All Elite Wrestling (AEW) thread

[RedwoodOriginal]

Have to say though Double Or Nothing 2021 was a very good PPV. A couple of issues aside, the PPV had a number of whopper matches/great moments. The build was good for nearly every match which is something you don't see too much of in WWE these days, and the crowd being very hot for most of the PPV really elevated the show for me.

 

[shaz619]

Shaz bro, you know we agree on the vast majority of stuff in pro wrestling. And eventhough AEW still has alot of stuff that enrages me, I have to say they have won me over to a great extent.

Maybe its just because WWE has been so incredibly lazy for so long. RAW at this point is in comparison with 2000s WCW Nitro. But AEW has alot of stuff that I'm starting to gravitate towards. I feel with AEW there's a focus on long-term story-telling because of the lack of PPVs, they can do the big gimmick matches well (WarGames, Exploding Barbed Wire Deathmatch, Lights Out match) even if they mess up the post-match stuff. And whether we admit or not they do have guys who are incredibly over and can become stars. I've always been big on Moxley, MJF etc. But guys like Orange Cassidy, Darby Allin, Eddie Kingston and others have won me over to a great degree. They are finally booking Miro the way he should have been booked all along. And one of my all-time favorite wrestlers Christian has come on-board too.

I have many issues with AEW still. They are obsessed with doing the flippy gymnastics that result in multiple botches and mean absolutely nothing. They are downright obsessed with WWE whether its doing cheap imitations or just trying to act like idiot smarks and the fact that they have a bloated roster with the Joey Jannelas and Marko Stunts of the world still employed. Not to mention, I will always despise the Young Bucks and everything they do, try to do.

That said, the potential of AEW is massive and that is something that I feel we should appreciate as wrestling fans. Especially since we have seen the kind of potential TNA had and the way it went up in smoke. I feel as AEW gets better than pro wrestling in general stands to benefit.

Re: Omega. I don't think he's the best wrestler in the world by any stretch. Just because he is such a horrendous promo. I do however think that he is a great wrestler if you just take in-ring ability. I didn't really think much of him, but that changed after I saw his series of matches with Okada.

I agree that if AEW do well and are capable of being a reasonable alternative, it is good for the wrestling industry. TNA obviously never had the backing of a platform like TNT and unfortunately they were plagued by a similar pattern of problems currently in AEW, I understand backstage not everyone is seeing eye to eye, the talent is heavily involved in the booking and there is a high level of nepotism to, sure you'd like to think in an ideal world they would make best use of the financial backing and exposure, but there is too much inconsistency. Also, for the same fans who hate on other promotions they at the end of the day support a company which is utilising the services of ex-WWE mercenaries more recently which is a bit ironic isn't it, it just shows that fans have been jaded for a very long time and a new shiny toy comes along and becomes very attractive.

I can't take Cassidy seriously, a guy who puts his hands in his pockets and faffs around with those light taps is in the main event scene, that surely has to be a joke, if he was a mid card act I'd get it but this bloke is a prime example of how jaded wrestling fans are, anyone who would leave a competitor right now and walk straight into AEW would become immediately over with cult following. MJF, Eddie Kingston etc are terrific but these blokes are not products of AEW, am not sure who they have managed to actually elevate themselves who I can take a bit seriously ?

Moxley in my opinion for all the talk he did before hand, I am vastly disappointed, I expected more edge from him instead I get garbage wrestling which he wasn't allowed to do in the WWE. Jericho is someone who I'd say on the other hand thrived and also Cody. Speaking of Omega, the matches he had with Okada are vastly over rated, and that wouldn't be more adamant now when you look at how badly exposed he has been in North America; absolute tripe on the mic and predominately excellent at high spots in the ring, Omega has all the creative control in the world, something wrestlers complain about not having enough in WWE yet he has still failed, it proves his overall in-ring IQ is very low, the matches he had in Japan are much better reflection of Gado the booker and Okada, I feel the matches Okada had with Omega elevated him to another level because he managed to convince the world Omega could be an all time great, the best wrestlers in the world truly are those who can get classics out of utter tripe and Okada has achieved a tick in the box for that. You stick any wrestler from WWE and you put them in the NJPW environment, and you can't disagree someone like a Ricochet, Mustafa Ali or Cesaro wouldn't have classics with Okada, NJPW is a great environment for foreign talent because you work at the top of the card with the best workers constantly and you don't have the pain of a rigorous schedule behind you or someone telling you what you can or can't do in the ring.

 

[Asim_khan]

I liked the show to a great extent eventhough I hated certain things. However, it was great to see a packed crowd after such a long time that was heavily invested in the action.

I don't however think that attributes to Omega because fact is no one: Omega or Reigns or Randy Orton is a big enough draw in wrestling today. AEW draws because of a number of guys (including Omega, but not just him), factors like: gimmick matches, being an alternative to WWE. WWE draws based on their brand name, and a number of guys. But none of these guys are even big enough draws than Cena, whether people like to admit it or not.

But since you're an AEW fan I wanted to get your perspective on The Young Bucks. What do you and other AEW fans think of all the smarky stuff the Bucks do? I have seen very little of it but they seemed to be in overdrive last night.

I'm absolutely loving to hate the Young Bucks at the moment, and so are the rest of the AEW fandom going by the traction their smarky "new bio" tweets are getting on twitter, this is the version of them I prefer, the one's from 2015-2018, who won over the PWG/ROH crowd as legit workers and brought the Bullet club shirts into Hot Topic. Their character was getting a bit stale as baby faces, sure they were still having great matches against FTR, Private Party, LAX & Death Triangle etc, but it's difficult to invest in them as EVP's being booked like Super John Cena. But then they made it even worse when this latest super elite/Bullet club rehash started, I absolutely hated the little tweener gimmick they did in and around the Revolution ppv where they wouldn't turn full heel, especially since they super kicked the Varsity Blondes, who are about as clean cut 80's baby face as you're gonna get, 2nd generation, mullets, starter jackets, faux GnR rock music theme and all. It's almost like they wanted the best of both worlds, but thankfully it was short lived and now, this sleazy, arrogant, version of the Bucks is so easy to hate, and off the back of that we got that incredible Eddie Kingson hot tag on Sunday, which I'm so happy he got, I honestly can't believe it's taken 20 years for him to get a moment like that.

I've always been a fan of the Bucks, I first saw them in TNA as Generations Me in around 2010, they had 4 or 5 of the best tag team matches I'd seen at that point against the Motor City Machine Guns, but that's all they did and then got fired by the Russo/Hulk/Bischoff regime along with Red,Lethal etc and I lost touch with them, The Summer of Punk was starting, and Jericho was back too, so I actually started watching WWE again, but I'd hear of the Bucks on Wrestling message boards having try outs at WWE and getting rejected, ending up in Cornette run ROH and never being booked lol and then next time I saw them was a PWG dvd and they were absolutely booed out of the building and I thought that was the end of them, until a few years later I read they'd debuted in NJPW with Devitt, and then next I actually saw them was with AJ Styles/Machine Gun KA version of Bullet Club and I couldn't believe these were the same guys. I think when they did "All In" they had to go full face and that's the Bucks we've had in AEW for the most part.

 

[shaz619]

I can rarely watch an entire event in one go these days but these are the matches I’ve managed today:

First impressions are good off the set and production quality, in the past there were errors made by the camera crew but they have been doing a good job for this PPV, it’s a hot crowd as you’d expect with more fans returning to a live event for a flagship show for the company.

- Cage v Page: Good solid opener, interference wasn’t needed at the end, I’d have ended the match with Page’s pin with the bridge at the end which would have been a better way to protect Cage but also give Page a clean win. Ricky Stark’s is one fine talent but I hear he is injured, if thing’s don’t change there will be more like him, spamming moves non-stop may be entertaining for modern audience but for the longevity of your roster it’s just stupid and to me achieved very little in the ring. Going back to Adam Page, why is he in the opener and not in the main event ? he has all the tools to be a credible performer at the top of the card this just seems like a big waste.

- I feel sorry for both Moxley and Kingston that they are limited to working a tag match with the Bucks who probably booked this angle for themselves and used main event calibre talent for a tag title defence, surely the incredibly creative Private Party were better suited to this spot....anyhow the match was apparently built on Kingston stealing a pair of sneakers from the Bucks going by the package before the match which is a bit poor tbh the match itself was fine for what it was, but it didn’t blew me away, I have become desensitised to excessive high spots in tag matches but feel FTR have found the perfect balance in these times, balancing effective tag team work with high octane offence, speaking of which, why were they not booked for a tag title shot ? another blunder

Despite that both opening matches were solid before we move on to the Casino Battle Royale

- The rules for the match were stupid and the entire battle royale was absolute ***** and pure aids, but wait the crowd was going nuts for Jungle Boy which means his in-ring IQ and ability to depict ring psychology must be the same as Bret the hitman Hart, couldn’t they find something better for Christian to do then put a 5 year old kid over? the finishing stretch was hard to watch and even for a vet like Christian it was difficult for him to work with Jungle Boy, they just didn’t mesh well and Jungle’s offence lacked impact, there was a poster who mentioned ‘you still watch this fake stuff’ honestly why get offended when there is tripe like this on a major PPV ?

- At this point I didn’t want to watch any further but stuck it out, not many will know who Anthony Ogogo is but with me being a big Boxing fan I could get into his back story and was impressed by the little he did show but he made mistakes and is still so green, why on earth was he booked on the card? he barely has any experience and jesus christ that too working with Cody Rodes who went 50/50 with him in the ring! both men come out the match looking a lot worse then when they went in.

- Lance Archer v Miro: Match started with a couple of big moves which normally I wouldn’t be happy with but this is an exception with two heavyweights, they had a solid back and forth match which was all it needed to be and Miro achieved a decisive win, I gather he is repeating his unbeaten gimmick from WWE days ? I didn’t see anything new from him but this match was fine again

- Womens match, this was a colossal waste of my time and an absolute pain to watch, a big gulf in class and a styles clash for all the wrong reasons, the Jap talent I have seen so far in AEW have struggled to adapt to the American style and Hiroshida or whatever her name is wasn’t remotely threatening, her grappling was very weak and she lacked an awareness for pacing herself, she had a great shining wizzard but that was it, even the cult audience found this one difficult to sit through and only woke up for the crutch spot, Dr Baker is one fine talent but she deserved a better dance partner then this, anyway we got the correct result in the end but AEW need to vastly improve their womens division instead of pandering to Kenny’s Jap Fetish or booking friggin tranny’s to win the title, Thunder Rosa was a welcome addition but I much rather prefer watching her in NWA

Will watch the rest later

 

[RedwoodOriginal]

I agree that if AEW do well and are capable of being a reasonable alternative, it is good for the wrestling industry. TNA obviously never had the backing of a platform like TNT and unfortunately they were plagued by a similar pattern of problems currently in AEW, I understand backstage not everyone is seeing eye to eye, the talent is heavily involved in the booking and there is a high level of nepotism to, sure you'd like to think in an ideal world they would make best use of the financial backing and exposure, but there is too much inconsistency. Also, for the same fans who hate on other promotions they at the end of the day support a company which is utilising the services of ex-WWE mercenaries more recently which is a bit ironic isn't it, it just shows that fans have been jaded for a very long time and a new shiny toy comes along and becomes very attractive.

I can't take Cassidy seriously, a guy who puts his hands in his pockets and faffs around with those light taps is in the main event scene, that surely has to be a joke, if he was a mid card act I'd get it but this bloke is a prime example of how jaded wrestling fans are, anyone who would leave a competitor right now and walk straight into AEW would become immediately over with cult following. MJF, Eddie Kingston etc are terrific but these blokes are not products of AEW, am not sure who they have managed to actually elevate themselves who I can take a bit seriously ?

Moxley in my opinion for all the talk he did before hand, I am vastly disappointed, I expected more edge from him instead I get garbage wrestling which he wasn't allowed to do in the WWE. Jericho is someone who I'd say on the other hand thrived and also Cody. Speaking of Omega, the matches he had with Okada are vastly over rated, and that wouldn't be more adamant now when you look at how badly exposed he has been in North America; absolute tripe on the mic and predominately excellent at high spots in the ring, Omega has all the creative control in the world, something wrestlers complain about not having enough in WWE yet he has still failed, it proves his overall in-ring IQ is very low, the matches he had in Japan are much better reflection of Gado the booker and Okada, I feel the matches Okada had with Omega elevated him to another level because he managed to convince the world Omega could be an all time great, the best wrestlers in the world truly are those who can get classics out of utter tripe and Okada has achieved a tick in the box for that. You stick any wrestler from WWE and you put them in the NJPW environment, and you can't disagree someone like a Ricochet, Mustafa Ali or Cesaro wouldn't have classics with Okada, NJPW is a great environment for foreign talent because you work at the top of the card with the best workers constantly and you don't have the pain of a rigorous schedule behind you or someone telling you what you can or can't do in the ring.

I can understand where you're coming from. And I can understand why alot of people are/would be turned off by Cassidy. That said, I also feel like modern wrestling has evolved for better or worse. And for all the pockets stuff, OC has a very genuine connection with the crowd. The quality of his matches will always depend on the quality of his opponents but the potential to do some creative stuff with him is significant. And I think the guy does deserve credit for elevating himself from purely a comedy act to someone who is incredibly over and just beneath the main-event level.

I dunno man. I kinda loved the Exploding Barbed Wire Deathmatch he had with Omega, barring the popcorn **** of an ending. It was something very different and not like the GCW-esque garbage I was expecting. I think there's still an audience for hardcore wrestling today that is closer to the the kind of stuff we saw in WWE or TNA, but not necessarily the full-on mud-show garbage wrestling that you saw in CZW or in GCW today where idiots are bashing each other with tube-lights and pizza-cutters. Moxley definitely seems obsessed with that stuff, and even has a mud-show garbage wrestling background. But as long as he doesn't go beyond the level he has gone in his two matches hardcore matches with Omega, I won't have a problem.

I don't think there's any denying that Okada was the star of the matches. I think if you talk about pure wrestling ability Okada is arguably the best in the world. That said, I feel Omega does deserve some credit for his performance in those matches too. Still don't think he's in the conversation for the best in the world, and he is vastly overrated by AEW fans. But I don't find him to be bad either and I have found myself enjoying Omega matches.

MJF, Eddie Kingston etc are terrific but these blokes are not products of AEW, am not sure who they have managed to actually elevate themselves who I can take a bit seriously ?

I'm not a big believer in this theory because I feel with every major wrestling promotion these days you're always going to have guys from somewhere else. I mean just look at WWE. Lashley and Drew, who are positioned as the two biggest top-guys after Roman both came from LOLTNA. Cesaro, Rollins, KO, Zayn have been there for a very long time but they all came from ROH. In the case of AEW, all their guys are bound to be from somewhere else since they have no real development. But I would say (off the top of my head) they do deserve credit for elevating; MJF, Darby Allin, Jungle Boy. Adam Page and Ricky Starks may not have been elevated yet but those are two more guys who can become massive stars in the future, particularly Starks. But point is that they do have young guys who can become stars down the line for them which is a major positive.

 

[RedwoodOriginal]

I'm absolutely loving to hate the Young Bucks at the moment, and so are the rest of the AEW fandom going by the traction their smarky "new bio" tweets are getting on twitter, this is the version of them I prefer, the one's from 2015-2018, who won over the PWG/ROH crowd as legit workers and brought the Bullet club shirts into Hot Topic. Their character was getting a bit stale as baby faces, sure they were still having great matches against FTR, Private Party, LAX & Death Triangle etc, but it's difficult to invest in them as EVP's being booked like Super John Cena. But then they made it even worse when this latest super elite/Bullet club rehash started, I absolutely hated the little tweener gimmick they did in and around the Revolution ppv where they wouldn't turn full heel, especially since they super kicked the Varsity Blondes, who are about as clean cut 80's baby face as you're gonna get, 2nd generation, mullets, starter jackets, faux GnR rock music theme and all. It's almost like they wanted the best of both worlds, but thankfully it was short lived and now, this sleazy, arrogant, version of the Bucks is so easy to hate, and off the back of that we got that incredible Eddie Kingson hot tag on Sunday, which I'm so happy he got, I honestly can't believe it's taken 20 years for him to get a moment like that.

I've always been a fan of the Bucks, I first saw them in TNA as Generations Me in around 2010, they had 4 or 5 of the best tag team matches I'd seen at that point against the Motor City Machine Guns, but that's all they did and then got fired by the Russo/Hulk/Bischoff regime along with Red,Lethal etc and I lost touch with them, The Summer of Punk was starting, and Jericho was back too, so I actually started watching WWE again, but I'd hear of the Bucks on Wrestling message boards having try outs at WWE and getting rejected, ending up in Cornette run ROH and never being booked lol and then next time I saw them was a PWG dvd and they were absolutely booed out of the building and I thought that was the end of them, until a few years later I read they'd debuted in NJPW with Devitt, and then next I actually saw them was with AJ Styles/Machine Gun KA version of Bullet Club and I couldn't believe these were the same guys. I think when they did "All In" they had to go full face and that's the Bucks we've had in AEW for the most part.

I can understand people liking them. Modern wrestling has changed significantly and I get why they appeal to alot of people. That said, I'm just not a fan and I think I never will be. I have grown to like many things in AEW that I thought I would never like but the Bucks just ain't one them.

I think its kinda desperate and sad that they have to mock a former WWE wrestler/angle/group in every match. It feels like they have no personality and are trying to substitute that by acting like smart marks. Alot of their moves feel like really well done gymnastics where its hard to believe that they are hurting anyone. But that's just me.

 

[shaz619]

I can understand where you're coming from. And I can understand why alot of people are/would be turned off by Cassidy. That said, I also feel like modern wrestling has evolved for better or worse. And for all the pockets stuff, OC has a very genuine connection with the crowd. The quality of his matches will always depend on the quality of his opponents but the potential to do some creative stuff with him is significant. And I think the guy does deserve credit for elevating himself from purely a comedy act to someone who is incredibly over and just beneath the main-event level.

I dunno man. I kinda loved the Exploding Barbed Wire Deathmatch he had with Omega, barring the popcorn **** of an ending. It was something very different and not like the GCW-esque garbage I was expecting. I think there's still an audience for hardcore wrestling today that is closer to the the kind of stuff we saw in WWE or TNA, but not necessarily the full-on mud-show garbage wrestling that you saw in CZW or in GCW today where idiots are bashing each other with tube-lights and pizza-cutters. Moxley definitely seems obsessed with that stuff, and even has a mud-show garbage wrestling background. But as long as he doesn't go beyond the level he has gone in his two matches hardcore matches with Omega, I won't have a problem.

I don't think there's any denying that Okada was the star of the matches. I think if you talk about pure wrestling ability Okada is arguably the best in the world. That said, I feel Omega does deserve some credit for his performance in those matches too. Still don't think he's in the conversation for the best in the world, and he is vastly overrated by AEW fans. But I don't find him to be bad either and I have found myself enjoying Omega matches.

MJF, Eddie Kingston etc are terrific but these blokes are not products of AEW, am not sure who they have managed to actually elevate themselves who I can take a bit seriously ?

I'm not a big believer in this theory because I feel with every major wrestling promotion these days you're always going to have guys from somewhere else. I mean just look at WWE. Lashley and Drew, who are positioned as the two biggest top-guys after Roman both came from LOLTNA. Cesaro, Rollins, KO, Zayn have been there for a very long time but they all came from ROH. In the case of AEW, all their guys are bound to be from somewhere else since they have no real development. But I would say (off the top of my head) they do deserve credit for elevating; MJF, Darby Allin, Jungle Boy. Adam Page and Ricky Starks may not have been elevated yet but those are two more guys who can become massive stars in the future, particularly Starks. But point is that they do have young guys who can become stars down the line for them which is a major positive.

Cassidy doesn’t belong anywhere near the main event he is there to pander to a cult, do you seriously see this bloke challenge Naito, Okada, Reigns, Edge, Drew, Lashley in a main event spot ? He wouldn’t work the top spot in any promotion outside AEW and probably the faded Chikara

When I said not products of AEW I meant guys like Kingston and MJF are good despite of AEW not because of them, off course in the present talent comes from every where but WWE has a proven history for having a knack for developing home grown talent if we look at 21st century there is OVW which was fantastic. Lashley had a good 1st run in the company and Drew actually has taken accountability for his own failings, Drew in particular revamped himself while you could argue that perhaps Lashley should have been booked much better in his first run as a main event guy but I didn’t have many issues with what he achieved, both are doing the best work of their career under the current set up with that being said, going back to ROH; this in a way has always acted as a bit of a development territory for WWE, there was a method behind them utilising talent from this company and I credit Bryan for opening that door as well, Gabe was one of the high profile bookers of ROH who WWE developed a good relationship with, he later worked with Evolve who then formed a partnership with NXT which has evolved into WWE’s own development territory. I don’t know what AEW are doing for development behind the scenes but I can’t see much from the on-screen talent which has a lot to thank the booking team for if one exists; MJF is a talent who has elevated himself, I don’t take Darby Allin too seriously. I will give you this, they have elevated Jungle Boy and Orange Cassidy that’s for sure, the new Rock and Stone Cold Steve Austin it seems

 

[SangasCoverDrive]

AEW is just another version of WCW. Tony Khan is a wannabe Vince. Their fans on social media are intolerable.

 

[RedwoodOriginal]

Cassidy doesn’t belong anywhere near the main event he is there to pander to a cult, do you seriously see this bloke challenge Naito, Okada, Reigns, Edge, Drew, Lashley in a main event spot ? He wouldn’t work the top spot in any promotion outside AEW and probably the faded Chikara

When I said not products of AEW I meant guys like Kingston and MJF are good despite of AEW not because of them, off course in the present talent comes from every where but WWE has a proven history for having a knack for developing home grown talent if we look at 21st century there is OVW which was fantastic. Lashley had a good 1st run in the company and Drew actually has taken accountability for his own failings, Drew in particular revamped himself while you could argue that perhaps Lashley should have been booked much better in his first run as a main event guy but I didn’t have many issues with what he achieved, both are doing the best work of their career under the current set up with that being said, going back to ROH; this in a way has always acted as a bit of a development territory for WWE, there was a method behind them utilising talent from this company and I credit Bryan for opening that door as well, Gabe was one of the high profile bookers of ROH who WWE developed a good relationship with, he later worked with Evolve who then formed a partnership with NXT which has evolved into WWE’s own development territory. I don’t know what AEW are doing for development behind the scenes but I can’t see much from the on-screen talent which has a lot to thank the booking team for if one exists; MJF is a talent who has elevated himself, I don’t take Darby Allin too seriously. I will give you this, they have elevated Jungle Boy and Orange Cassidy that’s for sure, the new Rock and Stone Cold Steve Austin it seems

Not at all. Cassidy is obviously a very limited talent. But the thing about him is that (and I'm speaking purely from a personal point of view) is that he can make you believe in his personality. And once someone does that than you are willing to look past some of the obvious limitations that guy has. I completely understand why people hate him, or dislike his schtick but at the same time I also understand why so many love him. And he gets a natural reaction out of me the moment he comes out to my all-time favorite song, Where Is My Mind? by Pixies (which I'm quite glad is his entrance theme now), and that's something I just can't deny because there's very little stuff that gets a natural reaction out of me these days.

My bad for misunderstanding that. AEW might consider setting up a development territory down the line at some point. But right of the bat I have to say the idea of one concerns me. Because eventhough I have grown to like alot of stuff about AEW, one thing I cannot accept is the abundance of high-flying and dangerous gymnastics on their show. And if they are going to be teaching that dangerous, botch-heavy, brainless style of wrestling to up and coming wrestlers than I won't have much hope for the future of AEW. Its also going to matter who they have as the trainers because if the trainers are The Young Bucks than you expect what kind of wrestlers would be coming out of there. And I loved what MJF had to say about AEW's love for high-flying gymnastics in an interview. He really hit the nail on the head:

"When I watch professional wrestling on AEW Dynamite, I cringe, I want to puke in my mouth a little bit, because I see these guys and they are murdering themselves. They are jumping from the top rope to the floor, they are doing the loopy loops, the twisty turns, the flippity do-das, and they are killing themselves. Some of these people who are younger than me, and I’m already wildly young, might not be able to walk anymore when they get to my age.”

So maybe its better if they keep plucking wrestlers that were either fired by WWE or were a big fish in a small pond in some obscure indie promotion. Personally speaking, I don't mind it because I have come to terms with the fact that pro wrestling is probably never going to be as good as it was in the 90s or 2000s. Its sadly the way it is and I for one have learnt to temper my expectations eventhough it does get hard at times. We're probably never going to see anyone who talents/draws like Austin, Rock or even Cena.

I have to slightly disagree with you on Lashley. I personally thought he lacked the mic skills and personality during his first run and was definitely a little green which prevented him from truly breaking through. But when I look at him now, its like he has reached another level altogether. His promo skills have improved massively eventhough he's got MVP and doesn't really need to talk. But in the ring the guy is an absolute beast. Its just a damn shame that it has happened so late when he is 44 but no one can say he doesn't deserve to finally be on top.

 

[RedwoodOriginal]

AEW is just another version of WCW. Tony Khan is a wannabe Vince. Their fans on social media are intolerable.

AEW is not even close to being WCW. WCW at its peak was the biggest wrestling company in the world whose weekly flagship show was watched by 5 million+ people. Even at its worst, in 2000, WCW Monday Nitro was doing 2 million+ which is something AEW can only dream about.

The only connection AEW has with WCW is that its on the same channel and its owner is a massive WCW mark.

 

[RedwoodOriginal]

I can rarely watch an entire event in one go these days but these are the matches IÂ’ve managed today:

First impressions are good off the set and production quality, in the past there were errors made by the camera crew but they have been doing a good job for this PPV, itÂ’s a hot crowd as youÂ’d expect with more fans returning to a live event for a flagship show for the company.

- Cage v Page: Good solid opener, interference wasnÂ’t needed at the end, IÂ’d have ended the match with PageÂ’s pin with the bridge at the end which would have been a better way to protect Cage but also give Page a clean win. Ricky StarkÂ’s is one fine talent but I hear he is injured, if thingÂ’s donÂ’t change there will be more like him, spamming moves non-stop may be entertaining for modern audience but for the longevity of your roster itÂ’s just stupid and to me achieved very little in the ring. Going back to Adam Page, why is he in the opener and not in the main event ? he has all the tools to be a credible performer at the top of the card this just seems like a big waste.

- I feel sorry for both Moxley and Kingston that they are limited to working a tag match with the Bucks who probably booked this angle for themselves and used main event calibre talent for a tag title defence, surely the incredibly creative Private Party were better suited to this spot....anyhow the match was apparently built on Kingston stealing a pair of sneakers from the Bucks going by the package before the match which is a bit poor tbh the match itself was fine for what it was, but it didnÂ’t blew me away, I have become desensitised to excessive high spots in tag matches but feel FTR have found the perfect balance in these times, balancing effective tag team work with high octane offence, speaking of which, why were they not booked for a tag title shot ? another blunder

Despite that both opening matches were solid before we move on to the Casino Battle Royale

- The rules for the match were stupid and the entire battle royale was absolute ***** and pure aids, but wait the crowd was going nuts for Jungle Boy which means his in-ring IQ and ability to depict ring psychology must be the same as Bret the hitman Hart, couldn’t they find something better for Christian to do then put a 5 year old kid over? the finishing stretch was hard to watch and even for a vet like Christian it was difficult for him to work with Jungle Boy, they just didn’t mesh well and Jungle’s offence lacked impact, there was a poster who mentioned ‘you still watch this fake stuff’ honestly why get offended when there is tripe like this on a major PPV ?

- At this point I didnÂ’t want to watch any further but stuck it out, not many will know who Anthony Ogogo is but with me being a big Boxing fan I could get into his back story and was impressed by the little he did show but he made mistakes and is still so green, why on earth was he booked on the card? he barely has any experience and jesus christ that too working with Cody Rodes who went 50/50 with him in the ring! both men come out the match looking a lot worse then when they went in.

- Lance Archer v Miro: Match started with a couple of big moves which normally I wouldnÂ’t be happy with but this is an exception with two heavyweights, they had a solid back and forth match which was all it needed to be and Miro achieved a decisive win, I gather he is repeating his unbeaten gimmick from WWE days ? I didnÂ’t see anything new from him but this match was fine again

- Womens match, this was a colossal waste of my time and an absolute pain to watch, a big gulf in class and a styles clash for all the wrong reasons, the Jap talent I have seen so far in AEW have struggled to adapt to the American style and Hiroshida or whatever her name is wasnÂ’t remotely threatening, her grappling was very weak and she lacked an awareness for pacing herself, she had a great shining wizzard but that was it, even the cult audience found this one difficult to sit through and only woke up for the crutch spot, Dr Baker is one fine talent but she deserved a better dance partner then this, anyway we got the correct result in the end but AEW need to vastly improve their womens division instead of pandering to KennyÂ’s Jap Fetish or booking friggin trannyÂ’s to win the title, Thunder Rosa was a welcome addition but I much rather prefer watching her in NWA

Will watch the rest later

- I really liked this match. The crowd were insanely hot. I didn't mind the interference because it served a purpose. Page has always been very good, but Brian Cage really exceeded my expectations in this one.

- The Young Bucks are frickin' egomaniacs. And this was a match designed by them, for them to do all their nonsensical B.S. The kind of reactions Mox and Eddie were getting, I expected them to go over. But I suppose that was too much to ask.

- I hated the idea of Christian putting Jungle Boy over. I mean I get that the kid is over and everything but really? You had to get Christian, who is a bigger name and has achieved more than 99.9% of the people in AEW to put him over? Maybe its coz I'm just a huge Christian fan but I despised this.

- Cody vs. Ogogo thoroughly mediocre. This entire feud has been laughably bad and stupid, its like something out of 80s WWF. Its shown that Cody (despite being a generally smart guy) is just as susceptible to buying too much into his hype as the Bucks or Omega.

- Yeah Britt Baker is a great talent. She has really gotten over and broken through after her brutal Lights Out match with Thunder Rosa on Dynamite. I'm glad they took the title of Shida because I have never been a fan of her. This was not a good match. And now Baker and Rosa should continue their feud for the title.

I know it may seem like I'm not high on the PPV but I loved everything after Baker vs. Shida. Would love to hear your thoughts on Sting/Darby vs. Sky/Page.

 

[Bhaag Viru Bhaag]

Won't be surprised if we see Braun Strowman and Aleister Black in AEW soon because they have been fired by WWE alongwith Lana, Buddy Murphy and Ruby Riott. Have heard rumours that Vince is planning to sell WWE.

 

[Asim_khan]

Won't be surprised if we see Braun Strowman and Aleister Black in AEW soon because they have been fired by WWE alongwith Lana, Buddy Murphy and Ruby Riott. Have heard rumours that Vince is planning to sell WWE.

Hopefully not Braun, that's the sort of guy I'd hate to see in AEW, but I'd take Aleister Black/Tommy End every day of the week, personally would love to see him come in and take over the Dark Order, they've been missing a figure head since Brodie passed, I'd love it to be him.

I think Vince reckons AEW won't take Braun, and since Braun's made it clear he is a WWE lifer and hates pro wrestling outside of the wwe bubble, he'll be forced to return at a much cheaper rate, rumors are that he had one of the biggest contracts on the roster since he signed in 2019, the so called "please don't go to AEW contracts", and it's cos of cold hearted calculating moves like that, Vince is a billionaire lol. If you ever get a chance to read JJ Dillion's book, please do, it will tell you how much of a leech Vince is, he'd force office guys who worked in WWF/WWE to move to Stamford along with their families, give them advances, and then charge them interest on that advance, so they'd end up working for almost free, paying off this house and interest, and literally be in debt to him working long hours.

Of the guys released in 2021, the one's I'd love in AEW/NJPW/Mexico etc are Bryan Danielson/Daniel Bryan, Samoa Joe (If fit/Concussion free) and Andrade/La Sombra. I'm in 2 minds in regards to Buddy Murphy, I've always seen him as a cosplay Omega, but would be fun to watch those 2 go at it, and he had a series of bangers on 205 live.

 

[Asim_khan]

I can understand people liking them. Modern wrestling has changed significantly and I get why they appeal to alot of people. That said, I'm just not a fan and I think I never will be. I have grown to like many things in AEW that I thought I would never like but the Bucks just ain't one them.

I think its kinda desperate and sad that they have to mock a former WWE wrestler/angle/group in every match. It feels like they have no personality and are trying to substitute that by acting like smart marks. Alot of their moves feel like really well done gymnastics where its hard to believe that they are hurting anyone. But that's just me.

Yes, sadly that's the Bucks, they've cornered the "LOLWWE" market and it gets over with their crowd and I can see how it can be 'go away heat' with people who don't give a crap about things like that, but I'm a huge fan of their in ring work, and they keep having these great matches and I actually find Nick Jackson absolutely hilarious (the younger taller balder one), Matt can come across as a bit of a try hard, but they complement each other in terms of ringstyle perfectly.

As for Orange Cassidy, there's alot more there, he may seem like a one trick pony, but I don't know if you're aware of his backstory, Matt/Nick Jackson booked him for the original Casino Battle Royal, and he came in as number 22 from the crowd in the 21 person Battle Royal, Tony didn't like what he saw but agreed to it but didn't want him back beyond the Battle Royal, backstage JR, Chris Jericho etc absolutely hated it and pretty much had Shaz' reaction, that they were ruining pro Wrestling, ruining AEW before it had even got started, was gonna cost them the TNT deal and needed to get rid immediately.

Anyway the Bucks kept pushing for him to come as manager of the Best Friends, and that's when it came out that before he was Orange Cassidy he was under a mask as Fire Ant of the Colony faction in Chikara, and Tony Khan signed him on the spot. If you're not familiar with the Colony, it was Drew Gulak/Orange Cassidy/Alex Reynolds and a few guys now in ROH who were incredible, and Fire Ant was the antithesis of Orange Cassidy, just an incredible lucha style worker. So he was seen as this drip drip drip style character who' they're gonna reveal slowly, who looks like a joke, but one day is gonna reach super saiyan status, and he's shown flashes of it against Pac, Jericho and now in this triple threat which really had me believing he was gonna win at times, personally I'm invested, but we'll see where it goes from here.

 

[shaz619]

Hopefully not Braun, that's the sort of guy I'd hate to see in AEW, but I'd take Aleister Black/Tommy End every day of the week, personally would love to see him come in and take over the Dark Order, they've been missing a figure head since Brodie passed, I'd love it to be him.

I think Vince reckons AEW won't take Braun, and since Braun's made it clear he is a WWE lifer and hates pro wrestling outside of the wwe bubble, he'll be forced to return at a much cheaper rate, rumors are that he had one of the biggest contracts on the roster since he signed in 2019, the so called "please don't go to AEW contracts", and it's cos of cold hearted calculating moves like that, Vince is a billionaire lol. If you ever get a chance to read JJ Dillion's book, please do, it will tell you how much of a leech Vince is, he'd force office guys who worked in WWF/WWE to move to Stamford along with their families, give them advances, and then charge them interest on that advance, so they'd end up working for almost free, paying off this house and interest, and literally be in debt to him working long hours.

Of the guys released in 2021, the one's I'd love in AEW/NJPW/Mexico etc are Bryan Danielson/Daniel Bryan, Samoa Joe (If fit/Concussion free) and Andrade/La Sombra. I'm in 2 minds in regards to Buddy Murphy, I've always seen him as a cosplay Omega, but would be fun to watch those 2 go at it, and he had a series of bangers on 205 live.

Am glad you’ve compared Buddy Murphy with Omega, in essence both are high flying wrestlers but in my view Buddy’s work is a lot more slick. We are all aware of Omega’s cosplay antics but ignoring what a goof he is, am sure you must be aware of the wrestler Omega cosplays from Japan and predominately copied majority of his move set and that wrestler in particular is much better then him at executing those high flying moves.

 

[shaz619]

- I really liked this match. The crowd were insanely hot. I didn't mind the interference because it served a purpose. Page has always been very good, but Brian Cage really exceeded my expectations in this one.

- The Young Bucks are frickin' egomaniacs. And this was a match designed by them, for them to do all their nonsensical B.S. The kind of reactions Mox and Eddie were getting, I expected them to go over. But I suppose that was too much to ask.

- I hated the idea of Christian putting Jungle Boy over. I mean I get that the kid is over and everything but really? You had to get Christian, who is a bigger name and has achieved more than 99.9% of the people in AEW to put him over? Maybe its coz I'm just a huge Christian fan but I despised this.

- Cody vs. Ogogo thoroughly mediocre. This entire feud has been laughably bad and stupid, its like something out of 80s WWF. Its shown that Cody (despite being a generally smart guy) is just as susceptible to buying too much into his hype as the Bucks or Omega.

- Yeah Britt Baker is a great talent. She has really gotten over and broken through after her brutal Lights Out match with Thunder Rosa on Dynamite. I'm glad they took the title of Shida because I have never been a fan of her. This was not a good match. And now Baker and Rosa should continue their feud for the title.

I know it may seem like I'm not high on the PPV but I loved everything after Baker vs. Shida. Would love to hear your thoughts on Sting/Darby vs. Sky/Page.

Just watched the tag with Sting and the triple threat.

- The tag match involving Sting is my favourite match of the night, I was very concerned about Sting taking bumps and any stupid risks bit it seems they managed to somewhat mitigate that, I did cringe a little at the start when he was suplexed on the ramp. The match had a traditional layout and some structure to it, Sting was in great shape and moved around quiet well without getting gassed, I found the code red spot hilarious because that’s all you need to do in this era to get a massive pop lol am pretty sure the Rock N Roll Express did something similar to, I loved the finish that was beautiful / simple and effective - it looked great and Scorpio Sky bloke had a good outing himself, as for Darby Allin don’t think he did much wrong but come on, he needs to bulk up.....as for Sting, I personally feel he needs to retire asap, don’t want him to go through what the Undertaker did, if you’ve seen the last ride you”ll know what I mean

- Triple threat was awful, I hated it. It took ages to get going and it seems they were caught between the pacing of a singles match and triple threat, part of the issue was having a joke like ‘Orange’ in it, they should have just had a singles match between Pac and Omega; in this match Omega is meant to be the heel champion right, why is it that Pac came across like the star, his work looked great, he sold a lot better, was more vicious and he actually was trying to draw a bit of heat with his offence despite his high impact arsenal, Omega no sold a number of times in the match and it wasn’t a shoot, his ring IQ is just too low, there was a spot where he took a high flying move from the top rope and then immediately got up and went to the corner lol if they say he had a unique take on working, am sorry but I think we deserve the you still watch this fake stuff jibes. This match just took forever there were instances where I might have dosed off or got distracted and rewinded a few times, in this era triple threats without the elimination formats tend to be fairly action packed and fluid, this match never had any flow for me

I will see the main event later today / tomorow

 

[shaz619]

Won't be surprised if we see Braun Strowman and Aleister Black in AEW soon because they have been fired by WWE alongwith Lana, Buddy Murphy and Ruby Riott. Have heard rumours that Vince is planning to sell WWE.

Why do they need Braun when they have Big Show and Mark Henry also, are there any minus sized male models out there, am sure AEW could do with more Jungle Boys

 

[shaz619]

[MENTION=147292]RedwoodOriginal[/MENTION] Am a big Christain fan myself, I thought his best singles run was as NWA champ / Christian Cage in TNA followed by his world title run in 2011 I believe, he is one of the most under rated minds in wrestling and it was a shame to see how he was utilised on AEW’s flagship show, he could have worked as a heel against Cody instead and had a very personal feud, this card could have been booked so much better

 

[Asim_khan]

Am glad you’ve compared Buddy Murphy with Omega, in essence both are high flying wrestlers but in my view Buddy’s work is a lot more slick. We are all aware of Omega’s cosplay antics but ignoring what a goof he is, am sure you must be aware of the wrestler Omega cosplays from Japan and predominately copied majority of his move set and that wrestler in particular is much better then him at executing those high flying moves.

Well despite being slicker and less of a goof in your opinion, it seems Omega is Murphy's dream opponent, as mentioned on Instagram a month or so ago. That's obvioulsy so he can show the world how much slicker and less of a goof he is no doubt and not cos he's inspired by him. Maybe that's what got him released.

And if we're talking Japan, it'd be remiss of me not to mention Omega left Japan as the 2nd greatest gaijin as voted by Tokyo Sports journalists behind only the great Stan Hansen.

As far as I know, 'Croyths wrath', the 'V trigger', the 'Snapdragon Suplex', the 'You will not escape' and the 'One winged Angel' are all original moves by Kenny Omega, feel free to point out any he's plaigiraized.

 

[RedwoodOriginal]

Yes, sadly that's the Bucks, they've cornered the "LOLWWE" market and it gets over with their crowd and I can see how it can be 'go away heat' with people who don't give a crap about things like that, but I'm a huge fan of their in ring work, and they keep having these great matches and I actually find Nick Jackson absolutely hilarious (the younger taller balder one), Matt can come across as a bit of a try hard, but they complement each other in terms of ringstyle perfectly.

As for Orange Cassidy, there's alot more there, he may seem like a one trick pony, but I don't know if you're aware of his backstory, Matt/Nick Jackson booked him for the original Casino Battle Royal, and he came in as number 22 from the crowd in the 21 person Battle Royal, Tony didn't like what he saw but agreed to it but didn't want him back beyond the Battle Royal, backstage JR, Chris Jericho etc absolutely hated it and pretty much had Shaz' reaction, that they were ruining pro Wrestling, ruining AEW before it had even got started, was gonna cost them the TNT deal and needed to get rid immediately.

Anyway the Bucks kept pushing for him to come as manager of the Best Friends, and that's when it came out that before he was Orange Cassidy he was under a mask as Fire Ant of the Colony faction in Chikara, and Tony Khan signed him on the spot. If you're not familiar with the Colony, it was Drew Gulak/Orange Cassidy/Alex Reynolds and a few guys now in ROH who were incredible, and Fire Ant was the antithesis of Orange Cassidy, just an incredible lucha style worker. So he was seen as this drip drip drip style character who' they're gonna reveal slowly, who looks like a joke, but one day is gonna reach super saiyan status, and he's shown flashes of it against Pac, Jericho and now in this triple threat which really had me believing he was gonna win at times, personally I'm invested, but we'll see where it goes from here.

Eh. They're not for me. I'm not gonna disparage them since they clearly have something that has made them as popular they are. But that style of wrestling just isn't for me.

Yeah. I've read about it. And I basically saw his rise pan out from the Casino Battle Royale at their first PPV. I never expected him to anything more than a comedy jobber atfirst but over time he grew on me, and not only got over but was pushed and protected (to some extent) as well. As for the Chikara stuff, it sounds fairly goofy to me. I can't say I am a fan of Chikara and alot of the stuff that they have done in the past tantamounts to embarrassing the business imo. Stuff like the invisible grenade. But if its something purely related to Cassidy I might be interested in seeing it. The Fire Ant stuff you mentioned, I would have to see it executed in AEW to know for sure whether I will like it or not. Because there's a lot of stuff in AEW that I never thought I would like and it surprised me.

Also, have the opinions of guys like Jericho and JR in AEW changed in regards to Cassidy? What is the general opinion of him backstage among people who aren't his friends?

 

[RedwoodOriginal]

Won't be surprised if we see Braun Strowman and Aleister Black in AEW soon because they have been fired by WWE alongwith Lana, Buddy Murphy and Ruby Riott. Have heard rumours that Vince is planning to sell WWE.

Buddy Murphy and Aleister Black would work well in AEW. Both are good workers that were underutilized in WWE. Braun Strowman would be a massively stupid signing for AEW imo. Not only is he terrible in the ring because of obvious reasons, and has zero personality, but he will also make the other guys look bad because of his size.

 

[RedwoodOriginal]

[MENTION=147292]RedwoodOriginal[/MENTION] Am a big Christain fan myself, I thought his best singles run was as NWA champ / Christian Cage in TNA followed by his world title run in 2011 I believe, he is one of the most under rated minds in wrestling and it was a shame to see how he was utilised on AEW’s flagship show, he could have worked as a heel against Cody instead and had a very personal feud, this card could have been booked so much better

I couldn't agree more bro. He and Kurt Angle basically made TNA relevant for me. And seeing him as a main-eventer was great because I always thought he was massively talented and really came into his own during 2003-05, but was sadly never given a chance in the main-event in WWE.

The one chance he did get, he knocked it out of the park and delivered one of the greatest feuds in modern wrestling history with Randy Orton.

The lack of respect he has gotten in WWE has always saddened me. Because he is outstanding on the mic and in the ring. Even when he made his stunning comeback at the Royal Rumble WWE did not sign him which really surprised me. Especially considering the number of part-timers WWE signs; many of whom like Oldberg can't work anything more than 2 minute matches. I just hope he is able to finish his career on a high in AEW and is not buried like he was on Sunday. He definitely deserves it.

 

[RedwoodOriginal]

Just watched the tag with Sting and the triple threat.

- The tag match involving Sting is my favourite match of the night, I was very concerned about Sting taking bumps and any stupid risks bit it seems they managed to somewhat mitigate that, I did cringe a little at the start when he was suplexed on the ramp. The match had a traditional layout and some structure to it, Sting was in great shape and moved around quiet well without getting gassed, I found the code red spot hilarious because that’s all you need to do in this era to get a massive pop lol am pretty sure the Rock N Roll Express did something similar to, I loved the finish that was beautiful / simple and effective - it looked great and Scorpio Sky bloke had a good outing himself, as for Darby Allin don’t think he did much wrong but come on, he needs to bulk up.....as for Sting, I personally feel he needs to retire asap, don’t want him to go through what the Undertaker did, if you’ve seen the last ride you”ll know what I mean

- Triple threat was awful, I hated it. It took ages to get going and it seems they were caught between the pacing of a singles match and triple threat, part of the issue was having a joke like ‘Orange’ in it, they should have just had a singles match between Pac and Omega; in this match Omega is meant to be the heel champion right, why is it that Pac came across like the star, his work looked great, he sold a lot better, was more vicious and he actually was trying to draw a bit of heat with his offence despite his high impact arsenal, Omega no sold a number of times in the match and it wasn’t a shoot, his ring IQ is just too low, there was a spot where he took a high flying move from the top rope and then immediately got up and went to the corner lol if they say he had a unique take on working, am sorry but I think we deserve the you still watch this fake stuff jibes. This match just took forever there were instances where I might have dosed off or got distracted and rewinded a few times, in this era triple threats without the elimination formats tend to be fairly action packed and fluid, this match never had any flow for me

I will see the main event later today / tomorow

- I figured you would like the Sting match. Personally I was amazed. Not just because of how beautifully it was booked and how perfectly it showcased Sting. But also because of how frickin' good Sting looked at 62 years of age! I mean I am still having trouble processing how smoothly Sting wrestled in this match and the finish was absolutely perfect. I was so taken in by his performance that I literally didn't even think about his Code Red, which in all honesty wasn't that bad especially when you compare it with the embarrassing botches certain wrestlers in AEW do on a weekly basis. I also loved the spot where Page literally threw Darby into the crowd. Very cool and not something I can ever recall seeing.

My minor quips were the typical stupid AEW subversion where Sting was tagged in, started doing his stuff, got the crowd hot, but the referee supposedly didn't see the tag even though it was obvious that she did. And I really did not like the bump Sting took on the outside. I thought it was absolutely pointless and when you have someone like Sting who is already at such a risky age, and it just doesn't make any sense to do a bump like that.

And I agree with you, that eventhough Sting delivered an amazing performance things could easily go south for him. He is now the same age that Flair was when he wrestled his last match in TNA and 6 years older than The Undertaker. And eventhough he looks better than both those guys (especially Ric), its a massive risk he is taking. I did see the Last Ride series and honestly it was sad to see Taker going through some of the stuff he has in the last 5 years or so. I think Sting should stick to cinematic matches. And have a short retirement match down the line against a young guy who can carry him, just so he can end his career in a satisfying manner. But anything more than that would be taking a massive risk.


- To each their own I guess. I really liked it for all the reasons you didn't. It was different, all over the place, with some cool spots and a far cry from the classical matches with great psychology. I'm someone who prefers a diversity i.e. I enjoy matches with great psychology but also something like this which doesn't necessarily have that. As long as I find it enjoyable ofcourse. However, I completely understand why you hated it, and they are all fairly valid reasons.

 

[RedwoodOriginal]

Hopefully not Braun, that's the sort of guy I'd hate to see in AEW, but I'd take Aleister Black/Tommy End every day of the week, personally would love to see him come in and take over the Dark Order, they've been missing a figure head since Brodie passed, I'd love it to be him.

I think Vince reckons AEW won't take Braun, and since Braun's made it clear he is a WWE lifer and hates pro wrestling outside of the wwe bubble, he'll be forced to return at a much cheaper rate, rumors are that he had one of the biggest contracts on the roster since he signed in 2019, the so called "please don't go to AEW contracts", and it's cos of cold hearted calculating moves like that, Vince is a billionaire lol. If you ever get a chance to read JJ Dillion's book, please do, it will tell you how much of a leech Vince is, he'd force office guys who worked in WWF/WWE to move to Stamford along with their families, give them advances, and then charge them interest on that advance, so they'd end up working for almost free, paying off this house and interest, and literally be in debt to him working long hours.

Of the guys released in 2021, the one's I'd love in AEW/NJPW/Mexico etc are Bryan Danielson/Daniel Bryan, Samoa Joe (If fit/Concussion free) and Andrade/La Sombra. I'm in 2 minds in regards to Buddy Murphy, I've always seen him as a cosplay Omega, but would be fun to watch those 2 go at it, and he had a series of bangers on 205 live.

Considering how obsessed Vince is with big guys I find it hard to believe that he will not do everything within his power to bring Braun back. Braun was apparently making a million a year in WWE. So I don't think he will have too much trouble taking a pay cut.

I have to say though the release of Aleister Black surprised me. Not just because he can actually work and they spent weeks building up his return, but also because he was rumored to be in-line for a big push a year ago, one that was eventually given to Drew McIntyre. Still I don't think he or Buddy Murphy would be too bothered beyond a financial stand-point. Both are very good workers and I'm almost certain Murphy will turn up in AEW. He is a wrestler who seems tailor-made for a promotion like AEW.

 

[shaz619]

Well despite being slicker and less of a goof in your opinion, it seems Omega is Murphy's dream opponent, as mentioned on Instagram a month or so ago. That's obvioulsy so he can show the world how much slicker and less of a goof he is no doubt and not cos he's inspired by him. Maybe that's what got him released.

And if we're talking Japan, it'd be remiss of me not to mention Omega left Japan as the 2nd greatest gaijin as voted by Tokyo Sports journalists behind only the great Stan Hansen.

As far as I know, 'Croyths wrath', the 'V trigger', the 'Snapdragon Suplex', the 'You will not escape' and the 'One winged Angel' are all original moves by Kenny Omega, feel free to point out any he's plaigiraized.

View attachment 109338

So because he is someones dream opponent that makes him your GOAT. Kenny stole Kota Ibushi’s entire move set and is significantly inferior in the ring, clearly you need Tokyo Sports, the eulogises of a senile mong in Meltzer and Instagram to make you feel better about how he is the most over rated wrestler this generation and about on par with how over rated Triple H was, but at least he could talk and didn’t wrestle blow up dolls, Omega and his fans should be on the potential pedo offenders list.

 

[shaz619]

- I figured you would like the Sting match. Personally I was amazed. Not just because of how beautifully it was booked and how perfectly it showcased Sting. But also because of how frickin' good Sting looked at 62 years of age! I mean I am still having trouble processing how smoothly Sting wrestled in this match and the finish was absolutely perfect. I was so taken in by his performance that I literally didn't even think about his Code Red, which in all honesty wasn't that bad especially when you compare it with the embarrassing botches certain wrestlers in AEW do on a weekly basis. I also loved the spot where Page literally threw Darby into the crowd. Very cool and not something I can ever recall seeing.

My minor quips were the typical stupid AEW subversion where Sting was tagged in, started doing his stuff, got the crowd hot, but the referee supposedly didn't see the tag even though it was obvious that she did. And I really did not like the bump Sting took on the outside. I thought it was absolutely pointless and when you have someone like Sting who is already at such a risky age, and it just doesn't make any sense to do a bump like that.

And I agree with you, that eventhough Sting delivered an amazing performance things could easily go south for him. He is now the same age that Flair was when he wrestled his last match in TNA and 6 years older than The Undertaker. And eventhough he looks better than both those guys (especially Ric), its a massive risk he is taking. I did see the Last Ride series and honestly it was sad to see Taker going through some of the stuff he has in the last 5 years or so. I think Sting should stick to cinematic matches. And have a short retirement match down the line against a young guy who can carry him, just so he can end his career in a satisfying manner. But anything more than that would be taking a massive risk.


- To each their own I guess. I really liked it for all the reasons you didn't. It was different, all over the place, with some cool spots and a far cry from the classical matches with great psychology. I'm someone who prefers a diversity i.e. I enjoy matches with great psychology but also something like this which doesn't necessarily have that. As long as I find it enjoyable ofcourse. However, I completely understand why you hated it, and they are all fairly valid reasons.

The move itself was fine had no issues with it but I found it amusing, Sting doing the code red may have even been a troll on this era of fans lol I felt Sting was carrying everyone and holding things together which is astonishing, it truly is miraculous his level of fitness and awareness but as we agree lets not get too greedy because there are very few fairly tale endings in wrestling, Shawn’s retirement being sort of the only one I have experienced. Yes that false tag was annoying it wasn’t designed to be a false tag to was it, she just missed it, normally I feel she does a good job but this either was poor execution of a false tag or both from the ref, on the show I can’t remember who match it was maybe bucks but someone got nailed with an object and chucked the object out the ring, ref saw them doing it and should have been a DQ, there are some big lapses like these which are annoying.

Thing is this, I am quiet de-sensitised to modern style to now and especially triple threats which tend to be big spot fests and high octane action, I sort of expect that now but I wasn’t sure what this match was trying to be and it didn’t help that I only rate Pac out the three, this was the equivalent of a world title match at Wrestlemania so it was very disappointing, seeing how fans make direct comparisons and all I thought this would be better then the triple threat I saw at WM

 

[shaz619]

Considering how obsessed Vince is with big guys I find it hard to believe that he will not do everything within his power to bring Braun back. Braun was apparently making a million a year in WWE. So I don't think he will have too much trouble taking a pay cut.

I have to say though the release of Aleister Black surprised me. Not just because he can actually work and they spent weeks building up his return, but also because he was rumored to be in-line for a big push a year ago, one that was eventually given to Drew McIntyre. Still I don't think he or Buddy Murphy would be too bothered beyond a financial stand-point. Both are very good workers and I'm almost certain Murphy will turn up in AEW. He is a wrestler who seems tailor-made for a promotion like AEW.

He will probably want to het Braun on the cheap and while Vince loves the big dudes he hasn’t been shy on pushing the welterweights once they prove to him they can draw, Braun in his first run was under paid but did a good job at the top of the card once he broke out the Wyatt family, for a guy his size he is pretty good and works like how a big guy should, he would be a better signing then Henry and Big Show and add more depth to their roster compared to signing mor Jungle Boy’s who btw isn’t even entertaining for me as a comedic act, I enjoyed Shark Boy and Curry Man alot more!

 

[RedwoodOriginal]

He will probably want to het Braun on the cheap and while Vince loves the big dudes he hasn’t been shy on pushing the welterweights once they prove to him they can draw, Braun in his first run was under paid but did a good job at the top of the card once he broke out the Wyatt family, for a guy his size he is pretty good and works like how a big guy should, he would be a better signing then Henry and Big Show and add more depth to their roster compared to signing mor Jungle Boy’s who btw isn’t even entertaining for me as a comedic act, I enjoyed Shark Boy and Curry Man alot more!

I dunno but I've never been a fan of Braun. I always hated his look with that stupid ponytail, didn't care much for his gimmick and just didn't ever think the guy could work, especially not as well as peak Mark Henry and Big Show during certain high points of his career. Sure, he had some good matches from time to time, but I feel like even WWE never had enough confidence in him to properly push him either. Vince will still want him for on the roster because of the reasons we've discussed but somehow I feel like he has hit his glass ceiling in WWE. Not that he should have a problem since he will still be getting filthy rich if or when he comes back.

 

[RedwoodOriginal]

The move itself was fine had no issues with it but I found it amusing, Sting doing the code red may have even been a troll on this era of fans lol I felt Sting was carrying everyone and holding things together which is astonishing, it truly is miraculous his level of fitness and awareness but as we agree lets not get too greedy because there are very few fairly tale endings in wrestling, Shawn’s retirement being sort of the only one I have experienced. Yes that false tag was annoying it wasn’t designed to be a false tag to was it, she just missed it, normally I feel she does a good job but this either was poor execution of a false tag or both from the ref, on the show I can’t remember who match it was maybe bucks but someone got nailed with an object and chucked the object out the ring, ref saw them doing it and should have been a DQ, there are some big lapses like these which are annoying.

Thing is this, I am quiet de-sensitised to modern style to now and especially triple threats which tend to be big spot fests and high octane action, I sort of expect that now but I wasn’t sure what this match was trying to be and it didn’t help that I only rate Pac out the three, this was the equivalent of a world title match at Wrestlemania so it was very disappointing, seeing how fans make direct comparisons and all I thought this would be better then the triple threat I saw at WM

Hahaha I see what you mean. Tbh, it definitely caught me by surprise aswell. It reminded me of my reaction to Cena hitting a Code Red against Styles at SummerSlam 2016. Its like whenever you need to remind the fans you can wrestle hit a Code Red. And I'm not gonna lie, it always grabs my attention. But yeah agree on the other stuff too. And even Shawn damaged his legacy by returning for that depressing, cash-grab tag team match in Saudi Arabia, which along with Taker vs. Oldberg is probably the saddest thing I have seen in wrestling in recent memory

I don't get why people make comparisons. You should be able to enjoy different things for what they are without comparing them to something. At any rate, I felt this was a high-octane, 'throw alot of different stuff at the wall' kind of a match with not any particularly great psychology. I liked the pacing of the match and I thought it did tell a good enough story, had some cool moments too. However obviously your ability to like this match does depend on how you feel about the competitors.

 

[Asim_khan]

So because he is someones dream opponent that makes him your GOAT. Kenny stole Kota Ibushi’s entire move set and is significantly inferior in the ring, clearly you need Tokyo Sports, the eulogises of a senile mong in Meltzer and Instagram to make you feel better about how he is the most over rated wrestler this generation and about on par with how over rated Triple H was, but at least he could talk and didn’t wrestle blow up dolls, Omega and his fans should be on the potential pedo offenders list.

Lmao sorry didn't mean to work you up, never forget the wise words of Vince's biggest success when talking pro wrestling "Goodnight HULKAMANIACS and jabronie marks without a life that don't know it a work when you work a work and work yourself into a shoot,marks" - HH

Kenny Omega's style has evolved so much from the DDT days, his All Japan matches against KAI are different from his DDT matches against El Generico & Kota Ibushi etc, and from his days as the Junior in New Japan, to his legendary reign in the Heavyweights which cemented him as the GOAT and Best bout machine, and led WWE to offer him the Brock contract. Now obviously as a casual you have no knowledge of any of this, and that's ok, some people prefer the hooting train sounds as Braun runs into a ring post for the 10th time, and others prefer a story told over 10 years, where a technical adjustment finally leads to a win, something which rewards the patient viewer, in the spirit of the great 4 pillars matches from AJPW/NOAH.

The issue seems to be you getting your information from unsourced and ignorants who are working idiotic marks online, who lap up everything they say for a supposed 'GOTCHA' moment and then being embarassed as I correct them for the millionth time, but I enjoy it, it's fun helping people learn, you can't stay in first grade forever.

 

[Asim_khan]

Considering how obsessed Vince is with big guys I find it hard to believe that he will not do everything within his power to bring Braun back. Braun was apparently making a million a year in WWE. So I don't think he will have too much trouble taking a pay cut.

I have to say though the release of Aleister Black surprised me. Not just because he can actually work and they spent weeks building up his return, but also because he was rumored to be in-line for a big push a year ago, one that was eventually given to Drew McIntyre. Still I don't think he or Buddy Murphy would be too bothered beyond a financial stand-point. Both are very good workers and I'm almost certain Murphy will turn up in AEW. He is a wrestler who seems tailor-made for a promotion like AEW.

The thing with Vince is if he gets bored of you he moves on so quickly, we've seen it recently with him trying to make the next Rey/Eddie with a latin star, and we've seen Garza, Andrade, Braun now seems to be yesterdays news, he's now got Omos and Shanky as his new 7ft giants he can try to turn into the next Andre the Giant. For all the talk of his booking, he's never been able to replicate the success his father had with Andre, Big Show, Braun, Khali etc all have failed to be that 'wonder of the world'.

Of Buddy and Black, I'd take Black, but I do feel like AEW's rosters getting a bit bloated, I'd prefer some of these guys to spread out, maybe go to AAA like Andrade has, or even ROH/Impact/New Japan, it's a shame ROH have the Sinclairs backing them and Impact has Anthem, legit billionaires, yet neither wants to open the coffers and make huge signings. As a fan that would excite me more, especially with the "Forbidden door" story line. With things seemingly opening up, would love the likes of Andrade and Vikingo coming to AEW.

As for Buddy, I'd love him to go to NJPW as Kenny Omega, kinda like the Fake Diesel & Fake Razor Ramon back in the day, and New Japan just no sell the fact he actually isn't.

 

[shaz619]

Lmao sorry didn't mean to work you up, never forget the wise words of Vince's biggest success when talking pro wrestling "Goodnight HULKAMANIACS and jabronie marks without a life that don't know it a work when you work a work and work yourself into a shoot,marks" - HH

Kenny Omega's style has evolved so much from the DDT days, his All Japan matches against KAI are different from his DDT matches against El Generico & Kota Ibushi etc, and from his days as the Junior in New Japan, to his legendary reign in the Heavyweights which cemented him as the GOAT and Best bout machine, and led WWE to offer him the Brock contract. Now obviously as a casual you have no knowledge of any of this, and that's ok, some people prefer the hooting train sounds as Braun runs into a ring post for the 10th time, and others prefer a story told over 10 years, where a technical adjustment finally leads to a win, something which rewards the patient viewer, in the spirit of the great 4 pillars matches from AJPW/NOAH.

The issue seems to be you getting your information from unsourced and ignorants who are working idiotic marks online, who lap up everything they say for a supposed 'GOTCHA' moment and then being embarassed as I correct them for the millionth time, but I enjoy it, it's fun helping people learn, you can't stay in first grade forever.

Well I apologise for offending your warped and depraved mind, I didn’t mean to insult your fandom of a guy who books sexual convicts on a raslin show, dresses up like princess jasmine and wrestles blow up dolls.

Yes, Kenny’s style had evolved into his Japanese video gaming anime fetish to appease little children with their low intellect and damaged brain cells who have already been de-sensitised severely to the point where they would clap for a **** in the ring. Anyone who actually follows Jap raslin and is not too far up Kenny’s behind will see he does an extremely poor imitation of Kota Ibushi’s move set and is no where near as good as him, ever since Okada and Gado carried him in a protected environment he has spectacularly failed in north america and there is little on his resume to make a case for being the best in the world let alone in history, he can’t talk to save his life and he can’t even be saved by a manager, he doesn’t know how to work like a heel, depicts zero ring psychology and even with all the creative control in the world constantly produces cow dung and is unable to sell, his technique is god awful and he doesn’t remotely pass the eye test either, at best he is excellent at spamming with the high spots and is a poor mans Buddy Murphy, GOAT my foot lmao

And yes we are aware of the contract WWE offered him, I think it would have been fantastic for Kenny, he would have had the opportunity to learn how to actually work in the highly regarded performance centre, instead he is limited to getting cheap pops from dweebs like you.

 

[shaz619]

Hahaha I see what you mean. Tbh, it definitely caught me by surprise aswell. It reminded me of my reaction to Cena hitting a Code Red against Styles at SummerSlam 2016. Its like whenever you need to remind the fans you can wrestle hit a Code Red. And I'm not gonna lie, it always grabs my attention. But yeah agree on the other stuff too. And even Shawn damaged his legacy by returning for that depressing, cash-grab tag team match in Saudi Arabia, which along with Taker vs. Oldberg is probably the saddest thing I have seen in wrestling in recent memory

I don't get why people make comparisons. You should be able to enjoy different things for what they are without comparing them to something. At any rate, I felt this was a high-octane, 'throw alot of different stuff at the wall' kind of a match with not any particularly great psychology. I liked the pacing of the match and I thought it did tell a good enough story, had some cool moments too. However obviously your ability to like this match does depend on how you feel about the competitors.

Pretty much that’s what they need to do, I use to pop for the Canadaian Destroyer big, in the early 2000’s it wasn’t spammed like it is now and was used as a unique finisher, Petey Williams was a fine talent, TNA had a really good crop to start of with they had some depth. I agree that Shawn shouldn’t have returned but he has a big body of work which protects that legacy, he treated it like a house show and in a way might benefit from the match being hidden away in Saudi, Taker/Berg should not have been booked like that it was ok until the severe botches after Berg got concussed, anyhow I struggle to see why vet talent is not booked against younger more experienced raslers to help carry them, Taker could have had the perfect send off he wanted ages ago against the likes of Styles or Bryan etc

I wouldn’t say that was the main point as I’ve enjoyed matches involving raslers I don’t like and even then the match still had Pac in it, but it did nothing for me I didn’t see the story they were trying to tell, there were obviously some near falls to tease the Orange win or whatever but I don’t know what the match was trying to achieve beyond that, you may have saw it a lot differently but on it’s own as a world title triple threat it wasn’t good, the commentary I forgot to add was horrible especially from the masked ***** trying to shove his fandom for Kenny down the throats of J.R who must have been full of cringe, seems like you need to be a mark / ****** to qualify for such a job pathetic

 

[RedwoodOriginal]

The thing with Vince is if he gets bored of you he moves on so quickly, we've seen it recently with him trying to make the next Rey/Eddie with a latin star, and we've seen Garza, Andrade, Braun now seems to be yesterdays news, he's now got Omos and Shanky as his new 7ft giants he can try to turn into the next Andre the Giant. For all the talk of his booking, he's never been able to replicate the success his father had with Andre, Big Show, Braun, Khali etc all have failed to be that 'wonder of the world'.

Of Buddy and Black, I'd take Black, but I do feel like AEW's rosters getting a bit bloated, I'd prefer some of these guys to spread out, maybe go to AAA like Andrade has, or even ROH/Impact/New Japan, it's a shame ROH have the Sinclairs backing them and Impact has Anthem, legit billionaires, yet neither wants to open the coffers and make huge signings. As a fan that would excite me more, especially with the "Forbidden door" story line. With things seemingly opening up, would love the likes of Andrade and Vikingo coming to AEW.

As for Buddy, I'd love him to go to NJPW as Kenny Omega, kinda like the Fake Diesel & Fake Razor Ramon back in the day, and New Japan just no sell the fact he actually isn't.

Yeah but his patience with big guys lasts much longer. Even if you're terrible in the ring and can't cut a promo, he'll persist with you. The fact that Khali spent two years in the main-event scene despite being one of the all-time worst workers in WWE history says alot. And results are oftentimes arbitrary to someone like Vince. I feel like alot of times he wants people to reinforce what he already believes. And how many times have we seen a talent who was great in the ring, over with the crowd but didn't necessarily meet Vince's expectations and was subsequently beaten and buried until the fans stopped caring about him.

I agree their roster is fairly bloated. But if I was Tony Khan I would just fire guys like Marko Stunt and Joey Janella, who I am still surprised have a job with a wrestling promotion like AEW. If they wanna make more space fire Kip Sabian and the Butcher and the Blade, who are also terrible. But I don't think that it would be especially smart to miss out on guys like Aleister Black/Tommy End and Buddy Murphy, while bringing in someone like Lio Rush who is no different stylistically than alot of the guys on the guys on the roster. And certainly doesn't have anything on Black or Murphy when it comes to in-ring ability.

Ultimately these guys will go wherever they can but I really believe that AEW would be the best place for their talents. Because from what I have seen Japan, Mexico and even ROH usually tend to be either stepping stones for North American talents to bigger and better things, or they work there because they can't work anywhere else. But with the emergence of AEW that has changed. Also, do Murphy and Black really wanna spend time elsewhere when signing for the second biggest company in North America is the best thing for them career-wise? Because Murphy is 32 and Black is 36. They don't have too many good years left.

And lets be honest here, Impact is a frickin' joke nowadays. Whereas, ROH is too small to be in comparison with the big leagues. And if you want to be a big deal in North America there are only two promotions where you can do that.

 

[RedwoodOriginal]

Pretty much that’s what they need to do, I use to pop for the Canadaian Destroyer big, in the early 2000’s it wasn’t spammed like it is now and was used as a unique finisher, Petey Williams was a fine talent, TNA had a really good crop to start of with they had some depth. I agree that Shawn shouldn’t have returned but he has a big body of work which protects that legacy, he treated it like a house show and in a way might benefit from the match being hidden away in Saudi, Taker/Berg should not have been booked like that it was ok until the severe botches after Berg got concussed, anyhow I struggle to see why vet talent is not booked against younger more experienced raslers to help carry them, Taker could have had the perfect send off he wanted ages ago against the likes of Styles or Bryan etc

I wouldn’t say that was the main point as I’ve enjoyed matches involving raslers I don’t like and even then the match still had Pac in it, but it did nothing for me I didn’t see the story they were trying to tell, there were obviously some near falls to tease the Orange win or whatever but I don’t know what the match was trying to achieve beyond that, you may have saw it a lot differently but on it’s own as a world title triple threat it wasn’t good, the commentary I forgot to add was horrible especially from the masked ***** trying to shove his fandom for Kenny down the throats of J.R who must have been full of cringe, seems like you need to be a mark / ****** to qualify for such a job pathetic

Yeah but that's the thing, how do you book Oldberg vs. Taker? Goldberg could barely work 15 minute matches in his prime and at this age he simply shouldn't be getting in the ring no matter how big of a star he still is, because he simply can't wrestle. When they brought him back he was still relatively okay and the match he had with Lesnar at Mania was probably the best way to book him. But even that was four years ago. I agree that the best way to book guys like these is by booking them with younger talents. Styles/Taker had the potential to be amazing but I blame WWE too for the way they mismanaged Taker at the end of his career. They could have gotten some great WrestleMania matches out of him because it was evident that he could wrestle and put on good matches even after the WrestleMania 33 disaster. It also made no sense to me personally why he couldn't have a match with Drew at WM 35 when he was wrestling an Extreme Rules tag match literally a month later against Shane and Drew. Heck, they could have had that exact same match at Mania and substituted in someone for Shane.

Oh god, I hate Excalibur. He looks like a sock puppet and talks like an over-enthusiastic mark who never moved out of his parent's basement. I get that he's a play-by-play guy but he rarely ever has anything insightful to say. And our opinions of the match aside, I think we both can agree that it was absolutely cringe-worthy and sad to see poor JR saying that even he would admit that Omega was the best wrestler in the world if he won the three way.

 

[shaz619]

Yeah but that's the thing, how do you book Oldberg vs. Taker? Goldberg could barely work 15 minute matches in his prime and at this age he simply shouldn't be getting in the ring no matter how big of a star he still is, because he simply can't wrestle. When they brought him back he was still relatively okay and the match he had with Lesnar at Mania was probably the best way to book him. But even that was four years ago. I agree that the best way to book guys like these is by booking them with younger talents. Styles/Taker had the potential to be amazing but I blame WWE too for the way they mismanaged Taker at the end of his career. They could have gotten some great WrestleMania matches out of him because it was evident that he could wrestle and put on good matches even after the WrestleMania 33 disaster. It also made no sense to me personally why he couldn't have a match with Drew at WM 35 when he was wrestling an Extreme Rules tag match literally a month later against Shane and Drew. Heck, they could have had that exact same match at Mania and substituted in someone for Shane.

Oh god, I hate Excalibur. He looks like a sock puppet and talks like an over-enthusiastic mark who never moved out of his parent's basement. I get that he's a play-by-play guy but he rarely ever has anything insightful to say. And our opinions of the match aside, I think we both can agree that it was absolutely cringe-worthy and sad to see poor JR saying that even he would admit that Omega was the best wrestler in the world if he won the three way.

Good question, but if I absolutely needed to and some saudi sheikh offered me 100 mill, I’d first eliminate all the high risk spots especially the turnbuckle spear Berg always messes up and and book the match for no more then 5 mins, I’d have both predominately use strikes, start out fast like they did and end it with the same finish where Taker chokeslams Berg, I need to watch the match again to see what worked and didn’t but that’s what I’d do, but really if it was up to me I’d have used Styles or DB, big missed opportunities like you say in the past and it didn’t help we got covid to may have seen Taker v Styles infront of a crowd.

I can’t remember JR saying that but I remember the pure silence when that masked morton was saying hey we can agree Omega is the best wrestler we have ever called and he is having the best year in history as a champ etc lmao jesus christ man it’s like that mark is a spokesman for all AEW cult, anyway am tuning into the stampede match and about 5-10 min in it’s hard to watch, is it worth me sitting through ? if so may try to finish it at some point

 

[RedwoodOriginal]

Good question, but if I absolutely needed to and some saudi sheikh offered me 100 mill, I’d first eliminate all the high risk spots especially the turnbuckle spear Berg always messes up and and book the match for no more then 5 mins, I’d have both predominately use strikes, start out fast like they did and end it with the same finish where Taker chokeslams Berg, I need to watch the match again to see what worked and didn’t but that’s what I’d do, but really if it was up to me I’d have used Styles or DB, big missed opportunities like you say in the past and it didn’t help we got covid to may have seen Taker v Styles infront of a crowd.

I can’t remember JR saying that but I remember the pure silence when that masked morton was saying hey we can agree Omega is the best wrestler we have ever called and he is having the best year in history as a champ etc lmao jesus christ man it’s like that mark is a spokesman for all AEW cult, anyway am tuning into the stampede match and about 5-10 min in it’s hard to watch, is it worth me sitting through ? if so may try to finish it at some point

I see what you mean. It would likely still be a bad match but atleast it wouldn't have been life-threatening.

From what I've heard, and these are purely rumors, Taker wanted to wrestle Bryan at WM 30. But it never materialized which I guess is good since Bryan instead ended up having the biggest moment of his career. But yeah, both are big missed opportunities. I feel like everything Taker did at Mania after WrestleMania 31 was largely pointless and didn't really do him or his opponents any real favors.

JR said it right before the start of the match. And lol I'm not surprised that the talking sock puppet said that since he is in-charge of AEW's marketing too, and you can pretty much always count on him to toe the company line with his eyes closed. He's like the Bruce Prichard of AEW.

As for the Stadium Stampede, I personally enjoyed it and thought it was much better than the one they had last year. But it has quite a bit of goofy stuff and like any cinematic match relies heavily on your ability to suspend your disbelief to enjoy it.

 

[Asim_khan]

Well I apologise for offending your warped and depraved mind, I didn’t mean to insult your fandom of a guy who books sexual convicts on a raslin show, dresses up like princess jasmine and wrestles blow up dolls.

Yes, Kenny’s style had evolved into his Japanese video gaming anime fetish to appease little children with their low intellect and damaged brain cells who have already been de-sensitised severely to the point where they would clap for a **** in the ring. Anyone who actually follows Jap raslin and is not too far up Kenny’s behind will see he does an extremely poor imitation of Kota Ibushi’s move set and is no where near as good as him, ever since Okada and Gado carried him in a protected environment he has spectacularly failed in north america and there is little on his resume to make a case for being the best in the world let alone in history, he can’t talk to save his life and he can’t even be saved by a manager, he doesn’t know how to work like a heel, depicts zero ring psychology and even with all the creative control in the world constantly produces cow dung and is unable to sell, his technique is god awful and he doesn’t remotely pass the eye test either, at best he is excellent at spamming with the high spots and is a poor mans Buddy Murphy, GOAT my foot lmao

And yes we are aware of the contract WWE offered him, I think it would have been fantastic for Kenny, he would have had the opportunity to learn how to actually work in the highly regarded performance centre, instead he is limited to getting cheap pops from dweebs like you.

The thing with Omega is his detractors come out with the usual buffoonery you get from resident gate keeping morons, just proving how ignorant they truly are of japanese wrestling, the history of it, and the role that Kenny Omega has played in its expansion. They can throw your toys out of the pram cos they want their diaper changing, but that isn't gonna change the fact Kenny Omega is currently the champion of 3 separate promotions in the west and is headlining all 3 promotion's next ppv's, and he's just headlined the biggest selling ppv since WWE in 2015, and the only non wwe company to do bigger numbers was WCW in 1998, so in what way any ***** would say that's failing to break the western wrestling scene is laughable, it's minstrel level clowning, it's always the same, he's got them ranting and raving like idiots with their fake internet keyboard warrior tough guy personas, it's laughable, cos they're not tough, not even funny, you're just little fat boys discussing pro wrestling online.

But returning to your point,the performance centre has given us so many first class wrestlers like Corbin and Braun, who has just been chucked to the side, you really think that's gonna improve someone most guys have stolen whole movesets from? And New Japan has very little history of ever letting any gaijins get anywhere near the main event slot unless they have a proven history in America, Kenny's the first, and you can talk all you want about Okada and Gedo carrying him, but those who know of his matches with Ishii, Tanahashi, Ibushi, Naito, Elgin, Jay white, Chris Jericho etc know who the real man is.

In fact Kenny's matches with Naito, Jericho and Jay Whie far exceed the matches Okada has had with them, in fact had it not been for Kenny, Naito would not have got another shot in the Tokyo dome after his first match with Okada, it tanked so badly, but there was Kenny to make him relevant again, it's what he does, the best bout machine.

and speaking of booking known child molestors, nice to see WWE finally get rid of Velveteen Dream. Unlike Kenny with Chasyn Rance, there was someone who WWE knew what he'd been upto, but then again Garvin, Morris, Pat Patterson and Vince stayed around after the ringboys scandal, so it's par for the course.

 

[Asim_khan]

Yeah but his patience with big guys lasts much longer. Even if you're terrible in the ring and can't cut a promo, he'll persist with you. The fact that Khali spent two years in the main-event scene despite being one of the all-time worst workers in WWE history says alot. And results are oftentimes arbitrary to someone like Vince. I feel like alot of times he wants people to reinforce what he already believes. And how many times have we seen a talent who was great in the ring, over with the crowd but didn't necessarily meet Vince's expectations and was subsequently beaten and buried until the fans stopped caring about him.

I agree their roster is fairly bloated. But if I was Tony Khan I would just fire guys like Marko Stunt and Joey Janella, who I am still surprised have a job with a wrestling promotion like AEW. If they wanna make more space fire Kip Sabian and the Butcher and the Blade, who are also terrible. But I don't think that it would be especially smart to miss out on guys like Aleister Black/Tommy End and Buddy Murphy, while bringing in someone like Lio Rush who is no different stylistically than alot of the guys on the guys on the roster. And certainly doesn't have anything on Black or Murphy when it comes to in-ring ability.

Ultimately these guys will go wherever they can but I really believe that AEW would be the best place for their talents. Because from what I have seen Japan, Mexico and even ROH usually tend to be either stepping stones for North American talents to bigger and better things, or they work there because they can't work anywhere else. But with the emergence of AEW that has changed. Also, do Murphy and Black really wanna spend time elsewhere when signing for the second biggest company in North America is the best thing for them career-wise? Because Murphy is 32 and Black is 36. They don't have too many good years left.

And lets be honest here, Impact is a frickin' joke nowadays. Whereas, ROH is too small to be in comparison with the big leagues. And if you want to be a big deal in North America there are only two promotions where you can do that.

Yea Vince loves his big guys, they say it's cos he loved the idea of people wondering who these absolute giants are when they're walking through the airport. His next big main event guy is probably gonna be Kross, who seems to be being groomed for the monster push in NXT, I can't see him staying their for too long, did you see the Adam Cole promo on him? Which is pretty much how I feel about him,


"The truth is that you're not Adam Cole BAY BAY and you never will be. This brand has done everything to make you feel special. They gave you the music, the lights, the smoke machine, the girl ... Do you know what they have given me to make me feel special? The sound of the bell at the beginning of the fight"

Marko Stunt is one of the biggest merch sellers in the company, and is the go to guy when you want to create a monster, and Joey Janela is king of the Indies as head of GCW, he's their scout who picks out the next generation of stars, the amount of guys he's got signed to AEW is ridiculous, so he's not someone they're gonna get rid of, even if he seems to save his best matches for GCW and phones it in with AEW, but the Bucks/Cody knew what they were signing him for, and that's the gateway to all the top indie talent.

Lio Rush is signed to New Japan, who are gonna allow him to work AEW on certain dates. It's a shame he's got PTSD from his youth, cos he could've been the next break out star as he was featured in MTV's The Challenge, which is an absolute monster ratings hit, and he was doing really well there, but then his mental health issues popped up.

AS for Impact and ROH, I don't buy the fact that they're small fry, sure they're in terrible shape and were pretty much running at empty even when fans were around,but both had opportunities to make it big, espeically after All In, they needed to invest and start touring, but instead went to bingo halls, and now we've got what we've got. Impact are trying to pick up some of the released WWE guys, and they've got some of the best young wrestlers in the world with Trey Miguel and Chris Bey, I can see them going upwards, especially with the Omega rub, say what you want about him, but at the last ppv where he won the title from Swann, ppv numbers were up by 900%, and second best selling Impact/TNA ppv ever behind Kurt Angle vs Samoa Joe back in 2007. But ROH are just happy to be bingo hall ready, they've got some legit great guys like Dragon Lee and Brody King, but they just dont wanna invest.

 

[RedwoodOriginal]

Yea Vince loves his big guys, they say it's cos he loved the idea of people wondering who these absolute giants are when they're walking through the airport. His next big main event guy is probably gonna be Kross, who seems to be being groomed for the monster push in NXT, I can't see him staying their for too long, did you see the Adam Cole promo on him? Which is pretty much how I feel about him,


"The truth is that you're not Adam Cole BAY BAY and you never will be. This brand has done everything to make you feel special. They gave you the music, the lights, the smoke machine, the girl ... Do you know what they have given me to make me feel special? The sound of the bell at the beginning of the fight"

Marko Stunt is one of the biggest merch sellers in the company, and is the go to guy when you want to create a monster, and Joey Janela is king of the Indies as head of GCW, he's their scout who picks out the next generation of stars, the amount of guys he's got signed to AEW is ridiculous, so he's not someone they're gonna get rid of, even if he seems to save his best matches for GCW and phones it in with AEW, but the Bucks/Cody knew what they were signing him for, and that's the gateway to all the top indie talent.

Lio Rush is signed to New Japan, who are gonna allow him to work AEW on certain dates. It's a shame he's got PTSD from his youth, cos he could've been the next break out star as he was featured in MTV's The Challenge, which is an absolute monster ratings hit, and he was doing really well there, but then his mental health issues popped up.

AS for Impact and ROH, I don't buy the fact that they're small fry, sure they're in terrible shape and were pretty much running at empty even when fans were around,but both had opportunities to make it big, espeically after All In, they needed to invest and start touring, but instead went to bingo halls, and now we've got what we've got. Impact are trying to pick up some of the released WWE guys, and they've got some of the best young wrestlers in the world with Trey Miguel and Chris Bey, I can see them going upwards, especially with the Omega rub, say what you want about him, but at the last ppv where he won the title from Swann, ppv numbers were up by 900%, and second best selling Impact/TNA ppv ever behind Kurt Angle vs Samoa Joe back in 2007. But ROH are just happy to be bingo hall ready, they've got some legit great guys like Dragon Lee and Brody King, but they just dont wanna invest.

No. I don't watch NXT but I am aware of what goes on there. And I am actually inclined to agree with you on this because when you think about it, Vince currently has 3 giants on his main roster: Omos, Commander Azeez and Shanky. And considering the push Kross has been getting on NXT its hard to believe that he won't be brought to the main roster sooner rather than later aswell. So maybe he is done with Braun, which still feels somewhat strange considering he was in a main-event title match just last month and Universal Champion not too long ago.

That's sad because those two are probably the two guys I hate most in AEW on pretty much every level.

I don't know about Lio Rush. Never been particularly high on him and from what I've heard the guy is something of an entitled p*ick and tough to deal with aswell. I think with that size you have to be really good in the ring, and he never really stood out to me based on what little I saw of him. But since he is signed with NJPW and is doing limited dates than I don't think he will be around for much more than a cup of coffee.

Oh come on man. Impact hasn't been credible since it was called TNA. Or atleast since 2013. Have you seen their roster? Its a sorry looking roster even if you take into consideration some genuinely talented guys. The fact that the champion of another promotion came in, beat their champion and took both his titles and it was good for business says volumes about where their company is at. And as good for business as this Omega rub has been for them, its only temporary. Also feel its pointless to talk about PPV buys with TNA/Impact considering the biggest they ever hit was what 60,000? That's a drop in the pond compared to something like WWE, while AEW in just their third year is doing nearly double those numbers.

Considering the fact that Black and Murphy's non-compete clauses run-out at the end of August, which is a week away from All Out, I won't be surprised if one or both of them turn up at the PPV. Omega has already professed to being a fan of Murphy while Khan wouldn't mind signing two talented workers considering AEW has Rampage debuting soon on Friday nights aswell. And I find it hard to believe that the YouTube job guys will be regularly featured on that show. Plus, AEW has a habit of debuting guys on PPVs so with all those factors in mind I can definitely see this panning out.

 

[RedwoodOriginal]

Yea Vince loves his big guys, they say it's cos he loved the idea of people wondering who these absolute giants are when they're walking through the airport. His next big main event guy is probably gonna be Kross, who seems to be being groomed for the monster push in NXT, I can't see him staying their for too long, did you see the Adam Cole promo on him? Which is pretty much how I feel about him,


"The truth is that you're not Adam Cole BAY BAY and you never will be. This brand has done everything to make you feel special. They gave you the music, the lights, the smoke machine, the girl ... Do you know what they have given me to make me feel special? The sound of the bell at the beginning of the fight"

Marko Stunt is one of the biggest merch sellers in the company, and is the go to guy when you want to create a monster, and Joey Janela is king of the Indies as head of GCW, he's their scout who picks out the next generation of stars, the amount of guys he's got signed to AEW is ridiculous, so he's not someone they're gonna get rid of, even if he seems to save his best matches for GCW and phones it in with AEW, but the Bucks/Cody knew what they were signing him for, and that's the gateway to all the top indie talent.

Lio Rush is signed to New Japan, who are gonna allow him to work AEW on certain dates. It's a shame he's got PTSD from his youth, cos he could've been the next break out star as he was featured in MTV's The Challenge, which is an absolute monster ratings hit, and he was doing really well there, but then his mental health issues popped up.

AS for Impact and ROH, I don't buy the fact that they're small fry, sure they're in terrible shape and were pretty much running at empty even when fans were around,but both had opportunities to make it big, espeically after All In, they needed to invest and start touring, but instead went to bingo halls, and now we've got what we've got. Impact are trying to pick up some of the released WWE guys, and they've got some of the best young wrestlers in the world with Trey Miguel and Chris Bey, I can see them going upwards, especially with the Omega rub, say what you want about him, but at the last ppv where he won the title from Swann, ppv numbers were up by 900%, and second best selling Impact/TNA ppv ever behind Kurt Angle vs Samoa Joe back in 2007. But ROH are just happy to be bingo hall ready, they've got some legit great guys like Dragon Lee and Brody King, but they just dont wanna invest.

Also re: Kross. He might get a decent run in the main roster yet. He is 35. Lashley got the biggest push of his career at 44. But obviously you can never predict anything with Vince. As much as I hate Triple H for all the guys he buried over the years, I actually look forward to when he get finally gets the keys to the kingdom. Because for all the damage he has done during his in-ring career, he has created genuine stars aswell and deserves alot of credit for what he has done with NXT. He also feels like someone who understands pro-wrestling in a classical sense, and at the same time has the modern day perspective aswell.

 

[shaz619]

The thing with Omega is his detractors come out with the usual buffoonery you get from resident gate keeping morons, just proving how ignorant they truly are of japanese wrestling, the history of it, and the role that Kenny Omega has played in its expansion. They can throw your toys out of the pram cos they want their diaper changing, but that isn't gonna change the fact Kenny Omega is currently the champion of 3 separate promotions in the west and is headlining all 3 promotion's next ppv's, and he's just headlined the biggest selling ppv since WWE in 2015, and the only non wwe company to do bigger numbers was WCW in 1998, so in what way any ***** would say that's failing to break the western wrestling scene is laughable, it's minstrel level clowning, it's always the same, he's got them ranting and raving like idiots with their fake internet keyboard warrior tough guy personas, it's laughable, cos they're not tough, not even funny, you're just little fat boys discussing pro wrestling online.

But returning to your point,the performance centre has given us so many first class wrestlers like Corbin and Braun, who has just been chucked to the side, you really think that's gonna improve someone most guys have stolen whole movesets from? And New Japan has very little history of ever letting any gaijins get anywhere near the main event slot unless they have a proven history in America, Kenny's the first, and you can talk all you want about Okada and Gedo carrying him, but those who know of his matches with Ishii, Tanahashi, Ibushi, Naito, Elgin, Jay white, Chris Jericho etc know who the real man is.

In fact Kenny's matches with Naito, Jericho and Jay Whie far exceed the matches Okada has had with them, in fact had it not been for Kenny, Naito would not have got another shot in the Tokyo dome after his first match with Okada, it tanked so badly, but there was Kenny to make him relevant again, it's what he does, the best bout machine.

and speaking of booking known child molestors, nice to see WWE finally get rid of Velveteen Dream. Unlike Kenny with Chasyn Rance, there was someone who WWE knew what he'd been upto, but then again Garvin, Morris, Pat Patterson and Vince stayed around after the ringboys scandal, so it's par for the course.

The only thing adamant here is how high you are of Omega’s behind crack, you have directly copy and pasted from the wrestling observer with all this none sense on Omega’s drawing capability, I don’t think I denied the fact that his main appeal is among a nice cult of warped and depraved fans who have been de-sensitised severely to the point where they would pop for cow dung in the ring, Zionists and BJP followers also have support to don’t they it is appropriate to describe the AEW cult with them; doing specific numbers in small ponds first of all isn’t a big deal or specifically attributed to the drawing power of princess jasmine who you orgasm to, Omega’s fans are extremely protective and highly ignorant of his true capabilities, using the wrestling observer and over rated run in Japan to prove to me that he is an all time great on the mic and in the ring.

In Japan you don’t need to work a rigorous schedule, have more flexibility with how matches are produced and work with supreme talents in the ring at the top of the card, Omega was pushed to the moon specifically because AJ Styles left and they needed the next white guy to play the role of a foreign heel, Omega never touched the main event scene up until that point but when he entered the top of the card he worked the same style against the same high level in-ring workers and was supported by the booking of Gado, his dance partners predominately carried him. His run in Japan speaks more for his opponents as they convinced mortons like yourself who jerk off to this fake ** that he is the best ever and use padded statistics to convince the world using his biggest bum chum Dave Meltzer to support you that he is the best ever etc but he has been badly exposed in north america, show me one promo from omega that compares to anything we have seen from the likes of Dusty, Punk, Austin etc show me one match which remotely compares to Austin/Bret, Michaels/Angle etc

Folk like you would get laughed at in the face by those who made the swift transition from the wrestling of today to combat sport, it’s embarrassing and you are embarrassing for drooling over a rasler who is more over rated then Triple H was, despite all his championships most could see his limitations and at least he could talk well, what is that Omega does that you enjoy so much, dressing up as Princess Jasmine or Ricky N Morty characters ? am sure those who are into warped and depraved fantasies must mind it easy to get into Kenny’s shtick.

 

[shaz619]

I see what you mean. It would likely still be a bad match but atleast it wouldn't have been life-threatening.

From what I've heard, and these are purely rumors, Taker wanted to wrestle Bryan at WM 30. But it never materialized which I guess is good since Bryan instead ended up having the biggest moment of his career. But yeah, both are big missed opportunities. I feel like everything Taker did at Mania after WrestleMania 31 was largely pointless and didn't really do him or his opponents any real favors.

JR said it right before the start of the match. And lol I'm not surprised that the talking sock puppet said that since he is in-charge of AEW's marketing too, and you can pretty much always count on him to toe the company line with his eyes closed. He's like the Bruce Prichard of AEW.

As for the Stadium Stampede, I personally enjoyed it and thought it was much better than the one they had last year. But it has quite a bit of goofy stuff and like any cinematic match relies heavily on your ability to suspend your disbelief to enjoy it.

Not sure am going to finish watching the Stampede match it may put me off wrestling for good and I’ve been enjoying my Boxing again lately which had taken a bit of a hit during the pandemic, this card was pure humiliating and embarrassing, it truly would make me go why you watch this fake ** and must be specific for those under the age of 12 years old or those with depraved minds that are ready to jerk to anything they see Omega do in the ring. Apart from that tag match, the card simply didn’t deliver even with the novelty of having the crowd back, I was under the impression this PPV might make me an AEW fan or get me interested in something they are doing better then others moving forward, from a year or two ago if this card had that match between Cody and Dustin I may have been inclined to agree, but this was all extremely average at best and nothing new. I don’t think I will be watching this fake ** in a long time now, I think want to puke every time I read some of the posts above and especially from AEW fans, absolute pure aids.

 

[shaz619]

AEW depraved cult fail to grasp what truly makes an all time great wrestler so no point discussing that, what I want to know is what has Kenny done outside his heavily over rated run in NJPW which makes him a legend in the North American territory, I will make it easier by asking for the following:

- A single promo that is worthy of being compared to some of the greatest promos in north american history

- A feud in north american territory which is worthy of being compared to say HBK/Jericho(2008)

- A match which is worthy of being compared to the best in north american history, you got Flair/Steamboat, Bret/Austin, Michaels/Angle etc

I am genuinely intrigued, if you can find these for me and am wrong I will put my hand up and say perhaps this guy is actually good, in the event you fail then you’re everything I said you are and his stuff is there to appeal to this new breed of fans which are basically a depraved cult.

 

[I Believe in the Teesra]

Shazaib619 writing paragraphs and novels as usual.

He fails to understand the greatness of KENNY BAW GAWD OMEGA.

 

[Asim_khan]

AEW depraved cult fail to grasp what truly makes an all time great wrestler so no point discussing that, what I want to know is what has Kenny done outside his heavily over rated run in NJPW which makes him a legend in the North American territory, I will make it easier by asking for the following:

- A single promo that is worthy of being compared to some of the greatest promos in north american history

- A feud in north american territory which is worthy of being compared to say HBK/Jericho(2008)

- A match which is worthy of being compared to the best in north american history, you got Flair/Steamboat, Bret/Austin, Michaels/Angle etc

I am genuinely intrigued, if you can find these for me and am wrong I will put my hand up and say perhaps this guy is actually good, in the event you fail then you’re everything I said you are and his stuff is there to appeal to this new breed of fans which are basically a depraved cult.

1) Promo on Jon Moxley after Mox pulled out of the All Out 2019

2) Jon Moxley feud > HBK/Jericho '08, and didn't even involve punching anyone's wife in the face

3) Omega vs Rey Fenix 2021 New Year's Smash, Omega vs Pac 30 min Ironman Match, tv matches which far surpass any you mentioned. And you want a tag match which is better than any TLC or RnR/Midnight Express match? Bucks vs Kenny/Hangman

All this when he's barely been in the country for 2 years, and lost all 3 of his big matches in his first year, GOAT ish!

 

[shaz619]

1) Promo on Jon Moxley after Mox pulled out of the All Out 2019

2) Jon Moxley feud > HBK/Jericho '08, and didn't even involve punching anyone's wife in the face

3) Omega vs Rey Fenix 2021 New Year's Smash, Omega vs Pac 30 min Ironman Match, tv matches which far surpass any you mentioned. And you want a tag match which is better than any TLC or RnR/Midnight Express match? Bucks vs Kenny/Hangman

All this when he's barely been in the country for 2 years, and lost all 3 of his big matches in his first year, GOAT ish!

Ok, so that promo is among the best in NA history according to you, if you have a link I will take a look and compare it to the greatest in history, I couldn’t find Omega’s famous backstage promo when he was in the gym attempting the bench press apparently that’s meant to be good to.

I will review that feud and let you know what I think of it, what I recall is a goof walking down the ramp with a mop which is his weapon of choice. HBK/Jericho 08 is one of the all time great feuds in history which wasn’t limited to that one spot, the fact that you can’t comprehend that shows how rtarded aew fans are, you are worse then covid considering what a big wwe mark you use to be, opening their very first thread on PP to, its there for all to see. Now you read the observer like it’s the holy word of god, ironic considering the observer didn’t even award Ofaga/Mox feud of the year

Yes many Ofaga groupies have a massive circle jerk over all those spot fests don’t they including tag team affairs, in my opinion those who feel that way should be drug tested but I will watch some or them to see how they compare

 

[Bhaijaan]

I am glad there are still enough promotions out there because WWE alone cannot do justice to all the talent in pro wrestling today which is significantly wah higher than back in even WCW wars days.

WWE for their part must recognise and embrace competition even if the opposition is not up to their level and might never even be.

Monday night wars were the origin of the most compelling and even whackiest characters and storylines in pro wrestling.

As for AEW, I just wish they learn from the failures of WCW, TNA etc. Vince is a genius and he will keep flooding the market with discarded WWE talent only for the opposition to blow through their finances in desperation.

Besides a lot of these heavily paid spoiled old brats of WWE bring their bad stuff to the locker room. Even someone seemingly as untroublesome like Jeff Hardy was a riot in TNA.

I remember segments when these guys couldn't even stand let alone perform, as effing high they were. They leave WWE and they feel they are a franchise in themselves lol. Say whatever but no one has ever been able to tame these spoiled brat pro wrestlers as efficiently as Vince.

 

[Asim_khan]

I am glad there are still enough promotions out there because WWE alone cannot do justice to all the talent in pro wrestling today which is significantly wah higher than back in even WCW wars days.

WWE for their part must recognise and embrace competition even if the opposition is not up to their level and might never even be.

Monday night wars were the origin of the most compelling and even whackiest characters and storylines in pro wrestling.

As for AEW, I just wish they learn from the failures of WCW, TNA etc. Vince is a genius and he will keep flooding the market with discarded WWE talent only for the opposition to blow through their finances in desperation.

Besides a lot of these heavily paid spoiled old brats of WWE bring their bad stuff to the locker room. Even someone seemingly as untroublesome like Jeff Hardy was a riot in TNA.

I remember segments when these guys couldn't even stand let alone perform, as effing high they were. They leave WWE and they feel they are a franchise in themselves lol. Say whatever but no one has ever been able to tame these spoiled brat pro wrestlers as efficiently as Vince.

The problem is because there's only been one shop in town for 20 years, you can't really pick up shop ready people without getting someone who's been in WWE at some point, especially since TNA/Impact/ROH lost the whole of their main event scene to WWE (aside from the Bucks/Kenny). The issue for me would be when you ignore people you have under contract and bring in, as Tyson Fury would say, 'bum dossers' from WWE and bury your major stars by having them job in 3 mins to ex wwe 'superstars' in the first week. Like an aging Rikishi did to a young vibrant Bobby Roode.

For the most part I've found that AEW have managed to avoid these pitfalls which affected TNA/WCW, the guys they've picked up from WWE have generally been the types they'd be interested in anyway, FTR, Miro, etc and letting dross like the AOP, Ascencion, Heath Slater etc go by the wayside.

For Instance they've just got Andrade, who apart from maybe the one match vs Gargano, never reached the level he was at as La Sombra in CMLL & NJPW, so he's someone I'm glad they've got, on the same lines I'm desperate for them to get Aleisteir Black/Tommy End, not for what he's done in WWE, but what he did in the Indies, and to reach his full potential, which I feel he can do in AEW. I hate how WWE hamstrings performers.

Even guys like Mark Henry/Big Show have been brought in as backstage hands, who are gonna be needed now that the second live show is starting, and who may be used as special attractions. Unfortunately though I've heard rumors that Mark Henry is pushing to bring in the guy formerly known as Braun Strowman, and that's where I draw the line, I think the guy is the absolute drizzles, who beyond being tall and big is hot garbage, and honestly if someone like him or Corbin ever came to AEW I'd stop watching, well aside from maybe the odd big match.

 

[shaz619]

The problem is because there's only been one shop in town for 20 years, you can't really pick up shop ready people without getting someone who's been in WWE at some point, especially since TNA/Impact/ROH lost the whole of their main event scene to WWE (aside from the Bucks/Kenny). The issue for me would be when you ignore people you have under contract and bring in, as Tyson Fury would say, 'bum dossers' from WWE and bury your major stars by having them job in 3 mins to ex wwe 'superstars' in the first week. Like an aging Rikishi did to a young vibrant Bobby Roode.

For the most part I've found that AEW have managed to avoid these pitfalls which affected TNA/WCW, the guys they've picked up from WWE have generally been the types they'd be interested in anyway, FTR, Miro, etc and letting dross like the AOP, Ascencion, Heath Slater etc go by the wayside.

For Instance they've just got Andrade, who apart from maybe the one match vs Gargano, never reached the level he was at as La Sombra in CMLL & NJPW, so he's someone I'm glad they've got, on the same lines I'm desperate for them to get Aleisteir Black/Tommy End, not for what he's done in WWE, but what he did in the Indies, and to reach his full potential, which I feel he can do in AEW. I hate how WWE hamstrings performers.

Even guys like Mark Henry/Big Show have been brought in as backstage hands, who are gonna be needed now that the second live show is starting, and who may be used as special attractions. Unfortunately though I've heard rumors that Mark Henry is pushing to bring in the guy formerly known as Braun Strowman, and that's where I draw the line, I think the guy is the absolute drizzles, who beyond being tall and big is hot garbage, and honestly if someone like him or Corbin ever came to AEW I'd stop watching, well aside from maybe the odd big match.

AEW is no where close to being the alternative TNA and ROH were in their hey day, they have the financial backing but keep hiring so much talent from the WWE who AEW fans then jerk to as if they are personified ATG’s, firstly this hurts their profitability and secondly I struggle to see what Big Show and Henry have to offer, backstage yes they have value but from an AEW POV I highly doubt they are worth what they are paying them, in fact signing these guys is worse then Braun who is in his prime much better then filling the roster with vanilla midgets and Japanese school girls. WCW did the same, ran themselves into the ground hiring such talent, in fact a casual relative of mine saw AEW recently and called it a WWE rip off. The signing of Andrade is arguably their best though, he is worth more then Henry and Show combined.

Who have AEW actually developed as their guy? what makes AEW so unique? which star can they build around who can deliver on the mic and in the ring, is a genuine performer who is worthy of being considered for the best in the world?

TNA at their peak had the X-Division and AJ Styles

ROH focussed heavily on ring generalship and shrewd coherent booking and had guys like Samoa Joe, Bryan Danielson, Nigel Mcguiness, CM Punk et al

These products provided a genuine / unique alternative, you knew what they were, what they were trying to do and their stars could genuinely be considered the best in the world, they were men, real fighting men.

AEW can’t truly take credit for Kenny as their guy but assuming he is, what an absolute joke he is compared to all the major stars I listed from TNA/ROH and AEW are having an identity crisis, they have no unique appeal outside the niche cult of hipsters who enjoy your Jungle Boys, how embarrassing, seriously their product is not fit even for a 5 year old, Orange Cassidy is your guy, compare him to Styles, Joe, Punk, Nigel etc from the period when they were alternatives to the E and my word what a joke, wrestling is a joke and more fake then ever. AEW is best suited for the inclusivity crowd and those who are big fans of the LGBT movement, am sure everyone was thrilled when a transexual held the womens title and fans still get all nostalgic over Kenny’s run as Princess Jasmine. Genuine bum dossers the whole lot.

 

[Asim_khan]

AEW is no where close to being the alternative TNA and ROH were in their hey day, they have the financial backing but keep hiring so much talent from the WWE who AEW fans then jerk to as if they are personified ATG’s, firstly this hurts their profitability and secondly I struggle to see what Big Show and Henry have to offer, backstage yes they have value but from an AEW POV I highly doubt they are worth what they are paying them, in fact signing these guys is worse then Braun who is in his prime much better then filling the roster with vanilla midgets and Japanese school girls. WCW did the same, ran themselves into the ground hiring such talent, in fact a casual relative of mine saw AEW recently and called it a WWE rip off. The signing of Andrade is arguably their best though, he is worth more then Henry and Show combined.

Who have AEW actually developed as their guy? what makes AEW so unique? which star can they build around who can deliver on the mic and in the ring, is a genuine performer who is worthy of being considered for the best in the world?

TNA at their peak had the X-Division and AJ Styles

ROH focussed heavily on ring generalship and shrewd coherent booking and had guys like Samoa Joe, Bryan Danielson, Nigel Mcguiness, CM Punk et al

These products provided a genuine / unique alternative, you knew what they were, what they were trying to do and their stars could genuinely be considered the best in the world, they were men, real fighting men.

AEW can’t truly take credit for Kenny as their guy but assuming he is, what an absolute joke he is compared to all the major stars I listed from TNA/ROH and AEW are having an identity crisis, they have no unique appeal outside the niche cult of hipsters who enjoy your Jungle Boys, how embarrassing, seriously their product is not fit even for a 5 year old, Orange Cassidy is your guy, compare him to Styles, Joe, Punk, Nigel etc from the period when they were alternatives to the E and my word what a joke, wrestling is a joke and more fake then ever. AEW is best suited for the inclusivity crowd and those who are big fans of the LGBT movement, am sure everyone was thrilled when a transexual held the womens title and fans still get all nostalgic over Kenny’s run as Princess Jasmine. Genuine bum dossers the whole lot.

Transex this, Princess Jasmine that, change the record Shaz, you're more unoriginal than a 3 minute DQ finish during a RAW rematch from the previous nights ppv. Something which AEW never does, so what part of AEW did this buffoon of a relative think was a rip off of WWE? The 4 sided ring? The facts it's wrestling?

And the inclusive crowd includes Muslims, Palestinians etc, so AEW wouldn't be having Sami Zayn delete pro palestinian tweets, but then again having a transsexual or Kenny cosplaying as an Aladdin character for one show is so much worse than Israel bombing Palesntinians, you might as well be waving the Israeli flag like Vince himself asked you to foreign gimmick it up. Munafiq's are the worst, the word of God from the Qu'ran itself. Nothing more disgusting than a hypocrite.

And as for the pro's of being inclusive, AEW is outselling WWE in tickets in Charlotte, the home of Flair, the home of the Horsemen, and you're telling me AEW isn't an alternative? When did TNA/ROH ever do that, It's sold more Tickets for their upcoming Miami show than WWE has for theirs, AEW has barely pushed these shows on tv, WWE has had wall to wall coverage on Smackdown, NXT and RAW, are you telling me they aren't an alternative? who are you trying to convince? The PG product seems to be aimed at Kids right? Which is strange cos we all know about the paedo ring boys scandal right? Disgusting.

AEW is running a show in NYC, their debut show, in Flushing meadows, the home of Billie Jean, the home of Arthur Ashe, the home of the US Open, Vince tried strong arming them with MSG and the Barclays centre, King Khan uno reversed him and has got front page coverage in the New York Times and New York Post, and you're saying they're not an alternative? AEW pays more than ROH/TNA, has more of a digital footprint, has been the highest rated show on Cable, something TNA/ROH were never able to do. So who are you trying to convince??

And Kenny is better than all the guys you named, so yea, AEW is better, and he's better than all the guys in WWE, it's why he got offered the Brock deal. Who else has been champion of 3 separate major companies based in 3 separate countries at the same time? Nobody.

Oh and AEW's self publishing their own Video Game, after the debacle of 2K20, and the fact no footage exists of 2K22 and it's to be released in a couple of months, there could be further solidifying itself as not only a competitor, but someone ready to kick someone right off their perch.

Also there's been alot of selling of WWE assets recently, is there something they're expecting something bad from this investigation https://news.bloomberglaw.com/esg/wwes-mcmahon-board-accused-of-insider-trading-over-saudi-deals

 

[shaz619]

Transex this, Princess Jasmine that, change the record Shaz, you're more unoriginal than a 3 minute DQ finish during a RAW rematch from the previous nights ppv. Something which AEW never does, so what part of AEW did this buffoon of a relative think was a rip off of WWE? The 4 sided ring? The facts it's wrestling?

And the inclusive crowd includes Muslims, Palestinians etc, so AEW wouldn't be having Sami Zayn delete pro palestinian tweets, but then again having a transsexual or Kenny cosplaying as an Aladdin character for one show is so much worse than Israel bombing Palesntinians, you might as well be waving the Israeli flag like Vince himself asked you to foreign gimmick it up. Munafiq's are the worst, the word of God from the Qu'ran itself. Nothing more disgusting than a hypocrite.

And as for the pro's of being inclusive, AEW is outselling WWE in tickets in Charlotte, the home of Flair, the home of the Horsemen, and you're telling me AEW isn't an alternative? When did TNA/ROH ever do that, It's sold more Tickets for their upcoming Miami show than WWE has for theirs, AEW has barely pushed these shows on tv, WWE has had wall to wall coverage on Smackdown, NXT and RAW, are you telling me they aren't an alternative? who are you trying to convince? The PG product seems to be aimed at Kids right? Which is strange cos we all know about the paedo ring boys scandal right? Disgusting.

AEW is running a show in NYC, their debut show, in Flushing meadows, the home of Billie Jean, the home of Arthur Ashe, the home of the US Open, Vince tried strong arming them with MSG and the Barclays centre, King Khan uno reversed him and has got front page coverage in the New York Times and New York Post, and you're saying they're not an alternative? AEW pays more than ROH/TNA, has more of a digital footprint, has been the highest rated show on Cable, something TNA/ROH were never able to do. So who are you trying to convince??

And Kenny is better than all the guys you named, so yea, AEW is better, and he's better than all the guys in WWE, it's why he got offered the Brock deal. Who else has been champion of 3 separate major companies based in 3 separate countries at the same time? Nobody.

Oh and AEW's self publishing their own Video Game, after the debacle of 2K20, and the fact no footage exists of 2K22 and it's to be released in a couple of months, there could be further solidifying itself as not only a competitor, but someone ready to kick someone right off their perch.

Also there's been alot of selling of WWE assets recently, is there something they're expecting something bad from this investigation https://news.bloomberglaw.com/esg/wwes-mcmahon-board-accused-of-insider-trading-over-saudi-deals

So WWE is rubbish and has its issues, what has that got to do with your depraved / deranged fetish for AEW and their actual product, you have failed to actually defend the trash they put out on national television and using Meltzer’s senile Observer to explain that because they are doing a show in NYC or sold this ticket or that ticket it means the quality must be amazing, firstly that’s just pure minnow mentality and desperation from AEW fans otherwise they wouldn’t jerk to Jungle Boy getting the rub or a bum dosser like Cassidy as your main eventer’s on par with Rock and Austin, your cult wanted to start a petition to ban NFL/NBA which is on at the same time during weekly episodes. At the end of the day you support transexuals, LGBT community and inclusivity movement pushed by AEW and if that does include your faith to then you are even worse then cow dung and those who drink their urine, you openly support those movements despite them being against your faith which would probably most likely make you a jew personified and the blind support of AEW, their Jungle Boys and Princess Jasmine who you think is better then real fighting men like Samoa Joe, Punk, Styles, Bryan etc proves the similarity with Zionists and also that you need to either be drug tested or are most likely have a personal affiliation with the LGBT community, only a lesbian, tranny, or gay would put over Princess Jasmine aka supporter of pedophilia over the golden generation of the US indie scene.

 

[shaz619]

How embarrassing and humiliating, imagine telling people you still watch this trash which is more fake then ever, jerking to your Cassidy’s and Jungles. Grow up and find a job you low life hipsters.

 

[Bhaag Viru Bhaag]

 

[RedwoodOriginal]

[MENTION=46929]shaz619[/MENTION] [MENTION=98507]Asim_khan[/MENTION]

Rumors are rife that both Punk and Bryan might end up at AEW. With Bryan the rumor is that he may already have signed a deal, while Punk is said to still be in negotiations.

On some level I expected Bryan to end up in AEW because he made it clear that he wanted to wrestle other talents outside WWE and in Japan. But Punk coming to AEW would be nothing short of earth-shattering. And considering the next AEW PPV All Out is in Chicago, if Punk does debut there you can just about expect the roof to blow off.

Both are easily the most over guys of the modern era by a fair country mile and if AEW somehow manage to pull this off, it will be nothing short of incredible in my opinion.

AEW have already picked up Andrade and Aleister Black and the roster is getting packed. There simply isn't any better time than this to drop Joey Janela and all the indie mud-show clowns of his ilk. There should be no room for amateur clowns like him in a professional promotion.

I think AEW are trying hard to improve their product and I enjoyed a number of matches on their recent string of special episodes. The Texas Deathmatch between Moxley and Archer last night, in particular, was really entertaining to watch. Even the stupid stuff they seem to do has a certain so bad its good entertainment quality to it, unlike WWE where the bad stuff is just bad comedy aimed at kids.

At any rate, what an exciting time to be a wrestling fan. What do you guys think? And please try to answer without completely burying each other and WWE/AEW.

 

[RedwoodOriginal]

The problem is because there's only been one shop in town for 20 years, you can't really pick up shop ready people without getting someone who's been in WWE at some point, especially since TNA/Impact/ROH lost the whole of their main event scene to WWE (aside from the Bucks/Kenny). The issue for me would be when you ignore people you have under contract and bring in, as Tyson Fury would say, 'bum dossers' from WWE and bury your major stars by having them job in 3 mins to ex wwe 'superstars' in the first week. Like an aging Rikishi did to a young vibrant Bobby Roode.

For the most part I've found that AEW have managed to avoid these pitfalls which affected TNA/WCW, the guys they've picked up from WWE have generally been the types they'd be interested in anyway, FTR, Miro, etc and letting dross like the AOP, Ascencion, Heath Slater etc go by the wayside.

For Instance they've just got Andrade, who apart from maybe the one match vs Gargano, never reached the level he was at as La Sombra in CMLL & NJPW, so he's someone I'm glad they've got, on the same lines I'm desperate for them to get Aleisteir Black/Tommy End, not for what he's done in WWE, but what he did in the Indies, and to reach his full potential, which I feel he can do in AEW. I hate how WWE hamstrings performers.

Even guys like Mark Henry/Big Show have been brought in as backstage hands, who are gonna be needed now that the second live show is starting, and who may be used as special attractions. Unfortunately though I've heard rumors that Mark Henry is pushing to bring in the guy formerly known as Braun Strowman, and that's where I draw the line, I think the guy is the absolute drizzles, who beyond being tall and big is hot garbage, and honestly if someone like him or Corbin ever came to AEW I'd stop watching, well aside from maybe the odd big match.

The biggest problem with WWE for me is Vince. I started watching NXT after we last talked on this thread and went through all their TakeOver PPVs, and I was utterly mesmerized by everything from the presentation, the wresters, the old-school storylines behind feuds and the absolutely unreal quality of wrestling. I doubt anyone who watches Cole vs. Gargano or The Revival vs DIY, or even the 6 man ladder match they had for the inaugural North American Championship can deny those are some of the greatest wrestling matches of the modern era. Watching NXT in general, it was like I was watching an entirely different wrestling promotion and in many ways it is.

But then you watch WWE, and I don't even mean to bury WWE here. Because WWE literally has the best talent pool of wrestlers in the world with guys like Reigns, McIntyre, Orton, Edge, Kevin Owens, Balor, The Fiend, Sami Zayn, Seth Rollins...the list just goes on. And you are still almost guaranteed to get atleast one whopper match on every PPV. But unfortunately the problem is that the guy at the helm is a completely out of touch 75 year old billionaire who has gone completely senile, thinks Disney channel comedy is funny and is still completely obsessed with big guys, even if they are utterly rubbish in the ring and can't cut a promo to save their lives.

He also seems to have an axe to grind with NXT for some reason. Because only that would explain him debuting a guy who has dominated the entire NXT roster for a year: Karrion Kross and then beating him in 3 minutes by Jeff Hardy, a guy who doesn't even feature on a 3 hour episode of RAW these days! Its stuff like this that just infuriates you with WWE and something that you wouldn't see on AEW. Any great star, wrestler, character can be buried in an instant if the king sees fit. He did the same thing with The Fiend at WrestleMania, who is arguably one of few truly great characters they have developed in quite some time and has the same potential (although to a far lesser extent) that the Undertaker had 30 years ago.

Its kinda amazing how much CM Punk's pipebomb promo (particularly the stuff he said about Vince) rings true today, even a decade later.

 

[shaz619]

[MENTION=46929]shaz619[/MENTION] [MENTION=98507]Asim_khan[/MENTION]

Rumors are rife that both Punk and Bryan might end up at AEW. With Bryan the rumor is that he may already have signed a deal, while Punk is said to still be in negotiations.

On some level I expected Bryan to end up in AEW because he made it clear that he wanted to wrestle other talents outside WWE and in Japan. But Punk coming to AEW would be nothing short of earth-shattering. And considering the next AEW PPV All Out is in Chicago, if Punk does debut there you can just about expect the roof to blow off.

Both are easily the most over guys of the modern era by a fair country mile and if AEW somehow manage to pull this off, it will be nothing short of incredible in my opinion.

AEW have already picked up Andrade and Aleister Black and the roster is getting packed. There simply isn't any better time than this to drop Joey Janela and all the indie mud-show clowns of his ilk. There should be no room for amateur clowns like him in a professional promotion.

I think AEW are trying hard to improve their product and I enjoyed a number of matches on their recent string of special episodes. The Texas Deathmatch between Moxley and Archer last night, in particular, was really entertaining to watch. Even the stupid stuff they seem to do has a certain so bad its good entertainment quality to it, unlike WWE where the bad stuff is just bad comedy aimed at kids.

At any rate, what an exciting time to be a wrestling fan. What do you guys think? And please try to answer without completely burying each other and WWE/AEW.

Am very selective with what I watch these days so can’t comment on what AEW has been doing recently after the last PPV I watched which I feel was vastly over rated, I don’t think I’ve seen a match better in the ring or with a superior story line then Edge/Reigns this year - two legit guys who look like men performing at the highest level easier to tune into this being aware of the back story from WM, the ending to the PPV was a nice surprise to. As for AEW, getting Punk or Bryan would be a massive coup indeed; some reports today that Punk has already signed, this one is not surprising to me given that WWE has made little effort to build a bridge with Punk, I feel HHH is to blame for that, his ego is the size of jupiter, he hasn’t changed one bit, AEW is a good environment for wrestlers in the sense of pay, dates and creative control, a little similar to the deals WCW use to put out.

Bryan signing would be a bit surprising in that how WWE would just let him go, I know the NJPW relationship AEW has is alluring for him but still, why would the E just let him go ? he is still arguably their best pure baby face and biggest draws / recently main evented a mania.

Having both in the AEW locker room is a massive boost for their viewership and especially roster, if the manage to massage Punk’s ego they may learn a few things about the art of the promo and Bryan is humble enough to teach everyone how to wrestle and carry them to the best matches of their career or at the very least in North America, there is no one on the roster more capable to help Kenny in that regard then Bryan and Kenny has the tendency to do well when there is a higher level opponent in the ring with him, but you’d expect that; Bryan belongs in the mount rushmore of wrestling, he made people enjoy matches with The Fiend under red lights, who else can brag about being capable of something similar ? the best performers do well against all kinds of opponents and situations. If they sign these two, I will watch AEW a bit more because I’d expect an improvement in the segments they are involved in.

 

[shaz619]

The biggest problem with WWE for me is Vince. I started watching NXT after we last talked on this thread and went through all their TakeOver PPVs, and I was utterly mesmerized by everything from the presentation, the wresters, the old-school storylines behind feuds and the absolutely unreal quality of wrestling. I doubt anyone who watches Cole vs. Gargano or The Revival vs DIY, or even the 6 man ladder match they had for the inaugural North American Championship can deny those are some of the greatest wrestling matches of the modern era. Watching NXT in general, it was like I was watching an entirely different wrestling promotion and in many ways it is.

But then you watch WWE, and I don't even mean to bury WWE here. Because WWE literally has the best talent pool of wrestlers in the world with guys like Reigns, McIntyre, Orton, Edge, Kevin Owens, Balor, The Fiend, Sami Zayn, Seth Rollins...the list just goes on. And you are still almost guaranteed to get atleast one whopper match on every PPV. But unfortunately the problem is that the guy at the helm is a completely out of touch 75 year old billionaire who has gone completely senile, thinks Disney channel comedy is funny and is still completely obsessed with big guys, even if they are utterly rubbish in the ring and can't cut a promo to save their lives.

He also seems to have an axe to grind with NXT for some reason. Because only that would explain him debuting a guy who has dominated the entire NXT roster for a year: Karrion Kross and then beating him in 3 minutes by Jeff Hardy, a guy who doesn't even feature on a 3 hour episode of RAW these days! Its stuff like this that just infuriates you with WWE and something that you wouldn't see on AEW. Any great star, wrestler, character can be buried in an instant if the king sees fit. He did the same thing with The Fiend at WrestleMania, who is arguably one of few truly great characters they have developed in quite some time and has the same potential (although to a far lesser extent) that the Undertaker had 30 years ago.

Its kinda amazing how much CM Punk's pipebomb promo (particularly the stuff he said about Vince) rings true today, even a decade later.

Vince can be petty but I don’t know if he has an axe to grind, I just think he is incredibly stubborn and unwilling to accept change sometimes until he is forced to, but beyond that he tends to prioritise the share holders; I wouldn’t underestimate him, but I agree the 50/50 booking is horrible. The fans are toxic to, just look at how they boo Drew; the best all round baby face on the roster, how do you cater to an audience who can switch like that ? they somewhat deserve bi-polar booking, wrestling as a whole outside a few bright spots is pretty shocking and a bit noticeably fake in this era all round not just AEW. I would agree with you on NXT, I have enjoyed it over the years; not always been a massive fan of the style but their
professionalism has always shined, everything is just done so well, I was also at the Takeover show in NYC before the pandemic and it was stacked from start to finish, I don’t watch it more recently though and am not a fan of Kross but I would agree that was non-sensical to have him job to Jeff in that way, I may tune in to NXT again though for the Samoa Joe match which might get booked

 

[RedwoodOriginal]

Vince can be petty but I don’t know if he has an axe to grind, I just think he is incredibly stubborn and unwilling to accept change sometimes until he is forced to, but beyond that he tends to prioritise the share holders; I wouldn’t underestimate him, but I agree the 50/50 booking is horrible. The fans are toxic to, just look at how they boo Drew; the best all round baby face on the roster, how do you cater to an audience who can switch like that ? they somewhat deserve bi-polar booking, wrestling as a whole outside a few bright spots is pretty shocking and a bit noticeably fake in this era all round not just AEW. I would agree with you on NXT, I have enjoyed it over the years; not always been a massive fan of the style but their
professionalism has always shined, everything is just done so well, I was also at the Takeover show in NYC before the pandemic and it was stacked from start to finish, I don’t watch it more recently though and am not a fan of Kross but I would agree that was non-sensical to have him job to Jeff in that way, I may tune in to NXT again though for the Samoa Joe match which might get booked

I agree that wrestling in general has some of the worst, most toxic fans that it has ever had, but there are alot of people like myself and you who just want to see good wrestling, good storylines and stuff that makes sense. And it isn't just one thing for me in the case of Vince either, its a plethora of things from his utter disregard for tag-team wrestling, his complete burial of guys he goes cold on, the outdated 80s mentality and his crazy capitalistic tendencies that get him to do business with Saudi Arabia and elevate Jobber Mahal from jobber to WWE Champion in the space of one week. As much as I hate HHH, he atleast understands wrestling and isn't out of touch like Vince. I get the shareholders part but doesn't change the fact that WWE is more soulless than it has ever been (despite the positives). Its essentially the Disney of pro-wrestling.

Kross is nothing particularly special, especially on a roster featuring Adam Cole, Kyle O'Reilly, Gargano, Roddy Strong, Ciampa etc. but thing is he was built up as the Roman Reigns of NXT who pretty much dominated the entire roster. By having him job to Hardy they didn't just make him look like a joke, but rather made the entire roster and the brand look like a joke. And that's what really frustrated me. Whether Vince has an axe to grind or not, surely he would have know how that would make NXT look.

At any rate, Joe vs. Kross should be good. Joe hasn't wrestled in a long time so it'll be great to see him back. I agree completely that everything in NXT looks amazing. And the booking complements the wrestling perfectly, which doesn't surprise me since Shawn and Hunter are the bookers from what I gather. The product is very wrestling-driven which I really dig aswell. But I have to say you have once again made me envious and jealous of you. I mean seeing any wrestling show in New York is a bucket-list item but getting to see WrestleMania, TakeOver and Raw, that's what dreams are made of man.

 

[RedwoodOriginal]

Am very selective with what I watch these days so can’t comment on what AEW has been doing recently after the last PPV I watched which I feel was vastly over rated, I don’t think I’ve seen a match better in the ring or with a superior story line then Edge/Reigns this year - two legit guys who look like men performing at the highest level easier to tune into this being aware of the back story from WM, the ending to the PPV was a nice surprise to. As for AEW, getting Punk or Bryan would be a massive coup indeed; some reports today that Punk has already signed, this one is not surprising to me given that WWE has made little effort to build a bridge with Punk, I feel HHH is to blame for that, his ego is the size of jupiter, he hasn’t changed one bit, AEW is a good environment for wrestlers in the sense of pay, dates and creative control, a little similar to the deals WCW use to put out.

Bryan signing would be a bit surprising in that how WWE would just let him go, I know the NJPW relationship AEW has is alluring for him but still, why would the E just let him go ? he is still arguably their best pure baby face and biggest draws / recently main evented a mania.

Having both in the AEW locker room is a massive boost for their viewership and especially roster, if the manage to massage Punk’s ego they may learn a few things about the art of the promo and Bryan is humble enough to teach everyone how to wrestle and carry them to the best matches of their career or at the very least in North America, there is no one on the roster more capable to help Kenny in that regard then Bryan and Kenny has the tendency to do well when there is a higher level opponent in the ring with him, but you’d expect that; Bryan belongs in the mount rushmore of wrestling, he made people enjoy matches with The Fiend under red lights, who else can brag about being capable of something similar ? the best performers do well against all kinds of opponents and situations. If they sign these two, I will watch AEW a bit more because I’d expect an improvement in the segments they are involved in.

Thing about Bryan is that he had been saying repeatedly that if he continues in WWE after Mania it would have to be part-time, but even more forcefully he has been saying that he wants to wrestle the top wresters in other promotions and Japan before he retires. So the feeling that I got was that he doesn't plan on wrestling for too long and when you think about it, he has gone as far as he could have in WWE. Besides winning the Rumble he has accomplished everything there was to accomplish there; he has won every championship, beaten multiple top guys, was part of one of the greatest wrestling storylines ever in my book back in 2014 and got over to a level that not even WWE ever imagined anyone could. And since his 2018 return, he has returned the favor incredibly well by putting over everyone he needed to put over. It makes sense for him to move on and I doubt he is someone who will stay in WWE even if they just offer him an obscene amount of cash to not go to AEW.

And thing is, that AEW is the only place that makes sense for him. There are alot of guys he could elevate and have great matches with there. He could wrestle in NJPW, maybe even AAA if he wants to (hopefully not Impact tho). And his signing would launch AEW into an entirely different stratosphere. Just like Punk's signing.

As for Punk, I really hope he gets everything that he wants from AEW because by God he deserves it. Knowing Punk he will be blunt and his demands will be big. Knowing Tony Khan, he will almost certainly bend over backwards and agree to them. I have seen few wrestlers who understand wrestling as well as Punk. So my only hope is that he is still smart enough to distance himself from the rubbish within AEW and remains a top guy for however long he wrestles more. Still, exciting times ahead. Certainly can't wait for All Out.

Btw: Bryan to AEW might be a done deal. Because Tony Khan showed up on Konnan's podcast yesterday and was not only being coy but also couldn't stop smiling. Knowing the mark he is, I think its pretty much guaranteed that Bryan has signed a deal with them. According to uncle Dave, his likely debut could be at their September 22nd NY stadium show.

 

[shaz619]

Thing about Bryan is that he had been saying repeatedly that if he continues in WWE after Mania it would have to be part-time, but even more forcefully he has been saying that he wants to wrestle the top wresters in other promotions and Japan before he retires. So the feeling that I got was that he doesn't plan on wrestling for too long and when you think about it, he has gone as far as he could have in WWE. Besides winning the Rumble he has accomplished everything there was to accomplish there; he has won every championship, beaten multiple top guys, was part of one of the greatest wrestling storylines ever in my book back in 2014 and got over to a level that not even WWE ever imagined anyone could. And since his 2018 return, he has returned the favor incredibly well by putting over everyone he needed to put over. It makes sense for him to move on and I doubt he is someone who will stay in WWE even if they just offer him an obscene amount of cash to not go to AEW.

And thing is, that AEW is the only place that makes sense for him. There are alot of guys he could elevate and have great matches with there. He could wrestle in NJPW, maybe even AAA if he wants to (hopefully not Impact tho). And his signing would launch AEW into an entirely different stratosphere. Just like Punk's signing.

As for Punk, I really hope he gets everything that he wants from AEW because by God he deserves it. Knowing Punk he will be blunt and his demands will be big. Knowing Tony Khan, he will almost certainly bend over backwards and agree to them. I have seen few wrestlers who understand wrestling as well as Punk. So my only hope is that he is still smart enough to distance himself from the rubbish within AEW and remains a top guy for however long he wrestles more. Still, exciting times ahead. Certainly can't wait for All Out.

Btw: Bryan to AEW might be a done deal. Because Tony Khan showed up on Konnan's podcast yesterday and was not only being coy but also couldn't stop smiling. Knowing the mark he is, I think its pretty much guaranteed that Bryan has signed a deal with them. According to uncle Dave, his likely debut could be at their September 22nd NY stadium show.

Bryan had one of the greatest career’s ever in the E and he really doesn’t have much else to achieve, his comeback was one of the best ever, to reach the same heights he did after being out for so long cemented his all time great status and not just as a technical wrestler. It’s a good move for Bryan but is it a good move for his neck ? his schedule may be limited, but if he goes back to working a physical style it wont end well, the E at least deserves credit for holding some of their talent back and the wellness program, this is also why a back stage role could have been a likely possibility perhaps but Bryan wants that illusive match with Okada, in any case this will be his final run imo. Punk has a high in ring IQ no doubt, a throwback and student of the game, he has probably learned how to be shrewd business man to at this point and will benefit massively from the deal, am sure he will protect his storylines and character, watch how AEW fans ride both these guys now, it wasn’t too long ago when the hipsters were burying both and especially Punk, now they will call both of them daddy.

 

[shaz619]

I agree that wrestling in general has some of the worst, most toxic fans that it has ever had, but there are alot of people like myself and you who just want to see good wrestling, good storylines and stuff that makes sense. And it isn't just one thing for me in the case of Vince either, its a plethora of things from his utter disregard for tag-team wrestling, his complete burial of guys he goes cold on, the outdated 80s mentality and his crazy capitalistic tendencies that get him to do business with Saudi Arabia and elevate Jobber Mahal from jobber to WWE Champion in the space of one week. As much as I hate HHH, he atleast understands wrestling and isn't out of touch like Vince. I get the shareholders part but doesn't change the fact that WWE is more soulless than it has ever been (despite the positives). Its essentially the Disney of pro-wrestling.

Kross is nothing particularly special, especially on a roster featuring Adam Cole, Kyle O'Reilly, Gargano, Roddy Strong, Ciampa etc. but thing is he was built up as the Roman Reigns of NXT who pretty much dominated the entire roster. By having him job to Hardy they didn't just make him look like a joke, but rather made the entire roster and the brand look like a joke. And that's what really frustrated me. Whether Vince has an axe to grind or not, surely he would have know how that would make NXT look.

At any rate, Joe vs. Kross should be good. Joe hasn't wrestled in a long time so it'll be great to see him back. I agree completely that everything in NXT looks amazing. And the booking complements the wrestling perfectly, which doesn't surprise me since Shawn and Hunter are the bookers from what I gather. The product is very wrestling-driven which I really dig aswell. But I have to say you have once again made me envious and jealous of you. I mean seeing any wrestling show in New York is a bucket-list item but getting to see WrestleMania, TakeOver and Raw, that's what dreams are made of man.

That’s a good comparison with Disney tbh, who knows maybe they will sell the company to them as well. It was good for Jinder and he’s a good sport but we’d rather have had even Cesaro as champion or Nakamura, some decisions make you puke, now they have been pushing the BJP stable hard recently, Jinder has no mobility he will get injured soon NXT has an amazing roster, a shame about dream he had potential, I was lucky to attend them shows literally not really been anywhere else and had been saving up for it, the mania packages for NYC were a steal, I will give Vince credit where due for the spectacle and competitiveness of the deals. I haven’t followed NXT in a while but I love Io Shirai and Dikota Kai, their womens division is stacked man, will be great to see Joe work one more time, I hope he destroys Kross

 

[RedwoodOriginal]

That’s a good comparison with Disney tbh, who knows maybe they will sell the company to them as well. It was good for Jinder and he’s a good sport but we’d rather have had even Cesaro as champion or Nakamura, some decisions make you puke, now they have been pushing the BJP stable hard recently, Jinder has no mobility he will get injured soon NXT has an amazing roster, a shame about dream he had potential, I was lucky to attend them shows literally not really been anywhere else and had been saving up for it, the mania packages for NYC were a steal, I will give Vince credit where due for the spectacle and competitiveness of the deals. I haven’t followed NXT in a while but I love Io Shirai and Dikota Kai, their womens division is stacked man, will be great to see Joe work one more time, I hope he destroys Kross

Jinder, for all intents and purposes seems like a stand-up guy, and I'm sure he is in real life too. But the guy simply cannot work. The only thing close to a good match that he has ever been in was probably the one he had against Orton at MITB, and the wily veteran carried Jinder throughout the whole match. And thing is that if they had decided that they wanted to make him WWE Champion, the least they could have done was build him up for a couple of months. Instead he's getting beaten by Mojo freakin' Rawley one week and is WWE Champion a couple of weeks later. It was absolutely jarring and made no sense. And now as you mentioned they've started the BJP stable lol. And athough there is potential for a good feud between Drew and Jinder because of the natural history between the two, at the end of the day 99% of the matches that Jinder is going to have are going to be bad matches. Sadly he just isn't cut out to be a main-eventer.

As for NXT, I think its better for guys like Cole, Roddy, O'Reilly, Gargano to stay there forever, or go to AEW if they think they've gone as far as they can on NXT. Ciampa has already said that he has no interest in going to the main-roster and who can blame him? So many great wrestlers have been NXT Champion in the last 6 years, but how many have really become bonafide stars on the main-roster?

 

[RedwoodOriginal]

Bryan had one of the greatest career’s ever in the E and he really doesn’t have much else to achieve, his comeback was one of the best ever, to reach the same heights he did after being out for so long cemented his all time great status and not just as a technical wrestler. It’s a good move for Bryan but is it a good move for his neck ? his schedule may be limited, but if he goes back to working a physical style it wont end well, the E at least deserves credit for holding some of their talent back and the wellness program, this is also why a back stage role could have been a likely possibility perhaps but Bryan wants that illusive match with Okada, in any case this will be his final run imo. Punk has a high in ring IQ no doubt, a throwback and student of the game, he has probably learned how to be shrewd business man to at this point and will benefit massively from the deal, am sure he will protect his storylines and character, watch how AEW fans ride both these guys now, it wasn’t too long ago when the hipsters were burying both and especially Punk, now they will call both of them daddy.

Hahaha last few lines you wrote were brilliant and I couldn't agree more. Punk is a smart man. He had to be to do what he did in 2011, and then deliver the way he did with that entire angle that blurred the lines between reality and fiction. It might be incredibly awkward though when he runs into Colt Cabana backstage.

As for Bryan, I am fairly certain that he will be working a limited schedule. Doing the big matches will likely be his priority: Omega in AEW, Andrade and/or some of the well-known luchadors in AAA...Okada, Osprey, Ibushi and Zack Sabre in NJPW. And since he expressed interest in having matches with Darby, Jungle Boy and MJF long ago, you can expect those will happen too.

I think the limited schedule and the ability to do other things might have been what likely drew Punk into a deal too. Because he has regularly lamented about the punishing schedule he worked in WWE and the fact that he never got any chances to act, even in those terrible WWE Studios movies. He was actually surprised to hear that wrestlers get time off now even in WWE when he did Starrcast.

While Punk and Bryan could both have a whole host of incredible matches, I have to say that two I would be most excited for would be: Okada vs. Bryan and Punk vs. MJF. Okada v Bryan just for the wrestling, but Punk v MJF for the incredible and mind-blowing promos that we'll get to see. I've said it before, MJF is the future of pro-wrestling. He gets it, he's a student of the sport and he is more talented than anyone from his generation. Heck he's more talented on promos and from a psychology point of view than most people who are 10-15 years older than him. Can you imagine him bringing up Punk's UFC run and then Punk offering his own retort?

 

[PakLFC]

Any former WWE/F stars in the AEW?

 

[RedwoodOriginal]

One thing I still can't wrap my head around about AEW though is why they insist on continually associating with some of these outlaw, deathmatch nuts when they are the second biggest pro-wrestling company in America and have a highly-rated weekly cable show.

Bringing guys like Janela and Jimmy Havoc was bad enough but now they are bringing Nick Gage to do a No-DQ match with Jericho! Nevermind the fact that this guy is (according to his own admission) a drug-addict and a multiple convicted felon, who once robbed a bank WITHOUT A MASK ON! He also nearly killed David Arquette once during one of his deathmatches when his cut him in the neck with a tubelight. Among other things, he nearly killed himself once aswell when he refused to get medical treatment during one of these mudshow deathmatches. Like all these deathmatch nutjobs, all he does is cut people with tubelights and pizza cutters. And what he and his promotion GCW do is not wrestling no matter what they and the hundreds of people who come to their shows think.

I don't know what AEW or Jericho are thinking with this. Even if they ensured that he doesn't kill Jericho like he nearly Arquette or the other people he has gotten in the ring before, why would you give this freak this kind of traction? The highlight of his career was when they made an episode about him on Dark Side of the Ring, a few months back, that was a depressing, cautionary tale more than it was any kind of celebration of his career.

 

[shaz619]

Hahaha last few lines you wrote were brilliant and I couldn't agree more. Punk is a smart man. He had to be to do what he did in 2011, and then deliver the way he did with that entire angle that blurred the lines between reality and fiction. It might be incredibly awkward though when he runs into Colt Cabana backstage.

As for Bryan, I am fairly certain that he will be working a limited schedule. Doing the big matches will likely be his priority: Omega in AEW, Andrade and/or some of the well-known luchadors in AAA...Okada, Osprey, Ibushi and Zack Sabre in NJPW. And since he expressed interest in having matches with Darby, Jungle Boy and MJF long ago, you can expect those will happen too.

I think the limited schedule and the ability to do other things might have been what likely drew Punk into a deal too. Because he has regularly lamented about the punishing schedule he worked in WWE and the fact that he never got any chances to act, even in those terrible WWE Studios movies. He was actually surprised to hear that wrestlers get time off now even in WWE when he did Starrcast.

While Punk and Bryan could both have a whole host of incredible matches, I have to say that two I would be most excited for would be: Okada vs. Bryan and Punk vs. MJF. Okada v Bryan just for the wrestling, but Punk v MJF for the incredible and mind-blowing promos that we'll get to see. I've said it before, MJF is the future of pro-wrestling. He gets it, he's a student of the sport and he is more talented than anyone from his generation. Heck he's more talented on promos and from a psychology point of view than most people who are 10-15 years older than him. Can you imagine him bringing up Punk's UFC run and then Punk offering his own retort?

The limited schedule is less taxing but also dependent on how stiff you work, pre-WWE career Balor had something like 5-10 concussions in Japan, there have been some high profile accidents up there, speaking of AEW and their stunt-fests, they’ve experienced their fair share of injuries to, also remember there will be no one holding Bryan back so it will come down to how mature he is at this point in his life, I don’t think he needs to work as physical as he did for ROH though, he is too versatile to rely on that.

Punk always wanted to main event a WM but its strange how his best shot would have been by leaving and coming back in, you always end up being an even bigger draw then you were, just look at some of the returning legends and how they have been used, if WWE were to show any interest it would no doubt have to be a part time schedule to benefit both parties. AEW would be best placed to use Bryan and Punk as special attractions much like Lesnar if they want to maximise their drawing power. MJF and Punk would be great no doubt, Ospreay and Punk is possible to, funny how he called Punk out not long ago and Punk replied hold on to the strap for 6 months then we shall see, Ospreay then got himself injured, perfectly summarises this gen of raslers Ospreay the bloke who Meltzer claims is better then Shawn he isn’t better then Sonic the Hedgehog. Punk and Okada would do record breaking numbers at the Tokyo Dome

 

[shaz619]

One thing I still can't wrap my head around about AEW though is why they insist on continually associating with some of these outlaw, deathmatch nuts when they are the second biggest pro-wrestling company in America and have a highly-rated weekly cable show.

Bringing guys like Janela and Jimmy Havoc was bad enough but now they are bringing Nick Gage to do a No-DQ match with Jericho! Nevermind the fact that this guy is (according to his own admission) a drug-addict and a multiple convicted felon, who once robbed a bank WITHOUT A MASK ON! He also nearly killed David Arquette once during one of his deathmatches when his cut him in the neck with a tubelight. Among other things, he nearly killed himself once aswell when he refused to get medical treatment during one of these mudshow deathmatches. Like all these deathmatch nutjobs, all he does is cut people with tubelights and pizza cutters. And what he and his promotion GCW do is not wrestling no matter what they and the hundreds of people who come to their shows think.

I don't know what AEW or Jericho are thinking with this. Even if they ensured that he doesn't kill Jericho like he nearly Arquette or the other people he has gotten in the ring before, why would you give this freak this kind of traction? The highlight of his career was when they made an episode about him on Dark Side of the Ring, a few months back, that was a depressing, cautionary tale more than it was any kind of celebration of his career.

Shocking behaviour and surprising, AEW is the most ethical company in the world. Tony Khan’s very own child in this thread would agree, he does his 5 daily prayers before Saint Ofaga and Jungle Rettard

 

[RedwoodOriginal]

Shocking behaviour and surprising, AEW is the most ethical company in the world. Tony Khan’s very own child in this thread would agree, he does his 5 daily prayers before Saint Ofaga and Jungle Rettard

Tony Khan is a money mark who it seems can be easily swayed by pretty much everyone. But I don't know where, down the line Jericho lost his mind. He has always been one of the smartest guys in wrestling and was fairly good right uptill the early days of AEW. But some of the stuff he has done recently has really made me question his IQ. Besides the fact that he is a rabid Trump supporter who got infected with COVID after playing a concert at a motorcycle rally during peak-COVID, he has been doing either low-grade WWE Attitude Era rip-off skits or falling from a cage onto a completely fake looking cardboard platform during the last year. Besides that he looks absolutely terrible for someone who is supposed to be one of their guys and his ability in the ring has fallen off the cliff.

As someone who idolized him ever since I started watching wrestling, I have to say its sad to see how the mighty have fallen.

 

[RedwoodOriginal]

The limited schedule is less taxing but also dependent on how stiff you work, pre-WWE career Balor had something like 5-10 concussions in Japan, there have been some high profile accidents up there, speaking of AEW and their stunt-fests, they’ve experienced their fair share of injuries to, also remember there will be no one holding Bryan back so it will come down to how mature he is at this point in his life, I don’t think he needs to work as physical as he did for ROH though, he is too versatile to rely on that.

Punk always wanted to main event a WM but its strange how his best shot would have been by leaving and coming back in, you always end up being an even bigger draw then you were, just look at some of the returning legends and how they have been used, if WWE were to show any interest it would no doubt have to be a part time schedule to benefit both parties. AEW would be best placed to use Bryan and Punk as special attractions much like Lesnar if they want to maximise their drawing power. MJF and Punk would be great no doubt, Ospreay and Punk is possible to, funny how he called Punk out not long ago and Punk replied hold on to the strap for 6 months then we shall see, Ospreay then got himself injured, perfectly summarises this gen of raslers Ospreay the bloke who Meltzer claims is better then Shawn he isn’t better then Sonic the Hedgehog. Punk and Okada would do record breaking numbers at the Tokyo Dome

Yeah I agree with you big-time. The style of wrestling some of these guys wrestle these days, especially in AEW, is downright dangerous. Its beyond stupid because the only way this will end for them is with them being on a wheel-chair or worse, crippled by the time they are 40. My hope is that both Bryan and Punk are smart enough to know this. Especially Bryan with his history of concussions. I think Bryan will have to be especially mindful when he wrestles in Japan because their strong, stiff style can end up being incredibly dangerous for him.

As for Punk, I'm not sure if him coming back was ever going to happen in my book. That's a burned bridge. Because if it was to happen it would have happened in the last few years, certainly when the crowd wouldn't stop chanting his name no matter who was in the ring or which city they were in. I completely understood Punk's frustration with not main-eventing WM, and his decision to walk away completely when they fired him. When you're that good you have every right to be confident and even, arrogant if you feel like you're not getting what you deserve. Even when he had that hallmark 434 day run as champion, Punk was never as important in the eyes of the Fed as Cena and main-evented only a handful of PPVs eventhough he was champion.

LOL Meltzer is another guy who has seemingly lost his marbles in the last few years. Its a shame because his star ratings used to be remarkably credible. And I rarely disagreed with them or his takes on wrestling until he became a total mark for Omega and the Bucks. I haven't really seen much of Ospreay to have a proper opinion on him, but one thing that immediately stands-out based on everything I have heard is the hard-hitting style and how injury-prone he is. Wouldn't take a genius to figure out that both things are connected.

 

[Bhaag Viru Bhaag]

Any former WWE/F stars in the AEW?

Heard that they have signed CM Punk and Daniel Bryan. They already have couple of former WWE stars like Jericho, Andrade, Matt Hardy, Christian, Big Show, Mark Henry, Alistair Black, Dean Ambrose etc.

 

[SangasCoverDrive]

Wrestling is never gonna be as big as it was in 90s and the main reason for it is the emergence of internet. A lot of kids used to watch wrestling bc they thought it was real but now everyone knows that its fake and scripted so no one wants to waste their time watching it in and out.

 

[shaz619]

Yeah I agree with you big-time. The style of wrestling some of these guys wrestle these days, especially in AEW, is downright dangerous. Its beyond stupid because the only way this will end for them is with them being on a wheel-chair or worse, crippled by the time they are 40. My hope is that both Bryan and Punk are smart enough to know this. Especially Bryan with his history of concussions. I think Bryan will have to be especially mindful when he wrestles in Japan because their strong, stiff style can end up being incredibly dangerous for him.

As for Punk, I'm not sure if him coming back was ever going to happen in my book. That's a burned bridge. Because if it was to happen it would have happened in the last few years, certainly when the crowd wouldn't stop chanting his name no matter who was in the ring or which city they were in. I completely understood Punk's frustration with not main-eventing WM, and his decision to walk away completely when they fired him. When you're that good you have every right to be confident and even, arrogant if you feel like you're not getting what you deserve. Even when he had that hallmark 434 day run as champion, Punk was never as important in the eyes of the Fed as Cena and main-evented only a handful of PPVs eventhough he was champion.

LOL Meltzer is another guy who has seemingly lost his marbles in the last few years. Its a shame because his star ratings used to be remarkably credible. And I rarely disagreed with them or his takes on wrestling until he became a total mark for Omega and the Bucks. I haven't really seen much of Ospreay to have a proper opinion on him, but one thing that immediately stands-out based on everything I have heard is the hard-hitting style and how injury-prone he is. Wouldn't take a genius to figure out that both things are connected.

Defo Bryan will have to be careful there, sometimes I never got the direct comparisons, they are able to work the way they do due to the limited schedule, I recall one of Okada’s breakthrough years, he worked something like 20 matches for the calendar year and most involved top tier in-ring talent, he passes the eye test anyway but I genuinely feel you need to be a special talent to make it in the unforgiving North American territory at the highest level. With Punk, I think Vince was a fan but HHH was on a mission to sabotage him long before he came to the main roster.

Meltzer is playing to the gallery to sell his WON and also appease to his friends, I have challenged him on the nepotism numerous times. For example, one of his biggest insiders of the 90’s was Bret, when he advocates the greatness of modern talent and claiming they are better then everyone on this earth, he will never bury Bret; that just confirms his bias and lack of objectivity, he also changed his tunes against Shawn towards the end of the 90’s and beyond that despite being his biggest fan in the late 80’s and early 90’s

 

[The_KING]

Wrestling is never gonna be as big as it was in 90s and the main reason for it is the emergence of internet. A lot of kids used to watch wrestling bc they thought it was real but now everyone knows that its fake and scripted so no one wants to waste their time watching it in and out.

No, genius. People (except kids maybe) in the 90s knew wrestling was scripted. It’s just that in the 90s and early-mid 2000s, you had compelling gimmicks and storylines with matches that told a great story. That hooked everyone’s interest.

Now the characters are generally boring. Storylines are crap. Most matches are high flying flippy floppy crap. People aren’t interested in that.

 

[The_KING]

AEW signing all of these ex wwe stats. WCW did the same. Guess what happened to them.

 

[RedwoodOriginal]

Defo Bryan will have to be careful there, sometimes I never got the direct comparisons, they are able to work the way they do due to the limited schedule, I recall one of Okada’s breakthrough years, he worked something like 20 matches for the calendar year and most involved top tier in-ring talent, he passes the eye test anyway but I genuinely feel you need to be a special talent to make it in the unforgiving North American territory at the highest level. With Punk, I think Vince was a fan but HHH was on a mission to sabotage him long before he came to the main roster.

Meltzer is playing to the gallery to sell his WON and also appease to his friends, I have challenged him on the nepotism numerous times. For example, one of his biggest insiders of the 90’s was Bret, when he advocates the greatness of modern talent and claiming they are better then everyone on this earth, he will never bury Bret; that just confirms his bias and lack of objectivity, he also changed his tunes against Shawn towards the end of the 90’s and beyond that despite being his biggest fan in the late 80’s and early 90’s

I love Okada and everything about him but it doesn't take a genius to deduce that he would not have nearly the same success in North America as he does in Japan. And that's not even a knock on him because I genuinely believe that he is one of the greatest wrestlers in the world. It's just that you need very different set of tools to be successful in the States, than you do in Japan. At any rate, Bryan and Punk vs. him would be a dream match that everyone in the wrestling world would be dying to see.

Yeah I agree with you on that part. The worst bit was HHH coming out of the woodwork just to bury Punk and ruin the 'Summer of Punk'. But even before that, there are stories dating back years where HHH deliberately buried Punk backstage and in meetings.

I don't think Meltzer's lack of objectivity and bias is even in question considering how he much he has gone out of his way for some of his friends recently. I can tolerate the Shawn and Brett stuff but his incessant cheerleading for bang average TV matches, or just some of the other garden-variety Young Bucks gymnastics is sad to see. One of the most entertaining feuds going around these days is the one between him and his former friend: Cornette. I don't know if you've been following it but it's pretty funny and entertaining. Cornette tends to go a little overboard with his hate sometimes but there is no one more entertaining at wrestling rants, and he is 100% right in this case, when essentially buried old Uncle Dave on his podcast recently.

Btw, I can never get enough of a kick out of how much Cornette seems to infuriate some of the boys in AEW. Its beyond hilarious that such a seemingly major pro-wrestling company would get this up in arms about a guy who just does a podcast. Its gotten to the point where they are even doing a parody of him on their show.

 

[RedwoodOriginal]

AEW signing all of these ex wwe stats. WCW did the same. Guess what happened to them.

Its easy to see that comparison but to their credit, AEW has avoided many of the humungous blunders that WCW made.

For one thing, their entire show is not catered around ex-WWE guys with zero attention to making their own stars. They have quite a few young wrestlers who could become major stars sooner rather than later. MJF and Adam Page being probably the best examples.

And though they are run by a money mark named Tony Khan, he is atleast a fan of wrestling and not completely off his rocker like Bischoff or Russo, or any of the other TBS executives that had a hand in running WCW.

 

[Asim_khan]

Its easy to see that comparison but to their credit, AEW has avoided many of the humungous blunders that WCW made.

For one thing, their entire show is not catered around ex-WWE guys with zero attention to making their own stars. They have quite a few young wrestlers who could become major stars sooner rather than later. MJF and Adam Page being probably the best examples.

And though they are run by a money mark named Tony Khan, he is atleast a fan of wrestling and not completely off his rocker like Bischoff or Russo, or any of the other TBS executives that had a hand in running WCW.

Its funny that he's called a money mark, cos he's shown himself to be a really shrewd businessman, he's basically strong armed WarnerMedia into fronting the money for Punk and Bryan. TNT have won the rights to the Wednesday NHL games, AEW's contract dictated that they'd have the regular Wednesday slot except during NBA play offs, so they've paid AEW an 8 figure amount to move to TBS, aside from 4 major shows on TNT on Saturdays which are call backs to the classic Clash of Champions that were on the Superstation in the GCW/NWA/WCW days. That money's gone towards the new signings. Alot of the analysts were surprised how little fight AEW put up to having to move, cos although TBS is available in more homes, TNT is seens as the hip & happening channel, but I guess it's no coincidence that they're then linked so heavily with Bryan & Punk, especially after they invested so heavily in the Video game, which they're self publishing.

Bryan has come for the chance to work with AAA and especially NJPW, and working for AEW allows that. WWE tried getting an exclusive deal with NJPW so they could keep Bryan and pie face AEW, but Vince has got a terrible reputation when it comes to working with others (), whereas AEW have rolled the red carpet out for Kenta, Rocky Romero, Haku's son etc and also allowed Moxley/Jericho to work the big NJPW shows, especially since Meij has left. Also the way to put over Yuji Nagata, and his return to TNT after 20 years got alot of traction in Japan and impressed the NJPW office.

CM Punk it seems is gonna be more of a WarnerMedia signing than an AEW one, do not be surprised to see him doing lots of media work for the NHL games, he's a huge hockey mark, and there's rumors that him and Renee Paquette nee Young aka Moxley's wife will be heading up the NHL's version of "NBA on TNT", which is probably why CM Punk has decided to sign with AEW, and also why WarnerMedia have paid the money to Tony, cos Punk is mainstream and he would be a big get for NHL, as he would bring in the casuals as well as the hardcore Hockey fans.

There's a certain excitement that comes with being an AEW fan cos of the likelihood of big signings, it's something WWE no longer has since every newcomer generally ends up in NXT. You get Cena/Edge returning, and maybe in the future The Rock, but it's not the same. There's been people on twitter tracking Tony Khan's private plane to Chicago and all sorts, which is madness lmao. The last time WWE fans were like this was when Kenny Omega was meant to Debut at the 2019 Royal Rumble, and instead you got Nia Jaxx.

And WWE fans aren't taking the fact Bryan maybe leaving too well. I Also wonder how much of these comments are from Desi's

This had me rolling

 

[Asim_khan]

AEW signing all of these ex wwe stats. WCW did the same. Guess what happened to them.

Or AEW is signing all these ex WWE guys, is like WWF signing all the under utilized WCW guys, who went onto be *World Champion/~Intercontinental/^European/Light Heavyweight Champion in WWE

*Stone Cold Steve Austin (Stunning Steve)
*Undertaker (Mean Mark Callous)
*Triple H (Terra Ryzing/Jean Paul Lavesque)
*Mick Foley (Cactus Jack)
~Goldust (Dustin Rhodes)
*Psycho Sid (Sid Vicious)
~William Regal (Lord Steven Regal)
*Chris Jericho
*Chris Benoit
*Eddie Guerrero
^Perry Saturn
^Dean Malenko

There's others like Edge (Sexton Hardcastle) and Molly Holly (Mona Madness) etc who I haven't included as they were generally jobbers in WCW.

 

[shaz619]

[MENTION=147292]RedwoodOriginal[/MENTION]

Had you thought of these dream matches:

Sting vs CM Punk
Sting vs Daniel Bryan

Kurt Angle vs Daniel Bryan

baah gawwd almighty )

Kurt hated his final opponent, if he could improve his ring activity and get in shape maybe it’s possible, Bryan has always been his dream opponent, and Sting still has a bit of gas left it seems.

Also to add to the Sting/Punk possibility, Sting’s little female dog may have potentially hyped that up or *pukes’ an interaction between Sting’s female dog and Punk, that would be horrid.