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This Week’s Wrestling Observer Newsletter

  • Updates on Chris Bey and El Hijo del Vikingo
  • Preview of Crown Jewel
  • Lots of notes on 2025 WrestleMania
  • WWE tie-in with some wrestling schools and what does it mean
  • Changes in TKO as a company
  • More on Samantha Irvin leaving WWE
  • Sports star ways he wants to do pro wrestling after he retires
  • Preview of Full Gear
  • Crown Jewel favorites
  • Updated Bad Blood and WrestleDream PPV numbers and the most shocking thing about the Bad Blood number.
  • Why the ringboys lawsuit was filed in Baltimore this year
  • A star from the 80s and 90s talks about the ring boys lawsuit
  • NXT Halloween Havoc coverage
  • UFC 308 coverage, fighter of he year thoughts, what’s next for the winners
  • Previewing Wednesday’s AEW & NXT going head-to-head, what are the key things to look out for
  • TNA Bound for Glory coverage
  • The weekly placing of the pro wrestling shows on cable
  • Competition, demos, where NXT was way down this week and where AEW is right now
  • Looking at how the segments did for the major shows
  • The longest reigning world champion of a major promotion of the modern era gives up his title
  • Women’s Grand Prix tournament
  • New Japan Super Junior tag tournament notes
  • Fantastica Mania 2025 notes
  • Kota Ibushi issues with DDT
  • Two pro wrestlers and MMA star entering amateur wrestling Hall of Fame
  • Anthony Robles movie out soon
  • TNA TV tapings notes
  • What interview actually secretly had the biggest AEW news in it
  • More on Young Bucks taking time off and dropping the titles
  • Jericho tries to get Hall of Famer to come out of retirement
  • Kenny Omega talking about a return
  • Ticket sales for upcoming WWE & AEW shows
  • International TV ratings Netflix ratings notes, streaming numbers
  • Merch numbers
  • Dana White wants to do rankings a new way
  • Former UFC champion retires at the end of this year and turns down January fight

This Week’s Wrestling Observer Newsletter Back Issue

Monday Update

  • Bryan and I will be back tonight talking about the latest news including Raw, Power Struggle, Wednesday head-to-head, and more.  You can send questions to the show tonight to mailbag@wrestlingobserver.com as we should have time for them.
  • I also want to mention that Granny’s 95th birthday party will be on the Bryan & Vinny show at midnight Eastern time tomorrow night. Man, that is so wonderful she’s doing well after her recent heart attack.  Happy birthday and best wishes.
  • Raw is a show taped yesterday from Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. There are results up on the site.  Joe Tessitore didn’t go on the trip so Michael Cole and Corey Graves are doing the show:
  • Battle Royal for a shot at Liv Morgan’s world women’s title
  • New Day vs. War Raiders
  • Dragon Lee vs. Chad Gable
  • Seth Rollins vs. Sheamus vs. Damian Priest vs. Dominik Mysterio for a shot at Gunther’s world title
  • We’re looking for your thoughts on Crown Jewel and New Japan Power Struggle, so you can leave a thumbs up, thumbs down or thumbs in the middle along with a best and worst match to dave@wrestlingobserver.com
  • If you have a ballot for the 2024 Hall of Fame, please email it to us by Friday afternoon for it to be counted.
  • Smackdown on Friday did 1.43 million viewers and an 0.42 in 18-49.  That was for a taped show.  Rampage did 172,000 viewers and 0.05. That was the lowest ever for an AEW wrestling show and there was no major competition. I mean news was up, nothing major in sports but no obvious reason why Rampage would do that badly past in the words of Paul Boesch or Vince McMahon, “I booked a show that people didn’t want to see.”
  • WWE ran a house show today in London at the O2 Arena:
  • Carmelo Hayes b Andrade via low blow to get a U.S. title match
  • LA Knight b Hayes to keep the title  in six seconds
  • B-Fab & Michin b Chelsea Green & Piper Niven
  • Tama Tonga & Tonga Loa b Street Profits when Loa pinned Ford due to help from Jacob Fatu
  • Nia Jax b Bayley in a cage match to keep the WWE women’s title
  • DIY b Pretty Deadly
  • Naomi b Tiffany Stratton
  • Cody Rhodes b Solo Sikoa in a street fight to keep the WWE title (thanks to Cameron Ranford and Laurence GibbonsZ)
  • Power Struggle was in my mind one of the best shows of the year. The key was setting up Hiroshi Tanahashi vs. Evil, Douki vs Desperado for the IWGP jr. title, David Finlay vs. Yota Tsuji for the Global title and a four-way for the jr. tag titles with Kevin Knight & Kushida defending against Drilla Moloney & Clark Connors, TJP & Francesco Akira and Super junior tag tournament winners Robbie Eagles & Kosei Fujita.  They have done this before in having a tournament but then making the jr. tag title match a multiple team bout. They also appeared to set up Ren Narita vs. Jeff Cobb vs. Ryohei Oiwa for the TV title and Zack Sabre Jr. vs. Shota Umino but not necessarily at the Tokyo Dome. The winners of the upcoming tag team tournament will face new champs Great O’Khan & Henare for the IWGP belts.
  • Kenny Omega was there and they shot an angle with him against Gabe Kidd.  He teased the idea of wrestling on the Wrestle Dynasty show on 1/5 at the Tokyo Dome.  Ricochet will face the winner of Zack Sabre Jr. vs. Umino for the IWGP world title at  the joint AEW/NJPW show. Ricochet was the big surprise at the show, laying out Sabre with a springboard clothesline after Sabre had retained over Shingo Takagi. Even though Ricochet wasn’t pushed as a top guy in WWE, when he left New Japan he was a star junior heavyweight who never won the jr. title and now he comes back as a Tokyo Dome main eventer.
  • The show was reminiscent of the glory days of New Japan, but with Sabre in the Omega role and TMDK as the cool merch sellers and not  Bullet Club or LIJ.  But the cast of characters have changed. The feel of New Japan having great matches and a kind of hot crowd was a major positive, but they are still a long way away from those advanced sellouts for shows like this. It’s a lot like AEW in the sense you get a lot of great matches but the crowds are not back at all.
  • Sanada left Just Five Guys and joined the War Dogs when he cost Taichi the Global title in a match with Finlay  So I could see Sanada vs. Taichi. With Yuya Uemura still injured, that means Just Five Guys is now three guys, Douki (who is a great jr. champion), Taka Michinoku and Taichi.
  • Tetsuya Naito & Hiromu Takahashi will form a tag team in the tournament.
  • We’re looking for reports from tomorrow’s WWE show in Nottingham and Wednesday’s show in Sheffield to dave@wrestlingobserver.com. We are also looking for reports of the Santo shows at York Hall in London.  They took place and I heard the shows drew well but have heard nothing about them.
  • Catalina made a Twitter push for Indi Hartwell to come to CMLL and CMLL retweeted it.  Doesn’t mean anything much. Going to Arena Mexico for a big show is not something you do to make big money, but for some talent these days it is a bucket list thing, but obviously that’s only some talent.
  • Steph De Lander was on The Commentary Booth Live talking about her collaboration creatively with Tommy Dreamer and her neck surgery. She said she was two week post-surgery. She said she would think if Indi Hartwell wanted to go to TNA there would be a place for her.
  • Dustin Poirier, who is talking now about doing one last fight, saying in response to a question that he’d like to face Max Holloway for the BMF title if he could pick his last fight. They have fought twice with Poirier winning both times.
  • Queen of the Ring, the movie on the life of Mildred Burke, that Jim Ross was involved with and features many current women wrestlers, as well as Jim Cornette, will be screening on Friday at the Fort Lauderdale, FL International Film Festival and Sunday in Coronado Island, CA at the Coronado Island Film Festival, as well as 11/6 at the St. Louis International Film Festival.
  • Defy and Progress are doing joint shows on 11/29 in Brooklyn,NY at the Roulette Intermedium at 3 p.m., before the 8 p.m. GCW show, and on 12/1 in Chicago at Thalia Hall at 2 p.m., before the 6 p.m. GHCW show. Announced for the shows are Mustafa Ali, Kevin Knight and Cara Noir.
  • BRG vs. Alex Kanein a chain match was announced for the 11/9 MLW show in Chicago, which is sold out .
  • The Big Event Sports & Entertainment Expo takes place in Belmont,NY on Saturday at  the Suffolk Credit Union Arena. A ton of celebrities and wrestlers will be there including a rare autograph show appearance by Paul Heyman. There are tons of  current and former wrestlers and celebrities including William Shatner, Ric Flair, Amanda Nunes, and Kurt Angle.
  • AEW is offering 40 percent off some seats at upcoming shows using the promo code VOTE tomorrow only for election day.