Here's your News for September 9th 2020 AJ Styles To Announce His Retirement! New Retribution Member Identity Leaked! Heyman Is Back WWE News 2 00:00:03,036 --> 00:00:04,871 And your headlines for today include
Breaking News - Paul Heyman Back Into WWE Creative Side!
WWE Rehires Previously Released NXT Ring Announcer!
In a Funny Way, Retribution Members Accidentally Revealed Who They Are!
Surprising Original Plans For Keith Lee Is Revealed!
AJ Styles To Reveal His Retirement Plans On This Friday Night Smackdown!
Former WWE Superstar Is Now A Head Booker Of Televised Indie Company!
Tessa Blanchard set for first match since leaving IMPACT!
Terrible News Concerning Chris Jericho; Fozzy Played Concert Now Associated With Over 250,000 New
COCID 08 Cases And More!
We’re kicking off with news from Paul Heyman, who recently returned to WWE TV as Roman Reigns’ Chief
Counsel, with Reigns now called the Tribal King, and things have gone smoothly for the new Universal
Champion. It's previously been reported that Heyman has a lot of input into
Reigns' storylines, and Vince McMahon doesn't let just anyone have so much input over the product.
Ringside News are reporting that Heyman was the designers of most of all Brock Lesnar storylines and
matches, which means Heyman has been a creative force in WWE for the past eight years,
and now it's the same story backstage for his new client. A tenured writer close to the situation
also said that McMahon respects Heyman's creativity, something that Vince mentioned during a recent
quarterly investors call, as this wasn't just a line to shareholders.
That being said, Heyman's influence isn't as part of the creative team, but the fact that Vince McMahon would
allow someone to contribute so much over the years, shows just how much the Boss respects
Heyman’s ideas. Nxt news now, as after the company released Josiah Williams in April,
the announcer is seemingly back. On Twitter, Williams posted ‘God always has a plan’, with the hashtag#
WWENXT and a picture of him on the NXT stage, and with the Connor’s Cure logo behind him, it seems this
is a recent photo. WWE confirmed the news by adding Josiah back to the NXT roster page
as a ring announcer, and we at Slat Rock would like to add to the throngs of well-wishers, congratulating
Williams for another golden opportunity in NXT.
RAW now, and fans saw a rare promo from Retribution, as five members stood backstage, with two members
speaking about taking over WWE. Whilst the group speak with altered voices, one Reddit user was able to
remove the filter, and the two who spoke sounded a lot like NXT’s Mercedes Martinez, and Dominik
Dijakovic. Both Martinez and Dijakovic have been rumoured to be part
of Retribution once they are revealed, and though it’s been reported that the members fans are seeing now won’t
necessarily be the ones revealed, it looks like these two will be called-up to the main roster as part of
Retribution. AN image of the group was also lightened up, giving fans a clearer
look at who’s under the masks, and since there was only five, it seems the WWE is still changing things around.
One person fans spotted was Mojo Rawley, and on Wrestling Observer Radio, Dave Meltzer confirmed that
Rawley was stood in the back of the group, though didn’t speak.
We’ve still got no idea about when the group will be unmasked, but with Martinez and Dijakovic seemingly
being used this week, it looks like the time for unmasking Retribution may be close at hand.
Over to NXT now, which saw Finn Balor win his second NXT Title last night, defeating Adam Cole,
after the pair tied in the fatal-four-way -Iron-Man match last week. Soon after Balor’s historic victory this
week, NXT’s Senior Producer Triple H weighed in, congratulating the new champion,
and said that through different eras and a changing brand, the Irishman is NXT.
Balor’s second reign makes him the third man to win the title twice, after Samoa Joe and Shinsuke Nakamura,
and after an impressive 292 days as champion from 2015-2016, we’ll have to see where Balor’s title reign goes
from here. From one Bullet Club alumni to another now, as AJ Styles has
become one of WWE’s biggest names, but has spoken about the chances of him retiring.
On his Twitch stream, the Phenomenal One said he’s ready to retire to spend more time with his
family, and spoke about how the ongoing global situation has affected him. He said:
“I want to retire. I really do. I'm going to give you a breakdown of what's going on this Friday. I'm going to
leave - and listen, it could be a lot worse, but with everything going on with the cocid and what not,
I've gotten to see my kids' practices. That's really cool for me. My son's games for varsity football are
on Friday nights. I perform on Friday nights. This Friday isn't one of those. For whatever reason, they moved
it to Saturday. He's going to have a Saturday football game and I'm going to get to see it.”
Styles added that his current contract will be his last, and given that he also recently said he wants to face Triple H
in the Game’s last match, perhaps the two former World Champions could be walking off into the sunset
simultaneously. Back to the gold brand, and after a huge Tuesday show, three big
matches have been announced for next week.
With NXT once again going against AEW Dynamite, next week’s show will see Breezango defend their NXT
Tag Team titles against Imperium, whilst Io Shirai will face Shotzi Blackheart.
Shotzi got a good look at Shirai’s NXT Women’s title, which she held this week, before not wanting to give it
back to the rightful Champion. Damian Preist will also have his first North American title defence against
Timothy Thatcher, as the company are stacking their show as they prepare to once again go head-to-head
with Dynamite. Now, Dave Meltzer recently took some heavy fire from Miro, as the Wrestling
Observer Newsletter writer was accused of only getting information from quote “stooges” in WWE’s offices,
and now former Superstar Ryback has weighed in.
Taking a direct shot at Meltzer, Ryback didn’t mince his words in his tweet against Meltzer,
saying I firmly believe the world would be a better place without Dave Meltzer.
He is the most dangerous kind of Mark there is and puts out lies for profit, creating hate for people he
he dislikes. He makes money off other diseased marks, but does so in a horrible way.
At this time, Ryback hasn’t taken his harsh words down, and Meltzer hasn’t responded, though many
fans have, and we very much doubt that Miro and Ryback are the only wrestlers who feel this way about
the veteran reporter. More news from former Superstars next, as Damien Sandow has ended
up back in wrestling, though not in the ring.
According to PW Insider, Sandow is now the head booker of Championship Wrestling from
Hollywood, which returned to TV with new programming this past weekend.
The promotion has a national deal to air on YouToo America and the Z-Channel, and is also available
in other markets for syndication. These new episodes were taped without a crowd due to the ongoing
situation, and PW Insider reported: The episodes were taped in an empty arena format and were the
first episodes under new booker Aron Stevens aka the former Damian Sandow in WWE.
The episode was more of a traditional, episodic style format with storyline vignettes and outside of the ring
interviews conducted by Jon Roberts helping to move storylines forward. Given that the show used to have lots
of matches with some promos, but no real weak-to-weak storylines, Sandow is changing up the booking style
as head booker, as he plans to show matches on a weekly basis that tell a larger story in context.
We’ll have to see how his influence on the company works out, but its clear he’s come in with some big
new ideas. We’ve got Tessa Blanchard news next, as after being stripped of the
Impact World title in July and leaving the company, her first match since March has been announced.
As part of Warrior Wrestling in Chicago, Blanchard will be part of Night of their Stadium Series,
where she’ll defend her Warrior Wrestling’s Women’s Championship against number-one contender Kylie
Raes, who’s also the contender for the Impact Knokouts title. Tessa will be joined by her husband
Daga on the night, and with Warrior Wrestling reportedly being the promotion that inspired Tony Khan
for how to handle bringing fans back, Blanchard and Raes are expected to have a stellar main event on
September 12th, with the show available on Fite TV. Back to WWE now, and on RAW,
Ivar’s signature dive went badly, and he threw up the X-sign to show he was injured.
The official report from WWE is that Ivar suffered a cervical injury, but is expected to make a full recovery,
and on Twitter, the Viking Raider thanked fans for reaching out to him with love and support.
Ivar didn’t specify how long he’ll be out for, but it’s clear he’s got a ton of support behind him, and they’ll be
plenty of folks cheering him when he returns to the ThunderDome.
Over to AEW now, as Chris Jericho and Fozzy played a few dates last month, including at Sturgi’s
motorcycle rally, and though they weren’t the only performers there, they got a lot of attention from
wrestling fans for those shows. Whilst Fozzy took all necessary precautions prior to the shows
and to protect themselves, photos emerged online of people not wearng masks or social distances, though
Jericho was pested by AEW and permitted to work All Out last week.
Now, new data has revealed that the rally Fozzy played has contributed to over 250,000 new cases in the U.S.
with Andrew Friedson, a health economist from the University of Colorado Denver, noting that this
rally makes up roughly 19% of all cases between August 2nd and September 2nd.
Clearly, the current situation which swept the U.S. in Match isn’t over yet, and hopefully a vaccine or some
kind of treatment will be found soon, but until that comes, there’s a reason why so many people will continue to
ask everyone to wear a mask. Over to RAW, and after a multi- segment worked shoot with Aleister
Black, Owens made his frustrations known on RAW Talk.
On the post-RAW show, Owens spoke about being overlooked and jumped on the desk, saying it’s high-time for
a change. Owens asked how long he needed to be quote “stomped, beaten down,
spat on”, until he’s tired of it, and though he admitted to doing terrible things in his career, argued that
WWE is giving him no-name talent, trying to make a name off him.
Adding that he still plans of giving Dabba-Kato hell, it seems like Owens is one of many frustrated Superstars,
and with Kato working hard in the Performance Center for years, his recent call-up is no doubt a big
opportunity for him, especially if he’s going to feud with the former Universal Champion.
Back to NXT now, and whilst the Cream defeated Ashante Adonis on this week’s Tuesday show, in a short
match that put him over, fans weren’t buying it. Once again, calls for WWE to fire the
former North American Champion popped up over social media, after it was cleaimed he sent in sapprociate
images to pinors, and whilst cream admitted the pictures are of him, he said they were sent from his official
Instagram account without his consent. WWE said that their investigation
found nothing, though one accuser claims the company never contacted him for their investigation,
and it seems WWE will have to get used to this online campaign to fire the former North American Champion.
We’ve got Keith Lee news now, and after defeating Randy Orton at Payback, the Limitless One has been
booked strong on AW, and could be in store for some big things. According to Tom Colohue, a feud
against Seth Rollins was in the original plans for the Limitless, as well as Championship gold, as he
reported: ''The original plan was to have Seth Rollins feud with Keith Lee for a month,
and Lee would later move into the United States Championship picture. Colohue also noted that the plan may
be unlikely now that Rey Mysterio has been injured.'' In such a short amount of time, Lee
has become one of RAW’s most prominent stars, and with reports of Vince McMahon seeing big things in
him, and a rumoured heel turn, we’ll just have to wait and see where the Limitless One’s career goes from here.
And finally today we’ve got details of Alexa Bliss’s new podcast, ‘Uncool’, which is set to debut on September
22nd. Following up from Corey Graves’ After the Bell and New Day’s: Feel
The Power, Bliss plans to venture into an array of topics, and though she doesn’t promise to be cool,
that should be assumed given the title. WWE are really given the show the
spotlight, as they pinned the announcement tweet to the top of their page, and with Bliss not seeming
like herself on TV in recent weeks due to her storyline with Bray Wyatt, we’ll have to see if this new persona
translates to her brand-new podcast.