The Official WWE / NXT Discussion Thread *May Contain Spoilers*

[ZMAN]

<blockquote data-ipsquote="" class="ipsQuote" data-ipsquote-username="crownsy" data-cite="crownsy" data-ipsquote-contentapp="forums" data-ipsquote-contenttype="forums" data-ipsquote-contentid="25169" data-ipsquote-contentclass="forums_Topic"><div>There's having control, and there's having a force vision for 15 minutes about your inter self after being teleported from the ring to an alternate dimension, where you apparently lose all control of your sanity and body. <p> </p><p> Look, i get it I'm in the minority, it seems to have landed for a ton of people and i'm glad they did something creative a lot of people enjoyed. </p><p> </p><p> For me, it was very corny. I would have even preferred Cena was challenged to drink some sort of potion by Bray and was like "Fine, I'll do it" and then seize out for 20 minutes until Bray decided to go "eh, he's done I guess"</p></div></blockquote><p> </p><p> </p><p> Cena/Wyatt was confusing even as someone who understood all the references. I wasn't expecting to have to believe that Cena would travel across dimensions to fight this guy. </p><p> </p><p> I would have kept it so much more simple. Wyatt invites Cena to his weird, cult compound. Have them beat the crap out of each other and throw in some of Wyatt's mind games. </p><p> </p><p> But nah, somehow we got mind control and a bunch of other dumb shit. I'm all for crazy stuff going down but damn you need to put limits on some of this sci-fi shit.</p>

[DeathZone2]

I honestly don't know what people were expecting with the Funhouse match, Bray's whole shtick is hurting people psychologically turning them into their true selves. With Cena it was ruining him, breaking him down, showing him that he is the villain not the hero he pretended to be.You saw Cena as he battered Huskus the pig, seeing all his worst moments, where he thought he was the hero, but was getting booed.It's never about championships, it's about hurting people and showing them for the frauds they really are.It's why he couldn't beat Goldberg, Goldberg never pretended to be someone else, he was always Goldberg and he didn't have that one weakness the Fiend exploits.

[Questlove]

I honestly don't know what people were expecting with the Funhouse match, Bray's whole shtick is hurting people psychologically turning them into their true selves. With Cena it was ruining him, breaking him down, showing him that he is the villain not the hero he pretended to be.You saw Cena as he battered Huskus the pig, seeing all his worst moments, where he thought he was the hero, but was getting booed.It's never about championships, it's about hurting people and showing them for the frauds they really are.It's why he couldn't beat Goldberg, Goldberg never pretended to be someone else, he was always Goldberg and he didn't have that one weakness the Fiend exploits.

 

I thought it was utterly fantastic, incredibly entertaining and I'd watch that a thousand times before I watch another normal Bray Wyatt wrestling match. Did it actually make any *sense*? Not really. This was on a whole different level to stuff like the Final Deletion and the Boneyard match.

[Mootinie]

<blockquote data-ipsquote="" class="ipsQuote" data-ipsquote-username="crownsy" data-cite="crownsy" data-ipsquote-contentapp="forums" data-ipsquote-contenttype="forums" data-ipsquote-contentid="25169" data-ipsquote-contentclass="forums_Topic"><div>according to the women herself, fake news. She's in Tampa as of last night. <p> </p><p> <a href="https://lordsofpain.net/rhea-ripley-is-still-in-the-united-states-despite-previous-reports/" rel="external nofollow">https://lordsofpain.net/rhea-ripley-is-still-in-the-united-states-despite-previous-reports/</a></p><p> </p><p> Now the truth is likely in the middle (she likely needs to renew, and guessing that renewal process is not top of list right now for either government) and she needs a renewal processed to be offical. She's not going home anytime soon either though with both countries having a travel ban in place. Also, Vince just got an exemption via the POTUS to tape in Florida, you think ICE is showing up for Rhea at those tapings? </p><p> </p><p> The Real reason is Ashley wanted the W as she always does at Mania, Vince booked the match not triple H (confirmed in interview with Trips as stated above) as Vince is convinced she moves the needle and is getting killed on Wednesdays.</p><p> </p><p> and what's the only time they've beat AEW? when the main roster stars were building S. Series.</p></div></blockquote><p> I have a hard time imagining Charlotte wanted the title when you look at Becky, Bayley and Sasha leading the divisions on the two main brands. Surely NXT is a step backwards for her?</p>

[milamber]

NXT:

 

- Ladder match was great. There were some brutal spots in the last 10 minutes. I'm happy Io got the big win but now I'm afraid she's going to do the job for Charlotte.

- It's early days but Bivens Crew don't look anything special.

- Gargano vs Ciampa was great. Their verbal sparring and Drake's involvement really sold the story. Candice finally joined her husband on the dark side. I wasn't a fan of how they filmed it to look cinematic even though it wasn't a special location like the Boneyard. Too many bright lights and too many camera cuts. Only time it worked for me was when they were atop the truck.

[ZMAN]

I thought it was utterly fantastic, incredibly entertaining and I'd watch that a thousand times before I watch another normal Bray Wyatt wrestling match. Did it actually make any *sense*? Not really. This was on a whole different level to stuff like the Final Deletion and the Boneyard match.

 

 

That's the problem, it didn't make sense. But i'm glad that a couple of idiots huffing on dank, goat herb got off on a bunch of dumb stuff. It's like if I had gotten plowed with the producers of Sharknado 3 and made fun of wrestling of 15 minutes. If I want to watch funny looking junk, I'll turn on Always Sunny in Philadelphia.

[Jaysin]

Finally got around to watching Night Two of Wrestlemania. Brock and Drew was terrible. There were literally three moves done, German Suplex, F5, and the Claymore.

 

At least the Cena/Wyatt "match" was utterly ridiculous to make up for the lack of wrestling involved.

[crownsy]

I honestly don't know what people were expecting with the Funhouse match, Bray's whole shtick is hurting people psychologically turning them into their true selves. With Cena it was ruining him, breaking him down, showing him that he is the villain not the hero he pretended to be

 

Right, like i said i appreciate the creativity and I followed the match.

 

Literally any kind of explanation of why Cena took an acid trip and Bray suddenly had the ability to teleport him to another dimension where he had no control of his own actions would have been great to make it land better for me.

[crownsy]

I have a hard time imagining Charlotte wanted the title when you look at Becky, Bayley and Sasha leading the divisions on the two main brands. Surely NXT is a step backwards for her?

 

you honestly think she's going to just show up on NXT?

[Sco xY2Jx]

So at the time of writing this, so far these talents have been released:

 

• Aiden English

 

• Curt Hawkins

 

• Drake Maverick

 

• EC3

 

• Epico

 

• Eric Young

 

• Heath Slater

 

• Karl Anderson

 

• Kurt Angle

 

• Lio Rush

 

• Luke Gallows

 

• Maria Kanellis

 

• Mike Chioda

 

• Mike Kanellis

 

• No Way Jose

 

• Primo

 

• Erick Rowan

 

• Sarah Logan

 

• Zack Ryder

 

• Billy Kidman

 

• Dave Finlay

 

• Lance Storm

 

• Mike Rotunda

 

• Pat Buck

 

• Sarah Stock

 

• Scott Armstrong

 

• Shane Helms

 

• Shawn Daivari

 

They've said released so I'm assuming lost their job completely as opposed to furloughed. That's a heck of a list with some solid names on there. Anderson and Gallows will definitely be in AEW or NJPW. No guarantees of the rest though. Maybe EC3 will go back to Impact or NWA. Dude deserves so much better than what WWE gave him.

 

Edit: Seems we can add Rusev to that list.

[franticloser]

List as of 1:49 pST

 

 

Rusev

No Way Jose

Zack Ryder

Maria Kanellis

Mike Kanellis

Rowan

Sarah Logan

Mike Chioda (referee)

Primo

Epico

Billy Kidman (producer)

Pat Buck (producer)

Shawn Daivari (producer)

Scott Armstrong (producer)

Sarah Stock (producer)

Heath Slater

Kurt Angle (producer)

Shane Helms (producer)

Dave Finlay (producer)

Lance Storm (producer)

Mike Rotunda (producer)

Aiden English

Eric Young

Drake Maverick

Curt Hawkins

Karl Anderson

Luke Gallows

EC3

Lio Rush

 

 

With the producers I'm thinking they are furloughed aside from Angle as he is specifically listed in the article on WWE's website as being released. Most of these guys are used on house shows or for dark matches. As a business they don't make sense to keep paying, I see a lot of them being brought back when business goes back to normalish. Also on the produces you have to look at three things. Age factor for risk (Rotunda, Armstrong, Finlay, Angle, Chioda) and travel/living in a high risk area (Pat Buck, Kidman, Storm, Stock, Helms, Daivarai), and then if you are only taping a couple of matches per show you don't need as many agents. So they probably just kept the handful who aren't at risk and live in Florida, Pearce, Abyss, Dutt, Jordan, and Jarrett. The OC just resigned for big money contracts that they can't afford to pay out right now, Rush has had attitude problems, Rusev has seemed to want out for a while, and Mike asked for his release last year, and they probably just let Maria go with him.

[Dorian]

Honestly just amazed at how today has become. WWE didn't even needed to do this and so many people are without jobs now.

 

Gods, I feel so bad for everyone. Also Drake Maverick's twitter post was so damn sad.

[Dr_Avalanche]

This the same month they bragged to stockholders they had half a billion in cash reserve. If these releases had happened a month ago, I wouldn't have blinked an eye. Now, I feel pretty disgusted.

[Blackman]

As long as they'll hire new people. Too bad about Rusev, and I've always like Sarah Stock's work, but hard to evaluate backstage people. I don't know how Angle worked as a producer, but I did like him as a personality.

 

I'm not really going to miss the rest.

[Mootinie]

you honestly think she's going to just show up on NXT?

No, of course not, but being asked to do TV on Monday and Wednesday is surely worse than simply doing TV on Monday. Imagine having to learn two scripts a week instead of one so you can work the C show that does one third the viewers of the A and B shows. Forget that.

[Mootinie]

With regards the releases, there's no doubt the timing is awful and on a moral level, this is a terrible thing for a company to do. It is not surprising though and some of these guys have been collecting $250,000 to like $750,000 per year to sit at home or sit in catering. They hoarded talent and refused releases just to keep people from AEW, I'm hopeful these releases open the door for some of these guys and girls to flourish elsewhere.

[tambourin81]

I've seen estimates that costs for talent are less than 10% (I've even heard somewhere around 7-8%) of the WWE's total annual costs, and they were still predicting profits this year despite COVID-19.

[milamber]

Not many shocks, TBH, except maybe Maverick, Logan, Rowan, Stock and Chioda. Some of the others probably should have left/been let go sooner.

 

NXT cuts have been made as well. Deonna's gone which isn't so bad because she was being poorly used and she'll have no shortage of offers.

[franticloser]

Totally pumped to see Thatcher was the replacement for Dunne, that man is amazing and I also was trained by him!

[Self]

<blockquote data-ipsquote="" class="ipsQuote" data-ipsquote-username="Mootinie" data-cite="Mootinie" data-ipsquote-contentapp="forums" data-ipsquote-contenttype="forums" data-ipsquote-contentid="25169" data-ipsquote-contentclass="forums_Topic"><div>With regards the releases, there's no doubt the timing is awful and on a moral level, this is a terrible thing for a company to do. It is not surprising though and some of these guys have been collecting $250,000 to like $750,000 per year to sit at home or sit in catering. They hoarded talent and refused releases just to keep people from AEW, I'm hopeful these releases open the door for some of these guys and girls to flourish elsewhere.</div></blockquote><p> </p><p> I get why Vince would do this. In uncertain times, you need to protect yourself and your interests. Turtle up. Secure your income (going live so that the Networks can't cancel contracts, contribute to a Florida governor's campaign) and reduce costs (release/furlough non-essential employees). If you're not on the road, you don't need as many agents. If guys are off TV and being kept to spite AEW, that's wasteful. And AEW are less likely than ever to pick people up. It's not a good look, but I can see the method in the madness.</p>

[Sco xY2Jx]

<p>On top of all the releases, today its been announced that Howard Finkel passed away.</p><p> </p><p>

RIP to a voice of my childhood. Will forever associate him with running down the rules of the Royal Rumble and his announcing of Andre... The Giant!</p><p> </p><p>

RIP Fink.</p>

[milamber]

NXT was good.

 

Totally pumped to see [REDACTED] was the replacement for Dunne, that man is amazing and I also was trained by him!

 

Perfect replacement, especially with his connections to a lot of NXT wrestlers.

[tambourin81]

I get why Vince would do this. In uncertain times, you need to protect yourself and your interests. Turtle up. Secure your income (going live so that the Networks can't cancel contracts, contribute to a Florida governor's campaign) and reduce costs (release/furlough non-essential employees). If you're not on the road, you don't need as many agents. If guys are off TV and being kept to spite AEW, that's wasteful. And AEW are less likely than ever to pick people up. It's not a good look, but I can see the method in the madness.

 

Also, for a publically traded company it's par for the course to announce large scale firings when your profits are getting lower than expected, because investors tend to see people getting fired as a good thing.

 

Also also, they just ran XFW into the ground, gotta recoup all that lost investment somehow.

[Jaysin]

WWE is doing a Corporate Ladder match at MITB where the competitors start on the ground floor of corporate hq and fight to the roof to get a briefcase that's hanging above it

[dvdWarrior]

WWE is doing a Corporate Ladder match at MITB where the competitors start on the ground floor of corporate hq and fight to the roof to get a briefcase that's hanging above it

 

I thought that sounded a lot like something you might find in a wrestling video game, rather than on an actual wrestling show. Could be interesting. It's definitely different.