Originally Posted by Vito Cruz (Post 4609624)

<font color=goldenrod>Is Tough Enough 2 on the WWE Network now or something? I kinda dug re-watching all of season 1 on there.</font>

Originally Posted by PWI

The Undertaker was telling those backstage after his match with Bray Wyatt that he felt great and intended to work next year's Wrestlemania in Dallas, Texas.

Undertaker shared a locker room backstage with Sting and the two actually shared the same flight back to Texas. There was a lot of "if we do this" talk between the two about a potential match. The original idea when Sting came in was to eventually lead to the Undertaker bout at a Wrestlemania, although WWE management has cooled on long-term plans for the former WCW World champion.

Originally Posted by PWI

Regarding Hideo Itami getting the spot in the Andre the Giant Memorial Battle Royal at WrestleMania 31, that was a late decision as Finn Balor or Adrian Neville were scheduled to be in the match. Once the Battle Royal was moved to the Kickoff Ore-show, the decision was made to use Itami as a way to tie into Tatsumi Fujinami's Hall of Fame induction as there were a lot of Japanese media in town.

Originally Posted by PWI

As noted, Vince McMahon attended his first WWE NXT live event in San Jose this past Friday night. Vince was said to be very high on Charlotte after seeing her match with NXT Women's Champion Sasha Banks. There had been talk of bringing Charlotte to the main roster but that talk multiplied once Vince saw her work. Vince also requested that Charlotte be featured more in the new Tapout commercials. Vince also reportedly loved the work that Banks did at the NXT live event on Friday

Originally Posted by PWI

We reported earlier that over WrestleMania 31 week that there was a lot of talk about WWE changing how the Divas are portrayed. It was noted that due to the "#GiveDivasAChance" campaign and the success of Total Divas, some WWE officials had their "eyes opened" in regards to how the Divas are booked with the feeling that they need to do more with their female competitors. Part of changing how the Divas division will be portrayed apparently includes bringing up new talents and introducing new characters. There's still a lot of talk about former NXT Women's Champion Charlotte making her main roster debut soon but we haven't heard anything about other NXT Divas that might get called up. On a related note, there have been rumors of doing a full heel turn with Emma on the main roster, which has been teased recently on NXT.

Originally Posted by PWI

Regarding WWE making changes to the WrestleMania Kickoff Pre-show this past weekend, they talked about moving more than the Andre the Giant Memorial Battle Royal from the main card. Before they decided on moving the battle royal, they were talking about moving 1-2 matches to the pre-show. One of the matches discussed to be moved was The Bella Twins vs. AJ Lee and Paige. However, there was a feeling that they would face big heat from the fans if they moved the Divas match, due to the ongoing "#GiveDivasAChance" social media campaign. One of the reasons they put two matches on the pre-show, besides timing, is so the fans who were watching for 2 hours would have more than one match to keep them occupied. Also, the idea was to free up more time for the main show so they wouldn't be so rushed but they still ended up rushing things.

Originally Posted by PWI

While the WWE Hall of Fame received awesome reviews from everyone here at PWInsider.com, I am told that behind the scenes, it was not as well received. WWE management felt the show ran far too long and that it wasn't exciting enough. While it was a long night, I disagree on the latter as I felt there was a lot of legitimately wonderful speeches WWE requested that several cut their speeches short, which did happen with Kevin Nash, Shawn Michaels and Ric Flair. WWE pushed hard to have Kevin Nash go into the WWE Hall of Fame as Diesel but Nash was having none of that. Nash wanted to go in under his real name so that whatever additional credibility the WWE HOF brought to his outside endeavors, he could use it. I was also told that Nash didn't want to go in under Diesel since for years the narrative was that he was one of the worst drawing WWF champions and now wasn't going to allow himself to be celebrated under that name for that reason. WWE tried to push Nash to cancel his late night Wrestlemania Shenanigans party but he refused.

I was told that several long-time executives, including Vince McMahon, weren't happy about the talk about how Kevin Nash helped transformed the business with all the guaranteed contracts since the feeling at the time was WCW was out to put WWF out of business and that since McMahon took it so personally at the time, this brought up a lot of old angry feelings on a night where things are supposed to be more celebratory. Shawn Michaels wasn't kidding when he said on stage he was going to end up in trouble as the company wasn't happy with his use of the word "strap" and "wrestler" during his speech. Michaels legitimately tore his prepared speech up and was going off the top of his head when he inducted Nash. The company wasn't thrilled with Madusa's use of expletives and some weren't happy about Eric Bischoff getting put over. The company absolutely loved The Bushwhackers speech, feeling it was the perfect meshing of their "on camera" characters and telling old stories.

Originally Posted by Some Jeff Hardy Interview

On whether there a different variation or completely new type of stipulation that you think fans would want to see in TNA: “Stipulation as in match wise? There’s always room for that. I have an idea but I haven’t pushed it yet. I asked the guy in TNA that does the ring work if there was a way to spin the ring like WCW did back in the Universal days. It would spin around so I got to thinking, and I asked if he could put a ring on a thing that would spin to make it go around and around, make it go faster and slow it down. A rotating match to pull off in the future, where you start the match and at a certain time it’s going to start to rotate and go faster and faster. If you could pull off spots while the ring is rotating would be awesome in itself. Anything is possible if people are willing to attempt to pull it off and get over the fear of trying. I’m willing to try anything.”

Originally Posted by Smelly Meatball (Post 4610449)

Originally Posted by Droford (Post 4610566)

No more WWE Monday Night Raw

Not an April Fools joke

Originally Posted by Observer

As noted, tonight's WWE SmackDown will feature Sheamus returning to the ring against WWE Intercontinental Champion Daniel Bryan in a non-title match.

Sheamus is accused of being reckless in the match and not protecting Bryan enough. Some who saw the match live noted that Sheamus worked too reckless in some spots.

Bryan ended up busted open and needed around 7 stitches to close a cut on his forehead but the cut may have came from Barrett. Apparently there is at least some blood shown on tonight's broadcast.

Originally Posted by Observer

We previously reported that fans at the WWE Hall Of Fame ceremony on Saturday night were sending word that Scott Steiner was barred from the event. They said a photo of Steiner had been seen hanging up in the security area with notice not to let him enter the SAP Center, the site of the ceremony.

A new report by the Wrestling Observer Newsletter states Steiner was banned because an incident with Hulk Hogan’s wife, Jennifer, on an airplane recently. No other details were given about what happened were given, but the situation was called “ugly,” and it snowballed into WWE refusing to allow Steiner inside the building.

Originally Posted by Observer

Vince McMahon was watching the show, the first time he had ever been to an NXT event. He loved the crowd reaction, but those who saw him said he wasn’t thrilled at the “Better than Raw” chants and appeared very unhappy at the “Better than Mania” chants late in the show.

Originally Posted by Observer

The format is expected to be similar to the Steve Austin interviews with Vince McMahon and HHH that garnered a lot of attention. The first show will air on 4/6, with John Cena as guest. It’s notable that it’s Jericho and not Austin doing the show. One person close to the situation said that there was a falling out of sorts between McMahon and Austin and that Vince was not happy with Austin’s interview with HHH. He then wanted a change in hosts, and he picked Jericho. I’m not sure exactly what, but the item that seemed to cause the most controversy after the fact was Austin asking about Chyna in the Hall of Fame, and the fallout of Chyna resurfacing, and talking about HHH and the physical abuse allegation.

Originally Posted by Observer

The decision to go with Rollins was not made at the last minute, although few were aware of it. Reigns was originally scheduled to win the title. The impression we have is that Lesnar was fully appraised of the plan for Rollins to win at WrestleMania when he was finalizing his contract. My gut is they had to tell him, because if he signed and then they sprung the change on him, while it wouldn’t hurt him since he knew he was losing the title anyway, it’s a trust thing. Lesnar has already shown he can walk out at any time, gets very mad when things don’t go as he’s told they will go, so you can’t play the usual games with talent on him.

I don’t know when Reigns was told that he wasn’t winning, past the point that it appeared nobody in his family knew. His father, Leati Anoa’i (better known as Sika Anoa’i of the Wild Samoans tag team) was so furious at the finish that later that night there was nearly a bad scene. It appears none of the other family members knew either and all were unhappy, some more than others.

Rollins found out that he was winning late in the show. He was also told that as champion, he would have to fly after the show to New York to appear on “The Today Show” (a victory appearance originally scheduled to kick off Reigns title run) and back to San Jose to appear on Raw the next night.

The last 45 seconds of the match and that he was getting the title was said to be told to Rollins right at the start of the Rock & Ronda Rousey angle. It was at that point when Rollins, Reigns, Lesnar, Paul Heyman and producer Michael Seitz (Michael Hayes) went together into a room to go through the “new” finish and work out how they were going to accomplish it. The rest of the match had already been worked on and formulated.

Originally Posted by Observer

New Japan Pro Wrestling was officially renewed for a second season on AXS, with the official announcement expected later this week.

The current run of shows ends on 4/10. There will be a break until 5/22, when a second 12-episode season will start, that runs through 8/14.

This season will run main events from June through August of 2014, climaxing with the match voted Match of the Year for 2014 in most Japanese polls, the Okada IWGP title win over Shinsuke Nakamura at the Seibu Dome in the G-1 finals.

The second season is based largely around coverage of the 2014 G-1 Climax tournament, which may have been the single greatest tournament of its kind in pro wrestling history.

Originally Posted by Observer

Because of the success in selling so well in Philadelphia and with the four dates, with the two shows in Toronto, New Japan and ROH have reached an agreement for seven wrestlers to come over. Among those coming are Hiroshi Tanahashi, Shinsuke Nakamura, Kazuchika Okada, Tetsuya Naito, Jushin Liger, Kushida and booker Gedo. As noted, ROH, because of budget issues, at one point was only going to use three Japanese stars and lots of Bullet Club guys, but now it’ll be talent similar, if not better, than last year, since the Bullet Club will also be on the shows.

Originally Posted by Observer

There is now heavy interest in WWE in ACH. The standards regarding who they are interested in has changed with the idea of NXT as the cool touring brand and guys they used to dismiss are now guys they want. Too bad they missed on Ricochet the first time because he’ll be tough as I believe he signed a seven year deal with Lucha Underground. But I see them making a play at a lot of the ROH talent when their contracts expire. Adam Cole seems to me to be as almost a no-brainer when it contact is up as far as someone they’ll pursue as well.

Originally Posted by Observer

E! noted that Total Divas would return for its new season in the summer, although that’s been well known since they’ve been filming of late. Ariane Andrew/Cameron and Summer Rae are being dropped as characters on the new season, but Trinity/Naomi is being brought back.

Originally Posted by Guru Dave (Post 4609964)

Rusev, the adorable Bulgarian

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en"><p>Space jam on cartoon network ...... Very nice</p>&mdash; Rusev (@RusevBUL) <a href="https://twitter.com/RusevBUL/status/242315599496224771">September 2, 2012</a></blockquote> <script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

Originally Posted by Lock Jaw (Post 4610773)

Yeah.... was thinking on RAW after "Neville" debuted about how I have grown to like it being just "Rusev" and "Cesaro"....

But feel like "Big E" and "Neville" are just weird sounding....

Originally Posted by Noid (Post 4610874)

Byron Saxton gets a lot more flack than he deserves, but I'm not entirely sold on him as a commentator either. I think he's got more "presence" than Phillips or Brennan, but he's just not a lead guy, but also isn't really "heavy" enough to be a color guy. He is a tremendous ring announcer though.

Originally Posted by Mercenary (Post 4610881)

Yeah Raw proved how great he really was.....

Originally Posted by Noid (Post 4610871)

I'm digging Rich Brennan though. I really like something about him. He comes off like a real fan.

Originally Posted by Observer

Regarding Bray Wyatt wrestling The Undertaker at WrestleMania 31 with a sprained ankle, there was no talk at any point about Wyatt not doing the match. We noted that Wyatt was hurting o bad they had to put his ankle in a cast until the match started and he took it off.

Originally Posted by Observer

We noted last week that WWE officials had security confiscating Lucha Underground related signs at last Monday's pre-WrestleMania RAW in Los Angeles. They were also taking anti-Roman Reigns signs.

Originally Posted by Heisenberg (Post 4611111)

won't that confuse all the different storylines and shit?