In this WrestleTalk News, a WrestleMania debut might have been accidentally leaked, an update
on the status of Steve Austin ahead of WrestleMania, AEW pens a new deal with a new promotion and
more.
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Like this great new Keith Lee meme.
Keith Lee looks like the kind of guy who would say ‘I cordially accept your invitation’
after being asked if he wants to go get food.
At least, that’s what I hope he’d say when I ask him out for food.
Keith, do you want to go out and get some food sometime?
Anyway, here’s some news.
There’s a lot of uncertainty surrounding WrestleMania 38, with Cody Rhodes, the details
still being unsure as to what matches will open and main event shows, Cody Rhodes, whether
Steve Austin will be wrestling or just doing a segment, Cody Rhodes, and other surprises
in the works.
Also Cody Rhodes.
And there’s another WrestleMania debut that might have been accidentally spoiled by the
man himself.
Gable Steveson hasn’t been seen in WWE since SummerSlam, where he came out, showed off
his Olympic gold medal, and then left.
He was also drafted to Raw in the 2021 Draft, but of course nothing has come of that whatsoever
and he can probably just show up on SmackDown because it’s been too long since the Draft.
Steveson just won his second consecutive NCAA title, and announced his retirement from amateur
wrestling shortly afterwards, leaving his shoes on the mat and telling ESPN that he
was “done”, finishing with an 85-2 record in the sport.
With the transition to professional wrestling seemingly the 21-year old’s next move, my
god he was born in the year 2000, we also now might know when we’ll see Steveson,
as he announced in a since-deleted tweet: “Also, I will be at #WrestleMania..
It’s time!!”
Steveson would quickly delete this, presumably to keep his appearance a surprise, which is
a bit late now.
He could also just be in attendance in the crowd with WWE showing him on camera and saying
‘look it’s Gable Steveson’ and nothing more coming of it, but with his very confident
‘it’s time’ with two exclamation marks after it, it could be hinting at a greater
involvement in the show.
But where would he slot into the show of shows, and on what night?
We might not know that just now, but there might be some more information as to where
some of the other announced matches and segments might be fitting together on the two night
event.
Reddit user kermitt, who the Reddit mods say have provided enough evidence to be considered
a reliable insider source, has shone some light onto match order, with some very interesting
news about Night 1 specifically.
In their post to the SquaredCircle Reddit page, they mention that Cody Rhodes vs Seth
Rollins is happening on Night 2, Becky Lynch vs Bianca Belair is opening Night 1, and that
the Kevin Owens and Stone Cold segment will be closing Night 1.
Where this leaves Charlotte Flair vs Ronda Rousey, who knows, maybe they open Night 2,
but you would have thought with how much WWE bloody loves Ronda, that she’d be in the
main event of Night 1 at least, but seemingly not.
It also lends some credence to the theory that Stone Cold and Kevin Owens will end up
having a match, because I don’t think even WWE would main event a WrestleMania opening
night with a talk show segment.
Maybe they would.
Maybe they think just a Stunner is enough to end the show.
Speaking of which, if it is just a talkshow segment, then Stone Cold seems to be taking
it awfully seriously, as according to Dave Meltzer on the Sunday Night’s Main Event
podcast, Steve Austin is reportedly in “fantastic shape” ahead of his WrestleMania appearance.
Would be pretty weird to get into this great shape for a talk show.
But maybe he would.
Meltzer added that “there’s gonna be a fight, there’s gonna be a brawl, without
a doubt”, but would that be enough to main event the show, or does it have to be a match?
Would you be satisfied if it were just a brawl in a KO Show segment, or would you need a
match for the main event of Night 1?
Let me know in the comments, I’m genuinely curious.
But with this coming WrestleMania being the third in a row to take place over two nights,
it seems this trend is here to stay.
With the first of the three, WrestleMania 36, taking place with no fans, and last year’s
Mania taking place with limited capacity, it was unclear to WWE exactly how well tickets
would sell for a two-night WrestleMania.
But this year, there are no restrictions, and according to Dave Meltzer on the Sunday
Night Main Event podcast, this was the true test year to see if the two night formula
would work.
“I think was the first step to see will people buy and they bought in good enough
numbers.
Did it sell out first day, were the original numbers gigantic?
No, but it’s fine.
It’s a big stadium.
It wasn’t gonna be easy to sell it out two straight days…I talked to people there and
they certainly gave me the impression that the idea is 2 days going forward.”
A 2-day show definitely does beat a 1-day 7 hour show, but couldn’t you just…do
like a 3-4 hour show on one night?
Just give us the best of the best and make a stacked card, so it’s like, I don’t
know, special?
Because it sure doesn’t feel all that special, especially if you watch the weekly shows.
Mainly SmackDown.
The build to WrestleMania this year has been…let’s call it subpar.
And according to Fightful Select, this week’s SmackDown sure wasn’t helped along by some
last minute changes.
According to the report, Ridge Holland was originally set to do a promo on the show,
addressing Big E’s injury, which probably would have been considerably more uncomfortable
than what they actually did in showing his injury.
This of course was instead changed to a Kofi Kingston vs Ridge Holland singles match, where
Ridge Holland won because of course he did.
Also originally slated for the show was the six-man tag match we were supposed to get
the week prior of Drew McIntyre & The Viking Raiders vs Happy Corbin, Madcap Moss and Jinder
Mahal.
Instead Shanky replaced Moss in the match, for reasons unknown currently.
Probably so they could continue the tag team dissension between Corbin and Moss because
WWE just can’t help themselves.
But escaping SmackDown not long ago was Toni Storm, who quit WWE after reportedly suffering
from burnout.
After working a triple threat match with Sasha Banks and Charlotte Flair at a live event,
Storm flew herself home and quit the company, which meant she managed to avoid being stuck
in her feud with Charlotte Flair where she got pied in the face multiple times and looked
like a doofus.
Her next move is still up in the air as she’s still under 90-day non-compete, though only
for a little while longer as if it was a 90-day non-compete and not a 30-day, it would be
due to expire next week, but she has already made a boatload of money by launching an OnlyFans
over the weekend.
In the first hour after launching the page, Storm reportedly made over $10,000.
Crikey.
And after 11 hours, with over 1700 people subscribing at a rate of $19.99, quick maths,
that’s over $33,000 in a day.
Good for Toni.
Glad she’s landed on her feet.
Though with Britt Baker originally tweeting a picture of Storm after her release teasing
a match between the two, Toni Storm to AEW confirmed.
Someone else who left WWE in 2021, though this one wasn’t their choice, was former
NXT North American Champion Bronson Reed, who was released from the company in August
last year after seemingly being set for a main roster call-up after taking part in some
dark matches for the main roster.
Reed was on an upward swing on the then-black-and-gold brand, having won the North American title
off Johnny Gargano in a cage match, and was being positioned more heavily on the card.
But in a recent interview on the Callihan Uncensored podcast, Reed, now going by JONAH,
mentioned that he promised even more than that in NXT:
“...as for that company that shall not be named, I was destined to become the top guy
in the black and gold brand.
That’s what was supposed to happen.
That’s what was promised.
But as we all know, promises don’t get kept a lot in professional wrestling.”
Since leaving WWE, JOHAH has made himself a top guy in IMPACT Wrestling, so hopefully
that upward trajectory can continue for him.
Here’s some weird news.
Jonathan Gresham is now the champion of a promotion owned by Tony Khan, and the champion
of a promotion endorsed by WWE.
Wild.
At PROGRESS Chapter 130, Gresham became the first ever American PROGRESS world champion
by defeating Cara Noir who had held onto the title for 26 months.
But Gresham is also the Ring of Honor champion, so now he’s Ring of Honor and PROGRESS champion,
and he won wXw 16 Carat Gold, which is another promotion endorsed by WWE, and he’s wrestled
in IMPACT, who have worked with AEW…I think Jonathan Gresham is the Forbidden Door.
And also one of the best wrestlers on the planet and pretty please can we have a match
against Bryan Danielson please and thank you.
But it might not be Gresham we’ll be seeing in AEW before long, as on last week’s episode
there was a little tease for Bret Hart to be joining the promotion soon.
The Young Bucks made a little ‘best there is’ reference with FTR, who have just fired
their previous manager Tully Blanchard.
FTR of course being the biggest ultra fanboys of Bret Hart in existence, it would make a
lot of sense to have Hart come in and manage the duo.
With Hart already having some sort of history with AEW, being the one to unveil the AEW
World Title when it was originally revealed, there’s already a precedent for Hart to
appear for the company, and now there’s more speculation-a-mania with a recent photo
of Hart appearing on social media.
It’s no secret that Hart has suffered with health issues in the past, but going by this
recent photo posted by him on Twitter, he looks to have slimmed down quite a bit.
It would be unlike AEW to tease something and not follow through with it, so the Bucks’
choice of words seem to be hinting to Bret Hart to AEW confirmed.
And we may be seeing even more crossover in AEW, as AEW’s Vice President of Talent Relations
Christopher Daniels announced that AEW will be renewing their working relationship with
DDT Pro Wrestling, a Japanese promotion known for its wacky hijinks and comedy.
Don’t be fooled though, they have some fantastic technical wrestlers on their roster too.
As part of the deal, it was revealed that DDT wrestlers would be making appearances
on AEW TV, so give me more Maki Itoh please.
And Chris Brookes.
Love that man.
There wasn’t a start date announced for this crossover or a timeline of when we can
expect to see these DDT stars coming in, but you can assume it will probably be soon.
They best be bringing the Ironman Heavymetalweight Title with them too.
And before we go today, y’all should go subscribe to partsFUNknown, we’re really
looking to hit 200,000 subscribers before WrestleMania, and we’re currently just over
197,000, we’re so close.
There’s loads of awesome content over there, later today there’s going to be episode
2 of the Monday Night War between myself and Luke Owen as we play MyGM mode on WWE 2K22,
there’s really awesome retrospective essays, Tempest just did one on Ring of Honor, and
there’s of course Adam’s lists.
Check his most recent one out of WrestleMania matches that didn’t live up
to the hype.