I have faith you’ll be able to entertain both truths.

That’s how I feel about the AOP. :naughty:

Not gonna be the same without Noid. ILL MISS YOU HO

Is TPWW really coming to an end? If so, I feel it is important to stress just how disappointing AEW was. Noid was right.

I won't say you were right but you were definitely not wrong.

Also yes, today is supposedly the last day of TPWW as we know it.

Well, it was a nice couple of decades or so. Take care and spread love where you can.

We're still here.

Oh damn what she doing?

The end of the world was greatly overstated

The asteroid burnt up and was no bigger than a chihuahua’s head.

Did anyone catch Dave Meltzer’s apologetics for The BCC being left out of the tag tournament? It doesn’t make *logical* sense, but it does make *booking* sense. And the business is apparently all about making money, so if FTR vs. BCC makes money (lol), then it’s all good.

Tony is back to having 4am social media meltdowns. Amazing. This time he aimed it at Eric Bischoff. He’s bragging about a media rights deal that hasn’t been confirmed yet, and may not even exist.

The ratings for this week’s Dynamite were deservedly low. <750k. It’s funny watching fanboys scratch their heads and wonder why the product is failing. It isn’t very good.

Okada has been exposed. Every time a NJPW guy comes in, they look like shit. I wonder if that’s because they’re trained by New Japan for New Japan and it’s a smoke and mirrors product? Okada’s making errors every time he’s out there. It was probably an Observer myth that he was good. Like Sabu being better than Bret Hart in 1994.

Tony keeps adding “stars.” This pushes his old “stars” out and forces his new toys to clash with fans of the old. And he keeps making loud noises to get attention but the output is shit. Do fans of Sasha Banks really want to go and watch her play the best value version of herself? The way Tony uses talent has to be offsetting to fans of those wrestlers. I used to love Daniel Bryan and Cesaro. Not so much Bryan Danielson and Claudio Castagnoli. And if you can’t be good with them, who can you actually be good with?

Wrestling would be better if AEW disappeared and the actual talent that is trapped there had to do other things. There’s at least a chance of them being optimized.

To be fair, I hear Daniel Bryan's misuse is mostly his own fault and how he doesn't want to be the focus and wants to just go "rassle" in "good matches".

Then again, I guess 66.666% of AEW's problems are probably attributed to the rasslers and their wants/ideas/desires and Tony Khan's inability to control his roster, say no, utilize them for what would be best for business and not just for what the rasslers themselves want to be used as.

Yeah, that falls on him as a booker/promoter. I’ve also read Daniel Bryan say he does what Tony asks him to, and if Tony wanted to make him the World Champion he would. So I think a large part of the idea that Bryan controls his own stuff is fan speculation. I doubt he’s doing anything he doesn’t actively want to do either. It’s probably a little from column A and a little from column B.

It’ll be interesting to see what happens when Bryan’s deal is up. He signed for 3 years, but time might be added on for injuries and the like. But that should be up this year.

Yes. What a fool. I also enjoyed Cornette pulling it apart :lol:

I see the rankings are back! Why was Swerve and Takeashit for the #1 spot. Didn't Osprey just beat him? Was is Takeashit now unranked?

Why is Christian unranked? How does Tony Khan not know how to do rankings - he's a UFC fan. Just emulate that without the voting panel. Or have the voting panel. Have the wrestling media vote on the rankings.

Rankings in wrestling are always restricting. They just brought them back and they’re already a mess.

Oh yes. It's complete garbage. But if they are insisting on doing it, do it right. Or as right as it can be.

Oh yeah. They lose points for the concept and the execution.

Tony Khan tweeted out “AEW: Where the Best Wrestle”

A lot of the work in AEW is really dodgy. Promotion is supposed to be true to the extent that it works for you and doesn’t cross into false advertising and setting unrealistic expectations.

I deliberately sought out the Ospreay/Shibata match to see if the lack of New Japan magic was a continuing theme. Can someone explain to me what they find appealing about this style of wrestling.

To me it isn’t “hard” and doesn’t make the guys look “tough.” No one wants to be punched in the face. It gives away that it’s fake as shit when they welcome love taps with their forearms. There’s also way too much obvious cooperation. It’s like two guys playing wrestler.

I had to turn it off after they do-si-do’d into some kicks they weren’t selling.

How many times does this rubbish have to run off viewers before AEW realizes that most wrestling fans want a little more credibility in their action?

I know New Japan isn’t exactly doing gangbusters, but they can’t be happy with how shitty Japanese talent looks in AEW. Okada is en route to being a certified flop in the US. I’m sure part of the reason Nakamura was in NXT was to get used to the US and help his family settle in, but now I’m wondering if part of that was to re-wire some horrible habits.

It’s going to be hilarious if Shinsuke Nakamura ends up having this Hall of Fame career in WWE, while internet fans bitch about how lazy and misused he’s been, meanwhile Okada goes to the internet darling promotion that fetishizes puroresu and he turns out to be a giant goose egg.

At least the dude is getting paid.

I wouldn’t be surprised if WWE ends up poaching the New Japan deal from AEW. Conspiracy theory: the AEW “Continental Crown” may have already been broken up in part because of that.

Where The Big Boys Play™

check the adjective: play!

Big naturals

CM Punk. What a guy. :heart:

I was glued to my TV for 1 hour and 50 minutes. Bravo.

What a masterful performance. He was calm and composed, but he without saying much he completely demolished AEW, The Elite, Tony Khan, Dave Meltxer and even the dweebs who still hold any of them to any credibility.

Dave Meltzer finally responded. He didn’t right away. That would require knowledge. He claimed to have knowledge that Punk had no non-compete. Idiot. He also lost his footing on the glass incident. Bryan Alvarez tried to no-sell it. Anazing.

Punk showed how idiotic and disorganized they are. They prove it every week. Colt and Jack Perry are still MIA. The “friends” aren’t friendly to their own “friends.” TK is incompetent and still shrivels. Dave reports Punk’s account as ostensibly true, but quibbled with points that makes him and his buddies look like idiots.

And this was all subtle build-up to remind you Punk will be talking at WrestleMania 40.

AEW is cooked.

I read some of what Punk said, maybe I ended up reading the whole thing across multiple posts - not sure. But I didn't really give a fuck about any of it.

I'm still going to watch AEW and enjoy it. Him spouting off - whether all of what he said is true or not - doesn't change my enjoyment of the show. I felt the same way when Ronda said her shit about WWE. I'm still going to watch and enjoy WWE, too.

(Plus if one person talking shit about backstage drama turns you off from an entire promotion's in-ring product, that says more about you than them, honestly.)

I started enjoying wrestling as a whole so much more when I stopped reading about backstage shit. I don't care about anything Meltzer says. I barely know who he is. I don't care who doesn't get along with whom. I don't care who talks shit about what behind the scenes.

Put on a good show and I'll keep watching.

This might explain why their ratings are so low.

I read what punk said.

"If i put a stop to it you wont like it." Punk

"I went to him and was super polite. I was calm." Also Punk.

Only one of these is true. Also there's been a suspicious lack of drama from the AEW lockerroom since punk left. I guess they just got better at covering it up. That must be it.

The product might be ass, i wouldnt know, but the idea that everyone else was the issue is a line punk has been selling for 25 years at this point.

There’s a whiff of elitism to this. People aren’t switching off the product just because of this (we don’t know that yet), but it explains a lot of people’s already existing frustrations. But even if they did, who are you to criticize them for being turned off by something just because they accept more information than you are willing to accept?

You’re not making an informed decision because you don’t know who Dave Meltzer is.

You know I love you, man. And I know you love debate. I’m just going to say it though: you have blinders up with CM Punk. I don’t know if he wronged you or buddies in any way, but if he was an asshole, he’s just met bigger assholes.

The specific point Punk was making in those situations you paraphrased was that he — as talent — was asked to take up for the inept boss who wouldn’t. In one specific case, he *jokes* about how he thought he was being responsible by not bloodying the guy up who challenged *him* to the fight. He just choked him a little bit. Safe. And he sucks at fighting. Alvarez and co have grabbed that as “he wants to hurt people” instead of him making light of a shitty situation that wasn’t handled by management.

I’m not a Punk mark. I think he’s talented but has never always been of the right mind for business. But if you listen to him, he’s obviously matured and was dealing with a clown show. And now HE is the one about the whole business.

You don’t have to like him, but he’s not wrong about anything. And, funnily enough, not even the dirt sheets that hate him are calling him a liar. They’re just left with turning a phrase and standing up for AEW.

And it’s objectively incorrect to say that AEW does not have political problems anymore. Jack Perry is whinging to the dirties about not being used, The Bucks whinged, FTR got buried, talent want out, releases have been made, TK is getting into X wars, people are off TV, guys are in Bulgaria and AEW doesn’t know they were hurt, people are MIA, Sammy Guevara got suspended, Matt Hardy is whining, the dirt sheets are complaining, attendance is down, ratings has become a story, Jericho is an idiot. The problems did not go away.

Yeah there's still quite a bit of AEW drama. It gets more light shed on it with Punk because he's a bigger star than the rest of them. But there's something new with those twits every week.

MJF tweeted something tying himself into the Rock/Cody stuff. By and large, people are dismissing it because…MJF is AEW apparently. But I wouldn’t be shocked if the dude’s deal actually expired and he signed with WWE.

I don’t get why a dude whose “I might leave” story (weird) went and passed without much on-air notice benefits his home company by breaking relative radio silence with something lending hype and attention to the WrestleMania main event.

I wanted to see what AEW would open with this week to play “guess the drop off” and see what TK thinks is his best foot forward. He got Edge to come out in a horrible segment and cut a rah-rah AEW speech and talk about how much he loves all professional wrestling, The Elite and Tony Khan. :lol:

I wanted to see what AEW would open with this week to play “guess the drop off” and see what TK thinks is his best foot forward. He got Edge to come out in a horrible segment and cut a rah-rah AEW speech and talk about how much he loves all professional wrestling, The Elite and Tony Khan. :lol: