Jmare007

No doubt. I guess it feels more of an issue because it came at the cost of Miro's run that was basically perfect. Then again, it does seem Miro got injured either during the November return or before it. It looked like his leg wasn't 100% in the Danielson match and he hasn't been back since. So maybe he was going to drop the title soon anyways?

I'm not a fan of Sammy Guevara, at all, but I think his TNT title run being underwhelming falls on AEW way more than him. Before he got the title he was more featured and got more chances to shine. As champ he was barely on TV and didn't really have real feuds, he only had his matches. Felt like booking abandoned him for no real reason. How has Cody's stuff done in terms of ratings? I think that's the main metric that should dictate if this meta stuff is really working or not.

Yeah, with the NFL and NBA bending themselves backwards to not lockdown again, I don't see the machine stopping again unless every hospital colapses with ER cases. Kinda crazy all these 1st world countries struggle to get past 70% vaccination rate. Here in Chile we are over 90% with 2 doses, 70% with a booster shot and yesterday they announced a 4th shot would be available starting Feb 15th.

LMAO!

I would've loved to see a 6-10 month run of him as super babyface El Genérico that would've ended in him losing his mask in AEW's first lucha de apuestas..

Bill's brain exploding at someone like Phil arguing with him about Shawn Michaels would be priceless

Caught up with the Brock segments from this month and they were real fun. And yeah, last night's felt like a big time confrontation but I wouldn't say Roman got massive heat for hitting Paul, he got a lot of cheers too. In fact he got a good number of the crowd chanting for him and shit. Brock is a massive babyface though and it was a nice surprise to see. I thought I was out on Brock vs Roman matches but I'll check the one at the PPV. I just hope they change their formula because that shit grew tired by their 2nd match together... BTW, are they pipping in noises for the live crowd still? Maybe it was issues with the dailymotion link I used to watch all the stuff but it sure as hell sounded like the audio was all fucked up, going super high in some instances to make it sound like a more heated crowd. Didn't noticed as much watching last night's final segment but there was still some, and for sure on the Sami/Brock interactions.

I'm a moron, it's Sakuraba not Shibata

The New Japan vs NOAH card is just plain bad. The company is too damn cold to do a card full of tag matches, they had to at least have a couple of standout single matches. Why not book some tags for WK night 1 or 2 to build up the singles in night 3? Besides, they built up the announcement as some big confrontation, not some "All Together" let's have fun type of show. Gedo continues to baffle me. Also, why the hell are KENTA and Shibata tagging? the last great segment NJPW did was Shibata coming to the rescue to stomp his ass

Been listening to some of these and they are great. Also, it's fucking awesome to see you get into The Ringer, hopefully it becomes a regular thing!

Same happened with Omega vs Danielson. So much for the "wrestling matches don't help ratings" old narrative.

Re watched it without commercials and it was slightly better, which is kinda crazy. I agree that the time Hangman was getting treated and Dragon was heeling it up felt more natural and it certainly pissed the crowd off and made support Page fully. I also appreciated Hangman's arm selling way more as he did a really good job in the 40 minute mark (which I think was the commercial break without picture in picture).

I guess I could buy the "doing stuff for the sake of doing stuff/fill in time" in the sense of Danielson changing focus so many times or the stretch before Hangman was tossed to the apron (sick bump btw). I'd actually like to go back to that period because it's the only one that's kind of a blur to me, I remember Hangman mounting a comeback but I'm not sure how "meaningful" it actually was. As far as Danielson switching his point of attack I tend to agree with what @MoS said. It would've bothered me more if he attempted more submissions that were clearly working (I remember a ZSJ vs Okada match that had that kind of "problem", in my eyes) but it seemed his most effective attacks were strikes to different body parts that were slowing or keeping Page down. Like, the ankle lock to kick in the gut transition he did was fucking awesome and made complete sense to me. I need the international feed of the match, were can I watch it @Matt D? Also, I need more people appreciating Dragon doing jumping jacks at the 40-50 minute mark on 1 foot because he had to sell the leg he's an asshole to the very end! Yup, this was my main take after the match too. The fact they had 10,000 people popping like crazy for a submission attempt at the 57 minute mark and legit buying into a possible pinfall after the buckshot lariat felt really special to me. Don't remember a 60 minute draw (I'm not counting Ironman matches) being able to get that kind of engagement at that point of the match were the most obvious result was a draw.

I gotta know why this was your main thought during the closing minutes of that awesome match

That's why I think the perfect ending was Hangman winning at 59:59, the pop that would've gotten would've been insane. But yeah, the fact they made the crowd believe to the last second there could be a winner in a setting were a draw was more predictable the longer it went shows how great the work they did was.

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO he HAD to win there!!!!!!!! Unreal match, specially for 2021 on TV.

This commercial break is killing me! I hope Adderall Man gives us the full version of this match on youtube.

Well shit, starting with the title match. There's gotta be a big debut for the main event then.

I wonder if the live crowd will buy into the idea of Dragon winning. To me it's fairly obvious Hangman should and will win so these two months of Danielson tapping people out in different ways and stomping their head in will have a big test. Will the crowd start believing he can win if/once he kicks Page's head in?

Togo and Shingo are for sure making my list. Sasuke might get in too if I get around rewatching Michinoku Pro.

I'm not defending the horrible booking philosophy, I'm just against the notion it's about Reigns. Guys like Rollins, Owens and Lesnar were pushed harder in the mid 2010s and they flopped too. Lesnar being the worst of them all as he basically had the same push Roman is having now but with 5% of the appearances and just as bad results to show for it (not even that depressing 300 to 3,000 sales boost used in the article).

But that's disingenuous though, well all know that in 5 of those 7 years the company failed to actually pull the trigger on Reigns. It's the most bizarre thing about his situation, always the threat of being the guy every Wrestlemania, but never actually being the guy...until he had to retire, returned and turn heel, lol. The "only one guy gets really featured" strategy has had diminish returns since Cena. Even Brock flopped, you can make a case Lesnar was worse because of his huge contract, very limited scheduled and almost nothing profitable to show for it (unless you go with the argument that the FOX deal was made because of him, which I've never really bought tbh).

Yeah I'm not sure about the point of that articule. Who is claiming Roman is a big difference maker to warrant pointing out what everyone who actually cares about drawing and that type of stuff already knows? I don't think anyone thinks WWE's fórmula is "working". If anything, people that are interesed in these types of discussions have mostly agreed that the company found a way to fail upwards no matter what.

Hook about to give Rampage record ratings!

Oh come on, Dragon/Page (+ Dragon vs Uno) and Punk/MJF (+Punk vs QT) were less than a month ago