sek69

His one friend is getting the payday of his lifetime for the show, and his other friend is next in line to run the company. Not surprised Nash is going to toe the corporate line here.

Well not anymor,e but it's something conservatives *used* to be against. Also after reading his latest Deadspin piece, WWE's going to send JBL to Bix's place to shut him up.

It was fine to use that talking point for the first show (not really but work with me here), to think that a regieme that blatantly murders journalists critical of them will suddenly see the light because rasslin' came to town is just flat insulting. Not to mention that the whole idea of murdering journalists is probably spank bank material for Vince's BFF. It's also pretty funny to see Randy Orton of all people, who's not afraid to be unabashedly right wing on social media, sucking up to Saudi Arabia. They stand for the complete opposite everything a diehard conservative is supposed to stand for.

All this time I thought the Frances being talked about was Jim Sr's widow, I didn't know there was a sister involved. I only ever heard of Jim Jr, David, and Jackie.

I can't wait for Roman's career retrospective in 15 years where he tells the story of having to prove management wrong and he really was a star after all.

Edge was the only guy to get the crowd 100% against him and for Cena at a time when that seemed impossible to pull off. He understood his character better than most do and it showed.

It also sells her short because she really has improved from the days where she wasn't much more than the typical good-looks-no-talent Divas era wrestler. It's just so WWE that even on the show meant to celebrate the Stephanie McMahon Memorial Women's Empowerment Movement they can't help but book the main event in the same old catty "you're jealous, well you're a ho" style.

I'd be curious to know the percentage of people in the crowd who are even aware of what is going on beyond a general sense of "the Saudis aren't someone we'd normally want to be so buddy-buddy with". I would be surprised if there was a high level of awareness, but I was surprised at how many people were aware of the issues surrounding Snuka when they aired the tribute package for him and then cut to an uncomfortable looking crowd.

Apparently JBL was on some Fox Business show and tried the "it's ok for WWE to run this show because they also do good stuff sometimes" and people are reacting as badly as you'd expect.

It can happen if, say, they have to back out of a 10 year deal set to pay them $40-50 million a year and investors react badly to it.

Funny thing is all three ended up putting in their notice, Flair only stayed because it was the key in TBS buying the company, and the specfic change they wanted (removing Dusty as booker) happened anyway.

Agreed that was the first big raid, along with Rick Steamboat going to the WWF after taking a hiatus after Youngblood's death. In one swoop, nearly everyone involved with 1983 being a boom year for business was gone.

Bryan was saying that the plan was for them to work a "shoot feud" but Aries legit got upset about Johnny calling him short, and then made a comment basically calling Taya fat which Johnny didn't appriciate. Also their press conference brawl ended up running over one of their sponsors which would not have been part of the plan. So it looks like they worked themselves into a shoot and then turned it back into a work. Rasslin. What a business.

It's just striking a lot of people as odd that all these tales of New Japan strife come out just as the Elite guys are about to become free agents.

If I'm WWE, I ask the Saudis if I can skip this show due to the political pressure and wait and see how the waters are for next time (assuming the deal was for spring/fall shows every year). It would probably be a safe bet to assume there would be less outrage by then due to the goldfish-like memories we have as a society now. Of course that all assumes there's not a more horrifying story waiting to drop after this one. (Doesn't it seem so long ago when the biggest problem with these shows was the lack of women?)

Well it wouldn't matter if Matthews had a good showing or not since she's apparently banned from the US for five years for visa reasons.

IIRC his opponent tried to say if he won he'd spend all his time in WWE and not running the town, and his response was if he won he would devote his time to the office and not wrestling. To the surprise of no one, that has not been the case so far.

To be clear, I don't think Dave is being dumb, but he does kind of have a history where he develops blind spots for guys he gets close to. By that I mean he's doing everything above board, but at times I think he forgets just because he has friendships with guys that means they stop being workers looking out for their own interests.

Alternate theory: they want to stay in New Japan, and floating stories of potential unrest could prompt New Japan to make a larger offer than they would have to keep and/or pacify them. Right now everyone knows they want to stay, and that WWE really doesn't like upending their pay scale, and that WWE likely doesn't see all of them worth backing up the money truck (maybe they would for Kenny but probably not for Cody and the Bucks), so what motivation did President Harold have to make them a bigger money offer? I could see their play being to see if they can make him pay up if they make him feel he's losing the room.

Also it gives them cover from any backlash from their fans if they go to the Evil WWE Empire to say "well things went downhill in Japan so we had no choice".

Yeah it looks like the Elite crew is stirring shit up, which is funny because they are proclaiming a united front when there's no way Omega would walk away from his spot as the face of their expansion efforts.

Their best bet is to just promote the show and try to minimize mentioning anything else. Problem there is that it's clear MBS is giving this money out to make sure the recipients promote how progressive the country is. They are going to expect the full BJ treatment they got last time, and that's going to look ridiculously bad for WWE.

Not unless Vince digs his heels in and has a public knock-the-papers-out-of-Bob-Costas's-hands tantrum about it, which is not an impossible thing to happen. I would imagine the Board of Directors probably has Vince tied up Hannibal Lecter style to prevent that.

With Benoit, it was a terrible thing that unfortunately happened on their watch. This thing is something they are actively talking part in as the optics just get worse for them.

So, recent events might end up having WWE's relationship with KSA blow up in their faces in a big way. It's looking more and more like the Prince had more than a passing involvment in making a journalist from the Washington Post disappear for being an outspoken critic. Having a big Saudi love fest a month after all this hits the fan is going to be an awful look for the company.