Here's your wrestling news for February 25th 2021
And your headlines for today include Why Big Show Leave WWE? AEW Locker Room Reacts! Sting Fully Cleared To Wrestle For AEW! WWE News
Major Life Events’ That Led To The Big Show (Paul Wight) Sign With AEW!
AEW Locker Room Reacts To Signing Of ‘Big Show’ Paul Wight!
WWE Wrestler Reacts To Paul Wight ‘Big Show’ Signing With AEW!
Cody Rhodes On Whether Paul Wight Is A Heel Or Babyface In AEW!
Sting ‘Fully Cleared’ To Wrestle In AEW!
Wrestler Suffered Broken Leg On WWE This Week!
"He Destroyed The Respect For Our Industry" - Wrestling Veteran Talks Chris Benoit!
‘Brock Lesnar Look-Alike’ Parker Boudreaux Comments On Signing With WWE!
Disguising Accusations On Dixie Carter And More!
We’re starting today with AEW, and after the company announced they had signed the Big Show Paul Wight,
there’s been plenty of questions about what the future holds for him. In a statement by AEW themselves
Tony Khan confirmed that Wight will have plenty of roles in the company, saying:
“We believe that he has a lot to offer us, both in the ring as a wrestler, and also outside the ring as a commentator, host
and ambassador for AEW.” The statement also confirmed that Wight will be working on commentary
for AEW Dark: Elevation, which will air Mondays at 7pm Eastern on the AEW YouTube channel.
Wight himself commented on the situation, saying that it’s been amazing to watch what AEW has built in just a couple of
years, adding: “I also love that established AEW can build out their personalities and
showcase themselves in new ways on Dark. It’s no exaggeration when I say that AEW is boundless”
These are still early days for Wight’s career in AEW, and after 22 years with the WWE, it’s very exciting to see what
the former World Heavyweight Champion has planned, and who he will face.
Wight’s last appearance for WWE happened last month at RAW Legends Night, and according to reports,
the signs were clear back then that he was leaving. According to PW Insider, the
then-Big Show was very unhappy that night, and how he was portrayed on the show. They explained:
“WWE and Wight were unable to come to terms on a new deal financially and his final contract with the company
last month, days after he made an appearance being verbally bullied by Randy Orton on the Raw Legends
Night episode on 1/4. One source stated that Wight was very open that night about his unhappiness about the
situation.” Shortly before AEW broke the news of Wight signing, WWE moved the
website profile of The Big Show to their alumni section, and we’ll have to see if he likes Tony Khan’s booking ideas any better.
Wight’s decision to leave the WWE after 22 years has been shocking to say the least, and it wasn’t just down to
money and his booking. That’s according to Fightful select, who report that the former World Champion’s
personal life was a factor in his decision, saying: “One person close to Paul Wight said
that they imagined a major career move was happening as Wight has had some “major life events” over the
past few months between selling his house, his WWE deal expiring and his Netflix show being cancelled.”
Wight will likely be a part of AEW for a long time to come, and it’ll be interesting to see how Tony Khan uses the
veteran performer.
Fans won’t have to wait long to see Wight on AEW programming, as he’ll be making his TV debut next week.
On last night’s Dynamite, Tony Schiavone confirmed that the former World Champion will speak on TNT
next week, and confirmed that Wight will be working commentary alongside him on the premiere episode of AEW
Dark: Elevation when it debuts on YouTube on March 15th. After nearly a quarter-century in WWE
it’ll be interesting to see what Wight has to say next week, and fans will be getting to hear plenty more from him
when AEW Dark: Elevation premieres. Wight signing with the company has certainly gone down well with the locker
room, who took to social media to speak about their member.
On Twitter, Matt Hardy shared a photo of himself and Wight on a plane from their WWE days, whilst Jake
Hager said this is exciting news Taz said that Wight is one of the good guys in the Business, whilst
Dustin Rhodes said “we meet again old buddy.” Marko Stung questioned how AEW
kept this information from him, whilst Lance Archer, hinting that a name- change will be in order, said “Welcome
to the team, Little Guy Paul Wight.” A name change will certainly have to happen, as WWE owns The Big Show
but the man who made that name famous is now All Elite.
It wasn’t just AEW talent who reacted to Wight’s shocking news, as Mick Foley also weighed in on the former
WWE Champion leaving Vince McMahon’s promotion. On Twitter, the Hardcore Legend
says he’s wishing for the best for Wight, and said that the seven-footer clearly feels he had more left in the tank.
Fans will get to see how much more the former Big Show has left, as we know he’ll be competing, as well as having
plenty of other roles which’ll help AEW in many ways.
One man the seven-foot star is familiar with is Cody Rhodes, AEW’s Vice President and his former rival in WWE.
Fans may remember their feud over the Intercontinental Championship in 2012, and in a statement of his own, Rhodes
revealed some secrets about what Wight’s character in AEW will be. Rhodes said that the former World
Champion will be quote “a damn babyface, I think,” which is seemingly poking fun at his many, MANY face/heel
turns throughout his WWE career. If you look at Wight’s start in WCW, where he debuted as a heel in the
Dungeon of Doom, then Show has had 36 combined face/heel turns, and ended his WWE tenure as a good guy,
helping the Viking Raiders and the Street Profits fend off the ninjas.
It appears that fans will be seeing Wight’s softer side when he makes his debut on AEW programming, but
for how long this face-run lasts is anybody’s guess.
Today’s news isn’t all about the former Big Show, as on NXT, a huge title match was announced for next week’s show.
It’s been confirmed that next week, the first-ever Women’s Dusty Classic w inners Dakota Kai and Raquel
Gonzalez will have a WWE Women’s Tag Title match against Shayna Baszler and Nia Jax.
If successful, Kai and Gonzalez will be the first NXT team to hold main-roster championship gold, but they have
a tall order ahead of them with the Irresistible Force and the Queen of Spades.
Speaking of titles, the NXT Women’s Championship will be on the line the week after, as Io Shirai will face
Tony Storm on March 10th. This match started when Shirai defeated NXT newcomer Zoey Stark
this week, only to be challenged by Storm, who pointed out that she wasn’t pinned in the Women’s title
triple threat at TakeOver: Vengeance Day. Though that title will be on the line,
the NXT Tag Title match between Oney Lorcan and Danny Burch against MSK is in doubt, after Wes
reported to be suffering from a ‘ broken hand’. The Dusty Cup winners the Grizzled
Young Veterans did the damage when they jumped Lee and Nash Carter during last night’s show, and time
will tell when MSK get their overdue title opportunity.
On a recent edition of AEW Dynamite, the 61-year-old Sting surprised fans by taking a Powerbomb from Brian Cage,
as the belief was that he’d only get physical in a cinematic sense. That’s clearly not the case, and ahead
of the Icon’s AEW in-ring debut at Revolution, Tony Khan spoke to PW Insider about Sting’s condition:
“He’s been fully cleared. He’s been training with Darby and sparring partners and he’s been fully cleared
to wrestle. In his training, one thing he’s done to get ready with his sparring partners is a powerbomb.
In terms of getting ready for this, I was more than fine with it.” It's certainly useful that Sting is
training to take a powerbomb, as we expect they’ll be of those when he and Darby Allin face Team Taz,
and it’s impressive that that WWE Hall of Famer can still take huge bumps and keep going, over five years since
his last professional match.
Back to NXT, and fans won’t be seeing Kyle O’Reilly for a while, after the beatdown he suffered last week
from Adam Cole. O’Reilly did so well selling last week’s attack that he had fans and his fellow
wrestlers concerned for his health, and WWE has now given an update, saying he’ll be out of action for 4-6 weeks.
On this week’s NXT, Adam Cole ended the Undisputed Era for good, and after a makeshift fake apology,
it’s safe to say that O’Reilly won’t be reconciling with the former NXT Champion.
On Twitter, O’Reilly made his views clear, saying “What a POS,” and with the next month or so on the shelf,
we’re sure that O’Reilly will be watching his former friend extremely closely.
Kacy Catanzaro is also on the shelf, after she was given a severe beating by Xia Li.
Reveiving medical attention in the ring, Catanzara was assisted out of the Capitol Wrestling Center, as the
announcers said there’s a feat that the former Ninja Warrior star suffered a broken leg.
We’ll have to see how things pan out when they conduct a more thorough medical evaluation, as yet another
NXT Superstar is out of commission.
Now, in 2007, the wrestling world was rocked by the final actions of Chris Benoit, and one person who was very
close to the situation was Hugo Savinovich. One of WWE’s Spanish-language
commentators, Savinovich had called countless Benoit matches, and this week, spoke about the immediate
fallout from the Benoit tragedy. Speaking to Sportskeeda, Savinovich broke his rule about not talking about
Benoit, and said that for 20 years, he had been a friend of Chris and his wife Nancy. He continued:
“He was a gentleman, but the moment that thing happened, I erased him from my life because I believe that in one
weekend, he destroyed not just lives, but he destroyed respect for our industry.”
It took the wrestling world many years to recover from the Benoit tragedy, and in many ways it still hasn’t, as Benoit’s
name has been for all intents and purposes, removed from WWE history.
This week, WWE confirmed a ton of new talent as part of their latest class of signings, and Parker Boudreaux
is one of the new stars. With his jacked physique and similar look to the Beast, many people have
compared Boudreaux to a mini Brock Lesnar, and Boudreaux himself isn’t hiding from the comparisons, calling
himself the Next Big Thing. On Twitter, Boudreaux commented on signing with WWE, saying that the
wrestling world will change forever, and calling himself #BigBoxOfficeBoudreaux.
We’ll have to see what Boudreaux ends up doing in WWE, as there’s plenty of people at the Performance Center
wanting to show what they can do, but with there being plenty of buzz around him, even before he signed,
the Lesnar lookalike is off to a great start in his WWE career.
More from AEW next, as next Sunday will be the company’s Revolution Pay Per View, and more matches were
confirmed this week. On last night’s edition of AEW Dynamite, it was announced that Kip Sabian and
Miro, accompanied by Penelope Ford will face Orange Cassidy and Chuck Taylor, after the latter team made a
Sabian and Ford’s wedding.
A casino tag team battle royale was also announced, and there’s been plenty of teams confirmed for the match.
With an AEW World Tag Team title opportunity on the line, the teams announced so far are John Silver
and Alex Reynolds, Stu Grayson and Evil Uno, Santana and Ortiz, The Butcher and the Blade, Top Flight,
Private Party and Bear Country. AEW Reolvution will also see Sting’s in-ring debut for AEW as well as an
exploding barbed wire seathmatch between AEW World Champion Kenny Omega and Jon Moxley,
and fans will have to wait until March 7th to see it all unfold.
We have NEWS from the WWE Champion The Miz, who shocked everyone last Sunday, by cashing in
his Money in the Bank contract at the Elimination Chamber Pay Per View.
Older fans will remember the A-Lister’s 160-day reign from 2010 to 2011, and in an interview with CBS Sports,
Miz spoke about the main difference between his two reigns on top. He explained:
“Now, I have the confidence… I always say my failures taught me more than all of my successes. Through all my
failures and successes, I’ve been able to learn and absorb what I needed to get back to where I am today. Now,
I am happy, confident, ready and well-prepared.” If Miz lacked confidence during his
first reign as WWE Champion, then he certainly could’ve fooled us, but with a WWE Championship match against
Bobby Lashley set for next week’s RAW, this newfound Confidence may not last for long against the Almighty.
We are finally ending with some news from TNA. Well-known figure Dixie Carter kept TNA afloat for several years.
That doesn’t mean everyone was a fan of her backstage. During The Beautiful Podcast, Velvet
Sky unloaded about her feelings regarding Dixie Carter. She didn’t go out of her way to be mean to Dixie,
but she wasn’t going to sugar coat things. Sky then said that Dixie Carter was a vile person and she was there
to supply the money. “There’s this huge misconception of her that she’s so sweet. I’m not hating
on her because people are like, ‘Well, if it wasn’t for her, there would be no TNA.’ Yea, good, she served her
purpose. She was the money person and I give her props for that. But, the way she treated people, I’m sorry
I’m real. I see through the bullsh*t. I’m not an a*s kisser. There were a lot of people in the company, male and
female, that did kiss her a*s. I was not one of them. You were not one of them. I did not give a f*ck if
she liked me or not. I was contracted under Jeff Jarrett. Jeff Jarrett signed my contract, not Dixie
Carter. I don’t have to do sh*t to appease her. I wasn’t a bitch to her. I didn’t go out of my way to be
a bitch to her. If we were face to face it would be like, ‘Yes, hello. How are you?’, out of respect
because I’m not a disrespectful person. She was just vile, that’s all.”
Dixie Carter hasn’t been a part of the pro wrestling business since Anthem took over,
lets just wait and watch how Dixie reacts!