If a 26 year old male wrestler stunk up the joint & got booed, no one would write "this poor boy" so please stop treating women wrestlers like children.
This is actually a *good* sign that WWE fans expect a certain level of quality from the women now.
I was at an AEW show in Jan. 2022 where Willow Nightingale was forced to play jobber for Brandi Rhodes on Dark.
To this day, the worst wrestling match I've ever seen live. And it wasn't Willow's fault. The crowd hated Cody so much on Dynamite later in part because of that.
“What I feared with that company (AEW), I was seeing before my eyes,
When you start to see things drift from the original vision and … I’ve seen this happen before, then you start to (think) this may not be what we thought it was.”
- Brandi Rhodes
(Progress News)
Anyone who tweets "AEW is like WCW 2000" should be forced to watch a 2000 episode of Thunder for 15 straight minutes. Mission impossible. These kids have no idea. They've only seen clips.
"The show has been airing on both TNT and TBS for the last five years and has grown to be one of the biggest ratings movers on cable Wednesday nights."
It's funny to see how normal people view AEW's success vs the drones on Twitter.
"As could be expected, Khan was protected well in the maneuver by the Bucks – revered workers within the business for nearly two decades."
The NFL knows real graps when they see it.
.
@TonyKhan
says if you want a sports based product, "put your fucking money where your mouth is" and "strap in" and watch The Continental Classic. He expects hard-hitting sports competition and stars fighting stars.
#AEWFullGear
NXT debuts a new midcard title for the women to match the men: "This is great! This is equality!"
RoH debuts a new midcard title for the women to match the men: "This is awful! Too many belts!!"
Pro wrestling commentary is now just: WWE good, AEW bad, rinse wash repeat
Dynamite demo went up ~30% from last week. Jack Perry's merch is sold out. NJPW closing in on 7k for the Chicago show.
But please, tell me again why there was no business reason to have everyone talk about AEW all week.
It's increasingly clear the AEW locker room issues were caused by one specific person. I haven't heard about any backstage nonsense in... how long ago was Labor Day weekend?
Rob Van Dam on the AEW locker room:
"A lot of the guys really went out of their way to make me feel appreciated and welcomed. They were like, ‘Hey, some of us might be a little apprehensive about coming up and telling you this, but we’re all so excited that you’re here and so…
As someone who currently enjoys AEW, I don't really get all these "how to fix AEW" opinion pieces.
The product is still good & entertaining. Theyre still selling tickets & PPVs. They just signed Will Ospreay. AEW can improve, but it is not broken. Those are different things.
I'm starting to think the "AEW is WCW 2000" talking point is not organic. No way the entire anti-AEW universe all decided on the same talking point in real-time last night.
"You talk a big game about workers’ rights. Well, you’ve shown the exact opposite since you got here. I love this place, I care about this place."
Hangman Page was always right about CM Punk
NEWS: I have received the minutes from January's Oklahoma Athletic Commission mtg about a "transgender" wrestler (h/t
@RealRasslinUK
)
In regard to Nyla Rose competing, the Commission passed a motion to "warn
@AEW
to not do this again" or there will be "punitive action" taken.
I just realized ESPN renamed its "WWE" section to "Professional Wrestling" so I think the monopoly is officially over. NBA, NFL, NHL, MLB, Pro Wrestling.
Fun fact: Eric Bischoff was fired from WCW in Sept 1999 after the 207th episode of Nitro.
The 207th episode of Dynamite was Grand Slam in Sept 2023, which drew 11k fans and won the night on cable with its best rating of the year.
Nick Hausman started the "Raw is going to WBD" rumor. On Friday, it was reported AEW & WBD are close to signing a new deal. In response, he's now comparing Chris Jericho to Harvey Weinstein.
I do not want to defend Jericho without more details, but Hausman is a proven fraud.
The WWE worship from pro wrestling "media" is really out of control. They fired (at least) 5 people on a Friday night 11 days after the most successful WrestleMania wknd ever. There's nothing respectful about that.
I should not have been the one to obtain the meeting minutes revealing Oklahoma threatened AEW for allowing Nyla Rose to work. I'm just a fan.
Pro wrestling is too big to not have a true media covering it:
The fact that WWE's offer is basically a "WrestleMania moment" when All In at Wembley last year sold more tickets than any WrestleMania ever is pretty hilarious.
The unwritten story is WWE can't splurge on salary because they spent so much on Vince's hush payments.
This is *literally* the first time Corey Graves has ever tweeted about Jinder Mahal. WWE down bad. TK called em out & now theyre stuck rallying around a jobber.
CM Punk publicly admitting he's so soft a midcarder saying "cry me a river" caused him to have an uncontrollable meltdown is wild.
But kudos to Punk for continuing to make Jack Perry sound look like an actual badass.
Cm punk says when Jack Perry took a shot at him at all in with the cry me a river
He told Tony khan to take care of it or else I will
Tony khan didn’t
CM punk confronted Jack Perry about it Jack Perry said do something about it and they fought
After the fight he told Tony…
World's End was a legit sell-out, ended with 3 straight awesome matches and AEW paid off the Devil angle to perfection.
I'm not seeing the negativity others do. I watched a good show. Not top tier or anything, but definitely not bad either.
AEW's ratings went up 30% in a week. Yet somehow no one is saying, "You know, maybe WWE shouldn't have spent its biggest week of the year talking about AEW."
Triple H went on ESPN & used that megaphone to talk about Will Ospreay. Genius stuff.
99.9% of AEW criticism & discourse is some variation of "that's not how Vince McMahon does it" and it's no fun to listen to wrestling podcasts anymore.
"All In at Wembley is in 11 days & we don't have a full card!"
Oh my God how can grown adults complain about such minutiae???
@ClaytonEchard
Are you serious bro? You let a woman get bullied on national TV & sent her home like she was the problem, even though everyone was telling you Shanae was the problem. And you have the nerve to play the victim?
Wow, maybe you & Shanae were made for each other.
AEW & RoH have 17 belts for 7 hrs of weekly shows.
WWE & NXT have 17 belts for 7 hrs of weekly shows.
You can argue there are too many titles across pro wrestling. You cannot argue it's just an AEW problem.
The "causal fan" does not exist in 2024. Not in pro wrestling. Not in sports. Not in entertainment. No one is flipping channels.
You increase your audience in 2024 by exciting your existing fan base so much they can't help but tell everyone they know.
Today, Nick Hausman confirmed that he lied about Chris Jericho and the Kylie Rae rumors he started were untrue.
A lot of people owe Chris Jericho an apology and none of them will. Online "fans" are embarrassed again. Stop falling for every single anti-AEW rumor.
Nick Hausman started the "Raw is going to WBD" rumor. On Friday, it was reported AEW & WBD are close to signing a new deal. In response, he's now comparing Chris Jericho to Harvey Weinstein.
I do not want to defend Jericho without more details, but Hausman is a proven fraud.
Please stop comparing Mercedes to CM Punk. Mercedes left WWE to further establish AEW's women's division. She's more Jon Moxley, thinking about the entire industry. Punk only ever thought about himself.
A great pro wrestling show with unscripted promos, inside references, curse words, blood, and poisonranas off the top rope?
Amusing the things WWE fans hate on Wednesdays end up being pretty awesome on Mondays.
It took Adam Copeland about a month to figure out the AEW promo style. Mercedes right on time with that promo. Much better. You got to feel it in AEW. If it feels scripted, we're out.
Meltzer causally mentioning in this week's Observer that World's End did 141k buys. Everyone online apparently hated the Devil angle but you cant deny it drew money.
MAGAs are threatening to boycott Best Buy because the company dares to have a program to diversify its leadership.
The best part? Best Buy announced it in July. Of last year.
MAGAs remain the absolute dumbest people on the planet.
An "old-fashioned approach" to winning a campaign is using the bully pulpit of the presidency to win re-election.
I think pundits hate Biden because they keep predicting his doom (a recession, mid-terms, Hunter, etc) & they're always wrong.
Meghan McCain did not hear her baby's heartbeat at 6 weeks because no one hears a baby's heartbeat at 6 weeks. There is no heart yet. That is a scientific fact.
It's impossible to have real conversations about abortion because these people don't exist in reality.
Hearing my babies heartbeats at 6 weeks is hands down one of the most exciting, liberating and most beautiful moments of my entire life. Hands down.
Stacey Abrams is a very sick person to say this and somehow accuse doctors of faking fetal heartbeats. Full stop.
This week's Observer is hilarious. AEW's ratings are cause for concern... also, Dynamite beat every channel from 9-10p except CBS, NBC, and ESPN.
Pro tip: A
#3
show is never cause for concern unless you're the NFL.
Adam Copeland's current AEW run has been excellent & I love the open challenge gimmick.
I was suspicious at first because the "I'm just hear to help the kids" stuff is the same stuff CM Punk said. But Copeland actually meant it.
Good news AEW fans, they sold more than 3,000 tickets to tonight's
#aewdynamite
! You are now officially allowed to enjoy the show*!!
*unless the tv rating is bad and/or a foreign wrestler shows up unannounced
This ESPN "article" doesn't mention Vince & is written by the guy who lied about AEWs Wembley ticket sales last year.
WWE wants you to forget about Vince. Do not. Others knew.
We’re on the Road to
#WrestleMania
after
@CodyRhodes
won the Royal Rumble on Saturday for the second time in as many years. Will he pick Reigns or Rollins? Plus fallout from CM Punk’s injury and comments from Triple H on Andrade’s return:
Wrestling twitter hates the Devil angle but the AEW live crowds are thoroughly invested. Hope that's a good sign they're selling more tickets to normal people.
This is possibly the best example of how deeply MAGAs are broken people: these are two photos of the Gonzaga basketball team arriving for the Midwest regional.
Happening right now. Three busses just loaded up with illegal invaders at Detroit Metro. Anyone have any idea where they’re headed with their police escort?
@petehoekstra
It's honestly embarrassing he even has to say this, though I'm glad he did.
The only answer to these anti-AEW trolls is squeezing their engagement away. Block them. Mute them. Ignore them. I got to be better too.
Tony Schiavone on fans thinking he was upset during Dynamite over the airing the All In footage:
"My facial reaction is trying to put more heat on the Bucks being assholes, in storyline, I didn’t have any reaction to the footage we saw cause I don’t give a damn. . . I was not…
"AEW Dynamite's disappointing tv rating"
Why don't Real Housewives fans obsess over tv ratings? Last week, they beat Dynamite. This week, they got crushed by Dynamite. But I don't see any Bravo ratings discourse. They just... watch the show & discuss what happened??
I'd love to know how much of the AEW fans' dislike of Cody was due to Brandi being one of the worst tv characters ever in pro wrestling.
I remember a guy next to me being so mad that Willow (who he knew) was forced to do that job because Brandi was married to Cody.
Are people actually paying for blue checkmarks just to trash AEW all day? Or are they being funded??
I'm at a loss about the number of bizarre anti-AEW accounts in my replies all week. These can't be real.
AEW has been around for 4 years now and the only top guy to jump ship has been Cody Rhodes.
Moxley, Omega, Rush, Bucks, Hangman, Jericho, Miro, FTR etc etc all re-signed when their original contracts expired. Interesting, right?
I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but WBD will ask (and pay) AEW to air Rampage after Dynamite or Collision in the next deal. The 0% demo change for that 3rd hour is impossible to ignore.
AEW was
#3
on cable from 8-10pm Saturday night, behind only ESPN & FS1. And it was very close to beating the Washington/Stanford game on FS1 in the demo.
I'm guessing WBD execs are pleased they're getting CFB ratings at a fraction of the cost.
The pathetic engagement farming from every pro wrestling "media" site is getting really annoying.
None of them took time to follow up on the Nyla Rose/Oklahoma story - an actual news story - but they sure can transcribe what negative things a WWE employee said about AEW.
"AEW has been on fire for six weeks. Great momentum. Incredible matches. But let's spend the next 20 discussing that one thing I didn't like." - every pro wrestling podcast this week
Triple H knew about Vince McMahon's victims & did nothing about it. Unfortunately, not a surprise at all.
When I said WWE needed to take out all the trash, I meant *all* of it.
AEW didnt announce Mercedes before Big Business all the media would refer to her as former WWE star Sasha Banks.
Now she's AEW wrestler Mercedes Mone at a Celtics game. A fresh start. Public perception is critical.
As an AEW fan from day 1, it has been remarkable (and depressing) how many online wrestling "fans" want it to fail.
Usually in sports & entertainment, people root for the upstart. But in pro wrestling, they rally around the established
#1
. It's bizarre behavior.
@Ourand_SBJ
woof. Rose Bowl could beat those numbers.
playing the Semifinals on New Year's Eve continues to be one of the dumbest decisions in the history of sports television.
This week's Observer is a trip. AEW is an ice cold product and can't sell tickets.
Also, 3 mega stars are joining, Dynamite is regularly beating broadcast shows, Revolution is the biggest gate in Greensboro history and the last PPV wildly exceeded expectations.
AEW tried to re-debut Jamie Hayter as a surprise during the very first Rampage and the crowd sat in absolute stone cold silence.
Instead of commending AEW for learning from a big mistake, it's just more complaints. So incredibly tiring to be an actual AEW fan & check twitter.
“that’s really how they debut mariah?” aew fans do not like women’s wrestling lmfao if she came out during a match it would’ve been dead silent . be serious
Okay, now I'm starting to think these anti-AEW troll accounts are being run by WWE.
This type of message coordination is never organic, and it's extremely weird for a pro wrestling show.
I'm a big fan of getting AEW Dynasty through YouTube and not BR Live. I don't care how much money AEW gets for the next rights deal, I do not want to log into BR Live ever again.
What an incredible week of PR for WWE. CM Punk started nonstop AEW cheap shots. Triple H told all pro wrestlers they were soft for taking more money. And the Rock went full MAGA!
Enjoy WrestleMania if you'd like. Hope it's a good show. Ill be watching basketball.
AEW is getting the women over. Multiple storylines & segments every week now. Willow saving Copeland was a nice touch. Stardom as a new forbidden door. All good.