NEWS

Never mind. We are less than a month away from one of the most unique shows on the wrestling calendar as AEW presents Forbidden Door. The show will feature a series of matches between AEW and New Japan Pro Wrestling stars, with the first match being announced this week. While CM Punk vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi is set, another match that was rumored will not be taking place.
On Thursday, a story reported by Dave Meltzer began circulating that IWGP Heavyweight Champion Kazuchika Okada will be defending his title against Hangman Page. However, according to Meltzer, the match is not going to be happening as the lineup that he saw for the show was not accurate. The rest of the card other than Punk vs. Tanahashi is being kept secret, with the June 26 card still to be announced.
Per @davemeltzerWON, his WOR note last night that Hangman Page vs. Okada was tabbed for Forbidden Door based on a lineup he had seen was incorrect. That match is not planned for the PPV as the lineup is being kept a secr..

Get her a different shirt. WWE has so many wrestlers on its roster that they have been able to slit them into multiple rosters. In addition to both versions of NXT, the main rosters are Monday Night Raw and SmackDown, which include all kinds of talented wrestlers who occasionally jump from show to show. That is the case again as a Monday Night Raw wrestler has moved to SmackDown (after a recent change).
According to PWInsider.com, Lacey Evans has been moved back to SmackDown from Monday Night Raw. This comes after Evans was moved from SmackDown to Monday Night Raw last month after appearing in a series of vignettes on SmackDown. Evans appeared on Monday Night Raw and addressed the fans but never wrestled a match, despite being advertised to wrestle on the May 30 Monday Night Raw. There is no word on why the change was made.
Opinion: This is one of those instances where WWE seems to be making all of this stuff up as they go. I’m not sure how they keep changing their minds on this stuf..

Catch you down the road. We are in a strange time in wrestling as we are seeing more great action and talented stars than have been around in a long time. The amount of content available at any time has allowed stars to emerge on a variety of stages and many of them have been on television. Now though, one of those names might be on his way to a new location.
According to PWInsider.com, W. Morrissey, formerly known as Big Cass in WWE, has finished up with Impact Wrestling with his match on this week’s television show being his last with the company. This comes a little over a year after Morrissey debuted with the company, though he also appeared with AEW earlier this year. There is no word on where he is expected to sign next.
Opinion: I’m not sure how surprising this really is as Morrissey was reportedly looking to find his next contract elsewhere. That is a bit of a shame though, as Impact Wrestling might not be the biggest game in town, but they gave Morrissey a chance and that is..

It’s that time of year again and….ok I might need to be a bit more specific. We are done with WrestleMania, but we are far from being done with the WrestleMania stories. The season might be done, but WWE has only milked one extra pay per view out of what they did at WrestleMania. That will be remedied this weekend by Hell In A Cell, because you know full well that WWE isn’t going to put in any extra effort than they have to. That has been on full display this week and now you can see it very clearly.
We are currently four days away from Hell In A Cell and as of this writing, there are six matches set for the show. Two of these were added earlier this week on Monday Night Raw and so far, there is not a single SmackDown star on the card. Not one, because there is not one match from SmackDown taking place. This is hardly the first time WWE has done this (they have even done it at Hell In A Cell before) but you would think they would have learned a lesson based on something else that has ..

NXT LVL Up
Date: May 27, 2022
Location: Capitol Wrestling Center, Orlando, Florida
Commentators: Sudu Shah, Nigel McGuinness
I’m not sure what to think of the show these days and there isn’t anything coming out of last week to set this up. They had something going for a few weeks with something leading to a possible story for the next week but that hasn’t bee the case in a long time now. Maybe we can get a little something here so let’s get to it.
Opening sequence.
Andre Chase/Bodhi Hayward vs. Bryson Montana/Demaris Griffin Hayward grabs a headlock on Griffin to start but Griffin reverses into one of his own. Back up and a hiptoss has Griffin in the corner but it’s off to Montana. A sunset flip gives Chase two before it’s time for the spelling stomps. Montana doesn’t care for that and sends him face first into the mat. Chase isn’t having any of this and fights up, getting over for the tag to Hayward. House is quickly cleaned and the Fratliner finishes Montana at 3:49.
Result: Andr..

History has been made! There are a lot of titles under the WWE banner and all of them have at least some kind of value. It means something to win any championship around and someone winning their first title can be a game changer for their career. You have to start somewhere and that is the case again, as a pair of wrestlers have picked up their first gold in the company.
This week on NXT UK, Ashton Smith and Oliver Carter defeated Die Familie and Moustache Mountain to win the NXT UK Tag Team Titles when Smith pinned Trent Seven. The win marks the first title in WWE for both Smith and Carter. The team had been chasing the titles for several weeks, with Moustache Mountain cheating to retain the titles in their previous successful title defense.
Opinion: At some point, you have to go with the title change to make some new stars and that is what they did here. Smith and Carter have been one of the hottest teams in NXT UK for a long time now and they finally won the titles to pay it off…

Welcome to KB’s Old School (and New School) Reviews. I’ve been reviewing wrestling shows for over twelve years now and have reviewed over 6,000 shows. Every Monday, Wednesday and Friday, I’ll be posting a new review here on Wrestlingrumors.net. It could be anything from modern WWE to old school to indies to anything in between. Note that I rate using letters instead of stars and I don’t rate matches under three minutes as really, how good or bad can something that short be?
Bash at the Beach 2000
Date: July 9, 2000
Location: Ocean Center, Daytona Beach, Florida
Attendance: 6,572
Commentators: Tony Schiavone, Scott Hudson, Mark Madden
Oh boy. After all those nice weeks of no Russo and/or Bischoff to screw things up, tonight we’re back to the old ways because this wrestling and storytelling stuff must be stopped at all costs. It’s a double main event of Goldberg vs. Kevin Nash for Scott Hall’s contract and Hulk Hogan challenging Jeff Jarrett for the World Title. Let’s get to it.
Cat s..

There is a history there. Wrestling has a history of bringing in athletes from other sports and seeing how much success they can have. It is something that has worked well for decades and will continue to do the same for years to come. One of the sports with a solid track record is mixed martial arts, and now WWE is trying their hand with another fighter coming over to wrestling.
According to Fightful Select, WWE is expected to sign Bellator fighter Valerie Loureda. This comes after Loureda, a fighter with a 3-1 career record, spent a week at the WWE Performance Center and impressed the company. WWE is hoping to have Loueda start her official training at the Performance Center in July. There is no word on when she could start regularly appearing in WWE.
Opinion: It makes sense for WWE to try signing another mixed martial artist as they certainly have a history of success with them. Why not see what you can find out there? WWE has found stars such as Riddle, Brock Lesnar, Shayna Baszl..

The interest is there. The wrestling world has been around for a very long time and there have been all kinds of larger than life characters throughout. Several of these people are worth looking at again as you can find some fascinating stories. Some of those stories have been looked at many of them and now we will be seeing even more of them in the near future.
A&E has announced the second season of Biography: WWE Legends, which will begin on July 10. The second season will include episodes on:
Undertaker
Bella Twins
WrestleMania
Goldberg
Rey Mysterio
Kurt Angle
Lex Luger
Edge
D-Generation X
A pair of new series were officially announced as well. First up is WWE Rivals, which will feature a look at famous WWE rivalries throughout history. Second is WWE Smack Talk, which will feature a look back at the two episodes from earlier in the night. All three shows will air in a weekly block.
There is a lot here. Check out the trailer for the three series:
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That’ll get people talking. There are certain wrestlers who are a lot better at talking than anything they can do in the ring. This can make them extremely valuable as they can stir up the fans’ emotions like few others. That is the case with a top AEW star and he certainly went on a rant this week. It turns out that there was even more than what you saw watching on television.
This week’s edition of AEW Dynamite featured a promo from Maxwell Jacob Friedman as he ranted and complained about his unhappiness with the company and President Tony Khan. The speech saw parts of Friedman’s speech being censored before his mic was cut off. According to PWInsider.com, during the commercial break, CM Punk came out to confront Friedman, who ran off through the crowd.
This was a fired up promo. Check out the uncensored part (contains strong language):
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Opinion: This is the kind of a promo that is going to be a huge deal for a long time to come and I’m cur..

He has earned it. Commentary is one of the most important things a wrestling promotion needs. The broadcasting team is tasked with telling the fans where the story is supposed to go and guiding them in the right direction. That can make all the difference in the world and give fans some very necessary information. Finding the right lead voice is key, and now WWE is paying tribute to someone who has been around for a long time.
WWE has released a video tribute to SmackDown broadcaster Michael Cole in honor of his twenty five years with the company. The video features a variety of current broadcasters talking about what Cole means to him and how important he has been to the company. Over the years, Cole has done commentary for Monday Night Raw and SmackDown, plus pay per views, as the voice of WWE.
This is rather nice. Check out WWE’s tribute to Cole:
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Opinion: I know he might not be the most popular name, but Cole is someone who has been aro..

Flashback? There are all kinds of ways to present wrestlers and many times it is with a rather specific gimmick. You might see something that is more or less serious, but there is often an idea there that is different than others. That idea can often need to be tweaked though, and that might be the case again, as a WWE star may be needing to change things up entirely.
SmackDown’s Xia Li has released a video on Twitter showing her training. During the video, there are glimpses of a woman with her face painted like Tian Sha, Li’s former character in NXT. This could be a hint that Li will be returning to her old gimmick after she was drafted to SmackDown in October 2021. Since then, she has only wrestled one televised match, defeating Natalya in February.
This might be a hint. Check out Li’s training video:
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Opinion: I mean, why not? I don’t think you could make Li’s time on SmackDown that much worse so far, so why not see what else she can do?..