POST IT NOTES
**Former WWE head writer Brian Gewirtz spoke with us about his new book “There’s Just One Problem…”, which comes out on Tuesday, and his time working for WWE from 1999-2015. Gewirtz spoke about his early days during the infancy of the writing staff, his contentious relationship with Paul Heyman during that era, the brand split of 2002, Vince McMahon out of WWE, and the changes, and being an introverted person in a world like professional wrestling. This was a really interesting chat with someone that had a very low public profile prior to this book tour.
**Due to the sudden announcement of WWE’s second-quarter earnings call on Tuesday morning, Brandon Thurston and I will be doing a show in the afternoon to go over the report and the call with analysts.
**Rewind-A-Raw is live at 11 p.m. ET tonight and Nate Milton will be my co-host to review the show and discuss the latest news in the industry. We will be live on the POST YouTube channel and the podcast will be posted late tonight.
**Karen Peterson and I did a free G1 Climax podcast on Sunday going through the Saturday & Sunday cards along with a preview of Tuesday’s matches at Nippon Budokan and the various scenarios. There is both an audio and video version of the show.
**Mike Murray will be joining me on Tuesday afternoon for a review of New Japan’s first of three cards at Nippon Budokan and the final round-robin matches. This show will be available for POST Wrestling Café members and we’ll have separate shows on Wednesday & Thursday with Bruce Lord to conclude our G1 coverage this year.
POST SCHEDULE
Tonight: Rewind-A-Raw with John Pollock & Nate Milton
Tuesday: G1 Climax – Day 18 Podcast w/ Pollock & Mike Murray (Patreon)
Tuesday: WWE Q2 Earnings Report with guest Brandon Thurston
Tuesday: upNXT with Braden Herrington & Davie Portman
Wednesday: G1 Climax – Day 19 Podcast w/ Pollock & Bruce Lord (Patreon)
Wednesday: Rewind-A-Dynamite with Davie Portman
Wednesday: Shot in the Dark w/ John Siino
Thursday: G1 Climax – Finals w/ Pollock & Bruce Lord (Patreon)
Thursday: The Wellness Policy w/ Jordan Goodman & Neal Flanagan (3 p.m. ET)
Friday: Rewind-A-SmackDown w/ Pollock & Kate from Montreal
Saturday: UFC 278 POST Show w/ Pollock & Phil Chertok
Sunday: The N.W.A. Podcast w/ Nate Milton, Kris Ealy & Andrew Thompson
Sunday: Wrestlenomics Radio w/ Brandon Thurston & Chris Gullo
G1 CLIMAX
The first of three shows at Nippon Budokan takes place Tuesday at 5 a.m. ET on New Japan World with eight final round-robin matches to determine the four block winners.
*A BLOCK: Kazuchika Okada vs. Lance Archer – The winner advances, Okada only needs a draw
*A BLOCK: JONAH vs. Bad Luck Fale – Even if JONAH wins, he is out due to losses to both Okada and Archer. Okada and Archer fighting to a no contest and receiving zero points with JONAH winning would have him tied with Okada at eight points and have the tiebreaker win.
*B BLOCK: Jay White vs. Tama Tonga – The winner advances
*B BLOCK: SANADA vs. Tomohiro Ishii – No effect on the outcome of the block winner
*C BLOCK: Zack Sabre Jr. vs. Tetsuya Naito – If Sabre wins or draws, he wins, Naito needs a win and a Goto loss to advance
*C BLOCK: Hirooki Goto vs. EVIL – If Goto wins and Naito wins, it’s a three-way tie with Sabre
*D BLOCK: Shingo Takagi vs. El Phantasmo – If Takagi wins, he wins the block and has the tiebreaker over Ospreay
*D BLOCK: Will Ospreay vs. Juice Robinson – If Ospreay wins, he needs Takagi to either lose or draw to advance. If Takagi and Ospreay both lose, it’s a seven-way tie with all the block members.
It seems likely that it’s Okada vs. White in the one semi-final. The C Block is the one where I can see a playoff match taking place on Wednesday and the winner would have to have another match that night against the D Block winner. My original thought was Naito vs. Takagi in the semi-final and that’s still my pick. Naito and Takagi have only had one singles match in their history and this is one of the only times they have a chance to do it given the tournament format for the stablemates. Naito was supposed to wrestle Takagi last year but was injured against ZSJ and removed from the G1. If White loses to Okada in the semi-final and Naito wins the G1, that’s two major opponents for White to defend the title against in the future.
POST Wrestling will have three more G1 podcasts this week for POST Wrestling Café members – all of the shows, written reports, and contest updates can be found in our G1 Climax section.
WRESTLING NEWS
**WWE announced that its delayed second-quarter earnings report will be released Tuesday morning with a conference call to follow at 8:30 a.m. ET. The dominant topic will likely center around Vince McMahon’s resignation and the new leadership tandem of Nick Khan and Stephanie McMahon-Levesque. The board of directors’ investigation is ongoing and that will probably limit what the key speakers can discuss but for analysts, that is the major focus.
From a financial perspective, the company did release preliminary expectations for the quarter by projecting $327.8 million in revenue and $49.0 million in net income with $0.55 earnings per share. The company has not experienced any type of financial windfall in the wake of Vince McMahon’s exit and its financial picture looks extremely healthy as they enter its next round of U.S. media rights negotiations, which expire in September 2024.
Brandon Thurston has a big analysis of his projections for the quarter and for 2022 for those that subscribe to Wrestlenomics on Patreon.
**WWE Raw takes place from the Capital One Arena in Washington, D.C., and airs at 8 p.m. ET on the USA Network. The show has been notably improved over the past two weeks as varying degrees of change have been evident in the make-up of the show, although Raw is the toughest with the three-hour format and there are only so many ways to thread that needle. General observations have been a concerted effort to produce better wrestling content and mainly consisting of clean finishes, although that has come with exceptions. The structure of the matches has also incorporated many more false finishes and matches getting the time necessary such as Bobby Lashley and Ciampa last week and a really strong Gunther vs. Shinsuke Nakamura match on SmackDown. Clearly, one of the priorities is elevating the secondary titles including strong video packages before the title defenses from Lashley and Gunther. That initiative will take some time as there are plenty of fans who have never lived through an era of WWE when those titles meant anything and it should have been a major focus when consolidating the two top titles and having fewer dates on Roman Reigns. Raw is clear of major competition for another month until Monday Night Football resumes on September 12th.
Below are the matches announced for tonight’s show:
*United States Championship: Bobby Lashley (champion) vs. AJ Styles
*Women’s Tag Title Tournament: Alexa Bliss & Asuka vs. Nikki A.S.H. & Doudrop
*Riddle to appear
**On Monday’s edition of Being the Elite, the majority focused on Hangman Page turning down The Young Bucks’ offer to be part of their team in the Trios tournament and to find someone that didn’t turn their back on the Bucks. The episode ended with Matt Jackson receiving a phone call and asking the person on the other line if they were sure, and whether they were ready. The scene cut with a second of music that sounded like the start of Kenny Omega’s “Battle Cry” theme. The Bucks & their partner will face Andrade El Idolo, Rush & Dragon Lee this Wednesday on Dynamite from Charleston, West Virginia.
**Kevin Kelly was interviewed on Wrestling Observer Radio to promote the final three nights of the G1 Climax. Kelly noted that several of the G1 participants have stated they would prefer having their big singles matches closer together rather than the long breaks between tournament matches. He noted that he never knows the outcome of a match ahead of time and was genuinely surprised when David Finlay beat Will Ospreay. Kelly said he will definitely be part of the New Japan & Stardom crossover event in November. In terms of the format, he seemed to prefer the prior one of two blocks rather than four and that having two blocks with ten performers in each was ideal.
**Below is the lineup for AEW Dark Elevation at 7 p.m. ET tonight and taped last week:
*Thunder Rosa, Toni Storm & Hikaru Shida vs. Emi Sakura, Marina Shafir & Nyla Rose
*Konosuke Takeshita vs. Cezar Bononi
*Private Party vs. Jah-C & JDX
*The Acclaimed vs. Justin Fowler & JT Energy
*Julia Hart vs. Free-Range Kara
*Tony Nese & Josh Woods vs. Travis Titan & Arik Cannon
*John Silver, Alex Reynolds, Evil Uno & Preston Vance vs. T.U.G. Cooper, Drew System, Rylie Jackson & Adam Grace
*Serena Deeb vs. Sierra
*Penelope Ford vs. Heather Reckless
**Next month, AEW returns to Washington, D.C for two nights at the Entertainment & Sports Arena on October 5 & 7. It’s the same city where the first Dynamite took place in October 2019 and coincides with the three-year anniversary of the program. Wednesday is a live edition of Dynamite and Friday they will be taping both Rampage and Battle of the Belts IV. Presumably, BOTB will air the next night on TNT and that’s noteworthy as that would mean it will be airing head-to-head with WWE’s Extreme Rules event, although it’s a rare weekend off for the UFC. IMPACT is also running its Bound for Glory pay-per-view on that Friday night and that’s going to be a tough night for IMPACT going against both WWE & AEW programming. The last time AEW ran Washington, they did two nights at the same venue in January and drew 3,500 and 2,800 paid respectively, according to the Wrestling Observer Newsletter.
**A&E’s Biography will cover Edge this Sunday and Rey Mysterio on Sunday, August 28th. WWE Rivals will profile Edge vs. John Cena this Sunday, and Mysterio vs. Eddy Guerrero the following week.
**The death of Jo Lynn Smith Rogers is explored on the latest Crack House Chronicles podcast. Smith was the sibling of Sam Houston, Jake Roberts, and Rockin’ Robin and daughter of Grizzly Smith, who was kidnapped in and killed in 1979 amid mysterious circumstances that never led to a murder charge because the body was never found. The story was discussed on Dark Side of the Ring covering Grizzly Smith. Sam Houston is interviewed on the podcast as well as private investigator Jim Terry, who investigated the kidnapping.
**Andrew Gordon Macpherson has been nominated for a Canadian Screen Music Award (CASMA) for his work on Dark Side of the Ring. Macpherson is nominated for Best Original Score for a Non-Fiction Series or Limited Series.
MMA NEWS
**Shane Burgos announced on The MMA Hour on Monday that he has signed with the PFL after finishing the last fight on his UFC deal last month. Burgos said he is expecting to start at featherweight in the PFL but may move up to lightweight in the following season as he said he’s getting tired of the cut to make 145 pounds. Burgos said he is looking at fighting before the end of the year in a non-tournament fight and “most likely” would be at featherweight. Burgos fought for the UFC since 2016 and has a 15-3 record overall. Burgos is coming off wins against Billy Quarantillo and Charles Jourdain, who he beat on July 16th on Long Island. During his UFC stretch, he went 8-3 with losses to Calvin Kattar, Josh Emmett, and Edson Barboza.
**Saturday’s UFC Fight Night card featured one of the greatest fights in recent memory between Nate Landwehr and David Onama. This fight was right out of a movie with the swings in momentum and sheer insanity the fight produced. Landwehr was dropped in the first round and appeared to be out and managed to survive an onslaught from Onama. Landwehr responded with a 10-8 round in the second and was extremely animated for the audience by walking away from Onama on the ground, flexing and getting the audience to go wild. Landwehr won the third round and received a majority decision win. You could argue the first round was also a 10-8 for Onama but the judges scored it 10-9 for Onama. All three scored the second round 10-8 for Landwehr and the third for Landwehr 10-9 across the board. This will be an easy contender for fight of the year and will greatly elevate Landwehr as a marketable star for his next fight. Obviously, these two received the fight of the night bonus.
**The card was headlined by Marlon Vera stopping Dominick Cruz in the fourth round with a nasty kick to the face and three follow-up strikes with Cruz dropping chest first to the canvas after the kick. Vera looked tremendous in this fight and Cruz was doing well but ducked and left his head open for the kick, which was timed brilliantly by Vera. Vera has now won four in a row in the ultra-deep bantamweight division and this will do a lot for his stock at 135 pounds after previous wins against Frankie Edgar and Rob Font.
**The UFC card also featured an excellent women’s strawweight fight where Yazmin Jauregui beat Iasmin Lucindo by unanimous decision. On most cards, this would have been the fight of the night but the Landwehr vs. Onama fight was on a different level. The strawweight fight was all action for three rounds and the two threw caution to the wind and had several exchanges where they unloaded everything they had on the other. Jauregui won the fight on scores of 30-27, 29-28, and 29-28. I had it 29-28 and scored the first round for Lucindo, who is only 20 years old but has a 13-4 record and has been fighting pro since 2017 when she was fifteen years old.
**Saturday’s card drew an announced attendance of 12,804 and a gate of $1,735,904.91 to the Pechanga Arena in San Diego, California. For its live events, the promotion has been on fire this year and that streak continues in Salt Lake City this Saturday for the pay-per-view
**The UFC 278 countdown show has been released focusing on this Saturday’s main event between Kamaru Usman and Leon Edwards for the welterweight title and the middleweight fight between Paulo Costa and Luke Rockhold.
ON THIS DATE
SummerSlam took place in Toronto in 2004 where Randy Orton won his first world championship beating Chris Benoit in the main event. It was a puzzling follow-up period for Orton with Evolution turning on him the next night in London, casting Orton as a misguided babyface, and going to the elusive match against Triple H several weeks later at the Unforgiven pay-per-view where he lost the title immediately.
******
POST INTERVIEW: Former WWE head writer Brian Gewirtz
John Pollock is joined by former WWE head writer Brian Gewirtz to discuss his new book and working at WWE for over fifteen years.
*****
WRESTLENOMICS: Were Vince McMahon’s Trump Foundation payments unrecorded WWE expenses?
WWE stated Tuesday it found an additional $5 million in unrecorded company expenses related to two payments Vince McMahon made in 2007 and 2009. WWE gave a total of $5 million to the Trump Foundation in the two same years, according to IRS filings.
*****
REWIND-A-SMACKDOWN
John Pollock & Kate from Montreal review the Friday Night SmackDown featuring Gunther vs. Shinsuke Nakamura, and Bryan Danielson speaks on AEW Rampage.
*****
POST INTERVIEW: Pat Laprade, Author & Historian
John Pollock is joined by historian Pat Laprade to discuss WWE without Vince McMahon, AEW coming to Canada & researching pro wrestling.
*****
MCU L8R: She-Hulk Primer
WH Park & Rich Fann (PW Torch) present a primer for Marvel Studios’ latest Disney+ series, She-Hulk: Attorney at Law starring Tatiana Maslany. They welcome John Siino to discuss the show and Marvel’s SDCC announcements.
*****
REWIND-A-DYNAMITE: Quake by the Lake
John Pollock is joined by Davie Portman & Braden Herrington to review AEW’s Quake by the Lake featuring Jon Moxley vs. Chris Jericho.
*****
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