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Former TPWW Royalty
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The Sheets:
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Raw dropped from last week's number boosted by the Becky Lynch pregnancy announcement, falling eight percent from last week and averaging 1.76 million viewers.
It was the second lowest viewer number in the modern history of the show, trailing only the episode two weeks ago that did 1.68 million viewers ...
The show was down 30 percent from the same week last year, and last year had competition from the NBA playoffs. It was down 42 percent from last year in the 18-49 demo ...
The third hour was the second least watched hour in the history of Raw television, beating only the 1.62 million mark of hour three two weeks ago.
The three hours were:
8 p.m. 1.82 million viewers
9 p.m. 1.81 million viewers
10 p.m. 1.64 million viewers
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Originally Posted by Observer
With the debut of the Owen Hart episode of Dark Side of The Ring series hours away and discussion about his controversial and tragic death expected to be revived on social media afterward, his widow, Martha, has been doing interviews of late to tell her side of the story and to bring attention to the episode.
While her stance on what happened and her opinion of the company hasn't changed throughout the years, Jerry McDevitt, outside legal council of WWE, wanted to have their side represented, and did just that with statements given to CBS Sports following the release of a Hart interview they did Monday.
McDevitt, who led the WWE legal team in the case, said that how Hart talks about the lawsuit is inaccurate and that her lawyer was trying to go about things the wrong way:
"What she did whenever this happened is, she hired a lawyer in Kansas City who we caught essentially trying to fix the judicial selection process to get a judge that was more to their liking. We caught them and went all the way to the Missouri Supreme Court. The Missouri Supreme Court said, 'No, no, no. We're not going to let that happen.' They essentially appointed an independent judge to come in from outside of Kansas City to oversee the proceedings. We were basically trying to find out what happened that night. Martha was not even remotely interested in finding out what happened that night; she just wanted to used it as a vehicle to beat up a business that she didn't like that her husband was in, the wrestling business."
In her book "Broken Harts", Hart didn't speak favorably of McDevitt and said that WWE's lawyers were claiming Kansas City police weren't being impartial in an effort to get the case heard before a different judge.
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Originally Posted by Post Wrestling
Justin Barrasso of Sports Illustrated has an interview with Martha Hart. In this interview, Martha spoke about WWE’s negligence when it came to the harness they used on the night of Owen’s death. WWE attorney Jerry McDevitt responded to the article:
“The manufacturer of the quick release device, if there is anybody directly responsible for Owen’s death, it would have been the manufacturer for that device.”
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Originally Posted by Observer
The Undertaker responded to a tweet about the right wing T-shirts he’s worn on his Last Ride documentary: “Everyone knows WWE is A political !! It’s all about the flag!”
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Link: https://twitter.com/undertaker/statu...880932357?s=20
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Originally Posted by Observer
CZW issued a statement about sexist PPV names like “Hair Pulling Catfights,” “Top Heavy & Tough,” “Hot & Sweaty,” and “All Assets Revealed” being used for specials of past content featuring women’s wrestlers: “Two years ago, CZW entered into a licensing agreement with a national media distributor to license CZW and WSU footage. That company has the right to utilize the footage without limitation. They have repackaged and renamed shows as it is their right to do so. Our athletes, regardless of gender, are just that, athletes, whom we are proud of and appreciate. We stand behind the ring action in all our footage.”
Jordynne Grace then responded to CZW’s statement: “Just so everyone is aware, there are many women already speaking to lawyers about this, as releases were not signed to authorize licensing footage for profit and distribution.”
Kimber Lee also responded to CZW: “And I’m certain I NEVER signed an agreement giving you the right to sell my intellectual property.... nor did ANY of the women you’re blatantly disrespecting. Or how you told us all you wouldn’t book us if you wouldn’t f**k us. It’s about time the harassment gets exposed.”
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Originally Posted by Observer
Tony Khan clarified how the TNT Championship will be worked into AEW’s weekly top-five roster rankings: “Good question. It’ll be a similar format, but going forward we’ll have the 2 male singles champions ranked at the top above the Top 5.”
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Originally Posted by Observer
On Busted Open Radio yesterday, Ricky Starks said his contract with the NWA has expired and he’s no longer with the promotion.
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Originally Posted by Post Wrestling
Nikki and Brie Bella were guests on the Sunday Night’s Main Event podcast. While speaking to Nikki, she shared that WWE and John Cena had editorial rights to alter anything in her book and Nikki said that there were a few stories that WWE removed from the book.
“I mean, of course. Definitely writing it, did that stuff cross my mind? It did and there was never anything bad I wanted to say about John. John and I had a beautiful relationship. Did we have troubles? Yes. Will anyone ever know about them? No, and this is something at least my therapist and I know about and I get through and I have gotten through, but overall, we did have such a beautiful relationship. I mean WWE also had editing rights and took out a few stories as well, and I respect that. I understand I’m not a private person and some people like to be private, but even with the stuff that was edited with John, there was nothing crazy bad. I just wish I was able to talk more about why I ended up where I ended up. I still feel like people will always wonder that, and I think it’s because we put our relationship out there on reality TV for five to six years and so, I wanted to tell that story.”
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Originally Posted by Post Wrestling
Will Cooling has an article on the Torch site looking at the finances of Progress Wrestling that are open to the public through the Companies House governmental agency in the UK. In Cooling’s research, it shows that under Progress’ real name (JJG Partners), the company paid out a dividend of £273,000 to owners Jon Briley, Glen Joseph, and Jim Smallman (the latter ended his role as a director in July 2019 and had his shares bought out. Smallman ended his role with the company by the end of the year to work exclusively with NXT UK). Cooling adds that the dividend payout was £155,000 in 2017/18. During the pandemic, the group has been running fundraisers and launched a Twitch channel to raise funds for workers.
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Link: https://www.pwtorch.com/site/2020/05...-events-pause/
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Originally Posted by Fightful
Although the NXT UK brand hasn't been putting on new shows in recent weeks, the wrestlers aren't staying put and sitting at home doing nothing.
According to Gary Cassidy of Sportskeeda, the wrestlers from the UK brand have been working with WWE doing some online seminars. The seminars, which have been called "Skull Sessions," saw NXT UK superstars doing online calls with the likes of William Regal and Robby Brookside and doing match analysis sessions.
As far as when NXT UK shows return, there's no set date yet, but Cassidy reports that there is a plan for programming to resume as soon as it is deemed safe to do so. Due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, wrestling companies across the world have postponed or canceled shows.
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Originally Posted by Fightful
When Goldust first debuted in 1995, the word often used to describe him was "bizarre." Well, this is bizarre.
While discussing the 1995 Survivor Series, Jim Ross imparted some wisdom concerning the early days of the Goldust character and an envelope-pushing element that was left on the cutting room floor of WWE creative.
Marlena would make her debut at the 1996 Royal Rumble alongside her husband at the time, Goldust. Goldust for the groundbreaking for the mid-90s as he portrayed a very androgynous character. According to Jim Ross, an element of this androgyny, specifically pitched by Vince McMahon was to be a prosthetic penis worn by the Marlena character to throw the audience off even more.
“Goldust was created to be polarizing. You know, it was very polarizing and when we put and is even going to be more so, Vince was all in this, the Attitude Era coming along with the sexual characters, this androgynous guy,” Jim began. “Was he really androgynous? Was he gay? Was he straight? Was he bisexual? We had no idea. But it was a very unique presentation to the point, and I told this to Terri Runnels one time and she was appalled, probably appalled at me. I'm not sure. But Vince had an idea to have to give her a prosthetic penis to wear under her attire. Something that was never [to be] talked about. Nobody said anything. It was never focused on. It was just there. Luckily, cooler heads prevailed and that never made air and it never even happened. She wasn't aware of it. There was a thought at one time about really going... 'Well we're going to go all the way, let's go all the way.' No, let's don't If we go all the way, we're gonna step off of a cliff here. I don't want to fall off a cliff. We don't need to be falling off cliffs here. Let's get close to the edge, but not quite step over it.”
While they never went in this direction with the character, only 2 years later Goldust was walked out on a leash on TV by Luna Vachon with a ball gag in his mouth, during the thick of WWE’s Attitude Era.
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Originally Posted by Fightful
Taynara Conti was waiting for an opportunity that never came in WWE.
Conti was signed by WWE in October 2016 and competed in both Mae Young Classics before making various appearances on NXT television. However, Conti never made the impact she was hoping to have, leading to her reportedly walking out on NXT in February 2020 over a disagreement. She returned shortly after, but was part of the April 15 cuts.
"I need to get better and think about my future and feel that I'm useful," Conti told Ring The Belle. "In the last couple of months, I was not feeling that anymore. I was trying to have conversations, asking for opportunities. I never asked for something big. I never asked for a TakeOver match or title shot. I was in the same spot for a long time, doing 3-4 minute matches to put someone else over and I was not able to show what I was able to do. Give me a 10 minute, 50/50 match, and I can show more about my character and what I do in the ring. A two-minute match, I can't do much. If the match is for someone else, I need to make them look good. At first, okay, that was my time to put people over. It's okay, I don't mind. But at some point, I was like, 'I have been doing the same thing for a long time. It's time to get better and show them more about me.' I would never do a promo and that was frustrating for me. 'You guys keep saying I'm good and will be a star.' All the feedback was amazing. I pitched like 100 different gimmicks. And they were like, 'No, keep doing what you're doing.' I tried to change my hair, my gimmick, and they were like, 'No, don't change, the opportunity is coming.' The opportunity never came. So, I was not happy."
She continued, "I asked them, 'What about me?' 'Well, there's people coming with more experience.' In my mind, I was like, 'If you keep signing people with more experience and you don't use me, why sign people that don't come from pro wrestling? Am I wasting my time here?' That was my feeling. I was like, 'What if I go wrestle outside and come back and have experience.' It just wasn't working. It was comfortable to have money every week, but I'm 24, I'm not scared of work. I wasn't happy anymore."
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Originally Posted by Observer
Both AEW and NXT will be going opposite NASCAR races on Wednesday, as well as on 5/27 and 6/10. The first NASCAR race back over the weekend had 6.3 million viewers, so this could be major competition even though the NASCAR audience is traditionally older than the wrestling audience, unlike UFC which skews younger than wrestling. The race Wednesday is from Darlington at 7 p.m. Eastern.
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Originally Posted by Post Wrestling
Following the success of ‘The Last Dance’, ESPN will be airing a never-before-seen cinematic presentation of Game 6 between the Chicago Bulls and Utah Jazz from the 1998 finals this Wednesday night at 9 pm Eastern that will go against AEW Dynamite and NXT. When the game aired in 1998 on NBC, it did almost 36 million viewers.
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Originally Posted by PWI
PWInsider.com has been told that Bret Hart was not interviewed specifically for the Owen Hart episode. He was interviewed for season one of the series and it is certainly possible material from that interview could be featured in the Owen episode.
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Originally Posted by Observer
Pro Wrestling Tees, Martha Hart, and Dark Side of the Ring have partnered together to release the first official Owen Hart T-shirts in over 20 years.
Two Owen Hart T-shirts were released on Pro Wrestling Tees tonight. The shirts are sold by Owen's wife Martha, with all profits going to the Owen Hart Foundation.
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