POST IT NOTES
**Rewind-A-Raw is LIVE tonight at 11:15 p.m. ET for Double Double, Iced Capp & Espresso members of the POST Wrestling Café. Wai Ting and I will be reviewing Raw from St. Paul, Minnesota, and going over the week’s schedule. We will also speak about Jimmy Rave on tonight’s show.
**The POST Daily News show is available, and I want to extend a big ‘thank you’ to Dickie Bird for the new opening for the daily show. Brandon Thurston of Wrestlenomics will join us for Friday’s show. The daily show is live weekdays at 1 p.m. ET on the POST YouTube.
POST SCHEDULE
Tonight: Rewind-A-Raw with John & Wai [11:15 p.m. ET]
Tuesday: upNXT with Braden Herrington & Davie Portman
Wednesday: Shot in the Dark with John Siino
Wednesday: Rewind-A-Dynamite [10:15 p.m.]
Thursday: The Wellness Policy with Wai Ting & Jordan Goodman [Live at 1 p.m. ET for Patrons]
Thursday: MCU L8R with WH Park & Karen Peterson [Patreon]
Friday: Rewind-A-SmackDown with John & Wai [11:15 p.m.]
Saturday: The NWA Podcast with Nate Milton, Kris Ealy & Andrew Thompson
Sunday: Wrestlenomics Radio with Brandon Thurston & Chris Gullo
WRESTLING NEWS
**Tonight’s edition of WWE Raw takes place from the Xcel Energy Center in St. Paul, Minnesota. They are advertising the following for tonight:
*Bobby Lashley answers for his actions from last week
The tag match between The Mysterios and The Street Profits scheduled for tonight has been pushed to 12/27 with the company citing “injuries” to both teams.
BREAKING: Due to injuries suffered by both The #StreetProfits and The Mysterios, @sarahschreib reveals that the RK-Bro-nament Finals have been pushed back. #WWERaw pic.twitter.com/TrLykayxug
— WWE (@WWE) December 13, 2021
**Our condolences go out to the family and friends of Jimmy Rave, who has passed away at 39 years of age. Rave underwent so much hardship over the last few years due to his health situation that resulted in amputations of his arm and both legs and mounting medical expenses so that no one in his position should have ever been saddled with. He was a great talent that came up through Georgia and had his strongest runs with Ring of Honor and TNA during the 2000s as a member of The Embassy and The Rock ‘n’ Rave Infection. His admitted drug issues impacted his second run with Ring of Honor in 2009 when the promotion was airing on HDNet, although was used several more times in the following years but nothing permanent. He wrestled until the end of 2019 and revealed his health situation in November of last year regarding the amputation of his arm and then revealed both legs being amputated in a post several months ago. It’s such a sad story and I want to express my condolences to his family for the loss of such a young man at 39, who leaves behind two children and it’s truly heartbreaking. For a further look at his career, we have an obit on the site.
**Amanda Huber penned a beautiful tribute on her late husband, Jon, as today would have been their tenth wedding anniversary. The Players’ Tribune piece was a glowing tribute with Amanda sharing the struggles their relationship endured and what fatherhood did for Jon. There was a great insight into Jon’s view of his career, always feeling like an underdog and always feeling he could achieve more. While it’s a unique perspective to the career side, this is more about the heartbreak of a family losing a husband and a father without any warning signs, who all of sudden got sick and whose health rapidly declined and sadly passed away in December of last year. It was heart-wrenching to read about Brodie Jr. asking about the fate of his father and Amanda being adamant to not lie to her children about the realistic situation involving Jon. The closing paragraphs included the story of Amanda reaching out to Jon’s close friends Cody Rhodes and Ettore “Big E.” Ewen, who immediately got to Jacksonville to be with the Hubers as Jon took a turn for the worse and it became a dire situation.
**The ROH Final Battle card ended up being more of a feel-good show than ending things on a downer, which it easily could have been. Ian Riccaboni was the star of the show in many ways as he was the perfect voice for the type of event it was designed to be with a heavy nod to the past, endless shout-outs to the people that kept the train moving for the company, while also being honest with the viewer that the future is uncertain. They ended the show noting that they would see everyone in April with a graphic at the end of the show about a “new era” beginning in 2022. There was hardly any promotion for the future or a date advertised for Supercard of Honor, which I would have wanted to hammer across the audience’s head. The taped messages were a nice touch including ones from CM Punk, Bryan Danielson, and The Young Bucks. The most newsworthy events included Deonna Purrazzo issuing a challenge for women’s champion Rok-C, The Briscoes brawling with FTR for an inevitable match down the road, and EC3 introducing “Titan” (the former Braun Strowman) for a beatdown of Eli Isom, Brian Johnson, and Dak Draper before taking the three with them to the back. It was unique in that all three angles will likely lead to follow-up and matches in the future outside of ROH while using the promotion’s pay-per-view to kick off those stories.
**Fightful’s Sean Ross Sapp reported on a nasty incident from the World Class Revolution card this past Saturday in Irving, Texas. There was an incident involving Devon Nicholson a.k.a. ‘Hannibal’, who was working under a mask as ‘Bloodhunter’ on the show. There was an angle with Nicholson attacking referee Lando Deltoro, that was said to have gone way too far resulting in several lacerations that required medical attention. Fellow referee Colby Cowperthwaite shared his firsthand account from ringside in a Reddit post noting that cops were called with Cowperthwaite stating Nicholson went too far and called it an “assault”. The Fightful report states charges have not been pressed but are a possibility. There were people at the event that said Deltoro went into shock afterward and tore an artery. A GoFundMe campaign has been launched to assist Deltoro with his injuries from the attack. Deltoro posted the following photo with an update after the attack:
Recovering at home, still a big fuzzy and pain, yes lots of pain. But I’ll live. Thanks you all for out pouring of love and support .
I am a firm believer that if you put good out into the world, good will return to you #downbutnotout pic.twitter.com/0bE71rWbtP— Lando Deltoro God’s perfect idiot (@Elcucuyfeo) December 13, 2021
**Sports Business Journal listed Vince McMahon, Stephanie McMahon-Levesque, and Nick Khan among its most influential media influencers. From the piece:
There is clearly a repositioning of the WWE to a media business under Khan, who joined the company from CAA Sports in August 2020, especially with the move to Peacock as part of a five-year deal reported to be more than $1 billion. High-profile projects include a multipart Netflix docuseries on Vince McMahon’s life and a deal with Blumhouse Television on a scripted series about the WWE in the 1990s.
**Here are the matches for AEW Dark: Elevation at 7 p.m. ET tonight on its YouTube channel:
*Thunder Rosa vs. Gabby Ortiz
*The Gunn Club vs. Joey Sweets, Antonio Zambrano & Jack Tomlinson
*Santana & Ortiz vs. Anthony Gangone & Mike Verna w/ Prince Nana
**NXT 2.0 has added a match between Dakota Kai and Cora Jade for Tuesday night.
**Takashi Sugiura will face Masakatsu Funaki in the main event of Pro Wrestling NOAH’s card at Korakuen Hall on Monday, December 27th.
**After traveling home to Japan last month, WWE performer Sarray announced she is returning to the U.S.
**The WWE stock closed at $48.12 on Monday.
MMA NEWS
**The announced attendance for UFC 269 on Saturday was 18,471 and a sellout at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas with a gate of $8 million.
**The Fight of the Night bonus was awarded to Dominick Cruz and Pedro Munhoz with Performance of the Night bonuses given to Charles Oliveira, Julianna Pena, Kai Kara-France, Sean O’Malley, Tai Tuivasa, and Bruno Silva with each receiving $50,000.
The live gate would be the sixth-largest MMA gate in the history of the state of Nevada topping the rematch between Conor McGregor and Nate Diaz from August 2016 for that spot. The top five are Khabib Nurmagomedov vs. McGregor ($17.2 million), McGregor vs. Donald Cerrone ($11.1), UFC 200 ($10.7), Jose Aldo vs. McGregor ($10.0), and the first fight between McGregor and Diaz in March 2016 ($8.2). If you remove the McGregor cards, UFC 269 would be the second-highest in Nevada behind UFC 200, which was a loaded card originally featuring Jon Jones vs. Daniel Cormier that was changed to Anderson Silva vs. Cormier the week of the fight along with Brock Lesnar vs. Mark Hunt and Miesha Tate vs. Amanda Nunes.
**Amanda Nunes suffered her first loss since September 2014 on Saturday night in one of the biggest upsets in UFC history. Julianna Pena overcame the first round, which Nunes dominated but tired in the process. Nunes was significantly affected as the second round began as Pena began to pepper with her jab and was landing constantly, sending Nunes down a road of overextending herself with big strikes that sped up her fatigue. With Nunes hurt, Pena took her down and secured a choke that Nunes immediately tapped to. It ended her reign as women’s bantamweight champion that lasted 1,981 days going back to July 9, 2016, when she defeated Miesha Tate in the same arena at UFC 200. In terms of upsets, this would rank right alongside Matt Serra’s win over Georges St-Pierre at UFC 69, Holly Holm beating Ronda Rousey at UFC 193, and Rameau Thierry Sokoudjou knocking out Antonio Rogerio Nogueira at PRIDE 33 (if you were not following the sport at the time, that upset was massive in 2007 and then followed up with a KO of Ricardo Arona two months later).
For Nunes, she defended the 135-pound title five times during that period while also becoming the women’s featherweight champion and has defended that title twice. For the health of the division, it makes for a more intriguing division with past challengers now having a second life in the case of Miesha Tate (who is coming off a loss) or Holly Holm to try and get back to the title picture. Of course, Nunes should be the first one to challenge Pena and receive her immediate rematch when she is ready to return. No one is unbeatable and time will always be undefeated where world-beaters will one day collide with the inevitable reality of the sport. It’s not to say Nunes is incapable of regaining the title or that she’s not an elite fighter, on that night she had one good round and had little output remaining for the duration. Several years ago, I looked at Pena as a significant threat in the division given her wrestling skill and top control that created a prospect out of the TUF winner. She took a hiatus after giving birth and came back with wins against Nicco Montano and Sara McMann while being submitted by Germaine de Randamie, which drew criticism for her path towards a title fight but there were few options given Nunes’ long list of fighters she had dispatched.
At the press conference, Dana White said that if Nunes had won, a fight with Kayla Harrison would have been huge. Harrison was shown on the broadcast of UFC 269 in the crowd and obviously, there is great interest and that line by White suggests Harrison is close. The funny thing is that Nunes is still the 145-pound champion and that would be the weight class for Harrison, who fights at 155 but did make a successful cut to 145 for Invicta FC. There is nothing stopping them from making a fight between Nunes and Harrison for the featherweight title but there is probably going to be a sizable demand for a rematch between Nunes and Pena first.
**Charles Oliveira made his first defense of the lightweight championship by submitting Dustin Poirier in the third round of Saturday’s main event. It was an exceptionally tough loss for Poirier, who came up short once again for the 155-pound championship. While Poirier was interim champion in 2019, he has never won the official title with a previous loss to Khabib Nurmagomedov prior to the Oliveira loss. Poirier may go down in history as the greatest UFC fighter to never win a title as his record is superlative. He is 32 years old and it’s hard to say he’ll never challenge for the title again especially in a division like lightweight where the change on top is inevitable and Poirier has shown an amazing ability to compete at the top of the division for so long. The question is the mileage piling up after thirty-six professional fights and the hunger to start another campaign to get back to the title. The strength of this pay-per-view number will be added currency for Poirier if he is a proven draw on his own without Conor McGregor. The live gate was a strong indicator of this card’s success and Poirier became the biggest star on the card once Jorge Masvidal had to withdraw from the fight with Leon Edwards.
For Oliveira, it’s an amazing ascension for a fighter that was always among the most skilled as a submission fighter but was plagued by weight cutting issues at featherweight and never seemed like he would advance to the top level of the sport. The permanent home at lightweight was a boon for his career and now possesses a ten-fight winning stream and 155-pound title. There is a crazy stat that of Oliveira’s 29 fights in the UFC, only three have gone the distance and only once during this current win streak. It would appear Justin Gaethje is the automatic choice to fight Oliveira next and that’s a big fight given the styles involved with both elevating their star status over the past year inside the loaded weight class.
Conor McGregor is always looming, and the rules don’t apply to him when it comes to matchmaking with the notion of McGregor fighting for the title in 2022 hardly one that is worth dismissing. The fact is a prime McGregor would present a lot of problems for Oliveira and it’s a more compelling fight than many of the options out there although it would be a mockery of the matchmaking for McGregor to leapfrog anyone. I’m not terribly interested in the fourth fight between McGregor and Poirier much economics suggest I’d be in the minority. Once McGregor is healthy, a fight with Michael Chandler would be a strong option and give us a better indication of where McGregor stands competitively, and both would promote that fight effectively. Nate Diaz has one fight remaining on his UFC deal and that’s a trilogy that everyone wants to see and is another in a long line of big fights they could pull the trigger on.
**The UFC will end their year with one more Fight Night card this Saturday from the UFC Apex. The card will be headlined by a heavyweight fight between Derrick Lewis and Chris Daukaus. There is also a welterweight fight between Belal Muhammad and Stephen Thompson, which is a great fight and would be an important win for Muhammad. After Saturday, the promotion will not return until January 15th. The next pay-per-view is UFC 270 on January 22nd with Francis Ngannou vs. Ciryl Gane to unify the heavyweight championship and the third fight between Brandon Moreno and Deiveson Figueiredo for the flyweight championship.
ON THIS DATE
WCW presented Starrcade in 1989 from The Omni that featured two round-robin Iron Man tournaments. The singles tournament was won by Sting while The Road Warriors won the tag team tournament where the participants had to wrestle multiple times throughout the card.
Steve Austin and Booker T’s grocery store fight on SmackDown in 2001:
The “Championship Ascension” ceremony on Raw in 2013 in Seattle with an extremely pro-Daniel Bryan audience:
*****
Wrestlenomics: The flow of talent from AEW to WWE
AEW and WWE’s views on talent development appear to be diverging. Brandon Thurston and Chris Gullo discuss WWE’s announcement of college athlete signings to its new NIL program.
*****
UFC 269 POST Show: Oliveira vs. Poirier, Nunes vs. Pena
Phil Chertok and Eric Marcotte are back to review UFC 269 featuring Charles Oliveira vs. Dustin Poirier and Amanda Nunes vs. Julianna Peña in one of the biggest upsets in UFC history.
*****
ROH Final Battle POST Show
John Pollock is joined by Mike Murray and WH Park to review ROH Final Battle 2021: End of an Era from Baltimore, Maryland.
*****
The Long & Winding Royal Road: Kawada vs. Misawa (May 1, 1998)
On this month’s Long & Winding Royal Road, WH Park is joined by Dylan Fox (The Eastern Lariat) to look at an important match in the Toshiaki Kawada vs. Mitsuharu Misawa rivalry from AJPW’s 25th Anniversary Show at the Tokyo Dome on May 1, 1998.
*****
REWIND-A-SMACKDOWN: Hook debuts on AEW Rampage
Wai Ting & Kate from MTL review AEW Rampage featuring the debut of HOOK and WWE SmackDown featuring more from Sami Zayn & Brock Lesnar as well as the debut of Xia Li.
*****
MCU L8R: Hawkeye Ep. 4 “Partners, Am I Right?”
Wai Ting & WH Park are joined by JoJo Remy to discuss Hawkeye Episode 4, Charlie Cox’s confirmation as MCU’s Daredevil, and the incredible hype surrounding next week’s Spider-Man: No Way Home release.
*****
BWE: RevPro Uprising, NXT UK, WWE Releases
Martin Bushby, Benno & Andy Ogden review the latest from RevPro, NXT UK, Will Ospreay at Wrestle Kingdom 16 and the latest WWE releases of Drake Maverick & Tegan Nox.
*****
REWIND-A-DYNAMITE 12/8: CM Punk & MJF on Long Island
John Pollock & Wai Ting review AEW Dynamite from the UBS Arena on Long Island with MJF’s homecoming, CM Punk’s heel promo, and the return of Trent.
*****
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