Daily Update: Mike Masters, WWE Raw, WrestleMania tickets

Daily Update

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This Week’s Wrestling Observer Newsletter:

  • Match and performer of the week
  • Rundown of SummerSlam, poll, star ratings, angles
  • Early notes on Clash at the Castle
  • Business notes on both shows
  • Scary moves during the show
  • Ric Flair’s last match show, the good, the bad, the ugly, and where it stands among the biggest indie shows in history
  • The life and legacy of Ric Flair
  • Behind-the-scenes notes on the show
  • Business coverage of the show
  • UFC 277 coverage by Ryan Frederick, match-by-match, what happens next for all the key fighters on the show, business notes and more
  • Full G1 coverage with the standings, key stories, notes on the matches this week and coverage of all the past week shows.
  • Coverage of Dragon Gate’s two major shows over the weekend including one of the company’s best matches, title changes and future notes
  • The life and career of Gil Hayes, a Stampede Wrestling Hall of Famer who was one of the key building blocks of WWC in Puerto Rico, a unique life of a headliner who is largely forgotten today
  • Ratings and trends of all the national shows
  • CMLL announces the biggest matches for its anniversary show, the biggest event of the year
  • CMLL announces its annual World Grand Prix
  • First two nights of the Stardom Five Star Grand prix
  • More on the new IWGP World Women’s Championship and why it is happening
  • Karl Fredericks leaves New Japan
  • New Japan’s U.S. show rundown
  • XFL news under Dwayne Johnson
  • Women of Wrestling starting up
  • New book on ECW
  • More news on King of Indies
  • Old promotion in Mexico restarting with a national TV deal
  • The WBD financials and how it affects AEW, as well as where AEW could be very valuable
  • Cost of AEW compared to usual Discovery fare, ratings, and compared to WWE programming
  • New trademark by AEW and what does it mean
  • More on new AEW promotions
  • Upcoming WWE & AEW ticket sales
  • Streaming numbers for WWE & AEW
  • International TV ratings
  • Major new UFC fight scheduled
  • Jake Paul-Rahman fight falling apart notes
  • Sasha Banks & Naomi
  • Peacock financials
  • New PPV location
  • WrestleMania launch party
  • How Nick Khan got to WWE and his deal making ability
  • What was the match that never happened which led to Nick Khan’s first interaction with WWE
  • Dana White talks his only live WrestleMania
  • Bryan Danielson talks famous Talking Smack segment with Miz

This Week’s Retro Observer Newsletter:

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Monday News Update

  • Bryan and I will be back tonight talking Raw, G-1 , various new wrestling TV projects and the rest of the news with Wrestling Observer Radio.
  • Mean Mike Masters, who also wrestled as Rocky Jones, passed away at the age of 68 due to throat cancer. He was a regular in WWWF but never pushed as a top star, but headlined in Los Angeles as Americas champion, and was a pushed heel star in Oregon as part of Buddy Rose’s Army.
  • We’re looking for reports from Raw tonight in Cleveland with dark matches or Main Event matches. We’re also looking for your thoughts on both G-1 shows over the weekend in Osaka with a thumbs up, thumbs down or thumbs in the middle along with a best and worst match to dave@wrestlingobserver.com
  • Tickets for WrestleMania at SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles on 4/1 and 4/2 has a presale tomorrow for both nights and a combo package. The presale starts at 1 p.m. Eastern and 10 am. local time.
  • Raw tonight is an interesting show for a number of reasons: 
  • Where are ratings now that the novelty of Vince being gone as Paul Levesque being in charge, plus the first show after SummerSlam is over. SmackDown on Friday was the first show back to whatever normal looks to be. 
  • They are at the Rocket Mortgage Fieldhouse. About 5,700 tickets were out this morning which is lower than Raw/SmackDown TV shoots have been doing. 
  • Rey Mysterio vs. Finn Balor for the second time ever in a singles match, Seth Rollins vs Angelo Dawkins, plus the start of the tournament to crown women’s tag champions and Bobby Lashley vs. Ciampa for the U.S title are the announced matches. 
  • Ciampa dedicated the match to the late Harley Race. It’s hard to believe someone would dedicate the match to Race with Levesque as booker (a huge Race fan) and then have him lose but I guess we’ll learn about Levesque and dedications. I don’t think anyone expected him to win.
  •  I wonder if there will be bump for the women’s tag titles with the idea people expect Sasha Banks & Naomi back very soon and with the tournament starting, some will reach that conclusion.
  • WWE results from last night in Fayetteville, NC (thanks to Joel Strickland)
  • Bianca Belair b Asuka to keep Raw women’s title
  • Finn Balor b Dominik Mysterio due to help from Damian Priest
  • Bobby Lashley b Ciampa to keep the U.S. title with the hurt lock
  • Seth Rollins b Dolph Ziggler – Riddle was there and attacked Rollins after te match
  • Liv Morgan b Natalya to keep the Smackdown women’s title
  • Gunther b Shinsuke Nakamura to keep the IC title with Ludvig Kaiser helping
  • Sheamus & Usos b Street Profits & Drew McIntyre when Sheamus hit McIntyre with the shillelagh
  • McIntyre & Street Profits b Sheamus & Usos in a short street fight
  • On tomorrow night’s Dana White’s Contender Series show on ESPN+, Bo Nickal, one of the top college wrestles of the past decade, will have his second pro fight. Nickal fights as a middleweight and his opponent, Zachary Borrego, missed weight by 1.5 pounds. Borrego comes in at 4-0. Nickal was a three-time NCAA champion at Penn State, and in 2019 was the under-23 age group world champion. He was also the 2019 Hodge Trophy winner.
  • The first of two G-1 nights in Hiroshima at the Sun Plaza Arena is tomorrow at 5:30 a.m. Eastern time
  • Shingo Takagi & Bushi vs Tomohiro Ishii & Kosei Fujita
  • Tom Lawlor & Royce Isaacs vs. Zack Sabre Jr. & Taka Michinoku
  • Will Ospreay & Jeff Cobb & Great O’Khan & Aaron Henare vs Evil & El Phantasmo & Sho & Dick Togo
  • Kazuchika Okada & Hiroshi Tanahashi & Hirooki Goto & Toru Yano vs. Jay White & Juice Robinson & Bad Luck Fale & Gedo
  • Yoshi-Hashi vs. Yujiro Takahashi
  • Sanada vs. Chase Owens
  • Tama Tonga vs Taichi
  • Jonah vs Lance Archer
  • Tetsuya Naito vs. KENTA
  • The N-1 tournament which is NOAH’s version of G-1, starts Thursday at Yokohama Budokan with Kazuyuki Fujita vs. Go Shiozaki, Kenou vs. Dr. Wagner Jr., Masaaki Mochizuki vs. Hideki Suzuki, Masato Tanaka vs. Anthony Greene, Takashi Sugiura vs. Satoshi Kojima, Jack Morris vs. Kaito Kiyomiya, Masakatsu Funaki vs. Kinya Okada, and Katsuhiko Nakajima vs. Masa Kitamiya.
  • Cody Rhodes is in Birmingham, AL today for his two month since surgery check-up.
  • NBC posted that they were looking for a Creative Director for Peacock Sports. They would oversee Peacock’s sports division an plan and execute campaigns for sports and live events, including both the major sports and the full WWE library and major events.

Other Notes

BetOnline has Impact Emergence odds:
Josh Alexander -800
Alex Shelley +450

Jordynne Grace -=500
Mia Yim +325

VXT -300
Taya & Rosemary +200

Chris Sabin & Kushida -180
Joe Doering & Deaner +140

Honor No More -140
Bullet Club +100

Steve Maclin -150
Sami Callihan +110