Daily Update: Raw, Naomi, Jake Paul

Daily Update

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This Week’s Wrestling Observer Newsletter:

The new issue of the Observer is up on the site with these stories:

*The life and times of Stephan Bonnar, a look at a person who was one of the key building blocks of the popularity of UFC, including the Forrest Griffin fight, his relationship with Griffin after the fight, season one of Ultimate Fighter and the building years, life after UFC, the feud with Tito Ortiz, his pro wrestling days and much more.
*Match of the week and performer of the week
*The WWE signing of Dragon Lee, full details of the deal, unique stipulations in the deal, how long WWE had been after him and what he told people he asked for decision making help
*How AAA, WWE and AEW had talent on the same show, including in the same match and the unique situation there
*Coverage of Wednesday’s AAA show in Acapulco, production issues, match to go out of your way to see
*What AEW knew about Dragon Lee
*Comparing his potential in AEW and WWE
*WWE talks using Lee to help expand
*A look at Stardom’s Sumo Hall show
*A look at a lot of Stardom plans going forward
*Dragon Gate’s Final Gate show
*WWE does its traditional Christmas week show in Madison Square Garden
*How the show did as compared with the last 13 years
*The life and times of Hall of Famer Johnny Doyle, one of the great promoters of all-time
*A detailed look at the ratings over the past week
*Streaming numbers and international TV numbers
*CMLL’s Jan. 1 cage match where somebody loses their mask
*Konnan talks about his health
*Cain Velasquez talks about his returning to wrestle and teaming with Daniel Cormier
*All Japan bringing in Minoru Suzuki
*NOAH’s Budokan Hall show
*Tokyo Dome preview
*Shibata vs. Tom Lawlor
*Ricky Steamboat talks why he didn’t wrestle Ric Flair
*Notes on the death of former WWE promoter Doc Holliday and why he was so well liked
*Anniversary of the first splash off the cage top
*AEW loses TV outlet in Canada and story behind it
*Tony Khan says AEW isn’t going anywhere
*Ticket sales for upcoming AEW & WWE shows
*Bellator signs former Olympic medalist
*WrestleMania updates
*Mysterio family angle
*Notes from all the WWE holiday house shows

This Week’s Retro Observer Newsletter:

November 21, 2005 Observer Newsletter: The death of Eddie Guerrero

Ordering Info:

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Monday Update

Bryan and I will be back tonight talking about Raw and the latest wrestling news. You can send questions to tonight’s show to mailbag@wrestlingobserver.com

Raw tonight is from Nashville. The only things announced are Austin Theory vs. Seth Rollins for the U.S. title and Bianca Belair vs. Alexa Bliss for the Raw women’s title. We’re looking for reports from the show as far as Main Event matches, dark matches and anything not on the live show to dave@wrestlingobserver.com As of this morning more than 8,600 tickets were out for the show so it will be a larger than usual crowd. As far as the competition goes, The NFL game tonight is the Cincinnati Bengals vs. Buffalo Bills, who are both division leaders and have two of the best records in the league. They aren’t big market teams but this is one of the strongest matchups as far as top teams go on Monday this seasonMike Johnson reported Summer Rae backstage but she lives in the area so it may not mean she’ll be on the show.

We’re doing polls this week on yesterday’s NOAH show and Thursday’s Stardom show, thumbs up, down or middle, best and worst match to dave@wrestlingobserver.com

Sasha Banks appears on Barmageddon tonight after Raw. There is a competition scene with Nikki Bella on the show. This was taped a long time ago. Banks has been in Japan for the past week and is scheduled for the Tokyo Dome show for an appearance.

Regarding Trinity Fatu (Naomi) being in Japan as reported by Mike Johnson, we haven’t heard of anything scheduled for her as far as pro wrestling is concerned. There has been at this point nothing talked about on the Stardom side of things.

Speaking of Stardom, they have a PPV for the start of their long trios tournament from Korakuen Hall starting at 2 a.m Eastern time or 11 p.m. Pacific tonight.

Swerve Strickland, who is from Seattle, faces AR Fox on Wednesday’s Dynamite show. The two, as Killshot and Dante Fox, had one of the most unbelievable taped and edited matches in history when they were with Lucha Underground. The other matches are Samoa Joe vs. Darby Allin for the TNT title, The Acclaimed vs. Jeff Jarrett & Jay Lethal for the tag titles, Bryan Danielson vs. Tony Nese, Chris Jericho vs. Ricky Stars and Jade Cargill & Red Velvet vs. Kiera Hogan & Skye Blue, plus build for the next show in Los Angeles regarding the women’s mystery partner and Hangman Page vs. Jon Moxley.

The New Japan WrestleKingdom show at the Tokyo Dome will run from about 1:20 a.m. to 7a.m. Eastern time.

  • Oleg Boltin (debut of one of the best freestyle super heavyweights in the world) vs. Ryohei Oiwa
  • Rumble match for the final four for the KOPW title (which will be decided the next night)
  • Togi Makabe & Satoshi Kojima & Yuji Nagata vs. Tatsumi Fujinami & Minoru Suzuki & Tiger Mask in the Antonio Inoki Memorial match
  • Francesco Akira & TJP vs. Lio Rush & Yoh for the IWGP jr. tag titles
  • Zack Sabre Jr. vs. Ren Narita to crown the first New Japan World TV champion
  • Karl Anderson vs. Tama Tonga for the Never title
  • Kairi vs. Tam Nakano for the IWGP women’s title
  • Keiji Muto & Hiroshi Tanahashi & Shota Umino vs Tetsuya Naito & Sanada & Bushi
  • Taiji Ishimori vs. Hiromu Takahashi vs. Desperado vs. Master Wato for IWGP jr. title
  • FTR vs. Yoshi-Hashi & Hirooki Goto for IWGP tag titles
  • Will Ospreay vs. Kenny Omega for U.S title
  • Jay White vs. Kazuchika Okada for IWGP World title

The Tokyo Dome press conference is at 1 a.m. Eastern tonight on New Japan World, or 10 p.m. Pacific. It will air free and you don’t have to be a subscriber to the service to watch it.

The first new Impact show of the year on Thursday will have Chris Sabin vs. Matt Cardona, Anthony Greene vs. Black Taurus, Masha Slamovich vs. Taylor Wilde and Jonathan Gresham vs. Jack Price.

Renee Paquette will be on the Rachel Ray TV show on Wednesday cooking Cincinnati chili.

Spencer Churchill, who was one of the oldest living pro wrestlers, passed away at the age of 93. He wrestled in the U.K.from the early 50s through 1977 and was a Mr. Universe place-winner and on bodybuilding magazine covers from the late 40s.

Jake Paul said that he’s not interested in a fight proposed with former UFC star Donald Cerrone. Paul said he’s tired of beating up old dudes. Translated, after the fight with Anderson Silva did weak numbers on PPV, the gig of facing smaller and past their prime UFC fighters under boxing rules is probably over as far as significant public buying power. Perhaps Nate Diaz can draw with him. But the days of Cerrone pulling big numbers against him are over and he knows it.

OTHER NOTES

Pro Wrestling Phoenix on 1/26 at the Waiting Room Lounge in Omaha.

Sabu will make a rare Northern California appearance on 1/21 at Barrio Toys in Roseville, CA from 2-4 p.m.

Kendall Grove, 40, who was one of the more popular fighters in the early days of the Ultimate Fighter reality show, was announced for the main event of the KSW show in a 195 pound weight division fight against Michal Materia on 1/21 in Szczecin, Poland at Netto Arena. They fought in 2013 for the KSW middleweight title with Materia winning a decision. Grove hasn’t fought in more than three years. That was one of the bloodiest fights in Poland MMA history.