In this WrestleTalk News, Finn Balor upset with WWE, a huge update about Sasha Banks
& Naomi returning to WWE, Oli’s review of Raw and more.
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After being beaten by the original lineup of The Judgment Day back at Hell in a Cell,
Finn Balor usurped Edge as the group’s leader, because Edge was the weak link you see, and
since then, Finn Balor has gone on to be 1-3 on WWE TV, losing repeatedly to the Mysterios.
With Triple H now in charge of creative though, some Balor fans might expect things to start
to change for the former NXT Champion - and they might need to for Balor’s morale, as
he revealed recently he was hurt by the company.
In an interview with Cheap Heat, when asked if Balor would like to participate at Clash
in the Castle in the UK in September, Balor replied:
“Obviously, it's something I absolutely want to be involved in.
Last year, I wasn't involved in Mania and I'll be honest, that deeply hurt.
Deeply hurt.
The fact that I show up for every TV, every house show, every overseas tour, every media
appearance.
Then, to be left off two nights of WrestleMania, that hurt.”
Balor hasn’t competed at a WrestleMania since WrestleMania 35 in 2019, where he defeated
Bobby Lashley for the Intercontinental Championship, meaning he’s now missed 3 WrestleManias
in a row.
Balor went on to say that he sometimes finds out about his matches after the audience does
as it’s announced on TV while he’s in the locker room, lamenting that there’s
no promise of a match in three months or six weeks that they’re building to, and he only
found out about his SummerSlam No DQ match against The Mysterios on the previous Monday.
Hopefully Balor can have a more fulfilling run under Triple H, because lord knows he’s
a Hunter favourite, being a two-time NXT Champion and having two very successful runs in NXT.
And two other people who might be looking to have more fulfilling runs are Sasha Banks
& Naomi, who walked out of Raw on May 16 and haven’t been seen since in WWE.
But with Vince McMahon, the primary source of their reported frustrations, now gone from
the company, will they be coming back?
WrestlingNews.co first reported that “an agreement has been reached” to have Banks
and Naomi return to WWE soon.
Bryan Alvarez then weighed in on Wrestling Observer Live, saying:
“I am not 100 percent confirming this, but since everybody is asking about it, I do have
one source who is saying that, yes, Sasha and Naomi have made a deal to return.”
Dave Meltzer also noted in his daily update that it’s not confirmed that it’s been
signed yet, but “it is moving in that direction and internally they do expect it to happen.”
And now we have the new faction of Bayley, Dakota Kai and IYO SKY, the WWE women’s
division has been given a real boost - and if we add Sasha Banks & Naomi to that mix,
it’s looking real good right now.
A year ago it was reported that alongside NXT’s revamp and rechange, WWE were also
going to change their hiring process, looking more for collegiate athletes to sign that
they could mould into Superstars, capital S, rather than the best independent wrestlers
in the world.
This was the NIL program, and it’s made fairly high profile signings so far, such
as Gable Steveson.
But things might be abou to change, as WWE held their latest batch of tryouts at SummerSlam
weekend, and things reportedly didn’t go well.
According to Bryan Alvarez on Wrestling Observer Live, this will reportedly be the last time
they hold tryouts with just collegiate athletes and no independent wrestlers, and that there
were “a ton of injuries”, including several concussions, a lot of the athletes weren’t
up to scratch with their performances, and the entire thing was described as a “disaster”.
With reports stating that Triple H was looking to go back to the way he used to run things,
looking for the biggest independent wrestlers, it seems these days may be behind us.
And now hot tag to Oli.
Thanks for the tag, Pete.
I take that tag, and I spam you back on the forehead!
You and Tempest beat me and Luke at QuizzleMania, meaning we have to review WWE for the next
month, while you get AEW.
But that was recorded before Triple H took over.
Ha.
So here’s my review of Monday Night Raw: It’s Good Now… in about 5 minutes
The first real Raw of the Triple H era unfortunately still does have one lingering issue from the
previous regime: everyone is getting injured.
Becky Lynch, fresh off her awesome SummerSlam babyface turn, revealed she separated her
shoulder in the match.
She embraced Belair once again, and then left saying ‘see you soon’.
Well that’s definitely the last we’ll see of-oh my god she’s getting beaten up
by Control- Your Narrative!
Stop trying to make Control Your Narrative happen, Braun.
Despite being three hours long, don’t I know it, Triple H somehow managed to only
book four stories for the whole episode.
And it was an enormous improvement of focus.
This was simply the first part of a night-long narrative.
Alexa Bliss vs Asuka only went a few minutes later on before Control-
Your Narrative!
Seriously, stop it Braun.
Ran into beat both women up.
They run the whole division now.
Belair helped chase them off, which set up Bianca vs IYO SKY in a singles match later
on.
Sorry, I think I pronounced that wrong.
I want to properly get Japanese wrestlers names correct.
It’s actually pronounced IYO SKY.
It’s all caps.
Belair and SKY had a terrific match, immediately solidifying IYO on the main roster.
Bayley and Dakota Kai kept getting in Belair’s way, so Asuka and Bliss came down to even
the odds, which eventually erupted in a DQ-causing brawl.
If I’m to hold WWE to a higher standard here, in my opinion IYO should have won, with
Bayley hitting Bianca behind the referee’s back.
It gives an actual finish to this very good match, and elevates SKY even more to the,
well… sky.
That said, the presentation and focus on the women’s division was exemplary.
Because if you don’t really have a world champion about, it makes sense to boost all
the other titles.
Speaking of, the main men’s storyline of the night was the similarly three segment
long US Championship picture.
The idea was to have two three ways, where the winners would face each other later on
to decide the No. 1 contender for Bobby Lashley next week.
Whackbat.
The first saw AJ Styles beat Mustafa Ali and The Miz in a brilliantly fast-paced innovative
match - with one of the better TV finishes of the year: Ali hitting a 450 on The Miz,
which AJ somehow caught the rebound into a Styles Clash on Ali onto the Miz to win.
This was a banger of a match.
Based on AJ winning, you could guess Tomasso Ciamp would win the second three way over
Dolph Ziggler and Chad Gable based on their burgeoning feud.
While not as good as the first match, this still had some terrific spots, including Gable
hitting a Chaos Theory suplex on Ciampa, which Ziggler somehow added a perfectly timed Zig
Zag to upon impact.
Ciampa won with a Fairytale Ending on Gable though, and the camera cut to two dudes in
the crowd who were like NXT LET’S F****** GO!
Styles then faced Ciampa later on in another terrific bout.
A mixture of AJ’s hurt shoulder from the opener and The Miz interfering at ringside
was too much to overcome though.
Ciampa won, meaning just two weeks into Triple H’s head of creative tenure, Tomasso Ciampa
is facing Bobby Lashley for the US Championship.
I can’t even comprehend that match, and I also can’t wait.
I think there’s a legitimate chance we could see a title change - and then we can just
redo Ciampa vs Gargano on the main roster for the US championship!
What I appreciated even more than Ciampa’s push right to the moon, though, was the significance
WWE gave the belt.
Before the first match, JBL voiced over an excellent video package on the championship’s
lineage.
And further getting over the sense of history, former US champion Booker T was brought in
to commentate on the No. 1 contenders match.
In a ‘fake’ pro wrestling world, titles are only as important as you make them.
And this episode was all about making the US Championship feel the most important it
has since Monday Night Rollins’ run.
Speaking of, Seth took on Riddle’s mate Montez Ford on this show, yet another instance
of WWE positioning Ford for a singles push.
Further foreshadowing a Street Profits split, Seth actively said they should break up, and
Tez kind of cheated on the Rock, Paper, Scissors game against Dawkins to decide who gets to
fight.
Always go for The Rock.
Montez showed great fire in another fast-paced back and forth match, but Seth got his knees
up on the Frog Splash and hit a Stomp to win.
I’m starting to think Ford’s Frog Splash does him more harm than anyone else?
The fourth and final story of the show was the continuing Edge and Mysterios vs Judgement
Day feud.
Edge cut a concise, effective in-ring promo early on, promising to kill what he’d created.
And then immediately following the Mysterios vs Usos main event - which somehow made me
think Dominik Mysterio was actually going to win at one point off an amazing Frog Splash
near fall - Judgement Day jumped them, Edge made the save, but accidentally speared Dom.
This was competently done, but I’m just not really into the feud unfortunately.
What did you think of RAW?
Let me know in the comments.
This wasn’t a huge reset show, with a Triple H promo, or some big Retribution style invasion.
But, at the same time, the changes were profound.
The storytelling was focused and coherent, the wrestling was both faster and increased,
the promos more organic, the rubbish practically non-existent.
But the bit that I enjoyed the most was how things felt like they mattered.
Wins, losses, titles.
If this is what Triple H’s main roster looks like, I’m very excited for what comes next.
And sometimes that’s just as important as the show itself.
This week’s Raw is my highest score of the year at 80%.
We’ve already had Dakota Kai, but what other former WWE stars could Triple H bring in next?
Watch on to find out…