The WWE Discussion Thread

[Rozalia1]

SOMEDAY LOVE WILL FIND YOU!

 

It was a Dark match so there is always the chance this is a one time thing, but damn if they really got someone licensed music again and it was a NXT midcarder of all people. Shawn Michaels going to bat for his boy. Jensen's look combined with the music is just incredible. It even fits him beyond the look a bit as NXT 2.0 had the long term storyline of him wanting a girlfriend, Fallon obviously liking him but too afraid to just tell him directly, and then Kiana taking advantage and turning Jensen against his friends. 

 

The only issue I have is that he really shouldn't get the music straight away, as good as it is. That is something you should be debuting at a PLE in a big time match. Jensen is currently wrestling Lexis King in dark matches and that would be a feud to debut this on. Lexis (who was recently flirting with an interviewer) gets with Fallon but is abusive. Jensen stands up for her but is beaten down several times. Finally it comes to a head in a PLE match and he comes out to this music and then wins at last.

[Maxximum]

Logan Paul as US champ is something I'm looking forward to see. Wonder if he'll be active and take this on another level. I know people hate him but I think for the most he's alright, well, except his subconscious attitude that he displays sometimes. (Like that one time he had a meltdown because his brother didn't let him promote Prime during his boxing event he had with Tommy Fury because that event was sponsored by a competitor energy drink), (and thinking he's a better boxer than Jake because he thought that was the reason everyone would rather choose to fight Jake instead of him). Anyways not part of this topic. Logan is built for this business. He's a great wrestler and even saved Rey Mysterio from seriously injuring his neck. 

 

I don't know why Gunther doesn't defend on PLEs. Last time he did so was at SummerSlam but I guess it's not a big deal because he always delivers on Raw against anyone. 

 

Maybe it's just me but Kevin Owens on Smackdown doesn't make sense. He and Sami just lost the tag titles and suddenly are on separate brands. Now Sami has to deal with Judgment Day stuff alone or get mixed with Jey Uso and Cody Rhodes. Same thing every other week. Can't these guys move on to something new and fresh? And I realised that Rhea Ripley is on almost every storyline on Raw. You see her involved with Seth, Drew, her division and her faction. Everything's just all over the place. I love the Judgment Day, I just want to see something different. At least they've added JD McDonaugh so he's the sacrificial lamb. Selling all the moves perfectly and basically being thrown around. 

[Rozalia1]

On 11/5/2023 at 4:57 PM, Maxximum said:

Logan Paul as US champ is something I'm looking forward to see. Wonder if he'll be active and take this on another level. I know people hate him but I think for the most he's alright, well, except his subconscious attitude that he displays sometimes. (Like that one time he had a meltdown because his brother didn't let him promote Prime during his boxing event he had with Tommy Fury because that event was sponsored by a competitor energy drink), (and thinking he's a better boxer than Jake because he thought that was the reason everyone would rather choose to fight Jake instead of him). Anyways not part of this topic. Logan is built for this business. He's a great wrestler and even saved Rey Mysterio from seriously injuring his neck. 

 

I don't know why Gunther doesn't defend on PLEs. Last time he did so was at SummerSlam but I guess it's not a big deal because he always delivers on Raw against anyone. 

 

Maybe it's just me but Kevin Owens on Smackdown doesn't make sense. He and Sami just lost the tag titles and suddenly are on separate brands. Now Sami has to deal with Judgment Day stuff alone or get mixed with Jey Uso and Cody Rhodes. Same thing every other week. Can't these guys move on to something new and fresh? And I realised that Rhea Ripley is on almost every storyline on Raw. You see her involved with Seth, Drew, her division and her faction. Everything's just all over the place. I love the Judgment Day, I just want to see something different. At least they've added JD McDonaugh so he's the sacrificial lamb. Selling all the moves perfectly and basically being thrown around. 

 

Logan Paul is incredibly gifted and casually does all manner of cool stuff. Good size, good look, can go, can talk, he has it all. An interesting detail with Logan is the fact that not only does he always cheat, but I like that who is helping him tries to remain hidden from the referee. I get that it happens commonly these days, but in the past and logically the referee turning around and realising the tables have turned and a guy is suddenly at ringside should be grounds to eject them.

 

Residency issue. Gunther has to be in the USA for 6 months and can't go abroad. As far as I know he'll be missing Elimination Chamber in Australia too for the same reason.

 

It would make sense to end, the JD part anyway, at Survivor Series. Cody/Jey/Sami/L.A/??? vs Solo/Jimmy/Finn/Damien/??? Kevin would make sense on the face team and Dominik/JD would make sense on the heel team... but I think they might be in doubt as you could slot in people who'd benefit more from it. The heel team for example could have Bron Breakker, the reasoning being that Heyman has brought him to give the heel team the advantage as he is 'the next big thing'. Logan Paul is an option too of course as why wouldn't he want to be in good with the two top heel groups. For the faces... I'd hate it because I really don't want to see him, but if they were to bring in CM Punk then it would be a good spot because you'd then be able to instantly have reason for Roman to have a match against him at Elimination Chamber. Cena is an option I suppose, the faces pushing for him to take part as they all believe that he still has it and all that. Carmelo would have made sense, but he looks to be turning heel so that would be a no go. Randy Orton if he makes a return could be slotted into either team easily enough, though leaning more to the face one obviously.

 

As for JD McDonaugh. I'm sure he is creating himself some goodwill with management with how much he has put into this, but I was fan of his NXT character so it is a bit of a shame that it had to be dropped as it simply wouldn't fit the story they got going on. As for Rhea, she is likely the biggest female wrestler there has ever been. She is all across the shows be it in wrestling capacity or managing. She is clearly the head of the Judgement Day which is the top heel group whenever Roman isn't around. She is also booked incredibly strong with it being established on the main roster (not NXT, in kayfabe I suppose she takes it easy and underestimates them) that a normal competitor like Natalya/Indi/Candice gets crushed in 1-2 minutes, hence why they're having to throw woman as big if not bigger than Rhea at her.

[Don_Chipotle]

So Rey got betrayed and i think we have an interesting match for survivor series, i like the tease both Seth and Opsreay did at twitter, and yes, i hardly see that happening, but its great they are breaking the fourth wall with respect

[jackmadrox]

CM Punk is back in WWE. Now everyone can shut up about it. But make no mistake: he's here to job to Roman Reigns.

[Rozalia1]

Survivor Series was a great show and thankfully it appears that it is reclaiming some of its prestige that had degraded over the years. For quite a while it was one of the 'Big Four' in name only as the 'brand vs brand' stuff that nobody cared about, outside the year that NXT was present, just sapped any interest for the show. Didn't help that RAW constantly destroyed Smackdown for whatever reason.

 

That said, the return of CM Punk is obviously the big story. Not going to be changing my tune on this. I didn't want Punk back in WWE because I've disliked the overrated cynical malcontent for a long time, but realistically all that talk AEW fans are doing right now that he'll be fighting people immediately is likely nonsense. The fact of the matter is WWE's boss is HHH who is heavily respected. Their top guys are also heavily respected and guys that Punk will see as at least an equal. None of those guys have the power and attitude (even Bucks fans will admit they rub people the wrong way) that the Bucks have within AEW either.

 

One thing with Punk, which I hope he proves, is the whole wanting to help out the younger wrestlers. We've heard talk of a number of wrestlers in AEW being better off when they listened to Punk's advice. The whole Perry issue ultimately was because Perry, likely due to being a friend of the Bucks, decided he was going to do the opposite of what Punk advised out of spite. As such I think Punk could do a lot of good with the younger wrestlers, be they on the main roster or even NXT if he has a short stint there (if not on the show then in the PC). The problem with all of that of course is Punk, ironically considering he should be against this sort of stuff, may well look at someone like Theory and instead of seeing someone who he should help, will see someone who should fail because of how he looks.

[Juzota]

Survivor Series is probably my favorite PLE this year. Only match I didn't care was Escobar - Dragon Lee and even that one was pretty solid. Kinda hoped Damage Control and Judgment Day would've won their matches, but it is what it is.

[SelectiveGamer]

WWE are a bunch of god damn idiots.

If anything happens.... they only have themselves to blame.

This is all your getting out of me

[R123Rob]

Cool surprise with CM Punk, but I don't think it's a good one. I never thought I'd write something like this about Punk. 

In a couple months we'll be writing about how bad the mood is and how Punk screwed up again.

[Maxximum]

On 11/26/2023 at 5:55 PM, jackmadrox said:

CM Punk is back in WWE. Now everyone can shut up about it. But make no mistake: he's here to job to Roman Reigns.

 

CM Punk is on Raw, or free agent, idk. I think he's going to feud with Seth Rollins given his reaction to his return. He also referenced in his promo on Raw about not being welcomed with open arms by everybody. 

 

I don't know how I'm feeling about all of this but I hope nothing bad happens down the road. The fans have been chanting his for 9 years in a row since he left and got what they wanted (me included). Hope it's all worth it. 

[LukeTheGooner]

when Cm Punk is involved you just know things will end badly down the road, the guy doesn't play well with others

[Don_Chipotle]

From what happen i consider hhh and wwe gave punk a chance with a contact filled with legal stuff in order to avoid some kind of meltdown down the road, but yeah, i didnt expect punk back at wwe for everything that went down 

[LukeTheGooner]

21 hours ago, Don_Chipotle said:

From what happen i consider hhh and wwe gave punk a chance with a contact filled with legal stuff in order to avoid some kind of meltdown down the road, but yeah, i didnt expect punk back at wwe for everything that went down 

 

I give it till 2024 and he will be gone again

[Rozalia1]

On 11/29/2023 at 3:55 PM, LukeTheGooner said:

I give it till 2024 and he will be gone again

 

I was on Punk the moment he debuted in AEW (not a popular thing to do at the time) as I knew how it'd go, but with WWE I don't think so. With AEW he saw guys like Omega/Bucks/Hangman as being beneath him and not worthy of respect. This is not the case with the established top people in WWE. Punk, like many, sees Tony Khan as a weak joke of a boss. HHH like Vince before him is not seen as a weak boss. Then there is the fact that if Punk messes this up then that is all of his chances used up.

 

Outside the stuff that came out after his exit it has to be remembered that Punk didn't really cause much in the way of trouble while in WWE. He annoyed a bunch of people by being a constant malcontent, but it never went beyond that and as HHH himself said on an interview some time back, if HHH came to him and asked if there was a problem Punk's response would always be 'no problem at all, everything's good'. Unless Punk has gone completely delusional then he will likely be like his 1st run in the company and try to avoid any problems with management.

[LukeTheGooner]

17 minutes ago, Rozalia1 said:

 

I was on Punk the moment he debuted in AEW (not a popular thing to do at the time) as I knew how it'd go, but with WWE I don't think so. With AEW he saw guys like Omega/Bucks/Hangman as being beneath him and not worthy of respect. This is not the case with the established top people in WWE. Punk, like many, sees Tony Khan as a weak joke of a boss. HHH like Vince before him is not seen as a weak boss. Then there is the fact that if Punk messes this up then that is all of his chances used up.

 

Outside the stuff that came out after his exit it has to be remembered that Punk didn't really cause much in the way of trouble while in WWE. He annoyed a bunch of people by being a constant malcontent, but it never went beyond that and as HHH himself said on an interview some time back, if HHH came to him and asked if there was a problem Punk's response would always be 'no problem at all, everything's good'. Unless Punk has gone completely delusional then he will likely be like his 1st run in the company and try to avoid any problems with management.

 

I get what you mean with management, seeing Tony Khan in press conferences he doesn't really fill me with much confidence as a leader because he looks like he could easily be walked over, with Triple H that guy was a top star for years and is much more of a MAN

[Rozalia1]

13 minutes ago, LukeTheGooner said:

I get what you mean with management, seeing Tony Khan in press conferences he doesn't really fill me with much confidence as a leader because he looks like he could easily be walked over, with Triple H that guy was a top star for years and is much more of a MAN

 

As you said. HHH was a top star in the business for a long time, is a 'student of the game', and was also under the learning tree of Vince McMahon. While many characterise Vince ruling his roster through fear, and certainly no one wanted to mess with Vince, he actually was very good at doing it through respect. HHH does much of the same. He also booked NXT (a smaller job than booking the main roster) for a time which I wasn't a fan of, but with Vince ripping it apart and Shawn Michaels doing such a great job with NXT I'm sure he has learnt valuable lessons from that experience.

 

Tony Khan's experience meanwhile, out of his own chicken lips, is that he has read Meltzer's Observer for decades which he thinks gives him qualification to be a booker. 

[LukeTheGooner]

2 minutes ago, Rozalia1 said:

 

As you said. HHH was a top star in the business for a long time, is a 'student of the game', and was also under the learning tree of Vince McMahon. While many characterise Vince ruling his roster through fear, and certainly no one wanted to mess with Vince, he actually was very good at doing it through respect. HHH does much of the same. He also booked NXT (a smaller job than booking the main roster) for a time which I wasn't a fan of, but with Vince ripping it apart and Shawn Michaels doing such a great job with NXT I'm sure he has learnt valuable lessons from that experience.

 

Tony Khan's experience meanwhile, out of his own chicken lips, is that he has read Meltzer's Observer for decades which he thinks gives him qualification to be a booker. 

 

Tony Khan is just a rich fan, he's learning on the job as he goes and also he acts like a kid (especially with his strange hugs and loving looks at the wrestlers)

[Don_Chipotle]

Well from what we can see they will place sooner or later punk and rollins, i think its the match many want, and it will sell tickets without a doubt, it will be interesting if they do the match straight into royal rumble, or they will build the rivalry in royal rumble maybe punk being eliminated by rollins, and then throwing crap at each other for a wrestlemania moment

[Rozalia1]

22 hours ago, Don_Chipotle said:

Well from what we can see they will place sooner or later punk and rollins, i think its the match many want, and it will sell tickets without a doubt, it will be interesting if they do the match straight into royal rumble, or they will build the rivalry in royal rumble maybe punk being eliminated by rollins, and then throwing crap at each other for a wrestlemania moment

 

Seems likely, but honestly I hope that Punk just gets himself a gimmick and goes with it for at least a while. Seth and others have done it to get away from whatever stink they got on them. Ultimately having face Punk, even if he is going to turn down the line, is possibly going to hurt others like Seth in being babyfaces. As such I think it would be better for everyone involved if Punk became (Corporate Made) Punk or something. He is here to make money and he'll do anything management wants. He can justify it all also by saying how society these days is all about being a rebel, going against the grain, so forth, so those people aren't really rebels/punks anymore. Being a corporate suck up, a sell out, so forth is who the real rebels/punks are these days.

 

---

 

NXT

 

Out of nowhere Wes Lee has apparently been crippled. Man had that AEW Big Show lean going on and his legs were literally shaking from having to support him even with the support of a cane. Due to this Dirty Dom once again is having his PLE opponent changed. We talk at times of curses and such, like the Women's tag belts who had so many teams go down with them that it literally got brought up on TV (thankfully Chelsea and Piper haven't gone down to it), but in this case the curse doesn't want to mess with Dom himself so it is targeting all of his big opponents. Rey Mysterio showing up on screen was a surprise. No surprise that the deadbeat would hire an assassin to take out his son. Said assassin being Dragon Lee, one of the Lee brothers, who I don't think would need hiring as I'm sure he'd want to fight for his brother regardless.

 

Woah! That slam was heard around the world. Incredible display from Lash Legend slamming that 600lbs Otis, brother. I hope they keep watch on Otis, because as we know Andre the Giant died just a few days later after being slammed by Hogan, and this event was that, except bigger. The amount of force generated was so much that Lash, who is a whole lotta woman, literally got blown into the air by the sheer impact. Hopefully this will really help in turning people around on Lash who early on certainly got maligned for not being very good (often happens when you're completely green and have to wrestle on live TV, learn to be more forgiving people). Apparently Lash broke all the records at the PC for the women for strength, records that Bianca used to hold, so Lash is certainly extremely strong and isn't just tall. As I've said before, I love the fact we're getting so many taller and stronger women in WWE. The policy changes that came with 2.0 are already paying off and will do so even more down the line I am certain. I mean, if you think about it they just make sense. Before they were bringing in loads of these indy guys, often mid 30s, massive amounts of wear and tear on them, massive amounts of bad habits to the point WWE had to retrain them anyway, and often possessing a lack of discipline. Now they get young disciplined athletes who can be built from the ground up, and if they get Indy guys it is the younger ones who aren't too far gone.

[Don_Chipotle]

2 hours ago, Rozalia1 said:

 

Seems likely, but honestly I hope that Punk just gets himself a gimmick and goes with it for at least a while. Seth and others have done it to get away from whatever stink they got on them. Ultimately having face Punk, even if he is going to turn down the line, is possibly going to hurt others like Seth in being babyfaces. As such I think it would be better for everyone involved if Punk became (Corporate Made) Punk or something. He is here to make money and he'll do anything management wants. He can justify it all also by saying how society these days is all about being a rebel, going against the grain, so forth, so those people aren't really rebels/punks anymore. Being a corporate suck up, a sell out, so forth is who the real rebels/punks are these days.

 

---

 

 

I totally agree with that, i mean, the "voice of the voiceless" gimmick died in the aew run, and i hope he also takes maybe a heel gimmick by "not supporting new talents" bullying new talents,  or something maybe makes heel rollins vs heel punk, and yes, everyone keeps wondering who will be at royal rumble and who will be against Roman

[Rozalia1]

1 hour ago, Don_Chipotle said:

I totally agree with that, i mean, the "voice of the voiceless" gimmick died in the aew run, and i hope he also takes maybe a heel gimmick by "not supporting new talents" bullying new talents,  or something maybe makes heel rollins vs heel punk, and yes, everyone keeps wondering who will be at royal rumble and who will be against Roman

 

Yeah. I've been tired of it for a long time but even people who liked it have started to tire of it. Don't agree with a heel Rollins though as I think he should be shown to be completely justified and correct in his assessment of Punk.

 

That idea would be good as it'd play off the events with Perry and the whole air that exists at AEW of guys thinking they know better than the veterans. If they want to test him first it would serve that role too as it'd mean him being kept away from even established midcarders. Naturally the payoff would be an NXT guy debuting in an open challenge from Punk at a PLE and utterly crushing him.

[Rozalia1]

NXT Deadline

 

The Women's Iron Survivor was a bit odd in how it was executed I felt. While I actually do like Blair, she basically did the least in the match and due to being missing for a good while has no real momentum behind them. Now yes, I get it, whoever wins this has to do a PLE singles match... but it really should have been Lash. That slam heard around the world of Otis rose her stock instantly and while they did do further building of her here with her coming in and instantly double pinning two women, plus her loss being due to Blair running away from her to avoid being pinned, it would have been better if she had won.

 

The Men's Iron Survivor had vastly more pinfalls and we almost got a classic modern day Vince finish where the face that everyone wants to win loses big time because a point needs to be made at the guy's expense. They really took it late because I started looking at the clock and thinking that Trick really doesn't have a lot of time to be racking up 4 pinfalls, but then he did and it was great. They even did a great fake out because at the end you knew that Bron was waiting with the spear and often that would finish it for Trick, but then he did the knee strike and won. Great stuff. Everyone looked good in the match of course, but especially Bron whose quick eliminations of three people is the type of thing you need to do with Bron. That he has such speed and power in him that if his opponents aren't careful then he'll beat them in seconds. Thankfully as this ain't AEW where main eventers will go 20+ minutes with jobbers who the audience has never seen win a match, when he goes to the main roster the odds are good that they'll show this to the WWE audience by having him quickly beat many of the midcarders on the roster quickly.

 

It happened before and happened again. The Cage match did not have the rule that allows you to win by escaping the cage. While not stated when Kiana James tried to get out, it might be that you instead lose the match if you escape the cage, like with Wargames. Does it sort of step over Hell in a Cell? Sure I guess, but NXT doesn't do Hell in a Cell anyway so it ain't anything to worry about. As I've said before. The escape the cage rule as it exists today is certainly stupid, but I would love to keep it if they reverted back to how it was in Bruno's time where essentially you could walk out of the door and win if you had a 10 second knockout on the opponent anyway. Some might remark 'why not pin him for 3 then?'. Simple. Bruno could've pinned all those heels for 3 too, but he put them down instead because he wanted to really punish them. With a 3 count the heel can state that the face got lucky, that it was a quick pin, that his shoulder was up and the referee missed it, but being put down for 10 while your opponent is all good walking out of the cage shows that you were clearly beaten.

[Rozalia1]

WWE Smackdown

 

Grayson Waller decided to innovate a new move on Smackdown. The Overdrive is a legendary move, a meme known as one of the worse moves in the business. Grayson Waller has taken this move and did it from the second rope, which with the added rotation actually makes the move look devastating.

 

AJ Styles returned looking like AJ Styles ate AJ Styles. Such is the power of prayer and training at the edge of the world. It is ironic that Vince is who is infamously known as the body guy, and yet it is only after he is no longer boss that guys consistently start making returns looking massively JACKED. As Cody recently said about MJF, if you're serious about all this, and it is a cosmetic business, then you got to get into shape (with exceptions of course). Even CM Punk, who we've yet to see with his shirt off, is looking bigger. This is yet another lesson taught to HHH by Vince McMahon when he destroyed Black and Gold NXT. Guys like Adam Cole, however talented they might be, just look wrong/unserious in the Heavyweight scene. Reminder, as many fans forget, you can both be talented and have serious muscle. It ain't one or the other. If you look like Adam Cole and you're in there with Drew McIntyre/so forth then sorry, but you just look like you don't belong. There is a reason Adam Cole has all those stories about people at the airport laughing at him or simply not believing him when he tells them he is a wrestler, hence the large belt he is carrying.

[SelectiveGamer]

Look... it sucks that Charlotte is injured for close to the next year. It really is. I wish her a fast and speedy recover. I really do.

 

However... I'm not the only one who thinks there's an opportunity here... am I?

 

There are reports that Sasha Banks may return to WWE after all. Although these should be taken with a grain of salt (really a MOUNTAIN of salt but you get the point and obviously this is what you should do) I feel Sasha could take Charlotte's place on SmackDown for her to return to save/rejoin with Bayley after she gets the inevitable knife in the back from the rest of Damage CTRL

 

I'm just spitballing obviously though lol. I'm no booker. Clearly. 😅

[Don_Chipotle]

On 12/17/2023 at 4:38 PM, SelectiveGamer said:

Look... it sucks that Charlotte is injured for close to the next year. It really is. I wish her a fast and speedy recover. I really do.

 

However... I'm not the only one who thinks there's an opportunity here... am I?

 

There are reports that Sasha Banks may return to WWE after all. Although these should be taken with a grain of salt (really a MOUNTAIN of salt but you get the point and obviously this is what you should do) I feel Sasha could take Charlotte's place on SmackDown for her to return to save/rejoin with Bayley after she gets the inevitable knife in the back from the rest of Damage CTRL

 

I'm just spitballing obviously though lol. I'm no booker. Clearly. 😅

 

 

I hope that she returns in a great way, she totally deserves it, hope this motivates other women back at lockeroom to look for a match, and try to reach the level of Ripley