Ricochet could become the next high-profile talent to enter the free agency market.
The 32-year-old high flyer signed with WWE in 2018. It\’s believed he signed a 3-year deal, which has lead to speculation about his future over the past several months. Fast forward to January 2021 and Ricochet might have some tough decisions to make about his future.
Bryan Alvarez addressed the situation this week on Wrestling Observer Live. Alvarez does not believe Ricochet has re-signed with WWE. This does not mean that Ricochet is definitely leaving WWE, but this is a developing story we\’ll be covering.
Ricochet\’s WWE run has been unremarkable to say the least. Sadly, his story is a familiar one. After an impressive career wrestling around the world and tearing up the independent scene, he signed with WWE and had a solid run in NXT before floundering on the main roster. Last year, he was saddled with a \”Losing Streak\” storyline, which always goes over so well.
In recent weeks, Ricochet has been wrestling on WWE Main Event with occasional appearances on WWE Raw.
WWE was offering big money contracts to talent up until year ago to prevent them from signing with AEW. Since the COVID-19 pandemic, there were drastic cost-cutting measures. Dozens of wrestlers were let go last year and WWE\’s offers to talent have been far less lucrative.
Mark Henry Calls Out Ricochet: \”I Want Him To Get Fired Up!\”
It turns out that WWE had a chance to sign a big free agent in RUSH, but decided against doing so.
The company recently passed on signing ROH World Champion, according to a new report by Wrestling Inc. Per the report, WWE passed on signing RUSH because his asking price was too high. The top champion in Ring of Honor was represented by AAA during the negotiations.
WWE reportedly made an offer that was lower than expected. It is believed that \”ROH has either re-signed RUSH or that they have come to terms on a new deal.\”
Back in January 2019, ROH had confirmed that they sign him to a deal where he would later become the top star for them and ended up winning his first ROH World Heavyweight Title by beating Matt Taven that September at the Death Before Dishonor XVII PPV pay-per-view.
He was last seen in action for ROH at the Final Battle pay-per-view event last month when he successfully retained the title over Brody King. The finish of that match saw RUSH\’s brother, Dragon Lee, and his father, La Bestia del Ring, get involved to help him get the victory.
It’s been reported over the last few months that WWE has been offering not only contracted talent, but also unsigned wrestler lower deals than they did in the past due to the budget cuts made related to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Monday’s edition of WWE Raw averaged 1.819 million viewers with a 0.55 rating in the Adults 18-49 demographic. Last week’s show did 2.128 million viewers with a 0.68 rating.
Here’s the hourly viewership breakdown for Monday night:
The first hour did 2.024 million viewers and a 0.62 rating (A18-49).
The second hour did 1.802 million viewers and a 0.53 rating.
The final hour of the show had just 1.632 million viewers and a 0.51 rating.
This episode was expected to drop for two reasons. The first being that last week’s show featured Legends Night and it worked at the time as it was the best ratings the show has done since the August 24th show that did over 2 million viewers.
WWE brought back the likes of Hulk Hogan and Ric Flair for a one week boost. The other reason for the decline was due to it going up against the college football championship game between Ohio State and Alabama on ESPN that did 18 million viewers.
Friday’s SmackDown averaged 2.120 million viewers. This is up from the 2.013 million viewers on FS1 that the show did for the previous week.
SmackDown pulled in a 0.56 rating in the 18-49 demos, up from the 0.53 rating as previous week’s show. The episode drew an average of 2.003 million viewers in the overnight ratings, up from the previous week that did 1.915 million viewers.
The first hour saw it pull in 2.036 million viewers while hour two did 1.969 million viewers. The show did 1.996 million viewers in hour one while hour two did 1.834 million viewers two weeks ago.
Triple H kicked off Monday’s episode of WWE Raw to do a promo in the ring. This was done to create buzz around the show following the news that WWE Champion Drew McIntyre tested positive for COVID-19 and had to pull out of his non-title match with Randy Orton on the same episode.
This segment saw Triple H welcome everyone to the show before being interrupted by Orton, who said the office decided to show up because McIntyre couldn’t. Orton asked him whether he will rule that he will enter the Royal Rumble Match last or hand him the WWE Title. Triple H wasn’t interested in doing either. Triple H brought up Orton’s history with attacking and talking down to various legends over the past few months. Triple H called him a prick for doing so.
Orton challenged him to a fight and Triple H said no because there’s no benefit to him. Orton threw a jab at Stephanie McMahon for having Triple H’s balls and she wasn’t there for him to get them. Triple H punched him then accepted the challenge.
Triple H fought Orton in the main event of the show. It started with six minutes left in the show. They brawled around the ring with no referee. Triple H grabbed a sledgehammer then as the lights started to go out, it was put on fire and then Triple H disappeared. Alexa Bliss showed up and threw a fireball in the face of Orton to end the show.
There had been a rumor earlier in the day of this happening. It turns out that the future WWE Hall of Famer hadn’t worked a match on Raw since 2016 when he went over Dolph Ziggler in a singles match.
Since 2010, Triple H has greatly reduced his in-ring schedule. He worked 9 matches in 2016, 14 in 2017, 4 in 2018, and 4 in 2019.
Before this match on Raw, the latest contest that Triple H competed in was in June 2019 when he teamed up with Shinsuke Nakamura to defeat Robert Roode & Samoa Joe in a tag team match.
It turns out that the reason why Kofi Kingston didn’t appear on Monday’s episode of Raw is due to him dealing with a real jaw injury.
WWE announced the injury as a way to explain why he wasn’t on the show, which featured Xavier Woods losing to T-Bar. WWE claimed that he’s dealing with a broken jaw.
While he is dealing with a jaw injury, it appears to not be broken as he recently spoke about it in a video shared on his Instagram account.
“I gotta apologize because I feel like I’m talking out of the side of my mouth and I’m dealing with a jaw injury right now. My mouth is only closing on one side and if I sound kind of funny, that’s why. Ordinarily, I do a lot of imitations, impersonations, and impressions but I’m not doing that right now. I’m talking funny trying to figure this situation out.”
There’s still no word yet on how or when he suffered the injury, but it could’ve happened at the WWE TLC pay-per-view when he and Woods dropped the Raw Tag Team Titles to The Hurt Business.
Kingston mentioned on Twitter after the show that he had lost two teeth during the contest.
WWE delivered on its promise that Drew McIntyre would speak about his COVID-19 diagnosis on Monday’s episode of Raw.
News that the WWE Champion tested positive for the virus came out on Monday when WWE confirmed it in a statement on its website. At the time, WWE noted that he was in quarantine after finding out. Originally, he was supposed to take on Randy Orton in a non-title match on this show, but that was scrapped.
McIntyre recorded a message via his phone that aired on the show where he talked about how he is one of the fortunate ones to not have any symptoms, but assured that COVID is not something to take lightly.
He said that people shouldn’t think they can’t catch it because they can. He noted that the only way to stop the virus is by working together and pleaded fans to follow social distancing guidelines as well as wearing masks.
McIntyre just defended the WWE Title over Keith Lee in the main event of last week’s episode of Raw, which was billed as Legends Night. After the match, Goldberg came out and confronted McIntyre. Eventually, the WWE Hall of Famer challenged him to a title match at the upcoming Royal Rumble show then shoved McIntyre down to close the show.
There’s no word yet on whether McIntyre’s COVID-19 diagnosis will impact plans for him to wrestle Goldberg at this pay-per-view event on January 31, 2021.
Even though Steve Austin hasn’t wrestled for nearly two decades, he’s kept in tune with WWE programming.
The WWE Hall of Famer recently spoke with Justin Barrasso of Sports Illustrated to promote \”Straight Up Steve Austin\” season two premiere on the USA Network.
During the interview, he spoke about the pairing of Paul Heyman and WWE Universal Champion Roman Reigns.
\”That\’s such a great package. They compliment each other so well,\” Austin said. \”Roman can work his ass off. He\’s always been very solid in the ring, but now there\’s this bond and this chemistry between Roman and Paul. That\’s what Paul Heyman does. He makes anybody he\’s with that much better.”
Austin recalled it happening for him as well with Heyman. He noted that if you want to suspend your disbelief, but you can’t because Reigns gets help from Heyman with his knowledge. He called the presentation and chemistry as these two stars together look and sound like money.
Heyman serves as the legal counsel for Reigns on WWE television and has been doing so since August when Reigns turned heel after his surprise return at SummerSlam.
The top WWE star is in quarantine and was pulled from a scheduled non-title match with Randy Orton in Monday’s episode of Raw. Unfortunately, McIntyre is not the only wrestler to test positive for the coronavirus in recent weeks. This comes after a busy holiday season with Christmas and New Year’s. According to Fightful, there has been another string of positive COVID-19 tests to hit the pro wrestling world. The positive cases reportedly affect WWE, AEW, and Impact Wrestling.
As it stands right now, there’s no confirmation on the specific changes that the cases have caused, but the report did state several matches and appearances are being nixed.
Some people in WWE expected a wave of COVID-19 infections from the holidays and were surprised that things were not worse considering the circumstances.
There is confirmation on wrestlers scheduled for Raw, SmackDown, Dynamite and Impact being affected by the outbreak aside from McIntyre.
Regarding WWE, they obviously air their television shows live every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. When it comes to AEW, they have been taping shows every other week. This week\’s New Year\’s Smash (Night 2) episode of AEW Dynamite was taped last Thursday night Jacksonville.
Impact is slated to tape several future episodes of their weekly TV program this weekend as well as air the Hard To Kill pay-per-view event.
WWE decided to do a title change on the Friday’s episode of SmackDown.
As seen on this week’s episode, The Street Profits defended the SmackDown Tag Team Titles against Dolph Ziggler and Robert Roode.
Ziggler and Roode dethroned Montez Ford and Angelo Dawkins to win the straps. This is the first blue brand title reign for Roode and Ziggler.
During this year’s Draft in October, The New Day was drafted to Raw while The Street Profits were drafted to SmackDown. At the time, WWE official Adam Pearce had the two teams trade championships.
As a result, there was never an official title change, but rather the titles were renamed and the champions followed suit. The Street Profits had been champions since winning the titles from Murphy and Seth Rollins on the March 2nd episode of Monday Night Raw.
The Hurt Business (Cedric Alexander and Shelton Benjamin) dethroned The New Day (Kofi Kingston and Xavier Woods) to win the Raw Tag Team Titles last month at the WWE TLC pay-per-view event.
Historically, WWE doesn’t have tag team champions defend their titles at the Royal Rumble, which is the next pay-per-view event on tap for the company as it takes place later this month.
WWE held a Gauntlet Match on this show that featured Daniel Bryan, King Corbin, Shinsuke Nakamura, Sami Zayn, and Rey Mysterio. It featured Mysterio and Zayn starting things off with Mysterio going over.
Nakamura then eliminated Rey, Corbin, and Bryan. It was later revealed that WWE agent Adam Pearce would be the final competitor after Paul Heyman pulled some strings. Uso and Reigns beat down Nakamura. Uso superkicked Pearce then pulled him onto Nakamura and the referee counted the three.
Pearce was victorious, which means he earned the right to challenge Reigns for the WWE Universal Title at the upcoming event. It will be interesting to see if WWE pulls Pearce, who hasn\’t worked a match in years, from the bout.
WWE presents the Royal Rumble pay-per-view event on January 31, 2021 at Tropicana Field in St. Petersburg, Florida that will air on the WWE Network.
It was reported a few months ago that WWE had plans for Bryan to challenge Reigns for the title at either TLC, which didn’t happen, or Royal Rumble. However, plans were later changed with “The Big Dog” entering a program with Owens.
Congratulations are in order for AEW star Matt Hardy and wife Reby. On Friday evening, the couple announced they are expecting their fourth child together. It will be their first daughter.
The couple got married in 2013 and had their first child, a son, Maxel in June 2015 before having their second son, Wolfgang Xander in June 2017. Their third child, Bartholomew \”Bartie\” Kit, was born in December 2019.
Hardy returned to WWE with his brother, Jeff, in 2017 at WrestleMania 33 after being away for several years. However, he had a run with WWE that wasn’t what he had envisioned, and thus, he decided to let his contract expire with WWE.
This was at a time where he wasn’t being used on television in a way that he wanted his brother went down with an injury that resulted in him getting surgery and being on the sidelines for several months. Hardy joined All Elite Wrestling earlier this year.
Hardy uploaded a new video on his YouTube channel earlier this week that saw him talk about where The Hardy Boyz ranks among the greatest tag teams of all-time. He even poked fun at Vince McMahon decided to put Jeff in a tag team with Matt Riddle as the Hardy Bros.
Steve Austin is already known as one of the best to ever do it in the pro wrestling business and one of the biggest stars that Vince McMahon has ever created.
However, there are some who still want to see him come back for one more match. The WWE Hall of Famer recently spoke with Fox Sports to promote the new season of his series, “Straight Up Steve Austin” on the USA Network.
During it, he made it clear that he’s done and has been for quite some time.
\”Man, 100 percent. Cause, you know, I\’m still the biggest fan of the business that I was when I was seven years old changing the channels and stumbled across it; and then got the chance to learn it and have a pretty good run. So, I don\’t want to do nothing else in the ring. I\’m done, I\’ve retired, everybody knows that.”
Austin continued by noting that he doesn’t need to go out there and drop anyone on their necks and give them stunners. He continued by noting that he’s paved the way that he did and had the career that he had, but he still watches the product. Austin added that he wants to have his finger on the pulse, which he cherishes.
Austin has not wrestled since retiring in 2003 at WrestleMania 19 where he lost to great rival and a better friend, The Rock.
Unlike some people before him, Daniel Bryan has been using his creative influence to elevate younger stars.
Dave Meltzer reported in this week\’s Wrestling Observer Newsletter that the former WWE Champion has been pushing for more NXT talent to be brought up to SmackDown. However, he has been met with opposition.
Bryan has received pushback from this idea due to the poor track record of wrestlers brought up from NXT to the main roster over the last two years. It all comes down to Vince McMahon losing interest in call-ups soon after they debut as well as several main roster talent who don\’t currently have a role on TV.
Rhea Ripley and Damien Priest
We know that Damien Priest and Rhea Ripley are two NXT stars that WWE plans to call up from NXT in the near future. Priest was set to be called up to SmackDown and align with Kevin Owens. However, this plan was shelved when WWE did not come up with a storyline that worked.
Rhea Ripley is also headed to the main roster soon following her loss to Raquel Gonzalez at NXT New Year\’s Evil. It is believed Ripley will resume her feud with Charlotte Flair, which was put on hold after their match at WrestleMania 36 last April.
There have been rumors about past backstage heat between Seth Rollins and Matt Riddle since November 2019.
The rumors about their issues go back to when Riddle’s wife made body shaming comments directed towards Becky Lynch, who is the fiance and mother of Rollins’ child, in a now-deleted Instagram post.
Rollins made an appearance on the Friday Night SmackDown Watch Along special that aired in October. During it, he made it clear that he had no desire to work with Riddle.
Fightful now reports that those within the company suggested the two stars have moved past the issues between them. The two stars did work the Men’s Elimination Tag Team Match at the Survivor Series pay-per-view event in November and fans picked up on how Rollins didn’t look at Riddle during the contest.
However, people backstage at the show noted that they talked about their differences at the show. Now, they’re said to be open to working with each other in the future.
It was added by sources that Riddle apologized to Rollins for his wife’s comments toward Lynch.
The January 6, 2020 episode of WWE NXT aired live on the USA Network from Orlando, Florida at the Capitol Wrestling Center.
WWE NXT Results
Karrion Kross def. Damian Priest
Santos Escobar def. Gran Metalik to retain the Cruiserweight Championship
Xia Li def. Katrina Cortez
Raquel Gonzalez def. Rhea Ripley in Last Woman Standing Match
KUShotzi (KUSHIDA & Shotzi Blackheart) def. The Way (Johnny Gargano & Candice LeRae)
Finn Balor def. Kyle O\’Reilly to retain the WWNXT Championship.
Here are the takeaways from this week’s show:
NXT Cruiserweight Title Match
Gran Metalik challenged Santos Escobar for the NXT Cruiserweight Title on this show, which was set up on last week’s episode.
Although Gran never had a chance of actually winning the title by beating the champion here, it was a good spotlight for him.
The match was a fast pace highly impactful contest. There were some near falls that made it seem like Gran was close to victory. After a lengthy match, Santos hit his finisher for the win to successfully retain the title.
Karrion Kross vs. Damian Priest in a singles match was just what fans had thought it was going to be. A fight. This marked Kross’ second match back after being sidelined with a shoulder injury that resulted in him getting surgery.
This was the opening contest and had no commercials. They had a hard-hitting style with two big guys just throwing. Priest got plenty of offense so it didn’t feel like a one-sided fight. The finish saw Kross hit his finisher for the win.
Kross made his return a few weeks ago by attacking Priest, who had been making his case to be the next challenger for Finn Balor’s NXT Championship.
There’s no date for NXT’s next TakeOver special, but it’s likely to take place later this month or in early February, it will be interesting to see whether Kross gets his shot at the NXT gold at this event.
A last woman standing match took place featuring Rhea Ripley vs. Raquel Gonzalez.
The match saw them use various weapons such as a bell hammer, a piece of fence, and other things.
At one point, Ripley was backdropped onto the side of the announce table, which broke. Raquel threw several chairs on top of her as the referee counted. They brawled backstage and Rhea tackled her through a glass door. Dakota Kai came out and hit Rhea with a kendo stick several times. Rhea placed Kai in a locker. They crashed through the stage with Raquel coming up to stand.
WWE made this match official last week after a confrontation between Ripley and Gonzalez. Gonzalez came out to the stage during Ripley\’s match against Dakota Kai on the show. They then went face-to-face following Ripley’s win. They got into a brawl.
Two weeks ago, Ripley lost to Toni Storm due to interference by Gonzalez. Ripley defeated Gonzalez when they faced each other at Halloween Havoc this October.
NXT Champion Finn Balor defended against Kyle O\’Reilly with the title on the line in the main event.
O\’Reilly defeated Pete Dunne on an episode of NXT TV a few weeks ago to earn this match.
O\’Reilly previously challenged Balor for the NXT Championship in the main event of TakeOver 31 this past October. Although Balor retained his title, he suffered a broken jaw in the process.
This latest match featured a similar style to their first match. Balor had a nasty cut on his left eyebrow. The finish saw Balor have Kyle in a chin/arm submission and Kyle tapped out. This comes after Balor worked over the jaw of Kyle throughout the match.
The big rematch between Finn Balor and Kyle O’Reilly was just as memorable as their first encounter.
The contest took place in the main event of Wednesday’s episode of WWE NXT on the USA Network, which was touted as New Year’s Evil. It served as the main event of the show that was the first 2021 episode from Orlando, Florida at the Capitol Wrestling Center.
The match went long as they had no commercials and about 20 minutes. It was building off what they did in their first match. Balor worked over the jaw of Kyle throughout the match so the finish had Balor get O’Reilly in a chin/arm submission.
WWE set up this contest on the December 16th episode as the company held a singles match between Pete Dunne and O\’Reilly. Because O’Reilly was victorious, he earned the right to challenge Balor for the NXT Title.
Their first bout took place at the TakeOver 31 event this past October. Although Balor successfully retained the title at this show, both stars walked away with injuries as Balor broke his jaw in two places in the match. O’Reilly reportedly suffered a concussion.
WWE has released the complete brackets for the 2021 Dusty Rhodes Tag Team Classic. This year\’s tournament will include the following teams:
The Undisputed Era (Adam Cole, Roderick Strong)
Breezango (Fandango, Tyler Breeze)
Legado del Fantasma (Joaquin Wilde, Raul Mendoza)
Ever-Rise (Chase Parker, Matt Martel)
Bollywood Boyz
Imperium (Marcel Barthel, Fabian Aichner)
Drake Maverick and Killian Dain
Curt Stallion and August Grey
Lucha House Party
MSK
Isaiah Scott & Jake Atlas
Grizzled Young Veterans
Tony Neese & Shawn Daivari
Kushida & Leon Ruff
The Way (Johnny Gargano & Austin Theory)
Drake Maverick & Killian Dane
Stallion & Grey
Here are the official brackets (Click to enlarge):
The tournament kicks off this Wednesday night on NXT with two First Round matches. The Undisputed Era takes on Breezango and Ever-Rise faces the Grizzled Young Veterans.
Dusty Rhodes Tag Team Classic
The Dusty Rhodes tag team classic tournament was established in 2015 as a tribute to the legendary pro wrestler.
The winners will be awarded the Dusty Rhodes Classic Cup trophy, which looks like Dusty’s signature cowboy wrestling boots.
Past winners include:
2015: Finn Balor and Samoa Joe
2016: The Authors of Pain
2018: The Undisputed Era (Adam Cole & Kyle O\’Reilly)
2019: Aleister Black and Ricochet
2020: The BroserWeights (Matt Riddle & Pete Dunne)
A WWE NXT star could have made their main roster debut last week on SmackDown, but plans for this to happen were changed.
WrestleVotes reports that this unknown star was supposed to appear in the main event segment on the episode that featured Jey Uso, Kevin Owens, and WWE Universal Champion Roman Reigns.
It wasn’t mentioned in the report who this star is, but it was noted that the wrestler is said to be on the card for Wednesday’s episode of NXT New Year’s Evil. There’s no word yet on whether WWE has nixed all plans to call up this NXT star or if it was pushed back by one week.
It was later reported by Fightul Select that Damian Priest could be headed to Raw or SmackDown soon, as WWE was discussing his call-up from NXT earlier this week.
Priest is scheduled to take on Karrion Kross at tonight\’s NXT New Year\’s Evil. This bout will open the show and will air without commercial interruptions.
Last week’s SmackDown featured Owens beating Uso in a singles match. After the contest, he was attacked by Reigns and Uso. The segment ended with Reigns tossing Owens from a platform in the crowd through a table.
Monday’s edition of WWE Raw averaged 2.128 million viewers with a 0.68 rating in the Adults 18-49 demographic. Last week’s show did 1.769 million viewers with a 0.52 rating.
This episode was expected to get a significant bump in viewership because of the company bringing back legends. This was the best ratings the show has done since the August 24th show that also did over 2 million viewers, which was the post-SummerSlam edition as well as the first show in the ThunderDome.
Here’s the hourly viewership breakdown for Monday night:
The first hour did 2.197 million viewers and a 0.70 rating (A18-49).
The second hour did 2.150 million viewers and a 0.66 rating.
The final hour of the show had just 2.036 million viewers and a 0.68 rating.
WWE brought back the likes of Hulk Hogan and Ric Flair. The last time WWE brought back legends was for the Raw Reunion special in July 2019, which averaged 3.093 million viewers, and featured an appearance by Steve Austin, Ric Flair, Shawn Michaels, Hulk Hogan, John Cena and several more.
SmackDown Viewership
Friday’s SmackDown averaged 2.013 million viewers. This is down from the 3.303 million viewers on FOX that the show did for the previous week.
SmackDown pulled in a 0.53rating in the 18-49 demos, down from the 0.96 rating as previous week’s show. The episode drew an average of 1.915 million viewers in the overnight ratings, down from the previous week that did 3.336 million viewers.
The first hour saw it pull in 1.996 million viewers while hour two did 1.834 million viewers. The show did 4.097 million viewers in hour one while hour two did 2.574 million viewers two weeks ago.
WWE didn’t waste any time in booking Drew McIntyre’s first WWE Championship defense of the new year against Keith Lee as well as setting up his next feud.
It happened on Monday’s episode of Raw, which was hyped as Raw Legends Night, on the USA Network. The contest was saved for the main event from St. Petersburg, Florida at Tropicana Field.
It was a lengthy back and forth match. McIntyre did a lot of selling for Lee to make him look like a worthy contender. At one point, McIntyre power bombed Lee through the announce table. Lee managed to hit a Spanish fly off the top rope for a near fall. McIntyre hit the Claymore Kick for the win.
WWE set up this contest last week on Raw as Lee battled Sheamus in the opening contest. Obviously, Lee went over and earned the title shot opportunity.
After the match, Goldberg walked down to the ring and grabbed a microphone. He praised McIntyre for having talent, but not getting the respect he deserves. He said that McIntyre looks at legends as wrestlers out of their prime and being better than them.
Goldberg said that this is where he steps in as he challenged McIntyre for the WWE Title at the Royal Rumble. McIntyre said that fighting him would be like fighting his own dad. Goldberg pushed him down and the show went off the air.
WWE holds the Royal Rumble pay-per-view event on January 31, 2021.
Goldberg made a surprise return on Raw and just challenged Drew McIntyre for the WWE title at Royal Rumble ?
The Big Show has made it known that he’s still interested in a match against Shaquille O’Neal even though the chances of it happening might be decreasing every year that passes.
This match has been talked about for years but never happened. While doing an interview with WWE UK, the former WWE Champion noted that facing Shaq at WrestleMania is his perfect scenario.
“Let’s see, in a perfect scenario at WrestleMania, it would be Big Show versus Shaquille O’Neal. That would be a perfect scenario because we never really got to make that happen. That’s one of those stones I’d like to get out of my shoe and settle that, who is the best big man of all time, period.”
Talks of this possible match started in 2016 after Shaq and The Big Show teased a match at WrestleMania 33 in Arlington, Texas at AT&T Stadium. Plans were changed as Big Show ended up competing in the Andre The Giant Memorial Battle Royal at the show.
The two sides have given different stories about why it didn’t happen as Shaq has claimed that plans continued to change throughout talks while WWE made it seem that the NBA legend was never interested in doing the contest.
Marty Scurll is no longer under contract with Ring of Honor.
On Monday evening, ROH announced on social media that the two sides have mutually decided to end their working relationship:
Marty Scurll In Ring of Honor
Marty Scurll joined Ring of Honor in 2016. He signed a new contract in January 2020. At the time, \”The Villain\” was a hot commodity. He was rumored to be joining either WWE or AEW.
The latest Ring of Honor contract called for him to take over as Ring of Honor\’s head of creative. Unfortunately, it was not meant to be. Just as he was supposed to begin expanding his duties behind the scenes, the Covid-19 pandemic hit. Ring of Honor soon suspended live events.
Marty Scurll was later the subject of lurid allegations as part of the #SpeakingOut movement. It was alleged by a young woman that Marty Scurll took advantage of her while she was drunk and underaged. Scurll addressed the situation publicly and soon made his Twitter account private.
Marty Scurll was removed from the ROH website roster in October 2020. Since the promotion resumed holding events, he had not been at any ROH TV tapings or PPVs nor had he been involved in any behind the scenes responsibilities.
We\’ll provide an update if Scrull comments on his departure from ROH.
In the eyes of some fans, Keith Lee had a rocky start to his run on the main roster as a member of WWE Raw.
He held both the NXT Championship and NXT North American Championship in 2020. However, he was called up after SummerSlam and immediately underwent presentation changes as his music and attire were altered. This upset some fans.
Lee recalled how he found out about his music being changed while speaking to Bleacher Report.
\”That was something else. Originally, honestly, even I was a little perplexed. You get all the people who came up to Raw who still used their old music. Mind you, none of them did their own music. I\’m the only one that did, so it would make more sense for me to be the one to keep using my music.
However, that did not happen, so they asked me to use something else, and I did, and I tried to be as accommodating a possible by putting the front of the song on that track, and it just didn\’t vibe [laughs]. It was rough, man! I did the best I could given the circumstances.”
Lee recalled thinking to himself that he just had to go with it until he can figure something out. He joked the fan backlash over it made him think if they were his friends or not.
“I think I\’m starting to understand some things here. Between the gear and the music, I just got destroyed.\”
He noted that he had nothing ready for new music because he didn’t think he would have to change it. He added that he wrote some things up with the music guys until he was happy. Lee said the current music he’s using now is different from what he wanted to use but happy to have something that he wrote and performed.
FTR has decided to do something pretty cool to honor Jon Huber, who passed away last month due to a non-COVID-related lung issue.
Cash Wheeler and Dax Harwood plan to change the name of their signature move as a way to remember Brodie Lee.
Harwood took to Twitter to announce the name change and mentioned that he got the permission of Amanda Huber, Lee’s wife, to do so. He wrote the following:
“After speaking with Amanda, and getting her blessing, we have decided to change the name of The Goodnight Express to “Big Rig”. This is our way of keeping a bit of his legacy alive in professional wrestling. We love you, Brodie. Can’t wait to see you again.”
Before making the jump to AEW from WWE, the move was called The Shatter Machined. Also, since joining the rival promotion, the tag team changed their finisher to a Spike Piledriver.
AEW did a tribute show for Lee on last week’s episode of Dynamite, which was watched by 9777,000 fans.
As of this writing, AEW has yet to book FTR in a match on this Wednesday\’s special edition of Dynamite, which is being billed as New Year\’s Smash and already has a stacked card.
Ric Flair is obviously very proud of his daughter, Charlotte, and her career that she’s had thus far in the pro wrestling business.
At 34-years-old, Charlotte Flair has accomplished everything there is to accomplish in WWE. She\’s held the NXT Women\’s Championship, was the final WWE Divas Champion, has reigned as champion on Raw and SmackDown and is a Royal Rumble winner. Success sometimes brings detractors with it. Charlotte has deal with her share of negativity from fans, but that does not bother her father.
During an interview with CBS Sports, Ric Flair says he\’s not concerned with wrestling fans who are critical of his daughter.
“I’m not so much bothered by it,\” said Flair. \”I just laugh at it. It’s really sad the impact that social media can have on people. She’s got thick skin. Wrestling is the only sport where somebody can’t be the best.
Flair added that fans are critical of all pro athletes. At the end of the day, it does not detract from Charlotte\’s legacy. She is currently in her prime and Flair sees his daughter as the greatest women\’s wrestler of all time.
Charlotte made her return to WWE programming at last month’s TLC pay-per-view to win the Women’s Tag Team Titles with Asuka. “When she walked out at TLC, what did you think? That’s star-power,\” said Flair.
The Nature Boy respects the accomplishments of Trish Stratus and Lita, but Charlotte Flair is still the greatest of all time.
\”She’s the best woman on the roster, but she’s the best woman of all time,\” Flair said of his daughter. \”I’ve been in the business 49 years. Give me an example of who you think is better. You can’t.”
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