[Emperor Smeat]

The Sheets:

Originally Posted by Observer Last night's Raw number, even though there were some bright spots as far as the first two hours not doing too badly, ended up as the second least-watched episode of the show in its history and third lowest ever in 18-49. Raw averaged 1.62 million viewers, down one percent from last week's second worst number ever. But this show was loaded between the Asuka vs. Sasha Banks Raw Women's Championship match and the Drew McIntyre vs. Dolph Ziggler match which was pushed on television as for the WWE Championship before it was quietly changed to non-title over the weekend ... In addition, Raw set all-time record lows for the third hour, built around those two matches, which did 1.46 million viewers (breaking the single hour record low of 1.50 set by last week's hour three with Randy Orton vs. Big Show) and 0.41 in 18-49, breaking the all-time Raw lowest hour of 0.42 set last week. The show averaged a 0.48 in 18-49, the third lowest ever, because the first and second hours were up from last week in the key demo, an overall four percent increase from last week. Raw finished 19th overall and third in 18-49 ... Raw is down 30 percent from the same week last year overall, 35 percent in 18-49, and down 52 percent from last year in 18-34. The bad sign was the 14 percent first-to-third hour drop is more than the show has been doing in recent weeks. The drops were 28 percent in women 18-49, 16 percent in males 18-49, 88 percent in teenage girls (unheard of), and 52 percent in teenage boys (also unheard of) while only seven percent in over 50. There was something in hour two that was as big a turnoff to teenagers as anything in recent memory. The three hours were: 8 p.m. 1.70 million viewers 9 p.m. 1.69 million viewers 10 p.m. 1.46 million viewers

Originally Posted by Observer Kris Statlander is recovering following surgery to repair a torn ACL. She posted a picture on her Twitter account this afternoon following her surgery. She had tweeted the day before that she was undergoing surgery today. Statlander tore her ACL in a match on AEW Dynamite that aired on June 10. The injury happened as she was going for a dive on Kip Sabian to the outside, injuring her knee on impact. It took place during a tag team match where Statlander teamed with Hikaru Shida to take on Nyla Rose and Penelope Ford.

Originally Posted by Observer WWE issued a new storyline update on Rey Mysterio’s status following his Eye for an Eye match against Seth Rollins at Extreme Rules: “WWE Digital has learned that Rey Mysterio’s vision is improving slowly each day, and that his optic nerve is intact, completely secured and back in its socket. A timeline for Mysterio’s return to the ring is unknown at this time.”

Originally Posted by Oberver Cody tweeted that the TNT title belt design will be finalized on August 12.

Link: https://twitter.com/CodyRhodes/statu...155670530?s=20

Originally Posted by Observer After being pulled from Sengoku Lord this past weekend as a precautionary measure, Tomoaki Honma and Yota Tsuji have been cleared to return by NJPW. NJPW announced on Saturday that Honma and Tsuji would both miss Sengoku Lord due to taping a television show with someone who later tested positive for COVID-19. NJPW wrote that Honma and Tsuji were both in good health and weren't in close contact with the person who tested positive. Today, NJPW announced that Honma and Tsuji have both tested negative for COVID-19 and will be returning at Wednesday's non-televised Summer Struggle tour show

Originally Posted by Observer The top two matches for Summer Struggle in Jingu have been announced. In a press conference held this morning, it was confirmed that IWGP Heavyweight and Intercontinental champion EVIL will defend both titles against Tetsuya Naito ... Naito confronted EVIL at the end of Sengoku Lord last weekend, setting up the title match for next month. Hiromu Takahashi will also defend the IWGP Junior Heavyweight Championship against Taiji Ishimori on this card. It was Ishimori who attacked Hiromu after losing his double title match to EVIL at Sengoku Lord. Naito eventually ran in for the save ... Additionally, a new championhip, the KOPW 2020 title, will be determined in a fatal four-way match. Four matches will take place on August 26, with the winners advancing into this match. Competitiors fighting for the championship will name their stipulations and will allow fans to vote on the matches they would want to see. Summer Struggle in Jingu will take place on August 29 at Jingu Stadium in Tokyo.

Originally Posted by PWI Betty Gilpin, who plays Liberty Bell on Netflix's GLOW was nominated for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series the 2020 Emmy Awards. This is the second year in a row that Gilpin has received that nomination. GLOW also received nominations in two additional categories: *Outstanding Production design for a narrative program (half-hour) for the episode "Up, Up, Up" *Outstanding Sound Editing for a Comedy or Drama (Half-Hour) for the episode "The Libertines." These nominations would be for GLOW's third season ... Overall, the series has won 3 Emmys and has scored 18 nominations total.

Meanwhile WWE has been trying for years to get officially nominated and win an Emmy and has been empty handed for both.

Originally Posted by PWI When ROH begins taping empty arena content for their TV show, it will be in the Maryland area.

Originally Posted by Post Wrestling vladTV released his full interview with New Jack. Towards the end of the interview, New Jack was asked if he believes WWE is a racist company, judging by the way they portray black wrestlers. Here was his response: “Yeah, because they always got the black guy doing stupid sh*t. They come out dancing and tap dancing and wearing dresses and eating cereal and all that silly ass sh*t…”

Originally Posted by Post Wrestling The Miz was a guest on the 411 Wrestling Interviews Podcast and stated that he and John Morrison are working a new song.

Originally Posted by WrestlingInc The WWE Women's Tag Team Champions, SmackDown Women's Champion Bayley and new RAW Women's Champion Sasha Banks, have made history and joined an exclusive list of Hall of Famers and Superstars in the WWE history books. With Banks' title win over Asuka on last night's RAW, Banks and Bayley became the first female Superstar duo, and the 5th pair overall, to join the list of teams who have held singles titles while also holding tag team titles together. Bayley and Banks are the only female team on the list. The other four teams on the list are Triple H and Steve Austin, Kevin Nash and Shawn Michaels, Owen Hart and The British Bulldog, Ken Shamrock and Big Boss Man.

Originally Posted by Fightful Bruce Prichard made headlines on his show Something To Wrestle when he said Nick Aldis lacked the "it factor" during his time in TNA. Prichard, who worked as head writer before taking on executive positions, worked with Aldis (Magnus in TNA) during his time in TNA from 2010 to 2013 and again in 2017. Aldis didn't take kindly to Bruce's comments and addressed Prichard on Busted Open Radio. "Bruce and I spoke on the phone and Bruce claimed 'I was talking about the Magnus character, I wasn't talking about Nick Aldis.' Well, his team uploaded a video and had a picture of me with the NWA Title and they used my name. So, he's full of shit," stated Aldis. "What he did was expose the fact that he hasn't been paying attention to anything going on. Anyone who has seen any of my shit over the last three years, everyone says 'you present yourself like a real pro wrestler.' For Bruce to say that, it just shows he hasn't been paying attention. Kinda like how when he was running TNA, he wasn't paying attention. He was asleep. He took a shot, gave a half-baked reason as to why he said it, didn't address it, and now he's getting an invoice. He likes to float things out as subjective and present them as facts. He lives in a past mentality where he thinks because he's in WWE, he can say whatever about someone and that's the only thing anyone will hear and that will be the opinion everyone shares. It doesn't work like that anymore." Aldis continued, pointing to Bruce's ratings failure in TNA and WWE. "By the time Bruce was relieved of his duties in TNA in 2013, he had viewership down to one million people. By the time I had the World Title at the start of 2014, we had the viewership figures back up to 1.3 million and peaked at 1.55 million, which is just shy of 1.56 million, which is the lowest Raw rating in history, which is the rating that came out the same week he decided to trash me on his podcast. Maybe that extra bit of rating that Raw got, that's the extra 'it factor' that I don't have. It can't be that his entire roster doesn't have the 'it factor,' if only I had the 'it factor' that those guys had, I could have got that extra half a fucking rating," said an agitated sounding Aldis.

Originally Posted by Post Wrestling We have a story on the site about Monday’s announcement that DDT and Pro Wrestling NOAH will be merging under a new banner called CyberFight and appears to be a direct response to the effects of the pandemic. The merger takes effect on September 1st with Sanshiro Takagi installed as its president. They explained that they would be separate divisions of the company with the in-ring style not changing and made it appear this was a way to fortify its business structure and make it more efficient rather than sweeping changes to the on-screen content. Takagi added that desire to run a proper Tokyo Dome card and hopes of overtaking New Japan, which are nice goals to have even though both would be characterized as very ambitious.

Originally Posted by Post Wrestling Earlier this month, WWE held a virtual shareholders meeting involving its executive staff for a company update. Brandon Thurston at Wrestlenomics has a great review of the call and below are some of the highlights: *Those on the call included Vince McMahon, Stephanie McMahon, Paul Levesque, Interim CFO Frank Riddick III, incoming CFO Kristina Salen, as well as executives John Brody, Jayar Donlan, Brian Flinn, Jim Johnstone, James Rosenstock, Brian Stedman, Michael Weitz, and other directors with the company *They noted advertising partnerships with Hyundai, Coca-Cola, Mars, Unilever, Microsoft, and KFC. *Their response to COVID-19 has included shifting its corporate staff to working from home, a reduction in management compensation, lowering its headcount of employees through furloughs, a delay in its new headquarters, temporarily suspending its stock repurchase program, and drawing $200 million from a credit facility *They have approximately $500 million in liquidity to deal with the challenges *During the Q&A, Riddick stated the free version of the WWE Network has had “early positive results, but nothing definitive” – last week, Stephanie McMahon had noted network engagement was up 67% and you would have to attribute a sizable portion of that to the opening of the free tier and the promotion they did when the pandemic began where lots of content was made free *In a major shift from the George Barrios & Michelle Wilson era, Riddick said that they don’t believe a premium tiered system is an optimum approach to maximize the subscription value. Instead, they are going with the free model to bring in new subscribers with the hope of converting them while also developing “local currency pricing in select international markets” *The WWE UK Performance Center has been inactive since March when the pandemic hit and are seeking out solutions to create new in-ring content from the NXT UK brand *They are hopeful of running another event in Saudi Arabia before the end of 2020 but cannot guarantee that *They have a back-up plan in case they were not allowed to run shows in Florida *The cost-cutting measures in April had nothing to do with the XFL

Originally Posted by Post Wrestling During the shareholders Q&A ... From Paul Levesque on the role of NXT as either a feeder system or a third brand for the company, as well as its television numbers: "So I think if you were to look at the NXT brand, it would be both. While it is, as Frank mentioned earlier, a third global brand, along with Raw and Smackdown, and our partners at USA, it is also the place where we make new stars and increase our talent and stars for the future, of both Raw and Smackdown. So that is the pipeline, and that is the — if you wanted to say, ‘the feeder system’, it is that, but it also has become its own third brand. As far as the ratings go, I’m very happy with them, especially in the current circumstances. Everything is going well. We look at the long-term of that, not the short-term of that. And the long term is very exciting. We have a lot of stars. There are a lot of hungry young athletes, and the pipeline to bring in more as they continue to train and get better is very exciting. The future is very bright in that regard."

Originally Posted by Fightful Charlotte Flair was the Queen of WWE television in the months following WrestleMania 36, appearing weekly on Raw and NXT while being sprinkled into SmackDown as well. Charlotte had already proven to be one of the greatest female wrestlers of all-time when she won the NXT Women's Championship at WrestleMania 36 and she hopes the women in NXT took notice of what you can achieve through hard work and consistency. "I don't want to say that I've added more to NXT, I just hope the talent in that locker room at NXT go, 'this woman is NXT homegrown and look at what she's done in her career.' That's what I strive for. I don't say, 'do I added to the show, the locker room, am I getting girls over?' There's no right answer for that. My answer is, I hope the women in the locker room look at me and go, 'Damn, she's done it all and I want to do it too. What has it taken her to do that?' For me, the answer is consistency. Whether the storyline is for you or not for you, whether you're apart of it, you shine no matter what. It's not about how many moves, it's the story you portray and how you hold yourself. If you learn anything in a ring with me and we're trying to tell a story; remember the story and who you are as a character because that's what the audience connects with," Charlotte told Pro Wrestling Illustrated. Charlotte lost the NXT Women's Championship at NXT TakeOver: In Your House. She is currently off television due to complications with plastic surgery.

TPWW Frontpage:

• WWE: Vince McMahon on WWE’s Declining TV Viewership, Top Matches of 2020, Updated SD Ratings
• NJPW Announces Tournament and Details for New KOPW Championship
• Two Title Matches Announced for SummerSlam
• Kairi Sane Says Goodbye to WWE