2K Sports today announced that former WWE & UFC champion Brock Lesnar will be on the cover of WWE 2K17.
The athlete on the cover is a decision based on what 2K considers crossover appeal, but made in conjunction with WWE. They also don’t like to do the same person too often.
The deal also means Lesnar has agreed to be part of a worldwide marketing campaign.
The game will be released on October 11th for PS4, PS3, Xbox One, and Xbox 360. Customers who preorder will get the Bill Goldberg character as well as Monday Nitro and Halloween Havoc arenas on launch day.
“My career has been defined by dominating every opportunity presented to me,” said Lesnar. “I am excited for my newest opportunity representing WWE 2K 17 as the franchise’s ambassador and honored to serve as the WWE 2K17 cover Superstar.”
Lesnar is currently out of WWE storylines as he prepared to return to the Octagon against Mark Hunt on the main card of July’s UFC 200.
By Joseph Currier for F4WOnline.com (updated on July 3rd)
The return of an ace and the debut of several key talents were the most notable takeaways from Monday morning’s announcement of the participants in New Japan Pro Wrestling’s 26th annual G1 Climax tournament, made during the promotion’s Kizuna Road show.
Hiroshi Tanahashi will make his return to the NJPW ring after a shoulder injury had kept him sidelined since May 21st. Tanahashi was written off in an angle with Kenny Omega and hoped that rest would allow his shoulder to heal in time for Dominion’s IWGP intercontinental championship ladder match. But after being replaced by Michael Elgin in that match, it became unclear whether he would be able to participate in this year’s tournament.
After the losses of Shinsuke Nakamura, AJ Styles, Kota Ibushi, Karl Anderson and Doc Gallows from NJPW, the rest of the field is full of fresh faces along with a veteran in Hiroyoshi Tenzan who is returning for his 21st tournament.
Kenny Omega headlines the six participants making their first G1 appearance in this year’s tournament. He is joined by Tama Tonga, Yoshi-Hashi, Seiya Sanada, Evil, and Pro Wrestling NOAH’s Katsuhiko Nakajima. Nakajima and NOAH stalwart Naomichi Marufuji are the only outsiders among the field.
I’m here at the Amway Center in Orlando, FL, for a WWE house show featuring some of NXT’s top talents.
– The Usos beat Luke Gallows and Karl Anderson
Superfly splash on Karl Anderson for the win.
– Pre taped promo by Samoa Joe and Austin Aries to hype the tag match vs Finn Balor and Shinsuke Nakamura later in the night.
– Baron Corbin beat Zack Ryder
End of Days by Corbin for the win.
– Finn Balor and Shinsuke Nakamura beat Austin Aries and NXT Champion Samoa Joe
Very good action as one would expect. Also, great reactions for Shinsuke and Finn.The finish saw everything break down and Finn hit the coup de grace on Aries for the win. Post match Too Sweets and stereo “YeaOh!”s to celebrate.
– Jack Swagger beat Viktor
Crowd was very into Swagger tonight with USA chants. They got excited for the Patriot Lock when he picked up the win.
– Pre-taped promo with Seth Rollins hyping his title match for later tonight.
– Cesaro beat Alberto Del Rio
Physical match that went outside of the ring to brawl. Plenty of uppercuts by Cesaro and even a short swing. Del Rio tried to set up for his corner stomp but missed, and Cesaro was able to hit The Neutralizer for the win.
– Sasha Banks, Summer Rae & Bayley beat Eva Marie, Dana Brooke & Natalya
Huge ovation for Bayley as the surprise third woman. Plenty of “We Want Sasha” chants, “Hey, We Want Some Bayley”, and big heat on Eva Marie as well. Bank Statement on Eva for the submission win.
– The Shining Stars beat The Prime Time Players
The PTP are reunited! Long match but both teams were over with the live crowd and did some cool spots which included Titus throwing the stars around. Primo rolled up Darren Young and had the tights to steal the win.
– WWE World Heavyweight Champion Dean Ambrose beat Seth Rollins
Great match as they delivered in the main event. Two attempted Pedigrees, trash talk, and heel stalling tactics from Rollins who took the title and proclaimed himself the rightful world heavyweight champion. This match got great reactions and the crowd was into every nearfall and double down. Towards the finish, Seth missed a frog splash and both slowly made their way to their feet, trading punches for the boo / yay reaction.
Seth went for the Pedigree, yet Dean countered and hit the Dirty Deeds to get the win. Place erupted and Ambrose celebrated his hard fought victory. Match of the night.
– ROH Tag Team Champions The Addiction beat Silas Young & Beer City Bruiser to retain in a great match.
– Fish Tank segment with Mark Briscoe and ACH led to a number one contenders match for the TV title. Briscoe then beat ACH.
– Jay White made his ROH debut and beat Kamaitachi (with Christopher Daniels) by DQ. Postmatch, the Addiction beat them down which brings out the Motor City Machine Guns.
– Jay White & Motor City Machine Guns beat ROH Tag Team Champions The Addiction & Kamaitachi
– Keith Lee & Shane Taylor beat an unknown tag team.
– Dalton Castle beat Roderick Strong in Strong’s farewell ROH match
Both guys hugged afterwards and there were “Thank you Roddy” and “You deserve it” chants post-match. Strong gives an emotional speech, thanking fans for their support and says he hopes to wrestle in ROH again someday.
– Kyle O’Reilly came out for his World Title match with Jay Lethal, but before Lethal can come out, Adam Cole hits the stage and says O’Reilly has skipped him in line and doesn’t deserve this match, and, in fact, he won’t be wrestling at all tonite. Young Bucks sneak attack O’Reilly from behind and the Bullet Club injures his arm and shoulder with a steel chair.
– War Machine beat an unknown tag team.
– Caprice Coleman and the All Night Express beat Cheeseburger & Will Ferrera & Moose
– ROH World Champion Jay Lethal beat the injured Kyle O’Reilly in a great match
Bullet Club attacks both post-match, leading Nigel to declare that Adam Cole will never get a title shot as long as he’s in charge. Lethal asks that he be added to the announced main event.
– Moose beat Mike “P-Dog” Posey. Dijak came out to challenge Moose. Dijak beat Moose, then attacked Stokley Hathaway.
– ROH Champion Jay Lethal & Briscoes beat Bullet Club
After the match, the Bullets incapacitate Lethal in the ropes and Cole cuts off Lethal’s dreads, then violently shave his whole head. Bucks lead the crowd in “That was too sweet” and “You deserve it” (to Lethal) chants to end the show.
Fantastic show, crowd was really into almost all of it.
First show is from August 15, 2015 at Sumo Hall. No intro, I guess Ishii didn’t feel like introducing us.
Yuji Nagata vs. Hirooki Goto
This was a good match.Even though Ross and Barnett put over both of their wrestling backgrounds over before the match started ,this was a very stiff back and forth match. Like Jim Ross said, it was nothing fancy- lots of stiff punches, forearms and kicks. Also really interesting to hear Nagata is 47. I know that Nagata is called Mr. Anti-Aging but I’ve never really thought of his actual age. The way he’s moving at 47 should really be commended. He got the win here.
Satoshi Kojima vs. Karl Anderson
This was also a very good match. Anderson worked hard and did his usual heel tactics. Kojima looked really strong. Not much more beyond that, just a good back and forth match. Kojima picked up the win with a lariat.
Tomohiro Ishii was interviewed. It didn’t mean anything to him to hear that this G1 was the longest ever. On Elgin, he likes his moves and any of them can be finishers. Unlike most Americans, he fights with his heart.
Tomohiro Ishii vs. Michael Elgin
This was one of my favorite matches from the last year. Elgin showed in this match that he’s one of the best commodities New Japan has picked up in recent years – he’s just tremendous working a stiff style and excelled here against Tomohiro Ishii, who is also one of the best in this style too. They worked themselves into an excellent match with some scary spots, including a death valley driver to the floor by Elgin.
He followed that up with one of the scariest moves in some time with a running powerbomb right into the steel guard railing on the outside. Insane. Ishii turned him inside out with a lariat but Elgin kicked out, only to taste defeat following a brainbuster. Fantastic match, well worth taking the time to watch. Definitely one of the best matches in the G1 tournament.
Ishii says he’s become nothing but a boaster and is disappointed in himself. Elgin vows with every last breath, drop of sweat and blood, he and Ishii will go at it again.
In an interesting note, Ishii mentions he lost consciousness after the first blow of the match, so he doesn’t have much memories of it. He was out of it. He thought although it was a good, he got beat badly. He thought he was doing well in the tournament until he lost to Okada .He says it’s been another disappointing year.
Okada welcomes us to part two of the August 15, 2015 G1 event in Sumo Hall.
Yujiro Takahashi vs. Tomoaki Honma
This was fine. Yujiro’s in the bottom rung of workers in the New Japan roster, but Honma is so over this turned into a good match anyway. Yujiro used a ref bump to low blow and the Miami shine to pin Honma.
Okada says that the G1 was probably the best condition he could have been in. He doesn’t fight against Nakamura too often, so this was interesting for him. He wasn’t sure if the math would go ahead due to his injury, but it did. When mentioning that one block was AJ vs. Tanahashi and the other one was him vs. Nakamura, he noted that it was the four best wrestlers in New Japan, so it was hard for him to compete against them.
Kazuchika Okada vs. Shinsuke Nakamura
The match that these two had in the previous year’s G1 was absolutely awesome. I forget how this one went, though I remember it being awesome as well, so let’s see how this fares with new eyes.
They started off slow, feeling one another. The match largely went with a back and forth style; well worked, nothing fancy .Once they started to go to the finishers it became great. Nakamura spun into that wonderful armbar, went into the gogoplata position, then sent him chest first to the ground and submitted him. I really liked that finish, but I thought the match they had in the G1 finals in 2014 has a bit more oomph to it. Still, these were two of the best workers in the business having a great match by any standard, so good on them. That makes it Tanahashi vs. Nakamura in the G1 2015 finals.
Nakamura says there’s only one more match to go, and he’s ready to give it his all.
Okada says it was frustrating he got submitted instead of pinned. By far, it’s the most frustrating match for him. If Nakamura wins the whole thing, he’s sure to face him again. The usually chatty Gedo this time says he has nothing to say, Nakamura was incredible. Meanwhile, Nakamura says he gave it his all today. One more match…he’s on fire.
In his reflective interview, Okada says for him, it was one of the most memorable matches of 2015. He remembers it even more than his match in 2014, perhaps because he lost. He also forgot about the armlock. It was his first tap out since returning to America. After taking part in such a big series, he was proud to take on so many matches. On Nakamura leaving, he’s going to miss him. But he’s not worried about New Japan Pro Wrestling. He’s excited for what’s to come. But with that said, he misses him but hopes he does well in America. He wants to fight him again, He’ll make the New Japan ring the best in the meantime.
Two very good episodes of New Japan on AXS this week. This show still remains as one of the best TV shows in North America, featuring both hot matches and fresh insight into them.
I’m here in Cocoa Beach FL, where they are expecting approximately 250.
– Liv Morgan beat Nikki Glencross
Fun opener with heel antics by Nikki, telling people to shut up, declaring herself the best in the galaxy, and all while womanhandling Liv. Towards the finish, Liv was able to matrix under a clothesline to begin her comeback, hit a big monkey flip out of the corner, a high spin kick and a standing moonsault for the win.
– Alexander Wolfe beat Kishan Raftaar
Crowd wasn’t in to this as neither are have been on TV that much, if at all. Both guys were heckled with “USA” chants for the two foreigners. Wolfe kept working the armbar and finally put Kishan away with an arm submission.
– Noah beat Steve Cutler
Cutler had the heel advantage early, as Noah just wanted a handshake and to be friends. Crowd chanted BFF to encourage him yet Cutler took the cheap shot. Noah fired up to hit a pop up powerbomb for the win.
– Wesley Blake beat Bronson Mathews
New ambient trance music for Blake who wearing trunks and boot tassels. Headlocks were traded early. Crowd was all giggles as Blake ended up with a wedgie. Blake then settled his trunks, went to the top, and hit a splash for the win.
– Andrade “Cien” Almas beat Angelo Dawkins
A lot of trash talk by Dawkins which prompted loud “WHAT?” chants. Front face lock and headlocks by Dawkins to keep Andrade grounded. The finish saw some flashy moves by Andrade such as a wheelbarrow bulldog and smooth rope running before the running knees to Dawkins in the corner.
– Oney Lorcan beat Tino Sabbatelli
Physical match. We got a lot of aggressive chin locks by Tino. Oney finally fired up and hit the running blockbuster for the win.
– In ring promo by the debuting Binky Blairwho says she’s going to be the “ist” of NXT: prettiest, baddest, etc.
– Daria beat Billie Kay
Billie taunted Daria early with her fancy gloves, so Daria got upset and threw down her own MMA gloves, and the fight was on. After some action, Daria locked in what looked like an triangle armbar for the submission.
– TM61 and Mojo Rawley beat The Authors of Pain and Bobby Roode
NXT Florida debut for Roode who entered to a Queen-esque theme that declared he is “Glorious!”. Roode was a heel and hid behind the Authors at times, worked over whomever he was working with, and looked great doing so. The finish saw TM61 hit their double team spinebuster finisher on Roode with Shane Thorne getting the pin for his team.
I’m here at Full Sail University in Winter Park, FL, for NXT’s tv tapings.
– Dark Match: Tye Dillinger beat Kai Katana
Over the knee neckbreaker by Dillinger for the win.
– Bayley beat Alexa Bliss
Bayley wins via Belly to Bayley in a great match. Her post match promo was interrupted by Nia Jax as the build to their eventual rematch has begun.
– Blake & Murphy vs Hype Bros never happened as Rhyno returned to destroy them all
– NXT Tag Team Champions The Revival beat American Alpha in a two-of-three falls match
First fall went well over ten minutes with Jason Jordan catching Dash Wilder with an ankle Lock for the submission. Second fall happened rather quickly thereafter with Scott Dawson catching Jordan in a leg lock submission of his own. Third fall had some amazing nearfall attempts early on. Finally, The Revival hit an apron shatter machine on Gable for the win.
– NXT Champion Samoa Joe/s in-ring promo is interrupted by Rhyno. Joe backs away.
– Austin Aries beat Patrick Clark
Aries won with the Last Chancery submission. Post-match, No Way Jose ran down and attacked Aries.
– Andrade cien Almas beat Angelo Dawkins
Running knees in the corner followed by a moonsault for the win for ACA.
– NXT Women’s Champion Asuka beat Eva Marie
Eva made Dasha Fuentes read a custom ring introduction for her, and it was amazing. The champ wins with the Asuka Lock. Crowd was actualy all over the place for this one.
– NXT Champion Samoa Joe beat Rhyno
Physical match to set up Joe vs. the winner of Finn v Nakamura. Joe clamped on the Coquina Clutch for the win after a mean guy match.
– The Authors Of Pain beat American Alpha
– AOP jump American Alpha as they made their way to the ring. They brawled in the ring with Alpha getting the upper hand. All four men were in the ring and a ref called for the bell to start the match. Great action early on with Gable and Jordan suplexing the much larger men all over the place. Dive to the outside by Jordan, to get the place going. Authors took control and hit their double team assisted lariat finisher to win it.
– Bayley beat Nia Jax
Physical match. Bayley took a lot of punishment early on before getting fired up and finally hitting the middle rope Belly To Bayley for the win.
– Shinsuke Nakamura beat Finn Balor
Spotlight introductions. Crowd loves both so a mix of cheers, chants, and even respectful silence early on. Finn showed up Nakamura by Too Sweeting him in the face on a break. Incredible match with all of the key spots. It went a good twenty minutes and Shinsuke won it with the Kinshasa. Post match, they celebrated together, and Finn went around the ring telling fans thank you for their support. This seems like this finally might be it for Balor in NXT.
H returns to traditional PPV Friday night for Best In The World, the seventh such event in company history. The event emanates from Concord, NC, the first time BITW has been held there.
Headlining the show is ROH World Champion Jay Lethal vs. Jay Briscoe, a rematch from last year’s BITW event where Lethal downed Briscoe for the belt in a winner takes all match.
KYLE O’REILLY VS. KAMAITACHI
O’Reilly won with a brainbuster and armbar. Very good technically. The crowd reacted but didn’t go wild. Kamaitachi reufsed to shake hands and left. The crowd isn’t mic’d well as you can see them reactingbut dont’ hear it that well. Kamaitachi didn’t look as impressive as he usually does. But his role was to put O’Reilly over as the whole thing they pushed was how O’Reilly gets a shot at the winner of the main event tomorrow.
SILAS YOUNG VS. ACH
Yeah, we’ve got the same problem with the bad crowd micing whicnh hurts the matches. You can see people are into it and hear it lightly. This was a good match. ACH did a great springobard flip dive. Young missed a springboard move, and ACH won with jumping double knees, a brainbuster and a 450 splash.
They just introudced Jay White at ringside. He looks like a teenager in the crowd.
Mark Briscoe was hilarious on his pre-match interview.
MARK BRISCOE VS. RODERICK STRONG
With Strong leaving, Mark got the pin after a brainbuster and fisherman buster in a really good match. Strong was excellent here and Mark hung with him. Mark has shaved his head but came out with a wig to surprise Strong. Both worked at a hard pace, with Mark doing all kinds of cool stuff and Strong solid with everything he did. Mark survived the sick kick and gutbuster. Mark used a sick kick on Strong. I think if the crowd was mic’d this would have come across as excellent. Fans were chanting “Thank you Roddy” and he was shaking hands on the way out.
WAR MACHINE & MOOSE VS. YOUNG BUCKS & ADAM COLE IN A TORNADO MATCH
Excellent match. Non stop action and the crowd was pretty hot. Finish saw them use the Meltzer driver on Moose and all three kissed each other after winning. We’ll update this later because it was a crazy match with all kinds of big spots and a ton of superkicks. Once again it was hurt by the crowd micing. Hanson in particular did crazy stuff for a guy his size.
CHRISTOPHER DANIELS & FRANKIE KAZARIAN VS. CHRIS SABIN & ALEX SHELLEY FOR THE TAG TITLES
Another good match. Actually this at first had a hard time following the previous match. Kamaitachi came out and attacked Jay White at ringside. They were brawling and distracted ref Paul Turner and Daniels hit Shelley with a low blow and he was out of commission. Daniels & Kazarian then pinned Sabin after the Best Meltzer ever. You’d think at this point I was the booker and had an ego twice the size of Dusty Rhodes. Daniels & Kazarian & Kamaitachi left together so they are forming a group.
STEVE CORINO VS. B.J. WHITMER IN AN UNSACNTIONED FIGHT WITHOUT HONOR
Corino came out to Shinya Hashimoto’s theme music. Corino bleached his hair blond. The commentators said this is a match that nobody wanted to see happen. This match was crazy. It came from another era as Whitmer went to hardway him. Corino bled like crazy. Whitmer juiced and it was a bloodbath. The crowd loved it. Whitmer put Corino through a table with an exploder suplex. They beat each other with broken pieces of the table. The lights went out and Kevin Sullivan showed up, teased hitting Whitmer with the spike but instead spiked Corino and Whitmer pinned him. Because nobody does this kind of match, it really worked. They saved things like tables, never do blood like this and used rolls of quarters but didn’t over do the foreign objects like in TNA where the shots meant nothing.
BOBBY FISH VS. DALTON CASTLE FOR THE TV TITLE
Another good match. Castle dominated. Castle suplexed Fish on his head and they teased Fish being hurt, but he then went for the bang a rang and Fish turned it into a front rolling cradle for the pin.
The All Night Express and Caprice Coleman came out. They came out to Presidential music. Coleman noted they were never defeated for the titles. He claimed they had to pay for this segment. Said each watched each others back and said all three are underrated and underpaid and now they are uniting and are now the group is called The Cabinet. Coleman is the Minister of Information. Rhett Titus said this whole show has been young punks flip flying around and nobody looks like pro wrestlers, said guys need to do bench presses and squats, how the tag champs have no abs and how the Young Bucks skip leg day and keep doing superkicks. Said there is an Olympic gold medalist is selling T-shirts to make wrestling great again. The Cabinet will will make wrestling great, won’t skip leg day and will win all the gold.
JAY LETHAL VS. JAY BRISCOE FOR THE ROH TITLE
Great match. Shorter than you’d think but time got out of control. The crowd loved it, chanting “That was awesome” after the finish. Lethal retained with a diamond cutter and Lethal iinjection. So right after the match ended, they turned up the crowd mic and you could hear how loud they were. If they’d done that during the show every match would have come across better. Both shook hands after the match. Briscoe nearly go the pin earlier with the Lethal injection and Jay driller. Lethal did two tope’s in a row and Briscoe came back with two of his own and a running flip dive. A lot of near falls. Crowd may have been hottest in this match.
On the go-home show leading to Best in the World on pay-per-view, Ring of Honor television from Toronto features ROH all-stars vs. Bullet Club in an eight-man tag team match. Elsewhere, Tomohiro Ishii circles his prey and Steve Corino threatens BJ Whitmer. Also on the show, Dalton Castle shines ahead of him challenging Bobby Fish for the TV title at the PPV.
Dalton Castle (with the Boys) beat Gedo
They did some comedy early on in the match. At one point at ringside the Boys began fanning Gedo, angering Dalton. He charged out after him. It was all a ploy as in getting the babyface to chase the heel around the ring. As Gedo slid into the ring, he cut off Dalton in one of the oldest tricks in the book.
Castle fired up moments later though Gedo countered the bang-a-rang. Gaining revenge for being dupped earlier in the match, the Boys smacked Gedo with punches and he fed into Dalton for the finish. After a bang-a-rang, Dalton covered him for the pinfall.
In a backstage promo, Adam Cole promised he would not get involved in the main event at Best in the World. He also promised to be the next ROH world champion.
Tomohiro Ishii beat Will Ferrara
Far from a squash match, the story was still the bout was a mismatch. Ferrara got a lot of offense and even got a nearfall on a small package. Even though Ferrara would knock him down, the “Stone Pitbull” would rise again to pummel his smaller prey. Ishii would hoist him up to deliver a vertical drop brainbuster for the pin.
Afterwards, Ishii was at ringside ranting at announcer Kevin Kelly in Japanese. As Ishii stormed off, Kevin said, “There you have it.”
In an in-ring promo, Steve Corino cut a go-home promo vowing to rid ROH of BJ Whitmer at Best in the World. Corino talked about all the evil things he’d done throughout his career. “I am what I am,” he kept saying. He tried to change his ways, fell in love and got married. That was all a fairytale he said. He is what he is. Corino said he was an evil man. He called Whitmer “trash” and mentioned all the evil things Whitmer did. He then said after the Fight Without Honor at BITW, Whitmer would no longer be in ROH as Corino will “take out the trash.”
Jay Lethal & Roderick Strong & the Briscoes beat Bullet Club (Matt Jackson & Kenny Omega & Tama Tonga & Tanga Loa)
Kenny Omega subbed for Nick Jackson in the match. Despite being pre-taped, no mention of the substitute until just before the match began. A subplot of the match was Jay Briscoe teaming with Jay Lethal as they will meet in the world title main event at Best in the World. However, they hardly teased dissension in this match. Also notable was Roderick Strong in the match in what could be one of his last appearances on ROH TV before departing the company.
Lots of tags and lots of action in the eight-man tag match itself. Almost too much to call. In the most dramatic showdown of the match, Lethal squared off with Omega for a heated exchange. Everybody exchanged moves in rapid fire succession in the closing moments. Eventually, Jay Briscoe executed the Jay driller on Tanga Loa to score the deciding pinfall.
Closing out the show was a series of promos hyping Best in the World which airs tonight on PPV. Our Dave Meltzer will have coverage starting at 8 PM EST.
