POST IT NOTES
**Rewind-A-Raw is live tonight at 11 p.m. ET with a review of the show from Ottawa. Wai Ting and I will also be discussing a lot of news coming out of the weekend including our thoughts on Battle in the Valley, re-watching Roman Reigns vs. Sami Zayn, and lots more tonight.
**On Tuesday, we will have a special show for POST Wrestling Café members with a review of the Keiji Muto retirement card from the Tokyo Dome, which will be released Tuesday evening for Café members.
**WH Park and Karen Peterson have a Battle in the Valley POST Show available to all POST Wrestling Café members.
**Jon Pine reviewed Jimmy Lloyd’s All Grown Up and GCW’s Middle of the Night cards from this past weekend.
POST SCHEDULE
Tonight: Rewind-A-Raw with John Pollock & Wai Ting
Tuesday: Keiji Muto Final Countdown POST Show (Patreon)
Tuesday: upNXT with Davie Portman & Braden Herrington
Wednesday: Rewind-A-Dynamite with John & Wai
Thursday: Pollock & Thurston Interview – Labor Attorney Lucas Middlebrook
Thursday: MCU L8R – Ant-Man & The Wasp Quantumania (Patreon)
Friday: Rewind-A-SmackDown with Wai Ting & Kate from Montreal (Patreon)
Saturday: IMPACT No Surrender POST Show with John Pollock & John Siino (Patreon)
Saturday: The N.W.A. Podcast
Sunday: Wrestlenomics Radio
WRESTLING NEWS
**There was a great update from Josh Wharton that Gracie Pugh is now home from the hospital along with her sister, Jayleigh, who was released over a week ago following the car wreck that took the life of their father, Jamin a.k.a. Jay Briscoe. Gracie will require outpatient care five days per week and was scheduled to start today. Gracie has normal feelings in both of her legs and has been doing some assisted walking. They are still hoping for more movement belong the knee, but they are hopeful for continued improvement.
**Raw takes place from the Canadian Tire Centre in Ottawa, Ontario with their third event in Canada since Friday. WrestleTix reports over 7,800 tickets distributed for the event tonight and would put the estimated number of tickets distributed for the three shows in Canada since Friday at nearly 35,000. The following has been advertised for tonight’s show at 8 p.m. ET:
*United States Championship: Austin Theory © vs. Edge
*Mustafa Ali vs. Dolph Ziggler
*The Miz vs. Seth Rollins
**The 39-year career of Keiji Muto is scheduled to end on Tuesday morning when Muto walks the ramp one final time at the Tokyo Dome to cap off a lengthy retirement series. While the caveat for pro wrestling retirements is always there, this should be Muto’s final match after a career where he mortgaged his health for decades and wore his knees to the grindstone as he continually turned back the hands of time. From his first match in October 1984 against Masahiro Chono to his final battle with Tetsuya Naito on Tuesday, he is among an elite class of all-time legends, who was involved in some of the biggest matches of the ‘90s and when it appeared to be winded down, shaved his head and reinvented himself in 2001 as he went on to have a career year not to mention tacking on another two-plus decades from that point. The retirement series has been a boon for Pro Wrestling NOAH has placed the promotion in a big spotlight and will see NOAH return to the Tokyo Dome for the first time since 2005. Whether NOAH can sustain itself once the Muto story ends is a tougher proposition, but it isn’t for lack of trying. The setup between Kazuchika Okada and NOAH’s Kaito Kiyomiya saw one of the best angles in recent memory with the recreation of the incident involving Akira Maeda kicking Riki Choshu in the face, which was a major historical event in Japanese wrestling history. The match will see New Japan and NOAH’s respective champions meet in a singles match with the hope that Kiyomiya is seen as an equal and comes out of this program with a larger stock among the audience with heightened credibility.
The card is available through Wrestle Universe as a separate pay-per-view purchase for 4,000 yen (approximately $30 U.S.) with a loaded lineup involving many promotions sending talent for the big send-off show for Muto. Below is the card, which begins late tonight at 2 a.m. ET:
*Final Countdown: Keiji Muto vs. Tetsuya Naito
*Kazuchika Okada vs. Kaito Kiyomiya
*Hiromu Takahashi vs. AMAKUSA
*Taiji Ishimori & Gedo vs. NOSAWA Rongai & MAZADA
*Kento Miyahara, Suwama & Yuma Aoyagi vs. Kenoh, Katsuhiko Nakajima & Manabu Soya
*Shun Skywalker, KAI & Diamante vs. Naomichi Marufuji, Hijo de Dr. Wagner Jr. & Ninja Mack
*MAO, Toi Kojima, Shunma Katsumata & Yuki Ueno vs. Tetsuya Endo, Hideki Okatani, Yuya Koroku & Takeshi Masada
*Yoshinari Ogawa, Eita, HAYATA, Chris Ridgeway & Daga vs. Atsushi Kotoge, YO-HEY, Seiki Yoshioka, Alejandro & Junta Miyawaki
*Takashi Sugiura, Satoshi Kojima & Timothy Thatcher vs. Jake Lee, Jack Morris & Anthony Greene
*Yuka Sakazaki, Miyu Yamashita, Shoko Nakajima & Rika Tatsumi vs. Mizuki, Maki Ito, Miu Watanabe & Yuki Arai
*Masa Kitamiya & Daiki Inaba vs. Yoshiki Inamura & Yasutaka Yano
**SLAM Wrestling’s Steven Johnson was able to confirm Lorne Corlett a.k.a. Karl Von Steiger’s passing, which occurred last November due to congestive heart failure. It turns out that Corlett and his wife Patricia legally changed their names to Karl Von Steiger and Patricia Von Steiger in 1982. Von Steiger came up in Winnipeg and became part of the heel German team alongside Kurt Von Steiger (Arnold Pastrick) and began teaming in Stampede Wrestling around 1967. The duo had a big run in Oregon where they won the NWA Pacific Northwest tag titles seven times between 1968 and 1971 before finally losing them to the Royal Kangaroos in July 1971. They also won tag titles in San Francisco for Big Time Wrestling, World Championship Wrestling in Australia, and in Hawaii where they feuded with Pedro Morales & Ed Francis over the belts and lost them for the last time to Ripper Collins & Curtis Iaukea. In the article, includes the story of the Von Steigers winning the AWA tag titles from Mad & Butcher Vachon in February 1971 in Portland but was only recognized in that territory as the Vachons dropped the titles without the permission of promoter Verne Gagne as they were off to Japan for a tour and it became a trivia note.
**Actor Richard Belzer died on Sunday at the age of 78. The Law & Order: SVU actor had a notorious incident with Hulk Hogan in March 1985 on Belzer’s show “Hot Properties”. Hogan and Mr. T appeared on the show several days before the first WrestleMania when the two were doing a media blitz. Belzer prodded Hogan into demonstrating a hold on him which led to Hogan applying a standing guillotine that led to Belzer crashing to the hard floor and was unconscious. After a few moments, he popped to his feet and threw to the commercial before turning his back to the camera and showing blood trickling from the back of his head. It was a surreal scene after the break as a producer sat in for Belzer and they acknowledged he was really hurt. Hogan apologized while Mr. T gave a warning regarding how pro wrestling was real and dangerous and cited the 20/20 piece involving John Stossel not believing it was real and T turned it into a plug for WrestleMania. Later, Belzer filed a $5 million lawsuit, which was settled out of court in late 1989.
**Scott Fishman of TV Insider spoke with Mercedes Moné prior to her match with KAIRI at Battle in the Valley where Moné described her status as being a free agent and is open to wrestling anywhere:
The thing is I’m a free agent. It doesn’t matter with New Japan. I can go anywhere. I can go to New Japan, Impact, Mexico, Germany, Europe. The potential matchups are endless. The same for New Japan. I know they have partnerships with CMLL, Impact, AEW. To be a fan and watch all these matchups from all parts of the world is amazing. I know there is a little woman in Impact I would love to face one day, Mickie James! We’ll see what is in the stars.
**SmackDown Women’s Champion Charlotte Flair appeared on behalf of WWE at the Daytona 500 over the weekend and was interviewed by the Daytona Beach News-Journal. Flair was asked about the changes to the company since Paul Levesque took over as the head of creative from Vince McMahon last summer:
I haven’t really noticed a difference because I feel, as a performer, that my job is just to make my boss happy. Whoever is in the seat is your boss. Maybe if I was new, I would feel a difference, but I’m on more of the seasoned vet side. I don’t feel like there is as much maneuvering or trying to build a new character.
Flair explained why she is not in favor of unifying the women’s titles:
I don’t recommend a unification program because I feel that would mean less opportunities for the women. It was cool for one of the girls to have both titles at one time, but it takes a lot of spots away.
**Yuji Nagata will make his first defense of the Triple Crown on 3/21 against Shuji Ishikawa at Ota Ward City Gymnasium. Nagata defeated Kento Miyahara on Sunday to become the fifth man to hold the IWGP, GHC, and Triple Crown championships during their career.
**Last Thursday’s episode of IMPACT Wrestling averaged 92,000 viewers and 0.02 in the 18-49 demographic, ranking #145 among cable originals that day. (Showbuzz Daily)
**The WWE stock closed at $87.98 on Monday.
*****
NJPW Battle in the Valley POST Show
WH Park & Karen Peterson cover NJPW’s Battle in the Valley card with Kazuchika Okada vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi and KAIRI vs. Mercedes Monè.
*****
WRESTLENOMICS RADIO: The business of WWE Elimination Chamber
Brandon Thurston, Jesse Collings, and Chris Gullo discuss Triple H’s thoughts on a potential WWE sale. Brandon shares his experience at Elimination Chamber.
*****
WWE Elimination Chamber POST Show
John Pollock and Wai Ting are in Montreal to review WWE Elimination Chamber 2023 featuring Sami Zayn vs. Roman Reigns for the Undisputed Universal Championship.
*****
THE LONG & WINDING ROYAL ROAD
John Siino and WH Park chat about a PWF World Junior Heavyweight Championship match between Rob Van Dam and Dan Kroffat from June 9, 1995.
*****
REWIND-A-SMACKDOWN
John Pollock & Wai Ting are live in Montreal after attending tonight’s WWE SmackDown featuring Sami Zayn’s homecoming ahead of Elimination Chamber.
*****
THE STORY OF SAMI ZAYN
John Pollock of POST Wrestling is joined by historian, reporter & author Pat Laprade to discuss the story of Sami Zayn.
*****
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