Daily Update: Impact in the UK, BOSJ results, FloSlam

THE ROUND-UP

The Latest from the F4W Staff

NEWS/COLUMNS

AUDIO

We are looking for reports on the WWE Raw show in Greensboro, Smackdown in Knoxville and NXT in Fort Pierce, FL to newstips@wrestlingobserver.com.

Sunday has Raw in Augusta, GA and Smackdown in Chattanooga.

UFC ON SUNDAY FROM STOCKHOLM, SWEDEN

Fight Pass at 10 a.m. Eastern time

  • Damir Hadzovic vs. Marcin Held
  • Jessin Ayari vs. Darren Till

FS 1 at 11 a.m. Eastern time

  • Nico Musoke vs. Bojan Velickovic
  • Reza Madadi vs. Joaquim Silva
  • Chris Camozzi vs. Trevor Smith
  • Pedro Munhoz vs. Damian Stasiak
  • Jack Hermansson vs. Alex Nicholson
  • Oliver Enkamp vs. Nordeen Taleb
  • Omari Akhmedov vs. Abdul Razak Alhassan
  • Ben Saunders vs. Peter Sobotta
  • Volkan Oezdemir vs. Misha Cirkunov
  • Alexander Gustafsson vs. Glover Teixeira

NEW JAPAN BEST OF THE SUPER JUNIORS ON SUNDAY IN TAKASAKI ON NEW JAPAN WORLD (airing sometime Sunday afternoon)

  • Marty Scurll vs. Hiromu Takahashi
  • Will Ospreay vs Taichi
  • Ricochet vs. Taka Michinoku
  • Jushin Liger vs. Dragon Lee

NEW JAPAN BEST OF THE SUPER JUNIORS LIVE ON MONDAY AT 5:30 A.M. FROM KORAKUEN HALL

  • Dragon Lee & Marty Scurll vs. Taka Michinoku & Taichi
  • Ricochet & Juice Robinson & Hirai Kawato vs. Seiya Sanada & Evil & Hiromu Takahashi
  • War Machine & David Finlay vs. Tama Tonga & Tanga Roa & Yujiro Takahashi
  • Yoshinobu Kanemaru vs. Bushi
  • Tiger Mask vs. Desperado
  • Volador Jr. vs. ACH
  • Kushida vs. Ryusuke Taguchi
  • Kazuchika Okada & Will Ospreay vs. Kenny Omega & Bad Luck Fale

Monday has Raw from Greenville, SC with Seth Rollins vs. Roman Reigns and Finn Balor vs. Bray Wyatt vs. Samoa Joe. Smackdown has a house show on Monday night in Macon, GA.

NEW JAPAN BEST OF THE SUPER JUNIORS ON WEDNESDAY FROM OSAKA (A BLOCK FINALS ON NEW JAPAN WORLD)

  • Jushin Liger vs. Taichi
  • Dragon Lee vs. Taka Michinoku
  • Ricochet vs. Marty Scurll
  • Hiromu Takahashi vs. Will Ospreay

Smackdown and 205 Live will take place in Atlanta on Monday including a women’s match with Charlotte Flair vs. Becky Lynch vs. Carmella vs. Tamina vs. Natalya with the winner getting a shot at Naomi’s title at the Money in the Bank PPV.

FIGURE FOUR WEEKLY: 5/22/2017: Jinder Mahal is actually WWE Champion

Even after having over a month to prepare for the possibility, it’s hard to believe that Jinder Mahal is actually WWE Champion. Title wins like Mahal beating Randy Orton at Backlash aren’t really supposed to happen in pro wrestling. When you have the ability to control wins and losses, challengers are theoretically built up over time and have enough credibility when they win a championship that the result is either obvious or hardly surprising.

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WRESTLING OBSERVER NEWSLETTER: May 29, 2017 Wrestling Observer Newsletter: WWE weekend show reviews, CMLL drama, plus tons of news

A detailed look at why Jinder Mahal got the WWE title, the strange situation of NXT Takeover blowing away the main roster PPV, and what the audience for all the U.S. shows that aren’t Raw and Smackdown say about what fans want from extra hours of wrestling are all part of the current issue of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter.

A look at the business and interest levels of WWE Backlash and NXT Takeover, plus what happened with ticket sales when the Backlash card was announced, the Jinder Mahal push, and how to judge it, and how something like this has never been done and look at other tries to make lower card guys into champions quickly and the result.

Upcoming big shows, plans for a major match coming up soon that hasn’t been hinted at, as well as full coverage of Backlash & NXT Takeover with match-by-match coverage with star ratings and poll results.

Updates on SummerSlam ticket sales, Dwayne Johnson’s week and how Saturday Night live did with him as host, updates on a lawsuit regarding WWE Network royalties, a storyline change, plans for a special Smackdown, updates on WWE injuries, more on the WWE women’s tournament, update on different wrestlers talking to WWE, rugby star may be signing with WWE, the three most-watched wrestling matches in the history of cable television, plus business notes and show highlights from all the WWE events this past week.

One of the craziest stories ever, with the Alvarado family’s destruction of Ultimo Guerrero’s car, how it happened, why it happened, the story behind CMLL firing two of its champions, who didn’t get fired, how the athletic commission is handling this and politics behind what happens next.

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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 Meltzer, or by using PayPal directing funds to Dave@WrestlingObserver.com. 

Rates in the United States are $13 for 4 issues, $32 for 12, $61 for 24, $101 for 40 and $131 for 52. In Canada and Mexico, rates are $14.50 for 4, $35 for 12, $67 for 24, $111 for 40 and $144 or 52. In Europe, you can get the fastest delivery and best rates by sending to moonsault@mediaplusint.com. For the rest of the world, rates are $16.50 for 4, $44 for 12, $85 for 24, $141 for 40 issues and $183 for 52. If you order by mail with a check, cash or money order (P.O. Box 1228, Campbell, CA 95009-1228), you can get $1 off in every price range.)

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WON BACK ISSUE: May 1, 2000: Justin Credible wins ECW Heavyweight Championship, safety concerns in Japan, tons more

When the smoke cleared after nine months of title changes largely forced upon him and designed to surprise, Paul Heyman finally went back to the original Plan A–as the latest surprise. Justin Credible (Peter Polaco), who Heyman had planned to be ECW heavyweight champion dating back more than 18 months, with the idea of not putting the title on him until he had a national television outlet, and being the wrestler that Rob Van Dam would chase in the company’s top program, wound up with the title after two more switches at ECW’s “Cyberslam” show on 4/22 in Philadelphia at the ECW Arena.

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SATURDAY NEWS UPDATE

WWE

  • A new episode of “Table for Three” with Jim Cornette, Eric Bischoff, and Michael Hayes will air on the WWE Network after Raw on Monday.
  • The former Crazy Mary Dobson’s new name in NXT is Sarah Logan. She had been going by her real name (Sarah Bridges) since debuting.
  • Today marks 21 years since Scott Hall debuted on WCW Nitro after leaving WWF.
  • Shawn Michaels and Mick Foley discussed their match from In Your House: Mind Games on this week’s episode of the Edge & Christian podcast.
  • Dean Ambrose and Jeff Hardy appeared together on Friday’s episode of Talk is Jericho.
  • With the Nashville Predators in the Stanley Cup Finals, Yahoo Sports interviewed Eric Young about his fandom and the team using Bobby Roode’s “Glorious Domination” theme song.
  • Braun Strowman revealed his regular Chipotle order while appearing on “The Masked Man Show” this week. Sasha Banks and Shinsuke Nakamura were also interviewed separately on the podcast.
  • Tyler Breeze teased that Breezango shirts could be coming soon.
  • Karl Anderson taught his son how to beat up John Cena in a video on Instagram.
  • WWE’s latest top 10 list on YouTube looks at times wrestlers have brawled in the crowd.
  • Jerry Lawler made an appearance at today’s Cleveland Indians game.

Pro Wrestling

  • Here are the results from the B Block Best of the Super Juniors matches that took place in Ibaraki last night:
    KUSHIDA defeated Yoshinobu Kanemaru
    Ryusuke Taguchi defeated Tiger Mask IV
    BUSHI defeated Volador Jr.
    ACH defeated El Desperado
  • No wrestlers have been eliminated from the block yet. Kanemaru, Taguchi, ACH, and El Desperado are tied at the top of the block with six points. KUSHIDA, Tiger Mask, BUSHI, and Volador Jr. have four points.
  • The IWGP Intercontinental Championship is in rough physical condition after Tetsuya Naito’s handling of it.
  • Spike TV in the UK accidentally aired the wrong episode of Impact last night, with last week’s episode being shown instead of a new one. The show had aired on Saturday last week because  Spike ran Bellator’s London event live on Friday. Impact acknowledged the problem on Twitter and said that they were working to resolve it. The most recent update from the company’s UK Twitter account also said that they were trying to find out what happened.
  • Impact ratings were up this week as the show averaged 305,000 viewers on Pop TV. The show did 272,000 viewers last week, which wasn’t against an NBA playoff game. This week’s show had competition from what ended up being the finale of the Cleveland Cavaliers vs. Boston Celtics series.
  • The first photos of Impact’s set for their TV tapings in India have been posted online.
  • FloSlam has raised its month-to-month subscription price to $29.99 per month for new subscribers. The yearly rate remains at $150 per year.
  • Sean Waltman spoke to TMZ Sports about being cleared of the drug charges that had been leveled against him earlier this month.
  • Cody Rhodes was interviewed by USA Today recently, with the article noting that he’s been gone from WWE for over a year now. He spoke about finding out that he’s more like his dad than he thought after having to be his own boss, his relationship with The Young Bucks, and not being ready to choose a full-time home in pro wrestling yet.
  • Tom Lawlor dressed up as Dan Severn for their match at AIW’s JT Lightning Invitational Tournament last night.
  • Davey Richards defeated Lio Rush at Defy Wrestling’s show at Washington Hall in Seattle last night to become the new CZW World Champion.

UFC/MMA

  • Dan Hardy said that doctors have given him clearance to come back and that he’s in the USADA testing pool. He noted that he’s waiting for the right opponent and venue to return.
  • Ariel Helwani tweeted that the UFC wants to book Francis Ngannou vs. Junior dos Santos for their August 19th pay-per-view.
  • Cat Zingano spoke to MMA Fighting about her feelings on the UFC Athlete Retreat.
  • Cris Cyborg responded to Germaine de Randamie refusing to fight her. Cyborg also tweeted about de Randamie: “We waited 5months to find out it wasn’t @IronLadyMMA hand that was hurt but her mental toughness n lack of confidence. #ufc214 #letsgochamp”

Today in Professional Wrestling History (5/27): Owen Hart wins IWGP Junior Heavyweight title

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