Russo opens today’s show by informing that he’s going to be a Grandfather for the first time. He’s very excited about this news and he thanks all of his fans for sending him so many kind messages on social media. He points out that news like this really helps you put life in perspective.

Russo mentions that a lot of his fans accused him of “working” them over the last couple of weeks as he refused to speak about RAW25. These fans assumed that Russo was invited to attend the event all along and he was refusing to speak about it in order to keep it a secret. That way, when he arrived at RAW25 it would be a huge surprise.

He says that this was never the case, and there were never any conversations between him and WWE about returning to the company for the one-night-only event. He points out that he hates to leave his house to travel these days, but a part of him really hoped that WWE would do the right thing in this case by extending an invitation to him and Ferrara.

Russo says that whether you like it or not, there would have been no attitude era without him and Ed Ferrara. He knows that Superstars such as Steve Austin and The Rock played a huge part in WWE’s success at that time as well, but the fact that he and Ferrara were the ones writing the lines for those stars made them an invaluable part of the company at that time in his opinion.

The post Vince Russo’s The Brand Recap – Real Feelings About Being Shunned From RAW25, Forgiving & Forgetting, No Attitude Era Without Russo, More! appeared first on Wrestling News & WWE News, Rumors & Spoilers.

According to Paddy Power, John Cena is currently the favorite to win the 30-Man Royal Rumble match at next month’s Royal Rumble event.

Cena’s odds are currently at 9/4. Roman Reigns is the running up with a 5/2 odd, with Nakamura being the third favorite at 11/4.

Cena already has two Royal Rumble wins under his belt. If he was to win again, he would tie “Stone Cold” Steve Austin’s record for most wins, which is at three.

The Royal Rumble event takes place on January 28 at the Wells Fargo Center Philadelphia in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. As always, we will have live play-by-play coverage of the show.

The post New Favorite to Win Next Month’s Royal Rumble Match appeared first on Wrestling News & WWE News, Rumors & Spoilers.

Photo: WWE

More Returns On Tonight’s RAW?

It looks like we may get a few more returns on tonight’s RAW. We’ve already reported that both Nia Jax and Samoa Joe are due back tonight, and now, it’s being reported that Bray Wyatt is backstage. Apparently, he has been cleared to return to the ring.

Braun Strowman is also backstage for tonight’s show.

Steve Austin On The Neville/WWE Situation

As everyone knows by now, Neville is apparently done with WWE. While there has been no official statement from either side, it’s pretty much common knowledge that Neville was very unhappy with his direction in WWE and quit the company.

In a recent interview, WWE Hall Of Famer Steve Austin reflected on the time he walked out on WWE and commented on Neville’s situation with the promotion.

“Well, my situation when I walked out, I wasn’t on board with the direction creative wanted to go. I was working my ass off and I just was not happy with that decision. So, I could have made a better decision with how I handled it. Just walking away like I did was a bad idea. I don’t know specifically what Neville’s business deal is or what his contract is or the circumstances under which he left. I know that any time you walk away from something and you don’t have that meeting or that one-on-one time with Vince or Paul or whoever it may be, but that’s the most prudent decision to make. By the same token, I can respect the guy that has enough balls to walk away just because he had a gut feeling like I did. I just wish him all the best in the world. In my opinion, he is an outstanding talent, he was really coming around with his gimmick and character, and he was a guy that I really liked watching. I’m sure a lot of people in the WWE Universe fell the same way. Hopefully he gets past this and whether he goes back to WWE or goes somewhere else, I hope he continues to have a successful career and have fun. At the end of the day, pro-wrestling, to be able to get paid to do that, it’s a fun job but it is a business and you need to get paid accordingly. I want the kid to have a great career, make his money and go on to the next phase of his life when it’s time to do that.”

The post More Returns At RAW?; Steve Austin On Neville/WWE Situation appeared first on TopRopePress.com – Wrestling News, WWE News, TNA News, Wrestling Results.

While speaking to Sports Illustrated, The Young Bucks talked about wanting to include Hulk Hogan into The Bullet Club’s entrance at next year’s Wrestle Kingdom event. However, Marty Scurll indicated that he would much rather have “Stone Cold” Steve Austin included in the entrance instead.

“I actually have a different wrestling legend in mind for my Wrestle Kingdom entrance,” said Scurll. “One that I have met on a podcast. One who likes to drink a little beer, raise a little hell. Put up the middle finger. But I don’t want to ruin any surprises. My lips are sealed.”

Scurll also mentioned that he’s going to headline ROH’s Final Battle show in December and, even discussed the idea of facing Conor McGregor.

“More important than headlining the show is shocking the world,” said Scurll. “Giving the people something they would never forget. There’s always talk about Conor McGregor getting involved in wrestling, so why not ROH? Put him in the ring against ‘The Villain’ at Final Battle. Maybe have my pal ‘Stone Cold’ Steve Austin in my corner. These are the kind of things I want to do for this business. The possibilities for the future captivate me. There’s so much good stuff to come.”

The post Marty Scurll Wants Steve Austin for Next Year’s Wrestle Kingdom Entrance appeared first on Wrestling News & WWE News, Rumors & Spoilers.

It’s been 20 years since Brian Pillman’s death so on today’s show Jericho welcomes Dave Meltzer from Wrestling Observer to discuss Pillman’s career.

Meltzer says he knew Pillman for many years, dating back to when Pillman began training and wrestling in Calgary for the Hart family’s ‘Stampede Wrestling’. Even during that time Meltzer knew that Pillman was going places, and Meltzer adds that up until Pillman’s death they still spoke fairly regularly.

Meltzer informs that Pillman quickly climbed the ranks and soon made his way to WCW where he would begin tagging with Steve Austin as the Hollywood Blondes. Austin wasn’t overly excited about that pairing at first because he was a fairly successful singles competitor, and he looked at this as a demotion. Eventually they developed fantastic chemistry and became a great team.

After some time WCW officials broke them up and Austin was the recipient of another singles run while Pillman was forgotten about. Pillman then hurt his back and became somewhat depressed. He knew at that time that he had to change his style because his injured back couldn’t keep up with the in ring work he was accustomed to.

The post Talk is Jericho Recap w/ Dave Meltzer – Remembering Brian Pillman, The Gun Segment, Drug Abuse & Untimely Death, More! appeared first on Wrestling News & WWE News, Rumors & Spoilers.

Edge and Christian open today’s show speaking about the attitude era. They wonder when the ‘attitude era’ actually started and ended. Edge says that the Goldust character was one of the first signs of WWE pushing the boundaries in his opinion. He gives a lot of credit to Dustin Runnels, who has been with the company for over two decades, and is still a terrific worker in the ring and person outside of it.

If Goldust was one key sign of the time’s changing, Steve Austin’s promo at King of the Ring 1996 also paved the way for what was about to come. After that, guys like Shawn Michaels and Triple H saw what was happening and changed their character to fit the times.

Another character who adapted with the times was The Undertaker. Christian says that Undertaker always found a way to tweak his character as required, in order for it to make sense in whatever era he was working in. The Rock and Mankind also made a huge mark on the business at this time and before long, young Superstars started transitioning from WCW to WWE such as Chris Jericho and Eddie Guerrero.

The post E&C’s Pod of Awesomeness Recap – Remembering the Attitude Era, Goldust Deserves Credit, Failed ‘Invasion’ Angle, More! appeared first on Wrestling News & WWE News, Rumors & Spoilers.

Stone Cold Steve Austin recently did an interview with TV Insider to promote the upcoming fifth season of his show, Broken Skull Challenge on CMT. Here are a few highlights from the interview.

Steve Austin says that Stone Cold gimmick was fun for him but the show will not feature the trash-talking character. The show will feature Steve Austin, who wants to give a fair platform for the athletes.

“Being ‘Stone Cold’ was a lot of fun. That was a guy who was in his element talking a lot of trash…That was the business of pro wrestling. It was entertaining, but I was a pro wrestler. You have to remember it’s been 14 years since I was doing that job.

“These days when I wake up, I am Steve Austin, period…Here, I never want to be a blowhard. I don’t want to trash-talk them, belittle or demean anybody. Our job is to bring these athletes, who are some of the best in the United States, and give them a fair platform. That’s the guy I try to be.”

Austin talks about the challenges that he can perform well in on the show, while also explaining the format of the competition.

“Don’t put me on Heartbreak Hill. I’ll have to put on my leg braces. It would be fun to get down in that trench. Trench Warfare is one of my favorite challenges out here because you go head-to-head with another human being. I’ve seen people slide by each other and turn it into a foot race…if I’m going against you in that trench, I’m going to stomp your ass.

“You have to dig deep here if you want to make it through. I was talking to Vince [Cariati, the show’s executive producer] the other day. We were talking about how our model is we bring eight great athletes here, and your chances of success are really slim because seven are going home and only one gets to take on that Skullbuster. We make it as tough as possible on every one of those people. We give them a fair shot, but we make it tough. That’s the way we want it.”

On which WWE Superstars could stand a chance in the tough competition:

“Cesaro, because of his strength endeavors. He is a workout freak and physical phenomenon,” he said. “I know Seth Rollins is in the CrossFit as well, but I’ll say those two names and stop right there, because it would be a really short list. Now Brock [Lesnar] would do great in The Pit, though. He would do good in the brackets and The Pit. But put him in the Skullbuster—and Brock is a very good friend of mine—but he wouldn’t do great on that because it would chew him up and spit him out.”

You can check out the full interview here.

The post Steve Austin Says He Doesn’t Want to Use His ‘Stone Cold’ Gimmick on The Broken Skull Challenge appeared first on Wrestling News & WWE News, Rumors & Spoilers.

While appearing on Steve Austin’s podcast, Bayley made the following remarks about possibly turning heel:

“It breaks my heart even thinking about it! And so, when I do have these ideas, like, I write everything down, ideas, just in case, they want ideas, ‘like, okay, we’re going to do this,’ I have ideas for that. But even just thinking about that, like one day, I was like, ‘yeah, I’m going to pitch this! I’m going to do it! Like, I want to be a heel!’ And then, I went out that night for our match and I saw maybe five or six girls dressed up like me and we had met these girls before the show that were just in tears meeting us. I was like, ‘okay, no, I can’t do it! I can’t turn my back on them. I don’t know what would happen.’”

You can check out the full podcast at this link.

The post Bayley Comments on Possible Heel Turn appeared first on Wrestling News & WWE News, Rumors & Spoilers.

There were rumors that ‘Stone Cold’ Steve Austin was going to be on RAW and even that he was spotted last week from Staples Center in Los Angeles. Austin responded to the rumours on the latest episode of his podcast, The Steve Austin Show.

“There has been word on the street, on my Twitter account, on all the sheets, ‘Stone Cold’ Steve Austin has indeed been spotted at the Staples Center. Well I can vouch for you or I can clarify that right now; if somebody thought they spotted me, they was wrong.”

Austin continued:

“I’m at 316 gimmick street in Marina del Rey. Staples Center is about 20 miles from my house, I ain’t nowhere in sight, I ain’t wearing camo, you can’t see me, because I ain’t there. I’m here at the house laying down an open for this damn podcast.”

The rumors were based on the fact that Austin is known to attend the shows and record his podcasts backstage whenever WWE comes to LA, and particularly, the new “Los Angeles 3:16” t-shirts that were on sale on the venue.

The post Steve Austin Reacts to Rumors of Being at RAW Last Week appeared first on Wrestling News & WWE News, Rumors & Spoilers.

Bayley was called up to the main WWE roster from NXT at last July’s Battleground pay-per-view. She was a standout down in NXT, having one of the best matches of 2015 against Sasha Banks at NXT TakeOver: Respect.

While appearing as a guest on Steve Austin’s podcast, “The Huggable One” said that while she felt that she could do anything in NXT, she’s still figuring out WWE fans a year later.

“With NXT I felt I can do anything. I knew exactly what they wanted and how they were going to react to me and my opponent, no matter who it was. I knew what they can do to get a reaction and what I can do to get sympathy or anything. But with this crowd I’m still kind of figuring them out with WWE.

“I think it has a lot to do with, I don’t know, in this day and age the crowds are… it’s so different than back then and they all want to cheer for the wrong person or they’re on their Twitter. That can mess with your head too, just reading tweets and people telling you this and you start to believe it. And you’re like ‘wait…’

“I’ve had to stay off Twitter before for a while because that can definitely mess with your head. I’ve seen it happen to people and I hear people talk about it. It shouldn’t matter because we’re doing our job and what we’re told to do and what we love.”

She added that while she’s in “a weird spot” right now, she’s “still figuring it out.”

“But I’m still kind of figuring them out. I feel right now I’m kind of in a weird spot with my career. So when I first came I felt like “Alright, I’m still from NXT.” I felt like I knew exactly what I was doing. But now I’m just… you know how we were talking a couple of months ago and you were helping me out with matches and stuff and how I need to go about certain things, I’m still figuring it out. I’m at a weird spot right now.”

The post Bayley Says She’s In A “Weird Spot” In Her Career appeared first on Wrestling News & WWE News, Rumors & Spoilers.