Daily Update: CM Punk, Alex Shelley, Sheamus

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This Week’s Wrestling Observer Newsletter:

In this issue:

  • Match of the week and performer of the week
  • The debut of Collision, AEW’s ratings decline and reasons and what the return of Punk will tell us
  • The problems Collision will have from the get go
  • Why the success of Collision is so important financially to AEW
  • The reaction as far as cheering and booing for Punk outside of Chicago and what is far more important than booing or cheering
  • Oversaturation of television in the marketplace
  • Ticket sales for Collision and all AEW & WWE events this summer
  • Update on WWE negotiations
  • Value of WWE to a new station with interest
  • The situation with WBD and potentially getting WWE
  • How many homes the key stations that could carry WWE & AEW are in right now
  • Conor McGregor sexual assault charge
  • Lawyer Eric Anderson breaks down the judges ruling to continue the MLW lawsuit against WWE, WWE’s arguments on antitrust, the judges reaction and what comes next
  • B.J. Whitmer fired
  • Full details on G-1 Climax tournament, the blocks, the favorites, the key matches and some storylines to look for going in
  • Update on the Forbidden Door show and business and key things to learn from about the business results
  • UFC 289 coverage including the retirement of Amanda Nunes, why, what about the titles she retires and other storyline notes from the most recent show and business notes as well
  • Updates on WWE Money in the Bank
  • Full coverage of All Together Now, the Japanese show with New Japan, All Japan and NOAH’s top talent and how it went down
  • Coverage of Final X
  • The most detailed look at the ratings of the wrestling and MMA shows this past week, with key breakdowns, segment-by-segment, who watches, rankings in sports and entertainment for the week
  • An attempt to make a superstar with a new character later this month
  • Update on Rush in AAA and TripleMania
  • New Japan Strong goes to Japan
  • More on the longest world title reigns in wrestling history
  • Movie on wrestling star to be released in September
  • Against All Odds results and Slammiversary notes
  • New AEW hires
  • What was Brock Lesnar’s biggest-ever one night payoff?
  • Jon Jones and Tyson Fury talk business
  • XFL business notes
  • Lots of injury updates

This Week’s Retro Observer Newsletter:

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Wednesday Update

WWE

  • After last night’s NXT went off the air, Seth Rollins gave a speech to the crowd. Rollins retained his World Heavyweight Championship against Bron Breakker in the main event of the episode.
  • Dana Brooke posted a tweet responding to the negative reaction she received from the crowd during her match against Cora Jade on NXT: “Alright I get it, y’all think I suck….Got it, NOTED, Awesome….. &…..”
  • Rhea Ripley told the Under the Ring podcast that she and Dominik Mysterio barely talked to each other before joining The Judgment Day:
          • We barely talked before this whole Judgment Day thing. Like we said, ‘Hi, how are you,’ and that was about it. But watching our chemistry just sort of blossom and grow week by week and we’re getting more comfortable with each other, which is fantastic. It’s been really fun and also getting to watch him grow as a performer and blossom and get more confident week in and week out has been very rewarding as well. I feel like since we’re both like around the same age, I’m 26, he’s 25, I feel like our minds are very similar and we just want to go out there and be chaotic and be menacers and just have fun, so that’s pretty much what we’re doing. We’re just going out there and we’re having fun and reacting off of each other and growing our bond. I think people are seeing that in a way and it makes it easy for them to follow and it makes it easy for them to understand what’s going on. I think it’s been fun for people to see how much we’ve grown together, but we’re having the time of our lives.
  • Sheamus said in an interview with Metro
  • that he doesn’t think WWE has really capitalized on The Brawling Brutes as a group:
          • I just don’t think they’ve really capitalized on the group, I don’t think they’ve really let us show what we can do. This stop/start stuff is really hard when you’re trying to highlight young talent.
          • It’s frustrating, you know? So I dunno, maybe we’ll get an opportunity to show what we can really do as a group because a lot of those other groups who are out there now have definitely got an opportunity that we haven’t had to do some storyline stuff, some character stuff.
          • That’s kinda been a shame, mate, to be honest, considering the talent that’s in there.
  • Pretty Deadly and Raquel Rodriguez were guests on WWE’s The Bump this afternoon.
  • WWE commentator Kevin Patrick was interviewed on Out of Character.

AEW/Other Wrestling

  • Bryan Alvarez reports that CM Punk is at tonight’s Dynamite, which is being held at Wintrust Arena in Chicago. Punk will be appearing on tonight’s show.
  • Saraya tweeted that she’ll be in Chicago for Dynamite tonight.
  • Tony Khan was a guest on our Pacific Rim podcast with Jim Valley and Fumi Saito.
  • In an interview with Sports Illustrated, Alex Shelley said friends from WWE, Japan, and AEW reached out to him after his Impact World Championship win: “I was very grateful that people watched the match and shared the moment with me. I’ve heard from a lot of people I was close with over the past 20 years. People from all over, including WWE and Japan and AEW. I didn’t even recognize some of the numbers at first. It was mind-blowing, it meant the world to me and I responded to every single one of those texts.”
  • Gail Kim and Gisele Shaw have been announced as one of the teams for season nine of The Amazing Race Canada. The season, which has already been filmed, premieres on July 4.
  • NJPW’s website has an in-character interview with Will Ospreay. He said competing in hostile territory at Forbidden Door in Toronto won’t be an issue for him:
          • No, I mean, I grew up in Essex, you know what I mean. It’s a horrible place. There are some nice parts of Essex, but it is a horrible place. I grew up around horrible, nasty people. I grew up going to football stadiums where people were getting stomped on their heads. I just grew up around that. So I fully embrace that, you know what I mean? In more of the sense that, the more you attack me with boos, it just kind of like, fuels me. It gets me off. Without being funny, I almost welcome it.
          • And honestly, I’ve been to Canada once, I went for a Ring of Honor show. And it was so f***ing boring, and everybody’s so up their own arse. Like, I don’t know where this notion came from, or all Canadians being so polite and all. Bret Hart, especially. All he ever does is just moan. All the time. He has nothing nice to say about wrestling, so why would you ever want to be near that guy? It’s just- I can’t stand Canada. I really can’t. So it’s going to be very satisfying going into that alien territory and whupping [Kenny Omega] in front of anyone.
  • AEW shared a Fight Forever video looking at the exploding barbed wire death match in the game. AEW also has character spotlights on CM Punk, Miro, Anna Jay, and Malakai Black.
  • This week’s episode of Tony Schiavone’s What Happened When podcast is an All Japan watchalong with Eddie Kingston.