[Emperor Smeat]

The Sheets sponsored by AEW's return to the Million Dollar Man Viewers Club:

Originally Posted by Observer Coming off the heels of Saturday's All Out pay-per-view, AEW Dynamite last night averaged 1.016 million viewers on TNT, up 9.5 percent from last week. It was the highest viewership for Dynamite since the show's second-ever episode. In the 18-49 demo, Dynamite finished seventh on cable with a 0.37 rating, up 2.8 percent in that category. It was the highest 18-49 number for the show since January 15. Comparing the individual demo ratings to last week, when the show charted at eighth in the 18-49 rankings with a 0.36, the numbers were as follows: women 18-49 -- 0.24 (up 14.3 percent). men 18-49 -- 0.51 (even), people 18-34 -- 0.22 (down 4.3 percent), females 12-34 -- 0.15 (up 50 percent), males 12-34 -- 0.24 (down 14.3 percent), people 25-54 -- 0.43 (even), and people over 50 -- 0.40 (up 14.3 percent) The 18-49 number with men is particularly impressive as it was fourth overall on cable behind two NBA games and the SportsCenter broadcast that immediately followed one of those games. In the people 12-34 category, AEW finished just shy of Raw this week, which did a 0.23 rating. With NXT airing on Tuesday this week, Dynamite was again unopposed by wrestling competition. The overall combined viewership for AEW and NXT was 1.854 million viewers, up 4.3 percent from last week. It was the highest combined total since October 2, which was the night of Dynamite's premiere episode.

Originally Posted by Observer This week's Super Tuesday II edition of NXT, which featured Finn Balor vs. Adam Cole for the vacant NXT Championship and a steel cage main event between Rhea Ripley and Mercedes Martinez, averaged 838,000 viewers, down 1.3 percent from last week. The show ranked 15th on cable in the 18-49 demo with a 0.22 rating, down 15.4 percent from last Tuesday. Despite no AEW competition, there were NBA playoff games on TNT. The late game went against the second half of NXT and averaged 4.65 million viewers. Though it was down from last week, the viewership was NXT's third highest of 2020. Here's a look at the other demo categories and how they compared to last week's NXT, which also aired on Tuesday: Women 18-49 -- 0.15 (down 21.1 percent), men 18-49 -- 0.29 (down 12.1 percent), people 18-34 -- 0.09 (down 35.7 percent), females 12-34 -- 0.06 (down 45.5 percent), males 12-34 -- 0.14 (down 22.2 percent), people 25-54 -- 0.28 (down 6.7 percent), and people over 50 -- 0.43 (up 7.5 percent). Ratings for the cable news channels, which do really well in NXT's strongest demo, were way down this Tuesday. That explains the viewership for the show remaining steady despite ratings dropping in every demo except people over 50. NXT returns to Wednesday night next week.

Originally Posted by Observer Update -- WWE has announced that "following the tournament, the NXT UK Heritage Cup will be defended as a championship under the same rules." ********** An eight-man tournament with British Rounds rules will soon kick off on NXT UK. WWE announced today that the Heritage Cup tournament is coming to NXT UK. Seven of the eight participants for the tournament have been revealed. They are: Flash Morgan Webster, Noam Dar, Alexander Wolfe, A-Kid, Dave Mastiff, Joseph Conners, and Trent Seven. Here are the rules for Heritage Cup matches: There will be six rounds for tournament matches. Each round will be three minutes. There will be 20-second breaks between each round. All matches are two-out-of-three falls. Falls can be won by pinfall, submission, or countout. Once a fall occurs, the round ends. Once someone has won two falls, they are declared the winner and they advance in the tournament. If there's a disqualification or knockout, the match ends. If a match goes the full six rounds, whoever is ahead on falls wins. More details for the tournament will be announced on NXT UK next Thursday (September 17). The episode will feature NXT UK's return to new in-ring action for the first time since events were paused in March due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The tapings for NXT UK's return are being done at BT Sport studios in London, England with no fans in attendance.

Originally Posted by Observer NXT UK Women's Champion Kay Lee Ray is set to make her first title defense since January. KLR will defend her NXT UK Women's Championship against Piper Niven on the Thursday, September 24 episode of NXT UK. The announcement of the match was made on today's NXT UK episode that previewed the brand's return to in-ring action.

Originally Posted by Observer On the Wednesday edition of Wrestling Observer Radio, Dave Meltzer clarified the status of AEW Dynamite for next week and specifically the one-hour show that is scheduled to air after the NBA playoffs Wednesday night. As announced by AEW on Dynamite, if the Los Angeles Lakers/Houston Rockets NBA playoff series ends in six games, Dynamite will air on Wednesday in its usual time slot. However, if the series goes to seven games, Dynamite will air at 8 PM Eastern on Thursday. Game six is scheduled for Monday night. However, AEW had planned to air a one hour Dynamite following the playoff game and the post show that Meltzer said is scheduled to be taped today. If Dynamite can air on Wednesday as planned, that one hour show would air on Tuesday, September 22nd instead. The time slot wasn't given, but Meltzer said that none of the announced matches would be on that one hour show. Other notes: Bryan Alvarez said Thunder Rosa has a per-date deal with AEW and next week's Dynamite match with Ivelisse will be for her NWA Women's World title. Promos and appearances by AEW World Champion Jon Moxley, Lance Archer and Jake Roberts will be part of next week's two-hour Dynamite.

Originally Posted by Observer John Cena will be one of the hosts of a revival of the obstacle course competition series Wipeout on TBS. It was announced today that Cena and Nicole Byer will host TBS' revival of Wipeout. Camille Kostek will be the host in the field for the series and will cover the contestants’ progress throughout each round ... Cena will also be an executive producer for the series ... Wipeout originally debuted on ABC in 2008 and aired until 2014. When TBS' revival of the show will be premiering hasn't been revealed.

Originally Posted by PWI WWE Producer Sarah Stock was officially released today as part of the WWE cutbacks, PWInsider.com has confirmed. She had initially been placed on furlough back in April. Stock, 41, had been working as a producer on the main roster. She initially signed to become a WWE Performance Center Guest Coach in 2015, occasionally making cameos on NXT broadcasts as well, before being shifted to a main roster Producer role. Prior to her time in WWE, Stock had a tremendous international in-ring career, performing as Dark Angel in CMLL and AAA. In the United States, she is best known for her time as Sarita for Impact Wrestling, where she teamed with current WWE star Zelina Vega, then known as Rosita.

Originally Posted by PWI WWE Producer Mike Rotunda, 62, was among those who were officially released by WWE as part of today's cutbacks, PWInsider.com has confirmed. Rotunda, the father of WWE stars Bray Wyatt and Bo Dallas, had been with WWE in a Producer/Agent role since 2006. Rotunda retired from in-ring performances in 2004. He is perhaps best known as former WWF Tag Team Champion Irwin R. Shyster (IRS) and had a long career in the WWF, WCW, Jim Crockett Promotions, the AWA and Championship Wrestling from Florida ... PWInsider.com is told that Rotunda had been furloughed back in April. At that time, he opened an official Pro Wrestling Tees store.

Originally Posted by PWI Impact Wrestling announced that Barry Scott, the voiceover artist who added a great dimension to TNA and Impact video packages: We are deeply saddened to learn of the passing of Barry Scott. For years Barry was the iconic voice of TNA Wrestling, lending us gravitas and credibility. He will be dearly missed. pic.twitter.com/rPxGsK8gqk — IMPACT (@IMPACTWRESTLING) September 10, 2020

Link: https://twitter.com/IMPACTWRESTLING/...56050518609926

Originally Posted by PWI Q - What happens when AEW goes to Picture in Picture outside of the United States? A - I am told the announcers keep calling the action.

Except for Canada which I think doesn't do split screen for commercial breaks on TSN.

Originally Posted by Post Wrestling Several days ago, former Presidential candidate Andrew Yang took to social media and shared his thoughts about the new edict that’s being established in WWE, which was first reported by Wrestling Inc. that talent will have to stop using third parties (Twitch, Cameo etc.) within 30 days or face the potential of fines, suspensions or even termination. Yang sat down with Chris Van Vliet for an exclusive interview to further discuss the topic at hand. Yang feels that it’s shameful and plain greedy that the WWE is worth billions of dollars and mistreats workers. He added that the affordability argument does not apply to the sports-entertainment company because of their investment and recent losses by way of the XFL. “Well this story is dead real and I will say though that there are a lot of effective storylines that kind of melded reality with fiction, so to the extent that this ends up being part of a narrative, I’d be open to it because I think the fans know. The fans are smart. The fans understand what’s going on. It’s one reason why a lot of people support AEW is that they get this negative vibe from the WWE about the way the talent’s being treated and you can tell that… you can tell that has nothing to do with the bottom line anymore because the McMahons have made so much money. They have enough money where they’re investing in these football leagues and whatnot and then the XFL failed again. If you’re a wrestler, breaking your back and then the WWE is like, ‘Oh we can’t afford you, you’re fired.’ It’s like, ‘Well, you probably could have afforded me if you could afford to lose tens of millions on that debacle,’ and so the affordability argument does not apply to WWE in a way that it applies to every other firm. If you look at AEW, I have a feeling their economics are real. But the WWE does not have those constraints anymore because it’s a public company, the McMahons are worth hundreds of millions of dollars, they spend it on all sorts of stuff. And the company worth’s 3.3 billion and so if your company’s worth 3.3 billion and you’re mistreating workers, I mean that’s just shameful. Really it’s shameful. There was a point in the distant past where you could’ve made a legitimate argument based upon cost but now you can’t. Now it’s just plain f*cking greed… so we can all see it, fans know. So it’s one reason why a lot of people want there to be fair treatment of wrestlers and genuine competition in the market.” Yang touched on WWE talents being classified as “independent contractors”. He rebutted against the argument that talents are the ones who signed the contract so they should be aware of what they signed off on. Yang feels that-that’s a reason why so many back All Elite Wrestling is so that they can create a competitive market so wrestlers don’t get exploited. “Well one, I heard from a former who’s not happy about this particular clarification or this particular rule but the truth of it is that there’s a vastly uneven bargaining table at work where if you’re a performer and WWE says, ‘Hey, here’s this contract and we’re going to stick a bunch of things in it that you think are unfair, ridiculous and exploitative,’ at the end of the day you feel like you have no choice but to sign that deal because WWE holds the keys to the kingdom. They are the largest company, they’re the surest means to elevate your career and there hasn’t been a genuinely competitive market for years. It’s one reason why I, like many other fans naturally root for AEW to succeed and create a genuine competitive market so that wrestlers don’t get exploited. But the reality is that WWE is a quasi-monopoly and imagining that, ‘These wrestlers, oh, they know what they got into,’ it’s like, well, they really didn’t have a genuine chance to negotiate a bargain.” At the beginning of the interview, Andrew Yang shared how he was first informed of WWE’s new edict. Yang mentioned that he has been on the side of MMA fighters who are involved in similar situations with Dana White and UFC. Yang reiterated that if Joe Biden and Kamala Harris are elected to office this year, then he could be in position to change how WWE goes about treating their wrestlers in a contractual sense. “I actually got a message from someone who’s a part of WWE, pointing out the story to me about how WWE was saying, ‘Hey, don’t go on Cameo or Twitch’ and it infuriated me because I know that the WWE has been trying to play it both ways for years where they’re saying, ‘Can’t do anything without our say-so. We own you, but you’re an independent contractor and we have nothing to do with your health, retirement, any of the benefits you get that would accrue to an employee.’ So to me, you have to make a choice at some point. If you’re gonna control all the aspects of a wrestler, performers waking life then you should take some responsibility too for that person. A bigger picture, maybe they have a kid, maybe they get maternity, paternity leave, maybe they get an off-season, maybe they get recovery time and I say this as someone who’s been a long time fan of the sport. I know you [Chris Van Vliet] know a lot of the performers well yourself. They’re putting their life on the line, their health on the line, their family life on the line all the time. They made Vince a billionaire and then the fact that he’s still being so heavy-handed about their ability to make a simple buck on Cameo just struck me as so absurd and ridiculous and wrong and I’ve been on the side of MMA fighters who are in this similar boat frankly, with UFC and Dana White and because I got this note from this performer I said, you know it’s past time someone calls Vince out for this. Particularly if Joe [Biden] and Kamala [Harris] win, I may be in position to do something about it.”

Originally Posted by Post Wrestling Aleister Black’s eye was driven into the steel steps on the 7/27 edition of Monday Night RAW by Murphy. Black was off TV for several weeks and returned just a few weeks after the segment and is now involved in a feud with Kevin Owens. After RAW went off the air on 9/7, Aleister Black and Zelina Vega went live on their Twitch channel. Aleister visibly has a black rim around the iris of his eye and he spoke about that during the stream. While he did not want to get too much into how that coloration formed around his eye, he said it obviously was related to the steel steps spot but there were issues coming out of that and more to it than what people know. “Yeah, it’s been a sh*t day guys. But I’m not gonna bore you with that… Alright, let’s address the elephant in the room, this thing [his eye]. It was a lot more that happened to the eye than a lot of people know, that’s why I was wearing the glasses. Half of it was obviously what happened but it was a little bit of an issue here and there. That’s all I’m gonna say about it. That’s why it looks like that. That’s it. I don’t wanna talk about it, I don’t wanna get into it. You’re gonna have to deal with me for a while, if it clears up with this nice little rim in my iris so…” A user in the chat mentioned how they did not see the black rim around Aleister’s eye while he was on RAW Underground. Aleister said it was there, but the camera did not zoom in on him when he took his bandage off. “Oh it was there, it was there. They didn’t zoom in on me. You could see it really small at one point in the beginning when I took my bandana off.”

Originally Posted by Post Wrestling Gail Kim joined Lisa Marie Varon, Mickie James and SoCal Val on GAW TV. Gail revealed that both she and Robert Irvine tested positive for COVID-19 but they are both feeling better now. “A lot of people don’t know this but I’m gonna say it out loud. We got COVID, so we did get COVID. Yeah, actually I’m glad we got through it quickly. Two weeks for both [of] us and [we] feel like we have antibodies which is great but of course still being careful. But it was more annoying than anything so, I’m just thankful we didn’t go through — I hear horror stories of people [and] what they’ve experienced. So yeah, I feel like he [Robert Irvine] got it and then I caught it from him.” On the topic of IMPACT Wrestling, while Gail is still agenting matches, she has been promoted to a member of the Talent Relations team with D’Lo Brown. Gail praised D’Lo for helping her adjust to the position. “So now, it’s kind of changed a little bit. I still agent some of the girls’ matches but now Madison [Rayne] has started agenting a little bit. They’re trying to get her in there doing a little bit more and they bumped me up. I’m now co-Talent Relations with D’Lo [Brown]. I love D’Lo. When I got promoted last month, I got a couple people just joking around saying, ‘Congratulations… I think’ because Talent Relations was always seen as that asshole position I guess. But you gotta remember, there’s never been a woman in that position and I think women handle things a little bit differently. Like we can be a little bit more empathetic at times I think and so far I’ve had such great feedback and I think as a woman, being in this position, I think it’s a positive that people feel… they feel like I’m more approachable to talk to maybe. I’m not sure. I’m only a month in but everything’s been going really great and D’Lo, I couldn’t have asked for anyone better. From day one, he’s like, ‘I want everyone to see you as my equal’ because he’s the Head of Talent Relations and we just take turns with everything, everything’s very 50/50. He’s just an amazing guy.”

Originally Posted by Post Wrestling AEW’s Jack Evans noted on Twitter that he’s currently out of action with a hairline fracture in his cheekbone. Jack appeared on the 9/9 Dynamite to back Angelico in his match against Orange Cassidy.

Originally Posted by Post Wrestling NXT announcer Vic Joseph was the latest guest on WWE’s After The Bell podcast. Joseph told the story of a car accident he was involved in where the result of it was the first responders putting a white sheet over him because they did not think he was alive. “I got into a car accident, which I never talked about this publicly either, and I went from the backseat through the front seat and had to go to speech therapy, relearn how to talk. There’s a scar on my face that no one ever sees. I don’t know if they can zoom in right now, if you [Corey Graves] ever noticed it. My knee from top to bottom, my knee was completely out. I was on the side of the road, white sheet over me. That’s how bad it was. I’m not joking either, I’m being dead serious and I moved and I remember them screaming, ‘Oh, he’s alive’ and they ran and got me, put me on the gurney, cut my shirt off and I made a joke. Like an off-handed Ohio State/Michigan joke because they were wearing a Michigan shirt… I woke up, neck brace on, they’re pulling glass. There’s a scar on my face. There’s still a piece of glass in there. So anyways, I had to go to speech therapy to relearn how to talk.”

Originally Posted by Post Wrestling Ring of Honor C.O.O. Joe Koff joined the Outside Interference podcast with Kenny Herzog that’s on the MLW Radio Network. Koff shared his thoughts about Ring of Honor’s resumption of television tapings and how they could’ve ran in the state of Florida but mentioned that there appears to be “no rules” when it comes to wrestling during the pandemic in that state. “I think this whole COVID pandemic is really about controlling what you can control. And there were so many different ways we could have wrestled. We could have wrestled in Florida where the other two major promotions wrestle, where there seems to be no real rules. The governor says, you know, just be careful.” Ring of Honor’s Flip Gordon has voiced his opinion about the Coronavirus pandemic and how he’s skeptical about it. Koff said that regardless of what Flip says on Twitter, Flip knows what he had to do to be able to wrestle at the ROH tapings. “That’s one person tweeting whatever he’s tweeting. Flip understood what he needed to do to be part of the taping or not to be part of the taping, and that will continue. I’m not going to be influenced by the Twitter world or what people say or don’t say. We’ll do the right thing based on [proper protocols and governance and common sense.]”

Originally Posted by WrestlingNews.co Sean Ross Sapp of Fightful Select reported today that Miro is signed with AEW as talks have been ongoing for quite a while. Per the report, the deal was “long term pending an option on the deal.” The deal will allow him to work for NJPW in addition to some dates on the independent wrestling scene. It should be noted that while he can work for NJPW, he can only do so in Japan. Thus, when the COVID-19 pandemic slows down and NJPW starts to run shows again in the United States, he can’t work events in America.

Originally Posted by Fightful Nia Jax isn't too happy with WWE using a picture of her after being Facetuned. Jax took part in a photo shoot holding the WWE Women's Tag Team Championship and a photo that was put up by WWE was modified. In an Instagram post that can be seen below, Jax voiced her displeasure over her picture being Facetuned. Jax has stated that she asked WWE to replace the modified picture with the untouched one.

Link: https://www.instagram.com/p/CE4MEVshWdl

Originally Posted by Post Wrestling Forbes chatted with Heath Slater. When asked would he have considered running for President of the United States with his current campaign gimmick that he’s been doing on IMPACT, Heath said that he’d 100 percent attempt to run for office.

Originally Posted by Fightful Fightful is sad to report that Stevie Lee, who performed in TNA as Puppet 'The Psycho Dwarf' has passed away. He also performed on “Half Pint Brawlers," which was a short-lived reality show on Spike TV. Lee was most famous for pulling a gun on Jeff Jarrett and masturbating in a trash can on television. A GoFundMe has been set up in his honor.

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