If any of the quotes from the following podcasts or video interviews are used, please credit those sources and provide an H/T and link back to POST Wrestling for the transcriptions.
** On the 6/3 Wrestling Observer Live, Nick Aldis joined the show and commented on Matt Cardona’s torn bicep injury. Aldis is scheduled to challenge Cardona for the NWA Worlds Heavyweight Title at ‘Alwayz Ready’ on June 11th. Aldis said he was getting on a call and guessed that-that is when he’d find out about the status of the NWA Title match.
I don’t know a whole lot [about the Alwayz Ready main event]. I’ve got a call actually in about an hour or so, so right after I get off this call with you guys, I’ll be getting ready for that and I guess that’s where I’ll get kind of the 4-1-1. So, unfortunately, your timing is not great here. If we scheduled this for a couple of hours later, I might have been able to lend you a bit more insight but, you know, it is what it is. I… when I heard that he’d [Matt Cardona] torn his bicep, my initial — right away, I said, ‘I bet it was catching a dive’ and sure enough, that’s exactly what it was because that’s how I tore my bicep in Mexico in 2015. Same thing so, that’s… it’s one of the new risks I guess in sort of modern wrestling is that’s what a common injury is-is the torn bicep from catching a dive or a torn pec from catching a dive because, you know, they are commonplace and yeah, unfortunately that was the case so I will — well I guess we’ll see what we’re gonna do but the good thing is-is that at least it — you know, even though it’s unfortunate for Matt in one respect, it does at least create some intrigue because as we’ve seen very much this last weekend with the MJF stuff and stuff like that, sometimes, people being unsure of, you know, what’s real and what’s not can sometimes be quite good for creating intrigue.
** Last month, GCW promoter Brett Lauderdale was accused of requesting fake COVID test results. These allegations were brought forth by Mikey Gordon, also known as ‘Dirty’ Ron McDonald. Lauderdale would later address the allegations and other comments made by McDonald.
Former GCW regular Gregory Iron took to his podcast to discuss the situation at hand. When it comes to Ron’s comment about Lauderdale underpaying talent, Gregory said based off his personal experience, he will not argue that point.
Where do I start first [with the accusations against Brett Lauderdale]? ‘Brett underpays his talent’ is one of the accusations. Well, yeah, I won’t argue that. There were times when I got really big pay days from Brett and there were other times where the pay days, they weren’t exactly what I expected and then I had to go back to Brett after the fact to get the rest of what I had asked for.
It was also mentioned within the allegations that talents who compete for GCW take care of their own travel. Iron first stated that talents were paid more than what McDonald listed in his post. He added that travel, hotels and rental cars were always taken care of by Lauderdale as far as he knows.
I can assure you — again, I’m not in the GCW camp, but I can assure you guys are getting paid more than that [$100-$200]. I’m sure there’s guys who are just starting there that maybe are getting somewhere in that area but I can assure you, at least as far as the people that I know go, they’re getting way more than that. Also, rental cars, trans, hotels, those were always paid for. So, and I’m speaking for myself personally and guys that I know. Outside of 44OH, I can say that there are people getting paid their trans and their hotel and their rental cars. Yes [it was the same for wrestlers in 44OH].
He went on to state that Rickey Shane Page would constantly stay on 44OH members to get their COVID tests done and said Page was always legit when it came to that. Iron said there were no fake negative COVID tests to his knowledge.
I can tell you that no one in 44OH faked COVID tests because Papa Rickey [Shane Page] was always on us about making sure our COVID tests were taken care of. In fact, one of the tests… I mean, Rickey’s name is mentioned in one of these screencaps and I can assure you… he was always legit.
And Tony Deppen went online and said he never — that sh*t never happened as far as he knows and I know Tony very well. I don’t think Tony would ever be a part of that. Allie Kat, I know was incredibly against anything like that so I… I’m not saying it’s impossible, but to my knowledge, there were no false negative COVID tests. There was no false tests at all [Iron said for clarification].
** Pro Wrestling Illustrated’s Candace Cordelia sat down with Thunder Rosa for an interview. Rosa was asked about the success that Jade Cargill has found in pro wrestling early in her career. Rosa said she and Jade had different journeys to get to where they are and from the moment she saw Jade in AEW, she knew she would be signed because of what she brings to the table.
It’s a business. You can’t look at somebody else’s journey [and] be like, ‘Damn it. Why is she getting that and I’m not?’ Like listen, I am not worried how she [Jade Cargill] got in, what she’s doing, where she’s at, I’m worried about myself, you know? I can’t be like, being jealous and all like, you know, bitter about, ‘Oh, people are getting –’ I’m worried about what is for me and right now, I’m the AEW Women’s Champion. The moment I saw Jade, honestly, when she came to AEW, I knew she was gonna get signed because of what she brings to the table. You don’t see a woman like her in professional wrestling. I think there’s so many people [that] have been looking for the next Chyna and she has a lot of things… you know, that are setting up for her in the future because of the way that she looks and how athletic she is and she’s a quick learner, she’s doing things real well, people are really behind her and that’s just what it is and like she says, I’m gonna have to give it up to her, she wears green because green is money and she is money, you know? I mean, you can knock that out of her. This is who she is and I’m just not gonna talk all this smack about her. I’m really happy for her success and you [interviewer] know me. She works hard, she does her thing and she does her and that’s it. My journey is completely different. Some of us have to struggle, and claw and really put the work in inside and outside of the ring, in the indies, some people don’t. That’s just how the cookie crumbles and good for her, she has success and she has been able to achieve that success in this company. But she’s just the champion as I am a champion. Like you said, I’m not worried about her 30-plus wins because that’s her. I’m worried about me and I’m worrying about this right now, the future, what is in front of me. Can’t be worrying about the future and again, I can’t be like [complaining]. Good for her. Good for her.
Cargill stated that she would like to have a title versus title match with Thunder Rosa and Rosa responded by saying she’s all for making that happen.
If you know me, do you think I’m gonna shy away to wrestle another champion? [Rosa said in reaction to Jade Cargill’s champion versus champion call out] I came to this company as a champion and I am now the company champion. So do you think I’m gonna shy away to have a match with Jade? I already had one with her, and I unfortunately came up short. However… however, hopefully it’s pretty soon. I will be ready for Jade. Again, I don’t know if she’s gonna be ready for me. I bring a lot more experience and yes, she’s probably gonna be way better than she was the first time when we met in the ring. But now more than ever, I am more hungry and I am more determined to keep what is mine.
** IMPACT Wrestling Executive Vice President Scott D’Amore revealed to Steven’s Wrestling Journey that he is legally blind in his left eye and has been since he was 16 years old.
Interesting fact might be — one might be I’m legally blind in my left eye. So, I got hit… my left eye, I see light and I see shapes and I see a little bit out of but there’s a big part where I don’t see out of it and that’s because I got hit with a baseball when I was 16 years old because I said I love to play baseball and when I was 16, I was warming up a pitcher and I was the catcher and I didn’t have a mask on because I wasn’t being smart and I stopped paying attention. My friend who was the pitcher, threw the ball without looking and threw a perfect strike right into my eyes so, I spent two weeks in a room in the dark trying to get my eye to heal and I’m very lucky that my eye healed and I have some vision out of it. But I am actually legally blind in my left eye.
So, something I had to learn to adjust to and everything else and it’s — I’m very lucky that I came out with my eye still intact and you know, compared to so many people in this world, I’m very lucky and yeah, I think that’s probably something that a lot of people don’t know about me.
** TNT Champion Scorpio Sky guest appeared on Busted Open Radio and reflected on the mixed trios match he was a part of at AEW Double or Nothing. Sky stated that for most of the match, he was focused on making sure Paige VanZant had a good showing.
You go back to the match we had the other night [AEW Double or Nothing], I told somebody — I’m talking obviously about the mixed trios match at the pay-per-view. I told someone yesterday, I said, ‘I’ve never gone into a match less focused on what I am doing,’ because I was so focused in on Paige [VanZant] and making sure that she was gonna be comfortable and making sure that she performed. I wanted her to do so, so well that I was just so locked in on — probably overboard with her like, ‘Are you okay? You comfortable? You ready? You nervous? You all right?’ And blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. So like, for me, I just kind of went out, I wouldn’t say ‘autopilot’ because once I was in, I was fully in on what I was doing but like, I’m thinking about so many other things like, oh, I hope this person is where they’re supposed to be, this person and the cameras and so many things. At this level, there’s just so many things running through my mind that I’m really locked in so I almost don’t even have time to be nervous. It’s just like a clock, you know? I’m just ticking.
** Ahead of NXT In Your House on June 4th, Joe Gacy has been making the media rounds to promote his NXT Title match with Bron Breakker. While speaking to PWInsider, Gacy discussed his on-screen character and said ideas for the character have always been inside him, but he’s never had this type of platform to express those ideas on.
Well, I’ll be honest, I feel like it’s kind of just been inside of me. I don’t know if it’s so much research or you know, whatever you might call it. I just have never had this kind of platform to be able to express it. You know, other places I’ve been, it’s always been kind of like, whoever you are, you have to introduce yourself completely immediately. But being here in NXT, you know, with WWE, you get the opportunity every week to show a little bit more of yourself. And I never had a platform like that. So for me, this has been great to be able to do the things I’m doing and having a platform like this to do it. It was new to me and it was a little intimidating at first but having it week after week after week, being able to show a little bit more and more and more, it’s been very rewarding for me. So as far as, you know, research or anything like that or advice, I get advice here and there from coaches, producers, but a lot of this is just kind of been, you know, me getting the opportunity to express myself.
** The ‘Front Row Material’ podcast welcomed Kimber Lee onto the show. She stated that she is hoping to do more coaching and mentoring in wrestling. She added that the miles she has put on her body has caused her to scale back on bookings.
I mean hopefully soon in my future, it’s something I can do more of [mentoring/coaching talents]. You know, I’ve been doing this for a while now and my body hurts and I’ve kind of even toned back some of my bookings a bit just because I can’t bump all the time anymore like I used to. But, it’s definitely an avenue I’m looking to get more into. That’s for sure.
Elsewhere during the chat, Lee discussed how far women in wrestling have come. She looked back on some of the things she was told she would need if she wanted to succeed in wrestling.
I mean, it’s like, it’s absolutely night and day from when I first started [how women are presented in wrestling]. When I first started, I was told I need to go get my boobs done and don’t get tattoos and you need to fall into this diva-like mold, but now, I would say all body types and everything are more accepted and you know, it’s just… it’s a beautiful thing to see and a lot more women are main eventing and is there still more work to be done? Absolutely. But the strides that have been made in the last 13 years have been pretty amazing.
** Episode one of Disney Channel’s wrestling-inspired series ‘Ultra Violet & Black Scorpion’:
** Following his 2022 NJPW Best of the Super Juniors win, Hiromu Takahashi told the press that he is interested in making a singles match between himself and Tetsuya Naito happen.
** Kevin Nash and Sean Oliver appeared on NBC Sports’ Ten Count podcast.
** Catch Off’s interview with Drew McIntyre that was recorded in Paris:
** Sportskeeda has an interview with WWE’s Ezekiel.
** Captain’s Corner hosted a virtual signing with Renee Michelle as the guest.
** NWA lead commentator Joe Galli joined Sports Guys Talking Wrestling to preview the ‘Alwayz Ready’ pay-per-view.
** David Lagreca and Mark Henry welcomed Thunder Rosa onto Busted Open Radio for her one-hour block on the show.
If any of the quotes from the following podcasts or video interviews are used, please credit those sources and provide an H/T and link back to POST Wrestling for the transcriptions.
