I heard he kept talking his clothes off in meetings and spraying baby oil everywhere, including on Vince's suits.

https://www.pwmania.com/wp-content/u...bigd-vince.jpg

Imagine being Big Dick Johnson and causing "issues" in the WWE. I've heard he was a cunt to the MLW guys when he was at Lucha Underground. I think he's a guy that the business might just sort of move on from, like Alex Greenfield.

So, I have a few questions.

1. How long has Gronk been training?
2. How high was this platform?
3. How many folks were supposed to catch him?

I ask all this because...
A. Why are they making green rookies take idiotic risks this early in their career?
B. Why are they making a guy who could make them millions of dollars take an unnecessary risk?
C. What would they do if everyone missed? (See Fenix, Rey)
D. Did these fuck baskets learn NOTHING from Owen?

I find Gronk to be an utter twat, and they created a situation where I have to defend the guy. I don't blame him going back to football.

Can’t remember how to embed on mobile.

Go to desktop mode

I got you:

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/B4ddjdZBiXY" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>

lol @ that taking 2 hours. I know it's disconcerting to fall backwards but he's barely jumping and there's like a dozen guys there. He'd have to actively try to miss.

Shit I had an acting professor in college who made us do trust falls off of a ladder.

Falling?


He SOARED!!!!! Didn't you read the description?????

eh, he probably knew he was going back to the NFL by that point and didn't want to hurt himself in the name of some carny circus act.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">WWE is rumored to have offered contract renewals to released Superstars at a fraction of what they were being paid before. <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/WWE?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#WWE</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/ImpactWrestling?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#ImpactWrestling</a> <a href="https://t.co/jUfipobAkZ">https://t.co/jUfipobAkZ</a> <a href="https://t.co/3dWWbKovaz">pic.twitter.com/3dWWbKovaz</a></p>&mdash; 411 Wrestling (@411wrestling) <a href="https://twitter.com/411wrestling/status/1268289187515494407?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 3, 2020</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

Shitty - but also understandable given the current climate of their business and the live gates not being there.


Revenue is down, but shit man, some of them may not have anywhere else to go....

WWE has too many people under contract and they don't use them. They need to let them go elsewhere! THOSE BASTARDS!
WWE starts releasing underused talent when the revenue goes down. THOSE BASTARDS!
A lot of released talent cant find jobs elsewhere atm, this is WWE's fault! THOSE BASTARDS!
WWE hires back talent, albeit at a lower rate because revenue is down, but at least they have jobs again instead of nothing...THOSE BASTARDS!

They literally can't win with some of you. Like how they were getting all that flak for still having tapings during the coronavirus shutdown. Ya'll were giving them the most amount of shit for it. But it was totally cool for AEW to do it AND have the rest of the talent around the ring at the same time, endangering even more people than WWE was. Then WWE has talent around the ring and ya'll give them shit for that. The irrational hate is palpable sometimes. I can see why Noid is the way he is about the double standards.

At least in regards to them actually releasing talent, the backlash mainly revolves around them doing it at the worst time possible and claiming financial issues despite posting record level revenues at the same time.

Same for the backlash of them hiring back those released at lower deals since they are still making record revenues regardless of everything else happening around them.

I'm not 100% informed about how that works...... but doesn't "record level revenues" come from previous revenue periods??


Surely they weren't posting record revenues without the live crowd, and with that a TON of merchandise sales? It would make sense that they were record setting right before this shit happened, then once it developed, realized they would have to cut talent.

Its mainly from their new US & UK tv deals kicking in and carrying the company even more than before. This current fiscal quarter is expected to be even higher for record revenues because that's when their new India tv deal starts to kick in.

Wrestlenomics figured out that if WWE was only making money from their tv deals and live events and other notable revenue streams were around zero, they'd still be posting around a $280 million record in revenues for this year.

Bryan Alaverz did some math as well and figured they could go around 4 years without holding any live events and I think also making money from other notable revenue streams and they'd still be hitting record revenues because of how massive their tv deals are. They still have another massive tv deal in the works from the Middle East.

The coronavirus has wrecked their live event revenues but that area has been down or more hit-and-miss in recent years to the point they were losing less money by holding fewer shows starting around last year. Same for merch sales being very hit-or-miss in recent years.

You don't know what their revenue will look like in Q2 until they release the details after it's over. You are basing their record revenues on data from a previous quarter where they were unaffected by the pandemic.

This was the source behind the original estimates and predictions:
https://wrestlenomics.com/2020/05/05...rights-remain/

Also ended up mixing again revenues and income but basically they are predicted to bank around $280 million in the end and shatter the old fiscal year record of $116 million. That's with no more live events for the year and other areas impacted by the coronavirus remaining around the same.

The only thing that's really going to hurt them in terms of record breaking money is them not being able to hold another Saudi show this year since that would have been another $50 million or so in the bank for them.

Ah, so speculation, just like our lovely stock market :)


Fuck their Saudi shows, tbh.


Most people will see this as a shitty way to do things, but at least they reached out to some released talent with a new deal. Some income in better than 0, at least for the layman.

Also Smeat - thank you for taking the time to report on things as you do. It is very insightful at times and interesting to read. Feel like you don't get the love you deserve.

I think part of it has to do with how AEW has used their cast offs. That big fear of "we can't release anybody because AEW" doesn't have the same fear.

How many guys can have the "I'm really great but WWE held me back" gimmick? Law of diminishing returns.

They did the same thing with NXT though. Started signing up names just so other promotions couldn't.


This isn't new. They have been bloated for way too long and need to trim their roster.

Yeah, I think the fear of potentially releasing their "Stunning" Steve and getting hit with a Stone Cold has dissipated and now they don't really care. They're careful who they are releasing -- mainly acts that have been around for a long time and are getting up there in age -- but the idea that it's going to damage them is out the window.

The only other dude AEW should pick up is Rusev.

I mean, you can't scoff at the Revival. Every single person not named Vince puts them over for being fucking awesome. Can't blame AEW for a second for snatching them up.

The Revival wasn't released due to Covid19 concerns. They wanted to get out for a year and a half.

I wasn't talking about COVID-19 releases you fucking moron. I literally just meant what I said.

God you're the fucking worst.

I can't believe you said Vince fired them for getting COVID-19

The Revival got released so that STD’s Irish ancestors could be made into John Cena shirts.

Whoa Dale, you doing ok?

You know this is my natural state of being by now. Come on Savio, you piece of shit.

I'd be very afraid if Dale didn't respond in such a manner

In Dale’s defense, STD unnecessary correction posts are the wrestling forum equivalent to Droford... general posts. It’s VERY tough to respond in a way that doesn’t scream “ARE YOU RETARDED!?”

Curtis Axel and Heath Slater are two guys that I see being back.

Might be a while for Heath Slater since he might have signed a contract with Impact Wrestling if a recent tease by Rhyno is any indication.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">&quot;I've already got a tag team partner...and he's got kids.&quot; <a href="https://twitter.com/Rhyno313?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@Rhyno313</a> has no interest in teaming with <a href="https://twitter.com/HakimZane?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@HakimZane</a>. <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/IMPACTonAXSTV?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#IMPACTonAXSTV</a> <a href="https://t.co/XVL8xQFdCD">pic.twitter.com/XVL8xQFdCD</a></p>&mdash; IMPACT (@IMPACTWRESTLING) <a href="https://twitter.com/IMPACTWRESTLING/status/1270518510750511105?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 10, 2020</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

and nwa want curt axel

Heath Miller and Rhino teaming makes sense. I'm not sure if the deals there are going to be long-term or not. Plus, they are TNA contracts.

They’re dropping hints everywhere. I don’t think the hints are necessarily an indicator of the likelihood of anyone signing or not.

Definitely not, but it's curious that TNA and AXS have found the money to allegedly play for guys again.

Apparently more cutbacks are coming today with possible releases


https://www.pwinsider.com/ViewArticle.php?id=139470

IRS and Gerald Brisco. Wow.