In this WrestleTalk News, Cody Rhodes shoots on Brawl Out, fences haven’t been mended ahead
of a potential CM Punk AEW return, some interesting AEW heat and more. Subscribe
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well then maybe I need to listen to some offers laid out to me about some contract tampering…
Dear Steve and/or Larson. My contract is up at…oh are we rolling? Uhhh, support wrestletalk!
CM Punk last stepped foot in an AEW ring on September 4th, 2022 when he won the
AEW World Championship for a second time from Jon Moxley. He then had an explosive post-show
media scrum where he lambasted The Elite, other members of the AEW roster, and ate a muffin.
It was a promo that sent shockwaves not just through AEW, but through his own face. As it
led to a backstage fight between himself, The Elite, and his friend Ace Steel. All
parties - including those that broke up the fight - were suspended and stripped of their titles;
as The Elite had won the Trios Championships that same night.
The Elite were brought back to AEW a few months later, competing at the next PPV Full Gear,
and have been regularly on TV ever since - even referencing the backstage fight
in a match with Death Triangle during a show in CM Punk’s hometown of Chicago.
Ace Steel was fired, but there were questions about what Tony Khan would do with CM Punk.
Punk has been a huge draw for All Elite Wrestling, which he himself has posted about on Instagram
recently, but was also sidelined with an injury he picked up in the match with Moxley; his second
major injury in the span of just a handful of months. There have been rumours and reports
since September last year from everything between a contract buyout to a return to the company. It
really could go either way. Punk’s name has not been mentioned since All Out, and he was removed
from the cover of AEW’s video game Fight Forever. Dave Meltzer has written and spoken about a
potential CM Punk return, especially now that his injury recovery is nearly done, and Punk posted to
Instagram just a few days ago alluding to the idea that he wants to forgive those who he might have
wronged, or might have wronged him. But there are two sides to this,
and one of those sides is The Elite. Speaking about Punk’s post and a
potential return, Dave Meltzer spoke further about the relationship between
the parties, and how it’s not looking great. Meltzer said, “A lot of damage done, there’s a
lot of mending of fences that needs to be done, and there’s been no mending of fences. At all.”
He adds, “It’s a big situation, because Punk could be back in two months,
then there’s a decision. That’s gonna be a big story, how that goes down, or doesn’t go down.”
It is a big decision for Khan. On the one hand he could keep his Elite EVPs happy - considering
that he’s trying to negotiate new contracts with The Young Bucks and Kenny Omega to get them to
stay - or he could bring back a proven draw in a period of time when AEW’s ratings are not at
their strongest - which is quite an important time as it’s TV contract renegotiation season.
Dynamite’s ratings last week were down only slightly from the week before,
but 20% down year-on-year. Fascinatingly the lowest rated segment on the show was The Elite’s
match with Top Flight and AR Fox. It was even worse news for Rampage, which fell below 400,000
viewers, down 31% from last year. A CM Punk return could change that.
I mentioned earlier that Khan and AEW are negotiating new deals with The Bucks and Omega
- who are EVPs within the company - and a former EVP of AEW recently spoke about Brawl Out and how
it has affected the company - ahead of him main eventing WrestleMania for the rival promotion.
Cody Rhodes leaving AEW and re-signing with WWE last year was such a big story that it
overshadowed the in-ring return of Steve Austin but somehow was only the third maddest thing that
happened in 2022. It was a story that seemed so unlikely, a lot of people downplayed Sean
Ross Sapp’s reporting of it. But it did happen. Just a few months later, Brawl Out took place and
suddenly Cody Rhodes looked like the smartest man in the room. There had been rumours and
speculation for a while that he wasn’t on the same page as Omega, The Bucks or Tony Khan anymore,
and some have even speculated that he left AEW because he could see the writing was
on the wall for a troubled promotion. And now Cody has spoken about all that
went down in an interview with Ariel Helwani, and was candid in saying
that the situation made him feel “bummed out”. “I remember somebody texted me ‘man you’re the
smartest guy in the room’, and I wanted to write back like ‘F you man’. I didn’t feel that way,
I feel this thing we built got damaged, and I’m not putting any blame on anybody, but I just
hated seeing that because as the company grows, and I hope it continues to grow, I hope people
remember the mission in the first place, why we were there. If you bring in people that don’t know
the mission, things like that can happen.” He added, “It’s just, that’s how I felt,
no heat on Punk, no heat on Matt, Nick, Kenny, or Tony, I was just bummed out when I saw it,
that’s not how we envisioned it.” Rhodes reiterated that he has a good
relationship with all parties involved, but that line of ‘bringing people in who don’t know the
mission’ does feel like a slight dig at Punk. As if catching himself he quickly added, “I’m not
saying [Punk] didn’t know the mission or anything of that nature but I was just bummed out.”
He also feels that something special within AEW died at Brawl Out, saying,
“If you were at All In, the spirit of All In, if you ever lose the spirit you’re lost,
and I think the spirit was gone in that moment.” Rhodes adds that he hopes AEW can get that
spirit back, and it’s interesting how his comments on the situation really echo what
a lot of fans felt about Brawl Out last year. Where do you land on things these days? Would
you bring back CM Punk, or try to recapture that original All In spirit? Or can you have
it both ways? Let me know in the comments. Speaking of heat, and there were some choice
words about AEW’s Konosuke Takeshita on the Keepin’ It 100 podcast. And for the
first time in seemingly forever, it wasn’t Disco Inferno that said something silly!
Konnan was seemingly very angry about Takeshita doing an Eddie Gurerro tribute in El Paso in
his Dynamite match against MJF. On his podcas he said, “Well, Takeshita, he’s got heat with
me. He’s lucky I wasn’t in El Paso, because when he went up and he did the f*****g Eddie Guerrero
thing for the frog splash…you’re not Mexican dude. I don’t care. Stick to your nationality.”
AEW’s Miro jumped to the defense of Takeshita, noting that Konan
wouldn’t last ten seconds with him in the ring. But Konnan has since retracted his thoughts,
however, posting on Twitter: “The Takeshita thing was a joke, like I'm really gonna get
mad over him doing a frog splash, everyone does it. If u actually believe I was hot, jokes on u.”
When a fan replied saying this felt like Konnan backtracking because of potential heat with AEW
while he’s trying to rebuild bridges between them and AAA after he screwed them over for
a potential working relationship with WWE instead, he replied, “Please dont tell me
what I did or what my intentions were...if u dont think it was a joke thats on u.”
Guys it was just a joke. Of course it was a joke. No backtracking here. And if you need
proof of that, here’s Disco Inferno unblocking WrestleCringe just to tell him it was a joke.
And if there’s one person you can trust in this world to be honest, it’s Disco f***ing Inferno.
Konnan was recently reportedly backstage at a taping for AEW Dark to try and smooth
over the relationship between AEW and AAA, especially as he wants to bring in Kenny Omega
to face Vikingo for the AAA Mega Championship. But it’s not just AEW that WWE has heat with,
as a lawsuit against them has now been thrown out of court.
Tony Khan spoke recently about WWE contacting their talent in an attempt to tamper with their
contracts, and get them to come back into their fold, but he’s not the first person
to accuse WWE of this or something similar. Let’s not forget that there was a lot of
contract tampering conversations around the signing of ROH’s Adam Cole, Kyle O’Reilly,
Bobby Fish and Donovan Dijak which delayed their debuts in NXT, and MLW took WWE to court claiming
that they had pressured third party streaming services to abandon their relationships in
favour of signing deals with WWE instead. The suit read that there were, “ongoing
attempts to undermine competition and monopolize the professional wrestling market by interfering
with MLW’s contracts and business prospects.” In perhaps the most hilarious part of the case,
WWE presented an October 2021 edition of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter as evidence to
show they were not a monopoly, highlighting the time that Rampage and Smackdown went
head-to-head for half an hour and AEW won. WWE’s own defense - which is now recognised
by a court of law - was that AEW’s The Bunny is a bigger ratings draw than Brock Lesnar.
I think it’s time to start pushing The Bunny, you guys!
And it worked, as a judge granted WWE’s request to have the case dismissed. MLW now have 21 days
to refile, which they plan to do. Court Bauer told PWInsider, “Our legal team is already at work on
amending the complaint. We have every intention to continue pursuing our case against WWE.”
We end today’s episode on some sad news, as it’s been reported that legendary promoter
Jerry Jarrett has passed away at the age of 80 after a battle with cancer.
Jarrett is best known for his work as booker and promoter during the glory days in Memphis
where he and Jerry “The King” Lawler ruled all of wrestling. His weekly show on Saturday mornings
was an institution, as Dave Meltzer writes on FigureFour, “During the late 70s and early 80s,
more than 20 percent of the homes in the metro area watched the show and more than 70 percent
of the television sets on during that time period were watching the wrestling show. It was by far
the highest rated wrestling show in the country.” When Vince McMahon feared that he would face jail
time during the steroid trial in the early 90s, he brought in Jerry
to run the company should he go to prison. After failing to buy WCW in 2000, Jerry Jarrett
and his son Jeff Jarrett started Total Nonstop Action in 2002. After substantial money losses,
they sold the company to the Carters. After a falling out with Jeff, Jerry left TNA.
The wrestling world has shared their memories of Jarrett, including Dutch Mantell and Nick
Aldis. James Storm and Frankie Kazarian shared their appreciation to Jerry for
getting their starts in the business, as did The Honky Tonk Man. Christopher Daniels posted,
“I had such good experiences working with him in early TNA. He told my parents that
the AMW-XXX cage match at Turning Point 2004 was one of the best he'd ever seen, which was
a compliment that I cherish to this day.” We here at WrestleTalk would like to extend
our thoughts and well-wishes to the family and friends of Jerry Jarrett.
Today on the WrestleTalk Podcast it will be Pete Quinnell and Sullivan Beau Brown battling over
Elimination Chamber predictions, with the winner getting both shots at my Jam That Jampionship at
WrestleMania. Only one may win, and the other will be branded a smelly loser for the next two weeks.
But if you’re looking for Elimination Chamber predictions on this channel,
myself and Oli Davis did them in our latest 3-count! Here’s a clip.