I didn’t know this because I thought, ‘Hey, I’m a wrestler. Of course I’m in pain.’ For me, it was freaking normal and then when I signed the contract in 2017 I think, they found out that I had this bad neck, then I had the surgery, and straight after the surgery, like the next day, there was zero pain. I was like, ‘Woah! What is this? I have no pain at all,’ and like 2018, the whole year, I was not in pain and then 2019, I signed a contract with WWE again and I’m hitting the gym, I’m having muscle pain and I’m going to the ring, my back is hurting again. I’m like, ‘Wow, I miss not being in pain.’ It was kind of strange for me. I love this business so much, but I love being pain-free too. So for me, it wasn’t really worth it. Don’t get me wrong, NXT UK, I see it’s improving if you’re all working hard, but, it was too much sacrifice for me I think for what I was getting out of there. It’s not a secret but the money is not that good there, you know? And I think if I would’ve made a little bit more money that my life would be a little bit more easier. Then, of course I could say, ‘Okay, come on. Let’s do it. It’s worth it.’ But, yeah, it was too many things. It was not just one thing. It was many things that made me feel like, ‘Okay, it’s not worth it.”
During an interview with Metro, NXT U.K. Champion WALTER shared that he was not too fond of his appearance at Survivor Series in the traditional 5-on-5 men’s elimination match in-which he was eliminated first. Jazzy Gabert was asked for her thoughts about WALTER’s comments and feels that the comments were selfish because she would’ve loved to be on a big stage such as Survivor Series.
“That’s also really selfish to look at, because I personally think, oh my God, I would give everything just to get a minute out there. Whatever it is. You know what I mean? So even if they put me in a team I don’t really get along [with], I mean look at me and Jinny. It didn’t work. For me personally, I was like, ‘Why would this be a team?’ But I enjoyed it because I got the chance to portray myself, got the chance to go out there so I was really happy about this.”
** According to PWInsider, over the recent weeks, Major League Wrestling has had talks with Amazon about MLW being featuring on their Amazon Prime streaming service. It’s noted in the report that MLW is still meeting with other outlets and there is “momentum in a few directions with major players.”
** During the ‘Satin Sheet’ portion of WWE Backstage on FS1, it was confirmed that Killer Kross and Timothy Thatcher have signed with WWE. Also, on the February 11th edition of WWE Backstage, both CM Punk and Charlotte Flair will be on the show.
** As first reported by Squared Circle Sirens, Aja Perera has signed with WWE. Perera received a WWE tryout this past December. The WWEPC YouTube channel uploaded a video about Aja Perera’s signing, now going by “Aja Smith” and she is going to be a referee for the NXT brand and the first African-American female referee for the brand as well.
[embedyt] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mR-a3Hnn-ho[/embedyt]
** PWInsider conducted an interview with former Women of Honor World Champion Angelina Love. Love shared that her WOH World Title reign was supposed to last longer than one month but she understands that plans change.
“Before we went into Glory by Honor, I was supposed to have it for a very long time. With the roster being so thin, some changes were made the day of the show. They had a really cool plan going forward of what we were going to do with the women’s championship between myself and Kelly. After she won it back, everything changed and we are where we are today. With Kelly and I, we were such good competitors for each other. We were going to have really good matches against each other — me winning it and her winning it and then me winning it and her winning and maybe doing it on smaller shows and not necessarily just pay-per-views to show that we could beat each other anywhere and anytime, but that didn’t happen.”
Love was asked about IMPACT Wrestling’s throwback show during WrestleMania 36 weekend. She said that she is allowed to do appearances but would not be allowed to wrestle on that show.
“I would not be able to do that. I can do appearances, but can’t wrestle anywhere else and I’m completely fine with that. I’m content where I am. I think for them it’s a really good idea. If they were going to bring back people from IMPACT 2009, we were having a blast then and we were getting crazy ratings and crazy crowds. You’ve got to shake up something that you’re doing weekly to give it something different and open people’s eyes like Ring of Honor is. They’re bringing back the Pure title and in Vegas, it’s Past vs. Present on March 13-14.”
She also talked about some of the changes made to Ring of Honor creative such as Marty Scurll joining the team and she shared her thoughts about Jonathan Gresham possibly heading the creative for Women of Honor:
“I know Marty Scurll had stepped up to help out creatively. Jonathan would be awesome. He helps train at the Ring of Honor dojo. We’re doing a Women of Honor tryout seminar and camp March 27-28. He’s going to be there. I’m going to be there along with Sumie Sakai and Delirious and Todd Sinclair and Ian Riccaboni. There will be a bunch of us looking at potential future Women of Honor talent. I think it’s going to be good to have a perspective from the boys to help everybody on the roster.”
** NXT’s Karen Q is set to undergo surgery again. Karen Q suffered a broken leg back in the Summer of 2019.
** While speaking with UPROXX, R-Truth revealed that Brock Lesnar pitched ideas to work with him after their segment on Monday Night RAW.
“Brock actually has been pitching ideas. He wants to work with me doing something because of that segment. He pitched a couple ideas. He and I talked afterwards. The sky’s the limit. This business is always changing, and I’m always changing with things.”
** The Kansas City Chiefs Twitter account posted a photo of Super Bowl LIV MVP Patrick Mahomes holding the custom WWE Championship belt that was sent to the Chiefs.
** Former IMPACT Knockouts Champion Taya Valkyrie did an interview with ‘Metro’ about the movie she and John Morrison are putting together.
** As first reported by ‘Toy News International’, All Elite Wrestling action figures will be revealed at the New York toy fair on February 22nd. Wicked Cool Toys/Jazwares are behind the design of the action figures.
** Below is the newest episode of WWE’s ‘The Bump’. Scotty 2 Hotty joined the show to praise The Street Profits (Montez Ford & Angelo Dawkins). Bianca Belair appeared on the show via satellite, as well as Josiah Williams and Ricochet. Also, it was announced that on next week’s program, Natalya, TJ Wilson, Candice LeRae and Johnny Gargano are all appearing on the show.
[embedyt] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bg5x33yj56A[/embedyt]
** During an interview with Metro, Buddy Murphy opened up about Edge’s return to in-ring competition and how emotional he was when Edge retired in 2011.
“I remember when he retired on television. I was a fan back then. I remembered bawling my eyes out just because of how tragic and unexpected it was. But I’m not gonna lie, I did enjoy coming out at number 30, pulling him out and kneeing him in the face. There was a childhood dream, so to speak, accomplished at that moment.”
** NXT Cruiserweight Champion Jordan Devlin chatted with TV Insider for an interview and told the publication that he wants to defend his title against the likes of Isaiah “Swerve” Scott and former champions Lio Rush and Angel Garza.
“Now that I’ve won the title and run my mouth for so long and asking for these opportunities, they’ve come and [I] have the title on my shoulder. It’s really time to pick up the pace and push the goal post back and see how far we can go with this. I’m looking forward to defending the title across the three brands in NXT UK, NXT and 205 Live. I’m not the typical cruiserweight that you’d see on 205 Live. I’m more of a junior heavyweight style wrestler. I look forward to meeting a Lio Rush and Angel Garza, who’d want a rematch down the line. I’d like to meet Isaiah Scott as well. I’ve wrestled him a couple times on the independent scene. I never had a bad match with him. I’m ready for any and all comers.”
** Digital Spy posted their interview with Buddy Murphy in-which Murphy talked about working with Paul Heyman on RAW:
“Working with Paul is awesome. Paul, during my NXT days where we originally met, gave me some nice words. Then I was drafted to 205 Live then to SmackDown and I kind of found myself a little bit lost on SmackDown with no real direction and Paul decided I would be a good fit for his brand, the next face of RAW. It’s been awesome to sit next to him and learn from him and just pick his brain on everything. It’s a great experience and I’m very lucky to be drafted there. He was a big part of my childhood. I watched and admired everyone that I saw on the television. So to be working side by side with him is awesome.”
** Paul “Triple H” Levesque announced that Poppy will perform live at NXT TakeOver: Portland on February 16th.
** Below is a Foster Farms Corn Dogs commercial featuring WWE talents:
[embedyt] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lc8RdnvBBDo[/embedyt]
** Matt Hardy posted a new video on Twitter and said he strained his back while moving some heavy luggage. Hardy said he is booked to wrestle twice next week.
** Gary Cassidy of Sportskeeda interviewed Trent Seven and Seven talked about an interaction he had with two-time WWE Hall Of Famer Ric Flair.
** FOX 4 in Southwest Florida has information up about pre-sale code[s] for Axxess during WrestleMania 36 weekend.
** The WWEPC YouTube channel posted a video which documents NXT Women’s Champion Rhea Ripley’s travels on her road to Worlds Collide where she defeated Toni Storm to retain her title.
[embedyt] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GJZPtOUIBx4[/embedyt]
** Here’s the latest edition of ‘Tour of The Wrestling Shop’ with Zack Ryder and Curt Hawkins and the video includes a special appearance by Shelton Benjamin.
[embedyt] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4rESnBGkChg[/embedyt]
** The Detroit Pistons are hosting ‘WWE Night’ on February 22nd and appearing on behalf of the sports-entertainment company is Cesaro.
** While speaking with Scott Fishman of TV Insider, Jon Moxley talked about the story that he, Chris Jericho and AEW have been piecing together to build to their AEW World Title match at ‘Revolution’. Moxley made comparisons between AEW and WWE and talked about the differences between the two companies when it comes to telling stories.
“It’s what it’s supposed to be. That’s pro wrestling. That’s the kind of wrestling I enjoyed as a kid. That’s the thing, the difference for us is we don’t have to have 37 pay-per-views a year and 600 network specials every year. We have Dynamite every week but four or five pay-per-views a year. We can keep those high-quality, big matches for those. A big fight feel. I think some of that has been missing over the last few years when you have to rush through stories and car crash stuff and give away so much on TV. The gratifying part for me is that it’s so much easier. You don’t have to over-complicate things. The story is simple. You have professionals who know what they are doing, veteran guys. Sometimes you can take risks and try something out. Maybe it works or doesn’t. It’s always great to be willing to do that. The lack of 30 writers buzzing around with all this weird f—’in energy is the biggest difference. Instead of a 10-minute sports entertainment segment, at AEW I don’t have anyone bugging me with [a] 40-page script to memorize or drilled to me how it’s supposed to be done. It’s very stress-free when you just let guys do their jobs. It’s easier when you have more in command of the rudder of the ship. Better than having the wind blowing in 50 f—-’in directions.”
** ROHWrestling.com conducted an interview with Session Moth Martina ahead of her ROH in-ring debut at ‘Free Enterprise’.
** ROH World Champion PCO spoke with Vulture Hound and told the publication that he wants to be a bigger name than The Rock, Stone Cold Steve Austin and Hulk Hogan.
“This year was very rewarding for me and my career because, since I was 14 years old, I’ve wanted to become the next Hulk Hogan in pro-wrestling, drawing major crowds, getting the crowd hysterical. My next step now is, as the World Champion, I want to be the biggest thing that has ever happened in pro-wrestling. Bigger than Hogan, bigger than The Rock, bigger than Stone Cold. I want to make a major impact on the industry. My goal is not only to have an impact on the wrestling fans but everyone, in every walk of life. I want everyone to know who PCO is, even someone who has never heard of wrestling before.”
Elsewhere in the interview, PCO revealed that there is a movie about him in the works and a camera crew has been following him for the past two years.
“One thing that I’ve learned that is some universal principle of success is to be humble, always be humble. I’m the same guy before I was the World Champion, and I will be the same after being World Champion. I will be the same guy after my movie will come out because there’s a crew filming me for the last two years. They’re making a movie documentary, so they’ve been following me. Even before I [signed] my contract with Ring of Honor, you can follow me from Toronto to Baltimore. They’re asking me questions before and after a championship match, talking to wrestlers. They are around me. They’re talking to executives at Ring of Honor, people from the wrestling business, journalists, they will talk to my family eventually. We have like a two-hour movie going on theaters. For me, it’s always to be humble, to be sincere, and to say how I feel at the moment, to be honest, but also authentic. Being successful but giving more than you receive.”
** News 9 has a story up about Roman Reigns meeting a fellow cancer survivor.
** WHNT News 19 chatted with Cody Rhodes to promote AEW: Dynamite in Huntsville, Alabama.
** Former WWE talent Christopher Nowinski spoke with Jim Varsallone of the Miami Herald at Media Row during Super Bowl LIV weekend. Chris shared that he suffered a concussion while in WWE in 2003 that he still feels the effects from to this day.
“So, it started with my concussion. So, I had a concussion [in] WWE, in 2003 that I didn’t realize was a concussion and so I kept performing, I kept wrestling and eventually I got post-concussion syndrome and could not get better and [its been] 17 years almost and I still have headaches, I still don’t sleep normally. It’s interesting how much these things can linger, and so it was the fact that I was so ignorant about concussions that got me interested in figuring out what was really going on with my brain and realizing that we were all handling concussions wrong around the world in all sports 15 years ago, and that could easily be fixed and that’s what we’ve done.”
** Dominic DeAngelo of WrestleZone interviewed AEW’s Shawn Spears.
** Booker T chatted with Miami Herald’s Jim Varsallone and revealed that it was Renee Young who put the word in for him to get his audition for WWE Backstage on FS1:
“I think it was all Renee Young actually. Renee put in the word for me to get an audition. My thing is, I didn’t think I was gonna get the role or anything like that but, my thing is, if you’re laughing, if you’re having fun, the people [that are] watching, they’re gonna be having fun and that’s what I bring to WWE Backstage is entertainment, excitement. Like Dusty Rhodes said back in the day, pandemonium. So, that’s what I love about being a part of Backstage.”
** NXT Champion Adam Cole cut a five-minute promo about Tommaso Ciampa to hype their title match at TakeOver: Portland.
** Lilian Garcia did an interview with Sportskeeda.
** Vickie Guerrero was the most recent guest on the Pro Wrestling Tees podcast with Scrump and Stank.
** Road Warrior Animal appeared on the ‘Perched On The Top Rope’ podcast and was asked for his thoughts about Tessa Blanchard winning the IMPACT World Championship. Road Warrior Animal voiced that he is not a fan of the decision and does not think it’s good business on IMPACT’s part.
“They’re trying to reach to do some things. Like there ain’t no way I believe that Tessa Blanchard should be the world’s heavyweight champion for men. I love Tessa, and I love the family. I love Magnum, and I love Tully. Not good business ’cause a girl is never going to beat a guy. I’m not chauvinistic, I’m honest.”
** Melina sat down with Chris Van Vliet for an interview and during their conversation, she talked about how she viewed her time as the manager of John Morrison and Joey Mercury. Initially, Melina was not pleased that she was not wrestling consistently but she soon gained the perspective that she was learning a great deal from being on the outside.
“But I broke myself out of that because [during] my time in OVW, it’s like, being a manager feels, or I thought was taking away from why I got into the business. I was like, ‘But I came in here to wrestle. They’re not letting me wrestle’ and I was just so upset and it’s like, ‘No Melina. No. You’re seeing it from the wrong perspective.’ I am learning so much more from being on the outside and so I then started taking away my ego and that I have something — that’s all me in my head. That, ‘I have something to prove.’ No, I saw the longevity in it, I saw storyline and I wanted to make sure to try to make my career last as long as possible. At least I was hoping, and it did. I mean, it wasn’t as long as other people but for me, I’m so grateful to have had all that time.”
Melina also opened up about her first WWE Women’s Title victory. She defeated Mickie James to win the title and when she was told she was becoming champion, Melina was in a state of shock and denied the opportunity.
“I can’t remember word for word but, I remember being told and I was like, ‘What?’ I’m thinking it might’ve been Johnny Ace [who told me about the title win], and I was just like, ‘Huh? What?’ And I was just like, ‘No!’ And they’re like, ‘What do you mean no?’ And I was like, ‘But I’m not ready.’ ‘It’s not about being ready. The way the story’s gonna go…’ and I was like, ‘Okay, alright’, and that’s when I went up to Mickie [James] and I was like, ‘Thank you, thank you.’”
** Episode 18 of AEW Dark premiered on the All Elite Wrestling YouTube channel from Cleveland, Ohio. Jungle Boy and Marko Stunt took on Sonny Kiss and Brandon Cutler. Hikaru Shida vs. Mel was on tap for the broadcast, Best Friends vs. Shawn Spears and Colin Delaney took place, as well as Kenny Omega teaming with AEW Women’s World Champion Riho in a mixed tag team match against Penelope Ford and Kip Sabian.
[embedyt] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-eoBkr7HvEI[/embedyt]
** Coming out of the 2/4/20 edition of IMPACT Wrestling on AXS TV, it was announced that on next week’s show, Jordynne Grace will challenge Taya Valkyrie for the IMPACT Knockouts Championship. Michael Elgin and Eddie Edwards will meet for the second match in their best of five series, RVD is clashing with Joey Ryan, and Madman Fulton is taking on Daga.
** WWE Hall Of Famer Booker T took to his Hall Of Fame podcast to address the report that The Revival requested their releases from WWE once again. This story was first reported by Bryan Alvarez on the January 31st edition of Wrestling Observer Live and has also been confirmed by Fightful.
[embedyt] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GUdlj3DBTnY[/embedyt]
** Gail Kim and Melina sat down with DS Shin of Ring The Belle for a new edition of ‘Best Friends Challenge’.
** New Japan Pro-Wrestling is teaming up with APPLEBUM and Isetan to create more New Japan apparel such as hoodies and shirts.
** WWE’s Alyse Zwick and Jonathan Coachman are hosting a weekly XFL show to preview the games that are taking place on the weekend.
** Xavier Woods was a part of a recent edition of Droaam & Defiance Wrestling:
[embedyt] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UP33dFV1bKc[/embedyt]
** Matt Hardy received a plaque from YouTube for reaching 100,000 subscribers on the platform.
** Sporting News pushed out their interview with Jordan Devlin. Devlin feels that with his NXT Cruiserweight Title victory, he can be a top player for NXT UK and fill the void that was left once Pete Dunne moved to the United States for NXT.
“I’m a firm believer that nice guys finish last. You have to get all of the eyes on you and get the spotlight on you but then when stuff happens, you have to deliver. I’m always saying that I’m the guy. Obviously, it was a big loss losing Pete (Dunne) to NXT in the States and I said I was the guy who could step up to the plate and fill those considerably large shoes. So, hopefully, I’ve done that now.”
With his constant travel overseas over the past month, Devlin is open to moving to the United States to try his hand at living in North America for a few years.
“Obviously, I’d like to be the guy to beat WALTER and win the UK title. That will bring my time in the UK full circle before I [take] off for the States. Yeah, I’d definitely be open to moving over and trying my hand stateside for a few years.”
The night after Devlin won the Cruiserweight Title, he attended the Royal Rumble pay-per-view and watched Drew McIntyre win the men’s Royal Rumble match. Devlin stated that his section went wild for McIntyre and he praised Drew for his reinvention.
“Talk about a guy reinventing himself. Drew is the perfect example of stick-to-it-tive-ness and not giving up on yourself and going away, regrouping, and coming back better than ever. He’s a huge inspiration not only for Scottish guys and girls on the roster that are his friends but for any young, aspiring wrestler. He’s just the total package. It was awesome. We had a suite in the stadium and I was there with a few of the Scottish guys and girls, watching along, and they were just going ballistic for him. It was great.”
** NJPW Road to New Beginning Results (2/5/20) Tokyo, Japan
– Yuya Uemura def. Gabriel Kidd
– Ryusuke Taguchi def. Yota Tsuji
– Togi Makabe & Tomoaki Honma def. Manabu Nakanishi & Hiroyoshi Tenzan
– Tomohiro Ishii, Will Ospreay & Robbie Eagles def. DOUKI, Zack Sabre Jr. & Minoru Suzuki
– Toa Henare & Hirooki Goto def. Shingo Takagi & EVIL
– Taichi, El Desperado & Yoshinobu Kanemaru def. SHO, YOH & Kazuchika Okada
– Elimination Match: KENTA, Jay White, Taiji Ishimori & El Phantasmo def. BUSHI, Hiromu Takahashi, Tetsuya Naito & SANADA
** talkSPORT’s Alex McCarthy interviewed Buddy Murphy recently and Murphy talked about his matches on SmackDown with Daniel Bryan and Roman Reigns. Murphy feels that Roman is one of the best in the world and thinks Roman hung with him during their match.
“Yeah, it was awesome to be in that position. First of all, with the Roman match and being thrown into the mix with him, Roman was awesome to work with. He kind of let me put my own little spin on it. It was more a Buddy Murphy match, so to speak. I know a lot of people in the internet wrestling community give Roman a lot of hate — ‘He can’t wrestle’ and whatever. Roman is one of the best wrestlers in the world and you can mark my word on that, and I feel like he opened up a lot of our eyes that he could do a match and hang with me, so to speak. I know a lot of people were saying I hung with Roman and that was the idea, but Roman hung with me! We had great chemistry together and I would wrestle him every day of the week. Same with Daniel Bryan. Bryan is obviously a little bit smaller than Roman and has had that independent background as have I, but it was just awesome to get in there and mix it up with them all. I would do it again any day.”
While speaking about the 205 Live brand, Murphy said that he doesn’t watch anymore. He feels that when he, Mustafa Ali and Cedric Alexander were taken off the brand, it took a big hit.
“I think 205 is a completely different universe than the WWE universe. The people that watch 205 are the die-hards for pure wrestling. The WWE universe is everyone else and the pure wrestling fans and it’s just a lot bigger of a universe. So we had to re-educate them, re-educate the fans on who we are. Fortunately for me, the Roman Reigns match and the Daniel Bryan match, I got to introduce my wrestling abilities to the WWE universe who weren’t familiar with me. But in the WWE universe, it’s more than just in-ring performances. They go a long way, but it’s that something else that people will sink their teeth into. I’m not worried about Cedric [Alexander] and Ali. They’re both two of the best in the world and I would gladly step in the ring with either one of them any night of the week. They’re going to be just fine. It’s just not their time just yet. But, when they get that opportunity, I can guarantee they will flourish.”
** While speaking with Metro on a conference call, Trent Seven spoke highly of his experience being able to work with Triple H, Shawn Michaels and Brian “Road Dogg” James in NXT and NXT UK.
“I just don’t think there’s a team of people that you’d ever dream of working under that would be any more perfect for the development of someone in NXT or NXT UK. All three of them came all the way through the systems, working their way up from the bottom to the top, and all three of them did numerous WrestleManias. Between Shawn and Triple H, you’ve got two of arguably the greatest of all time. With the learning curve for NXT and NXT UK, I think it’s been made so much steeper by having such wise minds guide us. Having the opportunity to have Shawn over here to just guide us and point us in the right direction, give us feedback, just little tips that he can add to our performances, it’s obviously invaluable and something I’m very, very proud to be say it’s part of my job.”
** WWE’s Eric Young is answering fan questions for his weekly mailbag for The Athletic.
** Essence put together a feature about black women in wrestling featuring comments from Naomi, Bianca Belair and Ember Moon. Bianca Belair opened up about always being the bigger, muscular girl growing up and remembering that she was always told to “tone it down” in some aspects because of her natural-given abilities.
“I was always the bigger, muscular girl. Growing up, I was always told what I needed to look like to perform best and be accepted. I knew that I was naturally smart, talented, and athletic, but was often told to tone it down and not be as ambitious. So, I felt like I needed to shrink myself to soothe other people’s insecurities.”
Ember Moon chimed in and said that it is a good feeling to walk into a locker room and not be the only black woman on the roster.
“It’s nice to walk into a locker room as you’re not the only African-American woman there. It’s a beautiful thing, and we are all so different even though we are from the same culture, and that’s true representation.”
** Athlon Sports has a Q&A up with XFL commissioner Oliver Luck. Luck was asked about the difference[s] that will be seen between the new XFL and the former XFL and he provided a detailed answer that was based upon the league’s conversations with fans about what they’d like to see change in the game of pro football.
“I think it really sort of began with Vince asking me, and I brought staff on board to think about the game and ask where can [we] innovate and where can we re-imagine the game. We really started with fans. We talked to thousands of fans through focus groups and a bunch of market research and asked, ‘What do you like about professional football and if you could change a thing here or there, what would you change?’ Generally speaking, the answer was somewhat unsurprising. People said, ‘Yeah we love pro football. It’s great. It’s the number one sport in America. It seems like every week there are new records being set for attendance or television ratings. But there are some things that we would like to change as fans.’ The game sometimes moves a little bit too slowly. There are too many interruptions for some people’s taste. They’d like a little bit better rhythm and better flow. So, we listened to all of those fans, and it was pretty much a consensus on where we could make a difference. We view it is taking a great game and making it a little bit better with the innovations that we’ve built into our rule book. We worked with a whole bunch of football experts: current and former coaches, current and former players, tech people because we wanted to make sure we could integrate tech in places where it helped the game. We brought health professionals on board because 20 years ago nobody was talking about brain health in football, but now it’s a very important topic and a serious topic, and we wanted to make sure we were doing the right thing in that space. Then we distilled our innovations down to about a dozen. We wanted to do enough to innovate the game where it really matters to help us play this up-tempo, fast-paced game, but I also didn’t want to just innovate for innovation’s sake. There’s no sense in changing a long-established rule just for the sake of doing it, so we tried to be very selective. We also understand that players play high school ball, they play college ball, they play professional football. You don’t want to overburden a player with too many new things all at once and that was a break as well on some of the ideas that we had.”
** RT Sport posted highlights from a conference featuring Khabib Nurmagomedov. Khabib talked about the potential rematch with Conor McGregor and he claims he was offered a great deal of money for that rematch.
** WWE’s trademark on the “EC3” name was abandoned on January 25th due to them not responding to a notice of refusal. EC3 filed to trademark the name in April of 2019.
** WalesOnline ran a story about Flash Morgan Webster and Flash’s support for the Hospice of the Valleys charity.
** All Elite Wrestling is coming to Milwaukee, Wisconsin on April 1st and the Milwaukee Record published a story about the company’s upcoming show in the city.
** NXT celebrated the beginning of Black History Month with a song that was put together by Josiah Williams:
[embedyt] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gjo-GOfvbK0[/embedyt]
** PopCulture released their interview with R-Truth.
** Prior to WWE Backstage going on live on FS1 on February 4th, the guest of the night, Drew McIntyre participated in the pre-show Q&A and when he was asked about the “Broken Dreams” theme song, he thinks it would be cool to bring it back for his WrestleMania match with Brock Lesnar.
“Oh, for WrestleMania? Oh that’s different. I keep seeing the Broken Dreams thing everyday. For years I’ve seen this on social media and people ask me this. It doesn’t work for my character and I love the song too, but it’s a little too slow. The lyrics kind of match my story so that’s interesting so I think WrestleMania would be a really cool place for it, and it would be cool that the crowd would probably know the words since I assume everyone knows every single word because you tweet me so often about it. So yes, Broken Dreams at Mania would be awesome.”
** Yahoo! Sports published their interview with AEW Chief Brand Officer Brandi Rhodes.
** Season five of Total Bellas on E! will premiere on April 9th.
** Ahead of the 2/5/20 episode of AEW Dynamite in Huntsville, Alabama, here’s a new edition of the AEW Control Center:
[embedyt] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5LuF0HlGTZw[/embedyt]
** Sasha Banks and Bianca Belair are appearing on tomorrow’s edition of WWE After The Bell with Corey Graves.
** Fightful’s Sean Ross Sapp conducted an interview with Christopher Daniels and during their chat, Daniels talked about how vocal AEW World Champion Chris Jericho is backstage. Daniels thinks Jericho has earned the right to do that but as far as he [Daniels] goes, he doesn’t believe that is his place or his fight to fight.
“Yeah, probably, but I feel like Chris [Jericho] is at the level of success that he’s sustained over his career, I feel like he’s definitely got more right to sort of put his foot down. I’m more of the mentality, especially since I’m not really one of the guys in terms of creative that has that final say, so I certainly don’t mind putting my ideas forward and saying, ‘This is what I think…’ But I also realized it’s not my fight to fight and all I can really do is offer my point of view. But, in the end, it’s not my decision and I have to sort of bow to the decisions that are made by the guys that are in the decision-making position and I’m cool with that and sometimes the decisions aren’t what I would’ve done but at the same time, like I said, I don’t have the right to really put my foot down but I feel like Chris definitely has that right. Certainly is very outspoken about what he feels is the right direction [for] various stuff and you can’t fault him. You look at his track record and you feel like, ‘Well, this guy definitely deserves to have a say in how it goes down.’”
** Here’s IMPACT World Tag Team Champion Ethan Page’s latest VLOG:
[embedyt] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y5a_3sT-4pk[/embedyt]
** While speaking with SPORTbible, former NXT North American Champion Roderick Strong told the publication that he almost blacked out from the excitement at NXT U.K. TakeOver: Blackpool II when Undisputed ERA ambushed Imperium.
“It’s chilled, freaking chilled. I just remember being… I ripped my shirt, I blacked out at some point and I was just like, ‘I’m gonna take all my clothes off.’ No, but very surreal [to be there]. Just a good reminder of where we’re at and then just to think about where we came from.”
** VAVEL spotlighted Bianca Belair for their Black History Month piece.
** Insane Championship Wrestling uploaded the clip to their YouTube channel of Noam Dar winning the ICW World Heavyweight Championship from Stevie Boy at ‘Square Go’ over the weekend.
[embedyt] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rLkAMUarcjs[/embedyt]
** Jim Ross spoke with WrestleZone’s Dominic DeAngelo for an interview and Ross shared his thoughts about the criticism that he receives on social media for his commentary on AEW Dynamite:
“You deal with it, you learn to deal with it because for every one or two idiots, there’s a thousand wonderful fans that have followed my career, they believe in me and their trust and their confidence have helped me get through some very rocky times in the last few years.”
** Sgt. Slaughter chatted with Jim Varsallone of the Miami Herald.
** Reby Hardy posted a meme about Vince McMahon rejecting Matt Hardy’s ideas.
