In this WrestleTalk News, yet more confirmation that Sasha Banks and Naomi have been released
for realsies, Bryan Danielson’s injury is branded concerning and injury/return updates
aplenty.
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Happy Friday folks from this blighted isle, for those of you not in the know, our government
in the UK has decided to eat itself alive with a bunch of cabinet ministers, aides etcetera
tendering their resignations in order to tell the Prime Minister Boris Johnson to get the
f out.
I will not be divulging my true feelings about the Tories imploding on this wrestling news.
Because some of you commenters want to keep the politics out of wrestling, but what about
when the wrestling gets into politics, because while the rats were leaving the ship, one
person hopped aboard… for 36 hours.
Conservative MP Michelle Donlan was appointed education secretary by Boris Jonhson on July
6th before tendering her resignation a mere 36 hours into the role.
You would have thought she’d last longer as she’s got experience of hostile work
environments - she used to work for WWE as an International Marketing Communications
Manager.
She definitely attempted a quick heel then face turn this week.
Moving on to real wrasslin’ news now because people are still trying to work out what is
going on with Sasha Banks and Naomi - have they stayed or have they glowed?
Previously wrestling pundits from Wrestling Inc, WrestleVotes and PWInsider have all reported
that Banks specifically was let go weeks ago and the pair were removed from WWE’s internal
roster despite their profiles being active on WWE.com.
A new report from Fightful Select has provided more information saying the pair were removed
from internal rosters “weeks ago” despite no one being prompted to remove them from
the roster page on the website.However someone was told to edit a Sasha Banks sign in a photo
gallery.
Fightful's report goes on to say that many top WWE Superstars are of the belief that
the initial reports about the Boss being released are true and she is officially gone from the
company.
The creative team are also reportedly working on the assumption that neither Banks nor Naomi
will return, and there are no contingency plans in place should that situation change.
Adding a little extra something to this story is the fact that both Sasha Banks and Naomi
have updated their instagram profiles to remove the words WWE Superstar and replace them with
professional wrestler.
A clear sign they can’t be working for WWE any more, WWE doesn’t have any professional
wrestlers.
Speaking of WWE releases, there have been absolutely loads of them over the last couple
of years - and I think the things that get lost in the shuffle of news is that some people
had moved their entire lives to go and work for WWE only to be left high and dry by the
company in the midst of a pandemic.
One name who certainly feels like that happened to them is Cathy Corino, aka Alison Danger,
who joined the company as a coach in late 2021 before being released in January 2022.
She had previously lived in Las Vegas and moved with her daughter to Florida in order
to work at the PC, but her husband was transferred by his work to South Carolina, Corino said
she would have joined him there had it not been for the NXT job.
Speaking with Renee Paquette on The Sessions Podcast she explained her situation which
she says after 5 months, still sucks: “I feel like I got brought to Florida and
then left to die.
Because now my family’s split.
We’re struggling through that.
I’m still now five months out and nothing to show for it, and I still have no idea what
I’m gonna do.
This has been a rock bottom year.”
“it’s to the point where I’m like, is the universe telling me this is it?
This is done?
I chased the dream.
I got it for three months.
And I’m financially devastated.”
Corino’s release was credited to restructuring the budget by WWE.
And just goes to show how much they ask of people to go and work there, but they offer
no securities back.
Here’s hoping things starts looking up for Cathy.
And while WWE restructured its budgets five months ago it is now seemingly being forced
to restructure its board as a new SEC filing indicates that Connor Schell has resigned
his position on the WWE board of directors.
The former ESPN Executive was elected to the board in mid 2021.
The filing cites an “increased slate of responsibilities resulting from his new, expanded
role at the newly formed The North Road Company, a global, multi-genre content studio.”
as the main reason for his departure, which is “effective immediately” and notes that
there was no dispute or disagreement between Schell and the company.
Though the timing is interesting as the board is currently investigating allegations of
misconduct involving Vince McMahon and John Laurinaitis.So Schell won’t be seeing that
through.
Now, another week, another update about Bayley who has been teasing her return from ACL injury
for quite some time now.
PW Insider are now reporting that Batley was at the Performance Center in Orland earlier
this week - the report doesn’t clarify precisely why Bayley was visiting the PC but it does
seemingly go hand in hand with Fightful's story that Bayley is preparing for a return
to in-ring action and is actively in training for it.
Sticking around with WWE is Pat McAfee who had reportedly signed a multi-year contract
extension with the company.
WrestleVotes tweeted to say: “I’m told the Pat McAfee extension was signed a few
weeks back, to the thrill of everyone involved.
WWE knows exactly what they have in McAfee and were steadfast on making sure they kept
him around.
Good job on them.”
It was said that everyone involved was thrilled to have him sign an extension and damn right
too McAfee has been a much needed jolt of energy on Smackdown commentary
Hopping the barricade and heading over to AEW now, where things are not looking good
for some of the injured members of the roster.
Firstly Bryan Danielson who has been out of action for over a month after suffering a
concussion.
Dave Meltzer on Wrestling Observer Radio voiced his concerns:
“I’m very concerned with Danielson obviously, because when you have the number of concussions
he’s had, and he’s been out now for five weeks.
You start worrying at five weeks of a concussion – this may be a real bad situation.
I know in real life and everything like that he’s fine, he can function, he can do everything,
but as far as being cleared to wrestle, I don’t know anything, no-one knows – getting
cleared from a concussion can be any time.
There’s no timeframe.
But the fact that it’s been this long is very concerning.”
While is this is certainly speculation at this point about the status of Danielson’s
health and whether he is cleared to wrestle or not - the fact does remain that Bryan has
a history of head injuries and the longer he is out of action the more people will worry
about his future.
Also out of action is Adam Cole who suffered a torn labrum and was concussed at AEW x NJPW
Forbidden Door.
Meltzer also had an update for him saying that we shouldn’t expect him back in a ring
any time soon: “Adam Cole’s gonna be out for a while.
Punk – I don’t know when the timeframe is and I think that they’re trying not to
let you know, but I’m pretty sure he’ll be back… surgery for a broken foot, it’s
a couple of months, but it’s not like it’s six months.
So he probably won’t be that long.”
The WrestleTalk website guys did a bit of research with Dr Google who suggested it takes
four to six weeks to recover from a torn labrum, but concussions obviously have an ill-defined
timeframe for recovery.
You’re just better when you are.
But it’s not just in the ring where you can risk injury, if things get heated backstage,
well, back in the day you might have found Taker waiting in the locker room with his
gloves on…AND A BAG FULL OF KNIVES.
One person who quite famously had issues with management over in WWE was CM Punk, Road Dogg
on his podcast recounted a time he and Punk almost went to blows backstage.
“Me and CM Punk almost went to blows when I was a producer on a live event.
And we had to get called into Vince’s office at TV and make nice and shake hands.
So that’s, that’s what some of the like, I don’t know, I never I never thought Punk
was what Punk was.
But again, I know he is what he is.
I know he’s hugely successful in this industry and over.
I give him all the credit in the world, I just didn’t get it.
I see it now, I still don’t get it.
But I see it, so I know it’s true.”
Maybe Punk was just a little frustrated that he was clearly over with the crowd and yet
still no one believed in him.
Maybe I dunno.
Any way Road Dogg went on to say that after making friends he was the one who continued
to be childish: “the next time I saw him it was it was not yelling in my face.
But it was, I was yelling in his face, he was a lot more professional and calm and I
wasn’t at the time.”