In this WrestleTalk News, the AEW locker room’s reaction to MJF’s pipebomb, Thunder Rosa
is frustrated with AEW, an update on Forbidden Door plans and more.
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MJF this past week has set the wrestling world on fire.
Through all the speculation of will he or won’t he be at Double or Nothing, of all
the reports of frustration, and then through this week’s Dynamite where he cut a scathing
pipebomb promo, the question of whether this is a work or not has remained.
The consensus seems to be that whatever frustrations have happened with MJF and Tony Khan have
now been altered into an angle, and that’s all well and good for the fans watching the
product, but what about the other people backstage in AEW who MJF called out as part of his promo?
Well Fightful Select has the latest on that, with a report saying that they spoke to countless
AEW talent about MJF’s pipebomb and their thoughts ranged from “it's always been a
work on MJF's side” to “well, it's definitely a work now.”
Interestingly though, one talent told them that “if they found out the situation had
been a work any further than this weekend, they'd be particularly frustrated for many
reasons” including the fact that talent had spoken to both MJF and Tony Khan in an
effort to learn more about the ongoing situation, which “by all accounts were real issues”.
Which makes sense if they had spoken to MJF and Khan in order to try and figure out what’s
happening and had been assured that their grievances were legitimate, only for it to
be a work.
On top of that, other wrestlers reportedly had to do extra work at the meet and greet
after MJF didn’t show up, “who weren’t clued in” of a potential work of this angle.
In terms of MJF’s demeanour backstage, the idea fans have that MJF is always working
and is always in character was “repeatedly debunked” by the talent that Fightful spoke
to, with one wrestler mentioning that “If he acted like MJF all the time, he probably
wouldn't still be working here”.
One talent, who is a longtime friend of MJF’s, said that MJF was “adamant” that the situation
wasn’t a work, and they also mentioned that the promo “reeked of desperation” to make
something happen on screen, and they don’t believe that TK would have allowed it to happen
on television “without a payoff or a plan”.
One AEW wrestler went very public with their thoughts though, as Chris Jericho tweeted
his thoughts, seemingly on this situation, saying:
“For the record @AEW is the best sports entertainment company I’ve ever worked for
& @TonyKhan is the best boss I’ve done business with.
If certain talents feel they’re under compensated, maybe ur not as good as u think u are.
Go elsewhere PLEASE.
You’ll be begging to come back!”
After MJF’s promo segment cut to commercial, CM Punk walked out to the ring to try and
seemingly talk to MJF, who left through the crowd, and Punk had previously tweeted about
standing alongside your co-workers, regardless of your opinion of them.
I wonder if that opinion has changed at all, or whether this is all part of the angle,
where CM Punk eventually turns heel and then babyface MJF returns to dethrone him.
Yeah.
Fun.
AEW keep adding to the kayfabe realism of this angle, having previously removed all
mention of this segment happening from their YouTube, socials and press release photos,
they have now removed MJF from their roster page on their website as well.
Whether this means something is coming regarding a suspension, firing or otherwise, we don’t
know, and isn’t it fun?
Isn’t it fun to be worked?
Of course stay tuned to wrestletalk.com for the latest news in case something breaking
happens.
But MJF seemingly isn’t the only AEW wrestler frustrated with the company.
After her excellent title match against Serena Deeb at Double or Nothing where she retained
her AEW Women’s World Title, Thunder Rosa was absent from this week’s episode of Dynamite
entirely, which has been a criticism of her booking since she won the title in March.
That being that she’s either absent, or there’s a lack of focus on her as champion,
or she’s not given enough time or material to work with.
And now it seems that Rosa herself has joined her fans in being frustrated with this booking.
WhatCulture are reporting that Thunder Rosa’s lack of TV time has “left her unhappy”,
and “very frustrated”, with this week’s Dynamite making it seem like her match with
Deeb last weekend “didn’t happen at all”.
Another notch in the frustration belt for Rosa is that she was not invited to the post-media
scrum after Double or Nothing, and while these little frustrations have been mounting and
exponentially growing, it “isn't to the extent that she is going to walk out of the
promotion”, though it has left her feeling “upset and confused”.
However, contrary to this report of Thunder Rosa simply not being used at Dynamite, PWInsider
are reporting that she was backstage at the Dynamite taping, but was not feeling well
and was sent home.
The report also clarifies that this wasn’t an injury she picked up at Double or Nothing,
but an illness that was making her feel unwell.
If she has picked up an illness, I hope she gets better soon, and if she simply wasn’t
used, well I hope that she gets used better soon.
It’s been an odd few months for AEW, with more reports of frustration, the MJF situation,
Thunder Rosa being upset now, Cody leaving to rejoin WWE, it definitely seems like some
cracks are starting to show for the company.
Still though, they make great wrestling shows don’t they.
And speaking of great wrestling, we’ve got Forbidden Door coming later this month, where
we’re most likely seeing CM Punk vs Hiroshi Tanahashi.
What a timeline we’re living in.
There were reports of another huge match that was lined up for the show from the Wrestling
Observer, as they had previously noted that Hangman Page vs Kazuchika Okada was slated
to be on the show.
However, this has now been corrected, as the Wrestling Observer Twitter account sent a
tweet to say that their previous report was incorrect, confirming that “That match is
not planned for the PPV as the lineup is being kept a secret.”
But I wanted to see which lariat was better: the one where you do a little flip beforehand,
or the one where you spin your opponent a bit beforehand.
That’s the real question here, surely.
No matches have been officially confirmed for the show as of yet, but I think it’s
probably a safe bet to say it’ll be Punk vs Tanahashi at least, based on the fact that
Tanahashi came out on Dynamite when Punk asked who he would be facing at Forbidden Door.
But you never know, could be MJF.
However there’s be someone else on the AEW roster who might not be able to compete at
Forbidden Door at all.
At Double or Nothing, The Hardys faced The Young Bucks in a dream match, though the match
itself never quite reached those lofty heights, in my humble opinion at least.
From my viewing of it, something seemed a little off between the teams, and Matt Hardy
has revealed exactly why that was.
On the latest episode of The Extreme Life Of Matt Hardy podcast, Matt mentioned:
“Yeah, I was happy with the match, especially considering very early on in the match Jeff
was almost knocked out.
So he got hurt pretty bad.
That's why he's being pulled from the match in Los Angeles, obviously.
So he was kind of running on fumes going through the match.
He still held up his end of the bargain pretty good in the big scheme of things”
Jeff was pulled from a match on this week’s Dynamite, with speculation being that he was
beat up and needed some time to recover, with Matt confirming that here.
In a more scary view of the match, Matt revealed that Jeff has “no recollection” of the
match at all, saying that he was just “a vessel” being given directions of what to
do during the match.
Which makes it both incredibly impressive and incredibly frightening when you look at
the two Swanton Bomb spots that Jeff did later in the match.
As of right now it’s unclear how long Jeff will be out of action, but best wishes to
him and we hope he recovers soon.
Sticking with Matt Hardy, Chris Jericho recently revealed on Talk Is Jericho that Matt Hardy’s
debut in AEW in 2020, which featured actual teleportation from the Broken character, is
something that Tony Khan says he wishes he never let happen.
“Tony was so mad at me.
That was the one thing that we were able to squeak through the goalposts of the supernatural
wrestling.
Afterwards, he was like, ‘I never should have allowed that.’”
The idea has been said to have been thought of by Jericho, which is why Khan was mad at
him for it, and Khan has said in the past about how he should have stood up and said
something if he truly believed it wasn’t going to work like he did and that it was
his fault for not intervening.
Switching over to WWE now, one of the more anticipated returns to the ring in recent
times is Lacey Evans, who had a series of impassioned promos about her backstory that
aired on SmackDown.
She then came out on SmackDown, potentially as a heel, the details are still fuzzy on
that one, but then she was moved to the Raw brand instead.
She was due to have her in-ring return on the Memorial Day edition of Raw this past
week, but that didn’t end up happening, card subject to change and all that.
But now, you might not be seeing her in-ring return on Raw at all, as PWInsider is reporting
that Evans has been moved back to SmackDown.
I’m really glad that WWE clearly knows what they’re doing.
I’ve got nothing else to say on this one.
It’s just very funny.
As Evans was on the Raw brand when she took her time away for her pregnancy, it means
that she switched to SmackDown, then to Raw, then back to SmackDown in the space of about
two months and without her wrestling a single match.
Incredible work.
Now check out yesterday’s WrestleTalk News episode, featuring Oli’s review of MJF’s
pipebomb promo.