The Wrestling Thread: WWE WrestleMania XL - 6/7 April 2024

[KK]

On one hand I have great sympathy for the majority of talent, and to have something like that women's match clearly meant a lot. But if anything does (or has) gone wrong, they're the ones who are going to be facing the brunt of it. But on the other, this is the first Saudi show a number of them could have quite easily told Vince to strawberry float off. AEW exists and I'm sure Vince doesn't want anyone showing up there. It's not like they're on these mega money deals like Lesnar and Tyson Fury.

[KK]

So Lesnar has now apparently ‘quit’ SmackDown and is heading to RAW on Monday to beat up Rey Mysterio instead.

Saying that, SD has been pretty good tonight. Apart from the blatantly forced verbiage (“sports entertainers”, “sports entertainment”) because Vince McMahon is probably in the writing chair tonight, this has actually been by far the best SD of the Fox era thus far.

They teased Daniel Bryan vs Triple H, then Bryan vs. Shawn Michaels, and then ultimately settled on NXT Champion Adam Cole defending the title against Bryan.

[Slimgrady]

This is the first live Raw, Smackdown or NXT I’ve watched in years and it looks like I’ve lucked out! Bryan V Cole! Obviously it’ll end in some sort of big NXT versus Smackdown run in seeing as the title is on the line, but still!

[KK]

I’m sure some main roster names are now going to be turning up on NXT in the coming weeks heading to Survivor Series.

[Slimgrady]

Great match with a clean finish, surprising! HHH rehashing his day after Wrestlemania 14 promo too

[KK]

A SD episode definitely worth checking out for a change.

To think, one of the advertised main events tonight was supposed to be Baron Corbin vs. Roman Reigns.

[Rog]

I see we have Kermit the Frog on commentary.

[captain red dog]

It was a rather decent episode I'll admit. Kind of made the Smackdown guys who stayed home look like absolute chumps though! It's a bit odd to see the NXT champ beat Bryan as that suggests he should be on the main roster rather than in developmental!

Still that's a minor grumble, but what does it say about WWE when the shows are better when 90% of the cast are stuck abroad and the trainees take over!

[KK]

I've noticed a few of the wrestlers have deleted their tweets about the Saudi delay, including one of them saying "plane trouble" in quotation marks, as if to say that's the horse gooseberry fool narrative everyone is publicly going with.

[captain red dog]

Whatculture reported that only one flight was due that day from Saudi to the US, it was only delayed by 1hr with no mention of mechanical faults.

Speculating, they think the 1hr delay was whilst they got WWE off the plane. I'd love to know what the reason was. Was it because of the women's match not being fully bought off by the Saudi authorities?

[coldspice]

Don't forget, in just a few hours, it's your chance to catch the greatest wrestler in the world share a ring with Miyu Yamashita, Riho and Kenny Omega.

[Mafro]

Jericho v Tanahashi at Wrestle Kingdom.

[KK]

Wonder how much of this is true...

Former WWE commentator Hugo Savinovich has claimed that the Saudi Arabian government didn’t pay WWE for their last 2 shows, so Vince McMahon cut the feed for the show in the country until they paid up. He then left early.

In a follow up to that claim, on the latest Wrestling Observer Radio Dave Meltzer says WWE had not been paid for the previous Saudi show, as of September 30th. WWE then reported hours before Crown Jewel that they got an unspecified 60 million dollar payment.

Dave calls it a really bad situation and doesn't know what WWE is going to do going forward. He had talent tell him they were never going back to Saudi Arabia, and others saying they couldn't wait to now leave the company.

Dave confirmed that Crown Jewel was supposed to air live in Saudi Arabia but instead ending up airing on a 40 minute delay.

None of the talent was harmed but there was talent there that felt like they were hostages, even though they were allowed to leave.

Bryan Alvarez tries to suggest Vince left before he knew all the problems talent would face. Dave says he doesn’t know.

[Dangerblade]

Power Struggle was awesome

[coldspice]

Don't forget, in just a few hours, it's your chance to catch the greatest wrestler in the world share a ring with Miyu Yamashita, Riho and Kenny Omega.

DDT Ultimate Party was show of the year btw

[Return_of_the_STAR]

Wonder how much of this is true...

Former WWE commentator Hugo Savinovich has claimed that the Saudi Arabian government didn’t pay WWE for their last 2 shows, so Vince McMahon cut the feed for the show in the country until they paid up. He then left early.

In a follow up to that claim, on the latest Wrestling Observer Radio Dave Meltzer says WWE had not been paid for the previous Saudi show, as of September 30th. WWE then reported hours before Crown Jewel that they got an unspecified 60 million dollar payment.

Dave calls it a really bad situation and doesn't know what WWE is going to do going forward. He had talent tell him they were never going back to Saudi Arabia, and others saying they couldn't wait to now leave the company.

Dave confirmed that Crown Jewel was supposed to air live in Saudi Arabia but instead ending up airing on a 40 minute delay.

None of the talent was harmed but there was talent there that felt like they were hostages, even though they were allowed to leave.

Bryan Alvarez tries to suggest Vince left before he knew all the problems talent would face. Dave says he doesn’t know.

It would have been interesting if it had escalated further and then Vince out a phone call into his best mate Mr Trump.

However on the flip side if something was really happening then I’m sure we would have at least seen a tweet from Trump or something.

[Rog]

Vince knowing that situation and leaving early, effectively leaving his employees to rot, is some of the most weasel behaviour I've ever heard in the business. He created the situation by withholding their show in their country and then bailed knowing the talent could suffer the consequences. Even for Vince that is just straight up snake behaviour that I wouldn't expect.

[Mafro]

Don't forget, in just a few hours, it's your chance to catch the greatest wrestler in the world share a ring with Miyu Yamashita, Riho and Kenny Omega.

DDT Ultimate Party was show of the year btw

The two chairs winning the Iron Man Heavymetalweight Title

[coldspice]

Don't forget, in just a few hours, it's your chance to catch the greatest wrestler in the world share a ring with Miyu Yamashita, Riho and Kenny Omega.

DDT Ultimate Party was show of the year btw

The two chairs winning the Iron Man Heavymetalweight Title

Also

twitter.com/oystersearrings/status/1191052743563251712

[Mafro]

Don't forget, in just a few hours, it's your chance to catch the greatest wrestler in the world share a ring with Miyu Yamashita, Riho and Kenny Omega.

DDT Ultimate Party was show of the year btw

The two chairs winning the Iron Man Heavymetalweight Title

Also

twitter.com/oystersearrings/status/1191052743563251712

How the hell do they get away with using the Undertaker's Ministry of Darkness music?