The WWE announced today that The New Day would be inducting The Freebirds into the WWE Hall of Fame on 4/2 in Dallas.
The connection is that The New Day as a three-man tag team championship team, where any two men can defend the titles, was taken from The Freebirds, of Michael Hayes & Terry Gordy & Buddy Roberts, who may have been the first team to do so with their Freebird rules.
The Freebirds scheduled for induction are Hayes, currently a WWE producer, Jimmy Garvin, Gordy and Roberts. The latter two, who have passed away, will be represented by their sons who became pro wrestlers, Ray Gordy, who worked for WWE as Jesse, and Buddy Roberts Jr., an independent wrestler in Illinois.
Yesterday the company announced that Vader would be inducting Stan Hansen. Vader and Hansen had a memorable match at the Tokyo Dome in 1990 where Vader’s eye came out of its socket. It was a dream match at the time, as Vader was the foreign monster for New Japan Pro Wrestling, while Hansen had a similar spot with All Japan.
Sasha Banks beat Charlotte in a non-title match with a roll-up. Becky Lynch attacked Charlotte after the match.
Sheamus beat Kofi Kingston with the Brogue kick.
The Usos beat The Ascension
Sami Zayn & Dolph Ziggler beat The Miz & Kevin Owens. After the match, everyone from the ladder match got in a brawl, which naturally included ladders. Zack Ryder climbed to the top of the ladder.
Roman Reigns no contest Bubba Ray Dudley. The crowd cheered Reigns, believe it or not.
A.J. Styles beat Tyler Breeze
Brock Lesnar and Paul Heyman were out doing an interview. The Wyatt Family came out. Lesnar & Dean Ambrose worked together in fighting The Wyatt Family. Lesnar and Ambrose went at it after and the show ended with Lesnar leaving Ambrose laying.
Another key note is that during Main Event, in a Naomi vs. Paige match, Tamina, Lana, Natalya, Fox, Summer Rae and Emma all got involved. Summer Rae and Emma were both on the heel side. So it would appear there will be a 5th babyface to be announced and a ten person match with Brie Bella on the face side and another person.
After hours of debating, the bill to legalize mixed martial arts and put it under the auspices of the New York State Athletic Commission passed the state assembly by a 113-25 vote.
The bill had already passed the state senate, which means it goes to Governor Andrew Cuomo, who is expected to sign, and UFC is expected to run its first event in Madison Square Garden toward the latter part of this year.
New York had been the lone holdout in UFC’s attempt to get the sport legalized nationwide. The bill had passed the state senate for seven straight years, but it had been blocked from even being voted on in the assembly.
UFC officials believed they had far more than enough votes last year, but time ran out in the session and once again, they could never get the legislation voted on.
There were long impassioned pleas on both sides, with the few dissenters talking about everything from homophobia, domestic violence, violence in society to the condition of Muhammad Ali, to the idea Madison Square Garden should be for team sports.
Less than two weeks before the “biggest WrestleMania of all time”, RAW’s ratings continue to stagnate. The show started weak but the audience remained remarkably consistent throughout the 3 hour broadcast, with a main event of Dean Ambrose facing Braun Strowman.
The average viewership was 3.4 million viewers, down about 2% from last week. It was down 19% from the same week last year but that’s not a fair comparison as it was the go-home show to Mania, which was held a week earlier in 2015. Comparing to the week prior to the go-home show last year, Monday’s show was down 13% as RAW continues to be down about 10% year over year.
After last week’s show saw the third hour as the highest rated of the show, things returned to normal this week as Hour 3 was down slightly from the previous 2 hours, which were almost identical.
RAW was just underneath The O’Reilly Factor as the most watched show on cable for the night as the FOX News show did 3,423,000 viewers. In the 18-49 ratings, RAW’s 3 hours were #2,3 and 4 on the night behind VH1’s Love and Hip Hop.
The vote in the New York assembly regarding MMA being legalized, that is expected to pass, is taking place right now. You can watch live via the video link below. The hearing has been a circus so far with every ignorant statement about MMA imaginable being made.
If it passes, the tentative plan would be to run a big show in November in Madison Square Garden.
UFC had hoped for it to pass for years now, and several times it likely would have, but it was blocked from going to a vote for a number of reasons. Amazingly, amateur mixed martial arts is legal in New York but professional mixed martial arts is not.
Dave Meltzer and Bryan Alvarez talked about this situation in detail in last night’s edition of Wrestling Observer Radio.
Daniel Bryan will not be appearing on Friday for what was scheduled as Daniel Bryan night in Madison Square Garden and there are reports we are awaiting confirmation on that indicate this is not limited to just the Madison Square Garden.
Several ticket holders for Friday night’s show were contacted today with a letter from Madison Square Garden stating:
“Due to a scheduling conflict, the ceremony to honor former WWE world heavyweight champion Daniel Bryan on March 25, 2016 has been postponed.
While this honoring may occur at a later date, WWE Live–Road to WrestleMania this Friday at Madison Square Garden will still take place as scheduled. The event will feature many of your favorite WWE Superstars. After nearly 5 years, Triple H return to action in the ring in the world’s most famous arena, Madison Square Garden. Also see Roman Reigns, Dean Ambrose, Ric Flair, Sheamus, A.J. Styles, Bray Wyatt, Kevin Owens and many more!
We apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused and look forward to your continued support of the WWE and Madison Square Garden.”
UPDATE: WWE officials have said that Danielson has requested time off and it was granted.
There was what looked to be an injury after Raw went off the air in a dark match with The Wyatt Family vs. Roman Reigns & Dean Ambrose & Dolph Ziggler & Sami Zayn.
Multiple reports have come in that Harper took a spill onto the floor and grabbed his right leg. Those at ringside believed he blew out his knee but as of this moment we don’t have anything official past the point the WWE medical staff came out immediately. He left under his own power but was helped to the back by the other members of the Wyatt Family.
This possible injury adds to a string of WWE injuries going back over the last few months. The most recent injury was to Neville.
Also during the dark match a fan attempted to attack Braun Strowman. It’s not clear exactly what happened but Strowman was attacked in some form and told security who dragged the fan out of the building.
We’ll update this if we hear more details tonight.
The trial of Hulk Hogan vs. Gawker Media, Nick Denton, and A.J. Daulerio (who we’ll collectively call “Gawker” unless we need to be more specific) turned out to be quite possibly even more of a circus than anyone even could have imagine, as of this writing, it resulted in Hogan being awarded $115 million in compensatory damages with punitive damages still to come. The jury split the compensatory damages as $60 million in emotional damagers and $55 million in lost wages, with the latter number determined in large part from how much Hogan claimed he would have made if he had decided to market the video. He most likely won’t get close to that, if anything. There’s a question of exactly what Gawker will need to do to appeal, as Florida has various laws relating to posting a bond to secure the award when filing an appeal. There are alternatives, but the options including Gawker trying to stay the bond with the trial judge (unlikely given Judge Campbell’s rulings up to this point), posting the maximum allowed $50 million bond, or having to hire a bond company and paying about $12 million so the bond company can post $50 million.
The Big News: Vince McMahon announced that if the Undertaker loses to Shane McMahon at WrestleMania, then the Undertaker will never wrestle at WrestleMania again. Kevin Owens became the latest wrestler to get scolded by Stephanie McMahon, who ordered him to defend the Intercontiental Championship in a ladder match against Sami Zayn, the Miz, Sin Cara, Stardust, Zack Ryder and Dolph Ziggler. Building up Shane McMahon was the backbone of the show through a series of vignettes, and no matter how much Vince McMahon has lost his creative touch, this company will always have great videos as extra spice in their stew. But they served a cold dish, overall, tonight.
Show Recap:
The show was dedicated to the memory of Mary Katherine Stewart, who was only 21 years old.
Stephanie McMahon announced HHH wasn’t going to be there tonight, and fans had 60 second to get to the box office for refunds. She claimed her husband was missing the show because of front office concerns, not because of Roman Reigns attack last week. She said Reigns proved why he would never be WWE World Heavyweight Champion, because he lacks intellect. Reigns came out to mostly boos, which was not the reaction he got when he defeated Sheamus for the WWE title in December. He’s no longer walking through the crowd.
Stephanie started to dress down Reigns until he put his hand over the microphone. Fans booed him as he started to talking, and said HHH didn’t come to Philadelphia because he knew he would whip his ass all over Broad Street. Reigns said he would walk into Texas and take his championship back, and there was nothing Stephanie or her daddy’s money could do about it. Stephanie started to slap him, but he caught her hand and said “Now, I’m the Authority.” It was the right idea to put Reigns in there with Stephanie because he’s the only person she sells for, but the fans just aren’t willing to accept him as a headliner. Short segment for an opener, going only seven minutes.
Kevin Owens (C) defeated A.J. Styles in a nontitle match (19:19)
They just can’t help themselves. A.J. Styles had Kevin Owens in the Calf Crasher, but Chris Jericho came out for the weekly distraction into a schoolboy cradle finish. Of course, it was a great match with Styles getting near falls following a Fireman’s Carry Neckbreaker and a Rack Bomb. During a commercial, Styles went for the Phenomenal Forearm, but Owens grabbed the ropes and Styles crashed to the floor. Owens pulled out a frog splash for a great near fall, and later showed off the F-Cinq. The crowd was into it, but the finish took it down a level. Styles chased Jericho to the back.
Afterwards, Owens laughed about winning over Styles and defending his title at “KO-Mania.” Dolph Ziggler came out to challenge him, and mentioned “KOMania and Botchamania.” Ziggler, who just got crushed last week, as the top challenger spoke volumes about the depth of the midcard. Then the Miz came out and laughed over how Ziggler thought he could get a title shot after HHH slaughtered him last week. Ziggler brought up superkicking Miz on SmackDown. Sami Zayn came out and said he had waited for months to get a piece of Owens and wanted him at WrestleMania. Owens said he would talk with the Authority about arranging a three-way match among those three challengers, and the winner would get the shot at WrestleMania.
Dean Ambrose was taped at the Philadium bar doing a promo on Brock Lesnar when suddenly, Terry Funk popped up. Funk looked like he had lost 40 pounds since his last television appearance. Funk did a variation of his classic promos, including this one from Puerto Rico that’s the White Album or Dark Side of the Moon of wrestling interviews. He told Ambrose that if he had a son, he would be just like Ambrose. Funk gave Ambrose a chainsaw which he could use against Lesnar, and Ambrose started sawing a table to the horror of various extras.
Owens approached Stephanie and asked for a triple threat match tonight that he could book. Stephanie agreed. The trick was Owens didn’t say who would be in the match, with Stephanie assuming it would be Miz vs. Zayn vs. Ziggler.
They did a good feature on Shane McMahon and the Undertaker featuring Mick Foley, Steve Austin, Ric Flair, Edge, John Cena, Booker T, Michael Hayes and Jerry Lawler. Foley said Shane’s return was among the top three reactions he’s ever heard in the business. Cena mentioned he never thought he’d see Shane in the WWE again. The piece featured headlines from when Shane left the company in 2010 and what brought him back.
Alberto Del Rio, Rusev and Sheamus did promos on the New Day laughing about how they beat them up last week. New Day came out with Booty O’s cereal. Xavier Woods held up placards which spelled out “You are trash.” Kofi Kingston said Rusev had stinky feet. Kingston wondered what happened to Del Rio, he used to come out in a car with his own ring announcer, but now he’s stuck in the League of Nations. They mentioned Sheamus’ parents must have known how he would turn out to be because they put the word “Shame” in his first name. Woods mentioned the tag line “Booty-O’s: They make sure you aren’t Booty.”
Big E. defeated Rusev (11:06)
Big E. won after the Big Ending. Lots of activity outside the ring, including King Barrett and Sheamus throwing Woods and Kingston into the barricade, which they sold for several minutes. Big E. hit several Belly-to-Bootie suplexes. Rusev teased the Accolade, but Big E. escaped with an Electric Chair, which was impressive considering Rusev’s size. Match was good but was a few minutes too long.
Vince McMahon will make an announcement concerning Shane-Undertaker later tonight.
The Wyatt Family did a promo about a match tonight between Ambrose and Braun Strowman, who said the God of War watches over him tonight and he would offer Ambrose for sacrifice.
Aliciia Fox and Naomi did a commercial for Snickers where some male was pretending to be a drama queen. So they gave him a “Drama Rama” bar, the guy took a bit out of it, and turned into Natalya.
The Big Show came out for a promo for the 3rd annual Andre the Giant Memorial Battle Royal. Byron Saxton vowed winning the battle royal could change someone’s life. So far, the winner’s of the battle royal have been Cesaro and the Big Show. Exactly how have their lives changed for the better? Show said he once claimed to be the greatest giant of all time, but the true greatest giant was Andre, because he was the first giant and the greatest giant. That’s why it meant so much for him to win the battle royal last year and wants to win it again. Social Outcasts came out. Heath SLater said Show’s mark on the industry would soon be the Social Outcasts’ largest victim. Bo Dallas claimed they were a Cinderella story. Curtis Axel corrected him and said they were like Voltron. Adam Rose said Show was in serious trouble. Show said the only trouble he would have would be figuring out which one of them to knock out first. Slater got choked, but Axel hit Show with a Shining Wizard. They started to put the boots to him, but Kane came out, threw Dallas and Slater over the top rope, as well as Rose. Dallas tried to shake Kane’s hand with his left hand, but he was thrown out. Show hugged Kane, who didn’t return the favor. Show posed on the second rope, but Kane grabbed Show and choke slammed him off the second rope. Guess that’s what Show gets for saying he wasn’t properly booked over the years on Austin’s podcast.
Chris Jericho defeated Fandango (2:08)
Nice to see Fandango back from the witness relocation program. He missed the Last Dance and Jericho started to put on the Walls of Jericho, but Styles came out and started chanting “Y2 Jackass.” Jericho must not be as easily distracted as Styles was, because Jericho kicked out of Fandango’s small package. Jericho got the pin with a codebreaker.
Jericho challenged Styles to get in the ring. When Styles ran in, Jericho ran out. Styles then did a promo saying he’s wrestled all over the world, but not at WrestleMania. He challenged Jericho to a match at WrestleMania, which Jericho didn’t answer.
Another Shane promo video, and this was very good. Of all people, they had Renzo Gracie cutting an interview about how Shane brings energy to his jujitsu workout daily. Renzo is as good a personality as you’ll find from the MMA world to get someone over on an interview, especially since he doesn’t have a script. Shawn Michaels, Edge, Road Dogg, Austin, and Booker built Shane up as someone tougher than shoe leather, but most of them picked Undertaker to win. A good hype piece, and it left the fans with a better flavor about Shane than if Shane had appeared in front of the live crowd and received a lukewarm response, which is always a danger in Philadelphia.
Owens handled ring announcing for the triple threat match for the Intercontiental championship. Instead of Miz vs. Zayn vs. Ziggler, Owens announced Stardust, Sin Cara and Zack Ryder.
Stardust vs. Zack Ryder vs. Sin Cara ended in no contest (3:41)
The joke here was Owens booked three jobbers for a fight for his championship. What’s scary is, after last week, Ziggler and Miz have as much credibility as the three who started this match. Zayn, Miz and Ziggler came out to confront Owens, who was on commentary. It led to Owens jumping Ryder for the DQ. Everybody started fighting with Owens, who walked away.
This led to our weekly segment known as “Stephanie gets to castrate talent.” Stephanie scolded Owens for misleading her about the triple-threat match, then ordered him to face Zayn, Sin Cara, Ryder, Stardust, Ziggler, the Miz and Stardust at WrestleMania in a ladder match for the I-C title.
Stephanie walked out of the building, where a black SUV was waiting for her. HHH came out from the backseat and kissed her. As the garage roof raised, Reigns was behind it. I guess HHH and Stephanie were making out in the backseat because the SUV didn’t move. Reigns pulled HHH out of the back and brawled with HHH, including ramming him into a set of bars. HHH got one punch in and the SUV sped off.
Charlotte (C) defeated Natalya (4:47)
Charlotte won with Natural Selection. Natalya got the Sharpshooter on, but Charlotte made the ropes. Sasha Banks and Becky Lynch were on commentary doing promos on each other that succeeded in making me less encouraged to watch the match. It’s sad how far behind the WWE is from UFC in terms of using interviews to build up fights. It’s like the gap between the New England Patriots and the Cleveland Browns.
Bubba Ray Dudley defeated R-Truth (2:04)
The gimmick was R-Truth was despondent about Goldust turning down his requests to be his tag team partner. Bubba Ray Dudley won with a big boot. Devon Dudley joined in to beat up Truth. So after weeks of building up the Goldust-Truth tag team, Goldust runs down for the save. And Michael Cole couldn’t have been more monotone in his delivery. Why the hell do you start the angle if you aren’t going to sell it big on the payoff? On top of that, Goldust ran in with a chair, but got laid out with a reverse 3-D. Then the Usos ran in and gave Bubba a double superkick, ditto for Devon. The Usos pulled out a table and teased giving Devon a splash through the table, but Bubba pulled his partner to safety.
Vince came out and he just has worn out his welcome. Total silence on his entrance. After the post-WrestleMania Raw in 2 weeks, he needs about nine months off to get fresh again. He reviewed the Shane-Undertaker stips, and said if Shane wins, it might mean he will never be on Raw again. Like anyone believes that. Then he put over Shane as a wrestler. He actually said Shane might be the most forminable opponent the Undertaker has ever faced at WrestleMania. You could a loud groan in the audience after that one. The big news is if Undertaker doesn’t beat Shane at WrestleMania, then the Undertaker will never wrestle at WrestleMania again.
Braun Strowman defeated Dean Ambrose by DQ (5:12)
Paul Heyman was on commentary doing his best to sell Ambrose’s match with Brock Lesnar. Crowd was so dead, it was amazing this was only two weeks before WrestleMania and one of the top babyfaces was in the ring. It got boring chants. All Strowman could do was nerve holds. Finally Ambrose used a chair on Strowman for a DQ for no real reason. Ambrose went after Luke Harper and Erick Rowan with the chair, then hit Dirty Deeds on Strowman onto the chair. Ambrose walked over to Heyman and mouthed off to him while Heyman looked on with concern.
Final Thoughts:
There is no momentum for WrestleMania at all. The event sells itself purely on its brand name. But there wasn’t one regular performer on this show who is over. As long as Raw is 3 hours, appearing on Raw is an obstacle to getting over because you’re overexposed. And there’s two types of people in this company. Those who have been castrated by HHH and Stephanie, and those who are going to be. Tonight, Owens joined the former club after being in the latter for eight months.
Although this has been well known for some time and reported in WWE’s WrestleMania magazine, it will be announced on Raw tonight that Stan Hansen will be inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame this year.
WWE used Tokyo Sports, a major daily sports newspaper in Japan, to break the story, since Hansen is best known in Japan as probably the biggest American star in that country of the last 40 years.
The WWE later put the story up on their web site.
Hansen was a college football star at West Texas State University, which produced a number of future wrestling superstars including Dory & Terry Funk, Bruiser Brody, Dusty Rhodes, Bobby Duncum, Tully Blanchard, Ted DiBiase and Tito Santana.
Hansen didn’t make an NFL roster but did play pro football with the Detroit Wheels of the World Football League with Brody. The two would go onto to becoming what is now considered the legendary tag team of Japan, as the two main evented for several years in All Japan and never lost one match via pinfall.
Hansen’s original career break came in a 1976 program with Bruno Sammartino. He accidentally dropped Sammartino on his head on a bodyslam, which broke Samamrtino’s neck. Sammartino returned far earlier than he should have too save a Shea Stadium show that was part of the Antonio Inoki vs. Muhammad Ali closed-circuit, and drew 32,000 fans for the rematch.
The success made Hansen a major star, and he for years divided his time between New Japan Pro Wrestling and Georgia Championship Wrestling. He had a second WWF run against champion Bob Backlund, and once beat Antonio Inoki for the NWF title. He also had what is generally considered the greatest match in the career of Andre the Giant in New Japan.
Giant Baba then raided Hansen from New Japan, using the Funks as conduits. Hansen was the top foreign star with All Japan for two decades, working with every top star that ever came through that promotion, and also had runs as headliners in the AWA, where he was world champion, and WCW, where he was U.S. champion.
