NEWS

Now it’s official. We are just over three weeks away from WWE Extreme Rules, which will serve as the official followup pay per view to August’s Summerslam. As a result, you can expect a lot of rematches at the show, possibly with a bit more intensity. That will be the case with a Summerslam title match, and now it has officially been added to the Extreme Rules card.
This week on SmackDown, Bianca Belair again challenged SmackDown Women’s Champion Becky Lynch to a title match. Lynch turned her down for the second week in a row, saying the match would take place when she decided. WWE officials Sonya Deville and Adam Pearce told Lynch that the match would be taking place at Extreme Rules, with the contract signing being held on the September 10 SmackDown.
The match will be a rematch from Summerslam, where Lynch made a surprise return and replaced Carmella, who was replacing Sasha Banks. Lynch went on to challenge and defeat Belair in less than thirty seconds. Belair went on to win a fou..

Welcome home? There are a lot of wrestlers on the AEW roster and as a result, it can be a little difficult to keep track of everyone. It doesn’t help when the company only has so much television time to use, meaning that someone can be dropped from the shows quickly. Things can be made even worse when someone is on the shelf with an injury. That is the case with a certain AEW star, but it might not be the case much longer.
According to Fightful Select, Kip Sabian is in Chicago for AEW’s All Out weekend, though it is not clear if he will be making an appearance at the show. Sabian has been out of action since March while recovering from surgery. Sabian was written off television due to an attack by Miro, who slammed a door onto Sabian’s wrist. Sabian has not wrestled since the March 31 Dynamite.
You might not remember him. Check out who might be on his way back to AEW television:
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Rampage
Date: September 3, 2021
Location: Now Arena, Chicago, Illinois
Commentators: Excalibur, Chris Jericho, Mark Henry, Taz
It’s the go home show for All Out and the big deal is that CM Punk is here in Chicago again. They’re still at the point where it feels important even though it happened two days ago, and it isn’t like they’ll be in Chicago every week. Other than that, expect a lot of hype towards the pay per view. Let’s get to it.
Opening sequence.
Lee Johnson vs. Malakai Black Johnson grabs a headlock to start but gets shoved into the ropes. Said ropes are grabbed out of fear of Black Mass, with Jericho and Henry thinking pain is coming. Black continues to take his time before knocking Johnson into the corner as we take a break. Back with Johnson striking away to send Black outside.
The big dive drops Black again and they head back inside so Johnson can hit a frog splash for two. Black kicks him in the head but would rather hammer away in the corner instead of covering. It..

205 Live
Date: August 27, 2021
Location: Capitol Wrestling Center, Orlando, Florida
Commentators: Nigel McGuinness, Vic Joseph
I think we can officially call this the new 205 Live, which is still not live and now has little to do with 205. Since it’s WWE though and it’s all about branding, expect them to keep the name because of the great history and pride associated with the low level, often forgotten former cruiserweight show. Let’s get to it.
Grayson Waller vs. Andre Chase Drake Maverick joins commentary as Chase works on the arm to start. Maverick can’t pick out any potential breakout stars around here, which might be due to no one knowing who is actually on the roster. Waller fights up and sends him outside but stops to yell at Maverick, allowing Chase to get in a shot from behind. A high crossbody gives Waller two but Chase is back with a belly to back for his own near fall.
Some shoulders to Waller’s banged up ribs keep him in trouble until he cuts off a shoulder with a knee ..

Impact Wrestling
Date: August 26, 2021
Location: Skyway Studios, Nashville, Tennessee
Commentators: D’Lo Brown, Matt Striker
Emergence has come and gone and that means it is time to start the path towards either Bound For Glory or whatever other one off show is taking place before then. Christian Cage is still the World Champion, having vanquished the horrible threat of Brian Myers. That means he needs a new challenger and we might be able to find out who that is tonight. Let’s get to it.
The opening recap looks at Emergence.
Opening sequence.
Chris Sabin vs. Sami Callihan Fallout from the Emergence #1 contenders four way. The brawl starts on the floor before the bell and Sami hits a powerbomb inside. The bell rings with Sami winning a slugout but being sent outside for the running flip dive from the apron. That doesn’t last long for Sabin, as Callihan powerbombs him into the post. Sami is having none of these chops from Sabin and pokes him in the eye before heading back inside. Sa..

Smackdown
Date: September 3, 2021
Location: VyStar Veterans Memorial Arena, Jacksonville, Florida
Commentators: Michael Cole, Corey Graves
It’s a title show this week as Finn Balor gets a shot at Roman Reigns and the Universal Title. That sounds like something that could headline Extreme Rules so we may be in for some shenanigans. Other than that, we need to get some things going for the pay per view, which is in just over three weeks. Let’s get to it.
We open with a recap/hype video for Roman Reigns vs. Finn Balor.
Here are the Usos for their Championship Contenders match against the Street Profits. Before we get started, the Usos talks about how the Profits disrespected them last week so come get them because they are the ones.
Street Profits vs. Usos Non-title. Hold on though as the Street Profits want to know how the Usos are in the ring without their permission slips. Ford admits the Usos are spitting facts and they are the ones. As in the ones about to take a beating. The Uso..

Just how bad? Vince McMahon wears a lot of hats in WWE and it is rare to find someone without some kind of an opinion on him. In addition to running the entire company, McMahon also has his hands on a lot of the WWE television product, which will be growing even stronger as he and Bruce Prichard will be producing NXT. Now we know a bit more about how that is expected to go.
According to Wrestling Observer Radio, there is a possibility that McMahon and Prichard will mainly be focusing on the bigger picture of NXT and not every single aspect. It is not clear if this will include the Takeover specials as well. According to the WrestleVotes Twitter account, Triple H, Shawn Michaels, William Regal and Matt Bloom will continue to handle the day to day operations. However, NXT will have a “Vince & Co” stamp on the product. The changes are expected to begin taking place later this month.
After talking to sources regarding NXT: the day to day operation isn’t changing that drastically. Still v..

I don’t see this going well. WWE is a big company and has more resources than they know what to do with most of the time. The good thing is that they are able to use some of those resources in good ways at the right time. That is something they were trying to do this week, but it seems that one of the company’s former employees is not exactly seeing things the WWE way.
Earlier this week, Daffney Unger passed away, sending a bit of a shock throughout the wrestling world. According to Sean Ross Sapp of Fightful, WWE sent out a mass text to its roster, reminding them that they have mental counseling available should their wrestlers need it. Impact Wrestling’s Karl Anderson responded to Ross’ tweet, saying “they suck bro” referring to WWE.
This led to several fans responding to Anderson, including bringing up Anderson being accused of cheating on his wife. Anderson insulted several of the fans by calling them marks and telling them to say these things to him in person. Anderson did pin a..

How did you think it would go? One of the biggest wrestling stories of the week has been the pretty much disaster that was Charlotte vs. Nia Jax on this week’s Monday Night Raw. The two did not seem to be on the same page and there were various moments during the match where the two seemed to legitimately attack each other. It was not well received by the fans, but how was it seen backstage?
According to WWE producer D-Von Dudley on his Table Talk podcast, Charlotte and Jax finished their match and had no further altercations backstage. Dudley described the match as a misunderstanding and nothing more, while promising that the two would draw attention if they had a rematch. Jax defeated Charlotte, the reigning Raw Women’s Champion, but no rematch has been announced as of yet.
He would know about something like this. Check out the full podcast, plus some of the match and some other well known WWE brawls:
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There’s no good thing to say about this one. This week, the wrestling world lost Daffney Unger, seemingly at her own hands, after she threatened to harm herself during an Instagram live stream. There is no positive way to look at something like this and the best thing to do is to look back at her career and see some of the positive things that others have to say about her.
Since news of Unger’s passing was reported, the wrestling world has expressed their condolences and shared thoughts and memories about her career. Several of her colleagues and friends have sent out tweets about Unger, who wrestled in Impact Wrestling, WCW and around the independent scene in a career than lasted from 1999-2011. Here are some of the reactions from the wrestling world:
“We are very sad to have to announce the passing of Shannon Spruill aka Daffney Unger @screamqueendaff. We are posting this at the request of her family. Please respect their privacy at this trying time.
I will miss you my logical sis..

That sounds bad. There have been a lot of important moments in the wrestling world this year but there may have been nothing bigger than CM Punk debuting for AEW last month. It was a heck of a moment and his debut promo made things even better. Without naming names, Punk spoke about his time in WWE and how poorly it went. Now we are learning a bit more about just how bad things were.
Punk discussed his time in WWE in more detail during an interview on Busted Open Radio. During the interview, Punk talked about how WWE rarely gave him time to heal up from injuries and how he would continue to push forward, often asking himself what Harley Race would do. He said that had he not left the company, he would have died as he would have kept going no matter what. When Punk left, he was in mental, physical, spiritual and emotional pain and needed to get away. Punk’s final appearance at a WWE event came at the 2014 Royal Rumble.
It seems to have done him well. Check out Punk’s time in AEW and o..

We’re not done yet? There have been all kinds of roster changes on the WWE roster in the last few months with dozens of wrestlers being let go from the company in multiple shifts. Wrestlers from up and down the roster, including former World Champions to lower level NXT stars, have been let go and the releases seem to come out of nowhere. Now WWE might be getting ready to do it again.
According to Wrestling Observer Radio, there are more names “on the chopping block” to be released from WWE. These names are said to be wrestlers who have been in NXT for a long time, though no specific names were given. There is also no word on when the releases could be coming. This comes as WWE is planning to relaunch NXT, with the changes coming to television later this month.
This could be more than a few people. Check out some of NXT’s glory days from years passed:
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O..