Dave Meltzer reported in the latest issue of The Wrestling Observer Newsletter that the reason WWE decided on having a tournament for the United States Championship Title was an attempt to jump start Rusev’s push. While Rusev isn’t in the tournament, it’s very possible that the tournament concludes with Rusev turning babyface and possibly winning championship title.

There is also speculation that after he captures the title, he may work a program with Aiden English.

The post WWE Planning to Push Rusev & Turn Him Babyface? appeared first on Wrestling News & WWE News, Rumors & Spoilers.

Russo is joined on today’s show by his co-host Jeff Lane.

On one of his shows this past week, Dave Meltzer discussed the merchandise sales of Finn Balor. He said that Balor has to be one of the top merchandise sellers in WWE because there are plenty of ‘Balor Club’ shirts at each WWE event. However, he doesn’t see many Balor shirts outside of WWE events.

Russo says that’s because there aren’t any wrestling shirts outside WWE events anymore. Back during the attitude era there were several wrestlers whose merchandise could be seen anywhere in public including Austin, The Rock and the NWO. Nowadays, you don’t see anyone wearing wrestling merchandise unless you’re at a WWE show.

Meltzer also adressed the Brock Lesnar/A.J. Styles Survivor Series match, calling it a success while pointing out that nobody would have cared about a Lesnar/Jinder Mahal match. Russo says, “Screw you, Meltzer”, adding that Meltzer’s problem is that he talks out of place, putting words in everybody else’s mouths. Russo says he would have much rather watched a Lesnar/Mahal match.

At another point last week Meltzer discussed RAW’s 3-hour run-time, saying that it doesn’t matter what WWE writes, fans are always going to tune out towards the end of a 3-hour program. Russo disagrees entirely, saying that he and Ed Ferrera wrote several 3-hour episodes of Monday Nitro and those shows held their audience right until the end.

The post Vince Russo’s The Brand Recap – Preferring Lesnar vs. Mahal, Elias Stuck in Second Gear, Meltzer & Satin go to War on Twitter, More! appeared first on Wrestling News & WWE News, Rumors & Spoilers.

Jim Cornette issued the following response to FightNetwork.com regarding Santino Marella’s remarks he made about the incident that took place over the weekended between the two.

“I was on my way to the food court. Marella approached me with his hand outstretched. I shook it and told him with no profanity and not yelling–the first time–that we had nothing to talk about and tried to walk away. He kept detaining me to plead the case of why an incident 12 years ago was not his fault. I told him, in ever-increasing detail, that we had nothing to talk about and why and tried again to walk off. He obviously expected me to say something different to his face than I have in public, and I did not, whereupon he then wouldn’t let me past and tried to wind me up to hit him in public and potentially get arrested. Regardless of who threw the first blow, I figured most people would believe it was me, so I called attention to the troublemaker. The worst part happened at that point, where with all the fans yelling and security swarming, I was unable to get my club sandwich.

If anyone wonders why Santino Marella and I will never be on the same page, I refer you to his own words in the statement he made. The fact that at a live wrestling television taping in front of 500 fans–for which I was not just the announcer but part owner of the company–that Marella, a wrestling school student of two weeks, would see one of the featured heels of the program heading toward him and his first thought was that his intent was to scare Marella’s daughter so everyone would laugh and have a good time, tells you all you need to know about this guy not understanding the world he was in and his place in it, a state which continues today. Also, he uses the word ‘Gosh’ in an official statement, so a special level of Hell should be reserved for him where he has to watch an endless loop of his comedy matches which were an embarassment to my profession.”

The post Jim Cornette Reacts to Santino Marella’s Statement appeared first on Wrestling News & WWE News, Rumors & Spoilers.

On October 8th, Hell will be upon Smackdown. Yes, everyone’s favorite bastardized gimmick match is returning. Hell in a Cell is nearly here. Of course, not all the matches will be contested inside the Cell, but there will be other matches.

Among these other matches are at least three championship matches. While the US title match hasn’t been announced yet, it’d be stupid to leave it off the card. For the purpose of this article, I’m assuming there will be a match.

Who will emerge victorious on October? Who will lose their coveted gold? Here are some guesses.

Baron Corbin

I think it’s safe to assume that at Hell in a Cell, the United States Championship will be defended in a triple threat match. AJ Styles is likely defending it against both Tye Dillinger and Baron Corbin. While many are no doubt pulling for Dillinger to pick up a win, I think that WWE must pull the trigger on the Lone Wolf if he is to ever be taken seriously as a competitor. WWE have done a great job with Corbin post Money in the Bank, what with him losing his cash-in and him losing to a smiling John Cena in 8 minutes. Needless to say, a loss for Corbin would be disastrous.

It would be easy to make Dillinger eat the pin, thus extending the program between Styles and Corbin. The feud can extend to whatever’s in December (also a great PPV name), where Corbin goes over. This frees up Styles for another feud, and hopefully they can put him back in the main title picture.

The post Predicting the Champions After Hell in a Cell appeared first on Wrestling News & WWE News, Rumors & Spoilers.

WWE revealed on Instagram that Nia Jax and Alexa Bliss will be going by the name “Team Rude” moving forward.

#TeamRude strikes again! #WWELexington

A post shared by WWE (@wwe) on Jul 16, 2017 at 5:40pm PDT

Alexa Bliss & Nia Jax were expected to work a program together with a match between the two at SummerSlam for the RAW Women’s Championship. Dave Meltzer indicated on Wrestling Observer Radio last week that those plans were changed and it now looks like the two will be coexisting as a team.

The post Alexa Bliss & Nia Jax Receive Team Name appeared first on Wrestling News & WWE News, Rumors & Spoilers.

WWE Network finally released the WWE 24 special involving Kurt Angle. I was unable to tune in last night so I watched it this afternoon, and there was no disappointment here. Goosebumps popped up on my arms and tears ran down my eyes. It was a whirlwind of emotion about the career of one of the greatest to ever lace a pair of boots. Life has came full circle for out Olympic Hero.

While watching the program, the memorable moments Kurt gave us over the years ran through my head. You all remember the milk truck correct? Or how about the Sexy Kurt song? Heck, even the miniature cowboy hat was hysterical. He was pure gold during his segments and his matches. However, Kurt’s career wasn’t all sunshine and roses.

Television has a way of portraying a normal individual as a superhero, but reality steps in and shows how destructive they really are. WWE 24 did a fabulous job of describing the demons Kurt faced throughout most of his adult life. Some of you may remember that Kurt broke his neck just weeks before Wrestlemania XIX. It was the second time he broke his neck, but the first time inside the WWE. Painkillers helped Angle battle some of the pain, but they took control of his life. He became addicted to them just like many others do. There was even an instance where Angle took around twenty-five at once and hoping he wouldn’t wake up. Angle would then go on explaining how he broke his neck again at Wrestlemania XX and eventually asking for his release just a couple of years later.

This is when the next chapter in Angle’s illustrious career takes a different path, one to the Impact Zone. Here is where Angle would put on some phenomenal matches against guys like AJ Styles and Samoa Joe. Even though Angle was in TNA, he kept hoping a certain McMahon over at WWE would see his work and realize that he was still a great wrestler. His time in TNA was longer than his time in WWE, but he always wanted to come back to his home.

Angle still battled his addiction with painkillers, and added alcohol to that addiction as well. It became so bad that his wife, Giovanna, was close to leaving him and taking the children with her. Sometimes all it takes to straighten you up is a caring woman. Angle would enter rehab and stayed thirty days before leaving and being clean. He’s been clean ever since, and you can tell it too by the way he looks and acts.

Now that Angle was clean and was a changed man, he knew the next stop in his redemption tour was the WWE.

Things started happening fast. Kurt became inducted into the Hall of Fame and now he is the Raw General Manager. Sure Angle burnt some bridges, but they always say that everyone can make their way back to the WWE. Angle is proof of that. The man made mistakes, but overcame them and is now doing much better. Will we ever see Angle compete inside a WWE ring again? Only time will tell, but rest assured that Angle is content with the role he is playing now. He has a loving wife, five beautiful children, and a job working for a man who was always like a father to him.

Life is great for Kurt Angle these days, and he has plenty more great days ahead of him.

The post Kurt Angle Homecoming: A Touching Story About An Olympic Hero appeared first on Wrestling News & WWE News, Rumors & Spoilers.

Blocks 1 & 2:

A listener calls into the show and informs that he recently watched an episode of Lucha Underground and was fascinated by Dario Cueto’s performance. Taz agrees and points out that the actor who portray’s Cueto on Lucha Underground never worked in the wrestling business before, rather he’s an actor who was brought in to play that role.

The caller also asks Taz if he thinks WWE would ever go down the same road, by bringing in actors to play authority figures or managers on WWE programming. Taz doesn’t think WWE would do this because the wrestling business is somewhat of a fraternity, and they like to stick to their own. It would also be a lot of work to train actors into the wrestling business, in terms of how the business works backstage and in front of a live audience.

Taz’s Producer Dennis Jones attended a CZW show this past weekend and although this overly violent brand of wrestling normally isn’t his cup of tea, he had a good time at this show. Taz says that CZW has been around for a long time and while it certainly isn’t for everyone, WWE Superstars such as Dean Ambrose and Luke Harper got their start in CZW.

The post The Taz Show Recap – Bringing Actors into WWE, Lesnar Returning to RAW Tonight, Losing is Bray Wyatt’s Job, More! appeared first on Wrestling News & WWE News, Rumors & Spoilers.

During the mailbag segment of today’s installment of Wrestling Observer Radio, Dave Meltzer was asked about No Way Jose’s absence from NXT programming and why he hasn’t been appearing on television lately.

Meltzer said that the reason that the company hasn’t been featuring Jose on television is because they really don’t have a television program for him to work at this time. Once they have a program for him, the feeling is that he will be brought back. In the mean time, Jose will be working NXT Live Events, like he has been.

The post Reason Why No Way Jose Hasn’t Been Used on NXT Television appeared first on Wrestling News & WWE News, Rumors & Spoilers.

Block 1:

A listener calls in to open today’s show, saying he’s really looking forward to watching Backlash this weekend. The caller also hopes that the United States Title match between Kevin Owens and A.J. Styles main events the show. Taz says that he can understand that opinion, because those two guys can potentially steal the show, however he thinks Randy Orton and Jinder Mahal are going to have a great match as well.

Taz says that he didn’t like WWE’s utilization of Kevin Owens last night. He doesn’t believe that Owens should be stealing Chris Jericho’s gimmicks, and he thinks that Owens should be standing on his own because he’s better than this. Taz assumes that Jericho will be returning sooner than later and these two guys will revisit their feud, but Taz wonders how long WWE can drag out this program. It has already been ongoing for multiple months, and it doesn’t appear to be ending anytime soon.

A listener calls into the show and says that reforming The Shield is the only way that Roman Reigns is going to get over as a babyface with the WWE Universe. Taz disagrees and says reforming The Shield right now would be admitting defeat and would be a step back for Reigns and the company as a whole. He believes that turning Reigns full heel for a year or more would eventually result in the audience getting on Reigns’ side, then the company can flip him back to babyface.

The post The Taz Show Recap – Smackdown Analysis, Is Rusev Disgruntled? What Was the Best Part of Smackdown? More! appeared first on Wrestling News & WWE News, Rumors & Spoilers.