In this WrestleTalk News, Johnny Gargano makes his first appearance post WWE in a surprising
place, WWE are trying to win Sasha Banks and Naomi back and so much more.
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As AEW continues to hoover up WWE releases and leavers, there are only a few names in
the wrestlesphere that we’re still waiting to see find a new home.
One name with a lot of intrigue around him is Johnny Gargano, where’s Gar-gonna-go
has become an even more prevalent question now that WWE creative has landed in the hands
of Triple H. But Johnny’s first major post NXT appearance
has actually come from a surprising place - Impact.
Johnny Wrestling popped up out of nowhere on Thursday’s Impact Wrestling for a cameo
spot.
Johnny appeared in a video heaping praise on Alex Shelley, an old friend and mentor
of his, who has earned his first ever shot at the Impact World a championship at Emergence
on Friday, August 12th.
Shelley earned the opportunity by beating Motor City Machine Guns partner Chris Sabin
and challenges Josh Alexander at the event.
Gargano did his best to out Shelley over saying: “In my opinion, Alex Shelley is one of the
most underrated, most influential wrestlers of this generation.
There are a lot of guys on television currently that would not be in the position they’re
in without the influence of Alex Shelley.”
Now obviously whenever something like this happens the rumour mill begins a-churning
and people immediately started to wonder if Johnny Impact could become a thing, hang on
we’ve already had one of those, Johnny Impact Wrestling.
Fightful Select managed to confirm that Johnny had done the spot as a favour to his friend
and was not in talks with Impact about signing there.
Where Gargano ends up is still a hotly debated subject as he’s mostly been laying low since
leaving NXT in December and the birth of his son Quill.
One of the other major mysteries in wrestling rosters is what is happening with Sasha Banks
and Naomi following their now infamous walk out.
The pair disappeared from WWE TV after walking out of Raw on May 16th, we’re verbally called
out in commentary on Smackdown for letting down the WWE Universe and have since reportedly
been removed from the internal roster at the company.
But there has also been a full on changing of the guard at the top of the company since
then and now according to secret spiller Dave Meltzer the new leadership of Stephanie McMahon,
Nick Khan and Triple H are looking to reconcile with the former Women’s Tag Team Champions.
Speaking on the Sports Illustrated Media Podcats He said: “It’s kind of up in the air.
I mean, they’re gone.
The last I heard was that there would be attempts made to reconcile, especially with Vince gone.
So, it’s up in the air.
I don’t think there’s anything definite just yet.”
According to several reports, both Banks and Naomi’s contracts were imminently set to
expire prior to their walkout.
While Naomi was negotiating a new deal shortly before her exit, Banks’ contract is set
to expire sometime later this year, according to former WWE writer Kazeem Famuyide.
Weirdly earlier this month, WWE sent out a survey seeking fan opinion on its current
crop of talent.
To the surprise of many, the names of Banks and Naomi were listed in the survey, despite
those reports that both women have been removed from the company’s internal roster.
Banks has mostly been laying low since her supposed release, but will make her first
non-WWE public appearance at next weekend’s Chicago Comic & Entertainment Expo C2E2 next
weekend.
According to Fightful Select, The Boss is commanding an asking price of $30,000 per
appearance, and she’s currently accepting only non-wrestling bookings through 2022.
It’s unknown if Banks is unable to make wrestling-related appearances this year due
to
a contractual obligation.
Continuing on with Sasha Banks and Naomi adjacent news, yesterday we told you about CM Punk’s
views on the situation after he made some comments at San Diego Comic Con pointing out
that while people were quick to call out the two women for walking out, the same treatment
was not given to Brock Lesnar despite him seemingly threatening to do something similar
at last week’s Smackdown.
Now Road Dogg Brian James has responded to Punk’s response with a response while guesting
on Busted Open Radio.
During the segment he said that the comparison was not fair and claimed that Punk was trying
to make WWE look like the devil, he said: “Only in WWE, do you get to go, ‘No, I
don’t like that’ and walk away, I’m including Brock in that as well.
Like I know he came back.
I don’t know what conversation was held, but you know.
I also imagine everyone on social media jumping right to — CM Punk as well, let me throw
his name in there to start some social media buzz.
He jumped right to, ‘Oh how come they didn’t do the same to Brock Lesnar like they did
to Sasha and Naomi.’
I think it was a totally different — it’s apples and oranges, you can’t compare the
two.
It’s not fair to compare the two.
Anything to make the WWE the devil, especially on Twitter.
He then called bringing it up “virtue signaling” Road Dogg also made an interesting pitch for
work during his time on the show, as he admitted to pretty much begging to work with AEW.
Rumor has it that Billy Gunn is trying to get him a job behind the scenes there.
He said: “I’m not retired, I’m unemployed...and I see things on Tony Khan’s TV show that
appall me.
I could help with that.
I have been begging him for a job on every platform I can, and I want to know the reason
why he won’t hire me.”
Your show has appalled me, hire me, is an interesting route to take, but you wouldn’t
want to be caught virtue signaling I guess.
My advice is I’ve got two words for ya Dogg, be nice.
But while the Dogg remains shut out in the yard, things aren’t perfectly peachy inside
the house that Tony Khan built as a mini-trend took over the AEW Twitter-verse with stars
seemingly airing their grievances about the amount of TV time they are getting within
the absolutely stacked company.
It began with Ethan page tweeting a match graphic and “Hey look … Ethan Page actually
gets TV time this week!
Nice change of pace at work if u ask me.
Keep up the great work @AEW 👍Can’t wait to do this again in 5 weeks.”
A harsh but fair tweet as AEW’s roster depth has been criticized of late for giving limited
TV time to some of the AEW originals.
Brian Cage also seemed aggrieved by the amount of wrestling he’s getting to do, saying:
“What's heartbreaking, is doing what you love, but not doing what you love.”
Which Sonny Kiss agreed with, adding: “Sure is.”
Critics have noted that it does seem that some of AEW’s focus is letting the ex-WWE
guys who have joined the roster rapidly float to the top, but there has still been huge
investment in ‘homegrown’ AEW talent like Jungle Boy, Ricky Starks, Powerhouse Hobbs,
Daniel Garcia and Darby Allin.
I think the hope will be that when Ring of Honor gets weekly TV, which is in talks reportedly,
there will be enough screen time for everyone to get more time in the spotlight.
But it is a shame that the sheer growth of the roster has left some people who have been
there since the beginning feeling left out in the cold.
But the drama is also within Ring of Honor, because shortly after dropping the ROH World
Championship to Claudio Castagnoli at last weekend’s Death Before Dishonor it was reported
that Jonathan Gresham had requested his release from AEW and ROH - reports also noted that
he had apparently felt disrespected over a lack of communication from Tony Khan and cussed
him out in a meeting.
Fightful Select have been doing some digging and found out new deets on the sitch.
They reported that even though both sides confirmed things got heated between Gresham
and Khan, it doesn’t appear that a bridge was burned.
In fact, the AEW side respected Gresham’s professionalism in going through with the
match despite his unhappiness.
Interesting while Tony Khan has previously noted that he would release talent from their
contracts if they do make such a request Fightful were not able to confirm that Gresham had
actually been let out of his contract.
This might be because they’ve tried to keep him in the fold or are still coming to terms
on the release.
Wait and see.
Back across the divide to WWE now and Alexa Bliss has been having a rough old time of
it since returning to screens - she has been to therapy, lost the dark Alexa character,
missed Mania, got new theme music and essentially had very little to do from week to week.
This is obviously frustrating for Bliss who was one of the highlights of the women’s
division before taking time out to get married seemingly killed her momentum.
Speaking with the Metro in the UK she said: “They always say ‘Be yourself but turned
up’, but for me in life – I like me.
For TV, I’m not entertaining, I know that!
I’m boring!”
“Now I’m in this limbo of, I don’t really now where I’m going with my character yet...So
now, it’s finding where I fit, what character is needed for the show.
Right now, I’m just me and I don’t like that for TV.
I like me for me outside in life, but for TV – Lexi is not entertaining.”
Here’s hoping that with new creative control under Triple H things will turn a corner.
Hopefully the new creative will also give us some progress in some other aspects of
the programming that have just gone unresolved - like where in the hell is Edge.
After being unceremoniously kicked out of Judgment Day by Finn Balor, the Rated R Superstar
has been in absentia but video packages hyping his return have been playing since Money in
the Bank last month.
Many thought that this would lead to a return at Madison Square Garden this week, setting
up a bout against Balor for SummerSlam tomorrow.
Then it transpired that WWE reportedly canceled travel for Edge on Monday afternoon and he
did not return on the show, leading to many speculating that he could make his return
at SummerSlam instead.
PWInsider provided an update on Edge’s status, noting that both Edge and Beth Phoenix were
slated for Raw in MSG, but the reported plans changed shortly after Vince McMahon’s exit.
The original plans had the pair slated for SummerSlam weekend, with there being no word
on whether that is still happening, or if they are holding off until after.
But it is worth noting that Seth Rollins is out an opponent for
the show, so maybe something could be done there?