Category: Daily Updates

A thumbs up show. The best match was Kushida vs O’Reilly. The worst match was the opening tag.

Opening tag

That was a great camera shot with Liger going for the surfboard. Taguchi is going to buried in the Observer awards this year. Tanaka’s delayed German was awesome. Pretty nothing match though. 1 1/2*

Owens vs Tiger Mask

I thought Tiger Mask was the wrestler who did the least in the tourney.Owens should get away from the Tyson Kidd look since Tyson smokes him as a wrestler. Tiger Mask going after the leg was solid stuff. Overall another match that was just there. 2*

Cavenario vs Dorada

I’m hoping for a potential show stealer here. Already loving the comedy with the ref. Both guys worked hard all tourney. These guys are working their asses off here. they’re cutting a hot pace. Dorada runs off 2 amazing spots including an ACH dive. They’re busting out highspots, but they’re selling . Man Dorada blows that spot at the finish and takes the sails out of a killer match. 3 1/4*

Fish vs Baretta

Baretta’s opening sequence was fun. Fish’s heat has a snugness to it. It’s very crisp. Loving fish attacking the leg. Baretta’s selling of the double stomp. Great counter of the heel hook by Baretta. A really great match. 3 1/2*

Nick Jackson vs Rocky Romero

Some shenanigans to start. Nick heeling it up. Romero with a rana to start a comeback that is shut down momentarily with a superkick. Rocky with a top rope Fujiwara. Some back and forth. Jackson takes control with a swanton. Back and forth again. Romereo’s Sliced Bread #2 on the floor was cool. This just isn’t resonating. Both guys are being a little too cute for my taste. Lack of structure hurt it in my eyes. Way too many teases of control segments that never happened. 2*

YUJI NAGATA & MANABU NAKANISHI & DAVID FINLAY VS. SATOSHI KOJIMA & HIROYOSHI TENZAN & TOMOAKI HONMA

I haven’t missed Nakanishi at all. Though Honma can work the headbutt spot with a broom. They isolate Finlay and work him over. Now the other side isolate Tenzan and work over his knee. A Nagata and Tenzan fight for a bit. Kojima is in and lights Nagata up. Kojima is a good hot tag here. Nagata with an Exploder into the dead man’s arm bar. It’s broken up. Honma is in control for a sec. Kind of what you expect. Finlay showed he belonged here. 2 1/2

KAZUCHKA OKADA & GEDO VS. YUJIRO TAKAHASHI & CODY HALL

The Bullet Club is working over Gedo. Hall working good big man spots. Hall’s punch looked nasty. This is a southern tag with a short shine, heat segment on Gedo, comeback, cut off, small heat segment on Okada,  comeback again. Finish. Really basic stuff.Neither of the Bullet Club members are actively good right now so the heat segments were pretty pedestrian.  2*

SHINSUKE NAKAMURA & TOMOHIRO ISHII & TORU YANO & KAZUSHI SAKURABA & YOSHI-HASHI VS. HIROSHI TANAHASHI & TOGI MAKABE & HIROOKI GOTO & KATSUYORI SHIBATA & CAPTAIN NEW JAPAN

Yano being a total pussy to start. The 10 man tag is such a huge NJPW trope. Nice opening exchange on who the bid dog is between Ishii and Makabe. Same pair offs as usual. It breaks down in Tulsa. Yano takes off the padding. This match is as predictable as a Lethal heat segment. We get a small Tanahashi as FIP segment. The beginning is typical, but then they kick it up a notch. Goto is running wild. The Nakamura/Goto sequence is pretty great. I will say though they’ve done a good job keeping the mediocre workers activity to a minimum. The pairing off segments have some meat to them. Fuck they all feed to Captain NJ like he’s Dusty Rhodes. I loved this match and it built and built into this great dramatic match . How cool would it be to introduce a new new baby face under the Captain NJ mask scoring a pinfall in something like this .Everyone had their working shoes on. Anyways 4*

Kushida vs O’Reilly 

O’Reilly really has an opportunity to show a huge audience what a great worker he is. Kushida  reminds me a lot of Rey Jr. I think besides Nakamura, Kushida is a guy who could get over huge in the States. We’re mat wrestling to start. The struggle here is well done. O’Reilly going after the arm, and he’s bringing new stuff to the dance here. O’Reilly is really torturing him on the mat. Kushida is doing his part selling underneath.  Kushida after the arm. Kushida mounts a comeback. Going after Kyle’s arm, reversal. Front guillotine by Kyle. Kushida reverses. Kyle with a flying arm breaker from the top. Kushida with a German than a Dragon Suplex. Kushida again ripping at the arm. Kyle counters with a sleeper. Flip dive by Kushida. Holy Moly Kushida does a moonsault into a triangle. Everything goes back to the arm. Kyle with a belly to back suplex from the top. A strike exchange that leads to some suplex throw by Kyle. The drama here is off the charts. Both wrestlers are just bringing it. Look at these guys selling the arms. Kushida with a vertical suplex on the apron. Fish has been a great 2nd. What a match. My complaint is they could have wrapped it up between 3-5 earlier. 4 1/4*

Plus the moment with Liger and Kushida post match was touching.

Pete Schirmacher

I thought Tiger Mask vs. Chase Owens was a dud, it was definitely the worst match on the card.

The main event however was spectacular, the match would definitely get a ***** rating from me. It had great pacing, ups, downs, not too fast, not too slow. Not too many high spots, which allowed these young men to really show off their technical wrestling ability. The mat wrestling was great, submissions left and right, armbars, kneebars, kimuras, guillotines etc. My final point was the selling, those guys sold their asses off, I was in a VOIP with some friends watching the match, it was 7am for some of us and 7pm for others, and there were points in the match where the room was silent, not because of boredom, but because we were on the edge of our seats observing the spectacle of these athletes putting it all on the line for our entertainment. It was a 30 minute epic that ended in a payoff of working an arm in Kushida’s favor.

Thanks for reading my email,
Lee Dolin

Thumbs up

Best match: KUSHIDA VS Kyle O’Reilly
Worst match: Chase Owens vs Tiger Mask IV

The first three matches were pure filler. Fish vs Barreta was solid but didn’t really kick into a high gear. Romero vs N. Jackson was fun and entertaining and was a smart choice due to their chemistry and familiarity with each other.

Tenzan, Kojima & Honma vs Nagata, Nakanishi & Finlay was fine and
the multi-man pre-main was the usual set up for upcoming title matches that had a frenetic final five which really got the crowd pumping before the main.

My word, what a main event. It was a great story with a variety of styles used that was worthy of headlining any PPV. KUSHIDA and O’Reilly made winning the BOSJ look like the most important thing on the face of the earth. Go out of your way to see this match.

Simon Copp

Devon, England

UFC FN 68

Beyond thumbs. All time short list. Amazing. This is the 11th good UFC card in a row. This is as far as quality already the best year in UFC history, regardless of whatever the deal is with ratings and buys.
Best fight: Ortega-Tavares, FotY so far, and also all time short list
Worst fight: nothing even close
Best performance: Ortega and Tavares
Worst performance: Boetsch, unless you count Rothwell’s stupid scripted heel promo
KO: Birchak
Sub: Proctor

Jose Quinones takes a couple of kicks from Leonardo Morales, works his way to a TD and then to RNC for the tap midway through the 1st. Great fight, FotN most nights, between Jake Collier and Ricardo ‘Demente’ Abreu and if I ever saw a draw, this was it. Anything from 30-30 to 30-27 either way is possible. Every round was that close. They slugged it out in the final seconds like the boxers from the ’50s and ’60s used to. It’s 29-28 split Collier.

Another outstanding fight as Justin Edwards dominates the 1st and early 2nd, then Joe Proctor comes on and puts Edwards out with the inverted grip Guillotine, setup by a knee to the body, with 2 seconds left in the fight. Chris Wade dominates Cristos Giagos, who keeps coming even after looking broken. Close 1st, then Wade took over. 29-28 or 30-27, and it’s 2 from Column A, one from Column B. Omari Akhmedov kicks the crap out of Brian Ebersole’s stupid ‘hairrow’ and more importantly his leg and Ebersole quits in the corner after the 1st. In a fight which somewhat amazingly goes into the 2nd, Shawn Jordan takes Derrick Lewis down 3 times in the 1st but gets busted up. Lewis is gassed. Jordan knocks him down with a hook kick to the head (this is a guy who walks around about 300—both of them are) early in the 2nd, takes back and pounds till the ref steps in.

Cisco Rivera, still smarting over the ripoff loss to Faber (funny how Cisco gets poked in the eye and it blinds the referee), flattens Bruce Leroy in a hurry with an overhand right left hook and follows up and that’s that. Major puncher. The left hook was a total arm punch. 21s. Alex sporting a nice ‘fro though. Cisco should get a rematch with Faber.

Anthony Birchak doesn’t take that much longer to drop Joe Soto twice, the second time for the clean KO. Well, 1:16 longer. Birchak vs. Cisco wouldn’t be a bad idea either.

OFF THE CHART fight. Heavily favored Thiago Tavares dominates position but Brian Ortega does far more damage from the bottom and hits the showstopping moves, dropping Tavares early in the 2nd with a spinning up elbow. Very high tech grappling from both. The fight is nearly stopped after the 2nd from cuts Ortega inflicted from the bottom. Warned in his corner that he’s probably two rounds down from being on the bottom, Ortega stands and trades in the 3rd and drops Tavares late in the round and finishes him with mount and G&P. This fight had everything.

Yancy Medeiros missed weight by 3.5. Dustin Poirier getting by far the biggest pop of the night. He blows Medeiros away, dropping him twice early, takes back and body tri but Medeiros fights off the choke and escapes, then Poirier blasts him again for another KD, lands a big liver kick and then traps him on the cage and flurries till the ref steps in.

A couple minutes in, Matt Mitrione shoots in and Ben Rothwell whizzers and grabs a Guillotine on the way up and Mitrione taps in like .05 seconds. Rothwell then proceeds to cut the stupidest promo in MMA history. Matt may be a great athlete but he’s just not a fighter.

Tim Boetsch looks twice Dan Henderson’s size but it doesn’t matter as he walks straight in with his hands down right into a right hand almost immediately and it’s over a knee and a few punches later. 28s. If that’s how he trained to avoid the right hand I’d hate to see if he didn’t. Beyond belief. You’re fighting Dan Henderson and you walk straight in with your hands down in the first 10 seconds. Hendo can win fights till he’s 90 if the other guy does that.
Crimson Mask

I gave the main card a huge thumbs up

Best Fight: Thiago Tavares vs. Brian Ortega

Worst Fight: none on the main card

Best Performances: how do you pick the bonuses tonite? It is a tossup with all those finishes. Dan Henderson, Dustin Poirier, Brian Ortega

Another night of upsets and all of these fights except Tavares vs Ortega were so short what can you say but wow! Dominant performances all around.

Thiago Tavares vs. Brian Ortega was a great war. If Ortega didn’t stop him it would have been interesting to see how the judges scored this. Volume and control vs damage.

Gotta love Hendo!

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Grant Zwarych

Wrestling Observer Index

Submitted by Geoffrey Gillott

They had some indy guys wrestling during the pre show, but it was hard to tell what was going on unless you had seats on the field. Matt Stryker and Ashley Massaro did live commentary during the show, after intermission Massaro was replaced by Brodus Clay. Dave Penzer was the ring announcer. 

Results for the matches that mattered:

• Jim Duggan beat Robbie E
• Curt Hawkins beat Brodus Clay
• Nasty Boys beat Ken Anderson and Mike Knox
• Tommy Dreamer beat Wes Brisco
• Evan Bourne beat Doc Gallows
• RVD beat Scott Steiner. After RVD beat Steiner, Doc Gallows and Steiner double-teamed RVD until Goldberg came out and made the save.

Overall the show was terrible, one of the worst I’ve ever seen. Brian Knobbs was scary out of shape, he looked like death. It did eventually move over to so bad it’s good territory however. Tommy Dreamer was tweeting out about 8000 people in Attendance, but he must have some serious vision problems, there was 1500 people there at the most, which is still good for an indy show.

by David Bixenspan | davidbix@wrestlingobserver.com | Follow @davidbix

TV and major show notes:

UFC has Fight Night: Boetsch vs. Henderson live from New Orleans, Louisiana:

Main Card at 10:00 p.m. ET on Fox Sports 1:
Tim Boetsch (185.5) vs. Dan Henderson (186) in the five round main event
Ben Rothwell (265) vs. Matt Mitrione (255)
Dustin Poirier (156) vs. Yancy Medeiros (159.5)
Thiago Tavares (146) vs. Brian Ortega (146)
Joe Soto (136) vs. Anthony Birchak (136)
Francisco Rivera (136) vs. Alex Caceres (136)

Prelims on Fox Sports 1 at 8:00 p.m. ET:
Shawn Jordan (263.5) vs. Derrick Lewis (264.5)
Brian Ebersole (170.5) vs. Omari Akhmedov (171)
Chris Wade (155.5) vs. Cristos Giagos (155.5)
Joe Proctor (156) vs. Justin Edwards (156)

Prelims on UFC Fight Pass at 7:00 p.m. ET:
Ricardo Abreu (183) vs. Jake Collier (185.5)
Jose Quinonez (135) vs. Leonardo Morales (137)

Not much in the way of major star power, but by all rights, this shuld be an entertaining main card, plus Jordan-Lewis should be fun heavyweight mayhem. Poirier-Medeiros is the one to watch, as it’s pretty much guaranteed to be an exciting fight from the way they match up.

New Japan World has the Best of the Super Junior finals live from Tokyo Yoyogi Gym tonight/tomorrow morning at 4 a.m. Eastern time with Kushida vs. Kyle O’Reilly for the trophy in the main event.

Tonight we’re looking for reports from:

* WWE in Baton Rouge (John Cena, Seth Rollins, Randy Orton, Bray Wyatt, Ryback, King Barrett).
* WWE in Salt Lake City (Roman Reigns, Kane, Dean Ambrose, Big Show, Dolph Ziggler, Sheamus)
* ROH in Nashville at the Fairgrounds Arena (Christopher Daniels & Frankie Kazarian vs. Raymond Rowe & Hanson vs. Jay & Mark Briscoe non-title, Michael Elgin vs. Matt Sydal, Roderick Strong vs. Dalton Castle, Moose vs. B.J. Whitmer vs. Cheeseburger vs. Silas Young, Adam Page vs. Will Ferrara)

NXT in Largo, FL

Tomorrow night we’re looking for reports from:

* WWE in Lake Charles, LA (John Cena, Seth Rollins, Randy Orton, Bray Wyatt, Ryback, King Barrett)
* WWE in Pensacola, FL (Roman Reigns, Big Show, Dean Ambrose, Kane, Dolph Ziggler, Sheamus)

Raw is Monday in New Orleans two night after UFC runs the same building, while Smackdown and Main Event will be taped Tuesday in Lafayette, LA.

Also on Tuesday night,  the special “We are Suzuki Gun” show will be held at Korakuen Hall, with a video on demand version uploaded Wednesday morning at 5:00 a.m. ET. The lineup is:

1. Naomichi Marufuji vs. Yuji Nagata
2. Genba Hirayangi & Hitoshi Kumano vs. John Webb & Jack Gamble
3. Gedo & Zack Sabre Jr. vs. Captain New Japan & Captain NOAH
4. Jushin Thunder Liger & Yoshinari Ogawa vs. Taichi & El Desperado
5. Takashi Sugiura & Daisuke Harada vs. Shelton Benjamin & TAKA Michinoku
6. NWA World Tag Team Title: Lance Archer & Davey Boy Smith Jr. (c) vs. Hiroyoshi Tenzan & Satoshi Kojima
7. Special Tag Match: Minoru Suzuki & Takashi Iizuka vs. Yoshihiro Takayama & MAYBACH Taniguchi

**** 

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**** 

The breakdown of the ROH deal on Destination America, how this affects TNA, the time frame of both company’s deals with the station and why this went down is the lead story in the new issue of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter.  We also look at Daniel Cormier winning the world championship and questions arising, full coverage of UFC 187, Full coverage of Samoa Joe to NXT and the last special, the AAA World Cup coverage, Bischoff sues TNA and the UFC hall of Fame.

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–ROH signs action figure deal

–Update on the next ROH PPV show

–TNA changes up television tapings and why

–Dixie Carter reality show

–Christy Hemme leaves company

–History of TNA sale talks

–Samoa Joe on why he left TNA

–Dana White talks UFC 189

–Where ticket sales for the show are coming from

–Dana White talks the PPV numbers

–Update on UFC in New York and where it stands

–Sara McMann thinking of legal action on the Reebok deal

–This week’s UFC show

–Tons of new UFC fights

–Lawsuit settlement results in apologies

–Suspended fighter thinks about going to Olympics

–Hector Lombard talks Josh Barnett

–Ronda Rousey at the  Wall Street Journal cafe brunch

–Fighter who had announced retirement now coming back

–Biggest World Series of Fighting show to date

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*January 16, 2006 (2005 Awards double issue, $6 or $7 overseas)

*April 3, 2006 (Story of Ann Calvello and the history of Roller Derby–many called this the best issue of the Observer ever)

*April 10, 2006 (Behind the scenes at the 2006 Wrestlemania/Hall of Fame week)

*July 24, 2006 (The History of the Von Erichs and World Class Championship Wrestling–the most unreal story ever in wrestling)

*September 4, 2006 (The Rise and Fall of Kurt Angle; 2006 Hall of Fame inductions of Eddie Guerrero, Paul Bowser, Masakatsu Funaki, Aja Kong and Hiroshi Hase including tons of wrestling history around the world from the 20s through the 60s, the evolution of working to not working in Japan, and a look at Guerrero in hindsight, double issue $6 or $7 overseas)

*October 9, 2006 (A look back nine years later at the life and legacy of Brian Pillman with tons of inside information about what made him tick as his real objectives)

*November 15, 2006 (History of WCW part one, Eric Bischoff’s book and how the industry was changed forever)

*November 20, 2006 (History of WCW part two, Why Jim Ross left WCW, How Bischoff changed the company, signing of Hulk Hogan, Beginning of Nitro, Jesse Ventura, Brian Pillman, Chris Jericho and signing Wrestlemania planned celebrity away)

*November 27, 2006 (History of WCW part three, When Bischoff challenged McMahon to fight; Truth and fiction around Bret Hart signing with WCW and why it didn’t click)

*December 6, 2006 (details behind Pride’s offers to sell promotion and Part four of History of WCW part four, Hogan-Goldberg match and why there was no rematch, WCW loses NBC network deal in 1999 and the real reasons the company fell apart)

*January 22, 2007 (2006 Awards issue, double issue $7 on its own, $8 overseas)

*February 14, 2007 (Life and Times of Bam Bigelow)

*March 5, 2007 (WWE begins plans that will change the business)

*March 12, 2007 (Life and Times of Mike Awesome)

*March 19, 2007 (Life and Times of Ernie Ladd)

*April 4, 2007 (Life and Times of Badnews Allen Coage–which many are calling one of the best issues in history)

*July 2, 2007 (Part one of the Benoit double murder-suicide)

*July 5, 2007 (Part two of the Benoit double murder-suicide)

*July 10, 2007 (Part three of the Benoit double murder-suicide)

*July 19, 2007 (Part four of the Benoit double murder-suicide)

*July 23, 2007 (Part five of Benoit double murder-suicide)

*July 25, 2007 (Part six of Benoit double murder-suicide)

*August 15, 2007 (The legend of the God of Japanese wrestling and his influence on MMA, Karl Gotch)

*October 15 (2007 Hall of Fame double issue, $7 on its own, $8 overseas including inductions of The Rock, Tom Packs and the original Strangler Lewis)

*November 12, 2007 (Life and times of Fabulous Moolah and history of U.S. women’s wrestling) .

*December 31, 2007 (History of Ric Flair and the heyday of wrestling at the Greensboro Coliseum)

*January 21, 2008 (2007 Awards issue, double issue $7 on its own, $8 overseas)

*March 17, 2008 (Life and times of Johnny Weaver)

*March 24, 2008 (Life and times of Gary Hart)

*April 10, 2008 (Farewell to Ric Flair; My thoughts, Shawn Michaels talks of Flair’s meaning to him; Hall of Fame; Wrestlemania double issue, $7 on its own, $8 overseas)

*August 11, 2008 (Ric Flair leaves WWE; Updated history of pro wrestlers and MMA fighters who went to the Olympics)

* September 8, 2008 (2008 Hall of Fame double issue, $7 on its own, $8 overseas; part one of Killer Kowalski bio)

* September 15, 2008 (Life and Times of Evan Tanner)

* September 22, 2008 (The amazing career of Killer Kowalski, one of our most in-depth bios)

You can also order any of these issues on their own for $4 in North America or $5 overseas.

We now have available personally autographed copies of Tributes II, our latest book, as well as a DVD that comes with it talking more about the subjects in the book. The book covers the life stories of Lou Thesz, Wahoo McDaniel, Elizabeth, Fred Blassie, Road Warrior Hawk, Andre the Giant, Curt Hennig, Johnny Valentine, Davey Boy Smith, Terry Gordy, Owen Hart, Stu Hart, Gorilla Monsoon, The Sheik and Tim Woods..

To get all of those biographies as back issues of the Observer would be a $60 value today. This is a collection of some of the best Observer articles of the past several years in a hardcover, full-color format that is 239 pages. There is also a foreword by Bret Hart. The book price is $12.95 plus $3.50 for shipping costs in the U.S., $20 for shipping costs to Canada and $25 for shipping costs outside North America. You can order the book the same way you order the newsletter.

****

Saturday Daily Update

— With Jessica Havok at the WWE tryout camp going on right now at the Performance Center, some fans started pointing out various tweets she wrote a few years ago that used racial and homophobic slurs. She started deleting those tweets, which didn’t help, as screen grabs had been taken and she didn’t realize that she had written literally dozens of other tweets using similar language. Obviously, in 2015, that makes WWE a lot less likely to hire her, so she tweeted this apology out in several parts:

“I want to apologize whole heartedly for the OLD tweets that are being brought up right now. Legit, It was years ago and i don’t even rem.tweeting over half of this stuff. The stuff i do remember was jokes that were in bad taste. I was young and very new to social media promo and i was very immature and just said things to make my friends laugh at the time. Inside jokes between us. I don’t really feel or believe any of the things i DID actually tweet. I am a loving, compassionate person and i LOVE everyone. No mater who! I would die for any wrestling fan and i care so much about wrestling and everything in it. I would not be here without any of you. I was young, stupid & immature. I am not too proud to admit some of it was me being bitter for all the wrong reasons, but I’ve learned and grown from this .. i hope this can be forgiven. I love you guys.”

She also told David Gilbert of TalkTNAPodcast.com that she also had an ex that “used to play on her phone.” For whatever it’s worth, in the past, she used the song “Third Reich from the Sun” by Hanzel und Gretyl as entrance music. There seems to be disagreement as to whether or not they’re a “white power” band, a satirical take on “white power” bands, or a band that claims to have no official political ideology but uses some Nazi imagery.

— Kawasaki Motors Corp issued a press release today announcing that they’ve signed Steve Austin as a brand ambassador. He’ll be appearing in ads for their “MULE PRO” series.

— UFC announced a very interesting lightweight fight for the August 8th card in Nashville (Glover Texeira vs. Ovince St. Preux main event) in the form of Michael Johnson (#5 contender) vs. Beneil Dariush (#14 contender). For Johnson, who was trying to earn a title eliminator, this is a very high risk fight, as Dariush seems to have the stylistic edge. It’s not official yet, but it looks like it’ll be the co-main event or, at worst, third from the top.

— Dan Henderson talked to Ben Fowlkes at MMAJunkie about testosterone replacement therapy. Worth a read. He feels that TRT was scapegoated as part of the larger concern over PEDs and that maybe the TRT ban would’ve have happened if there were already widespread, unannounced, random tests.

— Sports Illustrated’s Extra Mustard has an article about Justin Roberts. Lots of stuff about how much disliked the company culture in WWE, though the stars themselves were great, with Hulk Hogan always telling him stories. One pretty salient point he makes is that the writers, not being at the house shows with their larger cross-section of fans, are not in touch with the fan base at large as they could be. He says that he’s in the process of writing a tell-all autobiography.

— IHWE has Old School Hustle Night 1 & 2 tonight and tomorrow at 6:00 p.m. local time at the Crowley Rec Center in Crowley, Texas with the 2015 Southern Wrestling Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony. Tonight, Charlie Haas, Mike McGuirk, Max McGuirk, Lance Hoyt, Barbi Hayden, Marc Lowrance, Will all be on hand. Ray Rowe will be there tomorrow night plus Rodney Mack returns.

— Empire Wrestling Entertainment  is hosting a 16-man, first of it’s kind for a homegrown Southern indie, tournament on 8/7 and 8/8 at the Empire Arena in Rossville, Georgia (right over the state line from Chattanooga). The announced participants so far are Gunner, Gunner Miller (former UTC Football player and a guy with big time potential), KT Hamill (one of the best workers in the area), Moose and Kongo Kong. They are slow releasing names for the tournament, at a rate of one for every 40  likes of their Facebook page. Promoter Scott Hensley is looking to pack the venue for both shows, so check out their page here.

— Wrestlmerica results from last night at the Barnesville Academy Gym in Barnesville, Georgia drawing over 400 fans (taped for taped for Charter 181 Barnesville):

1. Andy Anderson beat Sal Rinauro
2. Iceberg defeated Twisted
3. Tracy Taylor beat Amber O’Neal Gallows using the trunks
4. Doc Gallows defeated Jake Davis and then was bloodied afterwards by Al Getz’s army of Davis, Andy Anderson, Pain, & Tyson Dean. Amber was being choked by Dean as this was going on and Getz called for the Bullet Club to come at them. The crowd was extremely hot for this.
5. Tyson Dean beat Fry Daddy
6. 3 Way Dance: Jimmy Rave defeated MVP & Micah Taylor with Rave pinning Taylor. MVP worked his ass off here.
7. Barnesville Street Fight: Southside Trash beat Trinity

Next show is on 7/10 with Magnus & Mickie James announced as coming in. (Thanks to Kris Zellner!)

— PCW results from last night in Preston, England in front of a sell out crowd of 850: Ashton Smith b Charlie Garrett, El Ligero, and Dean Allmark in a four-way match, Sha Samuels b Dave Mastiff, Joanna Rose b Dave Rayne, Team Single (T-Bone and Rampage Brown) b The UK Hooligans (Roy and Zak Knight) in a TLC match to retain the PCW tag titles, Noam Dar b Bubblegum, Kris Travis teased retirement before being insulted by Sha Samuels and it was announced he would make his return vs Samuels on the 7th August show, Joey Hayes and Martin Kirby b Ryan Smile and Damian Dunne, and AJ Styles b Lionheart with the Calf Killer. After the match Styles put over Lionheart on the mic and the two men shook hands.

TOMORROW’S WWE NETWORK SCHEDULE (thanks to Bert Duckwall)

12:30 AM ET
STONE COLD PODCAST WWE Hall of Famer and Icon Stone Cold Steve Austin will have a no holds barred LIVE interview with Paul Heyman!

1:30 AM ET
THIS WEEK IN WWE Get caught up on all the highlights from Raw and SmackDown with This Week in WWE.

2:00 AM ET
TOTAL DIVAS Nikki is devastated when she discovers John’s kept a secret from her. Rosa’s unaware she’s competing in her pursuits of an NFL player.

3:00 AM ET
TOUGH ENOUGH The last two contestants standing prepare for a final match at the WWE training facility. Stone Cold announces the winner live at RAW!

4:00 AM ET
MONDAY NIGHT WAR A controversial group of superstars set out to better sports entertainment and would rely on one another to do so.

5:00 AM ET
WWE COUNTDOWN Counting down the Top Ten Most Unique Matches of all time!

6:00 AM ET
WWE SUPERSTARS WWE Superstars features the best of the best, in matches you’ll have to see to believe. You never know what to expect, so expect everything.

7:00 AM ET
WWE NXT The future is here. Witness the entertainers, the leading men and women, the Superstars of tomorrow — this is NXT!

8:00 AM ET
TOUGH ENOUGH The last two contestants standing prepare for a final match at the WWE training facility. Stone Cold announces the winner live at RAW!

9:00 AM ET
WWE COUNTDOWN Counting down the Top Ten Most Unique Matches of all time!

10:00 AM ET
TOTAL DIVAS Nikki is devastated when she discovers John’s kept a secret from her. Rosa’s unaware she’s competing in her pursuits of an NFL player.

11:00 AM ET
WWE BEYOND THE RING Rey Mysterio: Life of a Masked Man features exclusive and candid comments from the Ultimate Underdog on his sports entertainment path!

12:30 PM ET
THIS WEEK IN WWE Get caught up on all the highlights from Raw and SmackDown with This Week in WWE.

1:00 PM ET
TOUGH ENOUGH The last two contestants standing prepare for a final match at the WWE training facility. Stone Cold announces the winner live at RAW!

2:00 PM ET
MONDAY NIGHT WAR A controversial group of superstars set out to better sports entertainment and would rely on one another to do so.

3:00 PM ET
WWE MONEY IN THE BANK 2013 Can John Cena overcome the brute strength of Mark Henry or will the world’s strongest man finally capture the WWE Championship?

6:00 PM ET
WWE QUICK HITS WWE Quick Hits 4 brings you some of the most unique, entertaining, and sometimes outrageous clips, unearthed from the depths of WWE Network!

6:30 PM ET
THIS WEEK IN WWE Get caught up on all the highlights from Raw and SmackDown with This Week in WWE.

7:00 PM ET
WWE NXT The future is here. Witness the entertainers, the leading men and women, the Superstars of tomorrow — this is NXT!

8:00 PM ET
WWE MONEY IN THE BANK 2013 Can John Cena overcome the brute strength of Mark Henry or will the world’s strongest man finally capture the WWE Championship?

11:00 PM ET
WWE MONEY IN THE BANK 2013 Can John Cena overcome the brute strength of Mark Henry or will the world’s strongest man finally capture the WWE Championship?

By Jeremy Wall

Glory 22 took place Friday, June 5th at the Stade Pierre-Mauroy in Lille, France. It was headlined by Rico Verhoeven (46-10-1, 11KO) beating Benjamin Adegbuyi (19-3, 13KO) via unanimous decision to retain the Glory Heavyweighth title. Also, Sitthichai Sitsongpeenong (97-27-5) won a one-night, four-man lightweight tournament by defeating Josh Jauncey via unanimous decision in the finals.

Also on the main card, Zack Mwekassa knocked out Carlos Brooks in 1:58 at light-heavyweight and in the two opening matches for the lightweight tournament, Sitsongpeenong upset Davit Kiria, knocking Kiria out and Jauncey stopped Djime Coulibaly at 2:59 of the third round. Commentary for the show was provided by the omnipresent Mauro Ranallo and Frank Shamrock, the latter replacing usual colour commentator Stephen Quadros.

Romania’s Adegbuyi, 30, had won a heavyweight title eliminator fight against Hesdy Gerges via unanimous decision at Glory 18 in Oklahoma on November 7th, 2014. He was unbeaten in three fights in Glory heading into his title challenge. Against Verhoeven, Adegbuyi came out throwing hard in the first round, looking to quickly finish the 26-year-old Verhoeven. Adegbuyi spent a lot of his energy in the first round and Verhoeven was able to win come back strong after the first and win the middle rounds. Adegbuyi came back late in the fight, but Verhoeven used his better cardio and better overall kickboxing to win the decision. Former K-1 champions Semmy Schilt, Remy Bonjasky, and “Mr Perfect” Ernesto Hoost were in attendance for the show and after the bout presented Verhoeven with the Glory Heavyweight title.

The Netherlands’ Verhoeven is somewhat of an interesting case because a lot of people in kickboxing see him leading the future of heayweight kickboxing stars. He is young, handsome, and a good fighter. I don’t find him to be particularly charismatic, though, and he has bad losses on his record, including one to relatively unknown Andrey Gerasimchuk via unanimous decision for Kunlun Fight in China on January 3rd. He also lost by unanimous decision to Semmy Schilt at Glory 4 on New Year’s Eve 2012 in Japan. Schilt retired not long after. I don’t see Verhoeven as being a breakout star, but rather the guy who is a minor star in a popular promotion, somewhat of the equivalent of the current star power for most of the heavyweights in the UFC.

The one-night, four-man lightweight tournament was won by Thailand’s Sitthichai Sitsongpeenong, 23, who has 129 fights already on his pro record. Winning the tournament earns him a shot at Glory Lightweight champion Robin van Roosmalen. It will be an interesting fight, but not one that will draw television ratings beyond what Glory regularly draws on Spike. Sitthichai won a one-night tournament for Kunlun Fight in China on January 3rd by beating former K-1 Max fighter Andy Souwer via decision in the finals. He has a ton of experience fighting in Thailand and throughout Europe. Sittichai upset Davit Kiria in the first round of the Glory 22 tournament, knocking Kiria out with a knee to the body at 2:09 of the second round. Kiria is a former Glory Lightweight champion and the favourite to win the tournament before being knocked out by Sitthichai.

Glory’s matchmaker Cor Hemmers is an obvious proponent of the tournament format for creating new title contenders. Glory will sometimes use the single-match format title eliminator to create a new challenger, as they did with Adegbuyi. But most of the time the promotion sticks to using the tournament. The tournament format is fine for a pure sport that does not have to worry about drawing money, but for a television product that needs to draw ratings to survive (and possibly even thrive), using the tournament format to create title contenders does not necessarily lead to the biggest fights at the box office. I’ve said this many times, but Glory would be better off scrapping the tournament format.

Glory doesn’t have any genuine stars, and an argument in favour of tournaments is that the winner becomes someone with a bit of star power who people may not have cared about otherwise. That’s a good argument if a promotion only holds a rare tournament that creates new stars because the tournament is prestigious. But holding quick one-night tournaments on nearly every card means the tournaments are common and winning one doesn’t mean much.

For instance, the real fight that Glory ought to put together for the Lightweight title is van Roosmalen defending against Giorgio Petrosyan. Petrosyan is considered arguably the best pound-for-pound kickboxer of his generation. He also holds a win over van Roosmalen before the latter won the Lightweight title, as Petrosyan beat van Roosmalen by unanimous decision at Glory 3 in November 2012. Petrosyan, 29, was knocked out by Andy Ristie in a shocking upset in November 2013 at Glory 12 in New York, but returned this year to win a couple of fights in Italy. Van Roosmalen lost to Ristie in November 2013 by knockout, but came back to beat Ristie in a rematch via unanimous decision in April.

Since Petrosyan is considered one of the best of all-time and holds a win over van Roosmalen in Glory, he is the obvious choice to face van Roosmalen rather than the winner of another tournament. But I’m guessing that Glory’s budget for talent is tight and Petrosyan may currently be out of the promotion’s price range.

That may be the real reason why Glory sticks with the tournament format despite it not working out for Bellator. It is cheaper to hire unknown fighters to fight one another in a tournament and try and create star power that way than it is to sign fighters who are already big names in kickboxing. And the ratings for a van Roosmalen-Petrosyan fight probably wouldn’t draw any better than the ratings for a van Roosmalen-Sitsongpeenong fight because Petrosyan has little name value in the American mainstream. But he does have that win over van Roosmalen and is considered one of the best, so if Glory wants to become a breakout promotion on American TV then they have to book using the most logical opponents. And Petrosyan is the most logical contender to van Roosmalen’s title.

Glory 22 aired live on Spike TV in the US in the unfortunate time slot of 4pm ET. Spike didn’t run a replay of the event later in the night, which I assumed they would because 4pm on a weekday afternoon (1pm on the west coast) is a terrible timeslot. But instead Spike ran reruns of Cops in prime time and late in the night aired shoulder programming for Premier Boxing. A weekday afternoon timeslot is particularly egregious for a kickboxing promotion because Glory has to overcome the idea in the minds of Americans that kickboxing is afternoon filler material after so many years of K-1 and other smaller promotions airing in terrible timeslots on US television.

“Previously we have aired non-U.S. events via tape delay, but for June 5 there was space in the timetable to allow for a live broadcast so we took the opportunity,” said Glory CEO Jon Franklin. “Certainly it will be the earliest we have aired a show in America and commencing at 4pm on a Friday means some fans may still be in work or traffic, but there will also be others who will be better placed to tune in at that time. College students, for example, will often be out socializing on a Friday night.

“There is a certain element of experiment to airing this live at 4pm but Spike TV felt that going live was optimum and we also prefer to be live wherever possible, so it will be interesting to see the viewership data after the broadcast.”

Airing a show live is great, but not if it results in a terrible timeslot with no prime time replay. Another point I’ve made many times before is that Glory needs to decide whether it wants to be an international kickboxing promotion or an American television product. I don’t think it can be both because of the time zone differences when running Europe, the Middle East, or Asia. College students aren’t going to be sitting around Friday afternoon watching television, either, so Franklin’s point makes little sense. College students are usually out socializing on Saturday nights, but UFC doesn’t have a problem drawing in that demo on Saturday nights.

It was also Glory’s debut on the UK version of Spike TV. It aired Saturday night at 10pm in the UK. Glory also has a deal with CBS Sports Network to air the undercard matches they tape before the live Spike TV event. The Glory undercard fights have the ostentatious name of “Superfight Series”, but rather than being super fights the matches feature lesser known fighters.

This was the twelfth Glory event to air on Spike TV. The first eleven events have averaged 462,000 viewers. This is the lowest compared to Spike’s two other combat sports properties, Bellator and Premier Boxing. Glory has ranged in average viewership between an all-time high of 659,000 viewers for Glory 13 to an all-time low of 352,000 viewers.

The average viewership for Friday afternoon’s show will be interesting because of both the timeslot and because Glory is heavily recorded by DVR. Glory 21 saw a 245-percent uplift via DVR.

“I think the big takeaway from the increased DVR numbers is that they indicate the continual growth of a core fan base in the US which does not want to miss the action and is recording the show if they are unable to watch the live broadcast,” said Franklin.

The problem is that DVR numbers don’t really do much for ad rates. Advertisers are looking for shows that people watch live and have to sit through the ads rather than shows that get recorded via DVR and people just skip the ads. But the late afternoon live start for Glory 22 was probably done with the thinking that some people will watch it live, but many more will DVR it and increase the overall Live+ ratings.

“That is true, traditionally,” said Franklin regarding shows taking place outside the US hurting television ratings on US television. “But GLORY is an international organization and there has been a lot of demand for a show in Northern Europe for some time now, so we couldn’t really ignore that any longer.

“We’re hopeful the momentum continues although we are of course aware that a certain percentage of fans may well use the internet to follow the event in real-time rather than wait for the tape-delay broadcast on Spike TV. Such is the nature of international sports event programming. It’s a factor in every sport, not just ours.”

An unfortunate situation also occured earlier in the week when Glory Welterweight champion “Bazooka” Joe Valtellini announced that he had to vacate his title due to lingering symptoms of post-concussion syndrome.

“After winning the title at GLORY 17/LAST MAN STANDING I went straight back into hard training. I was chasing a rematch with Nieky Holzken and wanted that fight to come around soon,” said Valtellini. “The doctors have diagnosed me with Post-Concussion Syndrome. It was something that occurred from training but I thought it would get better and I didn’t take that time to recover, which just made it worse. As a result neither the doctors nor GLORY will clear me to fight until I am symptom-free.”

“This is of course incredibly sad news and I know I speak for everybody at GLORY when I say that we share Joe’s pain in seeing him vacate a championship title which means so much to him. At the same time, I can only salute the selflessness and fortitude he has shown in making what must have been the hardest decision of his professional career,” said Jon Franklin.

Glory 23 takes place August 7th at the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas. It airs live on Spike. Nieky Holzken faces Raymond Daniels for the vacant Welterweight title. There is also a four-man middleweight tournament to create a new challenger for that belt.

Jeremy Wall can be emailed at jeremywall1984@gmail.com and found on Twitter @jeremydalewall.

By Dave Meltzer
dave@wrestlingobserver.com”>dave@wrestlingobserver.com

We’re looking for reports on tonight’s WWE show in Jackson, MS (John Cena, Seth Rollins, Randy Orton, Bray Wyatt, Ryback, King Barrett), ROH in Collinsville, IL (Jay Briscoe & Roderick Strong vs. Moose & Michael Elgin, Christopher Daniels & Frankie Kazarian vs. Matt Sydal & Delirious non-title, Jay Lethal vs. Raymond Rowe non-title, Matt Taven vs. Hanson, Michael Bennett vs. Dalton Castle, Adam Page vs. Mark Briscoe, Silas Young vs. Cheeseburger) and NXT in Fort Pierce, FL at dave@wrestlingobserver.com”>dave@wrestlingobserver.com

We’ll be doing one poll this weekend, which will be for Sunday’s New Japan Best of the Super Juniors final show.

World Series of Fighting at 9 p.m. on NBC Sports Network

Hakeem Dawodu vs. Chuka Willis

Mark Drummond vs. Michael Hill

Smealinho Rama vs. Blagoi Ivanov for heavyweight title

Lance Palmer vs. Chris Horodecki for featherweight title

New Japan on AXS at 9 p.m.

Doc Gallows & Karl Anderson vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi & Togi Makabe

Lance Archer & Davey Boy Smith Jr. vs. Satoshi Kojima & Hiroyoshi Tenzan

RFA on AXS at 10 p.m.

Danny Mainus vs. Boston Salmon

Ashley Gooch vs. Brandon Griffin

Andrew Sanchez vs. Clinton Williams

Bruno Fazatto vs Jarred Mercado

Thiago Rodrigues vs. Marcus Edwards

Benjamin Smith vs. Gilbert Smith for welterweight title

Saturday we’re looking for reports from:

WWE in Baton Rouge (John Cena, Seth Rollins, Randy Orton, Bray Wyatt, Ryback, King Barrett).

WWE in Salt Lake City (Roman Reigns, Kane, Dean Ambrose, Big Show, Dolph Ziggler, Sheamus)

ROH in Nashville at the Fairgrounds Arena (Christopher Daniels & Frankie Kazarian vs. Raymond Rowe & Hanson vs. Jay & Mark Briscoe non-title, Michael Elgin vs. Matt Sydal, Roderick Strong vs. Dalton Castle, Moose vs. B.J. Whitmer vs. Cheeseburger vs. Silas Young, Adam Page vs. Will Ferrara)

NXT in Largo, FL

UFC on Saturday from New Orleans

Fight Pass at 7 p.m. Eastern

Leonardo Morales vs. Jose Quinonez

Ricardo Abreu vs. Jake Collier

FS 1 at 8 p.m. Eastern

Justin Edwards vs. Joe Proctor

Christos Giagos vs. Chris Wade

Omari Akhmedov vs. Brian Ebersole

Derrick Lewis vs. Shawn Jordan

Alex Caceres vs. Francisco Rivera

Joe Soto vs. Anthony Birchak

Brian Ortega vs. Thiago Tavares

Yancey Medeiros vs. Dustin Poirier

Matt Mitrione vs. Ben Rothwell

Dan Henderson vs. Tim Boetsch

New Japan World live from Tokyo Yoyogi Gym at 4 a.m. Eastern time Sunday

Kushida vs. Kyle O’Reilly for the 2015 Best of the Super Junior championship

Sunday we’re looking for reports from:

WWE in Lake Charles, LA (John Cena, Seth Rollins, Randy Orton, Bray Wyatt, Ryback, King Barrett)

WWE in Pensacola, FL (Roman Reigns, Big Show, Dean Ambrose, Kane, Dolph Ziggler, Sheamus)

Raw is Monday in New Orleans.

Smackdown and Main Event will be taped Tuesday in Lafayette, LA.

In a busy news week, we’ve full coverage of all of UFC’s changes when it comes to drug testing, as well as other things the company is doing for fighters, looking at the pluses, the minuses, and the loopholes in the new system of drug testing.  We also look at Brock Lesnar vs. Steve Austin, Samoa Joe in WWE and how it’s changed, Destination America and wrestling, we’ve got a look at Money in the Bank, Elimination Chamber, the death of Tommy Rogers, UFC in Brazil, Dwayne Johnson’s latest projects and the retirement of Masashi Aoyagi.

The new issue is up on the site at June 8, 2015 Wrestling Observer Newsletter: Tommy Rogers bio, Austin-Lesnar notes, WWE signs Samoa Joe full-time

Web site subscriptions, which include access to both current and older newsletters as well as every audio show in the history of the site are at  Sign up here for as low as $9.99 per month!

You can also order the print Observer right now and get it delivered to your door via mail, by sending your name, address, Visa or Master Card number and an expiration date to dave@wrestlingobserver.com”>dave@wrestlingobserver.com

You can also order at www.paypal.com directing funds to dave@wrestlingobserver.com

Rates are:

For the United States, it is $13 for 4 issues, $32 for 12, $61 for 24, $101 for 40 and $131 for 52. In Canada and Mexico, rates are $14.50 for 4, $35 for 12, $67 for 24, $111 for 40 and $144 or 52.  In Europe, you can get the fastest delivery and best rates by sending to moonsault@mediaplusint.com  For the rest of the world, rates are $16.50 for 4, $44 for 12, $85 for 24, $141 for 40 issues and $183 for 52.

If you order by mail with a check, cash or money order (P.O. Box 1228, Campbell, CA 95009-1228), you can get $1 off in every price range.

The Wrestling Observer ranges weekly from 35,000 to 50,000 words covering pro wrestling and MMA internationally. Each issue has coverage and analysis of all the major news, plus every issue breaks major news stories before the Internet sties and has the most complete look at the pro wrestling and MMA business anywhere, plus history pieces available nowhere else.

Our lead story looks at the UFC’s new drug testing program, the keys to the program, questions that still need to be answered, loopholes, how often fighters will be tested, ability to beat the system and more.

We look at Brock Lesnar vs. Steve Austin, Austin’s promo on the WWE Network, Austin vs Lesnar history, and the value of next year’s WrestleMania on PPV and the Network.

We look at the new deal Samoa Joe is talking with WWE about, how the deal has changed, Joe’s future on the indies, Joe’s ROH future, what led to the change, as well as an update on the Tyson Kidd injury situation in the match with Joe.

We also preview and update Destination America and wrestling, as well as the competition on Wednesday nights.  We update Destination America on TNA and ROH, comparisons, how TNA hurt itself if it needs to shop for a new outlet by his actions this past two weeks, DA promotion of the two shows and why ROH on DA is only good for TNA.

We’ve got full coverage of the Elimination Chamber show, as well as a look at Money in the Bank, burning out programs, plus match-by-match coverage with star ratings and poll results.

We have a look at the life of Tommy Rogers, looking at the highlights of his career, how he achieved stardom, the last years of his life, how he got into wrestling, how The Fantastics were formed, the feuds with the Midnight Express and The Sheepherders, the first Clash of Champions, the first Crockett Cup, and time in Japan.

We also look at Brock Lesnar’s return to WWE, the 7/4 show in Tokyo, Sami Zayn injury update, Rusev injury update, Kevin Owens new changes, Lots of Dwayne Johnson career notes, why WWE won’t tape TV in Kentucky, Lots of WWE acting notes, WWE hiring, NXT updates, Stephanie McMahon looking at selling more stock, Finn Balor talks career, lots of notes about people at the training camp, Nelson Frazier lawsuit and annual income for Mabel and Viscera.

We also note Kevin Owens talking his career, Ric Flair talk show,who Flair wants to manage, WWE stock updates, notes on all the WWE and NXT house shows plus business notes from the past week.

We also look at how the Brazilian economy affects UFC in different ways, how it is similar to situations with pro wrestling in the past, as well as a look at Saturday’s show with match-by-match coverage and business notes.

We also look at the pro wrestling career of Masashi Aoyagi, and how he got into wrestling, what promotion he kicked off and how that changed the wrestling business and more.

We also have our monthly WWE & TNA business breakdowns.

The Observer is the world’s most detailed weekly pro wrestling publication, in its 32nd year of publication, and is read by the biggest names in the pro wrestling, industry, MMA industry, sports world and on Wall Street.

We also have our regular features such as the most complete look at ratings, plus results of the major house show events each week in pro wrestling and MMA, and complete inside rundowns of all the TV shows.

Also in this week’s issue:

–Update on this year’s Busca de un Idolo tournament

–Latest big matches from Arena Mexico

–Former star from more than 20 years ago returns to Arena Mexico for the first time in decades

–More on the AAA World Cup show

–Notes from the last two sets of AAA TV tapings

–Wrestle-1 world tour notes

–Road to Keiji Muto tournament

–Dragon Gate King of Gate tournament

–Next big Dragon Gate matches

–Cryptic tweet by an American who wrestles in Japan

–An interesting what if regarding New Japan bookings

–Politics of wrestling regarding New Japan

–What New Japan may have to change

–Notes on the Super Juniors tournament and all the results

–Benefit show for cancer-striken star

–Genichiro Tenryu’s final match in Osaka

–Update on GFW

–Mid Atlantic wrestling reunion

–Update on Terry Funk

–Update on Lucha Underground and Alberto Del Rio

–More on NESN deal

–What wrestling star has a 3.83 GPA in collage right now

–ROH notes from the weekend shows

–Really weird stuff in TNA

–Contract singing announcements

–Notes from a second TNA conference call with talent

–What happened with Tyrus and GFW

–GFW reaction

–TNA 2015 Hall of Fame plan that fell through

–Notes on TNA arena events

–Update on legislation to get UFC in Madison Square Garden

–Looking at Sara McMann’s complaints about he Reebok deal

–The business and income of Ronda Rousey

–UFC boosts minimum

–UFC lawsuit update

–Upcoming UFC title matches

–What happened with the Leslie Smith street fight on Saturday night

–UFC makes a number of cuts

–Update on T.J. Grant

–Update on Rashad Evans

–Lots of new UFC fights

If you are a new subscriber ordering 24 or more issues, you can get one free classic issue of your choice sent to you today.  With a 40 issue subscription, you can get two free classic issues sent to you today.

New subscribers ordering 24 or 40 issues have to let us know what major stories of the past 11 years you are most interested in and we’ll send the issue with the best coverage of that story. We’ve got coverage of every major PPV event and world wide spectacular, every major star switching promotions, histories of companies like FMW, Rings and New Japan, retirement and obit issues of every major star who fits into those descriptions over the past 11 years, as well as our biggest issue every year, the annual awards issue, and our most controversial issue of every year, the Hall of Fame issue.

Our most requested issues in our history are:

*November 17, 1997 (full details of everything leading to the most famous wrestling match finish of modern times at the Survivor Series plus a history of in-ring double-crosses)

*December 21, 1998 (the complete Vince McMahon-Bret Hart conversation right before the Survivor Series match so you’ll know exactly what was said–the conversation played in edited form both on the inaugural broadcast of Confidential as well as in Wrestling with Shadows, but everything that was said between the two about the match that was going to take place that same night)

*August 1, 1994 (the most detailed coverage anywhere of the Vince McMahon steroid trial, an issue praised in numerous newspaper article and Sex, Lies and Headlocks)

*March 26, 2001 (death of WCW and history of pro wrestling on the Turner networks)a

*October 22, 2001 (why the adult audience has left pro wrestling in such great numbers and what needed to have been done to save them)

*July 8, 1991 (Ric Flair leaves WCW as world champion/Zahorian steroid trial)

*February 8, 1993 (the life and times of Andre the Giant)

*May 13, 2002 (the life story of the most incredible pro wrestling career ever, a look at Lou Thesz, in one of the largest issues of our history)

*January 27, 2003 (part one of the two-part series covering the career and life of The Sheik)

*February 3, 2003 (Part two on The Sheik including thoughts from people who worked with him and where he stands historically)

*March 24, 2003 (history of the WWWF title, inside behind the Sammartino, Backlund and Backlund era)

*April 21, 2003 (history of WWF continues with the expansion nationally, the death of the regional territories and the rise of Hulk Hogan)

*May 12, 2003 (The life and death of Elizabeth and the rise of fall of Lex Luger)

*June 9, 2003 (Part 1 of history of WWF vs. WCW wars and what many say was the greatest year in U.S. wrestling; plus a look at Fred Blassie)

*June 16, 2003 (Freddie Blassie through the eyes of his biggest rivals and friends)

*July 28, 2003 (Part 2 of the history of the WWF vs. WCW war and the plans to make new superstars in the early 90s, what happened, and the night where the three biggest wrestling companies in the world combined for a joint show and what happened)

*August 25, 2003 (2003 Hall of Fame issue with huge profiles on the controversial career of Shawn Michaels, Chris Benoit as well as historical features on Earl Caddock and Francisco Flores)

*September 22, 2003 (Part 3 of the history of the WWF vs WCW war with the seeds that caused the collapse of the industry in the 90s, Zahorian trial, Gulf War controversy, Flair leaves WCW while holding world title and much more)

*October 27, 2003 (The fascinating life of Stu Hart plus the story of Road Warrior Hawk)

*January 19, 2004 (2003 Awards issue)

*February 2, 2004 (History of Toronto wrestling, Jack Tunney life story, Royal Rumble and Battle Royal history)

*February 23, 2004 (History of Guerrero family with Eddy’s win over Brock Lesnar)

*March 1, 2004 (History of WWF continues with the period that brought the company down in early 1992, the mistakes, the real stories and how the business changed)

*March 8, 2004 (History of Wrestlemania, its greatest matches and best and worst shows as voted both by wrestlers and non-wrestlers and Wrestlemania history books)

*July 5, 2004 (A look behind the scenes and Ric Flair’s book and his background with Eric Bischoff and Hulk Hogan)

*July 12, 2004 (A look at more on Ric Flair’s book and his comments on Bruno Sammartino, Bret Hart and Mick Foley)

*August 16, 2004 (History of the Olympians in pro wrestling)

*August 23, 2004 (2004 Hall of Fame issue and biggest issue of the year with huge profiles on Kazushi Sakuraba, Undertaker, Bob Backlund, Masahiro Chono, Ultimo Dragon, Kurt Angle and Tarzan Lopez–this counts as one issue if you are asking for a free issue, but ordered separately, due to size, is $6 in North America and $7 overseas)

*October 4, 2004 (the life and times of Big Bossman; as well as details of the life and times of one of the most influential men world wide in pro wrestling history, Jim Barnett)

*November 15, 2004 (the full story of what happened between Kurt Angle and Daniel Puder, plus coverage of the most important week in the history of TNA)

*January 24, 2005 (2004 Awards issue, Rock and WWE part company)

*March 14, 2005 (the 50 biggest money players in the history of WWF and a look at their Hall of Fame)

*May 9, 2005 (the life and times of Chris Candido)

*June 20, 2005 (The full story behind Paul Heyman and the death of ECW, as well as coverage of One Night Stand, Hardcore Homecoming and behind the scenes of both shows)

*July 18, 2005 (death of Shinya Hashimoto and his records with a look at the fall of New Japan, the Matt Hardy angle, tons of WWE firings, Cornette firing in detail as well as problems of a WWE developmental territory in our biggest news issue of the year which is a double-sized issue and would be $6 on its own and $7 overseas)

*August 24, 2005 (2005 Hall of Fame issue with career profiles of Paul Heyman, HHH and Freebirds plus debut of MMA Hall of Fame)

*September 12, 2005 (History of Mid South Wrestling)

*October 10, 2005 (Life and Times of the Ultimate Warrior)

*November 21, 2005 (Life and Times of Eddy Guerrero and Crusher, double issue $6 on its own and $7 overseas)

*December 5, 2005 (The Eddy Guerrero special issue, double issue $6 on its own, $7 overseas)

*January 9, 2006 (The life and times of Superstar Billy Graham, plus New Year’s Eve 2005 coverage)

*January 16, 2006 (2005 Awards double issue, $6 or $7 overseas)

*April 3, 2006 (Story of Ann Calvello and the history of Roller Derby–many called this the best issue of the Observer ever)

*April 10, 2006 (Behind the scenes at the 2006 Wrestlemania/Hall of Fame week)

*July 24, 2006 (The History of the Von Erichs and World Class Championship Wrestling–the most unreal story ever in wrestling)

*September 4, 2006 (The Rise and Fall of Kurt Angle; 2006 Hall of Fame inductions of Eddie Guerrero, Paul Bowser, Masakatsu Funaki, Aja Kong and Hiroshi Hase including tons of wrestling history around the world from the 20s through the 60s, the evolution of working to not working in Japan, and a look at Guerrero in hindsight, double issue $6 or $7 overseas)

*October 9, 2006 (A look back nine years later at the life and legacy of Brian Pillman with tons of inside information about what made him tick as his real objectives)

*November 15, 2006 (History of WCW part one, Eric Bischoff’s book and how the industry was changed forever)

*November 20, 2006 (History of WCW part two, Why Jim Ross left WCW, How Bischoff changed the company, signing of Hulk Hogan, Beginning of Nitro, Jesse Ventura, Brian Pillman, Chris Jericho and signing Wrestlemania planned celebrity away)

*November 27, 2006 (History of WCW part three, When Bischoff challenged McMahon to fight; Truth and fiction around Bret Hart signing with WCW and why it didn’t click)

*December 6, 2006 (details behind Pride’s offers to sell promotion and Part four of History of WCW part four, Hogan-Goldberg match and why there was no rematch, WCW loses NBC network deal in 1999 and the real reasons the company fell apart)

*January 22, 2007 (2006 Awards issue, double issue $7 on its own, $8 overseas)

*February 14, 2007 (Life and Times of Bam Bigelow)

*March 5, 2007 (WWE begins plans that will change the business)

*March 12, 2007 (Life and Times of Mike Awesome)

*March 19, 2007 (Life and Times of Ernie Ladd)

*April 4, 2007 (Life and Times of Badnews Allen Coage–which many are calling one of the best issues in history)

*July 2, 2007 (Part one of the Benoit double murder-suicide)

*July 5, 2007 (Part two of the Benoit double murder-suicide)

*July 10, 2007 (Part three of the Benoit double murder-suicide)

*July 19, 2007 (Part four of the Benoit double murder-suicide)

*July 23, 2007 (Part five of Benoit double murder-suicide)

*July 25, 2007 (Part six of Benoit double murder-suicide)

*August 15, 2007 (The legend of the God of Japanese wrestling and his influence on MMA, Karl Gotch)

*October 15 (2007 Hall of Fame double issue, $7 on its own, $8 overseas including inductions of The Rock, Tom Packs and the original Strangler Lewis)

*November 12, 2007 (Life and times of Fabulous Moolah and history of U.S. women’s wrestling) .

*December 31, 2007 (History of Ric Flair and the heyday of wrestling at the Greensboro Coliseum)

*January 21, 2008 (2007 Awards issue, double issue $7 on its own, $8 overseas)

*March 17, 2008 (Life and times of Johnny Weaver)

*March 24, 2008 (Life and times of Gary Hart)

*April 10, 2008 (Farewell to Ric Flair; My thoughts, Shawn Michaels talks of Flair’s meaning to him; Hall of Fame; Wrestlemania double issue, $7 on its own, $8 overseas)

*August 11, 2008 (Ric Flair leaves WWE; Updated history of pro wrestlers and MMA fighters who went to the Olympics)

* September 8, 2008 (2008 Hall of Fame double issue, $7 on its own, $8 overseas; part one of Killer Kowalski bio)

* September 15, 2008 (Life and Times of Evan Tanner)

* September 22, 2008 (The amazing career of Killer Kowalski, one of our most in-depth bios)

You can also order any of these issues on their own for $4 in North America or $5 overseas.

We now have available personally autographed copies of Tributes II, our latest book, as well as a DVD that comes with it talking more about the subjects in the book. The book covers the life stories of Lou Thesz, Wahoo McDaniel, Elizabeth, Fred Blassie, Road Warrior Hawk, Andre the Giant, Curt Hennig, Johnny Valentine, Davey Boy Smith, Terry Gordy, Owen Hart, Stu Hart, Gorilla Monsoon, The Sheik and Tim Woods..

To get all of those biographies as back issues of the Observer would be a $60 value today. This is a collection of some of the best Observer articles of the past several years in a hardcover, full-color format that is 239 pages. There is also a foreword by Bret Hart. The book price is $12.95 plus $3.50 for shipping costs in the U.S., $20 for shipping costs to Canada and $25 for shipping costs outside North America. You can order the book the same way you order the newsletter.

FRIDAY’S NEWS UPDATE

• UFC and WWE are both running the Smoothie King Arena in New Orleans within two days of each other.  While both sides will claim there is no competition and they attract different audiences, Raw coming after a UFC in the same market is usually way down from usual levels.  In this case, however, I think both will probably be hurt by the other but UFC will be hurt worse given the lack of star power in the lineup.
• The AAA Verano de Escandalo show on 6/14 from Arena Monterrey will be on iPPV in both English and Spanish.  The show will go head-to-head with WWE’s Money i the Bank show.
• Ric Flair will be working the NXT show in Columbus, OH on 6/13.  Zack Ryder is booked on the NXT tour next weekend as well, which runs Pittsburgh, Cleveland and Columbus.
• New Japan hasn’t released the card yet for Sunday’s show in Tokyo at the second Yoyogi Gym.  We’ll update when the card is out, which should be later today.
• The 6/26 PWG show in Reseda, CA, sold out in six minutes last night.
• Add Mikey Nicholls & Shane Haste from Pro Wrestling NOAH to those at the current WWE tryout camp.  They were doing cardio and fundamentals yesterday.
• I’m told to set my DVR tomorrow for the CMLL show on Azteca America as apparently the Dragon Lee vs. Negro Casas match is worth seeing.
• The first-ever Rush vs. L.A. Park match was announced for 6/27 in Tlalnepantla (thanks to Robert Bihari) 
• Bellator has released eight fighters:  Rameau Thierry Sokoudjou, Razak Al-Hassan, Alejandro Villalobos, Curtis Millender, Jesse Juarez, Rafael Silva, Antonio Duarte and Julio Cesar Nevez.
• Premier Wrestling on Sunday at the IFDES Lodge-Portuguese Hall in Gilroy, CA at 5 p.m.

JR Kratos (7-2) vs. Dylan Drake (4-3) for the Premier heavyweight title

Timothy Thatcher (2-2-1) vs. Marcus Lewis (4-3)

Jeff Cobb (5-2-1) vs. Kaimana (1-2)

Gabriel Gallo (2-0) vs. Sledge (4-4)

Joe Graves (1-0-1) vs. Buddy Royal (2-3)

Will Cuevas (1-2) vs. Dom Vitalli (0-3)

Tickets are on sale at www.premierwretle.com

• EWF tonight in Covina, CA at 4315 N. Vincent Ave.
• TSW Night of Champions on 6/20 in Vincennes, IN at the Eagles Lodge.
• Capital City Championship Combat on 6/19 in Ottawa at the Vanier Columbus Club.
• CMLL from Tuesday night in Guadalajara:  Furia Roja & Thunder Boy b Metatron & Tapatio, Magnum & Robin & Sensei b Camorra & Cholo & Rafaga, Astral & Electrico & Shockercito b Demus 3:16 & Nitrito & Pequeno Olimpico, El Terrible & Rey Bucanero & Vangellys b Atlantis & Delta & Guerrero Maya Jr., Mistico & Valiente & Volador Jr. b Gran Guerrero & Niebla Roja & Ultimo Guerrero (thanks to Kris Zellner)
• Laredo Brother & Laredo Kid & Valiente  vs. Guerrero Negro Jr. & Teddy Hart & Mascara Maligna Jr. headlines 6/13 in Houston at Plaza Garibaldi.
• Misterioso Jr. & Rush vs. Brian Cage & Steve Pain headlines Sunday in Cudahy, CA at the Potrero Night Club.
• Volador Jr. & Misterioso Jr. & Mistico vs. Blood Eagle & Histeria & Mr. Niebla headlines 6/19 in Tijuana at Gimnasio Independence. 
• One of our readers who subscribes to the WWE Network got an e-mail yesterday offering them June free. 
• Rock Solid Wrestling on 7/9 in Sudbury, ONT for a benefit show for the Playground Hockey League.
• Raymond Rowe of ROH in a music video
• A stunner performed at a high school graduation
• A show on movies with wrestlers
• The CFL is the latest league to have a concussion lawsuit against it.  Every league of any size in a combat sport is going to get one of these 
• The Miami Herald talks to Jerry Lawler about his DVD release, which includes an interview with his 89-year-old high school art teacher as well as Lance Russell
• The definition of the word Flair includes Ric Flair

ON THIS DAY IN PRO WRESTLING HISTORY INTERNATIONAL (thanks to Graeme Cameron)

1965 – Killer Kowalski beat Hercules Cortez in Melbourne to win the IWA title

1971 – Mark Lewin & King Curtis Iaukea beat Tiger Jeet Singh & Mr. Fuji in Sydney to win the IWA tag titles

1974 – Mariko Akagi & Junko Sasaki beat Jean Antone & Sandy Parker in Nagoya to win the WWWA tag title

1980 – Antonio Inoki beat Stan Hansen in Tokyo to win the Madison Square Garden tournament

1986 – Johnny Saint beat Jon Cortez in Bristol to win the world lightweight title

1990 – Terry Gordy beat Jumbo Tsuruta in Chiba to win the Triple Crown and Akira Taue & Shinichi Nakano beat Davey Boy Smith & Johnny Smith to win the All-Asia tag titles.  I was in Japan and supposed to go to that show and ended up at a business meeting in Tokyo that went long and you can just imagine my reaction later that night when I found out I missed a Triple Crown title change.  And yes, the Tsuruta vs. Misawa match three nights later at Budokan Hall was originally to be a Triple Crown title match, and if the title was at stake, I doubt Baba would have done the last minute switching of the finish and it wouldn’t have been one of the most famous matches of the last 50 years in Japan.

1992 – Kyoko Inoue beat Bison Kimura in Asahikawa to win the All-Pacific womens’ title

1997 – El Samurai beat Koji Kanemoto in Tokyo to win the Best of the Super Juniors tournament

2004 – Kazuyuki Fujita beat Hiroshi Tanahashi in Osaka to win the vacant IWGP heavyweight title

2005 – Takashi Sugiura & Yoshinobu Kanemaru beat Ikuto Hidaka & Minoru Fujita in Tokyo to win the GHC jr. title

TOMORROW’S WWE NETWORK SCHEDULE

12:00 AM ET
WWE BEYOND THE RING Rey Mysterio: Life of a Masked Man features exclusive and candid comments from the Ultimate Underdog on his sports entertainment path!

1:30 AM ET
FIRST LOOK A First Look to watch exclusive content from WWE Home Video’s latest release, Daniel Bryan – Just Say Yes! Yes! Yes!

2:00 AM ET
WWE NXT The future is here. Witness the entertainers, the leading men and women, the Superstars of tomorrow — this is NXT!

3:00 AM ET
WWE SUPERSTARS WWE Superstars features the best of the best, in matches you’ll have to see to believe. You never know what to expect, so expect everything.

4:00 AM ET
TOTAL DIVAS Nikki is devastated when she discovers John’s kept a secret from her. Rosa’s unaware she’s competing in her pursuits of an NFL player.

5:00 AM ET
WCW MONDAY NITRO On this episode of WCW Monday Nitro Hulk Hogan meets Sting in a huge main event match up.

6:00 AM ET
WWE ELIMINATION CHAMBER 2015 The Intercontinental Championship and the WWE Tag Team Titles will be decided inside the merciless Elimination Chamber, LIVE on WWE Network!

9:00 AM ET
TOTAL DIVAS Nikki is devastated when she discovers John’s kept a secret from her. Rosa’s unaware she’s competing in her pursuits of an NFL player.

10:00 AM ET
WWE BEYOND THE RING Rey Mysterio: Life of a Masked Man features exclusive and candid comments from the Ultimate Underdog on his sports entertainment path!

11:30 AM ET
FIRST LOOK A First Look to watch exclusive content from WWE Home Video’s latest release, Daniel Bryan – Just Say Yes! Yes! Yes!

12:00 PM ET
TOUGH ENOUGH The last two contestants standing prepare for a final match at the WWE training facility. Stone Cold announces the winner live at RAW!

1:00 PM ET
WWE COUNTDOWN Counting down the Top Ten Most Unique Matches of all time!

2:00 PM ET
THIS WEEK IN WWE Get caught up on all the highlights from Raw and SmackDown with This Week in WWE.

2:30 PM ET
WWE QUICK HITS WWE Quick Hits 4 brings you some of the most unique, entertaining, and sometimes outrageous clips, unearthed from the depths of WWE Network!

3:00 PM ET
SATURDAY NIGHTS MAIN EVENT Featuring a huge battle royal with Hulk Hogan, Mr. Perfect and more. Ultimate Warrior faces Sgt. Slaughter. Ted DiBiase battles Bret Hart.

4:30 PM ET
STONE COLD PODCAST WWE Hall of Famer and Icon Stone Cold Steve Austin will have a no holds barred LIVE interview with Paul Heyman!

5:30 PM ET
THIS WEEK IN WWE Get caught up on all the highlights from Raw and SmackDown with This Week in WWE.

6:00 PM ET
WWE COUNTDOWN Counting down the Top Ten Most Unique Matches of all time!

7:00 PM ET
MONDAY NIGHT WAR A controversial group of superstars set out to better sports entertainment and would rely on one another to do so.

8:00 PM ET
SATURDAY NIGHTS MAIN EVENT Featuring a huge battle royal with Hulk Hogan, Mr. Perfect and more. Ultimate Warrior faces Sgt. Slaughter. Ted DiBiase battles Bret Hart.

9:30 PM ET
STONE COLD PODCAST WWE Hall of Famer and Icon Stone Cold Steve Austin will have a no holds barred LIVE interview with Paul Heyman!

10:30 PM ET
THIS WEEK IN WWE Get caught up on all the highlights from Raw and SmackDown with This Week in WWE.

11:00 PM ET
SATURDAY NIGHTS MAIN EVENT Featuring a huge battle royal with Hulk Hogan, Mr. Perfect and more. Ultimate Warrior faces Sgt. Slaughter. Ted DiBiase battles Bret Hart.

AJ Styles joined Inside The Ropes radio show yesterday. Here are the highlights:

Would he go to Global Force Wrestling:

I think that there’s definitely an opening, it’s just finding an opening in the schedule. That’s the biggest problem we’ve come across is my schedule is so full that it’s hard to fit me in. That’s the problem we’re having right now. I always stay busy but I’d say it’s only a matter of time before I show up in Global Force.

His reaction when he found out ROH were going to be on Destination America:

A huge shock to me. Did not expect something like that. It’s one of those things where I was told and I just started laughing. It was just one of those things, I was so surprised I just started laughing hysterically. I even called a couple of my buddies in Ring of Honor and we just chuckled together. It’s gonna be fun man. We always did a great job with wrestling but now there’s something to prove and I think you’re gonna see a different Ring of Honor, in a good way.

Would he go to NXT?

The first thing I’m gonna do is what’s best for me and my family, that’s what I’m gonna do. People know I was in TNA but I don’t think people think of me now as ‘The TNA Guy’ Now they see me as a New Japan guy or a Ring of Honor guy. I had to work to make sure I wasn’t known as a TNA guy to get my product, being AJ Styles, out there again but at the end of the day like I say, whatever’s best for me and my family I’ll do. This is a business. Despite what people may think “AJ left TNA” this is a job. I thought I deserved a little bit more for all the effort and stuff into, you know any business, and to not get paid what I think I deserve would be dumb. You don’t work hard to take a step down, you work hard to take steps up. I went out and found a step up in the wrestling business and if there’s another opportunity to step up, then I’ll do that.

You can hear the full interview at this link: http://theinsidenetwork.podomatic.com/entry/2015-06-03T11_31_39-07_00 where he also talks about working face and heel, Samoa Joe in NXT, if he believes there’s anything that can save TNA and more

By Dave Meltzer
dave@wrestlingobserver.com”>dave@wrestlingobserver.com

Smackdown tonight on Syfy:

Lucha Dragons vs. The Ascension vs. Prime Time Players for a tag title shot
Ryback vs. Stardust
Kevin Owens vs. Zack Ryder for NXT title
Neville vs. Kofi Kingston
Roman Reigns vs. Sheamus

New Japan World has a live show from Korakuen Hall tomorrow morning at 5:30 a.m. Eastern and 2:30 a.m. Pacific

Jushin Liger vs. Barbaro Cavernario
Ryusuke Taguchi vs. Chase Owens
Yohei Komatsu vs. Baretta
Kyle O’Reilly vs. Gedo
Tiger Mask vs. David Finlay
Mascara Dorada vs. Rocky Romero
Bobby Fish vs. Nick Jackson
Hiroshi Tanahashi & Hirooki Goto & Togi Makabe & Katsuyori Shibata & Tomoaki Honma vs. Shinsuke Nakamura & Tomohiro Ishii & Toru Yano & Kazushi Sakuraba & Yoshi-Hashi

This will lead to Sunday’s Best of the Super Junior tournament finals at 4 a.m. Eastern and 1 a.m. Pacific.  In the main event, B block winner Kushida will face the A block winner.  If Taguchi beats Owens, he will face Kushida.  If Owens wins and Kyle O’Reilly beats Gedo, O’Reilly goes to the finals.  If Taguchi and O’Reilly both go to draws, Taguchi advances.  If Taguchi wins and O’Reilly draws, Taguchi advances.  If Taguchi draws and O’Reilly wins, O’Reilly advances.

In a busy news week, we’ve full coverage of all of UFC’s changes when it comes to drug testing, as well as other things the company is doing for fighters, looking at the pluses, the minuses, and the loopholes in the new system of drug testing.  We also look at Brock Lesnar vs. Steve Austin, Samoa Joe in WWE and how it’s changed, Destination America and wrestling, we’ve got a look at Money in the Bank, Elimination Chamber, the death of Tommy Rogers, UFC in Brazil, Dwayne Johnson’s latest projects and the retirement of Masashi Aoyagi.

The new issue is up on the site at http://www.f4wonline.com/component/content/article/110-wrestling-observer-newsletter/42867-june-8-2015-wrestling-observer-newsletter-tommy-rogers-bio-austin-lesnar-notes-wwe-signs-samoa-joe-full-time-more

Web site subscriptions, which include access to both current and older newsletters as well as every audio show on the history of the site are at  http://www.f4wonline.com/member/signup.php

You can also order the print Observer right now and get it delivered to your door via mail, by sending your name, address, Visa or Master Card number and an expiration date to dave@wrestlingobserver.com”>dave@wrestlingobserver.com

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The Wrestling Observer ranges weekly from 35,000 to 50,000 words covering pro wrestling and MMA internationally. Each issue has coverage and analysis of all the major news, plus every issue breaks major news stories before the Internet sties and has the most complete look at the pro wrestling and MMA business anywhere, plus history pieces available nowhere else.

Our lead story looks at the UFC’s new drug testing program, the keys to the program, questions that still need to be answered, loopholes, how often fighters will be tested, ability to beat the system and more.

We look at Brock Lesnar vs. Steve Austin, Austin’s promo on the WWE Network, Austin vs Lesnar history, and the value of next year’s WrestleMania on PPV and the Network.

We look at the new deal Samoa Joe is talking with WWE about, how the deal has changed, Joe’s future on the indies, Joe’s ROH future, what led to the change, as well as an update on the Tyson Kidd injury situation in the match with Joe.

We also preview and update Destination America and wrestling, as well as the competition on Wednesday nights.  We update Destination America on TNA and ROH, comparisons, how TNA hurt itself if it needs to shop for a new outlet by his actions this past two weeks, DA promotion of the two shows and why ROH on DA is only good for TNA.

We’ve got full coverage of the Elimination Chamber show, as well as a look at Money in the Bank, burning out programs, plus match-by-match coverage with star ratings and poll results.

We have a look at the life of Tommy Rogers, looking at the highlights of his career, how he achieved stardom, the last years of his life, how he got into wrestling, how The Fantastics were formed, the feuds with the Midnight Express and The Sheepherders, the first Clash of Champions, the first Crockett Cup, and time in Japan.

We also look at Brock Lesnar’s return to WWE, the 7/4 show in Tokyo, Sami Zayn injury update, Rusev injury update, Kevin Owens new changes, Lots of Dwayne Johnson career notes, why WWE won’t tape TV in Kentucky, Lots of WWE acting notes, WWE hiring, NXT updates, Stephanie McMahon looking at selling more stock, Finn Balor talks career, lots of notes about people at the training camp, Nelson Frazier lawsuit and annual income for Mabel and Viscera.

We also note Kevin Owens talking his career, Ric Flair talk show,who Flair wants to manage, WWE stock updates, notes on all the WWE and NXT house shows plus business notes from the past week.

We also look at how the Brazilian economy affects UFC in different ways, how it is similar to situations with pro wrestling in the past, as well as a look at Saturday’s show with match-by-match coverage and business notes.

We also look at the pro wrestling career of Masashi Aoyagi, and how he got into wrestling, what promotion he kicked off and how that changed the wrestling business and more.

We also have our monthly WWE & TNA business breakdowns.

The Observer is the world’s most detailed weekly pro wrestling publication, in its 32nd year of publication, and is read by the biggest names in the pro wrestling, industry, MMA industry, sports world and on Wall Street.

We also have our regular features such as the most complete look at ratings, plus results of the major house show events each week in pro wrestling and MMA, and complete inside rundowns of all the TV shows.

Also in this week’s issue:

–Update on this year’s Busca de un Idolo tournament

–Latest big matches from Arena Mexico

–Former star from more than 20 years ago returns to Arena Mexico for the first time in decades

–More on the AAA World Cup show

–Notes from the last two sets of AAA TV tapings

–Wrestle-1 world tour notes

–Road to Keiji Muto tournament

–Dragon Gate King of Gate tournament

–Next big Dragon Gate matches

–Cryptic tweet by an American who wrestles in Japan

–An interesting what if regarding New Japan bookings

–Politics of wrestling regarding New Japan

–What New Japan may have to change

–Notes on the Super Juniors tournament and all the results

–Benefit show for cancer-striken star

–Genichiro Tenryu’s final match in Osaka

–Update on GFW

–Mid Atlantic wrestling reunion

–Update on Terry Funk

–Update on Lucha Underground and Alberto Del Rio

–More on NESN deal

–What wrestling star has a 3.83 GPA in collage right now

–ROH notes from the weekend shows

–Really weird stuff in TNA

–Contract singing announcements

–Notes from a second TNA conference call with talent

–What happened with Tyrus and GFW

–GFW reaction

–TNA 2015 Hall of Fame plan that fell through

–Notes on TNA arena events

–Update on legislation to get UFC in Madison Square Garden

–Looking at Sara McMann’s complaints about he Reebok deal

–The business and income of Ronda Rousey

–UFC boosts minimum

–UFC lawsuit update

–Upcoming UFC title matches

–What happened with the Leslie Smith street fight on Saturday night

–UFC makes a number of cuts

–Update on T.J. Grant

–Update on Rashad Evans

–Lots of new UFC fights

If you are a new subscriber ordering 24 or more issues, you can get one free classic issue of your choice sent to you today.  With a 40 issue subscription, you can get two free classic issues sent to you today.

New subscribers ordering 24 or 40 issues have to let us know what major stories of the past 11 years you are most interested in and we’ll send the issue with the best coverage of that story. We’ve got coverage of every major PPV event and world wide spectacular, every major star switching promotions, histories of companies like FMW, Rings and New Japan, retirement and obit issues of every major star who fits into those descriptions over the past 11 years, as well as our biggest issue every year, the annual awards issue, and our most controversial issue of every year, the Hall of Fame issue.

Our most requested issues in our history are:

*November 17, 1997 (full details of everything leading to the most famous wrestling match finish of modern times at the Survivor Series plus a history of in-ring double-crosses)

*December 21, 1998 (the complete Vince McMahon-Bret Hart conversation right before the Survivor Series match so you’ll know exactly what was said–the conversation played in edited form both on the inaugural broadcast of Confidential as well as in Wrestling with Shadows, but everything that was said between the two about the match that was going to take place that same night)

*August 1, 1994 (the most detailed coverage anywhere of the Vince McMahon steroid trial, an issue praised in numerous newspaper article and Sex, Lies and Headlocks)

*March 26, 2001 (death of WCW and history of pro wrestling on the Turner networks)a

*October 22, 2001 (why the adult audience has left pro wrestling in such great numbers and what needed to have been done to save them)

*July 8, 1991 (Ric Flair leaves WCW as world champion/Zahorian steroid trial)

*February 8, 1993 (the life and times of Andre the Giant)

*May 13, 2002 (the life story of the most incredible pro wrestling career ever, a look at Lou Thesz, in one of the largest issues of our history)

*January 27, 2003 (part one of the two-part series covering the career and life of The Sheik)

*February 3, 2003 (Part two on The Sheik including thoughts from people who worked with him and where he stands historically)

*March 24, 2003 (history of the WWWF title, inside behind the Sammartino, Backlund and Backlund era)

*April 21, 2003 (history of WWF continues with the expansion nationally, the death of the regional territories and the rise of Hulk Hogan)

*May 12, 2003 (The life and death of Elizabeth and the rise of fall of Lex Luger)

*June 9, 2003 (Part 1 of history of WWF vs. WCW wars and what many say was the greatest year in U.S. wrestling; plus a look at Fred Blassie)

*June 16, 2003 (Freddie Blassie through the eyes of his biggest rivals and friends)

*July 28, 2003 (Part 2 of the history of the WWF vs. WCW war and the plans to make new superstars in the early 90s, what happened, and the night where the three biggest wrestling companies in the world combined for a joint show and what happened)

*August 25, 2003 (2003 Hall of Fame issue with huge profiles on the controversial career of Shawn Michaels, Chris Benoit as well as historical features on Earl Caddock and Francisco Flores)

*September 22, 2003 (Part 3 of the history of the WWF vs WCW war with the seeds that caused the collapse of the industry in the 90s, Zahorian trial, Gulf War controversy, Flair leaves WCW while holding world title and much more)

*October 27, 2003 (The fascinating life of Stu Hart plus the story of Road Warrior Hawk)

*January 19, 2004 (2003 Awards issue)

*February 2, 2004 (History of Toronto wrestling, Jack Tunney life story, Royal Rumble and Battle Royal history)

*February 23, 2004 (History of Guerrero family with Eddy’s win over Brock Lesnar)

*March 1, 2004 (History of WWF continues with the period that brought the company down in early 1992, the mistakes, the real stories and how the business changed)

*March 8, 2004 (History of Wrestlemania, its greatest matches and best and worst shows as voted both by wrestlers and non-wrestlers and Wrestlemania history books)

*July 5, 2004 (A look behind the scenes and Ric Flair’s book and his background with Eric Bischoff and Hulk Hogan)

*July 12, 2004 (A look at more on Ric Flair’s book and his comments on Bruno Sammartino, Bret Hart and Mick Foley)

*August 16, 2004 (History of the Olympians in pro wrestling)

*August 23, 2004 (2004 Hall of Fame issue and biggest issue of the year with huge profiles on Kazushi Sakuraba, Undertaker, Bob Backlund, Masahiro Chono, Ultimo Dragon, Kurt Angle and Tarzan Lopez–this counts as one issue if you are asking for a free issue, but ordered separately, due to size, is $6 in North America and $7 overseas)

*October 4, 2004 (the life and times of Big Bossman; as well as details of the life and times of one of the most influential men world wide in pro wrestling history, Jim Barnett)

*November 15, 2004 (the full story of what happened between Kurt Angle and Daniel Puder, plus coverage of the most important week in the history of TNA)

*January 24, 2005 (2004 Awards issue, Rock and WWE part company)

*March 14, 2005 (the 50 biggest money players in the history of WWF and a look at their Hall of Fame)

*May 9, 2005 (the life and times of Chris Candido)

*June 20, 2005 (The full story behind Paul Heyman and the death of ECW, as well as coverage of One Night Stand, Hardcore Homecoming and behind the scenes of both shows)

*July 18, 2005 (death of Shinya Hashimoto and his records with a look at the fall of New Japan, the Matt Hardy angle, tons of WWE firings, Cornette firing in detail as well as problems of a WWE developmental territory in our biggest news issue of the year which is a double-sized issue and would be $6 on its own and $7 overseas)

*August 24, 2005 (2005 Hall of Fame issue with career profiles of Paul Heyman, HHH and Freebirds plus debut of MMA Hall of Fame)

*September 12, 2005 (History of Mid South Wrestling)

*October 10, 2005 (Life and Times of the Ultimate Warrior)

*November 21, 2005 (Life and Times of Eddy Guerrero and Crusher, double issue $6 on its own and $7 overseas)

*December 5, 2005 (The Eddy Guerrero special issue, double issue $6 on its own, $7 overseas)

*January 9, 2006 (The life and times of Superstar Billy Graham, plus New Year’s Eve 2005 coverage)

*January 16, 2006 (2005 Awards double issue, $6 or $7 overseas)

*April 3, 2006 (Story of Ann Calvello and the history of Roller Derby–many called this the best issue of the Observer ever)

*April 10, 2006 (Behind the scenes at the 2006 Wrestlemania/Hall of Fame week)

*July 24, 2006 (The History of the Von Erichs and World Class Championship Wrestling–the most unreal story ever in wrestling)

*September 4, 2006 (The Rise and Fall of Kurt Angle; 2006 Hall of Fame inductions of Eddie Guerrero, Paul Bowser, Masakatsu Funaki, Aja Kong and Hiroshi Hase including tons of wrestling history around the world from the 20s through the 60s, the evolution of working to not working in Japan, and a look at Guerrero in hindsight, double issue $6 or $7 overseas)

*October 9, 2006 (A look back nine years later at the life and legacy of Brian Pillman with tons of inside information about what made him tick as his real objectives)

*November 15, 2006 (History of WCW part one, Eric Bischoff’s book and how the industry was changed forever)

*November 20, 2006 (History of WCW part two, Why Jim Ross left WCW, How Bischoff changed the company, signing of Hulk Hogan, Beginning of Nitro, Jesse Ventura, Brian Pillman, Chris Jericho and signing Wrestlemania planned celebrity away)

*November 27, 2006 (History of WCW part three, When Bischoff challenged McMahon to fight; Truth and fiction around Bret Hart signing with WCW and why it didn’t click)

*December 6, 2006 (details behind Pride’s offers to sell promotion and Part four of History of WCW part four, Hogan-Goldberg match and why there was no rematch, WCW loses NBC network deal in 1999 and the real reasons the company fell apart)

*January 22, 2007 (2006 Awards issue, double issue $7 on its own, $8 overseas)

*February 14, 2007 (Life and Times of Bam Bigelow)

*March 5, 2007 (WWE begins plans that will change the business)

*March 12, 2007 (Life and Times of Mike Awesome)

*March 19, 2007 (Life and Times of Ernie Ladd)

*April 4, 2007 (Life and Times of Badnews Allen Coage–which many are calling one of the best issues in history)

*July 2, 2007 (Part one of the Benoit double murder-suicide)

*July 5, 2007 (Part two of the Benoit double murder-suicide)

*July 10, 2007 (Part three of the Benoit double murder-suicide)

*July 19, 2007 (Part four of the Benoit double murder-suicide)

*July 23, 2007 (Part five of Benoit double murder-suicide)

*July 25, 2007 (Part six of Benoit double murder-suicide)

*August 15, 2007 (The legend of the God of Japanese wrestling and his influence on MMA, Karl Gotch)

*October 15 (2007 Hall of Fame double issue, $7 on its own, $8 overseas including inductions of The Rock, Tom Packs and the original Strangler Lewis)

*November 12, 2007 (Life and times of Fabulous Moolah and history of U.S. women’s wrestling) .

*December 31, 2007 (History of Ric Flair and the heyday of wrestling at the Greensboro Coliseum)

*January 21, 2008 (2007 Awards issue, double issue $7 on its own, $8 overseas)

*March 17, 2008 (Life and times of Johnny Weaver)

*March 24, 2008 (Life and times of Gary Hart)

*April 10, 2008 (Farewell to Ric Flair; My thoughts, Shawn Michaels talks of Flair’s meaning to him; Hall of Fame; Wrestlemania double issue, $7 on its own, $8 overseas)

*August 11, 2008 (Ric Flair leaves WWE; Updated history of pro wrestlers and MMA fighters who went to the Olympics)

* September 8, 2008 (2008 Hall of Fame double issue, $7 on its own, $8 overseas; part one of Killer Kowalski bio)

* September 15, 2008 (Life and Times of Evan Tanner)

* September 22, 2008 (The amazing career of Killer Kowalski, one of our most in-depth bios)

You can also order any of these issues on their own for $4 in North America or $5 overseas.

We now have available personally autographed copies of Tributes II, our latest book, as well as a DVD that comes with it talking more about the subjects in the book. The book covers the life stories of Lou Thesz, Wahoo McDaniel, Elizabeth, Fred Blassie, Road Warrior Hawk, Andre the Giant, Curt Hennig, Johnny Valentine, Davey Boy Smith, Terry Gordy, Owen Hart, Stu Hart, Gorilla Monsoon, The Sheik and Tim Woods..

To get all of those biographies as back issues of the Observer would be a $60 value today. This is a collection of some of the best Observer articles of the past several years in a hardcover, full-color format that is 239 pages. There is also a foreword by Bret Hart. The book price is $12.95 plus $3.50 for shipping costs in the U.S., $20 for shipping costs to Canada and $25 for shipping costs outside North America. You can order the book the same way you order the newsletter.

THURSDAY’S NEWS UPDATE

–We’ve got a new interview with Chris Hero up on the site talking the indie scene as well as his doing at least a two hour match, maybe longer in an ALS benefit match on Sunday in Waterloo, ONT at the Cross Body Academy.  All donors will get a download of the match before its release.  For every $500 in donations, Hero will wrestle for 30 minutes straight, and we’re now past $2300 for two plus hours.  For more info you can go to http://smash-wrestling.com/als/

–TNA has announced a deal with Sony Six for a Hindi language feed of Impact starting on Saturday at 9 p.m.  The Hindi airings will be built around Khoya, who is from India.  The show will be called “Shera ki Kahaani,” built around Mahabili Shera, the original wrestling name of Khoya. (thanks to Himanshu Doi)   

–War Machine Jon Koppenhaver was in the news yesterday after causing a problem in the court room.  He was attempting to get charges of attempted murder, burglary and sexual assault in an alleged attack on former girlfriend Christy Mack thrown out after the savage beating Mack took which became a major national news story.  Those were four of the 34 charges he’s facing.  When the judge ruled against him, he caused a scene and demanded to be able to take a lie detector test.  His trial on all the charges is scheduled for September.

–Metro Pro Wrestling celebrates its fifth anniversary with a show on Saturday night at the Turner Rec Center in Kansas City, with Tommy Dreamer as the headliner.

–On Monday night’s Observer radio, a question was asked about who the agent was when Sid Eudy (Sid Vicious) suffered his horrible broken leg in 2001.  The agent was John Laurinaitis.

–In another note from last night’s show, Alicia Webb is dating Shawn Daivari.  They’ve been together for years.  Webb was Ryan Shamrock in WWE in the late 90s.

–Add Jessicka Havok to the list of those that have been in the Observer the last few weeks as far as being in Orlando this week for the current tryout camp.  She was Havok in TNA  earlier this year.

–Jim Cornette has signed a deal with Figures Toy Company for a legends of pro wrestling action figure.  Cornette, New Jack and Mikey Whipwreck were the latest names announced by the company, which is also producing the ROH action figures line.

–WWE announced shows on 11/6 and 11/7 in Spain, in Barcelona and Madrid respectively. 

–UFC.com is looking for a Managing Editor for its web site.  You need a BA in Journalism, Art/Design/Creative Multimedia, Mass Communications, Advertising/Media or Linguistics/Language or equivalent experience, five plus years of journalism experience with a proven track record of quality reporting, A track record of management, solid news judgement, creative thinking and planning long-term coverage, understanding the sport and the UFC business model and the ability to work nights and weekends.  For more info go to www.indeed.com

–Rolling Stone has a story on Bill Goldberg promoting Sunday’s Legends of Wrestling show at Citi Field in New York.  Goldberg, Bret Hart and Ric Flair will be the headliners, although none of the three will be wrestling.  He talks about doing one last match as well as a potential kickboxing match, his year in WWE, Brock Lesnar and more.

http://www.rollingstone.com/sports/features/bill-goldberg-on-kicking-ass-and-returning-to-the-ring-20150603
–The Mets sent out an e-mail blast to their season ticket holders with every seat for that show slashed by 50 percent in price.  They just started promoting the show during the Mets game last night mentioning Flair, Hart, Goldberg, Rob Van Dam, Lita, Nasty Boys, Matt Sydal, Tommy Dreamer and Jim Duggan.  They’re running the show in a 45,000 seat stadium.   

–Here is the FS 1 weekend UFC schedule

Friday at 5 p.m. Eastern are weigh-ins from New Orleans with Karyn Bryant, Kenny Florian, Dominick Cruz and Heidi Androl.  The pregame show will be on FS 2 at 7 p.m. Saturday.  Live fights start at 8 p.m. to 1 a.m. on FS 1, followed by the post-fight show at 1 a.m.

–FS 1 has a special “Inside American Kickboxing Academy” that will air on Sunday at 5:30 p.m. Eastern showing the training of Cain Velasquez, Daniel Cormier and Luke Rockhold.

–FS 1 also has a show previewing Cain Velasquez vs. Fabricio Werdum on 6:30 p.m., and a very different Countdown show for UFC 188, Velasquez vs. Werdum and Gilbert Melendez vs. Eddie Alvarez, at 10 p.m. Sunday night.   

–There is a pre-sale with the code word UNITED all day today for the 7/25 UFC show in Chicago headlined by TJ Dillashaw vs. Renan Barao at the United Center.  This show will air live on FOX and also feature Jessica Eye vs. Miesha Tate, winner gets a UFC women’s bantamweight title shot.

ON THIS DAY IN PRO WRESTLING HISTORY INTERNATIONAL (thanks to Graeme Cameron)

1962 – Mike Sharpe & Buddy Austin beat Rikidozan & Toyonobori in Osaka to win the All-Asia tag title
1980 – Lizmark beat Supremo in Acapulco to win the NWA middleweight title
1981 – Antonio Inoki beat Stan Hansen to win the Madison Square Garden tournament
1990 – Yoshihiro Asai (Ultimo Dragon) beat Cuchillo in Tokyo to win the UWA middleweight title
1993 – Gran Hamada beat Villano IV in Tokyo to win the UWA super middleweight title
1995 – Lionheart (Chris Jericho) beat Gedo in Tokyo to win the WAR Int.jr. title
1999 – Takao Omori & Yoshihiro Takayama beat Hayabusa & Jinsei Shinzaki in Sapporo to win the All-Asia tag title
2004 – Tatsuhito Takaiwa & Tomohiro Ishii beat Leonardo Spanky (Brian Kendrick) & Low Ki in Hachinohe to win the Zero-One lightweight tag team title
2006 – Kenta Kobashi & Tamon Honda beat Takeshi Morishima & Mohammed Yone in Sapporo to win the GHC tag title, and Takashi Sugiura beat KENTA to win the GHC jr. title
2006 – Charly Manson beat Zorro in Pachuca to win the Mexican national heavyweight title

–Brian “Road Dogg” James was interviewed today for the Owen Hart DVD.

–A fund raiser to get Tommy Rogers’ body back from Hawaii to Florida for a funeral is at

http://www.gofundme.com/TommyRogers

–A very interesting story on how easy it is to beat the tests for EPO and why the biological passport isn’t all it’s cracked up to be
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-32983932

–John Cena was on Good Morning America today for a brief segment with the kid on Raw from Monday.

–Samoa Joe vs. Chris Hero headlines for Smash Wrestling on Saturday night in Toronto, which also features Matt Cross and Rich Swann.

–Rockstar Pro Wrestling has an iPPV tomorrow night in Dayton outdoors at 1106 E. Third St. with Ron Mathis vs. Abyss for the Rockstar championship and Davey Richards vs. Dave Crist.

–Chris Jericho donated $3,000 to the fundraising campaign for Brian Knighton (Axel Rotten) trying to raise money for surgery that will hopefully get him out of a wheelchair.  For more info you can go to www.youcaring.com/brian-knighton

–Legacy Pro Wrestling on Saturday night in Palmyra, PA at the InTheNet Sports Complex with AR Fox and Shane Strickland.

–Grand Slam Wrestling on 6/20 in Moosic, PA at the Youth Center.

–Absolute Intense Wrestling on 7/10 in Cleveland at the Ohio City Masonic Arts Center with Josh Alexander vs Ricky Shane Page, Tim Donst vs. Nick Gage and Ethan Page vs. Eddie Kingston in an I Quit match.

–New England Championship Wrestling on Saturday night in Everett, MA at the Rec Center with Slyck Wagner Brown vs. Brad Hollister.

–Dr. Wagner Jr. & El Hijo de Dr. Wagner Jr. face L.A. Park & El Hijo de L.A. Park in the main event of a Lucha Libre show in Houston.

–Chael Sonnen interviews Randy Couture on his podcast at www.podcastone.com/chaelsonnen

–Brian Solomon has a book signing for his book Pro Wrestling FAQ on Wednesday at 4 p.m. at the Barnes & Noble in Westport, CT.

–The Fight Network in Canada has signed a multi-year contract with the World Series of Fighting.  The deal kicks off with a tape of the show from Edmonton headlined by Lance Palmer vs. Chris Horodecki for the WSOF featherweight title.  All WSOF events air in the U.S. on NBC Sports Network, with the U.S. airing the show live tomorrow night at 9 p.m. Eastern.  On The Fight Network in Canada, they will air the RFA show from Broomfield, CT live at 10 p.m., and follow it with a tape of the Edmonton WSOF show.

–WWE stock has had two really strong days, up 38 cents per share today to close at $14.80.

–Tomorrow is the final day for Tough Enough submissions at www.WWEToughEnough.com  One man and one woman who are the overall winners will each get one year WWE deals at a $250,000 salary.

–Glory will be airing tomorrow at 4 p.m. Eastern live from France on Spike with Mauro Ranallo and Frank Shamrock as announcers.  Rico Verhoeven defends the heavyweight title against Benjamin Adegbuyi in the main event and there will also be a one-night four-man lightweight tournament.

–Hoosier Pro Wrestling on Saturday night in Columbus, IN at the 4-H Fairgrounds featuring Iraqi war hero Michael Hayes from OVW and a Rob Ramer vs. Flash Flanagan match.

–Superkick’d on 6/27 in Toronto at the Great Hall at 1087 Queen Street West.

–River City Wrestling on 6/12 in San Antonio at the Sidelines Grill featuring Hernandez from Lucha Underground.

–Legacy Kickboxing on 7/24 in Houston at the Bayou Music Center. 

–James Storm will headline for the Columbia Wrestling Association on Saturday night in Mt. Pleasant, TN in a benefit for the family of Lucas Golden, a fan who passed away recently  Storm was his favorite wrestler.  The show will be at the Community Center.

–Bellator’s next show will be 6/19 in St. Louis at the Scottrade Center with Kimbo Slice vs. Ken Shamrock.  There will be open workouts on 6/17 at the Scott Air Force Base at 2 p.m.

–An injury to Hector Urbina pulls him out of a welterweight fight with Albert Tumenov that was scheduled for the 6/13 UFC show in Mexico City.  UFC is looking for a late replacement.

–Alpha One Wrestling on 6/14 in Hamilton, ONT at 222 Queenston Rd. with Ricky Shane Page vs. Tyler Thomas, Ethan Page vs Biff Busick, plus Brian Myers. 

TOMORROW’S WWE NETWORK SCHEDULE (thanks to Bert Duckwall)

12:00 AM ET
RAW FLASHBACK The 1-2-3 Kid’s new alliance pays dividends. Shawn Michaels gives his all in a match that proves there is more than one way to spell heart.

1:00 AM ET
STONE COLD PODCAST WWE Hall of Famer and Icon Stone Cold Steve Austin will have a no holds barred LIVE interview with Paul Heyman!

2:00 AM ET
WWE COUNTDOWN Counting down the Top Ten Most Unique Matches of all time!

3:00 AM ET
WWE ELIMINATION CHAMBER 2015 The Intercontinental Championship and the WWE Tag Team Titles will be decided inside the merciless Elimination Chamber, LIVE on WWE Network!

6:00 AM ET
WWE NXT The future is here. Witness the entertainers, the leading men and women, the Superstars of tomorrow — this is NXT!

7:00 AM ET
TOTAL DIVAS Nikki is devastated when she discovers John’s kept a secret from her. Rosa’s unaware she’s competing in her pursuits of an NFL player.

8:00 AM ET
STONE COLD PODCAST WWE Hall of Famer and Icon Stone Cold Steve Austin will have a no holds barred LIVE interview with Paul Heyman!

9:00 AM ET
WWE NXT The future is here. Witness the entertainers, the leading men and women, the Superstars of tomorrow — this is NXT!

10:00 AM ET
TOTAL DIVAS Nikki is devastated when she discovers John’s kept a secret from her. Rosa’s unaware she’s competing in her pursuits of an NFL player.

11:00 AM ET
STONE COLD PODCAST WWE Hall of Famer and Icon Stone Cold Steve Austin will have a no holds barred LIVE interview with Paul Heyman!

12:00 PM ET
WWE NXT The future is here. Witness the entertainers, the leading men and women, the Superstars of tomorrow — this is NXT!

1:00 PM ET
TOTAL DIVAS Nikki is devastated when she discovers John’s kept a secret from her. Rosa’s unaware she’s competing in her pursuits of an NFL player.

2:00 PM ET
STONE COLD PODCAST WWE Hall of Famer and Icon Stone Cold Steve Austin will have a no holds barred LIVE interview with Paul Heyman!

3:00 PM ET
MONDAY NIGHT WAR A controversial group of superstars set out to better sports entertainment and would rely on one another to do so.

4:00 PM ET
WWE BEYOND THE RING Rey Mysterio: Life of a Masked Man features exclusive and candid comments from the Ultimate Underdog on his sports entertainment path!

5:30 PM ET
FIRST LOOK A First Look to watch exclusive content from WWE Home Video’s latest release, Daniel Bryan – Just Say Yes! Yes! Yes!

6:00 PM ET
TOTAL DIVAS Nikki is devastated when she discovers John’s kept a secret from her. Rosa’s unaware she’s competing in her pursuits of an NFL player.

7:00 PM ET
TOUGH ENOUGH The last two contestants standing prepare for a final match at the WWE training facility. Stone Cold announces the winner live at RAW!

8:00 PM ET
WWE SUPERSTARS WWE Superstars features the best of the best, in matches you’ll have to see to believe. You never know what to expect, so expect everything.

9:00 PM ET
WWE BEYOND THE RING Rey Mysterio: Life of a Masked Man features exclusive and candid comments from the Ultimate Underdog on his sports entertainment path!

10:30 PM ET
FIRST LOOK A First Look to watch exclusive content from WWE Home Video’s latest release, Daniel Bryan – Just Say Yes! Yes! Yes!

11:00 PM ET
WWE SUPERSTARS WWE Superstars features the best of the best, in matches you’ll have to see to believe. You never know what to expect, so expect everything.

These were the ratings for last night’s shows:

8 p.m. ROH 163,000

9 p.m. TNA 297,000

11 p.m. ROH 110,000

12 a.m. TNA 72,000

It was TNA’s second lowest (trailing only the week they aired a show that was a year old). 

by David Bixenspan | davidbix@wrestlingobserver.com | Follow @davidbix

TV notes for tonight, the night that takes Wednesday from the most crowded night of the week to even more crowded:

* ROH debuts on Destination America at 8:00 p.m. ET (and re-airing at 11:00 p.m. ET) with The Briscoes vs. The House of Truth, KUSHIDA vs. Will Ferrara, Watanabe vs. Silas Young, and Moose vs. B.J. Whittier.

* Lucha Underground on El Rey at 8:00 p.m. ET has Argenis vs. Jack Evans in an Aztec Medallion match, Son of Havoc, Angelicio, & Ivelisse vs. Big Ryck and two mystery partners for the Trios Championship, and Sexy Star vs. Pentagon Jr. in a submission match.

* NXT on WWE Network at 8:00 p.m. ET features Carmella vs. Alexa Bliss, Finn Balor vs. Rhyno, and a contination of the Kevin Owens-Samoa Joe drama.

* Impact Wrestling on Destination America at 9:00 p.m. ET (and 12:00 a.m. ET) has Rockstar Spud’s decision about whether or not he’ll vacate the X Division Title to get a World Title shot, The Wolves vs. The Dirty Heels in match 3 of their best of 5 series, Brooke Tessmacher vs. Jade, The Beat Down Clan vs. The Rising, and the return of Pope D’Angelo Dinero (Elijah Burke).

* UFC on Fox Sports 1 is the usual arrangement we’ve seen the last few weeks: UFC Tonight at 8:00 p.m. ET, last week’s episode of The Ultimate Fighter at 9:00 p.m. ET, a new episode of The Ultimate Fighter, “Eyes on the Prize,” airs at 10:00 p.m. ET, and then the first 20 minutes or so of Fox Sports Live at 11:00 p.m. ET consists of the “TUF Talk” wrap-up show.

As always, more after we pay the bills… 

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The newest issue of Figure Four Weekly is up on the site for subscribers (subscribe here) with a detailed look at the history of popular music being used in pro wrestling, including:

* Who actually did the first pro wrestling music video?

* The role of popular songs gtting major acts over.

* What made the use of music in ECW so special.

* How “real” songs make wrestlers stand out in a sea of in-house productions.

And much more. Plus, as always, we have  all of the usual reviews and international news.

Also, now available for the first time on Kindle (meaning Kindle devices and anything with the Kindle app) is Fall Guys, the seminal 1937 book that has been described as being like the 1930s version of the Wrestling Observer. It was surprisingly not on Kindle already, so we put together a nice version with a full table of contents w/ chapter marks, proper formatting on everything, etc. Right now it’s available from the American, Canadian, and cn Amazon/Kindle stores OR you can also buy it from anywhere in the world on PayHip, who will provide you with both Kindle and ePub (every other e-reader) format files, and you can either sideload them to your device or have them email it to your Kindle. 

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The breakdown of the ROH deal on Destination America, how this affects TNA, the time frame of both company’s deals with the station and why this went down is the lead story in the new issue of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter.  We also look at Daniel Cormier winning the world championship and questions arising, full coverage of UFC 187, Full coverage of Samoa Joe to NXT and the last special, the AAA World Cup coverage, Bischoff sues TNA and the UFC hall of Fame.

The new issue is up on the site at June 1, 2015 Wrestling Observer Newsletter: ROH to Destination America, Bischoff sues TNA, UFC Hall of Fame

Web site subscriptions, which include access to both current and older newsletters as well as every audio show in the history of the site are at  Sign up here for as low as $9.99 per month!

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If you order by mail with a check, cash or money order (P.O. Box 1228, Campbell, CA 95009-1228), you can get $1 off in every price range.

The Wrestling Observer ranges weekly from 35,000 to 50,000 words covering pro wrestling and MMA internationally. Each issue has coverage and analysis of all the major news, plus every issue breaks major news stories before the Internet sties and has the most complete look at the pro wrestling and MMA business anywhere, plus history pieces available nowhere else.

We look at TNA’s actions over the past week since the original Observer story broke, the expansion in coverage of ROH, why the ROH deal got done, how Dixie Carter handled the situation, the conference call with TNA talent and how it went, the lineup for the first month of ROH on Destination America and the key show to watch, what to expect from the ratings, the ROH PPV schedule and the Samoa Joe situation with ROH.

We also look at Daniel Cormier winning the UFC light heavyweight title, the Jon Jones situation, the situation with Ryan Bader, the shadow over the Cormier win, Vitor Belfort physically, the Arlovski vs. Browne fight, all the business notes from the show including a top ten of all time, and match-by-match coverage.

We also look at the NXT Takeover show.  We look at the situation with Samoa Joe, plus match-by-match coverage.

We’ve also got full coverage of the World Cup show, including screw-ups, best foreign stars, and the awards from the show.

We also look at Elimination Chamber, the Rusev injury, Ronda Rousey and next year’s WrestleMania, talk about a gimmick for a future NXT special, notes on the new season of Total Divas, Notes on someone who is a TV star that got a tryout as a WWE star this past week and how it went, A look behind the scenes on the Daniel Bryan/A.J. Lee angle, how WWE is changing its thoughts on talent, another celebrity angle, NXT dates and a look at the upcoming Australia tour.

Plus we’ve got notes from all the arena events from the past week as well as business notes.

We look at the Bischoff-Hervey lawsuit against TNA.

We also have a full breakdown on the UFC Hall of Fame and its new members.  We look at their histories, why they are in and more.

We’ve got first word on the Extreme Rules PPV business.

The Observer is the world’s most detailed weekly pro wrestling publication, in its 32nd year of publication, and is read by the biggest names in the pro wrestling, industry, MMA industry, sports world and on Wall Street.

We also have our regular features such as the most complete look at ratings, plus results of the major house show events each week in pro wrestling and MMA, and complete inside rundowns of all the TV shows.

Also in this week’s issue:

–A look at CMLL’s new tournament over the next few months and background of the guys

–What pro wrestling event in Mexico will have a number of U.S. reporters from another sort attending

–Tetsuya Naito in CMLL

–Wife of wrestler planning oncoming out of retirement

–UFC fighter making appearance at international wrestling show

–King of Gate finals and rundown of semifinals

–Looking at the booking from there

–Triple Crown title change

–MMA fighter coming to All Japan

–Full coverage of the first week of the Best of the Super Juniors tournament

–Current standings

–Why this year doesn’t have as much interest as in the past

–Why all the booking had to be redone after the first night

–How business has been

–Tournament lineup for this week

–Satoru Sayama health update

–Terry Funk news

–World champions from two different promotions team up together in a third promotion

–Global Force Wrestling update

–Go fund me campaigns for wrestlers

–Update on the past week’s PWG show

–Trish Stratus talks thinking about doing MMA

–One of the biggest indie show of the summer

–Tammy Sytch on doing adult videos

–Latest on Lucha Underground and season two

–Alberto El Patron talks about doing MMA and Bill Goldberg

–The back story in one of Lucha Underground’s main angles

–ROH signs action figure deal

–Update on the next ROH PPV show

–TNA changes up television tapings and why

–Dixie Carter reality show

–Christy Hemme leaves company

–History of TNA sale talks

–Samoa Joe on why he left TNA

–Dana White talks UFC 189

–Where ticket sales for the show are coming from

–Dana White talks the PPV numbers

–Update on UFC in New York and where it stands

–Sara McMann thinking of legal action on the Reebok deal

–This week’s UFC show

–Tons of new UFC fights

–Lawsuit settlement results in apologies

–Suspended fighter thinks about going to Olympics

–Hector Lombard talks Josh Barnett

–Ronda Rousey at the  Wall Street Journal cafe brunch

–Fighter who had announced retirement now coming back

–Biggest World Series of Fighting show to date

If you are a new subscriber ordering 24 or more issues, you can get one free classic issue of your choice sent to you today.  With a 40 issue subscription, you can get two free classic issues sent to you today.

New subscribers ordering 24 or 40 issues have to let us know what major stories of the past 11 years you are most interested in and we’ll send the issue with the best coverage of that story. We’ve got coverage of every major PPV event and world wide spectacular, every major star switching promotions, histories of companies like FMW, Rings and New Japan, retirement and obit issues of every major star who fits into those descriptions over the past 11 years, as well as our biggest issue every year, the annual awards issue, and our most controversial issue of every year, the Hall of Fame issue.

Our most requested issues in our history are:

*November 17, 1997 (full details of everything leading to the most famous wrestling match finish of modern times at the Survivor Series plus a history of in-ring double-crosses)

*December 21, 1998 (the complete Vince McMahon-Bret Hart conversation right before the Survivor Series match so you’ll know exactly what was said–the conversation played in edited form both on the inaugural broadcast of Confidential as well as in Wrestling with Shadows, but everything that was said between the two about the match that was going to take place that same night)

*August 1, 1994 (the most detailed coverage anywhere of the Vince McMahon steroid trial, an issue praised in numerous newspaper article and Sex, Lies and Headlocks)

*March 26, 2001 (death of WCW and history of pro wrestling on the Turner networks)a

*October 22, 2001 (why the adult audience has left pro wrestling in such great numbers and what needed to have been done to save them)

*July 8, 1991 (Ric Flair leaves WCW as world champion/Zahorian steroid trial)

*February 8, 1993 (the life and times of Andre the Giant)

*May 13, 2002 (the life story of the most incredible pro wrestling career ever, a look at Lou Thesz, in one of the largest issues of our history)

*January 27, 2003 (part one of the two-part series covering the career and life of The Sheik)

*February 3, 2003 (Part two on The Sheik including thoughts from people who worked with him and where he stands historically)

*March 24, 2003 (history of the WWWF title, inside behind the Sammartino, Backlund and Backlund era)

*April 21, 2003 (history of WWF continues with the expansion nationally, the death of the regional territories and the rise of Hulk Hogan)

*May 12, 2003 (The life and death of Elizabeth and the rise of fall of Lex Luger)

*June 9, 2003 (Part 1 of history of WWF vs. WCW wars and what many say was the greatest year in U.S. wrestling; plus a look at Fred Blassie)

*June 16, 2003 (Freddie Blassie through the eyes of his biggest rivals and friends)

*July 28, 2003 (Part 2 of the history of the WWF vs. WCW war and the plans to make new superstars in the early 90s, what happened, and the night where the three biggest wrestling companies in the world combined for a joint show and what happened)

*August 25, 2003 (2003 Hall of Fame issue with huge profiles on the controversial career of Shawn Michaels, Chris Benoit as well as historical features on Earl Caddock and Francisco Flores)

*September 22, 2003 (Part 3 of the history of the WWF vs WCW war with the seeds that caused the collapse of the industry in the 90s, Zahorian trial, Gulf War controversy, Flair leaves WCW while holding world title and much more)

*October 27, 2003 (The fascinating life of Stu Hart plus the story of Road Warrior Hawk)

*January 19, 2004 (2003 Awards issue)

*February 2, 2004 (History of Toronto wrestling, Jack Tunney life story, Royal Rumble and Battle Royal history)

*February 23, 2004 (History of Guerrero family with Eddy’s win over Brock Lesnar)

*March 1, 2004 (History of WWF continues with the period that brought the company down in early 1992, the mistakes, the real stories and how the business changed)

*March 8, 2004 (History of Wrestlemania, its greatest matches and best and worst shows as voted both by wrestlers and non-wrestlers and Wrestlemania history books)

*July 5, 2004 (A look behind the scenes and Ric Flair’s book and his background with Eric Bischoff and Hulk Hogan)

*July 12, 2004 (A look at more on Ric Flair’s book and his comments on Bruno Sammartino, Bret Hart and Mick Foley)

*August 16, 2004 (History of the Olympians in pro wrestling)

*August 23, 2004 (2004 Hall of Fame issue and biggest issue of the year with huge profiles on Kazushi Sakuraba, Undertaker, Bob Backlund, Masahiro Chono, Ultimo Dragon, Kurt Angle and Tarzan Lopez–this counts as one issue if you are asking for a free issue, but ordered separately, due to size, is $6 in North America and $7 overseas)

*October 4, 2004 (the life and times of Big Bossman; as well as details of the life and times of one of the most influential men world wide in pro wrestling history, Jim Barnett)

*November 15, 2004 (the full story of what happened between Kurt Angle and Daniel Puder, plus coverage of the most important week in the history of TNA)

*January 24, 2005 (2004 Awards issue, Rock and WWE part company)

*March 14, 2005 (the 50 biggest money players in the history of WWF and a look at their Hall of Fame)

*May 9, 2005 (the life and times of Chris Candido)

*June 20, 2005 (The full story behind Paul Heyman and the death of ECW, as well as coverage of One Night Stand, Hardcore Homecoming and behind the scenes of both shows)

*July 18, 2005 (death of Shinya Hashimoto and his records with a look at the fall of New Japan, the Matt Hardy angle, tons of WWE firings, Cornette firing in detail as well as problems of a WWE developmental territory in our biggest news issue of the year which is a double-sized issue and would be $6 on its own and $7 overseas)

*August 24, 2005 (2005 Hall of Fame issue with career profiles of Paul Heyman, HHH and Freebirds plus debut of MMA Hall of Fame)

*September 12, 2005 (History of Mid South Wrestling)

*October 10, 2005 (Life and Times of the Ultimate Warrior)

*November 21, 2005 (Life and Times of Eddy Guerrero and Crusher, double issue $6 on its own and $7 overseas)

*December 5, 2005 (The Eddy Guerrero special issue, double issue $6 on its own, $7 overseas)

*January 9, 2006 (The life and times of Superstar Billy Graham, plus New Year’s Eve 2005 coverage)

*January 16, 2006 (2005 Awards double issue, $6 or $7 overseas)

*April 3, 2006 (Story of Ann Calvello and the history of Roller Derby–many called this the best issue of the Observer ever)

*April 10, 2006 (Behind the scenes at the 2006 Wrestlemania/Hall of Fame week)

*July 24, 2006 (The History of the Von Erichs and World Class Championship Wrestling–the most unreal story ever in wrestling)

*September 4, 2006 (The Rise and Fall of Kurt Angle; 2006 Hall of Fame inductions of Eddie Guerrero, Paul Bowser, Masakatsu Funaki, Aja Kong and Hiroshi Hase including tons of wrestling history around the world from the 20s through the 60s, the evolution of working to not working in Japan, and a look at Guerrero in hindsight, double issue $6 or $7 overseas)

*October 9, 2006 (A look back nine years later at the life and legacy of Brian Pillman with tons of inside information about what made him tick as his real objectives)

*November 15, 2006 (History of WCW part one, Eric Bischoff’s book and how the industry was changed forever)

*November 20, 2006 (History of WCW part two, Why Jim Ross left WCW, How Bischoff changed the company, signing of Hulk Hogan, Beginning of Nitro, Jesse Ventura, Brian Pillman, Chris Jericho and signing Wrestlemania planned celebrity away)

*November 27, 2006 (History of WCW part three, When Bischoff challenged McMahon to fight; Truth and fiction around Bret Hart signing with WCW and why it didn’t click)

*December 6, 2006 (details behind Pride’s offers to sell promotion and Part four of History of WCW part four, Hogan-Goldberg match and why there was no rematch, WCW loses NBC network deal in 1999 and the real reasons the company fell apart)

*January 22, 2007 (2006 Awards issue, double issue $7 on its own, $8 overseas)

*February 14, 2007 (Life and Times of Bam Bigelow)

*March 5, 2007 (WWE begins plans that will change the business)

*March 12, 2007 (Life and Times of Mike Awesome)

*March 19, 2007 (Life and Times of Ernie Ladd)

*April 4, 2007 (Life and Times of Badnews Allen Coage–which many are calling one of the best issues in history)

*July 2, 2007 (Part one of the Benoit double murder-suicide)

*July 5, 2007 (Part two of the Benoit double murder-suicide)

*July 10, 2007 (Part three of the Benoit double murder-suicide)

*July 19, 2007 (Part four of the Benoit double murder-suicide)

*July 23, 2007 (Part five of Benoit double murder-suicide)

*July 25, 2007 (Part six of Benoit double murder-suicide)

*August 15, 2007 (The legend of the God of Japanese wrestling and his influence on MMA, Karl Gotch)

*October 15 (2007 Hall of Fame double issue, $7 on its own, $8 overseas including inductions of The Rock, Tom Packs and the original Strangler Lewis)

*November 12, 2007 (Life and times of Fabulous Moolah and history of U.S. women’s wrestling) .

*December 31, 2007 (History of Ric Flair and the heyday of wrestling at the Greensboro Coliseum)

*January 21, 2008 (2007 Awards issue, double issue $7 on its own, $8 overseas)

*March 17, 2008 (Life and times of Johnny Weaver)

*March 24, 2008 (Life and times of Gary Hart)

*April 10, 2008 (Farewell to Ric Flair; My thoughts, Shawn Michaels talks of Flair’s meaning to him; Hall of Fame; Wrestlemania double issue, $7 on its own, $8 overseas)

*August 11, 2008 (Ric Flair leaves WWE; Updated history of pro wrestlers and MMA fighters who went to the Olympics)

* September 8, 2008 (2008 Hall of Fame double issue, $7 on its own, $8 overseas; part one of Killer Kowalski bio)

* September 15, 2008 (Life and Times of Evan Tanner)

* September 22, 2008 (The amazing career of Killer Kowalski, one of our most in-depth bios)

You can also order any of these issues on their own for $4 in North America or $5 overseas.

We now have available personally autographed copies of Tributes II, our latest book, as well as a DVD that comes with it talking more about the subjects in the book. The book covers the life stories of Lou Thesz, Wahoo McDaniel, Elizabeth, Fred Blassie, Road Warrior Hawk, Andre the Giant, Curt Hennig, Johnny Valentine, Davey Boy Smith, Terry Gordy, Owen Hart, Stu Hart, Gorilla Monsoon, The Sheik and Tim Woods..

To get all of those biographies as back issues of the Observer would be a $60 value today. This is a collection of some of the best Observer articles of the past several years in a hardcover, full-color format that is 239 pages. There is also a foreword by Bret Hart. The book price is $12.95 plus $3.50 for shipping costs in the U.S., $20 for shipping costs to Canada and $25 for shipping costs outside North America. You can order the book the same way you order the newsletter.

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Wednesday Daily Update

— UFC officially announced its plans for enhanced drug testing today. The press release is on the front page and Shaun Al-Shatti has a good breakdown at MMAFighting.com. The keys points are:

* The entire roster will be subject to year-round, unannounced testing “with the possibility of a collection occurring any place, any time, with no notice.” One key is how true that actually is since human growth hormone is normally taken by athletes at bedtime with the idea that you’ll be clear by morning and testers will only come during somthing approximating the regular nine to five work day.

* Suspnsions for positive tests for “non-specified substances” (effectively banned performance enhancing drugs from anabolics to growth hormones to peptides to blood doping) will be two years for the first offense (four years for “aggravating circumstances”), followed by double the punishment of the previous suspension for the second and third suspension.

* Suspensions for “specified substances” (marijuana, stimulants, and glucocorticosteroids, only tested for in-competition) will be will be one year for the first offense (two years for “aggravating circumstances”), followed by double the punishment of the previous suspension for the second and third suspension.

There’s no indication yet as to whether or not athletic commissions would recognize the suspensions if UFC suspended and cut a fighter.

— The class action antitrust lawsuit against the UFC has been moved to Nevada, primarily because judge Edward Davila determined that the lawsuit is an action to interpret the fighters’ contracts, which have clauses about the jurisdiction of any related lawsuits. Paul Gift has much more detail on the decision at Bloody Elbow.

— Eric Fisher at Sports Business Journal is reporting that Major League Baseball is moving quickly at spinning off MLB Advance Media (the subsidiery that handles the technological end of WWE Network as well as other services like HBO Now) into its own company.

— Sky Italia announced today that they renewed their deal to carry WWE programming in Italy through June 2020.

— Tyrus tweeted yesterday that he will not be working for Global Force Wrestling as previously announced “due to contractual obligations.”

— It wasn’t officially confirmed until last night when MMAFighting heard back from the UFC, but the promotion has cut Shayna Baszler, Tim Elliott, Dylan Andrews, Alptekin Ozkilic, Vik Grujic, Shane Howell, Rocky Lee, Tateki Matsuda and Alexander Torres. The releases were initially reported by @UFCFightersInfo, a Twitter bot that tracks changes to the UFC roster and rankings pages. there are exceptions, but a deleted profile does usually mean a fighter has been cut.

Elliott was considered something of a surprise because while he’s on a three fight losing streak, he only lost to top 10 contenders, is an action fighter, and could have at least gotten one fight against an unranked opponnt to see where he stood. One would think that World Series of Fighting should have some interest in him and the flyweights that were cut now that they’re trying to build that division.

— Max Landis has a new wrestling-themed video where he explains why John Cena is booed. This one is just him talking to a camera for a few minutes, not a big production like Wrestling Isn’t Wrestling was.

— On June 27th, Tuff-N-Uff is running “Pack the Mack,” a MMA card at the Thomas and Mack Center in Las Vegas  which is serving as a memorial for founder Barry Meyer and a benefit for the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention. They’re hoping to break the attendance record for amateur MMA, which they set last year. Tickets are available at UNLVTickets.com. 

— Bill Goldberg talked to AM New York as part of his publicity tour for the Legends of Wrestling event this Saturday at Citi Field.

— A Vine of a high school graduation featuring a Stone Cold Stunner may or may not be going viral at the moment.

— ONE Championship announced a card for June 20th at the Guangzhou Tianhe Gymnasium in Guangzhou, China with featherweights Timofey Nastyukhin and Yusuke Kawanago battle ine th main event.

— Per John Finnegan of the North American Wrestling Rankings blog, this past Monday, Raw was the host of Sheamus’s 300th televised WWE match. 

— Arianny Celeste, the UFC’s most famous Octagon Girl, is the host at the Marquee nightclub in Sydney, Australia this Friday night.

TOMORROW’S WWE NETWORK SCHEDULE (thanks to Bert Duckwall)

12:00 AM ET
CULTURE SHOCK WITH COREY GRAVES Corey Graves jumps into horse racing, gambling, the legendary infield, and much more at The Preakness on this episode of Culture Shock!

12:10 AM ET
TOTAL DIVAS Eva’s sexy bachelorette in Curacao gets heated when TJ destroy’s Nattie’s hopes of rekindling their marriage.

1:00 AM ET
TOTAL DIVAS Nikki is devastated when she discovers John’s kept a secret from her. Rosa’s unaware she’s competing in her pursuits of an NFL player.

2:00 AM ET
WWE BEYOND THE RING A look inside the life and career of CM Punk from his early success in ECW to the top of the WWE.

4:00 AM ET
RAW FLASHBACK Following Stone Cold Steve Austin’s controversial Royal Rumble victory, Bret Hart lashes out and bids farewell to WWE.

5:00 AM ET
RAW FLASHBACK Before Shawn Michaels can celebrate his reign as the new WWE Champion, he is greeted by the four men who want to take the title from him.

6:00 AM ET
PRIME TIME WRESTLING Join Gorilla Monsoon and Bobby ‘The Brain’ Heenan for Prime Time Wrestling featuring Harley Race, Junkyard Dog, and many more!

8:00 AM ET
WRESTLEMANIA 12 Shawn Michaels and Bret ‘Hit Man’ Hart battle in an Iron Man Match for the WWE Title. Diesel faces The Undertaker. Roddy Piper vs. Goldust.

11:00 AM ET
SMACKDOWN FLASHBACK Edge and Christian and the Hardyz battle for Terri’s services. The Rock serves as the People’s Referee. HHH defends his title.

12:15 PM ET
CLASH OF THE CHAMPIONS Clash of the Champions XXIV; Davey Boy Smith challenges Vader for the World Heavyweight Title. A ‘shocking’ edition of Flair for the Gold.

2:00 PM ET
OLD SCHOOL Old School WWE card from the Maple Leaf Gardens features Hulk Hogan defending the WWE Title against Paul Orndorff. Ricky Steamboat and more.

3:00 PM ET
WCW MONDAY NITRO On this episode of WCW Monday Nitro Hulk Hogan meets Sting in a huge main event match up.

4:00 PM ET
RAW FLASHBACK The 1-2-3 Kid’s new alliance pays dividends. Shawn Michaels gives his all in a match that proves there is more than one way to spell heart.

5:00 PM ET
WCW STARRCADE 1994 Hulk Hogan defends the WCW World Title against The Butcher. Sting battles Avalanche. The Nasty Boys face Harlem Heat. Jim Duggan vs. Vader.

8:00 PM ET
WCW MONDAY NITRO On this episode of WCW Monday Nitro Hulk Hogan meets Sting in a huge main event match up.

9:00 PM ET
RAW FLASHBACK The 1-2-3 Kid’s new alliance pays dividends. Shawn Michaels gives his all in a match that proves there is more than one way to spell heart.

10:00 PM ET
STONE COLD PODCAST WWE Hall of Famer and Icon Stone Cold Steve Austin will have a no holds barred LIVE interview with Paul Heyman!

11:00 PM ET
WCW MONDAY NITRO On this episode of WCW Monday Nitro Hulk Hogan meets Sting in a huge main event match up.

Submitted by Anonymous

Rey Horus pinned Anthony Nese in 15:38 with a top rope huracarana. 

It was a good match.  Problem with EVOLVE is every match is nearly the same with a lot of big moves and a lot of kick out of big moves.   Right off the bat again, we have a match like this.  When this happens in every match, it takes away the importance of the near fall from the top matches.  Opening match is the second most important match on the card behind the main event.  Opening match sets the tone, but it should also just warm up the crowd.   This match would have been better at only ten minutes instead of going fifteen.   Anthony Nese is really good and I always enjoy his work.   I wish he would do the cartwheel off the apron reversal he does here and there.  He does it every match I see him in.   It is cool, but how in every match he is on the apron and doing a cartwheel getting away from his opponent trying to kick him?   Rey Horus is good, but still very green as he showed in this match.  His finisher is amazing, but it takes a long time for both men to be balanced on the tope rope that it becomes a total expose.

Davey Richards pinned Caleb Konely in 20:55 with a running kick. 

Great match.  Both went out and put on a great performance.  Konely is so underrated and could be the best heel in EVOLVE behind Rodrick Strong.  Richards has looked great since his return to EVOLVE.   At times it got a bit ridiculous as they both kicked out out of so many finishers.  In the case of one move too many,  Richards hit a double stomp off the top rope and the crowd went nuts.  That should have been the finish, but he instead hit the running kick for the pin and pop wasn’t as loud.   Crazy that this was only the second match on the card.

After the match Caleb Konely and his tag team partner Anthony Nese argued after the match teasing a split.  Splitting up the Premier Athlete Brand tag team would benefit both.  Konely has been real impressive with his single matches against Rey Horus and now Davey Richards.   Konely is a natural heel and he understands how to work as a heel which is truly rare on the indy level.  Nese comes off more as a natural babyface and with all flashy moves, a turn to babyface would be good for him.

TJ Perkins pinned “Speeball” Mike Bailey in 11:14 with a cradle. 

Fun match.  Mike Bailey is a joy to watch.  His style is based around his strikes and thus he stands out from the rest of the EVOLVE roster.  Story early was Bailey was trying to KO TJP with his kicks and TJP was working on the legs on Bailey.   Speedball just needs to get a better body, better gear to not look so indy.  As long as he stays injury free, this kid does have a bright future. TJP was solid as always, but still very robotic with his facial expressions.  Actually both men are and that lack of facial expressions brings down the intensity of the match.

Chris Hero pinned Trevor Lee in 18:02

Match of the night as this was better then Richards-Konely earlier.  Lee would get a move, but Hero would always counter.  Hero plays his role as the veteran making the young talent coming up to prove themselves.  Loved the pacing of this match, it was slower then the pervious matches, but each thing they did meant something and you remembered it after they did it.  Hero kept trying to finish off Lee, but he would keep kicking out.  Finally, Hero pinned Lee with a Gotch Piledriver and then picked him up for a tombstone piledriver.  Maybe a bit overkill, but it continued the story that Hero felt he needed to go that extra mile to finish off Lee.

DragonGate Open The United Gate Tag Team Champions Rich Swann & Johnny Gargano defeated Drew Gulak & Tracy Williams when Gargano made Williams submit to the “GargaNoEscape”.

Very good tag team match. This is another match that probably went a bit too long.  Giving guys long times is a good, but it can also be negative, especially in matches were workers like this do a ton of moves.  You see so much  and nothing registers for long.  With so many moves, the crowd gets exhausted and thus the crowd heats lowers and match starts to drag.  Tracy Williams is a great young prospect.  Really reminds me of a young Timothy Thatcher.  This kid is going to be really good.  Williams and Gulak have the potential to be one of the best tag teams in the US if they continue to team up.   Swann was his great self as usual and Gargano put on a very good performance as well.  This match made me want to see a long program between these two teams.

After the match Gargano and Swann “vacated” the DragonGate Open The United Gate tag titles.  Basically, DragonGate USA is no more and this is was a nice way of making it official.  Gargano and Swann hoped EVOLVE would create Evolve tag team titles.  I am sure this will happen soon and I hope these two teams are programed together for those newly created titles whenever that is. 

DragonGate Open The Freedom Gate Champion Drew Galloway pinned Biff Busick with a double arm DDT in 15:35

There is nobody in the US that can match Drew Galloway’s presence as a World Champion.  It is hard to give off that aura, but Galloway does it.  I bought the IPPV for this match alone and these two did not let me down.  It was hard hitting and dramatic.   They brawled around the building.  Nine times out of ten I do not care for that, but these two are so good with putting a believable and intense brawl that I really enjoyed this.   Busick kept going for his rear naked choke finisher throughout the match and Galloway would keep reversing.

At one point Busick locked it on and many thought a title change was near.  The finishing sequence was a thing of beauty as Busick kept going for his finisher, but Galloway kept reversing and finally catching Busick with his finish.

After the match Galloway cut another great promo.  Why did the WWE let this guy go?  Galloway is living up to his  “Chosen One” gimmick now on the indies.  Johnny Gargano came out and talked about Galloway defeating him in San Jose at the WWN Super Show for the DragonGate Open The Freedom Gate title and mentioned how he and his tag team partner Rich Swann are looking towards the future and they vacated the DragonGate United tag belts and Galloway should follow their lead and putting DragonGate USA behind them.

Galloway disagreed, basically saying he won this belt with hard work and he is going to keep defending it.  He told Gargano they would face again for DragonGate belt and if Gargano beats him then he could do whatever he wants with the title, but “If” that happens he is going keep defending it.  I think they should unify the titles.  Maybe do a gimmick where Galloway will defend both each weekend, but if he is able to retain after a years time (March 2016) then the belts would unified.   Really, after Galloway beat Gargano in at the WWN Super Show the titles should have been unified then.  Positive is they are moving to getting rid of the DragonGate USA brand all together.  Since combining the promotions, it has been more confusing then good.

Overall Analysis:

This was one of the best Evolve shows this company has put on.  I highly recommend this IPPV.  Only negative was the lighting in this venue sucked.  The guys all looked light blue from the lights and it was very dark at times in the corners.  If you can get past the poor production, you will love this show.  Hero-Lee is worth going out of your way to see.  I understand this was a rematch from PWG out in LA which was another great match.  I can’t compare the two since I did not see the PWG match, but this Hero-Lee match here in Evolve was one of the best indy matches of the half year.  Still way below Hero vs Timothy Thatcher at the WWN Super Show in San Jose, CA this past March however.