Any Pro Wrestling Fans in the Audience? (Multiple promotions) (Part 2)

Two very good to excellent matches last night on RAW, including the first one-on-one match between Bobby Lashley and AJ Styles for Lashley’s United States Championship. The Miz and Tomasso Ciampa got involved at one point before they got kicked out, but the match ended cleanly. The main event saw Dolph Ziggler bumping hard for that twerp Theory. I especially liked a sequence in which Theory rolled into the ring right into a Ziggler Famouser.

The jobber fed to Veer Mahaan last night was named Beaux Keller. I checked, and as of last night he didn’t have an entry on the Internet Wrestling Database, but now he does. He has a little bit of experience in CZW, CHIKARA, and AEW. He’s wrestled since 2016, so I assume he’s had bingo-hall matches not listed.

http://www.profightdb.com/wrestlers/breaux-keller-13336.html

Sasha Banks’ car was broken into while she and Naomi were in Oakland for the premiere of She-Hulk: Attorney at Law. The perpetrator broke her rear windshield and grabbed what he could before beating a retreat in the middle of the day. Banks wasn’t hurt, and I couldn’t tell from the article whether she was even in the vehicle at the time.

Dammit, I was hoping Brawn Breaker vs JD McDevlin would turn into a long-term feud, but they went with the Goldberg ending, and then immediately transitioned into establishing a rivalry between Breaker and Tyler Bate. Not that Bate’s a bad thing, but I was really digging JDM’s character and all the sudden BOOM the storyline’s over.

AEW Dark Taz/Excalibur moment of the day

Taz was in top form today, and Excalibur is so much more than a straight man for him. Ex is like a living Wikipedia. His keywords have links, and he doesn’t forget anything. I will actually be using my archive for part of this.

Ari Daivari vs. Fuego Del Sol

Taz: This man Ari Daivari, extreme wealth. Extreme wealth. He’s locked in to a plethora of trust funds, hedge fund men and women, throughout the great state of New York and New York City there, the Financial District. Excalibur, I know you’ve never been around there. I used to do the Taz Show and I had lunch there, I’d get lunch there with my hedge fund friends, we’d sit around and talk money. I’m sure I bumped into Daivari and his family members there. I would assume I did.
Ex: But you know what, you’re so rich, you can’t even remember.
Taz: I can’t remember. I buy, I spend money on my memory, because I store it with other people. Like I could say to you, “remember this for me,” and I’d give you 50 grand. That type of thing. I might do that with you, because you have a good memory.
Ex: Taz, if I had your money, I’d burn mine.
Taz: I actually stole that line from one of our broadcast colleagues, and I’ll leave that there. The one with the cowboy hat, but you don’t know who he is.

Parker Boudreaux and Slim J watch from ringside.
Taz: That Slim J Jones there, imagine him walking around Manhattan Financial District. Daivari’s maybe gotta purchase a suit for this guy. Maybe like some kind of a custom suit, or maybe he can wear the white tank top, with the hat, like it’s 1990.
Ex: I think there might be a custom tank top. I don’t think they sell those in stores anymore. I think you have to go a tailor for that.
Taz: or Price.com.

Ex: Parker Boudreaux, just jaw-jackin’ with Fuego. Insult to injury, Taz.
Taz: Yeah, I think it’s Parker BOO-DROO, it’s a French New Orleans vibe, he’s not from there, but you’re using the wrong accent. It’s a French thing, my friend.
Ex: How did I pronounce it?
Taz: BOO-DOE. You said it like some guy from Detroit would say things.
Ex: We’ll have to go back and review the tape.
Close-up of Boudreaux watching from ringside
Taz: BOO-DOE is loving this.

Robyn Renegade vs. Willow Nightingale

Taz: She is fun, but dangerous.
Ex: “Fun but dangerous.” That’s how I describe you Taz, to everybody that I meet.
Taz: That’s what I am when I’m saving files on my computer. Fun, but very dangerous… and incompetent.

Ex: Well, the Renegade sisters, Robyn and Charlette, we’ve seen in the past Taz, that they like to use the old “Killer B’s” switch when the referee’s not looking. They’ll trade places, and sometimes even come away with a victory.
Taz: I know, and it’s tough for the opponents to deal with that. You know, if I had a twin brother back in the day when I was wrestling, I would have done this too. What would his name be? Spaz, Jazz, Raz, I’m not sure. Something like that.
Ex: Well, Raz was a Psychonauts character, Jazz was a wrestler you may have shared a locker room with.
Taz: I did, well, she was in the ladies’ locker room, but yes, yes, we were in the same company together.
Ex: (chuckles) I didn’t mean you were in the dressing room together. I just meant you worked in the same place.
Taz: You said “shared a locker room with.” Semantics, bro. I hear ya.

Serpentico vs. Brock Anderson

Serpentico debuts with new ring gear, including spiked shoulders.
Ex: Serpentico looks like he may have left Chaos Project and joined the Road Warriors with those spikes.
Taz: Yes, he’s a modern-day Road Warrior Knots. But yeah, good observation on the spikes. Serpentico, I’m still trying to figure who he is under the mask, that mask of masks. I figured you might know. You guys wear masks, so you might know each other. Super Strong Suplex Machine hasn’t been around by the way, he’s got some trouble.

Ex: So it’s been established in AEW Dark canon, not only am I an 87-year old man, but I live in a gated community of masked wrestlers, and one of the wrestlers in the gated community is Super Strong Suplex Machine, who I have not seen recently, because he is currently summering in Australia, where it is currently the winter.

June 9, 2021
AEW Dark Taz/Excalibur moment of the day
Taz: It’s like my friend, the Super Strong Suplex Machine, yet to make his debut here on AEW Dark.
Ex: Yeah? Where’s he been?
Taz: Oh, it’s summertime. He’s on vacation. He’s got this summer house in Lake Hilliard, in Western Australia.
Ex: Oh really?
Taz: Yeah.
Ex: It’s wintertime there, weird place for a summer vacation.
Taz: …
Ex: GOT YOU TAZ!


Taz: What is this mask? Can you explain? You’re an expert, you buy the ones from Amazon and Price.com, what kind of mask is this man wearing here?
Ex: It’s a Dia de Los Muertes-inspired mask, little bit like a Calavera.
Taz: I meant like the material. I’m talking about the construction, the construction, do you know about that? Not the inspiration. Is it polyester? Spandex? Lookin’ a little lycra-ish?
Ex: I believe it’s probably a lycra base, with some sturdy elements around the lower jaw area.
Taz: Probably some nylon in there, maybe some pleather?
Ex: A plethora of pleather.
Taz: A plethora.

Serpentico pantomimes loading a shotgun and shooting it.
Taz: Taz, you ever had somebody pulling out an imaginary shotgun during a wrestling match on you?
Taz: No, I had a guy pull out a real knife on me during a match, though. It was outside of Philadelphia, guy pulled out a little mini saw. It was a fan, tried to stab me. Didn’t go well for him. Good times. True story.
Ex: Yeah, can’t believe that would happen in Philadelphia of all place, Taz.
Taz: The suburbs of Philly too!

Taz: Ooh, Serpentico’s gonna do something here, going to the top. Flippy Dippy Do Dippy Jones. New move, the Flippy Dippy Do Dippy Jones, man.
Ex: Kinda doubtful, but if he hits it, it’ll be all over. Serpentico looking for the Flippy Dippy Do Dippy Jones…
He misses.

There’s so much more, but I’m ending it here.

@Knowed_Out , I swear these are the highlight of my week in this thread.

I was looking forward to talks about Taz watching Excalibur shower…

There was also the bit where Taz tried to hypnotize Ex into agreeing with him, but my fingers were giving out.

The WSJ is confirming that Vince made payouts to Donald Trump’s fake charity.

Did the Trump Foundation have hot paralegals too?

Spoilers please? It’s just wrestling, not that big of a deal, but it’s easy to spoiler stuff just in case.

Instead of saving the CM Punk vs. Jon Moxley title unification match for All Out, where it might make them some money on PPV, AEW is broadcasting it next week on Dynamite on free television. This is Hogan/Goldberg all over again.

Their promos were pretty vicious though. They referenced the less savory parts of each other’s WWE careers. The Shield were originally supposed to be Punk’s bodyguards and he left after they ascended to Main Event level, so there’s that bit of unfinished business.

I’m not sure of why there’s heat between Punk and Eddie Kingston though, other than Eddie will find a reason to hate anybody.

So it’s going to gwt thw highest ratings in AEW history and be remembered for decades to come?

Yeah, but not sell any pay-per-views.

NXT UK is going on hiatus and rebranding as NXT Europe.

The UK division has just been quietly doing its own thing while Vince took a sledgehammer to Hunter’s vision. Now that Hunter is in charge, it looks like he’s going to pursue his old plan of launching a global network of farm leagues.

Presumably the UK title is going to be incorporated into a resurrected and elevated European Championship.

Half their talent is from outside the UK anyway. When you think about it, HHH is becoming a heavy influence on post-Brexit politics.

That promo last night, when CM Punk called out Hangman Adam Page? He wasn’t supposed to do that. That’s why Page didn’t respond. He wasn’t even at gorilla.

According to one of the better news sites, Punk’s callout was in retaliation to things Page said about Punk being a carpetbagger, and Punk, with his infinite ego, wouldn’t let it slide. So rather than letting go of something already forgotten, Punk had to get his receipt. Just the sort of thing Punk has called out others for in the past.

In other news, WWE announced NXT Europe Worlds Collide for September 4 at 4:00pm Eastern, same day as All Out - right after All Out lost its marquee match to TV and with no headline announced. This is definitely going to cost AEW some buys.

My honest guess is thaat their match on Dynamite will end in some sort of non-finish like a 60-mimute draw, and they’ll do some sort of hardcore match at All Out.

Oh, yay, watching Mox bleed for 58 minutes. Sign me up*

*for absolutely anything else