The Ariel Helwani Show - AEW makes national headlines, WrestleMania ticket woes, more | The Uncrowned Wrestling Show

Episode Date: February 18, 2026

The Uncrowned Wrestling Show is BACK with news on Cain Velasquez (yes, he used to wrestle!) being released from prison (00:19).Plus, thoughts on AEW Grand Slam Australia and the Brody King controversy after Dave Meltzer's erroneous report about Warner Brothers Discovery barring him from TV last week (03:40).Next, diving into WWE calling an emergency meeting over WrestleMania 42 ticket sales, the reasons why this is happening and the changing dynamic of the WWE audience if they continue down this path (25:17).On to Elimination Chamber updates, including the latest names to qualify, Bianca Belair's injury status and Raw’s MYSTERY CRATE (37:13).Discussion turns to LA Knight‘s rumored WrestleMania match and him still being trapped in The Vision Vortex (54:58), before focusing on TNA’s audience gains on AMC and Chris Bey‘s birthday message (1:01:14).Finally, some New Japan Pro Wrestling notes, including another departing star who may be WWE-bound (1:07:22), and Solomonster answers your questions (1:14:14)!

Welcome to the Uncrown Wrestling Show, episode number two. Talking all things pro wrestling, I am Jason Solomon. You know who did some wrestling once upon a time? Kane. Not that Kane. I'm talking about former two-time UFC heavyweight champion Kane Velazquez. He worked a half a dozen matches from 2019 to 2020, mostly for AAA in Mexico. Although he did wrestle Brock Lesner in WWE at one of their Saudi shows.

For Yahoo Sports, Velazquez was arrested for engaging in a high-speed car chase where he fired a gun multiple times into a car containing Harry Gularte Jr. A man Velazquez accused of molesting his son. Galarte was not shot, but his stepfather was. Facing a dozen charges, including attempted murder, Velasquez could have been sentenced to life in prison, but after a drawn-out process, he reached an agreement with prosecutors that saw him receive four. five years in prison with four years of supervised parole. But between time served and house arrest, he was eligible for parole next month. Well, that timeline got bumped up because on Sunday,

Velasquez walked out a free man into the arms of his wife and kids and with a mariachi band playing in the parking lot. It was quite the scene. You can find the video on social media. I'm happy to see it. I'm happy to see it. You cannot excuse the fact that what he did with, was very dumb, right? You can understand it. Like, if that was my child, I would have murder on my mind, too.

But the fact is, like, he chased after the guy in his car and he shot the wrong person. We cannot ignore this fact. He's very lucky that bullet didn't go flying into someone else's head. So when you do that, there are consequences for that. And he's had a few years now of dealing with the legal ramifications of what he did. But he's getting out a lot earlier than I expected him to when I first talked about this story on my other show years ago, and I'm not upset about this at all. As far as the man he accused of molesting his son, he's still facing a felony charge of lewd acts with a minor. If he did what he's accused of doing, may he meet his fate final destination style, is all I have to say. Thank you for the unbelievable response last week

to the announcement that Ariel put up ahead of the first episode, the kind words for me. him and from all of you really meant a lot. I'm very excited to be part of the uncrowned family now and doing this show and I hope you are enjoying it so far. So tell a friend, spread the word. We got wrestling now here on this feed each and every Tuesday. And later, I'm going to be answering some Q&A from you guys. Don't forget, you can email your questions to me at the solomonster at gmail.com with the word uncrowned in the subject somewhere or tweet me on X at Solomaster with your question and include the hashtag uncrowned. I got news for you this week from WW, AEW, TNA, and even some New Japan notes.

Brody King, he made national headlines this week. Tickets for WrestleMania not selling quite as well as they did this time last year. And I got some updates on the elimination chamber, including the box. What's in the box? Yeah, we'll talk about that. First, though, let's start with AEW because they held their Grand Slam Australia special special episode of Collision on TNT and HBO Max. It was basically like their version of Saturday Night's main event, but with a much better

in-ring wrestling than you would normally get on a Saturday night's main event. But that's really about it. We didn't get much in terms of storyline stuff or major angles on the show. No mystery boxes on. the show. I need my mystery boxes in my wrestling shows. There was none of that here. Last year, they did 13,000 fans in Brisbane. This year, they were down to about 7,000 in Sydney in a much bigger venue. I enjoyed it. I thought it was an easy two and a half hours to sit through, but I do have questions about some of the things they did. They had John Moxley and Konosuke

to Kestha for the Continental title. Two of them went to a 20-minute time limit draw. and it was made very clear on commentary that on television the time limit is 20 minutes and on paper view the time limit for these matches would be 60 minutes. And when this was over, Takesh went and laid out Moxley at the end with his raging fire finish. Perhaps he should have done that during the match. But you sure got the indication that they were building to a rematch possibly for revolution. And the match that, you know, if you were to watch the television shows, they have been building for months and months and months,

tension between Takeshita and Kazuchka Okada. And they did have a match in the Continental Classic at their World's End pay-per-view in December. It was a good match, but I mean, it wasn't the knock-down dragout that you know those two can go out there and have. And so I'm looking at this as a fan of what they've been doing with the two of them for months.

And I'm like, well, they don't have another pay-per-view until Revolution, which is on March 15th. So one would assume they're going to build to a bigger match, you know, between the two of them on that show. Maybe Takeshita gets the win there. I'm watching this, and it sure doesn't feel to me, and they've done nothing since World's End, so far this year, to really further any sort of story or tension between Takeshda and Okada. In fact, they've gotten away from it. So now it feels to me like we may be headed for a rematch with these two at Revolution.

And Takeshda may well walk out with the Continental title and has me, thinking, you know, are they going to make us wait, possibly until Wembley Stadium? Because they're back at Wembley this year. You know, they took a break last year. They're back at Wembley this year in August for All In, right? Their big annual show. Would they save the rematch between Takesha and Okada for that show and do champion versus champion? You know, Okada's got the international title. If Takesha were to take the Continental title off of Mokshlet, you have this collision course between these two where they could, you know,

fight for both belts, unify them, because they did create a unified title, by the way, which is now on a shelf somewhere, and do a big match on that show. But that's a long ways down the road. Like, and again,

I don't know if this is what they're doing or not, but, I mean, to make us wait that long, you know, for the ultimate payoff between these two would be very frustrating, but I see a path there. That may be the direction they're taking with it. They had the Babes of Rath successfully retaining their women's tag team titles over the team of Megan Bain and Penelope Ford.

The story here was when the match was over. We had the debut of Lena Cross. Lena Cross is a very talented, independent standout from the Australian scene. Quite frankly, I'm surprised it took this long for her to pop up on television somewhere. But they saved her debut here for this show. I'm wondering why if they were going to debut her. her here. You know, they wouldn't have done it in a more impactful way and actually had her, I don't know, help Megabed win the tag team titles instead of waiting until they already lost

and the match was already over. And then she comes out and she helps the two challengers who failed in their bid for the belt. So that was a little weird to me. But she's a solid addition, though, to that women's division. Orange Cassidy and Timeless Tony Storm, they got a win over Wheeler, Yuda and Marina Shafir, with Wheeler Yuda getting his head shaved. No surprise there. Hangman Page. Hangman Adam Page. Hans Andrade L. Edelow, his first loss since coming back to AEW. I enjoyed this match. If I had one critique, I wish it would have gone longer. You know, they only had about 12 or 13 minutes. This is a match I think that could have benefited from an extra five, seven, eight minutes somewhere in that range.

It just never felt like they had the chance to really go switch up into that next gear. But Hangman winning was the right choice here. And I know that this online has been the subject of a lot of debate and people, you know, wishing they would go in a different direction. Why go back to Hangman, right? We've seen Hangman and MJF before for the world title because the winner of this match would become the number one contender at Revolution next month. So we now know that Hangman is going to the main event.

to challenge for the AW World Title. The reason it makes sense for it to be Hangman is because that's where the story is. The history and the story is with Hangman and MJF. Yes, part of the point is that they have wrestled before. They had two singles matches last year, both of which were won by Hangman. And then if you remember a few weeks ago on television, who was the person who came out and distracted MJF and led to him being embarrassed in 60 seconds by Brody King and dropped on his head and pinned? was hangman. That's where the tension is. That's where the story is. So yeah, it kind of feels like

old hat because we've seen it before. Andrade, it would have been somebody fresh. But honestly, I look ahead here. And I know Tony Khan has said that they are absolutely going to do another Grand Slam Mexico special. I assume sometime in June because they did one last year from Arena Mexico. Great atmosphere. A really fun show. To me, if you're going to do Andrade challenging for the AW World title and you want to have the best atmosphere possible for a match like that, where he would totally be the baby face in that match. You do it on Grand Slam Mexico. You know, if they're going to be back at Arena Mexico. Like, that's the place to do it. You don't need to blow that match a revolution. So I'm hopeful we'll get that match down the line because I don't see MJF dropping that belt so fast.

They'll probably be champion, you know, come summertime, and just do the match there. But the Hangman matches the right one for Revolution. What I don't like, though, and this is one of my pet peeves here. You have Hangman now challenging for the AEW world title. He is one-third of the Trioz champion. They have Trio's titles in AEW. And so now he's going for a completely different championship. At a time when we see this constantly, you know, Willow Nightingale, I mentioned the Babes of Wrath.

She's won half of the women's tag team champions. But she's also the one who beat Mercedes-Money to win the TBS title. So she's got the TBS title to defend as well. And I just don't understand with so many people on this roster. And Tony Khan is still signing people by the day, giving people all kinds of opportunities to come on over and be all elite. And we know there's only so many spots. There's only so many, you know, hours of television time a week that they have. Really, it's four that they have.

So you have very limited real estate for the roster as it currently exists. and I just don't know why there's this need to have multiple people holding multiple championships at any given time. I don't know why we constantly see this. It's just this annoying habit. I wish that we would get away from that. Kyle Fletcher, speaking of titles, retained his TNT championship in a ladder match, a brutal ladder match against Mark Briscoe. They build this as game seven because these two have wrestled many times. times before. And they were all knotted up. So this was going to be the final match, the rubber

match, and the feud between these men. And this was after, because I didn't even get a chance to talk about this, this happened the day after the first episode of Uncrown dropped last week, that Kyle Fletcher won the TNT title off of Tomaso Champa. Tomaso Champa, another new addition to the AW roster, this very impressive presentation for his debut with the music and everything else. And his first match in, he won that TNT title off of Mark Brisco. And I'm thinking, well, a hell of a way to debut this guy here. And he didn't even have the championship for two weeks before dropping it to Kyle Fletcher. And what I will say, best television match of the year so far. I know we're still early in the year yet, but that match they had on Dynamite last week was

fucking awesome. Questionable, though, taking the title off of him. But obviously what they wanted to do. They wanted to put the belt back on Kyle Fletcher because they were going not only to his home country. They were going to his hometown of Sydney. And so they wanted him to have this big homecoming. I mean, you could have done it the other way where in that match last week, you know, they went to a time limit draw. You run it back in Australia and you have Kyle win the belt on the show instead of defending it. But, you know, they wanted to put a nice bow on this feud here and do the latter.

Matt, the big stipulation match with him and Briscoe. again, there was some brutal bumps in this match. I mean, there was a J-driller onto a ladder. Then there was a spot where Fletcher gave him a brain buster from the top of the ladder down to the mat. Yeah, I wish these spots had more time to breathe instead of just quickly moving on to the net. It's the nature of these types of matches these days, you know, coupled with the limited time they had on television. But I enjoyed it, you know, as ladder matches go, again, you had the brutality and you have the, you have the, you know, the drama that ladder matches bring with it. That's why they did it. Kyle Fletcher got a big win,

you know, in his hometown, in his home country, in front of his home people. And we go on from here, finally, we can move beyond the Kyle Fletcher, Mark Briscoe stuff. I just wonder what the immediate future looks like for Tomaso Champa coming out, because he had such a hot start, right, in those first two weeks. You just hope that there's not this huge drop off with him. Because I know he's got a chip on his shoulder, and he talked about this when he left WW and came to AEW, now that he's out to prove something, and you see it. When you watch

him wrestle, these last few matches that he's had, he's got a chip on his shoulder, you know, and he's out there to prove that I'm not, you know, washed, and I'm not like people say online, oh, Pete Champo was, you know, eight years ago in NXT or whatever, and drives him nuts, and I know it does, and I know he wants to go

out there and have killer matches, so hopefully he has the opportunity to do that. And in the main event, we had MJF retaining the AEW World Championship over Brody King. This went a lot longer than their first match did. The first match went less than 60 seconds. This match went a little over 20 minutes. And I thought it was very good. And they told the story of him working over Brody King's knee. And in the end, MJF got a clean win, which was kind of surprising. He got a clean win over Brody, right in the middle of the ring, he pinned him. I don't know that anybody really would

have expected anything any different. And really once Hangman won his match earlier that night, I think we pretty much knew what that revolution made event was going to be. But yeah, there was, you know, we had Bandito come out. And Bandito, of course, has been tag team partners of Brody King for a while and he was pounding on the mat. He was cheerleading him and trying to root him on. Don't give up, don't give up. So he had some of that drama in there. But, you know, otherwise, it was a good main event. And then Hangman came out, he signed the contract and made it official for revolution. But I cannot mention Brody King without talking about the elephant in the room,

the Dave Meltzer report this past week that caused all sorts of chaos online to the point where Warner Brothers Discovery, AEW's media rights partner, who has a lot of other very important things going on right now, even as I am speaking right now. There's all kinds of news stories going back and forth today about the Netflix acquisition and the latest bid from Paramount Skydance

and a shareholders meeting and a vote and all kinds of stuff, but they had to respond to this. They were forced to respond to this report. Now, let's take it back to Dynamite last Wednesday. This was the final dynamite before they went to Australia for the show that I just talked about. Brody King was not on the show on Wednesday. Outside of a video package, she was hyping up his match with MJF.

MJF was not there either. Neither were Hangman Page or Andrade and others as well. So I didn't think anything of it. I just assumed, reasonably, that they had all either left for Australia or they were already down there and they were doing some PR. But later that night on Wrestling Observer Radio, Dave Meltzer suggested that Brody King was intentionally held off the show. by Warner Brothers Discovery. Now, this comes after the crowd in Las Vegas the week before had broken into anti-ice chance before his match with MJF. According to Dave, Warner Brothers Discovery was worried about the prospect of more chance and did not want to upset the president because of the pending acquisition of the company by Netflix.

So that was the story. And again, he spoke about this as if this was something that he was told. This was not just him giving his opinion or anything, but he was indicating that this was a story here. Sean Ross Sapp of Fightful refuted this, saying the rumors that Brody King was kept off AEW Dynamite by WBD were vehemently denied to me. And Fightful was then given an official statement from Warner Brothers Discovery. They actually responded to this and said Warner Brothers Discovery did not have any involvement in Brody King's upcoming AEW schedule. Any speculation to the contrary is categorically false. Brody is scheduled to appear during the next AW event,

which will air this Saturday on TNT and HBO Max. Brandon Thurston, of post-wrestling, followed up by asking, well, some might interpret, you know, you saying that Brody's upcoming schedule was unaffected, that you're leaving open the possibility that you did, in fact, prevent him from appearing this past week. and the spokesperson said that their denial includes that show from last Wednesday. And again, emphasizing that the report is categorically false.

So they were vehement in this. Now, there are a lot of times that we hear reports about Warner Brothers Discovery and things that happen or how they feel about this or how the network feels. And we never get any actual feedback from Warner Brothers Discovery. This is one of those rare times where they responded. directly. And again, they were pretty adamant in their denial. Now, before Brody's match with MJF on that show in Australia, the fans in Australia, they broke out into the same chant as the fans did in Las Vegas. And those chants were not edited off the show. So if it was such a big problem for them, they would have had the power to edit them completely off the show or mute them.

Because again, the show aired on like a 14 or 16 hour tape delay. It was not even like it was airing live. But even if it was live, you got the seven second delay. It was in there. They left it in there. So obviously it wasn't too big of an issue for them. Now, after the official denial, Meltzer tweeted, so this corrects the report from last night. It had been a topic of conversation over the weekend. And it's like, you know, yes, it corrects the report, but it was a report that you put out there. That's really what sparked this entire thing in the first place. You know, and when I talked about this on my platform, and look, Dave has been doing this for a very long time. And people can say what they want to about him or the observer, but, you know, the wrestling observer newsletter, going back to the early 80s has been the standard publication when it comes to pro wrestling news.

Now, obviously the world has evolved and social media has evolved and there's a lot of different places to get your news now. And you have to just decide whether or not you feel that, you know, that outlet or that individual is credible. or not. But it was always for years and years. It was the wrestling observer and Dave Meltzer, and it was the pro wrestling torch and Wade Keller. So Meltzer's been doing this for a very long time and should know better when it comes to stuff like this. But there are times where, you know, there have been some very embarrassing fauxas. And I used the backlash poster last year as an example. There was a fake, I don't know if it was AI generated or whatever, but there was a fake poster for the WWE Backlash, PLE, showing that backlash was going to be coming to the Tokyo Dome.

Because people are always making jokes about Dave. He loves his Japanese wrestling. And if it was in the Tokyo Dome, it would get six stars from him in the newsletter. So they said backlash is coming to the Tokyo Dome, which just on its head just doesn't really sound credible, right, if you just think for two seconds here. But he reported it. He tweeted on it as if it were news and it started to spread. Only, you know, he later had to tweet. Oh, I can confirm that backlash is not coming to the Tokyo Dome. Yes, but you're the one who spread this fake poster in the first place and turned it into a story to begin with. Yeah, and then a couple of years ago, you go back heading into WrestleMania 40 when the Rock came back, right?

We had the final boss and there was all this excitement going into WrestleMania. They were teasing on-screen issues with him in Triple H. There's going to be some sort of turf war between these two guys. But, you know, he reported in the newsletter that they had filmed. day segment that he saw with the two of them going nose to nose cutting promos on each other as if they were going to have a match. A match with Triple H who already retired because he almost died. You know, the man has a defibrillator in his chest and Dave thought that he would be back

in the ring taking bumps. But I'm like, I remember reading his description of this segment and I said, boy, you know, this segment sounds awfully familiar. I feel like I've seen this myself, even though I don't really have any idea what he's talking about. And anyway, it ended up being a segment, legitimately a segment from Smackdown in 2014. It was like the 15th anniversary of Smackdown or whatever. The Rock was on the show. And it was like a backstage segment where they were cutting promos on each other. And then I think the two of them and Stephanie McMahon all walked off to go have lunch or whatever. That's all it was.

But he mistook it for a recent segment and reported on it like it was new. So I mean, those are some big mistakes for someone in his position who's been doing this for over four decades. And his words carry weight. You know, him reporting that could have an impact on Brody King's career one way or the other, you know, positive or negative. It can have a big impact on someone. It's not like it's some throwaway story. Now, I don't blame Brody King for going out on television and expressing himself because

that's what his boss allows him to do. Right. However you may feel about it, Tony Khan gives his wrestlers the freedom to express themselves in ways that WWE talent cannot. So Brody is free to express himself however he chooses so long as it isn't, you know, overly vulgar. But this is how Tony has chosen to run his company. And I'm sure that one day someone will will step over the line in a way that upsets someone

with power and, you know, whether WBD or whoever it may be, and that'll be the day that he puts limitations on what they can and cannot do on TV. But by Dave speaking on it as fact, all that's going to do is make people want to do it even more. And then you look at the schedule that AEW has coming up. They're in California every week leading into revolution, which is in Los Angeles. And they're in St. Paul, Minnesota, at the end of March. So these chants aren't going away. So we'll see if Warner Brothers Discovery keeps that same tone, the longer this goes on for.

time, A.W. has gotten a ton of mainstream publicity out of this. They got a big story on the CNN website. Brody King was front and center in that story. You can't miss it. I mean, his photo just smacks you in the face when you open it. But again, for Meltzer, it's not even a crazy assumption that maybe Brody was missing from the show for those reasons, you know, given this pending multi-billion dollar acquisition that I talked about. But whether he inferred that or he was given bad information, it shouldn't be too hard for him to check up on something like that and verify it. And he didn't do that, and it turned into a whole thing.

The other big story of the week was concerned internally in WWE over softer than expected WrestleMania 42 ticket sales. Ticket sales are not as hot as TKO thought they would be. Ticket sales right now from both nights of WrestleMania are roughly 18% lower than they were this time last year. Right now they have almost 38,000 tickets out for each night, maybe a little bit more by now, in a venue that can seat more than 60K after you account for production. That's a far cry from four years ago when tickets went on sale for WrestleMania, and you had Paul Levick announcing that they had already sold 90,000 tickets in the first 24 hours that they

went on sale. In the first 24 hours, they had 48,000 tickets out for night one. 49,000 tickets for night two. And that was in August when he made that announcement in 2022. That was a whole 10 months before WrestleMania. Now, Russell Votes Radio on Fightful Select reported this past week that WWE held a multi-department company meeting on Wednesday to address WrestleMania ticket sales. According to a source, leadership acknowledged internally that the current numbers are below expectations, and all departments have been tasked with developing strategies and promotions to roll out beginning in late February in an effort to boost momentum and sales heading into the event.

Additionally, we're told WWE intends to keep current ticket pricing as is for the time being. Boy, they are bound and determined not to touch those ticket prices, aren't they? At those prices, it's no surprise they're finding it difficult to sell 60,000 tickets. Back-to-back nights in the same venue in the same venue in the same venue. in the same city, which is already one of the most expensive tourist destinations in the country. Okay, this is for a WrestleMania that in that same venue in city last year did not exactly rank among the best that they've ever done, okay, even in the last decade. It was not a great WrestleMania.

Just the other day, you had Allegiance Stadium, which is hosting the event. They announced 25% off tickets through, I believe, yesterday. So that offer is probably not even valid anymore. I'm sure we'll see similar offers between now and then. So what's going on here? You know, if it was any other company and even WWE, I mean, 38,000 tickets out for both nights and it's still, you know, there's still a couple months out from the event, right? That's not a horrible number by any stretch of the imagination. But if they're calling at a multi-department company meeting, emergency meeting, to address lagging ticket sales, then obviously they're not very happy about the way things are going.

Now, the first thing I think of is ticket prices, obviously, but before I even get to that, you have to address the issue with creative. And you have to address the reality that the product is just not as hot as it used to be. It's not. Yeah, we're past that peak where it was just a given that when they would have a raw or they would have a Smackdown or a PLE, they would just sell out. Record Gates, right? They would love to hype up this record gate here, record gate in this city, highest gate ever for this event.

And we don't hear about that as much anymore. Because the product is just not as hot as it was a year and a half ago, two years ago, right? There was a peak and we're past that now. Like, look at WrestleMania this year so far. The only thing that we know for sure right now, and now we're about eight weeks away, is that Roman Raines is challenging CM Punk for the World Heavyweight title. there is nothing else on the show at this exact moment that is a sure thing. There really isn't, even when you look at the two women's titles, right?

There's still some mystery there as to who Liv Morgan, who won the Royal Rumble, is going to choose as her opponent. And you just look at the rest of the card. You can kind of sketch out in your mind where things are going in a couple of different scenarios, but everything else just feels up in the air right now. And there is no lasting story that has been building for months and months to culminate. on the big show of the year. WrestleMania 39, the one that I just mentioned, that sold 90,000 tickets 10 months in advance.

WrestleMania 39 had multiple stories that they were building up for a period of months with the bloodline, the various members of the bloodline, Roman and Cody. The Usoes were on this 600-some-odd-day streak as tag team champions, and Kevin Owens and Sammy Zane, they were building to them reuniting and taking down the Uso's. You had these different stories creatively that you can rely on. You look at WrestleMania 40. They had the rock on the show. Last year, WrestleMania 41 in Vegas, it was John Cena's final WrestleMania match.

He was going to try to win number 17. That was the story going into the show. This year, they don't have a big attraction like that. There is no rock. There is no John Cena. They don't have these long-term stories, even without the big names, in the absence of the big names. That can really hook people in. They don't have that.

So you cannot let creative off the hook here. But yes, ticket prices is the first thing that most people, myself included, are going to point to. Ticket prices and location. Okay, they're running Vegas back-to-bag years, which is expensive enough when you factor in all the other expenses that people are going to incur when they fly out there, especially if they're bringing their family with them. Good luck with that. But, yeah, I checked on Ticketmaster, and right now a nosebleed seat is going to set you back over 200 bucks, not including taxes. and a hell of a lot more than that, even more than 10 times as much if you want floor seats. They are charging premium prices for a product that does not feel premium right now.

Yet Randy Orton, one of the biggest stars in the company last year, was caught on camera by a fan saying he agreed. He thought WrestleMania ticket prices last year were insanely expensive. You have other wrestling personalities like Rikishi and Teddy Long. They've spoken out publicly recently about the crazy price. too. So it's not just the fans complaining about this. You have talents and legends who are chiming in saying, this is crazy. I've never seen it like this before. There was an article that was published just yesterday from WrestleMania in post- Wrestling. It was using data from, there's a trade publication, a live event publication called Polestar. And it showed that last year's

WrestleMania at Allegiance Stadium generated over $66 million at the gate for WWE. and they didn't have a breakdown for each night, but they were kind of assuming that even if you split it down the middle 50-50, $33 million a night is easily going to surpass any pro wrestling gate record in history. It's not a surprise when you take into account how much they're charging for tickets. Of course, they're going to be set in gate records left and right. That explains it. So for them, it ended up being a very successful show last year.

But I said this on X the other day. I don't believe this would be happening if they had brought the show to New Orleans like they originally announced. This show this year was originally supposed to be in New Orleans. And they had the Rock go out there on television when SmackDown came to New Orleans. I want to say maybe they were at the smoothie king center, whatever the main arena was. Rock showed up on the show and he made this big announcement. And the place went crazy because it's like, holy shit, we're getting WrestleMania for the first time in like eight years. and everybody there was all excited.

And then they changed their mind. They saw how much money they made last year. And even though they did all of that, and they had already announced it publicly, they pulled out in favor of going back to Vegas. Their greed consumed them, and they decided, we got to run this back to back. They're like Jay Uso.

We got to run it back. Now, I'm not saying that if they would have run New Orleans this year, tickets would have been cheap. Cheap is a relative term. cheap for you or me may mean different things. But I do believe it would have been a more affordable trip for most people. You can see why they've done it when you take into account. They get millions of dollars for a site fee just for running the venue.

They get millions of dollars. And then they qualify for millions more in tax credits. You know, Wesselnom excited it is over $4 million in tax credits alone. So that's the real driving force here when you dig down into the numbers. Now, you also look at this news that broke last week about a ban that they are imposing on WrestleMania airings within a 50-mile radius of Allegiance Stadium. This is their latest effort to try to force people who are going to be in town to buy tickets to go to the show. Sean Ross Sapp of Fightful says that there are a lot of venues and businesses, hotels, tied to the city that have communicated major frustration about watch parties being blacked out because they're no longer going to be allowed to show WrestleMania. They felt like the city paid a site fee for WWE, again, I think to the tune of $5 million,

for WWE to help encourage tourism, and now they're restricting it with this move. So there are a lot of people who are very upset about that. But I go back to something that Mark Shapiro said, Mark Shapiro of TKO. He said last year when he was talking about ticket prices, he said, we know we have a lot of room there. Vince McMahon was primarily pricing tickets for families and was not totally focused on maxing the opportunity. Of course, Vince McMahon wanted to make money, but he was also smart enough not to chase away families by pricing them out.

Like, I just look at myself as one example. Okay, and I'm sure many of you can relate, because I'm sure we have some older fans listening to this right now. I became a fan because my dad watched wrestling, and so did my grandfather, which is probably why my dad started watching. So when I started watching, and I go all the way back to 87, would be my earliest memories of it, but I became a fan because of them, and we would go to some of the shows together. It was a family thing. You win over those kids, and eventually those kids are

going to make fans out of their own kids. TKO, I mean, they're about to hear it now. You know, how can we make as much money as possible right now, right, without paying any mind to what that audience might look like a few years down the road? But those hardcore fans, those are the heart and soul of the company. And they're being priced out right now. They're being left out. Now, for TKO, they seem very content to make a lot of their money before a single match ever hits the ring on night one with all the money they get in advance of the

show. And remember, they're taking WrestleMania overseas to Saudi Arabia for the first time next year. And how much do you think they're getting for that? I don't know what the number is. It hasn't been announced publicly. But reportedly, they've been getting 50. $50 million for every Saudi show that they would bring over there, going back to the beginning of their agreement in 2018.

In the not too distant future, we're going to be coming up on 10 years of this relationship between WWE and Saudi Arabia. 50 million. And they were bringing usually two shows a year. So that's $100 million, guaranteed money reportedly, that they were being paid for those Saudi shows. Now, for the Royal Rumble last month, which by far is the biggest event they've ever done over there.

we don't know what the number was. It was probably at least double that, right? At least. So just think what they're going to be getting for WrestleMania, what it took for them to get WrestleMania 43 next year. I doubt they're going to be holding any emergency meetings over ticket sales next year. I don't expect to be reading any stories like this a year from now.

But before we get to WrestleMania this year, we got elimination chamber, which is less than two weeks away. But we got to talk about this first. And this actually ties into the elimination chamber. We got to talk about the crate. The crates. Yes, I'm not talking about creep show from 1982.

My favorite story from that movie, by the way. Backstage last night, there was a delivery guy named Eli, who alerted the raw general manager, Adam Pierce, to a large wooden crate that was just standing there, sitting there, whatever, a tall crate. And it had a message on it. it said deliver to WWE and do not open until 22826, which happens to be the date of the elimination chamber.

It was written right on the side of the crate. And he was very annoyed Adam Pierce was that Eli did not seem to know anything about the contents of said crate. And he told him, do me a favor, send it over to Smackdown on Friday so that Nick Aldis can deal with it. and I'm watching this Eli has this clipboard with a piece of paper on it that's totally blank. So of course, Eli wouldn't know what the fuck is going on here

because there's nothing written on the paper. So they're doing the giant egg gimmick from Survivor series all those years ago with the gobbledy gooker. We already have the mystery man coming out every single week, stomping all the members of the vision. Now we have the mystery crate.

Triple H is bound and determined to keep these people. PLEs to four batches. We got the two chamber batches. We have two title batches. And now we have a mystery crate reveal on the show. I mean, there's still a week to go. I suppose they could still add one more match, but they seem to be allergic to doing that for most of these PLEs. Now, my question is, are we supposed to believe that it is, now look, I know it's pro wrestling. And you suspend disbelief and there's a lot of stupid shit that we see on wrestling television any given week. But are we supposed to believe that it is a person in there. See, at least when the gobbledy gooker popped out of the egg of the 1990 Survivor series, right, it was the gobbledy gooker. I mean, I don't know what he's supposed to be, right? He wasn't necessarily a human being, right? He could be some fucking alien from outer space for all we know. But are we supposed to believe that it is a person in there with no food or water for the next 12 days? And like, I'm watching this last night and I'm thinking, okay, what could

this be for? Like, obviously, it's going to be for some sort of reveal for a person, right? Whether it's a debut or return. The first name, obviously, that pops in my head and probably most people's heads with all the news and rumors going around is Chris Jericho. And we don't know what the status of Chris Jericho is. As far as I know, I believe Chris Jericho is still listed on the AEW roster page. And normally when someone's contract expires, they come off the page immediately. So I don't know if that means anything or not. There's a lot of people speculating that Jericho is coming in before WrestleMania. He just had a tour with Fossey, or he might actually be in the middle of one, now, but it does not coincide with the elimination chamber. So in theory, he would be free and

clear to do something on that date. Could this tie into the return to WWE of Chris Jericho? That would be my guess because I don't know what to make of this, but I was like watching the show last night and talking about it last night. And I know it's kind of morbid, but I was like, man, can you imagine like on this show? Like they pry that crate open and it, it's just, Jericho, but he's just like dead inside the box because they forgot to like poke holes in it. Like he's just, he's just laying in there dead in the box, like with his old light up jacket on. And you've got like one little bulb that's still flickering and just fighting for its life. I don't know. I don't know what's in the fucking crate. It could be Jericho. It could be,

I don't know. It would be nice if we had some good creative ideas that were stowed away in this crate. So I guess we'll find out together when the, uh, the chamber takes. place. But let me go back to Smackdown on Friday last week, because Jade Cargill had her very first defense of the WW Women's Championship. She just passed 100 days as champion. Finally, she had her first defense, and she retained over Jordan Grace. So to the surprise of no one, Jade Cargill is going to walk into WrestleMania as the champion. Now, I, as a fan of her work, and as someone who believes that the Smackdown Women's Division, rather, has been severely depleted for many, many months now,

and boy, could they use this woman back, I have been holding out hope for the return of Bianca Bel Air. Bianca Bel Air is one of the best they have in the women's division. The last match that we saw her in, it was almost a year ago. They opened Night 2 of WrestleMania in what I thought was the match of the year. Just an incredible match, her, Ria Ripley, E.O. Sky, match of the weekend when it came to

WrestleMania last year. Unfortunately, she got injured in that match, and we have not seen her since. But I was hopeful that we would see her pop up in the rumble, maybe even the elimination chamber. Well, those hopes were dashed

with a social media update from Bianca herself. She shared this on Sunday that she was going to be undergoing surgery on Monday. She posted a message saying finger surgery tomorrow with a praying emoji.

and it's been a real tough struggle for her. Now, if you don't know what happened during that triple threat match at WrestleMania last year, I believe it was like a Tower of Doom Spot or it was something like that. And in the course of everybody falling down, I think it might have been Ria Ripley, who fell down on Bianca's hand. And her hand got all messed up and supposedly there was some broken fingers. And, I mean, that's a terrible injury.

I certainly wouldn't want that to happen to me. But you hear that. And the last thing on your mind is like, oh, this woman's going to lose a year of her career for this. But in December, she was writing on Instagram that she would be getting her finger fixed. So I'm not sure if this is the first surgery or if this is the second surgery. I'm a little fuzzy on that. I don't know that she's come right out and said whether or not she's had surgery prior to this.

But she had done an interview a few months ago with BET, and she explained the nature of the injury. So this is in her word. She said, I broke my knuckle, not my finger. I broke the joint. It's something that I thought was going to be very straightforward, maybe eight to 12 weeks. I was in a triple threat with Ria Ripley and Eoske. We were going to the top rope. And we came off the top rope and Ria landed straight on my hand.

And it just crushed everything in my finger. So it's been a crazy journey. Being an athlete and having an injury, you rely on your body. And now my body is not doing what it's supposed to do. And occasionally, she would post. little video clips on social media where she could not bend the finger. Like she could bend her other fingers, but not that one. So I'm sure for her it's got to be an incredibly frustrating injury because she's obviously a very

driven athlete. She comes from an athletic background. That's how they recruited her. And to have to sit on the sidelines and watch everybody else and watch all of your friends going out there doing what you should be out there doing. When you otherwise feel fine, it's just this one finger. The issue is that, you know, if the finger is still not fully heat, if she can't grip things in the same way, or if it heals but not fully and it's easily breakable

again, you can't wrestle like that. You know, you can't wrestle like that and you can't pick people up. You know, she's very strong. She used to, you know, kind of military press people over her head. There's just certain things that you can't do safely if you have a finger that is in the state that her finger is in. So I guess she's had the surgery now. I don't know if there's going to have to be a follow-up surgery. I don't know what the recovery time is. We're basically waiting on Bianca to chime in with an update. But what we do know is that she ain't going to be back in time for WrestleMania. She's out, and certainly for the elimination chamber. So the question now turns to who does Jade Cargill defend her championship against in Las Vegas? And there's really

only two names that would make sense. One of them is Charlotte Flair, and the other one is Tiffany Stratton. Now, Tiffany Stratton was the person that she beat to win the championship. It's a match that we've seen actually multiple times before. And I mean, I just don't have any interest in seeing that match again. Charlotte Flair is a match that has not been done before, and it's a match that they've teased. And Charlotte has been out of the world title picture now for the better part of a year, right? It would have been since WrestleMania last year. She's really been doing the tag team thing with Alexa Bliss.

There's a qualifying match coming up on Smackdown this Friday. And just a reminder, this is the second, I think, and final week, that Smackdown is airing on Sci-Fi Network and not USA Network because they're bumped for the Winter Olympics. So just be aware of that. But on Smackdown this Friday, it's going to be Charlotte Flair, Nia Jax,

and Keanu James in a triple threat qualifying match. Alexa Bliss, Tiffany Stratton, Ria Ripley, and Oskah. They have already qualified. Oscar qualified on Raw last night with a win over Bailey and Natty. So that would, now let's assume, Charlotte qualifies, which I think she should on Friday.

That would leave one spot open, and we now know, as of last night, that on Raw next Monday, the final qualifying match on the women's side will be E.O. Sky, Rekyll Rodriguez, and Kyrie Seine. They're going to be fighting for that final spot. It should be EO. I don't know why you would not want to have EO on the show. EO is fantastic. Ria Ripley, her tag team title partner is already in the chamber, so I don't know why you. you would leave EO out. But I will point out to you, take a look at that lineup that I just mentioned, all those names. What is the common denominator there? No heels outside of Oskah. She is the lone heel as of this moment in that elimination chamber match. It's very lopsided right now.

So as much as I would like to see EO in there and it makes sense for her to be in there, it does make me think they may go with Raquel in that spot. Kyrie, I don't think, has any shot at it. But they could go with Raquel for that reason just because it is very lopsided right now. Now for the men's chamber, Randy Orton is in. I believe this is going to be his 10th, or he's been in 10 and this is 11. I forget. He's been in a shitload of elimination chamber matches.

So he's the veteran in there. Randy Orton is in. L.A. Knight is in. I'll get to him in a second. And Cody Rhodes is in after his win over Jacob Fattu and Sammy Zane on Friday night. They had a triple threat match that, you know, had some drama because, you know, had some drama because it really could have gone any number of ways. Like when I first saw that they announced that match, I was surprised, right?

Because you got Cody and Jacob and Sammy. You could argue all three of those guys should be in the elimination chamber. And now you're putting them in a qualifying match and only one of them can advance. So Cody was the likely winner. Cody did win. He's going to the chamber. He's probably going to win the chamber because he didn't win the Rumble. So he could still win the chamber.

and then he gets his title match of WrestleMania. They ain't going to keep Cody Rhodes out of the title match of WrestleMania. I just cannot see that happening. But now we'll see, you know, if Sammy Zane or Jacob Fattu is going to be worked into the title picture

in some other way. It doesn't feel that way. I mean, they lost. Now, the thing with Jacob, I shouldn't say that about Jacob. Jacob has a legitimate reason to be given another opportunity to be a part of that title match,

maybe make it a triple threat. he had the match won. The reason that he did not win is because Drew McIntyre ran in with a Claymore kick as he was covering Sammy Zane. He had the match won and he got kicked in the head. So Jacob actually has a very good case. Sammy Zane is, I mean, he's just a loser lately. So I don't know any other way to put it. I mean, look, I like Sammy, but he's been a fucking loser lately. He lost, clean as a sheet at the Royal Rumble. And he had the opportunity in this match to take advantage of Drew's interference, but the righteous guy that he is, he couldn't leave well enough alone, and he screwed himself out of a spot in the chamber. So he does not deserve to be

wrestling for the championship. Now, on Raw last night, we had a qualifier with Gunther, Javon Evans, and Dominic Mysterio. And I said coming into this, Gunther should not win this match. There is no good way to have Gunther in the elimination chamber unless he is winning and have him in there without being beat. He is not in a position right now where he should be beat. Not coming off, you know, John Cena's last match, AJ Stiles' last match, and he was in the Rumble. He got eliminated by Roman. He was the second to last one in. Why you would repeat that in the elimination chamber, I have no idea. It just seemed pretty clear. You could have Dragon Lee do some sort of run-in because of what Gunther did to him a couple of weeks ago, and he gets his revenge.

And that's exactly what happened. Dragon Lee ran out. out to hit Gunther in the head with the ringbell. And, I mean, poor Dragon Lee, you know, we talk about the pop that people get, right? This person came out, oh, man, they got a big pop. If there was such a thing as the anti-pop, it's what Dragon Lee got on the show last night. I had secondhand embarrassment watching this. But Javon Evans wins, and he's going to the chamber. And just him being involved, of course he's not going to win, but just him being involved in the chamber is going to make that match a lot more fun. So, That was one thing I saw last night on the show that I was very happy about.

On Friday, it's going to be Damian Priest, Trick Williams, and Carmelo Hayes in another qualifying match. That should belong to Trick Williams. I could see them going Damian Priest, but I think Trick Williams is the way to go. I have to say this. Trick Williams has not been up on the main roster, but for more than maybe a month at this point, and he's killing it. I mean, he just fits like a glove. He's already super over. I know he's supposed to be a heel, but, you know, the fans get into his entrance music when he comes out.

I mean, you watched Raw last night, and there were random breakouts in the crowd of whoop that trick chance all night long. The guy is just, again, he's got charisma for days, and you could just see that he is going to be a big, big deal on that main roster before long. So I think you keep that momentum going and you have him in the chamber. He's been talking smack about so many different guys now for weeks and weeks. He belongs in the mix with them and then they can smack him around a little bit in there. He's another one like Javani. He's not going to win the chamber. But he belongs in the mix there.

But his time on the main roster so far, A plus. Just whatever you're doing with him so far, just keep it going. But that would leave one spot open, which we now know will be filled by one of of three people. Jay Uso, Bronson Reed, or the OG El Grande Americano. El Grande Gable is going to be in that match. And again, you look at who we have, either qualified or potentially qualified so far in this chamber, just like with the women. Very baby face heavy inside that chamber. And if I'm wrong and Trick doesn't advance this Friday, then there's not going to be any heels in the elimination chamber. But I think we're looking at Jay Uso advancing when the masked man appears next week

and he screws Bronson Reed out of a spot. Because think about it, this man in black who's been running around now for weeks, he already cost Austin Theory a spot. He stomped Logan Paul's head in last night. Now, he'll be okay. He just made $16 million for his Pikachu Pokemon card at auction this week. He'll be all right. and the masked man, of course,

cost Bronn Breaker the Royal Rumble. So that only leaves Bronson Reed left to be screwed over. And I think that happens next week. Jay Uso in the chamber, all so that he can run it back when he makes his entrance, right? Whatever. Now, WWE has announced two big things

for next week's show in Atlanta, the return of Brock Lesnar five days before the elimination chamber, which makes me wonder why, now. Why now and not the week after the chamber? And AJ Stiles will also be on the show for a special tribute. That was a surprise when they made that announcement last night. So evidently, they have been holding him off for the Atlanta show so that he could have this tribute in his home state. I don't know if there's anything to read into there as far as him having signed a deal to keep him under

the WWE umbrella or if there's still a chance of him wrestling somewhere else. you know, this year. There's definitely been chatter about, you know, him wrestling elsewhere, but AJ has been very tight-lipped about his plans outside of him making it clear to Stephanie McMahon on her podcast that his match with Gunther probably wasn't the last time we're ever going to see him in the ring. You know, even if it's just a matter of him tagging up with his son at some point when he gets older, we have almost assuredly not seen the last of AJ Styles inside the ring. But we will see him in the ring next week for this tribute. But in this week's Wrestling Observer newsletter, Dave Meltzer reported that as of late January, Brock Lesner against L.A. Knight

was listed internally as the match for WrestleMania 42. And it scares me because, and I know this was not a great week for Dave, but it scares me if this is true because it's actually very plausible. If you think back to the Royal Rumble, right? Who eliminated Brock Lesnar from the Royal Rumble? It was Cody Rhodes.

and L.A. Knight. They teamed up to eliminate Brock. So if Brock has a bone to pick with L.A. Knight over that, that would actually make sense. As a match, it's not a match that I want to see at WrestleMania. That should not be the WrestleMania match for either one of these men. I'm sorry. And you look at Rawl last night. You know, L.A. Knight comes out. God bless the guy, man. He is still super over. You know, by the grace of the wrestling gods, I don't know how, but he is still over despite the booking. He comes out last night. He challenged the vision to a man. match and he proceeded to get his ass kicked for most of it and then his team lost.

And there are people who think a match with Brock Lesner is a good idea. Who are these people? Not any L.A. Knight fan I know. You know, L.A. Knight first started feuding with the vision in June. It was right after money in the bank. He is still fighting the vision. And think about this. Given Brock Lesnar's affiliation with Paul Heyman, you could argue that Brock is an honorary member of the vision, which means that if they do this match, you can't even say, well, at least it's not the vision.

At least he'll be working with somebody else. Like, technically, L.A. Night, you could argue, would still be working with the vision if he feuds with Brock for WrestleMania, which is just so ridiculous. Just, I'm looking at this. Obafemi is right there. Obafemi is right there.

The guy is a phenom. And look, I understand. Some people may look at this and think, why are you rushing him into a match with Brock Lesnar at WrestleMania? He's had one match officially on the main roster. Why rush him? And I get it. I understand the argument.

They need to make a new star now. Okay, Oba Femi is not just some NXT call him. NXT or Obafemi should not be treated like any NXT call-up or just anybody else who you build up, you know, slowly bit by bit. You got plenty of guys you can build up that way, right? You got Royce Keys, the former powerhouse Hobbs who just came over from AEW. If you want to build him up slowly that way, be my guess, that's fine. Obafemi, though, is somebody, I think, who needs to be treated as an attraction.

And the personnel site is Brock Lesnar. It's actually the perfect person to use as an example. Brock Lesnar, when he debuted in WWE in 2002, I mean, he was like, you talk about a phenom, the way he showed up and he just started wrecking shop. We hadn't seen anything like that. And he had Paul Heyman by his side within a few months of him being on the main roster and on television. He had already, I mean, he had wrestled Rick Flair and beaten Rick Flair. He had wrestled Hulk Hogan.

He beat Hulk Hogan with a bear hug. On television, it wasn't even a pay-per-view match. He won the King of the Ring. After he beat Hogan, that got him. the shot at SummerSlam, he beat the rock to become undisputed champion at SummerSlam. Then he feuded with the Undertaker and he beat the Undertaker in a hell and a cell match a couple months later. There's a blueprint right there. I'm not saying you have to copy and paste, but I'm just saying you have an example right there of a guy who debuted and you could say,

oh, they rushed him, but boy, they created a major star that year, didn't they? Why can't you do something similar with Obafemi? That's one of the things that they're missing right now, that one new hot star. And the idea of doing, you know, Brock and Oba at WrestleMania and Brock beating him, I'm not really a fan of that idea. But you know what? Even if you did the match and Oba didn't win, just to run it back, let's say it's SummerSlam in Minneapolis and give Oba a win there, you know what?

I could live with that. But to not even do the match, and if this rumor is true, and they do Brock in L.A. night, and then I don't know what Oba is doing on that show, because you got to give them a match. I mean, you can't call Oba Femmy up before WrestleMania and then not have him on the WrestleMania card. Right now, they have him working Kit Wilson on SmackDown. This will be his second match this week

with Kit Wilson. And my only hope is that they're just stalling until Brock comes back next week and we'll get, speaking of the vision, we'll get a vision for where they're going with Brock Lesnar. But it's right there. Like that match with Oba, it's right there. Now, Oba is still trying to decide between

Raw and Smackdown, which brand he wants to sign. with. He has standing offers from Nick Aldous, and he has a standing offer from Adam Pierce. And as he was exiting Adam Pierce's office, Oba ran into Rusev, Rusev, who we have not seen since he was eliminated in 30 seconds from the Royal Rumble. Rusev, whose interview with Chris Van Vlee just dropped this morning. I've only seen parts of it so far. All of Chris's interviews are great. You should go check it out. I did laugh, though. when Rusev said the reason that he left AEW to return to WW was because he wanted to wrestle more.

He wanted to wrestle more and more. Because you remember, he was just, he was benched. Whatever the issues were, creative issues with him and Tony Khan, he wasn't doing nothing for the majority of his run there. So it's like I just, I wanted to wrestle more and more, right? And yet outside of his 30 seconds in the Royal Rumble, he has had a whopping two matches so far this year. Both of which were on main event

against Joaquin Wilde of the LWO. And he had one match in all of December, also on main event against Otis. I think we can do a little bit better than that. I got some TNA wrestling notes. I wanted to run through here real quick. I thought this was interesting. There was a story from Deadline.com,

AMC Networks, which is now for those who don't know the home of TNA Impact every Thursday night, posts mixed Q4 results as streaming overtakes linear TV as its top U.S. revenue source. AMC networks posted mixed fourth quarter results with streaming remaining a bright spot with a 14% year-over-year increase in revenue. It marked a milestone with AMC networks now making more revenue from its collection of niche streaming services than it does from long-established cable networks, like AMC.

So, yeah, and I see stories like this from time to time where you could just see how different things are now, you know, these days relative to traditional cable and streaming and how kind of the worm is turning there. But in its fourth week on AMC, Impact posted its best cable viewership, bringing in 241,000 viewers on AMC, which was up 20% from the week prior. and, you know, good demo number and all that. And I don't pay too much attention to the ratings anymore. It's just a different time now.

But you use that as a barometer when you read these stories for whether or not the product they are putting out is attracting new eyeballs. So it's very cool to see after what I thought was just a disaster of a first show with that first episode they had on AMC. I thought it would have chased away more viewers than it would have generated. but they have been able to settle in and slowly grow their audience. And keep in mind, these are taped shows, too. They were only live for the first two weeks. I don't think they're live again until the beginning of next month. So these shows are taped, and you never know how that might impact the viewership.

So it's good to see. Now, they held their no-surrender pay-per-view last Friday in Nashville. Jelly Roll was in attendance. You just picked up three Grammy Awards a few weeks ago. Trey Miguel, he won the, TNA International Championship with a win over Stax Lorenzo of NXT

and the story of Trey Miguel is a very interesting one so far this year where he was part of this group called the Rascals their contracts or at least the members of the rascals who were actually working with contracts either expired

or they were not renewed and all four of them signed with AEW they were bringing the Rascals in but when the Rascals debuted on TV there were only three of them. And then it came out that Trey Miguel, as quickly as he was signed to a contract, had been released from his contract,

that effectively fired from AEW. And as far as the reasons why, I mean, there's a lot of rumors as to why. There was talk that it came from above, you know, from Warner Brothers Discovery. I mean, I think that there's a better chance there was somebody in the company who just didn't want him there.

And anyway, he ended up on the outside looking in. And I'm sure for him it was a very painful thing and a very embarrassing thing. he had to go right back to TNA, but they brought him in, and he was part of this, what they call Feast or Fired Match, where you have four briefcases on polls and four corners of the ring, and you pull them down. Each briefcase has either a title shot of some description or a pink slip. So there is the risk that you could pull down the briefcase that has the pink slip, and then you're fired.

So he returned in this feast or fired match where he very well may have pulled down a briefcase, that had a pink slip in it. And I said, boy, you know, you got to put that guy on suicide watch if that ends up happening. But he ended up with an international title shot. Now he's a champion. So he has rebounded nicely in TNA here. Arianna Grace, also from NXT, the daughter of Santino Morella, she beat Leying Lee to win the TNA knockouts title. This was after Lee had beaten another NXT name, Kalani Jordan for the belt in November. I do believe that is the first title that Grace has held anywhere in her career. But as soon as NXT loses one TNA title, they immediately pick up another one.

And evidently, they feel the partnership with WWE is important enough to keep doing this sort of thing and giving their belts, I guess, visibility on NXT television, even though I fail to see how this benefits their own roster by continuously doing this. And the TNA Hall of Famer, Mickey James, who should also be a WWE Hall of Famer, she made a surprise return on the show. She came out to attack Ash by Elegance after the Elegance brand retained their knockouts tag team titles. I don't know if she is going to be in on a regular basis or not, but it was good to see Mickey. Mickey was a very big part of that knockouts division for a very long time.

And former TNA tag team champion, Chris Bay, who broke his neck in the ring with the Hardies in October of 2024, and he was paralyzed for a time, celebrated his 30th birthday on Friday with a video on social media showing how much progress he has made over the past year. And he said, birthday equals gratitude. God is good. One year ago today, I was taking my first steps unassisted and posting to the world about my injury. The support has been overwhelming, and I can't describe how I feel other than grateful. From that moment on, I walked independently, no matter the distance. One step at a time. Thank you all for walking with me.

Time to jump into the next chapter. I love you all. I don't know if he'll ever be back in the ring again. Frankly, I don't really care. I'm just glad to see him doing so well and able to move around on his own. Because for a while there, things have kind of gone dark. In the aftermath of the injury, there was a lack of updates. And it just wasn't looking good.

But he has been a great comeback story. Whether he gets back in the ring or not, I think Chris Bay is a great comeback story. And New Japan Pro Wrestling held its new beginning at Osaka Show last Wednesday, selling out a week in advance for Yotas Suji's first title defense of the IWGP World Heavyweight title since winning the belt at the Tokyo Dome last month. That's got to be a good sign. Good early sign here for his run because they desperately needed to anoint a new top star, you know, with all the other ones either retiring or exiting the company. You know, they can't rely on the old guard anymore, you know, because the old guard is either aged out or they've signed with AW.

But they needed some new talent and some new blood up at the top of the card. Case and point, Hiromu Takahashi. He wrestled his final New Japan match for now on that show as he has exited the company. New Japan has made it official. to go where exactly we don't know yet. There's talk of WWE, there's talk of AEW, or he could just freelance, you know, the way that Tetsuya Naito has been doing since he left last year. But he won on his way out, which was strange. He won in a tag team match.

At the end of the show, he said his goal is still to win the IWGP junior heavyweight title, which he has held many times before, and then win the IWGP heavyweight title. and he said that this is not goodbye, but rather see you later. Now, if he ends up going to AEW, they have the working relationship with New Japan, which would make it possible for him to still work here if he wants to, kind of the way Kanosukee does. Takesha has contracts with three different promotions, New Japan being one of them, AEW and DDT Pro.

And do you know why he has three different contracts? Because he's a great fucking pro wrestler. That's why. I just had to say that. And Aaron Wolf lost his never-openweight title that he just won from Evil, who also is likely WWE-bound. But he just won the never-openweight title from Evil last month at Russell Kingdom. That was his first professional wrestling match. He lost that title here on this show to Ren Nerita, who is part of the same faction that evil has now departed. So I guess they're maybe trying to anoint him as the new leader.

When I say that he lost this match in quick fashion, he lost in two minutes. He got beat down by the House of Torture. I think maybe he hit like one move, but ultimately then he was penned. Now, Aaron Wolf is a big deal in Japan. He's an Olympic gold medalist in judo. He is one of the reasons, frankly, if not the reason, why they got that Tokyo Dome show last month, back on network television in Japan. First time in over 20 years that the Tokyo Dome show has aired on TV,

V. Asahi over there. And he had a lot to do with that. And he may well be the reason that they're going to be back on network television this June for their Dominion show. So what I'm thinking is he wins the belt back there on that show. If that's the plan, then taking the belt off of him this quickly at least makes sense. That and you give him more time to develop. I think it's very telling that they didn't trust him to do more than two minutes. In those two minutes, it was all interference.

It was all smoke and mirrors. He's still brand new to this. I saw that first match against evil. I watched that match. He was very impressive. But it was a very controlled environment. The way they laid that match out, I thought was very smart. But he is still a novice at this.

Now, New Japan is holding its new beginning USA show in Long Beach coming up on February 27th. It's actually the day before the elimination chamber. It'll be airing on NJPW World. And you look at this card here and you could see, like all of the AEW influence. You got Yotas Tsuji putting his title on his global title, because he's got two titles. Putting his global title on the line against Andrade L. Edelow, who has been all over the place lately, not just in AEW. Rikishay is going to be defending his AEW national title against Taiji Ishamori. You got the Gates of Agony, who, of course, are on television with Rikishay and AEW.

They're going to be challenging for the IWGP tag team titles. Athena is challenging Shuri for the IWGP women's title. Takeshita, who I just mentioned, is going to be wrestling El Fantasmo for Fantasmo's NJPW television title. But there's another match on that show, and it is David Finley against Fred Rosser, in what it is increasingly looking like, is going to be David Finley's final match in New Japan. Fightful Select reported on Monday. So just yesterday that Finley's contract with New Japan has expired, and he is officially a free agent.

Despite this, they are reporting that the company is actively trying to resign him. And they first reported back in December that Finley was looking to explore free agency. So that match coming up on the 27th is likely going to be it for him. It's obviously not a done deal, whether he's leaving New Japan or where he may be going. There have been a lot of, there's been a lot of chatter about him ending up in WWE. And I think that him in WWE is very interesting. Because then you get into the question of whether or not, you know, you start him in NXT or does he go to the main roster? And I mean, it's fine either way, because there are a lot of guys who want to have that time in NXT first just to see how things are done there and get them prepped and ready for television because it's a totally different beast, especially from New Japan.

you want to know what I think would actually be a good spot for David Finley, the judgment day. I actually, and I kind of feel the same way about evil, quite frankly, not that I'm all that interested in seeing evil on television, but David Finley and the judgment day, I think ultimately could be a worthwhile direction for him. It's very interesting how they use the judgment day to get certain people over. Like it's a faction that's existed now for several years, and they've gone through different iterations of it. But you can't say that it hasn't been beneficial to the people who are part of that group. It gets them television time every single week. You got the judgment day.

I mean, there are at least three or four segments a week, right, on Monday nights. But I do. I think that he, especially if Finn Baller is not going to be part of it for too much longer, I could essentially see a swap where Baller goes babyface, leaves the judgment day and David Finley ends up in there. If they wanted to try to get him, you know, push quickly on television, I mean, that'd be one of the ways to do it. So we'll see where he ends up.

But that is the news of the week. A lot going on in wrestling. And I suspect it should get busier as we head into WrestleMania, which is eight weeks away. But I mentioned that, you know, I wanted to hear from you guys. And I got a bunch of questions. We'll get to some of them here. So we got some Q&A. We'll start with Brue and A.

Brendan here from, well, he didn't say where he's from. He just sent in an email. You can, you can indicate where you're from if you want to, but Brendan sent in an email. He said, great first episode, as a big fan of pro wrestling and uncrowned, it is awesome to hear a wrestling show on this channel. Do you ever see WWE giving the push to L.A. Knight to a main event title, or is his sealing the midcard titles? I think he has been over the last few years and it seems like a missed opportunity, especially after seeing Jay Uso, get the push last year. See, now I think if L.A. Knight would just learn how to yeat, then he might have a shot at the World Heavyweight title. Look, you and I both know. Like, L.A. Knight, can he be a World Heavyweight

Champion? Absolutely. I would actually prefer to see it as a heel rather than a baby face. There's no indication that they see him the same way. There's no indication to kind of look at like, oh, he's going to be in the mix this year. Like there's, it feels like there's something coming up soon. They got plans for him. I don't get that sense. But people get hurt. Injuries happen. Creative has to be adjusted. He's right there. I can't sit here and say he'll never be a world heavyweight champion. I think he can be. I think he may, he may get the chance at some point. But he is not a focal point on the show in a way that would lead you to believe that it's kind of in the near-term plans for him.

So I can't sit here and say never, but I also can't sit here and say, hey, you know, you got to be optimistic because I feel like this is going to be his year. I kind of felt that way last year, right? And then it wasn't. But I do think that when injuries happen, plans change,

I see him maybe as somebody who ends up being the beneficiary of that, rather than the company actively saying, hey, we got to build around this guy on this brand. He may benefit from someone, else going down, losing their spot, and then they slide him in there. Adam, via email, says, do you ever feel that MJF is too much of a joke? He makes ridiculously silly faces in the ring, and he doesn't have any signature moves that

stand out. Size-wise, he comes off as a smaller than, or smaller than the average WWE wrestler, and would likely just be a weasel-type heel. I assume you're talking about if he ever went to WWE. Yeah, well, that's what MJF is. Don't you watch the TV shows? I mean, he's a weasel-type heel. He literally calls himself a scumbag.

Yeah, he's got the diamond ring that he uses as a weapon, right? He's not above using that. I mean, he beat Brody King pretty clean in Australia this weekend. No, I don't. MJF is the type of heel that I wish we had more of in wrestling. He's very committed to the role. and against certain people he can play the chicken shit heel. He doesn't do it all the time.

But, you know, when the situation calls for it, especially just to make the other guy look better and make the other person look more credible and just more intimidating. Like, that's what he did with Brody King. So, you know, he can adjust, depending on who the opponent is. If MJF were to go to WWE,

and one day I do believe we'll see it, but if you were to go to WWE, he's going to be a big star there the way that he's a big star in AEW. It doesn't matter that he's smaller than a Drew McIntyre or someone like that. Like every other box that you would want someone to check in that spot in terms of their charisma, in terms of their verbal skills, in terms, just in terms of everything, in terms of their in ring work, which I don't think he gets enough credit for, because I think people look at him as this great promo.

And maybe this was more of an issue earlier in his career. people, it was the weirdest thing. People just, like, wouldn't see him as a good wrestler. And I think by now he has silenced a lot of those people. I think with that first world title run and the matches he was having with people like Brian Danielson and Kenny Omega, Adam Cole. I think he silenced a lot of people back then. But I do think there are probably still some people who look at him as more of a promo guy than

like a ring work guy. And I don't really understand it. You know, he checks all the box. So, you know, if and when he becomes a free agent again, you're going to have, believe me, a lot of interest from the other side and bringing him in. And he'll be a major star. He'll be a WrestleMania main inventor if that's what he wants to do. So, no, I don't see there being any issue with the way that he, you know, kind of handles himself or his character. That's what MJF is as a heel. It's nothing new.

Michael from Long Island, New York. They have to get the women's championship off of J.D. Cargill. The experiment with her has been a failure. They shouldn't have Charlotte qualified for the chamber this week and should instead have her beat Jade for the belt before WrestleMania, like Eo did to Ria last year. Alexa Bliss should win the chamber. And at the very least, it should be Alexa, Charlotte, and Jade at WrestleMania 42. Do you agree? Um, I don't. I don't. I mean, I could see them weaving the Charlotte, Alexa story in there to turn it into a triple threat?

You know what? It could work just because I think Jade is not going to lose that title of WrestleMania. It doesn't feel like Jade is dropping that championship anytime soon. So if Charlotte and Alexa are going to start having issues with each other, and they end up in the same match, their drama could ultimately just lead to their downfall and then Jade is the beneficiary of it. And that's how Jade kind of skates by and holds on to her title.

So that could work. But to me, it's always strongest when you have one-on-one. When you have that one-on-one issue between two people, that to me always makes for the best and biggest matches of WrestleMania. Charlotte and Jade, I think, should be the direction. I think that, you know, Bianca obviously is not going to be back. So I think Charlotte and Jade should be the mania match. And then coming out of that match, I mean, look, you could always do Charlotte and Alexa coming out of that match. We also got some questions on X.

Let me run through these real quick here. Should David, oh, this comes from at the smart mark. So at least he's self-aware. Should David Finley go straight to the WWE main roster? I feel like a feud with Carmelo Hayes would be a great first start. Yeah, I just talked about David Finley. I think that, I mean, it doesn't matter to me one way or the other, you know, whether he goes straight to the main roster. They've really rated a lot of NXT talents recently, so I kind of feel like NXT could use someone like.

Kim for a period of time. So, yeah, I'm kind of indifferent towards it. A feud with Carmelo Hayes over the U.S. title on Smackdown? Yeah, I mean, that'd be great. But I do think that he would also be a good fit for the judgment day. At Pardon My Music says, can a wrestler truly reach the top without the right entrance theme? How much does music contribute to getting someone over?

Well, this is one of my biggest issues with WWE these days. just the lack of really great entrance music for so many different people on that roster. It's been an issue. It's been a very big issue now with Def Rebel for a number of years. And can someone become a top star without having a great entrance theme? Yes, they can be. They can be a big star without the right entrance music. But it will affect, though, I think, how over, for lack of a better term, they are,

because entrance music is a vital part of a wrestler's presentation. Like, it is a super important part. And actually, the music situation over the last few years in WWE, I think illustrates that better than anything I could ever say. You see the importance of entrance music. When Tomaso Champa showed up on Dynamite a few weeks ago with that entrance music and that whole presentation, right? That's another great example of it.

How it just kind of set him apart from so many other people, and that was his first night in. So music is super important. But to say that, you know, you cannot become a top star without good music, I can't say that. If you got the talent, you got the talent, right? The cream always rises to the top. So I think you can be a top star, but it helps a hell of a lot better if you got a great entrance song. And at like the mouse, Justin says, what value do awards like the wrestling observer,

worse commentator or most overrated wrestler category bring to the wrestling scene and do polls like that contribute to the widespread tribalism and toxicity within the IWC? Does it contribute? Yeah, it contributes because people are just out of their minds and there's so many tribalistic fans online who are just looking for blood, you know, whenever that stuff gets published. You know, Dave's got his awards with the observer that people vote on. He's been doing it for. for years and years, everybody's got awards that they do. You got the best of, you got the worst of. I mean, look, you got the Academy Awards. You got the Razies, right? I mean, it's not just a wrestling thing.

So, I mean, does it contribute to it? Yeah, I mean, maybe in a small way, but I don't blame him or the awards for that. I blame the people who are just out of their freaking minds and take that stuff too seriously. I had one person send me or ask me a question yesterday. because every week when the television shows are over on my Twitter account at Solomonstor, I post a poll that you can vote in. Thumbs up, thumbs down. What did you think of the show?

And somebody said, do you think polls like this contribute to the tribalism and toxicity? I said, dude, it's a fucking poll. I'm just, I'm asking the question, if you watch the show, did you like it or not? Does this contribute to the toxicity? No, brain rot. That's what contributes to the. the tribalism and the toxicity that we see online. It's not the fault of the polls. It's not the fault of the awards. It's the people themselves. Anyway, no toxicity here. Keep sending those

questions in, the Solomonster at gmail.com or tweet me on X at Solomonstr. Make sure to include the hashtag Uncrowned. And don't forget to check out all the other great content here on Uncrowned in the Ariel Helwani Show feed. You got the guys from the crack. You got the boys in the back. And you got this guy right here. And since I didn't get a chance to mention it last week, shout out to Killer Cross.

He won the MLW heavyweight title in their battle riot match. Technically, it was the end of last month, but it didn't air on YouTube until, I don't know, 10 or 11 days ago. Cross is good people. He's been doing his thing on the independent scene since leaving WWE last year. And he got to win the title with his mom. mom in the front row, first time that she has seen him wrestle live since beating cancer last year. And, you know, I lost my mom to cancer.

I don't think I'm alone in saying fuck cancer. So to see him get that moment was very cool. I will see you guys back here next Tuesday for episode three of the uncrown wrestling show. Until then, take care, guys.