Daily Update: Mick Foley, MJF, WWE Payback poster

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This Week’s Wrestling Observer Newsletter

In this issue:

  • Match of the week and performer of the week
  • Feds investigating Vince McMahon and more
  • AEW signings Kenny Omega, Young Bucks and Adam Page, lots behind it with comments from any going into details on the reason the decision was made, their pact to stay together and far more
  • WWE financials for quarter two, including why the next TV deal is taking longer to negotiate, how every sector of business is doing, USA Network with and without WWE and looks to the future
  • SummerSlam, why matches were changed, the huge Saturday night of events, ticket sales and more
  • Updating All In, where it stands on all-tie records, two straight weeks of PPV shows, the last time it happened and the history, rumored matches and more
  • G-1 Climax, what everyone needs to advance to the final eight, cards for the rest of the tournament and running down the shows from the past week
  • UFC 291 coverage, the stories behind the stories, what is next, business notes
  • NXT Great American Bash notes with full coverage
  • The life and times of Adrian Street, his death, his start, the famous photo, his U.K. heyday, why he came to the U.S., thinking wrestling was real, meeting Linda and his life after wrestling
  • The most detailed look at the television ratings for all the pro wrestling and MMA shows, including what the numbers mean, rankings, segment-by-segment and how shows are doing compared with one year ago.
  • Promotion shooting new star to the top
  • One of the best matches of the year in Mexico
  • Top pro wrestler worked as an Uber driver during the pandemic
  • Why Stardom is bringing back 80s and 90s legends
  • Wrestle Kingdom notes
  • Minoru Suzuki match in a unique location
  • Second generation star celebrates his 50th birthday on show this past week
  • Update on the number of homes and carriage rates for the shows that carry wrestling and MMA
  • More on a new television wrestling promotion starting in the fall
  • More matches on All In weekend in London
  • Who Giulia is likely defending her New Japan Strong title against next
  • Men’s All Japan Strong title match in Defy
  • Business of AEW and its value
  • Tony Khan talks business growth
  • Update on WBD business
  • Health updates on AEW & WWE wrestlers out of action
  • Paul Levesque and Tony Khan exchange words
  • International TV ratings
  • Streaming numbers
  • Ticket sales for upcoming WWE & AEW shows
  • Top merchandise sellers in WWE & AEW
  • UFC pushing Slap Fighting at commission meeting
  • Dwayne Johnson buys a house for a UFC fighter
  • Backstage fight at show in Japan
  • Notes on Jake Paul vs. Nate Diaz
  • Crawford-Spence PPV numbers
  • WWE returns to India and details on that
  • Kevin Owens talks future
  • Former WWE personality working in TV news
  • WWE house show notes

This Week’s Retro Observer Newsletter

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Wednesday Update

WWE

  • All four members of The Judgment Day are featured on the poster for WWE Payback, which takes place in Pittsburgh on Saturday, September 2.
  • LA Knight threw out the first pitch at last night’s New York Mets game.
  • WWE uploaded a clip of Michael Cole and Corey Graves’ live reactions to the biggest moments from SummerSlam.
  • Mick Foley wrote a Facebook post in praise of Ronda Rousey’s time in WWE. In the post, Foley wrote that he thinks it’s unlikely that WrestleMania 35’s history-making main event would have happened without Rousey:
          • It would be easy to dismiss Ronda Rousey‘s time in WWE as something of a disappointment. Maybe she never became as beloved as Becky Lynch, as proficient as Charlotte or Sasha, or had a great long term story arc like the one Rhea Ripley is currently enjoying as part of Judgment Day. I haven’t always been watching the product as intently these past few years as I had for the previous 40, but from what I did see – coupled with a pretty good gut feeling – is that Ronda wasn’t quite as invested emotionally for her second WWE run, as she was for her first. Motherhood has a way of redefining priorities, and rightfully so. But I firmly believe that her first run was not only incredibly impressive in the ring, but even more consequential in introducing new eyeballs to the product, and injecting a major dose of credibility into the general public’s perspective of professional wrestling.
          • I was in the crowd in San Jose for WrestleMania when my pal Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson introduced Ronda to the crowd to a thunderous ovation. She was quite simply, the baddest woman on the planet. And while the back-to-back defeats she suffered in UFC may have taken a little shine from her, Ronda was still this incredibly sparkling diamond in the rough when she made her WWE debut at 2018’s WrestleMania. That match, where she teamed with Kurt Angle to take on WWE’s power couple of Triple H and Stephanie McMahon was my personal favorite match of 2018. That’s not to say it was the best match of 2018 – merely my favorite. It was one of those matches I need every once in a while to remind me of why I fell in love with pro-wrestling to begin with. I specifically remember watching the show with friends, and during this incredible moment where she had Triple H rocking and reeling, I just yelled out, ‘she’s not phoning it in!’ She certainly wasn’t. Ronda Rousey took pride in what she did, worked diligently to become really good, really fast, and as she progressed, had good-to-great matches with a variety of opponents.
          • Without Ronda, it’s highly unlikely WWE would have featured a women’s match as its main event at WrestleMania in 2019. I still believe the real marquee match would have been Becky versus Ronda in a singles match – but nonetheless, let the record show that Ronda Rousey main evented WrestleMania with just one year of professional wrestling experience.
          • I would put Ronda’s rapid progress up there with that of Steve Austin, Kurt Angle and The Rock – the fastest learning curves I’ve personally seen in our business. But each of those giants had one formidable arrow in their quivers that Ronda never quite got the grasp of – the ability to cut a great promo. That’s really all that was missing, all that prevented Ronda from being considered an all-time great. Steve Austin was a respected and admired worker for eight years before he caught fire with the ‘Stone Cold’ character and became one of the biggest drawing cards of all time. Dwayne Johnson went through some growing pains as Rocky Miavia before his switch-flipping heel turn that revealed one of the greatest entertainers in our business, or any other. Kurt Angle, as amazing as he was in the ring, became a beloved and iconic character by utilizing an innate sense of comedic timing that would have been impossible to guess at. If Ronda had an achilles’ heel as a performer, it was that all of her mistakes were made on the big stage, and that her wrestling character did not evolve as quickly as her in-ring skills did.
          • I only met Ronda once – during that first run with the company. But I remember watching her and marveling at how much fun she was to watch interacting with her WWE peers. This was during the time when Bo Dallas and Joe Hennig were teaming as ‘The B Team’, and I specifically remember Ronda just lighting up the faces of those around her with some type of little dance she did ringside when the ‘B Team’ music was played. I remember thinking how comfortable she looked, and how supported she was, and I specifically remember thinking that if she could take a little bit of what I saw of her ringside and put it into her character, that she could become one of the great performers in WWE history.
          • I don’t think most fans equate Ronda with humor or with warmth. But those were the qualities I saw on display – those are the qualities I really believe could have been put to work. For the time being, at least, I will be left to wonder ‘what if’. But while those two words ‘what if’ may remind me of what Ronda Rousey could have become in WWE, they don’t lessen what she actually was – a great worker with a love and respect for WWE that benefited everyone around her.
  • Foley also sent his best wishes to Sonya Deville following her torn ACL:
          • Man, this one hurts… I am a huge fan of @sonyadevillewwe’s tag team with @chelseaagreen and they were just getting started on what would have been an incredible run as @wwe tag team champions. More than that, Sonya is a great person and wrestler, and truly deserves the best. I hate seeing anyone get dealt such a rough hand, especially when they are doing so well — but I know she’ll be back and better than ever soon.
  • SportsNet has a story on Omos.
  • Logan Paul said there’s a clause in the contract for his upcoming Misfits Boxing fight against Dillon Danis where Danis will have to pay $100,000 if he pulls out due to a fake injury: “That’s my concern. ’m convinced he’s not going to show up. The clause is this, if he pulls out because of some sort of injury that he fakes, a doctor of our choosing has to verify the injury and then if he is indeed faking, he has to pay $100,000. There is a pull-out clause.”
  • Santos Escobar, Kofi Kingston, and Sam Roberts were today’s guests on WWE’s The Bump.
  • Alexa Bliss turns 32 years old today.

AEW/Other Wrestling

  • During an appearance on Insight with Chris Van Vliet, Diamond Dallas Page said MJF is “the nicest guy” in real life: “I personally know that Max, MJF, would be pissed off at me for saying this, but he’s the nicest guy. He really is, to me. But if he’s out in the open, he’s an assh**e. And it’s not him being an assh**e, it’s him living the gimmick. He could turn babyface in an instant, and he would be over even bigger, I think. But as a heel? Oh my god.”
  • Mercedes Mone celebrated the 13th anniversary of her pro wrestling debut yesterday.
  • On the latest episode of Talk is Jericho, Chris Jericho discussed his favorite matches from the first 200 episodes of AEW Dynamite.
  • Anna Jay was a guest on Busted Open Radio today.