[Emperor Smeat]

The Sheets sponsored by WCW Hardcore Division Appreciation Night:

Originally Posted by Observer The return of Shane McMahon on Monday's WWE Raw led to a stronger second hour than usual and brought viewership up six percent from last week's second lowest number of all time with the show averaging 1.71 million viewers and 0.51 in the 18-49 demo. The first hour was slightly ahead of last week (1.71 million to 1.70 million last week), likely due to the last day hype of the McMahon addition and the promised debut of a new stable. The key was that the second hour not only didn't decline, but it grew greatly to 1.82 million viewers before the show experienced a third hour drop to 1.61 million ... Raw was No. 4 in 18-49, trailing 90 Day Fiance, NBA on ESPN, and Below Deck: Mediterranean. The show was No. 22 for the night overall and No. 4 among non-news shows ... Raw was down 31% from the same week last year overall, 37% in 18-49 and 51% in 18-34.

Originally Posted by Post Wrestling The three-hour show averaged 1,715,000 viewers on the USA Network and a 0.51 in the 18-49 demographic. Viewership increased by 6% and the demo rating improved by 6.25% and were their best figures in those categories since June. The show started with 1,710,000 viewers and increased by 6.6% in the second hour to 1,824,000 viewers, which is the highest hour of Raw since the opening hour of the June 29th show. In the third hour, viewership dropped by 11.7% but that was heavily skewed by the over 50 audience turning off the show. In the key demos, the largest increase this week was among females 12-34 that were up by 60% from last week followed by males 12-34 improving by 26% and females 18-49 increasing by 25%. The only demo that fell was a minor drop with males 18-49 falling 3% this week.

Originally Posted by PWI WWE Network News is reporting that the new show "WWE Timeline" debuting this Sunday on WWE Network will focus on the rivalry between The Miz and Daniel Bryan. It will be available on both the free and paid versions of the streaming service.

Originally Posted by Post Wrestling Ariane Andrew and Matt Dillon welcomed Naomi onto their ‘Sippin The Tea’ show on YouTube. To kick off the conversation, Ariane Andrew spoke about her stint with All Elite Wrestling and competing in their Women’s Tag Team Cup. Ariane clarified that she is not with AEW and is still a free agent. “So since we are spilling tea, I’m gonna keep it 1,000 percent so everyone can hear it right here, right now. I am not with AEW. That was just a little something, something. A little something, something. I’m a free agent. As excited a people were, people were like, ‘So what does that mean? There’s no Funkadactyl reunion?’ And the thing is, I can’t say anything — not that I can’t say anything but it’s like I don’t wanna spill the tea but I’m spilling the tea right here, right now that it’s not official so there’s still a door. Hello Vince, are you listening? Funkadactyl reunion.”

Originally Posted by Post Wrestling ESPN has a feature story up about the recent purchase of the XFL by Dany Garcia, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson and their backer, RedBird Capital Partners. Garcia spoke to ESPN for the article and recalled reaching out to Johnson when the news of the XFL going out of business became public. “I told DJ, ‘We have something really important to do. We want to do this.’ It was so natural. There was a moment in Dwayne’s life when football was going to be his [career]. I’m a professional athlete myself. We do sports. We do entertainment. If you look at our résumés, everything points to this moment and opportunity for us, to work with these athletes and to build this brand.” It’s noted in the article that Oliver Luck, who’s currently suing former XFL owner Vince McMahon for wrongful termination, will not be a part of the forthcoming version of the league. Regarding a 2021 season, the XFL built a bubble plan for their eight teams to either be used during the COVID-19 pandemic or as a cost-cutting measure and that bubble plan is a part of the intellectual property that’ll transition over to Garcia, Johnson and the group that now owns the XFL. Dany Garcia was also heavily involved in Dwayne Johnson’s contract negotiations while he was with the WWE full-time and she knew Vince and Linda McMahon “very well”. The unsecured creditors filed an objection to the sale of the XFL because of the feeling that the sale might not have maximized the value of the league. The committee also expressed concerns about the relationship between Johnson, Garcia and McMahon.

Originally Posted by Post Wrestling Lance Storm was a guest on the ‘Sitting Ringside with David Penzer’ podcast and Storm told the story of when he was informed that WCW talents were supposed to get involved in the match between Vince and Shane McMahon at WrestleMania 17. According to what Storm was told, they were scheduled to do more than just appear on camera from the press box but due to Shawn Stasiak doing a radio interview and tipping off that WCW talents were being brought to Mania, their initial plans were scrapped and Vince McMahon was not pleased that their appearances had been leaked. “That first WrestleMania, the Mania 17 where we all sat in the luxury box or whatever and we’re there to support Shane O’Mac. From what I was told, again, it was second-hand but I was told we were originally going to be involved in the match but Shawn Stasiak stooged off that we were gonna be there in a internet interview that he did on the Friday, because we all got called less than a week before. ‘Hey, we’re gonna bring you into WrestleMania.’ We’re like, ‘Mhm, cool!’ And it was Johnny Ace that called me. He was always the liaison guy and he didn’t specifically say, ‘Hey don’t tell anybody, kayfabe this.’ But it’s not my first rodeo. Unless they tell you to promote it, you shut your damn mouth so I’m like, ‘Cool’ and kept it quiet. Well, Shawn Stasiak did an internet radio interview and said, ‘Oh yeah, we’re all being brought into WrestleMania. We’re gonna be at Mania 17’ and I was told Vince [McMahon] lost his sh*t and wanted to just cancel us all and not bring any of us there but tickets were booked, planes were booked, all that stuff and apparently, someone managed to calm him down and still bring us in but we were just sitting in the box, they’re having nothing to do with this and were sort of shunned and I think that was step one of, ‘Man, we’re in trouble.’”

Originally Posted by Post Wrestling When asked about the whereabouts of Austin Theory, Dave Meltzer of F4WOnline noted that Theory’s situation is a “unannounced suspension of sorts”.

Originally Posted by Fightful Extreme Rules didn't happen the way Kevin Dunn wanted. The WWE executive was particularly unhappy with a couple of spots in the Asuka vs. Sasha Banks Raw Women's Championship match, according to backstage sources within WWE. As reported on Fightful Select recently, we detailed what upset Dunn: Extreme Rules was high quality for WWE, but not everything went so smoothly, we're told. During the Sasha Banks and Asuka match, there were some production snafus that set Kevin Dunn off. We weren't told of specific instances, but Dunn was upset that cameras were catching Bayley in spots where they weren't supposed to. When asking around, we were told it wasn't significant, but enough to get Dunn to shout at people over it for not protecting talent.

Originally Posted by Observer Stock had a big drop from the $48 range to $44.17 Monday. The drop was based on uncertainty with the ratings which has never been an issue before, but now is a big issue because analysts have brought it up.

As of Tuesday's after hours trading, WWE Stocks were at $44.31

Originally Posted by Fightful You may have noticed that before his Great American Bash double title victory, a of Keith Lee celebrating with both titles emerged. It was posted Instagram by Indus Sher's Saurav Gurjar. This past week, Fightful Select learned more about how the situation was handled. Fightful has learned that at the last set of WWE NXT tapings, a backstage meeting was held and Indus Sher's Saurav Gurjar apologized for spoiling the results of the title-for-title match before it happened. Gurjar posted a picture of Keith Lee celebrating in the ring with both title belts with confetti falling a week before the title switch aired. We're told there's no significant heat on him, and there's no punishment expected to be handed down, though he and his partner have not been mentioned on TV since. Indus Sher is a personal favorite of Matt Bloom, who has been a big proponent for them in the past. There was disbelief in Gurjar among those in the company that we spoke to, with most of it being a "why did he think it would be okay to post anything from the tapings, much less that?" type of reaction. He was said to have apologized to Lee directly for spoiling a huge moment for the star.

Originally Posted by PWI It was announced over the weekend that the Shoney's restaurant in Acworth, Georgia owned by former WCW World Champion Scott Steiner has closed. It opened in 2016 and shut down due to COVID-19 and will not be re-opening. The restaurant featured a display case featuring items from Steiner's career, including his Michigan University jacket, action figures, PPV posters and photos.

Originally Posted by PWI While Major League Wrestling has been militant about not running show due to COVID-19 (MLW HQ is located in New Rochelle, the same city where COVID-19 first hit New York, so a lot of staff dealt with the issues firsthand), we are told they are reconsidering the stance after watching UFC, The NBA and boxing on DAZN have handled the situation. If those entities don't have massive flareups (see Major League Baseball and WWE), the more likely MLW will return to live events. Currently, nothing is on the books until December at the 2300 Arena, but the company has been willing to wait as long as 18 months before running. It's a situation that could change by the moment, just like the rest of this horrible ongoing pandemic ... Speaking of BeIN, John Duff, who was head of acquisitions and perhaps MLW's biggest advocate at BeIN, left in March to head up programming at MAVTV. We are told by MLW sources the departure will not have any bearing on their relationship with the Network. Duff and Dan Teitscheid, the President of MAVTV, went to UCLA together and previously worked together at Viacom. MLW had been scheduled to film content with the Von Erichs in Hawaii this past week but had to delay due to concern about Hurricane Douglas hitting the Island. Of course, MLW HQ is scheduled to be hit with a Tropical Storm tomorrow thanks to Isaias as well ... There's been talk of bringing in Canadian talent Michael Richard Blais, who won the first-ever Reid Flair Memorial Scholarship at the 2013 Mid-Atlantic Legends Fanfest in North Carolina. Blais was originally trained by TJ Wilson (Tyson Kidd) and has popped up on Raw and 205 Live in the past. We are told July was the third strongest MLW merchandise sales month in the company's history. The number one selling piece of merchandise was the LA Park Face Mask. MLW has seen an increase in online merch sales across the board since COVID-19.

Originally Posted by PWI As reported last week by PWInsider.com, the trial in the lawsuit brought by Jeff Jarrett and Global Force Entertainment lawsuit against Impact Wrestling parent company Anthem Wrestling was ruled a mistrial on 7/30. PWInsider.com has acquired a copy of the official order of the mistrial signed by United States District Court of The Middle District of Tennessee Chief Judge Waverly D. Crenshaw, Jr. ORDER In a July 30, 2020 ruling from the bench, the Court declared a mistrial in this case and a new trial was ordered in accordance with Rule 59 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure because cumulative errors by both the Court and counsel resulted in neither party receiving a fair trial. This included, but was not limited to: (1) the Court’s failure to instruct on comparative negligence; (2) the identity of the wrong entity in the verdict form on the counterfeiting claim; (3) improper comments by Defendant’s counsel in opening statements; and (4) improper statements by Plaintiffs’ counsel in closing arguments, all of which were discussed in detail in the Court’s oral ruling. Accordingly, the jury is hereby DISCHARGED, and the Clerk shall note on the docket that a MISTRIAL has been declared. A status conference will be held on September 11, 2020 at 9:00 a.m to set a new trial date.

Originally Posted by Post Wrestling TNT has announced that three episodes of AEW Dynamite will be affected by the network’s NBA coverage. The Wednesday, August 19th edition of Dynamite will now air on Saturday, August 22nd at 6 pm Eastern, which is the same night as NXT TakeOver on the WWE Network. The following week’s episode will air on Thursday, August 27th at 8 pm Eastern and the September 16th edition of Dynamite airs on Thursday, September 17th at 8 pm. TSN in Canada has not confirmed how this will impact their airings of the show but we should know later this week. Dave Meltzer of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter adds that the August 26th episode of AEW Dynamite will air later that night on TNT and then be replayed in prime time the following night.

TPWW Frontpage:

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