Here's your wrestling news for September 21st, 2022.
And we're kicking off today with WWE and for the past week,
the WWE universe has been fixated on the white rabbit.
The company's latest mystery that audiences have
been trying to solve between the eerie white
rabbit music and red lighting used at live events.
Many believed.
This is the long awaited return of bray Wyatt,
and it's not just the fans who think that.
When Wrestle votes spoke to a source who works in WWE they said
that they believed it is indeed Wyatt, but can't say for certain
as that information is being withheld from everyone asked to source
about the white rabbit deal source said that while he suspects
it's bray Wyatt, he said it's being withheld from everyone.
WWE has been able to draw significant interest
from this without it being a TV storyline.
And they'd like to keep it as quiet as possible.
WWE has been able to get the interest of fans in a very efficient
way with just playing some music and shining a spotlight.
As the wrestling world, talking, whatever WWE has planned,
it managed to hook a ton of fans all without a single
wrestler, having to cut a promo or take a bump over to NXT.
Now is this week's show came seven days after solo Sikoa won
the north American title, but his reign has already come to an.
Last night, the street champion handed over the strap to Sean Michaels
and Sikoa reacted on Twitter saying he made the title more valuable in
a week than any other title reign, Sikoa addressed his title defense
on last week's SmackDown and said, there's always more gold out there.
And he has his eyes set on it already on Twitter.
Fans had a mixed response to the decision with some
thinking it's wrong for Sikoa's first title reign to
end just one week later, without him even being Pined.
Some, however, love the idea.
Praising Sean Michaels, who ruled that's win wasn't
legitimate as fans hadn't voted for him to be in the match
where he became Champion's reign as champion may have
already ended, but he has a bright future ahead of him.
So don't be surprised to see the latest
bloodline member with a championship.
Soon enough, the NXT north American championship has officially
been vacated, but the title won't stay without an owner for long.
During NXT, it was confirmed that a five man leder
match will determine the next champion, which
will take place at Halloween havoc next month.
Carmelo Hayes automatically qualified last night, receiving
a buy since he's a two time former NXT champion while Oro
Mensah earned his spot with a win over Grayson Waller Waller
seemed to have the match Won until Apollo cruise appeared out
of nowhere at ringside distracting, Grayson, and giving Mensa
the opportunity to hit his big spinning heel KICK for the win.
Mensa is a new name in NXT, but worked with NXT UK
under the name Oliver Carter, and is one of the very
few NXT UK stars not to be released in the coming weeks.
Three more superstars will qualify for the
lader match scheduled for Halloween havoc.
And time will tell who holds the north American championship next.
AEW news.
Now, as Sammy Guevara has made a name for himself as
part of the promotion first as part of the inner circle
and later as part of the Jericho appreciation society.
But his time in the company may be ending last Wednesday.
The former TNT champion lost his AEW world title tournament
match to John Moxley and his tease taking a break from the
promotion, speaking on his vlog, the Spanish God spoke about
his run in AEW so far and brought up another three time.
Former TNT champion.
Maybe I should go away.
Maybe this is it for me.
I had a nice ride and maybe I need to go away to get
y'alls to appreciate me cuz that's what you guys do.
That's what you did to Cody while he was in AEW you hated him.
And when he went to WWE and you guys love him now
Guevara later clarified that he would still keep trying
in AEW and we'll face Eddie Kingston later this week.
Whether this is just for show or referencing some
real life issues with AEW that's difficult to say
for sure, but Sammy Guevara could be the next star to
leave and try his hand in Stephanie McMahon's company.
Now, Tony Khan has never shied away from taking aim at
WWE and has consistently brought up the other promotion
for years now, despite claims that AEW only focuses
on themselves Khan's words tell a different story.
And he's now taken aim at WWE's work overseas.
Appearing for news 12 Khan was asked about hosting AEW shows
in the Northeastern area of the us, and couldn't help himself.
We're running a lot of great shows around the Northeast.
It's so many great wrestling markets in one geographic region.
I'll say it.
The crown jewel of wrestling markets, the real crown
jewel of wrestling markets, not some BS overseas in
Saudi Arabia, New York city is where you want to be.
And I love, love, love New York.
And as a wrestling fan, I've had a special connection to the.
Some of my first memories of watching sporting
sports in New York are watching the bulls and
the Knicks and watching the bears and the giants.
But really for me, wrestling has been my first love.
So as a sports fan, you can't be a
wrestling fan without loving New York city.
And without having this great connection to the fans up there,
WWE's deal with Saudi Arabia has been both lucrative and
controversial with the country and the company facing criticism.
So expect more comments from fans and Tony khan for years to come.
Tony khan was very direct with his reference to WWE's deal with
Saudi Arabia, but he's also seemingly taken aim at WWE's viewership
for raw in recent months, the numbers for the red brand have been
up, but that took a turn last week with the return of the NFL.
This week's episode had to go up against two NFL games and the effect
was clear with raw earning these show's lowest viewership in months.
On Twitter, Tony Khan tweeted a gif of a man yelling.
Are you ready for some football?
And many in the comments saw this as a nod to the dominance.
The NFL has over, especially as Khan's own Jacksonville Jaguars,
hadn't played according to show buzz daily, raw drew an average
of 1.59 million viewers down considerably from recent weeks,
which have been over 2 million since the change of leadership.
If khan is taking aim at WWE's ratings, he may
want to remember that raw up against the NFL is
still defeating his AEW dynamite every single week.
So he may wanna think twice about throwing these stones in his
proverbial glass house, more from AEW and when the company was
founded, they immediately tried to set themselves apart from WWE.
And one way to do that was win loss records.
Well, it seems at times that wins and losses don't
matter in WWE AEW has kept a strict record of how many
times a wrestler has tasted victory and bitter defeat.
But that's about to change.
According to Dave Meltzer on the latest wrestling
observer radio win loss records, aren't going
to go away completely, but will be deemphasized.
AEW's, moving forwards.
Previously the records were used to determine the number one
contenders for title matches, but in recent times, title contention
matches and other more traditional wrestling staples have been used.
Instead, it doesn't help AEW that they have ignored
their own rules as by their own ranking system.
FTR should have been the number one contenders for the tag
team titles for months, but have yet to have their title shot.
AEW will still keep track of the rankings, but it won't be as
big a deal allowing the company to change up how their title
contenders will be decided at summer slam 2022 Brock Lester
came up short in his efforts, see throne Roman reigns falling
to the tribal chief in an incredible last man standing match.
Lester hasn't been seen on WWE TV since then with fans wondering what
he'll do next, but his return could be sooner than first thought.
Zero news reports that Lester is set to return to WWE in
October though, the exact date isn't clear, but there are
plans for him to compete at crown jewel in early November.
The current report is that Lester will face us champion Bobby
Lashley at the event rekindling their feud from earlier this year.
Not only that, but it's also noted that lash Lee's us title will be
on the line as part of triple H's efforts to make the championship
more prestigious by putting high profile names in the title picture.
Since winning the title in July, lastly has faced
the likes of Seth Rawlins and AJ styles, but his next
challenger could be none other than the beast incarnate.
Now in recent months, WWE has been making major changes
backstage with several top level executives being released.
Jeff Jarrett was released last month from
his role as senior VP of live events.
But now WWE is looking to fill some gaps.
In its job listings, it's revealed that WWE is looking for a
new senior vice president of customer growth who will answer
to WWE's marketing, EVP, Catherine Newman, who joined in June.
WWE is also looking for a digital producer in
vertical video, specifically for creating content
on platforms like TikTok and Instagram reels.
WWE is also looking for a VP of affiliates
and a VP of marketing operations.
So expect plenty more changes from the
company's corporate side in the coming weeks.
WWE has been making a lot of changes behind the
scenes with these job listings, just the latest, but
these changes have for the most part been received.
Well, it's been said that WWE has seen a significant boost in morale.
As employees have been enjoying this post Vince McMohan era.
And there's now another reason for them to be happy.
Fightfull select reports that WWE co CEO, Stephanie McMahon and
Nick Khan, as well as triple H, recently held a meeting where they
confirmed that the paid holiday schedule will be getting a lot bigger.
WWE has added veterans day, Juneteenth, Thanksgiving, Eve, and a
floating holiday in the new 2023 company schedule on top of the usual
holidays, like independence day, new year's Christmas and others.
khan Stephanie McMahon and triple H also told the
employees that their flexible work policy will also
expand in another piece of good news for the staff.
Employees who have worked with WWE for years had
resigned themselves to the ideas that what was
happening was as good as they were going to get.
But now those employees will get to spend more time
with their families in the latest, positive change.
In July Rick flair brought his in ring career to a close competing
in the appropriately titled Rick flare's final match as part
of star cast in the days running up to the event, fans saw
several events, praising Rick flair as the greatest of all time.
But his permanent retirement may not be his permanent.
His first thought while speaking on his to be the man podcast,
Rick spoke about his old rival Ricky, the dragon Steamboat, who
is set to return to the ring this November after a 12 year hiatus.
Flare said that he is confident that the dragon will do
great in his first match back and admitted that hearing of
Steamboat's return has made himself want to get back in the ring.
At one point it was reported that flare's alleged
last match was going to be him versus Steamboat.
But the latter later said that he turned down the match
time will tell whether flare has another final match.
And even if he did, he'd hardly be the first
or last wrestler to come out of retirement.
And we're ending today with Oscar who has been teaming with
Alexa bliss and Bianca Belair as of late, but there's one
more individual as part of this team during this week's
raw bliss took on Bailey with both women, having their
respective teammates while damage control made their entrance.
Oscar could be seen holding Bliss's Doll Lilly.
The Empress of tomorrow later shared
the picture on her official Twitter.
And this got a response from bliss saying that Lily loves her friend.
It's been a while since WWE stopped portraying bliss as a
supernatural character, though, recent rumors have suggested that
that could change soon, especially if Bray Wyatt returns, but
until then, bliss is pleased that her creepy doll has a new friend.