The Game is over.

https://www.wwe.com/article/triple-h-an ... first-take

Anybody watch the first night of Wrestlemania?:

It was actually a pretty good show overall, although it's highly recommended that you watch the replay and just skip past all the commercials, as that'll easily cut out a good hour or so of runtime. In terms of the matches, Cody vs. Seth was very much the match of the night (plus the general insanity of seeing the AEW version of Cody Rhodes in WWE, right down to having the Codyvator entrance), followed right behind by Bianca vs. Becky. It was also legit surreal to see Steve Austin have one more match, and it was actually quite good with Austin taking a couple pretty nasty bumps for someone his age. Let's see how night 2 stacks up against night 1.

I thought night 1 of WrestleMania was fine. Nothing was outright bad, most was average to good. Only two really good matches though in Becky vs Bianca and Cody vs Seth. The women did their usual type match and they get better all the time. I still think American women's wrestling has ways to go but they get better and better and the top talent is really good. Cody vs Seth was also great, and probably my favourite of the night. I never liked Seth in ring or out of the ring. I think Cody hit his thing in AEW - he's a great storyteller. To re-debut in this way was great for him. At first I thought this would be bad for his career but now I think he has really secured his future. He no doubt got a great deal and if his first appearance is anything to go by he has the faith of Vince. When his contract is up he's in a great position. If things go well he can stay. If he needs to be refreshed he will be welcomed back to AEW as a god. All good for him.

I didn't like Steve Austin ending the show. I understand why they did it this way but having a talking segment (I was never much into it) and then an ok match for a pensioner wasn't my cup of tea. This was exactly what I expected and it wasn't very exciting to me.

I got really annoyed with the video packages throughout. I'm watching the show already I don't need to see an hour of pre-taped packages. Something to sum up each feud, ok, but commercials for everything else they should have left behind. And I don't think WrestleMania should be two nights.

Would you rather the 5-7 hour abominations that WrestleMania's 32 through 35 were? Having the show be spread over two nights is significantly better than that.

So how was night two, then?

No, it isn't a two choice only. I want them to stack the card, have the matches mean something, cut it to one night and have it go about 4 hours max.

I haven't watched WWE with any sort of regularity since 2015, even then mostly just the Owens/Cena feud (KILL STEEN KILL), so take my opinion with a big ol' grain of salt.

Two nights for WrestleMania, the biggest show in the entire industry, is fine. Not offering a product that could comfortably fill both nights with solid action, however, is not.

The insane thing is that if you cut out all the promos and commercials, there was only just over 3 hours of actual wrestling on both nights of WrestleMania combined. You could conceivably try to put all that into one night if you run it New Japan or AEW style with zero stuff on the show beyond the actual match segments and a few pre-match promos.

But filling out two shows could become overkill. WWE would inflate both evenings and the overabundance of matches (and unpredictability of the sport) would make even the main event card a constant mess.

I came out of night 2 feeling it was a better show than night 1. Then I looked back and wondered if I was really sane because night 1 was obviously stronger. My brother then reminded me that we sat through the entire night 1 while with night 2 we skipped all the commercials, video packages and interview segments. It made a huge difference. The matches were better on night 1 but I wouldn't recommend anyone to sit through the entire show as it was presented live.



Overkill is the problem of so much, not just in wrestling but in society. My interest in wrestling waned as there was more and more product available. It wasn't just overkill in general but also in specific parts of WWE. One gimmick match a year - or perhaps two - created a hype. Now they can do a whole show filled with ladder matches or the like. I just loose interest. It was the same thing with MMA. I loved it when UFC ran 6 shows a year and Pride did 6 shows a year. It was easy to follow. Now there are several shows every week. I can't keep up and I stopped watching almost completely a few years ago.

The match from everything this past weekend I most want to see is FTR vs. the Briscoes. Dem Boys are one of the best tag teams of all time, IMO, and FTR are a perfect way of taking a throwback gimmick and making it work in a modern setting. By all accounts, it exceeded its lofty expectations, too.

Opinions on the Rhea Ripley heel turn? Personally I think it was way too abrupt as Liv 4 Brutality were only put together a month ago and it would've had a bit more impact if they'd have been crowned the new women's tag team champions and then lost them.

For anyone looking for another Scott Hall tribute...

What's going on with Sasha Banks? I can't bring myself to watch Raw or Smackdown, but I've seen bits and pieces about how she's walked out again? She did this 2-3 years back iirc?

The best I can tell, its this:

1. Sasha and Naomi are currently the Women's Tag team Champs.
2. On Monday's Raw, they were to be part of six women match to determine the next challenger to Bianca Belair for the Raw Women's championship and Naomi was to pin Sasha.
3. At Hell In The Cell PPV, Naomi would face Bianca and Sasha would face Rhonda Rousey. They would both lose.
3. The pair feel that they are under utilized as a tag champs and are frustrated with the creative direction of that was well has having one pin the other on Raw just to put over the current Women's Champs at Hell in The Cell.
4. They brought their concerns to Vince, who may or may have not agreed to change to the Raw program, only to find out later that Raw was going to continue as originally planned with the six women match.
5. They walked out, leaving their tag belts behind. Corey Graves called them "unprofessional" on air (allegedly under Vince's direction).

Holy shit:

https://www.wsj.com/articles/wwe-board- ... 1655322722

Not good, and possibly why Stephanie decided to get out when she did if she heard any rumblings of this coming to light.

...that may be the first A24 movie I'm looking forward to in a while. Efron is underrated and usually chooses some bad work, but he does a good to great job in everything he's in. I wonder if he'll be Kerry or Kevin, because I can't see him as Fritz, David, or Michael.

And now I'm wondering who's going to play the Freebirds.

Whoa, Vince is stepping down as CEO: https://corporate.wwe.com/investors/new ... -120023255

He's temporarily stepping down from corporate activities, while retaining all his creative responsibilities. Anyone who hoped the product would improve its going to be severely disappointed.

https://youtu.be/vo5RmTOTBb8

Welp...that's it. Pack it in. The Canadian indies gave us the craziest ladder match of all-time 18 years ago and nobody even knew about it.

Upon digging deeper, it's no wonder that Crazy Crusher retired in 2007 after only 4 years as an active talent. Dude had a deathwish.

So yeah, AEW just did Blood abd Guts II, and it was absolutely fucking insanity the entire time. It was just short of one solid hour of a dozen dudes beating the everloving fuck out of each other. Go out of your way to watch this, as it is the true successor to WrestleWar 92 as THE WarGames match.

Any thoughts on Vinnie Mac finally stepping down, guys?

Turns out Triple H is now in charge of all creative.

It's one of the four biggest news stories in the history of the business, alongside the death of WCW, the birth of AEW, and the Benoit murders, and this probably eclipses all of those other stories since Vince was the biggest, most successful promoter in the history of wrestling. I personally am actually quite interested and excited to see what direction WWE goes in with Triple H as the booker, and I'm fully expecting there to be gradual, yet noticeable, changes in the product over the next year. The best case scenario here is that WWE becomes reinvigorated creatively, and then AEW gets a big new TV deal once that time comes, and we'll actually have a truly competitive big two North American wrestling companies again for the first time since WCW's heyday.

I have a good feeling about HHH being in charge of creative. NXT was awesome when he was in-charge of it.

The thing that will cement my certainty in Triple H making WWE eventually worth watching again is when the last of Vince's yes-men in Bruce Prichard and Kevin Dunn get pushed out. The interesting part there is who will Hunter bring in to replace those two and also who else will fill out the rest of the backstage spots as part of his inner circle. Had all this happened a year or even six months ago, people that were clearly going to be in said inner circle that have since been released would not have been, like William Regal. I think that ultimately the core heads of WWE business are gonna be Stephanie, Hunter, Paul Heyman, Jeremy Borash, Shawn Michaels, and Jeff Jarrett, as they are all currently in the company and either already in positions of power or gaining power right as the shift from Vince to Hunter as booker was happening.

In defense of Bruce Prichard, his run with the book in TNA was one of the best things in all of wrestling back in 2012. And he admits he was on autopilot and just put people together in programs that he thought had decent chemistry more than any real long-term thought.

Personally? Since HHH is the one who expanded into the UK market to broker deals with Jim Smallman (Progress) and Mark Dallas (ICW), I'd like to see if he could get Mark Dallas on board with some ideas. Not that I want anything negative to happen to ICW, but Dallas made Chris Renfrew get super goddamn over.

Are you a Jay Hunter guy, or a Mr. OOC guy?

What, no love for V1?

Royal Rumble should be interesting. Gotta wonder who will win with all the possibilities.

The most interesting thing happening in wrestling at the moment is at WWE boardroom level. Vince is back. And he's back to sell WWE, looking to have the company sold by April. He effectively held the company hostage demanding back his chair position. He's truly fucking insane.

Well then, thats not an exaggeration