Daily Update: Countdown to Full Gear, SmackDown ratings, John Cena

Daily Update

Latest News:

Latest Audio:

Latest Free YouTube Video:

This Week’s Wrestling Observer Newsletter:

This Week’s Retro Observer Newsletter:

Ordering Info:

Order the print Wrestling Observer right now and get it delivered via mail, by sending your name, address, Visa or Master Card number and an expiration date to dave@wrestlingobserver.com or by going to www.paypal.com directing funds to dave@wrestlingobserver.com.

Rates in the United States are $14.50 for 4 issues, $35.50 for 12, $70 for 24, $116 for 40 and $149.50 for 52.

In Canada and Mexico, the rates are $16 for 4, $27 for 8, $38.50 for 12, $76 for 24, $126 for 40 and $162.50 for 52.

For the rest of the world, rates are $18 for 4, $48.50 for 12, $93 for 24, $155 for 40 and $201.50 for 52.

If you order by mail with a check, cash or money order to P.O. Box 1228, Campbell, CA 95009-1228, you can get $1 off in every price range.

Saturday News Update

WWE

  • Last night’s SmackDown averaged 2.13 million viewers in the fast national ratings, up from last week’s fast national number of 2.115 million viewers. The rating in the 18-49 demo was a 0.5.
  • In an Instagram post, John Cena appeared to respond to Logan Paul’s comments about wanting to face Cena at WrestleMania. Cena posted a photoshopped picture of Paul’s face on “Stone Cold” Steve Austin’s body with the caption “Stone Cold Someday?”
  • Bianca Belair told Comicbook about her and Montez Ford’s reality show that WWE is producing for Hulu: “Uhm, I will say that I used to have a little bit of downtime at home, but now I guess I won’t have any [laughs]. The icing on the cake is that I get to do it with my husband, it’s exciting. I am nervous, I never thought that I’d be doing a reality type show but my husband is full of life and when I tell people that the person y’all see in the ring is the person I get at home. So now, I get to share that with the world. But I’m excited and I’m also nervous. We’re exposing ourselves and our family and pulling the curtain back a little bit and showing a balance between who we are in the ring but also outside of the ring. It’s exciting, it is exciting times.”
  • Mick Foley explained why he’s no longer on Twitter:
          • It would be easy to blame the atmosphere on Twitter. That was part of it, but since day one, I had trouble using Twitter in moderation, so it’s mostly on me. I struggled with it. I think a lot of people do. Then you get to where you’re spending hours a day just looking at everything on there, and as it became progressively more divisive, I began to feel like I was swimming in a pool full of turds. One turd, you can dodge that turd. Right? You can still enjoy the crystal clear water. But at a certain point, when being on Twitter just becomes an exercise in dodging turds, it’s time to get out of the water and that’s what I did.
  • Foley said he may come back to Twitter at some point:
          • I may come back on after the New Year. I may let you guys (AdFreeShows) run the account. I mean, I worked really hard to get up to 2 million. I really did, and it was a struggle over time. I posted stuff that I thought was interesting and sometimes funny, sometimes relevant, but it just feels like a filthy place for me to be and spend so much time. But maybe after the New Year, it’ll come back under new ownership.
  • Ricochet, Ronda Rousey & Shayna Baszler, and Legado Del Fantasma were interviewed on The SmackDown LowDown.
  • JBL and Baron Corbin were guests on this week’s edition of WWE After the Bell.

AEW/Other Wrestling

  • AEW uploaded an extended cut of its Countdown to Full Gear special ahead of tonight’s PPV.
  • I previewed the Full Gear card for Sports Illustrated.
  • During an appearance on Busted Open Radio, Tony Khan discussed wanting to do more AEW live events in 2023:
          • I think, in 2023, I would love to expand our content, and we have such a great roster. I think I can utilize the people on the roster even more, and there’s ways we can do that by expanding the content, doing more shows, and I do think live events is something we could do more of, and we have the potential to do that.
          • We have the wrestlers, and we have the interest around the country, and there’s markets that we’re just now hitting for the first time in years. We have that capacity.
          • That’s one of the reasons I wanna do more live events and increase our live event revenue, bring it up because that’s one of the reasons I brought in somebody who has such great experience there in Jeff Jarrett, who has worked in the office of, I guess at least four promotions, off the top of my head, if not more and wrestled in countless promotions.
          • So certainly Jeff’s experiences are so valuable in that area. So as we expand live events, I think Jeff, with his experience there, will be a great person to help grow that part of the company, in addition to being a great wrestler.
  • TVInsider asked Jungle Boy about starting to show more of his real self onscreen: “What I loved about the Jungle Boy character is I didn’t talk or do any of this bullish-t. You are just going to watch me wrestle. A lot of people don’t like to wrestle as they like to do other stuff. A lot of people prefer to cut promos and all that stuff. I’m working on that, but I love to wrestle. I loved that Jungle Boy allowed me to do that. Then paired with Luchasaurus, it fits in a weird way. People dug it. At this point, not referencing my personal life has now been blown out of the water. It felt a little silly to me to have Christian saying all these crazy things and referring to me as Jungle Boy. It felt like a time to get serious with the whole thing. I brought my real self forward a bit.”
  • Lee Moriarty appeared on the latest episode of Talk is Jericho.
  • Vulture has a feature story on MJF.
  • While doing commentary for Cage Fury Fighting Championships, CM Punk joked about the post-All Out brawl, saying he’s bad news and you don’t want him in your locker room.
  • Naomichi Marufuji told Sports Illustrated that he wants to wrestle Bryan Danielson and Chris Jericho: “Bryan is now far away in the distance, but you never know what happens in this world of pro wrestling. I just had an opportunity to see him, and I’d love to wrestle against him again. I also want to wrestle Chris Jericho. I have been hoping to wrestle against him.”
  • Bobby Fish spoke to The Ten Count about winning his boxing debut: “Well, I have a martial arts background from when I was kid, and I have had three amateur kickboxing fights and kickboxing is something I’m very comfortable with. This happened to be just boxing. So it was my boxing fight. Boxing and kickboxing, although the layman might look at it and be like ‘Oh, well you just take kicks away’, but it’s very nuanced in that way. That’s where the differences are stark contrast for sure. So there was some work that needed to go into this camp that was different than what would have been prior experience just to, you know, not not completely redirect, but change some habitual behavior, you know, just some things that are different with kickboxing and boxing.”
  • Indie wrestler G-Raver (Brandon Graver) was arrested in Huntingdon County, Pennsylvania after police found more than 20 grams of drugs in a vehicle that he and another person were in. G-Raver reportedly admitted to snorting 10 bags of heroin.
  • Thursday’s episode of Impact Wrestling averaged 109,000 viewers (0.02 rating in the 18-49 demo).