Have you guys been watching Maven on YouTube? He's exposing the business! Good stuff, check out his video where he sneaks backstage to AEW.

His videos went from being charming to super weird. The Saturn video, the Justin Credible video. He seems to have run out of things to talk about.

I liked the Against All Odds show. It’s so weird to say that TNA might be my favorite show right now. I do like NXT. Smackers has been a major chore lately. I don’t think it’s just the 3hrs. The direction is grating on me. Lots of “losers” on the show. Starting off with Seth Rollins talking should probably be outlawed for shows with that long to go.

I saw Mavens video with Mick Foley, first one I have ever watched. It was ok.

The most hilarious thing about Maven's video's are the way he transitions into the ad reads.

Like in a video about backstage heat he just randomly started telling an unrelated story about how someone walked up to his house with a gun one day and now he's happy he doesn't have to worry about it because of SimpliSafe.

If Goldberg lives to be 90, that means Bret Hart will live until at least 100. I think Bret is going to will himself to outlive Goldberg so he can go to his funeral and trash him one last time.

I dunno bret looks old and shriveled. Goldberg looks jacked and ready to fuck

If Goldberg wins the World Title in Atlanta, would he be the only person to win the belt in 4 different decades?

Just saw the video of Cena's pipe bomb referencing promo on SD.... pretty good...

That was great. People have been chasing the pipebomb for 14 years and ironically the only guy who could deliver was the guy it was initially cut on. Poetry.

Something something long term story telling

The table was sponsored by Slim Jim

Cena made me want to see Claudio, Cardona & Nemeth back in WWE. Good job. Ryan Nemeth has been a gem on TNA. The Nemeths vs. Punk would be awesome stuff.

That segment also tips off how far WWE thinks about things in advance these days. They lined this up for a slam dunk almost perfectly. They knew they were going this route a long time ago — when the dirt sheets were speculating about whether or not Punk was even going to Saudi Arabia.

The segments involving R-Truth also lend credence to the idea that WWE knew he would be there.

It’s not that hard to deliver things like this if you know where you’re going. You can give hints and build ideas in people’s minds.

Decent Raw. Gunther has become a great promo. I liked how Cody and Jey both tried to use their rivals’ signature holds. Needed more Chad Gable.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">CM Punk is currently being evaluated by the WWE medical team, as there is a major fear he has &quot;completely lost his backbone&quot;.<br><br>(via <a href="https://twitter.com/FrightfulSelect?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@FrightfulSelect</a>) <a href="https://t.co/I7YDf8reTP">pic.twitter.com/I7YDf8reTP</a></p>&mdash; WrestleOops (@WrestleOops__) <a href="https://twitter.com/WrestleOops__/status/1938641192620609752?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 27, 2025</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

It kind of takes balls to travel to Saudi Arabia after even tangentially insulting the regime.

SmackDown was ok. Glad it’s going down to 2 hrs. CM Punk and John Cena are just on a different level. DIY actually got good reactions, and I have to say that match was bangin’. Andrade is so good in the ring. The Saudis are a pretty smarky crowd. They seemed down on Jade Cargill and The Wyatt Sicks. Can’t say I blame them.

NOC had some good wrestling. I’m not that into Jade or Cody right now. CM Punk and Cena energize every show they’re on.

I noticed they changed their tone on Goldberg. That’s interesting.

Karrion Kross has done a Rusev and an LA Knight for me. I’ve become a fan.

Finished the Wrestling Observer 1984 yearbook. Its a collection of all his 1984 Newsletters. So good.

Probably the nerdiest thing I ever posted. Brought this book to Cuba when I first bought it lol

Dave’s antics over the past 6 years or so have to call into question the credibility of his entire body of work. I think social media, age and competition in the space have been influencing factors. But at his core there is a speculative mark who clearly doesn’t have a problem making things up. A lot of “smart fan lore” has to be revisited.

He's just going where the money is, it's not like he has ever been a real journalist. The people who are likely to pay money to subscribe are pro AEW online hard-core fans.

That might be the intention, but is that really where the money is? He had to up his subscription price recently. I guess if your audience is going to decline anyway, might as well preach to the especially gullible.

I think some wrestlers give him kickbacks every now and then, and that “unofficially” buys them good coverage. You’ll never see a critical word written about certain people (and that’s always been the case). Jericho comes to mind as an example going back to around 1998. I think a lot of those wrestlers are currently in AEW and don’t want Dave blowing up their spot with honest AEW coverage, because they’re worried Tony will bail.

Plus they can write it in their own books if they don’t blurt everything to Dave.

As you said, it is a declining audience. The money became anything anti-WWE, which is why AEW got such a big push out of the gate. When TNA started the money was still WWE so it didn't get as big of a push. It is still a declining audience, but he's been able to extend his shelf-life by leaning hard in that direction. Now he has to justify the camp he is in to try to retain what subs and audience he has.. Pretty much Fox News, he'll bend the truth, he'll use whatever language he needs... he is just going to push the point as long as he can and as long as his audience lasts.

Your sources dry up when you spend so many years trashing a place too.

Again, not like it is anything like real journalism anyways... so F having sources, can literally just make things up or speculate. Wrestling sometimes real predictable too, so you can guess and be right a lot of the time.

Or just be wrong and say plans changed.

Dave Meltzer

It's very difficult to read Dave since AEW launched. I rarely read his work, definitely not paying for his thoughts ever again. He upped the price? Well that's kind of in line with everything else I'm this country right now.

WWE title picture is actually pretty good for each belt right now. The main titles are hot as ever.

Glad that Judgement Day won the tag titles on Raw because that scene is very slow right now.

I wasn't as impressed with Cena's pipebomb as I was CM punk's pipebomb years ago but it was a good promo. I wouldn't mind if Punk was the last opponent for Cena this December. They are a classic rivalry.

If you are looking for more wrestling, and if you enjoy current TNA (really fun promotion currently) I'd recommend you try a Maple Leaf Pro Wrestling show. It's Scott D'more's fed, and it's probably the highest quality indie product I've ever seen. Check it out, they run small arenas but they are actual arenas and they fill them. Looks like at least 1500-2k in attendance for their shows. The Indy wrestling is obviously there but they have a lot of really good unsigned stars too. Great for a random watch.

Precisely. There are no consequences.

I’ve never paid for him, so I’m just going by what others are saying there. I don’t think it was natural inflation when he raised the price. More like “there’s way fewer of you and I need to pay the divorce lawyers” style gouging.

More and more people have walked away from him, but it is really annoying how often you have to knock back Observer rumors and remind people it’s propaganda at this point. It’s done a lot of damage to wrestling too.

Punk and Cena have great chemistry. I liked how they tied the future main event scene to their Night of Champions match. Gave a few guys the blessing in there.

I was surprised how into the Judgment Day/New Day match the Pittsburgh crowd was. Great match too. I love me some John Dorian McDonagh. Good title change. There are fewer teams on Raw, but this felt bigger than the sum of its parts.

They make a big deal out of the SmackDown tag scene, but I actually feel that it the one connecting least. NXT has Hank & Tank and Briggs & Inamura. SmackDown feels very AEW. They need some star teams in there. Andrade & Fenix are a good start. The Motor City Machine Guns could use a move to Raw. Working with the heels there, including Theory & Waller for the moment, would help them out a lot.

My pipe-dream is for Carlito to return with Eddie and Orlando Colon too and add them to the mix. The Nemeths from TNA too. That’d be some pretty good stuff.

Cena/Cody is going to have Orton drama. I’m low-key hoping Jacob Fatu kind of says nuts to fighting his family and moves against Cena. I don’t feel strongly about Cena’s last opponent, but I would throw Fatu’s name out there. He’s got all the tools, they just need to pull the trigger.

Haha I can't wait for him to put out his 85 collection

How is this cesspool surviving?

:heart:

Saw a live Cholitas Wrestling show in La Paz, Bolivia... was very entertaining.... the damn male ref was the biggest heel of the night.

Hope you’re having a good time in Bolivia.

Had a good feeling about Yoshiki Inamura beating Oba Femi at The Great American Bash. This week’s NXT reinforced that for me. I’m really rooting for the guy. Got no clue why the crowd boos Briggs lol.

I think we might get some call-ups soon. Oba Femi is a guy I can see them putting in the deeper waters. He really seems to get it.

Watching a video on Muhammad Hassan as we just passed the 20 year anniversary of the airing of the Undertaker angle that pretty much got his character cancelled.

That the 7/7 London bombings happened on the day of the airing obviously made the optics worse (though WWE seemed to follow the "controversy creates cash" and instead of using this as a chance to revise the tape delay, they just slapped a content warning on it). I don't think they expected the sheer level of blowback they got, including UPN basically threatening to cancel the contract.

Kinda think there would've been at least some blowback even if 7/7 hadn't happened and if it had been on Raw/Spike TV instead. There's a reason they didn't attempt to just take him off TV for a few months and try again on Raw.

The facial expressions of the crowd during that SmackDown say a lot. It's a taped show so of course boos are piped in. But you really don't see anyone booing, either out of genuine anger/hatred or "booing because it's wrestling and it's fun to play along and boo the baddies" spirit.

You do see a lot of people looking totally stone faced and uncomfortable. You don't see too many crowds get to that degree.

A shame all told. Hassan was an awesome promo. And the character had a lot of nuance. The whole point of him is he's an Arab-American angry at the discrimination he's facing with people assuming that he must be a terrorist because he's Arab. They know the jingoistic crowds are gonna boo him and of course Hassan can shit on them for it. But there's a layer there where the crowd's just willfully ignoring their biases.

Instead they stripped any nuance away when he got to SmackDown and decided, yeah, let's make him an actual terrorist now.