Category: Wrestling Musings

Source: https://www.f4wonline.com/news/aew/kota-ibushi-update-aew-collision-injury/

So former New Japan star and occasional AEW participant Kota Ibushi, who had recently returned from years of injuries and recovery, suffered yet another horrific injury that might put him out for another year. A femur fracture, it’s been said.

I almost feel bad for the guy. He had a good run in New Japan and then at some point, he started racking up these injuries and other issues that kept him on the shelf more than in the ring. I’m not sure if maybe it’s a sign that he should hang it up and do something else in the business, but regardless of where he goes from here, I wish him nothing but a speedy recovery and then we’ll see where he goes from there.

Side note: today’s video offering will be up later than usual. Thanksgiving and all… later.

Someone was watching AEW a while back and asked me why they keep bringing back Riho every year to lose to whichever champion they want to push at the time. Part of me think it’s giving Riho something to do because she’s a friend of Kenny Omega, another part is that Riho is busy with stuff in Japan and there’s also dealing with work visas and things of that nature.

This isn’t a knock on Riho; she’s a fine talent, first AEW Women’s Champion, got the ball rolling on that… but they’re bringing her in every year to have a couple matches, challenge for whatever title, and then lose, which kind of mitigates the “specialness” of the whole deal, right? And it’s not just her; the same deal happened with Hikaru Shida, who was also once a prominent star in the early days of AEW – especially during the pandemic days – and now she just shows up here and there. Again, she has stuff in Japan and work visas to deal with, but it’s just sad that she was actually one of my favorite characters on the program and she barely shows up.

And then there was the comments that Gail Kim made regarding Riho that I’m not really going to get into. As a prominent wrestling veteran, she can say whatever she wants and people will be pissy about it. It happens to anyone these days and honestly, I don’t care what Gail Kim thinks about Riho. Someone else’s opinion is not going to hinder my own enjoyable of a show or a talent; I’m not sure why it should hinder anyone else’s unless they’re really, really stupid.

If you’re upset because Brock Lesnar has some peripheral involvement in the McMahon/Grant case and how dare WWE sully their good name or whatever, it’s worth noting that WWE is a named defendant in that case while Brock Lesnar is not; he was mentioned in the suit (at first as a former UFC champion and later by name to try and get more traction or something), but at the moment, he isn’t named as a defendant. So if you want WWE to swear off anything involving that legal business, you probably want them to shut their doors and hide under their rocks since – again – they are named defendants in the case as well. That sure as shit isn’t happening.

If you’re upset because Brock Lesnar is back to being the uber-kill main event push guy who shows up every ten months or so to have boring Suplex City matches or whatever the case may be… here’s the deal; WWE has begun airing PLEs on ESPN’s streamer in the U.S. while the rest of the world gets it on Netflix. Naturally, ESPN would want their first WWE event to feel like a really big deal, so they get a big star like Brock Lesnar to come back and have a match with John Cena, which will be the same shit we’ve seen before because John is all about replaying the hits and not doing anything interesting for this final run… like wrestling Joe Hendry.

If you’re upset that Brock Lesnar beat John Cena at the PLE… well, it could have been worse. He could killed Kofi Kingston in less time than he did at the FOX debut of Smackdown so he could go on to face some other former UFC guy nobody cares about anymore. Or he could have challenged for a World champion and beat one of those guys in a couple seconds to win another title that he doesn’t need.

Finally, if Brock Lesnar being brought back to WWE for sporadic appearances at best is making you long for the days of Vince McMahon… back when Brock did sporadic appearances at best… meet the new boss, same as the old boss…. that sort of thing?

Look, I genuinely don’t care if Brock sticks around for the long haul or if he’s just there for a bit before farming season kicks off again. I have a lot of issues with WWE programming that adding another one to the pile isn’t much of a big deal. And I’m not saying that you shouldn’t be upset about Brock coming back; it’s okay to feel that way. I’m just giving some reasoning as to why this is now a thing.

Really, if this thing is upsetting you that much, then maybe you should spend your time and money elsewhere. Thank fuck I don’t live in the U.S. where being a WWE fan (or really any sports fan in general) requires two mortgages minimum to keep up with all this shit. It’s ridiculous.

This is a developing story… not the Brock thing, but my continued interest and investment in this modern form of wrestling that has become something that I really don’t care for… and I can’t blame the talent for this because they’ve been putting on some great matches. Hell, some of the creative is actually pretty good… but then there’s the stuff around it that… eh, we’ll get to that point, eventually.

This has been your utterly worthless Sunday sermon for the whackos. Good night.

WWE has the Wrestlepalooza PLE coming up featuring the Punks going up against the Lynches. AEW has the All Out PPV featuring Hangman Page defending his Men’s title (his words, not mine, but technically correct) against somebody and other stuff happens, I guess. One is going to be three hours of a couple matches, ten thousand vignettes, and twice as many commercials, while the other is eighty hours of great wrestling featuring guys that I used to care about, but now don’t because the stuff they’re doing from a story perspective is uninteresting.

That, along with the fact that watching a WWE PLE requires a Netflix subscription, which I’m not keen on getting at the moment, while an AEW PPV costs 60-70 Canadian dollars, which I could spend on essentials like drug prescriptions.

On the other hand, the WWE Vault recently uploaded that Wrestlefest show from 1997… you know, the one where Bret Hart wrestled Terry Funk in what was allegedly Funk’s last match (good one, pal!)… you know, the one where Dennis Stamp got booked. It’s on Youtube. And it’s free.

Yeah, I know what I’m watching this weekend.

Have fun, kids.

It’s write, you illiterate cretin. Not right… twat.

It’s not the only time that I found issues. There’s little typos here and there that pop up every so often. These articles try to beef up their worth by adding some pointless exposition to news articles about someone’s tweet and yet they can’t be bothered with simple proofreading, despite the fact that there are tools readily available.

Again, people get paid to post this crap. How do I get a gig like that because I think I more than qualify… hell, I’ve got my own gaffs to add to the mix, so your mistakes will at least be varied.

0/10. Must tried harder, lads.

While clearing away some old e-mails, I came across a question from someone who used the question box gimmick on the blog, back when that was a thing. For those who don’t know, I used to do an audio thing called the DTM-Cast and every so often, I pull out a few questions that would be submitted via this gimmick. I may revive the thing if there’s interest, but otherwise, it really doesn’t matter.

So this person asks if I still watch Billy Corgan’s NWA program, to which my answer would be no. For those who don’t know, Smashing Pumpkin frontman William Patrick “Billy” Corgan had acquired the National Wrestling Alliance a few years back after a failed attempt to acquire TNA. He gave the promotion a reboot that featured a throwback to the glory days of the old NWA shows, but with more modern stars. The first year or so showed some problem and was the launching pad for a lot of names you might know today.

And then COVID happened and things got derailed.

Nowadays, NWA has a show on the CW app that you can watch… and that’s why I’m not watching the show… but even the few clips I’ve seen them post on Youtube hasn’t really inspired me to follow the promotion. Even before that one PPV with the James Mitchell bit – if you don’t know, here’s some musings to kinda bring you up to speed – the show had lost a bit of its luster. Going from Nick Aldus to the former Brodus Clay as your reigning World Champion soured things (not necessarily due to politics, but mostly because the Brodus Clay of the 2020s was nowhere near as good as the Brodus Clay of the 2010s… and he wasn’t even all that great in the first place!) The matches nowhere being as good, lots of unknowns, other things… eh, it was a show that I enjoyed when it started, but eventually went in directions that soured me on the product.

It’s worth noting that since that one PPV, the NWA has never held another PPV event. While they still do things like Crockett Cupp or the NWA Anniversary Shows, those end up airing as episodes of their main show, Powerrrrrrr. And since those are on the CW App… well, zero chance of me watching, is there?

(Apparently, they’re also on Twitter, but fuck off if you think I’m spending time on Twitter looking for whatever version of NWA exists now.)

So… I guess what I’m saying is… the answer is no.

Later.