Coming up, have WWE cancelled some huge WrestleMania plans for next year? They certainly cancelled
a PPV this year, more on the real reason for that and did Bray Wyatt have heat backstage
before he was let go? All that and more in today’s WrestleTalk
news so make sure you subscribe to the channel to stay up to date on all the latest from
between the ropes. So here’s a thing you know TLC, the pay
per view scheduled for December this year? Yeah, that might not be taking place after
all. Dave Meltzer is reporting on Wrestling Observer
Radio that the event, which was set to take place in Chicago, won’t be happening now.
“The decision was made that… originally there was going to be a pay-per-view in Chicago
at the Allstate Arena in mid December, and the feeling is now that doing 12 a year, and
the December pay-per-view will actually be January 1 in Atlanta. The idea of doing January
1 rather than do mid-late December. And then they’re still gonna do Royal Rumble as the
January pay-per-view.” Hopping back into the TLC chat, Fightful Select
are reporting that the plan to hold no pay per view in December was made over a month
ago. WWE sources also confirmed that TLC was scrapped
in order to concentrate on the January 1st ‘WWE Day 1’ event, an idea that is being
‘spearheaded’ by Nick Khan. So that means that come January we are going
to potentially have two pay-per-view level events with the New Year kicking off with
‘Day 1’ and then the Royal Rumble closing out the month.
Just nudge it a few days into February WWE, for those that bother with dry January.
Of all the shocking things WWE do, perhaps this year’s most shocking was the decision
to let Bray Wyatt go during the seemingly never ending cuts a few months back.
Wyatt was a fan-favourite performer who got a lot of TV time and was a mainstay in the
main event scene since returning with The Fiend character and utilizing cinematic matches
during the pandemic era. So strange that he would be given the old
heave ho. Now perhaps shedding some light on this situ though is this bit of reporting
from Andrew Zarian which he says he got from ‘the most legitimate person’ and not from
Bray. He said: “Bray was being difficult.”
“He was a little difficult, he had some performance issues in the ring, and he had
some weight issues. I’m not saying that that’s the reason, I’m not gonna say that’s
the reason, but you can kind of piece things together as to the things – when you evaluate
a talent and you’re like, ‘Okay we need this and we need that and this is the plan
moving forward’, you need someone… sometimes the decision is easier to make if you make
it more difficult for them to make that decision.” “There was a financial issue, there were
plenty of other scenarios here. I don’t think he was happy. And I would tell you that
these decisions are not cut and dry. It’s not like, ‘Oh it was a money thing and that’s
it’.” While the weight thing and in-ring performance
thing sound like your bog standard WWE excuses that they heap on top of the financial side
to make it easier to justify to themselves, this is one of the first reports of Bray being
quote unquote difficult backstage during the closing stretch of his WWE run.
But I mean, considering the booking decisions surrounding his character I would’ve been
more than a ‘little difficult’. I would’ve been all the way a pain in the ass. Bray invented
two seperate interlinked characters, a mythology, the whole shebang, for ages King Corbin was
just a king because he had a crown. Now Shinsuke is.
So speculation about where Bray might end up now that his WWE career had come to a close,
with many obviously saying the three magic letters AEW, while others are saying Impact
might be the better fit for his style of character. Regardless, Tony Khan recently confirmed that
he has not yet chatted business with Bray, real name Windham Rotunda.
Though that doesn’t mean he isn’t open to it, telling the New York Post:
“I really like Windham. I know him a little bit and I really enjoy him. The last time
I saw him was at Chris Jericho’s birthday party and that was a long time ago. I like
him as a person very much and he’s a really talented person. At the right time and place,
sure I’d be interested to talk to him. I’m interested to talk to him in general because
he’s a great person.” Moving on, sooo the plan for the old Universal
title picture has been that The Rock is going to show up and challenge Roman right? We’ve
known about that for ages, right?!? RIGHT! Well apparently getting one of the highest
paid actors in the world to swing by is more difficult than previously thought. Not least
because of all the eggs and chicken your catering department needs to buy.
So originally we all thought that Rocky would be showing up around Survivor Series time
in order to start building to a match at WrestleMania 38 in Dallas.
Well plans are subject to change and according to Andrew Zarian on the Mat Men podcast who
spoke to ‘multiple sources’ in and out of the company they have. He said:
“Little update on The Rock – he is apparently in Australia during Survivor Series. Now does
that mean that he won’t be doing something at Survivor Series? They’re definitely gonna
mention it. They’re definitely gonna talk about it. There will be maybe a video appearance
or something that’s planned. But he’s not gonna be there,”
This not only sets back the plan for the Universal title picture, but also according to Zarian
has WWE rethinking the whole thing. Adding: it really looks like the focus has shifted
to moving a Roman/Rock match to LA. I’ll say it this way – there are people that
are adamant that it needs to take place in Los Angeles. They’re adamant. There are
certain people that say, ‘No, this match should not happen at Dallas, it should happen
in LA.” WrestleMania 39 will be taking place in Los
Angeles in 2023, which would mean cancelling the plans for this year and moving the entire
thing back. Which quite drastically changes the Universal title picture as either Brock
is winning the belt at Crown Jewel next week or someone else is going to have to rise through
the ranks and claim the title from Roman, but who that is isn’t very clear with the
emphatic victories Reigns has had over the last year.
And this Roman Reigns problem harkens back to something that has plagued WWE for a while,
they just aren’t building that many young stars up to the main event level.
A new report from Wrestling Observer Radio re-iterated this saying that WWE officials
are very much aware that they have a lot of 40 year old superstars on the main roster
and are in dire need of an influx of young blood. Mostly to keep Vince McMahon alive.
Like he’s a vampire or the space marine emperor.
The report went on to say that this realisation is the reason for the change in NXT and the
move to the 2.0 style of show, the idea being to get more wrestlers in their 20s ready for
a WWE Main Roster run. A quick rundown from Wrestling Inc noted that
22 main roster stars are 40 or older: Asuka, Cesaro, Finn Balor, Kofi Kingston, Randy Orton,
Shinsuke Nakamura, Shayna Baszler, The Miz, Dolph Ziggler, John Morrison, Sheamus, Tamina,
AJ Styles, Jeff Hardy, Titus O’Neil, Bobby Lashley, Robert Roode, Rey Mysterio, Shelton
Benjamin, MVP, Edge and R-Truth - plus you’ve got Brock, Cena and Goldberg all recently
in the mix. The sooner Bron Breakker is done cooking in
NXT the better. Bron vs Von for Mania 39! The tit for tat war between WWE and AEW which
has spun out of 30 minutes of counter programming tonight as Rampage and Smackdown go head to
head for a brief amount of time has hotted up.
Tony Khan has been firing some shots on Twitter and scheduling Bryan Danielson to take on
Minoru Suzuki just of the lols, but he’s also been hitting Vince where it hurts. HIS
WALLET. Never insult the size of a man’s wallet Tony.
Speaking to the New York Post Khan hyped up the importance of a bit of healthy competition
and talked about the Wednesday Night Wars and the tendency for WWE to go ad-free then,
as well as their plan for that tonight: He said:
“We can take the commercials out of it. If you want to take the commercials out of
it, I can do that too. It doesn’t seem very civil but I have more money than they do so
I can afford to do that longer than they can. But that’s how we make money at the end
of the day, so I was surprised when they took those out.”
IT’S NOT THE SIZE OF THE WALLET TONY. IT’S WHAT YOU PUT IN IT. WHAT YOU PUT IT IN. F***
In some final if it ain’t broke why not break it while fixing it news, Vince McMahon
has reportedly ordered Cameron Grimes to undergo a character makeover.
A skit aired on this week’s NXT where Grayson Waller gave Grimes dating tips including shaving
his chest and trimming his beard, Vince’s long-standing vendetta against body hair continues.
Don’t let the the tiny bastards win. Apparently Grimes will undergo the makeover
in the coming weeks, which is lame, but according to WrestlingNews.co, Vince’s desire to change
the ‘presentation of his character’ was what stopped Grimes being called up to the
main roster during the recent Draft. Absolute madness.