POST IT NOTES
**Rewind-A-Raw is live tonight at 11:05 p.m. ET on the POST YouTube channel with John Pollock & Wai Ting.
**Bruce Lord has a big preview of this year’s G1 Climax tournament, which kicks off this weekend. “Addition by Subtraction” previews the blocks and a look at the participants in this year’s G1 and what the key stories of the tournament are. Bruce Lord will be doing a show with Karen Peterson this Sunday on the POST Wrestling Café to review the first two nights of the G1.
**The feedback thread is open for this week’s Rewind-A-Wai show covering the WWF Invasion pay-per-view from 2001.
**The deadline to enter the G1 Climax Contest is this Thursday at 11:59 p.m. ET. It is free to join the contest by submitting your picks of the winners for all the tournament matches. The contest is sponsored by Chopped-Tees with the winner receiving a prize pack.
**Thanks to everyone who has checked out the POST Wrestling Media Panel we released on Sunday. The roundtable features Wai Ting, Brandon Thurston, Stephanie Chase, Benno, and I chatting about numerous subjects related to the industry with our own experiences and thoughts on the landscape.
POST SCHEDULE
Tonight: Rewind-A-Raw with John Pollock & Wai Ting
Tuesday: The Wellness Policy
Tuesday: upNXT
Wednesday: Pollock & Thurston w/ guest Walker Stewart
Wednesday: Rewind-A-Dynamite
Thursday: MCU L8R – “Deadpool” w/ guest JP Houlihan [POST Wrestling Café]
Friday: Rewind-A-Wai – WWF Invasion 2001 [POST Wrestling Café]
Friday: Rewind-A-SmackDown [POST Wrestling Café]
Saturday: TNA Slammiversary with John Pollock [POST Wrestling Café]
Saturday: Collision Course [FREE]
Sunday: G1 Climax – Day 1 & 2 with Bruce Lord & Karen Peterson [POST Wrestling Café]
WRESTLING NEWS
**The build toward SummerSlam continues with Raw tonight from the Nutter Center in Dayton, Ohio. The show is set to begin with Rhea Ripley speaking for the first time after last week’s return. There will also be a segment involving Drew McIntyre and Adam Pearce, which should make clear the status of the expected match with CM Punk, which has been building ever since Punk’s injury in January. The show will also air against ESPN’s coverage of the MLB Home Run Derby while NXT airs against the All-Star Game on Tuesday.
Below are the announced matches and segments for Raw:
*Intercontinental Championship: Sami Zayn © vs. Ilja Dragunov
*Bronson Reed vs. Sheamus
*Face-to-face segment with Damian Priest and Gunther
*Drew McIntyre returns from suspension
*Rhea Ripley starts the show
**There was an angle on The Pat McAfee Show when Pat was interviewing baseball reporter Jeff Passan. A box appeared in the studio and contained another VHS tape from The Wyatts, which will be played on Raw tonight.
Wyatt Sicks are messing with Pat Mcafee again.#wweraw pic.twitter.com/Zwa0UMBnL4
— FirstNameJ0hn (@FirstNameJ0hn) July 15, 2024
**WrestleTix reports nearly 8,600 tickets distributed for tonight’s edition of Raw.
**Friday Night SmackDown averaged 220,200 viewers and 99,600 in the 25-54 demographic on Sportsnet 360 in Canada this past week. The show ranked third among sports programming that day and second in the demo behind the CFL game between Calgary and Winnipeg. SmackDown topped the Toronto Blue Jays game in the demo for the night.
**Since AEW Collision was taped in Calgary, it aired on TSN 2 this past Saturday and averaged 31,000 viewers and 24,000 in the 25-54 demo. The UFC Fight Night card aired on Sportsnet 360 and averaged 14,000 viewers and 6,000 in the demo for the prelims, and 31,000 and 24,000 in the demo for the main card. Both programs aired against the Canada vs. Uruguay game in the Copa Americas tournament.
**Bryan Danielson was interviewed by SI.com about winning the Owen Hart Foundation Cup and looking up the tournament’s namesake. Danielson stated the series of matches with Hangman Page were never planned but has found an undeniable chemistry working with Page. He spoke of how he envisioned having a series of matches with Kenny Omega but to date, has only had one match from September 2021 at Arthur Ashe Stadium:
Me and Kenny, unfortunately, we’ve only had the one match. When I came to AEW, I envisioned having these series of matches with Kenny. Instead, it’s been Hangman, and I’ve learned firsthand how incredible he is.
Hangman’s the man. That dude’s awesome. When AEW started, he was the one everyone was pointing to as the future, as the guy who was going to lead the company forward. The personality he brings, the intensity–I think that’s where we find our chemistry. We both love these intense matches. There’s not a lot of pulled punches, right? And maybe that’s what makes the two of us so good together.
**WWE will be staging three events in Japan later this month. The promotion will be in Osaka on July 25 at Edion Arena and back-to-back nights at Sumo Hall on July 26 & July 27. The tour is advertising Meiko Satomura for the events, who hasn’t wrestled in a WWE ring since March 2023. The shows will overlap with the G1 Climax, which begins this weekend with two shows at Edion Arena on Saturday & Sunday.
**Pro Wrestling NOAH issued a notice that Daiki Inaba is out of action due to a meniscus injury. Inaba wrestled on the pre-show of this past weekend’s Destination pay-per-view with Manabu Soya & Masa Kitamiya against Kazuyuki Fujita, Shuhei Taniguchi, and Takashi Sugiura.
**NOAH returns to Korakuen Hall this Sunday with its Star Navigation tour and the card is headlined by Kaito Kiyomiya teaming with Jack Morris & Dragon Bane against Go Shiozaki, Ryohei Oiwa & Masa Kitamiya. There will be one title match on the card as Shuji Konda & Eita defend the GHC Jr. Heavyweight tag titles against Alejandro & Cristobal. The show will stream at 11:30 a.m. JST (10:30 p.m. ET on Saturday) on Wrestle Universe.
**The new Fishers Event Center in Indiana has announced the first slate of events including AEW running the arena on Wednesday, December 4 for Dynamite & Rampage. The arena lists a capacity of approximately 7,500 depending on its configuration and opens in November.
**PBS will be airing a documentary on the Dorton Arena in Raleigh, North Carolina during the era when Jim Crockett Promotions ran the building. The doc is titled When Giants Walked Here and is directed by Cliff Bumgardner. The Dorton Arena was a staple in the Mid-Atlantic territory where the promotion had television on WRAL and was run through 1993 several years after JCP was purchased by Turner Broadcasting. In 2022, Ricky Steamboat came out of retirement and teamed with FTR at the Dorton Arena for Big Time Wrestling. The doc will premiere on PBS North Carolina and stream nationally on the PBS app.
**C*4 Wrestling in Ottawa has announced a big match for its annual Fighting Back event on Friday, August 16. Donovan Dijak is set to face “Speedball” Mike Bailey at the Preston Event Centre with all proceeds from the show going to the Canadian Cancer Society. C*4 noted that all VIP tickets are sold out with general admission tickets still available.
**MLW has announced that KENTA will face AKIRA in the Opera Cup quarterfinals at its ‘Summer of the Beasts’ event on August 29 at the Melrose Ballroom. The event will stream for free on YouTube. KENTA defeated Bobby Fish and AKIRA beat Ikuro Kwon in the opening round of the Opera Cup.
**Daniel Makabe had his retirement match this past Friday against Kevin Ku on the first night of the Scenic City Invitational. After his final match, Dusk Pro Wrestling released a match between Makabe and Nicole Matthews filmed last weekend at the Lion’s Gate Dojo.
MMA NEWS
**Judge Richard Boulware held a hearing this past Friday in Nevada with reporter Josh Gross in attendance and reporting on the latest developments in the UFC antitrust cases. Gross reports that Boulware did not grant preliminary approval of the settlement due to his concern that the $335 million settlement figure is too low given the plaintiffs’ case. Gross shared that one of the central issues is the different objectives between the class led by Cung Le (those who fought in the UFC between December 16, 2010, and June 30, 2017) and the class led by Kajan Johnson (July 1, 2017, onward). The Le class was after monetary damages while the Johnson class wanted to explore injunctive relief that could impact the structure of UFC contracts and have serious changes to the way UFC conducts its business. As well, many of the Johnson fighters have signed waivers in their UFC contracts and are limited to receiving $3,000 if this current settlement goes through. The initial amount the Le fighters were seeking was between $811 million and $1.6 billion, which would be tripled if the plaintiffs won in a trial. Boulware will make a ruling this week, which lawyer Erik Magraken notes would be a preliminary approval to move forward with final approval still pending.
Today’s UFC antitrust lawsuit development explained in 90 seconds. pic.twitter.com/u62Qqxk5Yt
— Erik Magraken (@erikmagraken) July 13, 2024
**Nate Diaz has launched a lawsuit against the promoter of last weekend’s boxing fight involving Diaz and Jorge Masvidal. Diaz stated he was promised $10 million to fight Masvidal and is owed $9 million. His attorney Jeremiah Reynolds filed a suit on Monday in the U.S. District Court of Miami against promoter Solomon Engel and his company, Fanmio for fraud and breach of contract. Diaz is claiming that Engel is unable to pay him because they didn’t profit off the fight as expected but have verbal and written agreements in place. This was Diaz’s second pro boxing fight after losing to Jake Paul last August and rebounded with a majority decision win over Masvidal on July 6. (TMZ)
**Dana White was on The Pat McAfee Show on Monday and stated he had no date yet for Conor McGregor and Michael Chandler but said it’s the fight that needs to happen. White repeated that they have already spent $17 million on the UFC card at The Sphere for the September 14 event. White said there will be ten fights on the card, but they have not announced any fights yet. White is set to speak at the RNC convention this week and said he’s already spoken with Donald Trump since the assassination attempt this past Saturday.
**Former UFC light heavyweight champion Jon Jones is facing two misdemeanors charged after an alleged encounter with a drug inspector. In March, a complaint was filed by a worker with Drug-Free Sport International after visiting Jones’ home in Albuquerque, New Mexico, to procure a sample. The worker stated in their complaint that Jones became verbally combative after having difficulty providing a sample. After the worker suggested taking a blood sample, Jones allegedly took the worker’s phone from them and threatened to sue them before making a threat to their life. Jones has denied the allegations and produced home security footage where he is high-fiving the worker. Jones is facing a charge of assault and interference with communications with a virtual hearing scheduled for Wednesday with Bernalillo County Court in New Mexico. (MMA Fighting)
**The UFC returns to the Apex on Saturday for a card on ESPN. The main event is a Strawweight fight between Amanda Lemos (14-3-1) and Virna Jandiroba (20-3). Lemos has won three of her last four fights and is coming off a decision win against Mackenzie Dern after challenging Zhang Weili for the 115-pound title last August and losing by decision. Jandiroba has won her last three fights against Angela Hill, Marina Rodriguez, and Loopy Godinez.
**Pollstar has released data for the UFC’s International Fight Week events at the T-Mobile Arena in Paradise, Nevada. The UFC 303 pay-per-view featuring the new main event of Alex Pereira vs. Jiri Prochazka (replacing Conor McGregor vs. Michael Chandler) is listed as selling 17,483 tickets and a gate of $14,090,445 (the figures announced by the UFC that night was 18,881 and $15,909,243). The UFC Hall of Fame ceremony on June 27 sold 2,529 tickets for a gate of $26,700.
**The UFC Fight Night event had a listed attendance of 16,884 at the Ball Arena in Denver, Colorado this past Saturday with a gate of $2,374,303. It was the UFC’s first card in Colorado since 2018 with WWE just announcing back-to-back events in the same venue in September for NXT and Raw. Below are the results from the card:
*Rose Namajunas def. Tracy Cortez by unanimous decision (49-46, 49-46, 48-47)
*Muslim Salikhov def. Santiago Ponzinibbio by split decision (29-28, 28-29, 29-28)
*Jean Silva def. Drew Dober by TKO (doctor stoppage) at 1:28 of Round 3
*Gabriel Bonfim def. Ange Loosa by unanimous decision (30-27, 30-27, 29-28)
*Julian Erosa def. Christian Rodriguez by guillotine choke at 4:49 of Round 1
*Abdul Razak Alhassan vs. Cody Brundage went to a no-contest (illegal elbows) at 0:37 of Round 1
*Charles Johnson def. Joshua Van by KO at 0:20 of Round 3
*Jasmine Jasudavicius def. Fatima Kline by unanimous decision (30-27 all)
*Montel Jackson def. Da’Mon Blackshear by KO at 0:18 of Round 1
*Luana Santos def. Mariya Agapova by rear-naked choke at 3:27 of Round 1
*Andre Petroski def. Josh Fremd by unanimous decision (30-27 all)
*Evan Elder def. Darrius Flowers by arm-triangle choke at 1:46 of Round 2
**The Fight of the Night bonus was awarded to Jean Silva and Drew Dober despite the lack of a winner. The Performance of the Night bonuses went to Charles Johnson and Montel Jackson with all recipients receiving $50,000 each.
*****
POST Wrestling’s Media Summit
John Pollock, Wai Ting, Brandon Thurston, Stephanie Chase & Richard “Benno” Benson discuss various topics related to their coverage of professional wrestling.
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COLLISION COURSE
John Siino & Kate From MTL are back to review this week’s AEW Collision taped from Calgary, AB featuring Konosuke Takeshita vs. “Dynamite Kid” Tommy Billington.
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L&WRR: Jumbo Tsuruta Biography
Japanese wrestling historian Cameren Lee makes his L&WRR debut to share his knowledge of the legendary Jumbo Tsuruta’s history with WH Park.
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REWIND-A-SMACKDOWN
John Pollock & Wai Ting review WWE SmackDown from Worcester with the fallout from Money in the Bank involving The Bloodline.
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POST INTERVIEW: Lenita Erickson on the death of WCW
John Pollock speaks with Lenita Erickson on her short but incredible tenure working at World Championship Wrestling.
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