Here's your wrestling news for October 14th 2021
And your headlines for today include
00:43 AEW Full Gear Main-Event Confirmed. Tony Khan Leaks Card And Huge Title Change!
04:11 WWE Hall Of Famer’s Son To Debut In NXT Very Soon !
04:59 Real Reason Why AEW Won’t Sign Bray Wyatt Revealed !
07:43 “Thank You For Being There” WWE Referee On Being Praised By Vince Mcmahon !
Stephanie Mcmahon Claims WWE Listens To Their Audience And Gives Them What They Want !
10:32 “That’s Where I Dropped The Ball,” WWE Legend Explains Why His World Title Reign Disappointed Fans And more !
We’re kicking off today with AEW, as the main event for next month’s Full Gear Pay Per View has now been confirmed.
On the My Mom’s Basement podcast, Tony Khan confirmed that next month’s Pay Per View will see AEW World Champion Kenny Omega defen
against Hangman Adam Page, in what will be Page’s cash-in after winning the Casino Ladder match.
Before this announcement, it’d been rumoured that Bryan Danielson would challenge Omega in the main event, as the pair have been
teasing a feud ever since the former WWE World Champion joined AEW. That match may happen down the line, but it won’t
be at Full Gear, as after what fans have been calling a very slow building feud, Page could finally have his moment as AEW World Champion
on November 13th.
The AEW World Title match is the only match Khan deliberately revealed during his appearance on the podcast, but now the rest of the card may
may have also been leaked. On Twitter, a user snagged a shot of Khan from a Forbes video, in which he seems to be holding a
notebook with the card for this November’s event. It’s hard to make out all the matches, but the card does appear to have Jade Vs. Rosa, MJF
Vs Darby Allin, and Kenny Omega vs Hangman, and it’s very interesting that Page’s name has been circled.
There’s always the chance that this could be a plant from Khan himself to get fans talking, but it’s worth mentioning that these matches are all
part of feuds that are currently ongoing on-screen. Of course there’ll be more than three matches at Full Gear, and we’re sure they’ll be plenty
of news and speculation on the road to the show, but fans are already aware of some matches, and possibly a huge title change already.
Full Gear will be the latest in a long line of Pay Per Views by the company, who’s library of content continues to grow each and every week.
While WWE has it’s very own Network where fans can relive classic shows, matches and moments, that isn’t the case for AEW, but that will change
soon enough. Sitting down with Brandon F. Walker for his ‘Rasslin’ podcast, Tony Khan was asked AEW’s
library, and when will a streaming service like the WWE Network be available for AEW fans. He responded:
I’m talking to great people about WarnerMedia and AEW partnering. I think there’s a great opportunity as I work with one of the great media companies
in the world, and they have a lot of great ideas. So hopefully we can make a solution for the fans, because believe me, I get asked that question every day.
Between over 100 episodes of Dynamite, a dozen or so Pay Per Views and Rampage adding more hours of content every week, AEW has amassed
huge library, and if Khan gets his way, it won’t be long until a streaming service specifically catered to AEW programming becomes a reality.
On the latest episode of NXT 2.0, Carmelo Hayes cashed in his guaranteed title shot from winning the 2021 Breakout Tournament, defeating Isaiah
Isaiah Scott to become the new North American Champion. 2021 is definitely proving to be Hayes year, and
according to Fightful, the new champion has impressed several people of influence backstage and at the Performance Center.
More specifically, Shawn Michaels is said to be 100% on board with Hayes, and considers the 2021 Breakout start as a personal project of his.
Shawn’s last project in NXT was Adam Cole, which led to the AEW star becoming an NXT Triple Crown Champion, the longest reigning NXT Champion
and the leader of the gold brand for years. Time will tell if Hayes has the same success as the newest project of Shawn Michaels, but
with Mr. WrestleMania involved, things are looking up for the brand new North American Champion
The latest episode of NXT 2.0 also saw a vignette air for a brand new Superstar, who appeared in shadows, and teased that he will be coming
soon to the colourful brand. In the video, the new name introduced himself as Solo Sikoa, and though fans may not know him,
they know his family. It turns out that Sikoa is Joseph Fatu, the son of WWE Hall of Famer Rikishi, and therefore the
the younger brother to SmackDown Tag Team Champions The Usos. The cousin of Universal Champion Roman Reigns,
Sikoa signed with WWE in August, and the company haven’t waited long in bringing the College football star to TV.
With the Bloodline being one of wrestling’s most \interesting stables, he may eventually join his family on SmackDown, but fans can expect Solo Sikoa
on NXT 2.0 very soon.
In July this year, WWE shockingly released Bray Wyatt, and since then, fans have speculated on where he’ll go next, with AEW being the favourite
home for the Fiend for many fans. Earlier this week, we reported that Tony Khan hasn’t been in talks with the former Universal
Champion, and it now appears that AEW are far from interested in the ex-Superstar. That’s according to Bryan Alverez, who spoke
about Wyatt on the latest edition of Wrestling Observer Live, and explained why the former Superstar almost certainly isn’t heading to AEW.
Alverez explained that when he’s asked his sources, he was told that AEW has shown little interest in Wyatt, or paying what will surely be a
high price for the massively popular former Fiend. This is especially true now, as after the signings of Adam Cole, CM Punk and Bryan
Danielson, AEW will want to hold off signing any more very expensive names for the time being.
If Wyatt did join AEW, there’s no shortage of dream matches he could have, but between his h igh-price, AEW’s reported lack of interest, and the
reports that Impact are also making a play for him, don’t expect to see Bray on Dynamite or Rampage.
Bray Wyatt may not be coming to AEW, but one person who’s already there is Scorpio Sky, and we’ll be seeing a lot more of the forme
World Tag Team Champion in the years to come. During All Out, commentary noted that Sky had signed a new deal, and when interviewed
by Mike Johnson of PW Insider, the Man of the Year has signed a five-year contract extension with the company.
On this Saturday’s Dynamite, Sky and Ethan Page will team with Junior Dos Santos against the Inner Circle, and win, lose or draw, Scorpio Sky is sticking
with AEW for the foreseeable future.
Back to WWE, as 2021 has been the year of Damian Priest, who had a great showing at the Royal Rumble, before teaming with Bad Bunny at WrestleMania 37.
Defeating the Miz and John Morrison, this Mania match is considered one of the best celebrity- guest matches ever, but the Archer of Infamy
almost didn’t make it to the biggest match of his career. Speaking to Superluchas.com, Priest explained his road to WrestleMania, and how there
to WrestleMania, and how there were originally plans for someone else to take his place as Bad Bunny’s partner. He said:
"On Raw, they told me that maybe they were going to change Bad Bunny’s partner. But one of my bosses, Triple H, said that he absolutely does not.
And then Bad Bunny, he told them himself that he wanted to work with me. That was great.” Priest didn’t explain who would’ve replaced him
had WWE changed the plans, but with the company’s history of keeping creative plans secret, even from it’s roster, it’s likely that they
wouldn’t have told him any possible replacements. Thankfully, Priest got his chance to shine at WrestleMania, and would go on to win the United States
Championship at Summerslam, and his wave of momentum shows no signs of slowing down at all.
Now, in 2007, Triple H and Shawn Michaels faced Rated RKO at New Year’s Revolution, In a match that’d go horribly wrong.
During the match, the Game would suffer his second torn quad, six years after his first, and the match was quickly called off.
One man at the scene that night was Marty Elias, who officiated the match, and in a sit down interview with Dr Chris Featherstone of Sportskeeda,
explained how Vince McMahon praised his efforts after the match went wrong and his son-in-law got hurt.. He explained:
After the match, we called it a no-contest and all that, we got to the back. Vince pulled me aside and he told me straight up he goes, ‘Thank you
for being out there and for being where you were because you really helped Paul (Triple H) and thank you for being out there and for taking care of him.
Elias added that typically, McMahon never gave him feedback unless he was nitpicking at something, which meant this bit of praise mean a lot for
the referee, who told Vince that he was simply doing his job. On-screen referees are meant to officiate the
rules and count falls, but they are also there to protect the wrestlers when they can, something that WWE’s Chairman was very appreciate of in
in January 2007.
Back to the present, and in recent weeks, the WWE’s Women’s division has been struggling for screen time, with less than 10 minutes being allocated to
the entire first round of the Queen’s Crown Tournament. It’s been six years since Stephanie McMahon
announced the women’s revolution in WWE, and despite this lack of screen time lately, the WWE’s Chief Brand Officer is still convinced
that the company is all about female empowerment. Speaking to Sport Business Journal’s World Congress of Sports, McMahon spoke about the role
fans have played in the evolution of women’s wrestling, saying: If you listen to your audience, they can impact
your brand in such positive ways. Give them the power, empower your audience… Listen to your fans, give them what they want, and it’ll work
McMahon may say that WWE listens to it’s fans, but there’s plenty of fans who think differently, as the past year of mass releases, storylines that
go nowhere and random tag team breakups has certainly turned fans off the current product. With the arrival of AEW, and the past year of shaky
booking, countless fans have walked away from WWE, believing that their voices don’t matter, but as far as Stephanie McMahon
believes, her father’s company is always listening to what the crowd have to say
Over to MLW, as former IWGP World Heavyweight Champion will make his debut for the promotion later this year, and his first appearance has
been confirmed. Last night, it was revealed that O’Spreay will make his live debut at a December event, when
MLW returns to the Melrose Ballroom in New York City. There’s still no word on who O’Spreay will be
facing, but it could very well be Enzo Amore, who was teased during last night’s broadcast, and whoever O’Spreay faces, we’re sure it’ll
be a big deal when the British wrestler steps foot in the MLW ring.
And we’re ending today with Rey Mysterio won the Royal Rumble in January 2006, in what would be a monumental year for the high-flyer.
Despite the consensus that Rey’s push only came because of Eddie Guerrero’s tragic death the prior year, Rey would go on to win the World Heavyweight
Championship at WrestleMania 22, but his reign was underwhelming. From being crushed by the likes of Mark Henry,
the Great Khali and Finley, to having a No-Contest finish at ECW One Night Stand, Rey may have had the worst World title reign in
history, and during an appearance on the Kurt Angle show, the former World Champion explained what went wrong:
“I never took the time to work on what I needed to work on in order to back that title up and that was working on my promos or character
development. In lucha, you were never taught that part of this industry. I think that’s where I dropped the ball, tremendously, on not being
able to backup having the title and being able to cut promos. I’ve never really been a promo guy.” Losing the title in just 112 days to King Booker,
Rey’s title reign was a let-down for his long-time fans, and though he’d go on to win two more world titles in WWE, his first, and longest
reign, could’ve been much so more according to the man himself.