Title change, but no one cares about this so I’ll say it- Shayna Baysler started beating up her partner Rhonda Rousey mid-match for no apparent reason (?), and walked off.
Rhonda gets pinned, and Liv Morgan and Raquel Rodriguez new tag team champions.
Looks like I missed it. Didn't realize the show was overseas and wouldn't have the usual time. Tuned in with approximately 60 seconds left and the Usos celebrating.
I really probably should go to the effort of digging into my DVR and dialing up the shows just to fast-forward to Bloodline stuff so I can keep up on the story, because it always seems super compelling just from the fragments I put together.
I suppose that might be my entry point in general is just to turn on these shows on DVR and be really quick to use fast-forward instead of just slogging through a bunch of **** that I'm confident I won't like.
I'm curious also about this LA Knight push, because I really liked him as Eli Drake in NWA Powerrr and then what I saw of LA Knight in WWE seemed really stupid...but it looks like he's been face-turned and the character has changed? And the little I saw made me think that he's basically now just getting to be Eli Drake under a new name. Outside of Nick Aldis I regarded him as NWA's best promo man before that promotion got gutted by the pandemic.
On the LA Knight topic- I don’t know anything about him, and he seemed totally ordinary to me, but like most people I don’t watch the weekly shows at all (only the PPVs).
Like, this got pushed into my YouTube recs, and it shows that while I wasn't paying attention LA Knight was busy making some hay. And it sure seems like the Eli Drake act that I remember from the smaller company. Don't know if it was a particularly hot crowd, but he sure wasn't getting reactions like this last time I was watching a bit more.
I was intrigued by a couple of promos by him and reverse engineered it and am torn. On one hand he has big zack Ryder vibes and with Vince back in the fold I don’t trust him to be able to actually give him a shot and not have it blow up in his face (see: Ryder when Vince caved)
On the other, he can cut a promo pretty well, doesn’t need fourth wall breaking smark winking content like punk and MJF, he has the build, decent enough in the ring, fantastic crowd control
There are worse options to give a shot to. And considering how ludicrously over he is right now he should get one. The problem is I don’t believe for a second whoever won the briefcase was gonna get the belt. Having a slow burn here to see if he can stay over makes sense and having him win the rumble if he stays over makes more sense
The greatest peril of LA Knight would appear to be that he could make "yeah" the new "what?" And absolutely nothing would be worth paying that price.
I looked it up and see that he's already 40, which surprised me even though I knew he wasn't super young. But I do have to think that there are limits to what he'll get to do when he's just finally getting his biggest break now.
Definitely think he's more talented than Zack Ryder though.
What is never going away ever. If it became ‘yeah’ im for it
To his age, ya I mean its a now or never proposition. Him being a main eventer is pretty much live fast die young. Still, there’s a shelf life of at least 3-5 years on top if they do it right
It’s rare to have someone this organically over and the talent to back it up. CM Punk is probably the last one in WWE I can think of. Gotta roll the dice here and see what you’ve got
"What?" has faded significantly. It used to basically ruin every segment of every show. COVID is also not outright going away during our lifetimes, but thankfully we're not in 2020 anymore.
My fear is that it would revive the underlying concept. God knows that most wrestling fans enter the arena with a primary goal of putting themselves over as a collective obnoxious character, and if there's a good wrestling show in front of them then that's a nice bonus.
Anyway, this is not me changing my tune about LA Knight. I would like to see them give the big push a chance based on what I've seen.
A thing I certainly love about AEW is that what chants are few and far between.
Incidentally, anyone at least slightly interested should definitely check out the Omega/Ospreay match from Forbidden Door. Just google “watch wrestling” and you’ll figure out the rest.
I don't watch much WWE, but I'll occasionally watch the PPVs on replay if I heard it was a good event. The ladder matches were pretty good, but I really dug the main event. That hype package right before the match was so good. It seems like there have been so many epic moments with the whole Bloodline storyline. Hopefully someone does a 2-hour recap video of the whole thing on YouTube b/c I've only been able to catch bits and pieces.
