Jim Cornette wrapped up everything wrong with the gimmick really succinctly. It’s the wrong type of heat for wrestling. The heel is either too cheap and it becomes offensive or the heel makes good points and it stops being light entertainment.

I think the whole terrorist bit was Vince thinking.

"And then at GAB one of the masked men can RKO the Undertaker and he'll take off his mask and be RANDYYYY ORTONNN"

since he was returning at the time (I believe).

Going to Raw later this month in Detroit.

Have a good time. Hopefully Raw isn’t cancelled by the time you get to go.

Not sure how many people watch EVOLVE, but Jackson Drake was also on NXT this past week. That guy is REALLY talented. He’s like a good Zack Sabre, Jr. He actually does the little things a lot of pushed wrestlers outside the WWE neglect. I loved the spot where he played possum against Ricky Saints, and Saints couldn’t see it, but if you were paying attention to Drake, you could see him setting it up.

And Corey Graves misses the multiple meanings, but I think calling himself the Carolina Reaper is supposed to play off where he’s from and the pepper (he’s hot), but also the Grim Reaper and “sucking souls” playing into the playboy gimmick. One of the best nicknames in wrestling. He’s generally good at naming things. His knee is called “The Unaliving,” which is his Gen Z/reaper gimmick smashed again. On the indies he does an F5 called “The Crown of Dirt,” which is just an appropriate visual. Plus, dirt…he’s the hottest pepper in the garden. And he’s part of the dirty party animals.

Sounds like this should be in the NXT thread.

Is Gen Z really a gimmick when it's just... being in your 20s

lol Jelly Roll

I imagine a future where WWE has very few actual wrestlers and it’s just a rotating cast of celebs. Like a modern day Celebrity Deathmatch.

The Jelly Roll stuff was done beautifully on SmackDown. One of the best things on the show.

Naomi really impressed me on Raw.

Watching some classic TNA. Modern wrestling makes me appreciate what I slept on more.

TNA Turning Point 2009 is on the agenda right now. Only just started.Good opening match between Amazing Red and Homicide. Don West was a gem. The Beautiful People faced ODB, Sarita & Taylor Wilde in a six-woman tag. The Lacey Von Erich version of The Beautiful People. She wasn’t horrible here. Don’t like all the belts being on the line in one match, but the match itself was good. Desmond Wolfe cuts a forced promo with good content and now we’re onto Motor City Machine Guns and Beer Money challenging The British Invasion.

Good show so far.

Watched Angle vs. Joe from Genesis ‘06 before. Great match. The booking of it felt rushed at the time, but in retrospect it is classic storytelling.

WWE ran an angle on Jimmy Kimmel Live to promote SummerSlam.

Saw a few seconds of that, Logan went through a table.

Slammiversary has got me pretty intrigued. AJ Styles is going to be involved. Enzo Amore has been recording some interesting Fourth Rope promos too. I guess they’re a hip hop/wrestling indy thing that seems to be working with TNA. Enzo alluded to Zilla Fatu and The Good Brothers showing up with him. He seemed to take aim at Joe Hendry and Tony D’Angelo of all people lol. He also seemed to reference CM Punk.

Steve Maclin also issued a challenge of sorts. Tom Hannifan said he was looking for a fight at Slammiversary. Maclin seemed to imply it should come from an international promotion.

In other TNA news, Carlos Silva did an interview with Ariel Helwani.

* They’ve been working on a new TV deal since about the start of the year.

* It’s accelerated in the past 60 days. Should be ready to announce something in a 60-90 day window.

* It’d be for the end of the year with plans to go live every week eventually. That seems to be the desire of the entities making offers.

* TNA+ is like their WWE Network and TNA is open to integrating it with the streaming services of potential partners.

* They’re looking for about $10 million a year and expect about 250k-500k viewership wifh a broader platform.

Good for them. :y:

The Good Brothers are wrestling in a free outdoor show in my city down the street from my house for Maple Leaf Wrestling next weekend

Cool. Are you going to go?

Slammiversary a good show. I get a kick out of AJ Francis these days. Enzo’s promo on the countdown was good.

I’ve been trying to go back and watch some Ruthless Aggression era shows. The cynical mark in me didn’t appreciate them at the time. I wonder how they age? Because I’m getting old I forget how long ago they actually were lol. I watched Judgment Day ‘05 today. That was 20 years ago. Damn.

What a great show. Things that stand out:

* It’s eerie how similar WWE is now and then. It feels like such a better product because Trips took over, but they still hold the same things sacrosanct.

* The crowd is hot for some bizarre acts. Hardcore Holly and Charlie Haas get some good pops. Heidenreich is over with the crowd.

* This is the Kurt Angle/Booker T/Sharmell stuff. It’s outrageous what they tried to get away with. Angle and Sharmell’s performances are incredible though. Heiden rich is somehow just as unsettling.

* The work is just so much better than what you see from a lot of current guys. The focus has just shifted to become way more dull and repetitive.

* I used to be a big Paul London mark, but his selling was a bit hammy.

* JBL’s promos were insanely good. He does a pre-match promo with Josh Mathews that is just mint. JBL bends over backwards to make Cena. The amount of blood in “old” WWE is jarring. I can’t remember this being labelled as particularly gruesome at the time. I remember it being lauded as good and better than Mania.

* Matt Morgan impressed me here. Carlito too. Worked great as a chickenshit against Big Show.

Was this Stuttering Matt Morgan or normal bland Matt Morgan?

Yeah ill probably walk down for a bit. Ill know a bunch of people there, so I'll go by and catch up with some people. D'Amore did this a couple years ago and it was a good time.

D'Amore's family construction business is currently tearing up the road in front of my house

Is he as rich/influential in the area as people say?

Started watching SummerSlam 2018. I don’t think I watched the whole thing live at the time. If I did, I didn’t pay much attention.

I was a bit cold on the whole product, but this show has been pretty damn good. Weird coincidence that Seth and Dolph opened the show and did a reverse superplex spot after I just saw Iyo and Stephanie Vaquer do one on Raw lol.

The product hasn’t changed that much from the vibe of this show. AJ Styles vs. Samoa Joe is the reason I chose this one. I’m on a bit of a TNA kick. Great match between them, and the story of Joe getting Styles off his game by putting the smack on his family is great. Can Joe just please get out of AEW already?

Haha his family gets all the city construction jobs

that dastardly son of a bitch

Maybe they'll fire him abruptly too

If Joe could have kept himself uninjured, it would have been "sweet" for him to come in when the Bloodline stuff was going strong. Push how he was Samoan but not from that tribe, he's his own Tribal Chief.

And it ends with him marrying Nia Jax and they all become fast friends :)

I’ll still take him now. He would make a great opponent for Solo Sikoa. Hell, throw everything out the window and just have him be the guy who beats Cena. Do Joe vs. Jacob Fatu at Mania after Jacob wins the Rumble.

The guy who tracked the lineal Custody of Dominick back to the original ladder match has announced that the project can finally end.

On July 26th, 2025 at the Supershow Mexico, nearly 20 years after his custody was put on the line - Dominik Mysterio beat El Grande Americano and current custodian Ron Killings in a triple threat match, becoming the 225th custodian of Dominik and finally earning his lineal freedom.

Went to Raw last night. Was very fun.

Nice, is the Yeeting as wild in person as it looks on TV?

Awesome

Watched a few episodes of WWE Unreal. You obviously can’t watch it for documentary purposes. But it is interesting to see what sort of messages they want to put out to frame talent.

I don't really watch current WWE much but I was shocked at how fucking over Jey Uso and Rhea Ripley are

You can feel that through the TV. CM Punk also gets massive star reactions.

Rhea Ripley hot braud

A Gertner 6 though

That's fair

It used to be a "meme" here about how one of the Usos sucked but the other was good.... I forget which one was which though.

"Jey's ok" sounds familiar....

I always wanted to like Jey more, but Jimmy always struck me as better. He’s married to Naomi, so he got to get mad when Miz hit on her and stuff. Always seemed to get more of a chance to show more.

Only time I remember Jey doing anything on his own is when he stepped out against Roman when Jimmy was hurt to kick off this Bloodline stuff.

I just watched a random NWA match: Mike Mondo vs. Paul Burchill. In 2025 lol. Both men can still work. Mondo is in tremendous shape and is such a pro. He’d be good for TNA or something.

That was from an R-Truth WWE.com video about "all the Jimmy's he hates". One listed was "Jimmy Uso (Jey's alright)"

that's wild how over they still are, because they were getting huge reactions at WM40.

and LA Knight, but I don't know if he is still *that* over now (haven't watched in a while)

Why is WWE so keen on featuring Trump? You'd think someone with half a brain would be like "Let's not do that".

WWE has always been full of MAGA chuds, usually they do a better job of hiding it though

I dunno Trump and Hogan got showered with boos.

'Member Ron Killings?

Seems the plan there was to hire him back, get rid of everything that made the fans like him, so then they'll be able to fire him again without a huge backlash. Wonder how long they'll wait to do it.

What's new on his character?

I dunno. Guy is in his 50’s. I don’t think the plan was ever to run him like a pack horse. He was featured in the SummerSlam videos about how great WWE is and last we saw him he got a big win.

I can see Brock destroying him after Cena apologizes though lol.

I am watching Extreme Rules 2012 for a Brock/Cena fix. It’s a tremendous show. I really should have appreciated WWE more at the time. It’s weird how similar modern WWE still is. Michael Cole has the same sort of trivia on hand.

Bryan/Sheamus and Brock/Cena are brilliant matches. I haven’t rewatched Punk and Jericho yet. I forgot the whole framing of the feud lol. Jericho is “waging psychological warfare” on Punk after losing to him at Mania. He’s found out why he’s straight-edge and is torturing him by pouring alcohol over him and accusing him of being an addict at heart. It’s hectic lol. Punk pretended to be drunk to mess with Jericho back, then whooped his ass after “passing a field sobriety test.”

Bryan’s heel run with the World Heavyweight Title was so good. His promo on the show where he low-key brags about being a vegan and having a better gut than Sheamus is well done.

I'd wear getting boos in the liberal wasteland of California as a badge of honor.

You do that.

no cause no reason for me to ever be in the CESSPOOL of California

WWE are taking their PLE to ESPN and its direct-to-consumer app in 2026. The deal is said to be $325 million per year. Netflix will retain international rights on PLE and almost all WWE content.

Smackdown was a fun show. Normally it’s my least favorite WWE show of the week, but it was good this week.

I've noticed you will often just say that you watched something and it was good.

Remember when CM Punk was rasslin Dean Ambrose and Phil pinched off a crusty in the ring and the ref picked it up with his bare hand?

R-A-S-S-L-I-N THATS RASSLIN'

It’s crazy that we’re only like 2 years removed from the dirt sheets trying to tell us CM Punk was unprofessional and that major companies should avoid him at all costs. And some people bought it.

now this is the content we need in our algorithms

just trying to do my part bossman

Remember when AEW leaked the footage of the backstage scuffle between CM Punk and Jack Perry at All In and it matched CM Punk’s account of what happened to the point you could play them side-by-side?

It’s really bizarre if you think about it.

Yeah that was pretty bizarre lol. Speaking of all that though, I don't keep up with AEW as much as I used to, but...is Jack Perry gone again? I remember they brought him back with that whole scapegoat persona (which tbf I kinda liked that gimmick for him, thought it worked well) but then....what happened? He's been gone for like 8 or 9 months now. Is he injured or is this just another one of those times where TK just drops something and hopes if he keeps people off screen long enough that they forget about it?

lol imagining a world where Perry ends up feuding with Punk in WWE in a couple years.

When they turned Perry heel, I had the sneaking suspicion he’d be done with wrestling in a few years. He didn’t have the chops to pull it off, but his “friends” still threw him to the wolves by encouraging the heel turn. There’s a lot of sabotage over there. I kind of figured Perry would end up leaving the business bitter, complaining that everyone is an asshole because he can’t pick his friends. We’ll see if that happens.

But yeah, I think he’s gone again. No one really seems to miss him. He isn’t very good. The whole “Scapegoat” thing was weird, because it didn’t really make sense as a gimmick. But he was gone for a long time before that because apparently he was fighting with Tony, but then Tony brought him back. But why exile him in the first place? AEW is just a giant mess lol.

Maybe TK just gave in to pressure from The Bucks? Now he’s just getting paid to sit at home and is probably cool with that, but it doesn’t give the appearance that you back your talent.

It’s crazy that they even tried to make him a big star in the wake of it. He looked like the silliest little bitch coming out of it. Then they were like “he’s going to be a bad ass on our TV.” Lol wut?

If he ever got a shot in WWE (and I don’t know why he would be brought in), I see him as a white meat babyface in a tag team (like he should have been) or as a lackey heel carrying Drew McIntyre’s bags or something.