WORLD WRESTLING ENTERTAINMENT
7/5 Raw TV results from Nashville, TN: Ted DiBiase w/ Maryse over John Morrison; Santino Marella & Vladimir Kozlov over William Regal & Great Khali; The Miz vs. R-Truth didn't happen; Evan Bourne & Randy Orton over Edge & Chris Jericho; and Alicia Fox over Eve Torres to retain the Divas title.
The Smackdown and NXT tapings are tonight at Philips Arena in Atlanta. Much of the Raw crew will be at the show as locally they are advertising John Cena, Randy Orton, Edge & Chris Jericho vs. Nexus as well as Rey Mysterio vs. Big Show vs. Jack Swagger vs. Kane in a four-way. WWE is hoping for a lot of press in the city today to push Wrestlemania 27. We're looking for reader reports to you2us@wrestlingglobe.com.
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WWE announced it's first live event in China on 8/22 at the 18-000 seat Expo Cultural Center in Shanghai. The arena is the country's premiere entertainment venue constructed on the Huangpu River in 2008 by AEG. Basically similar in size to Madison Square Garden or Staples Center. The 90-minute show will be free to visitors of the Expo 2010 Shanghai. WWE opened an office in Shanghai in 2007--a major project managed by Shane McMahon before he left the company.
Carlito did an interview with Arda Ocal on the Right After Wrestling radio show. He talked about suffering from depression blamed on being miserable while working for WWE mostly during the past three years. He said he had no qualms about his release because he had asked repeatedly to be let go for a long time. He said he was frustrated creatively and felt he was held back because he spoke his mind and didn't play politics. He said he loves the business and still has a passion for it, but working here drained that passion out of him. He noted that he's looking forward to working some upcoming indy shows and having fun again. He said he wants to apologise to anyone he may have upset over the past three years because he was in a dark place in his life.
Ricky Steamboat is hoping to be released from the
hospital on Wednesday.
The Hart Dynasty vs. The Usos for the tag titles was added to the Money in the Bank pay-per-view.
The injury angle with R-Truth last night was due to the legit groin injury he sustained during a house show loop last month. For whatever reason they pulled him from the pay-per-view even though he had said he would be good to go.
Steve Austin on WWE teasing him as the anonymous Raw GM: "I missed (the show) but it sounds like it was an interesting Raw." Austin noted that he's busy working on a movie project to be shot in Vancouver in a few weeks.
Several players with the Atlanta Hawks are planning to go to the TV tapings tonight.
May's Over the Limit PPV did an estimated 229,000 buys, up slightly from last year's Judgment Day PPV (228,000) in the comparable month.
The Ranjin Singh angle from last week has been dropped already apparently.
Drew Mcintrye returned and cut a promo at the house show last night in Savannah.
Lex Luger was the No. 12 most searched term yesterday on Google as he was featured on 'This week in WWE history' where he talked about the Lex Express tour back in 1993.
Maryse and Tatsu flew out to Japan today for a promotional tour.
Indy wrestler Oren Hawxhurt (Luke Hawx/Alter Boy Luke) filmed a fight scene with Triple H for the WWE Studios movie The Chaperone which is filming down in New Orleans. He's teasing a local farewell tour as he claims he's just signed with a major company. Hawxhurst also did some stunt work on RVD's movie Wrong Side of Town.
Superstars last Thursday night did a 0.6 rating.
Former Governor of Connecticut and current WWE Director Lowell Weicker was criticised by the Connecticut Post for defending Linda McMahon during a recent taping of Channel 3's Face the State show. Weicker praised Linda while running down her Senate election rival, Democrat and Conecticut attorney general Richard Blumenthal. "If Weicker didn't have such close ties to McMahon, it'd be fine for him, as a former politician, to say whatever he wanted about the current race. If he were just a run-of-the-mill WWE board member, we'd take his comments for what they were and discard them,'' wrote the Post in an editorial. "But Weicker's history coupled with his close ties to McMahon make it inappropriate for him to publicly thrash Blumenthal. He should refrain from doing so in the future."
TOTAL NONSTOP ACTION WRESTLING
Paul Heyman did an interview with Bryan Alverez during the UFC 116 weekend in Las Vegas. He said he has no desire to join TNA unless he's given complete control and points in the company. Basically he wants to be Dana White. "I'm not interested in being a cog in the wheel," he said. "If I'm going to put my emotional investment into it, I want to get something financially and emotionally out of it." Heyman believes that TNA has a 5 percent market share of the industry right now with WWE controlling the rest. He said: "They need to redefine the company and take about 10 percent of that market share off the WWE. Then they make some serious money and bring in multi-millions. If I could take the company and turn it around, boost PPV revenue, work with Spike and make it work then it would be worth the emotional investment for me. There's nothing that I'm doing now that will pay $25-30million dollars over the course of the next five years. If that's a situation that can happen, and I can also put a team together and put together a five year plan, then it merits a lot of consideration. If it means anything less than that, I'm not taking the time away from my children." Full interview at http://tinyurl.com/39tfr63.
The Sun at www.the-sun.co.uk/wrestling has an interview with Desmond Wolfe to promote the UK tour in January. He put over the other British wrestlers in the company. "When I started out in wrestling, Doug (Williams) was one of my peers that I aspired towards," he said. "I watched a lot of his technical wrestling when he was working for (UK promoter) Brian Dixon and he helped me a lot. I tagged with him in Japan and stuff like that. It was great to see him there in TNA." Wolfe added: "Magnus I hadn't actually met before I went to TNA, but I think he is a tremendous talent. He has great ability to make people dislike him! I think he's brilliant! And then Rob (Terry). He's the heart and soul. He genuinely wants to be the best wrestler he possibly can and is very respectful ad works his a*** off. You can only get good things from people like that." Wolfe also says he wrestled Kurt Angle on several shows during the last UK tour and this time around is hoping for matches with RVD or Jeff Hardy.
Kurt Angle did an interview with Busted Open radio in New York City over the weekend. He noted there is one year left on his contract, feels banged up, and said next year may be his last year as a wrestler. He put over Wolfe as an incredible worker saying that they had to cut the legs from his push recently because they felt he needed to learn how to work with people not at his level. Not sure that's a good enough reason not to push someone. Angle also talked about Dixie Carter as a boss. "Dixie is great. She has a big heart. I think she wears her heart on her sleeve and sometimes it backfires on her," he said, adding "she's too nice... working for Vince McMahon is worlds apart. Both are very good at what they do. Dixie is learning (the business) every day--a women like that is not afraid to speak her mind." Regarding Jeff Jarrett, he said at one point he felt that he couldn't work with him and asked for his release, but those days are behind them and claimed they are good friends once again.
Scott Hall and Sean Waltman did interviews this past week with Gods of Rock radio in Chicago. Hall was very emotional and broke down crying several times when discussing his health noting he's suffering from a mental illness. Friends of Hall say he is working on getting better.
Impact last Thursday night did a 1.0 rating averaging 1.2 million viewers. Quarters were 0.98, 0.90, 0.93, 0.90, 0.98, 1.09, 1.05 and 1.08. The highest rated quarter hour included Matt Morgan vs. Jay Lethal and the opening of Madison Rayne vs. Taylor Wilde.
Before the Bell promoting Sunday's Victory Road pay-per-view is online at http://tinyurl.com/364csy6.
SoCal Val did some modeling work today to promote L'oreal iNOA Hair Color. She teased dying her hair on Twitter but obviously that didn't happen.
OTHER WRESTLING NEWS
Strikeforce CEO Scott Coker discussed the chances of Dave Batista working for the promotion. "Is he signed right now? No. But is he somebody we’d like to see in the cage in the future fighting for Strikeforce? It’s a possibility." Coker was speaking during a recent interview with Sherdog Radio Network’s Beatdown show. He added: "Just like we did with Herschel (Walker), we’d have to put him into a gym... It doesn’t matter what gym, as long as it’s a reputable mixed martial arts academy. He has to go in there and train because if he didn’t, we’d probably have a short relationship." When asked about a possible Batista-Bobby Lashley fight, Coker said, "That would just be a fun fight to watch" adding that Brock Lesnar successfully crossed over from pro wrestling to MMA. "We’re not the guys that are putting all the circus fights on but in all fairness, look at Brock Lesnar. He made the crossover. Why not Batista?"
Lesnar took home on record at least $470,000 ($70,000 was a bonus for submission of the night) for his victory Saturday night over Shane Carwin at UFC 116. We're talking 7-figure mind boggling money when it's all said and done.
Booker T is writing a non-wrestling book that will cover his early years--growing up on the streets of south central Houston and doing jail time for armed robbery--before eventually turning his life around. The book is slated for release in 2012. Booker is also looking at doing voice over work in Hollywood.
Wrestling Fan Xperience out of Winnipeg has Survivor star Rupert Boneham
working in the ring Wednesday night against Johnny Fairplay in a six man. WFX is the baby of Mike Davidson who's been around the Winnipeg indy scene for 12-15 years. They recently signed TV deals with America One, Tuff TV and LoneStar Television Network to air it's show. They are booking a ton of former WWE and TNA names such as Shane Helms, Charlie Haas, Bob Holly, Christopher Daniels, Kip James, Daivari, Tajiri, Gangrel, Nick Dinsmore, Bushwhacker Luke, and Larry Zbysko. More info at www.wfxwrestling.com.
Former WWE wrestler Antonio Thomas has been working in Japan of late and is booked for All Japan's annual Jr. heavyweight tournament later this month. He's also working towards a master's degree in exercise science and has plans to open a personal training studio in the fall.
Melissa Anderson as Alissa Flash got some nice press on the Fox News affiliate in San Antonio over the weekend for winning the championship of local group RCW.
Mickie James returned to the ring over the weekend at the World Wrestling Council anniversary show in Trinidad. She came out to her WWE entrance music and teamed with Carlitos (not Carlito) against ODB and Christopher Daniels.
The former Katie Lea Birchill as Kat La Noir also returned over the weekend at a charity show to support the Advantage Village Academy. She won't be using her former moniker of Nikita for any future wrestling bookings as she passed on the rights to a girl in Germany before she signed with WWE.
Sonjay Dutt and Awesome Kong are booked in Perth, Australia 8/21-8/22 for New Horizon Pro Wrestling.
Dragon Gate USA will debut in Milwaukee, WI on 9/26 with an appearance by Bryan Danielson. More info at www.dgusa.tv.
Today's Babe of the Day is Candice Michelle at http://www.thewrestlingpress.com/DailyDiva.
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