WWE notes: Jimmy Yang, referees, Saudi Arabia, Vince McMahon

In this week’s Wrestling Observer Newsletter, Dave Meltzer had a note on a new producer hire, a directive when bringing on future referees, and more.

Meltzer reported that Jimmy Yang (James Yung) started as a producer on Raw this week.

The 40-year-old had two runs with the company as an in-ring performer during his career, the most recent of which ended in May 2010. While he never won a title, he was arguably best remembered for his Jimmy Wang Yang, a cowboy character he rolled out while there in 2006.

A WCW Power Plant product that started in 1999, he also competed in then-TNA, MLW, All Japan and Ring of Honor during his career. He went into semi-retirement in 2013, but returned in 2021 to team with his daughter, Jazzy, three times. Jazzy appeared on the recent NWA Empower pay-per-view.

A few other WWE-related notes of interest from Meltzer’s newsletter:

• There’s a new directive when it comes hiring referees: they should be shorter to make the talent look taller.
• Vince McMahon returned to Saudi Arabia this week in a planned trip to have more “business-related discussions.”
• As mentioned on WOR this past week, WWE “met with officials at London’s Wembley Stadium and Cardiff’s Millennium Stadium recently” in regard to their announced Labor Day weekend pay-per-view.
• Also regarding the schedule, “WWE sources have confirmed that the February and October shows would be Saudi Arabia dates on Thursdays.”
• In discussing the Charlotte Flair-Becky Lynch situation from last week’s SmackDown, he said Flair has “a long time, said to be more than a year, left on a WWE contract that guarantees her seven figures annually.”