POST IT NOTES
**Rewind-A-Raw is LIVE tonight at 11:15 pm ET for Double Double, Iced Capp & Espresso members of the POST Wrestling Café. On the show, we have an announcement to make about an upcoming event for all members of the Café.
**Wai Ting and I spent an hour discussing the two Castle Attack events and the Jon Moxley vs. KENTA match from NJPW Strong. This show is available for all members of the POST Wrestling Café.
**The feedback thread for WrestleMania 6 is up on the POST Wrestling Forum for Tuesday’s edition of Rewind-A-Wai. The show will be out for all members of the POST Wrestling Café.
**It’s the first of the month and therefore, the best time to sign-up for the POST Wrestling Café so you get your value for the entire month. In March, we will be doing LIVE shows after AEW Revolution and WWE Fast Lane, there will be three editions of Rewind-A-Wai including Tuesday’s show covering WrestleMania 6, and we will be live after every edition of Raw, Dynamite & Friday Night SmackDown. All members of the Café receive access to the entire archive going back to December 2017 with a minimum of two extra shows per week.
**This Saturday, Wai Ting and WH Park are doing a special LIVE edition of Rewand-A-Vision covering the finale and they will be joined by Nate Milton. The live edition will stream for members of the POST Wrestling Café on Saturday night at 10 pm ET.
Tonight: Rewind-A-Raw with John Pollock & Wai Ting (LIVE at 11:15 pm ET for Double Double, Iced Capp & Espresso Café members)
Tuesday: Rewind-A-Wai #81: WrestleMania 6 w/ guest Dan Lovranski (Patreon)
Tuesday: DEEP IMPACT with Davie Portman & Andrew Thompson (upNXT feed)
Wednesday: Rewind-A-Dynamite (LIVE at 10:15 pm ET for Dbl Dbl+ Patrons)
Wednesday: upNXT with Davie & Braden Herrington (upNXT feed)
Wednesday: Shot in the Dark with John Siino (upNXT feed)
Friday: Rewind-A-SmackDown with Wai Ting & Kate from MTL (LIVE at 10:15 pm ET for Patrons)
Friday: Best Death Match Ever with Davie, Braden & Damian Abraham (upNXT feed)
Saturday: UFC 259 POST Show with John & Phil Chertok (LIVE on POST’s YouTube)
Saturday: Rewand-A-Vision with Wai, WH Park & Nate Milton (10 pm ET for all Patrons)
Sunday: AEW Revolution POST Show with John & Wai (LIVE for Dbl Dbl+ Patrons)
WRESTLING NEWS
**Tonight’s episode of Raw will feature The Miz defending the WWE Championship against Bobby Lashley, which has been promoted throughout the week. They have also advertised that Drew McIntyre will appear on the show to address his loss at Elimination Chamber after missing last week’s show.
**We want to send our best wishes to Jim Crockett Jr., who is in grave condition due to kidney and liver problems. The 76-year old Crockett was one of the most powerful figures in the industry after taking over Jim Crockett Promotions from his father and later brother-in-law John Ringley. Crockett was the president of the NWA throughout the ‘80s promoting JCP as it ascended into national exposure through WTBS with an incredibly hot period from 1984-87 under the booking of Dusty Rhodes. Crockett oversaw the creation of Starrcade in November 1983 that ran on closed circuit and promoted around Ric Flair regaining the NWA championship from Harley Race inside of a steel cage and placing Greensboro, North Carolina as one of the top pro wrestling cities in the country despite a limited population base to draw upon. As the expenses increased, JCP found itself in financial turmoil in 1988 and led to the sale to Turner Sports in November and Crockett being retained in a consultant role without power. Crockett has kept a minimal public image outside of a few appearances including interviews for “The Good Old Days” documentary produced by Highspots and a recent interview with Conrad Thompson on his Ad Free Shows outlet. We send Crockett our best wishes for a turnaround and that he gets through his health struggles.
**Dean Higuchi, who wrestled as Dean Ho passed away on February 20th and it’s believed to have been a result of complications from CTE. Higuchi was a bodybuilder and won Mr. Hawaii Islands in 1956. Higuchi also played football prior to entering the wrestling industry where he worked for promoter Ed Francis in Hawaii beginning in 1962. Higuchi traveled to several territories including San Francisco, Vancouver, and won the WWWF tag titles with Tony Garea in November 1973. The pair held the belts until May 1974 losing them to Jimmy & Johnny Valiant. Higuchi retired in 1983 and had a wife and two sons and had been living in Kelowna, British Columbia.
**This past Friday’s edition of Friday Night SmackDown finished with 2,145,000 viewers and a 0.54 in the 18-49 demographic, They were third for the night behind ABC’s Shark Tank and 20/20. The show also did a 0.29 in the 18-34 demo. They were down 3.2 percent in viewers and declined 8.5 percent in the 18-49 demo.
In Canada, the show did 144,300 viewers and 96,100 in the 25-54 demographic on Sportsnet 360.
**AEW will be streaming the semi-final match between Thunder Rosa and Nyla Rose tonight at 7 pm ET. The winner advances to face Ryo Mizunami this Wednesday on Dynamite to determine who challenges Hikaru Shida on Sunday at Revolution.
**AEW has added additional seats for Sunday’s pay-per-view at Daily’s Place. Tickets went on sale this Friday with approximately 1,100 tickets gone that day. We have asked AEW what the new capacity level will be for Sunday. Those buying tickets will be placed in physically distanced seating pods with the additional tickets available for $50 plus fees.
**AEW experienced problems for its international audience Sunday for the stream of its Women’s Eliminator Tournament. Those outside of the U.S. were unable to watch the show on Bleacher Report despite advertising its availability worldwide. As a concession, Tony Khan apologized and added the show to YouTube for everyone to see.
**On the show, Thunder Rosa defeated Riho to advance to the semi-finals against Nyla Rose, and Ryo Mizunami beat Yuka Sakazaki to advance to the finals. The show-stealer was the opening six-woman tag with Hikaru Shida, Mei Suruga & Rin Kadokura defeating Emi Sakura, Maki Itoh & Veny. The match went over eighteen minutes and even in front of a limited audience, it would have torn the house down. The six excelled in this setting and I wish this had aired on Dynamite, but the staleness of the empty Dojo wouldn’t translate well for television nor would they have that length on TNT.
**The WWE stock jumped 6 percent on Monday and closed at $52.49.
**Stardom presents the biggest show of its ten-year history early Wednesday morning with All-Star Dream Cinderella from Budokan Hall. The tenth-anniversary show will be streaming on pay-per-view with Japanese commentary. The following line-up has been announced for the show which airs at 2:30 am ET Wednesday morning:
*Wonder of Stardom Championship, Hair vs. Hair: Giulia (champion) vs. Tam Nakano
*World of Stardom Championship: Utami Hayashashita (champion) vs Saya Kamitani
*Mayu Iwatani vs. Yoshiko
*SWA Undisputed Championship: Syuri (champion) vs. Konami
*Momo Watanabe vs. Nanae Takahashi
*Stardom All-Star Rumble: Kyoko Inoue, Mima Shimoda, Koguma, Hiroyo Matsumoto, Yoko Bito, Mei Hoshizuki, Emi Sakura, Hakura Kato, Yuzuki Aikawa, Yuna Manase, Hiromi Mimura, Miho Wakizawa, Bea Priestley, Chigusa Nagayo, Rin Kadokura, Mina Shirakawa, Unagi Sayaka, Saya Iida, Starlight Kid, Lady C, and Gokigen Death Star
*Goddesses of Stardom Championship: Maika & Himeka (champions) vs. Natsuko Tora & Saki Kashima
*High-Speed Championship: AZM (champion) vs. Natsupoi
**Brandon Thurston at Wrestlenomics uncovered some interesting data from an outlet that monitors unique YouTube and Facebook viewers in the U.S. Their data covering February to December of 2020 reports that WWE ranks third among males between the ages of 13-24 with 8.3 million unique viewers, which ranks ahead of SportsCenter (6.3 million), ESPN (6.3), and ABC News (5.7). For males 25-54, WWE ranks sixth with 13.7 million unique viewers with SportsCenter on top of that demo with 20.7. Thurston added that the numbers are based on 30-second views.
**The Countdown to AEW Revolution special will air Wednesday night on TNT immediately following Dynamite.
**MLW has added a World Tag Team Championship match for this Wednesday’s episode of Fusion with Los Parks defending against Simon Gotch & Shawn Daivari of CONTRA Unit. The episode will be headlined by Jacob Fatu defending the MLW World Championship against Jordan Oliver and airs Wednesday at 7 pm ET.
**The WWE is releasing a documentary called “Goldberg at 54” this Sunday profiling his preparation for the Royal Rumble match with Drew McIntyre. Goldberg turned 54 years old on December 27th and appeared on the Legends Night edition of Raw on January 4th to challenge McIntyre for the WWE Championship.
**Justin Barrasso of SI.com has a feature on Cesaro that features comments from the performer as well as WWE performers Shinsuke Nakamura, Sheamus. During the interview, Cesaro said he would not confirm or deny if he has signed or verbally agreed to a new WWE deal, which was recently reported by the Wrestling Observer Newsletter. In the same piece, Sheamus gave the following answer regarding how Cesaro helped him in 2016:
If it wasn’t for him, I don’t know if I’d still be in WWE. I’d just finished with League of Nations, which didn’t work, and I didn’t know where I was going. Cesaro had just come back from a shoulder injury, and he didn’t know where he was going. Then they put us in the best of seven. By the time we’d wrestled twice, it felt like people were already over it. But we tried to do something different with our fights, and it won the crowd over. We knew each other before we teamed together in the Bar, and we were always cordial to one another, but now we’re brothers. He helped me improve my ring work and relax a whole lot more in the ring. I wouldn’t be where I am right now without him.
**The Kickstarter campaign for Our Heroes Rock has hit its goal within one week. The project is led by Big E., Jonathan Davenport, and Andreas Hale with the goal of producing an animated pilot aimed at both kids and adults that focuses on important black voices with the usage of hip hop, science fiction, and other storytelling techniques. The campaign set out a goal of $75,000 for the pilot and was reached on Monday. If you’re interested in the project, we recently did an interview with Big E. about Our Heroes Rock!
**Bobby Lashley spoke with Bleacher Report about tonight’s match against The Miz, his rise as part of The Hurt Business, how his run at IMPACT Wrestling helped prepare him for his WWE return, and those that have helped him including MVP and Booker T.
**The next major card from Pro Wrestling NOAH is the Great Voyage card in Fukuoka featuring Keiji Mutoh making the first defense of the GHC Championship against Kaito Kiyomiya on Sunday, March 14th. The card will stream on FITE TV late Saturday/early Sunday morning at 1 am ET for $19.99 U.S.
**AEW GAMES has released the AEW Casino: Double or Nothing mobile game that is available for free on Google Play and the Apple App stores. The game was developed alongside KamaGames.
**ECW Press will be releasing Austin 3:16, a book of facts and stories on Steve Austin written by Michael McAvennie with illustrations from Anthony Kingdom James. The book will be released on Tuesday, March 16th.
**Maple Leaf Wrestling, who authored the book From The Nanjo to The Sheik, did some research noting that the oldest living wrestler to compete at Maple Leaf Gardens is Sammy Berg. Berg is 91-years old and first wrestled at MLG in 1951 and is followed by Mark Lewin who is 83 and debuted at the arena in 1956, Tony Marino is 89 and debuted in 1960, Dominic DeNucci is 89 and debuted in 1960, Sweet Daddy Siki debuted in 1962, and Emile Dupree debuted in 1965.
**SLAM Wrestling’s Nathan Hatton has a review of “Master of the Ring” by Tim Hornbaker chronicling the life and career of the late Buddy Rogers, who was the first man to hold both the NWA and WWWF championships and had a legendary career. The book is an eyeopener to just how influential Rogers was, some of the misconceptions that grew over the years, and his incredible ability to draw in so many different places throughout his career. Hornbaker is a fantastic reporter and his research is an amazing resource from this book and the many other he has published chronicling the National Wrestling Alliance, the Capitol Wrestling Corporation, and the history of the territories.
**Being the Elite Ep. 245 – “Back When You Were a Jobber”.
**Ettore “Big E.” Ewen turns 35 years old today while Kyle O’Reilly turns 34.
MMA NEWS
**This Saturday is the UFC 259 pay-per-view featuring three championship fights among the fifteen scheduled. In the main event, Israel Adesanya becomes the latest champion to attempt to secure his second belt when he meets light heavyweight champion Jan Blachowicz. The card will also see the return of Amanda Nunes who defends her 145-pound women’s championship against Megan Anderson, and bantamweight champion Petr Yan defends against Aljamain Sterling. Here is the current card for Saturday’s show:
MAIN CARD (10 pm ET on pay-per-view)
*Light Heavyweight Championship: Jan Blachowicz (champion) vs. Israel Adesanya
*Featherweight Championship: Amanda Nunes (champion) vs. Megan Anderson
*Bantamweight Championship: Petr Yan (champion) vs. Aljamain Sterling
*Lightweight: Islam Makhachev vs. Drew Dober
*Light Heavyweight: Aleksandar Rakic vs. Thiago Santos
PRELIMINARY CARD (8 pm ET on ESPN & ESPN+)
*Bantamweight: Dominick Cruz vs. Casey Kenney
*Bantamweight: Song Yadong vs. Kyler Phillips
*Flyweight: Joseph Benavidez vs. Askar Askarov
*Strawweight: Livia Renata Souza vs. Amanda Lemos
EARLY PRELIMS (6 pm ET on ESPN+)
*Flyweight: Tim Elliott vs. Jordan Espinosa
*Light Heavyweight: Kennedy Nzechukwu vs. Carlos Ulberg
*Welterweight: Jake Matthews vs. Sean Brady
*Flyweight: Kai Kara-France vs. Rogerio Bontorin
*Lightweight: Uros Medic vs. Aalon Cruz
*Bantamweight: Mario Bautista vs. Trevin Jones
**The UFC has released the first episode of UFC Embedded for this Saturday’s pay-per-view. They have also released the Countdown to UFC 259 special.
**Veteran MMA writer and reporter Chuck Mindenhall has launched his own outlet where he will be writing and doing a weekly podcast with Shaheen Al-Shatti. Mindenhall has worked for ESPN, MMA Fighting, and The Athletic, and is as good as they come with regards to his long-form pieces and day after coverage for big shows.
FIGHT ANNOUNCEMENTS
Kana Watanabe vs. Alejandra Lara at Bellator 255 on April 2 (ESPN)
James Gallagher vs. Patchy Mix on May 7 at Bellator 258 (MMA DNA)
ON THIS DATE
*****
NJPW Castle Attack POST Show – Ibushi vs. Naito, Okada vs. EVIL
John Pollock & Wai Ting review both nights of NJPW’s Castle Attack 2021 shows headlined by Kota Ibushi vs. Tetsuya Naito for the IWGP Intercontinental Championship and Kazuchika Okada vs. EVIL.
*****
REWAND-A-VISION: Episode 8 “Previously On” (w/ Brent Chittenden)
Wai Ting & WH Park are joined by Brent Chittenden to review WandaVision Episode 8 as Agatha Harkness forces Wanda to confront her past traumas in an effort to uncover the true source of her reality-altering powers.
*****
REWIND-A-SMACKDOWN 2/26/21: Bryan challenges Reigns, Belair’s choice
John Pollock and Wai Ting are back to review Friday Night SmackDown, a recap of Jon Moxley vs. KENTA, the passing of Joseph Hudson, AEW & NXT ratings & your calls.
*****
BTWA #6: Eddie Guerrero ‘Cheating Death, Stealing Life’ (2004)
Martin Bushby & Andrew Thompson are back with another round of Wrestling Adventure. This month, they are joined by Neal Flanagan to look back at the 2004 Eddie Guerrero documentary, ‘Cheating Death, Stealing Life’.
*****
upNXT 2/24/21: “What Is Happening?!”
Braden Herrington and Davie Portman review the February 24th, 2021 episode of WWE NXT featuring Adam Cole explaining his recent actions and Santos Escobar facing Karrion Kross in a No DQ match!
*****
REWIND-A-DYNAMITE 2/24/21: Archer-Fenix, Paul Wight signing
John Pollock & Wai Ting review AEW Dynamite featuring Lance Archer vs. Rey Fenix, the signing of Paul Wight, AEW launching another series & more.
*****
SITD 2/24/21: AEW Women’s Tournament continued, New ROH Six-Man Champs
John Siino reviews this week’s editions of AEW Dark, 205 Live, NXT UK, NJPW Strong, Ring of Honor, PROGRESS, Main Event and the AEW Women’s World Championship Eliminator Tournament in under 15 minutes on Shot In The Dark.
*****
Browse the POST Wrestling Store
https://store.postwrestling.com
Subscribe to POST Wrestling
https://postwrestling.com/subscribe
POST Wrestling Forum
https://forum.postwrestling.com
Support our Patreon – The POST Wrestling Café
http://www.patreon.com/POSTwrestling
