WWE is having a revolving door of commentary for the Rumble this weekend and I just might hang myself. They’re using everyone from the normal team to JBL and King Lawler and even Shawn Michaels. Someone on Facebook said the WWE should do what ESPN does for big college bowl games and allow different commentary experiences on different feeds on the network. Let’s have the normal team, but also a team where they analyze the wrestling more, maybe a team who calls it more straight, a “throwback” team of an obvious face and heel…just something different.
Well, various articles from 2016 said Konnor and Viktor were making $300k per year, which is about average for low to midcard card men in WWE.
I don’t know that there would be any such ability for those two guys to make that much, or anywhere near that much, on the indy circuit. Unless you have some great passion for the business (which doesn’t seem the case with them), then why not take that cash and ride the train as long as they’ll let you? Shit, live in an apartment, keep your expenses low and put as much of that as possible into investments and retirement accounts so you don’t need to sell cars for a living when you’re done.
Apparently Abyss and Sonjay Dutt are done with Impact and are headed to WWE, probably mostly in backstage/trainer roles.
Way too late for the Abyss/Undertaker program Abyss was supposedly offered many years ago, hopefully they can do good behind-the-scenes work (reuniting with Borash, perhaps?)
Wonder if the WWE offer was really that good, or if Anthem is tightening the pursestrings?
Abyss and Sonjay were practically running Impact from what I understand. I guess Sonjay would be good for 205 Live and the India market. Maybe Abyss could add to the hard core element WWE occasionally toys with. He’d make a good surprise entrant for da Rumble.
So what’s going to happen with Lars Sullivan? Vince has supposedly moved on from him, but does that mean his career is over? It’s hard to market a monster who has anxiety attacks, unless it’s like an elephant vs. mouse thing. Maybe work a feud with Hornswoggle?
Anecdotal: The funniest thing to me about Borash is we always loved him as the host if the Impact tapings because he would constantly hock backstage passes and t-shirts to the loudest fans (re: kids). It was a constant. Then he made the move to WWE and the first time we see him he’s…
Hocking t-shirts to the loudest fans (re: kids) at Full Sail Tapings.
Wellp, do one thing and do it well I guess!
Edge and Christian’s Show That Totally Reeks of Awesomeness has a hilarious parody of GoT called Game of Jabrones. Edge plays Jamie Lannister, with the gold hand that he can’t use, and Christian plays Jon Snow, but his name is Al. Hornswoggle is Tyrion, and Beth Phoenix is Cersei. Tommy Dreamer is Sandor Cleghan, dressed up as Mankind. They bring back some of the stupidest heels of wrestling past like the Yeti, the ECW Zombie and Mordecai to be the undead invaders from the north. Alexa Bliss makes an appearance as Denyaris, and Ricky “The Dragon” Steamboat is her dragon child.
I love it when badass wrestlers show what nerds they really are.
rousey might be done after wm MSN
Supposedly Royal Rumble is tanking at the box office. With any luck, the same will happen for Wrestlemania and I can score some tickets. Brokers got all the NXT Takeover tickets before I ever had a chance. 
I’m not sure how much available Rumble tickets means for WM. The Rumble was usually in a normal arena and this year they put it in a 43K stadium, which is probably double the usual available seats. WM is a destination event, where people fly in from all over the world–the Rumble is popular, but probably not too many people fly in from Australia for it.
Oh, I know. It’s just that WrestleMania is in my backyard, and scoring tickets just to fill in the venue would be, as they say, too sweet.
if McMahon ever retires I say give trips the wwe main roster and let jim cornette go nuts with nxt…….
Damnation, the opening tag team match already stole the show! I’m always amazed at how agile that big beefy dude Hanson is. UE and War Raiders need to feud forever ever ever…
WoW. The Gargano-Ricochet ballet was a fucking masterpiece. It told an incredible story, and Rico took some sick bumps, just like his LU days as Prince Puma.
Kassius Ohno reminds me of Fat Bastard from the Austin Powers movies. He wants to do ugly things to you. Riddle took a vicious kick in the teeth and spewed some mouth blood.
I gotta say, in the four or five decades I’ve watched wrestling, this is the best I’ve ever seen. Nothing can top NXT.
NXT keeps the Takeover shows tight with a good pacing and minimal shenanigans…just enough but rarely too much. Another killer show. The only downside is all the top-notch talent that doesn’t get on the Takeovers. Every PPV should have a Takeover, not just the big shows.
I dunno, I’m pretty happy with how NXT is run right now. I would be opposed to any change in this.
I know the Rumble is literally on right now, but I actually watched Takeover (live too!) and thought it was a solid show. The tag match was good and War Raiders are way more agile than their size suggests. They should have a good future.
Ricochet is king and always will be.
I need to see Matt Riddle wrestle more before I make a judgement, but KO is just…blegh.
I’m not too impressed with Shayna Baszler and thought the use of her friends was just stupid. That being said, she looked good yesterday and Bianca BelAir is frigging STAR. Good ending to this match.
Main event left me wanting a lot more. It was much slower than I hoped it would be and despite the good storytelling I was just waiting for it to get going. It was a perfectly fine match, but that was it to me.
Asuka’s best selling since entering WWE. My Empress of Tomorrow just remedied my one knock on her.
Hot take: I’m so bored with the women’s division.
Maybe it’s because it’s more obvious because of the smaller roster, but just like the men’s side the WWE has 4 people they care about and don’t let anyone do anything else.
I’m so tired of seeing becky, charlotte, bayley, sasha and (to a point) Nia do EVERYTHING. You have a whole goddamn division! USE THEM!
Nia got in the men’s match, so your final point is made doubly so, STC.
Overall, good show. I liked the CW Fatal 4 Way and how it made Buddy Murphy look like a giant in a world of not-so-big men. Asuka vs Becky was pretty brutal, and I dig the way Asuka does her battle shriek. The Bar vs Shane and Miz was a dud. Ronda vs Sasha was pretty good.
Women’s RR had some surprises, with MYC competitors getting called in instead of “Legends.” Becky’s win was kind of cheap, but they’ve been building up to her vs RR at WM anyway. DB vs AJ was excellent. Good to see Erick Rowan back, but what happens to the Bludgeon Brothers? Maybe DB becomes the new Bray Wyatt and Luke Harper returns to be part of the cult.
Finn vs Brock was better than expected, with Brock’s rl diverticulitis made into a plausible angle. Men’s RR had Johnny Gargano, Aleister Black, and Pete Dunne get some lengthy time. Dunne used his finger-breaking fetish on Aleister, and Black sold it so well, he made it look like he was popping his dislocated finger back into the joint. I do not wish to speculate on whether that was real, because it gives me the willies, but excellent touch! Mustafa eliminated Samoa Joe, meaning they’ll have a WM feud! Glad Seth won.
Brock Lesnar has worked harder and sold more for the smaller Finn Balor and Daniel Bryan than he ever has for Braun Strohman, and often even Roman Reigns. It’s a good look for Lesnar.
Other than Cesaro/Sheamus vs. Miz/McMahon and the criminally short Rusev vs. Nakamura, all the matches were entertaining. Hell, my only complaint with Rusev vs. Nakamura is that they didn’t give it time to develop and booked that weak-ass finish. I don’t think many were Takeover level…well maybe Riddle vs. Ohno level…but entertaining nonetheless.
I agree Sir T-Cups - too much emphasis on too few talents. Smackdown is doing a better job at undercard feuds, but that is just damning them with faint praise because it might be literally impossible to do worse with the undercard than they do with 3-friggin’-hours of Raw.