THE ROUND-UP
The Latest from the F4W Staff
NEWS/REPORTS
WWE UK TV taping results: Tyler Bate puts his title on the line
Tag team turmoil match set for Raw in London
ROH TV results: Four corner survival for a World title shot
WWE-bound Kairi Hojo announces departure from Stardom
NXT Riverside, CA, live results: Roode vs. Dillinger; Almas vs. Ohno
WWE Dublin, Ireland, live results: Rollins & Balor vs. Joe & Wyatt
NXT Gainesville, FL, live results: Strong teams with Heavy Machinery
WWE Cardiff, Wales, live results: Orton vs. Mahal vs. Styles; UK tag match
AUDIO
Wrestling Weekly: CAC, Mid-Atlantic Fanfest, TNT’s Hearts & Flowers 5/5
B&V: NXT, WWF Wrestling Classic, RAW, Granny, tons more! 5/5
WOL: Meltzer, Brandon Howard, Lance Archer guest on an eclectic show 5/4
WOR: Cauliflower Alley, SmackDown, ratings, New Japan, tons more! 5/4
The WWE tour continues with Raw in Belfast, Northern Ireland, SmackDown in Valencia, Spain, UK TV tapings in Norwich, England and NXT in San Diego, CA and St. Petersburg, FL. We’re looking for reports on all of those shows.
WWE on Sunday has Raw in Liverpool, England and SmackDown in Coruna, Spain and U.K. TV tapings in Norwich, England.
Raw will be Monday night from the O2 Arena in London featuring a tag team turmoil match. SmackDown will be running in Bornemouth, England.
Tuesday has SmackDown and 205 Live being taped at the O2 Arena in London and Raw will be in Lille, Frame.
Wednesday has a Raw house show in Zurich, Switzerland, and a SmackDown has show in Brighton, UK.
FIGURE FOUR WEEKLY: 5/1/2017: The rise of Braun Strowman
It was somewhat fitting that Braun Strowman’s win against Roman Reigns in the main event of Payback came after the conclusion of a dreadful House of Horrors match between Bray Wyatt and Randy Orton. At the very least, it was a reminder of how far Strowman has come since splitting from the Wyatt Family last July. He has seamlessly transitioned out of the group and gradually become the most compelling character on Raw in less than a year.
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WRESTLING OBSERVER NEWSLETTER: May 8, 2017: WWE Payback review, WWE financials, plus tons of news
A brief look at the WWE financials for the first quarter, basically looking at why the profit margin was so far down this quarter, where the added spending came in, a look at the house show business in WWE and NXT, what categories are losing money in WWE, and what are increasing the most is the lead story in this week’s Observer.
Also, look at the major WWE storylines, the next few PPV shows, what WWE match result changed four times in 30 hours before the PPV, behind the House of Horrors segment, plus match-by-match coverage of Payback with star ratings and poll results.
Notes on the New Japan booking coming out of Dontaku and likely matches for Dominion, one of the company’s biggest events of the year, plus Dontaku coverage, in this issue.
The biggest junior heavyweight tournament in probably a decade is coming up. Check out some of the big matches that will be part of it, with the announcement of the bracketing of this year’s Super Junior tournament and the web site schedule.
There is an update on the ITV television project and why the tapings were postponed, plus the key thing going on behind-the-scenes.
News on Brock Lesnar going forward in WWE, his latest plans and title matches expected, more on Fate of the Furious and its box office, update on the Hardy broken gimmick in WWE, a new WWE movie with Michaels, Hogan talks Vince McMahon, indie champion gets WWE tryout his week, and the most watched WWE Network shows this past week, in this issue.
Read about the WWE & NXT shows this past week including both the Raw and SmackDown tour openers in Europe
Boxing fans, check out the highlights of the Joshua vs. Klitschko fight, the amazing U.K. business numbers, as well as whether heavyweight boxing is back big in the U.S. because of the fight or not.
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WON BACK ISSUE: April 10, 2000: Wrestlemania 16 reviewed, NBC buys into the XFL, more
Wrestlemania XVI, the first Wrestlemania that seemed to take on almost Super Bowl or Final Four level proportions as an American institution, turned out like many Super Bowls, with a flat crowd, a been there, done that main event finish ending a disappointing match, and with the exception of a ladder match, which was an amazing stunt show, it was probably not as good as an average episode of Raw. The show ended with Hunter Hearst Helmsley retaining the title when Vince McMahon, instead of Mick Foley, was the one to make the heel turn screwing The Rock at the end.
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SATURDAY NEWS UPDATE
WWE
At today’s WWE UK TV tapings in Norwich, it was announced that there will be a United Kingdom title match at NXT TakeOver: Chicago on May 20th. Pete Dunne will face Trent Seven at tomorrow’s tapings to decide who gets the title shot.
It was confirmed that the UK tapings were being filmed to eventually air on the WWE Network.
WWE is putting on a total of five live events today. Both Raw and SmackDown had shows on the European tour, the UK show took place in Norwich, and NXT has house shows in San Diego and St. Petersburg.
The SmackDown house show in Valencia, Spain took place at Plaza de Toros de Valencia, which is an open-air venue.
Brie Bella posted a video update about her pregnancy on YouTube after having to spend the night in the hospital. There were issues with her baby’s breathing that had to be monitored, but everything is fine. Brie is five days past her due date and said that she hopes the baby will be born this weekend.
In a video that WWE posted, Scott Dawson said that The Revival plan to be back in six weeks. Dash Wilder is currently sidelined after fracturing his jaw.
Sawyer Fulton had his first match back from injury at NXT’s house show in Gainesville, Florida last night. He defeated Brennan Williams.
As he’s said previously, Bully Ray told ESPN that he was one day from bringing his Bully Ray character to WWE during the Dudleys’ last run in the company before the idea got nixed. He claimed that one of the issues was that WWE didn’t want to have a bully character because of their anti-bullying efforts.
Pro Wrestling
Ratings for this week’s episode of Impact were only up to 260,000 viewers from last week’s 255,000. The show went up against the NBA playoffs, though last week’s had competition from first round playoff games and the opening round of the NFL draft.
Reby Hardy tweeted about her and The Hardys’ situation with Impact Wrestling today: “TNA: Cut everyone’s pay & lay off a bunch of people. ALSO TNA: Let’s spend $ to go after a woman who’s 8mo. pregnant & no longer works here.”
Today marks 33 years since Kerry Von Erich defeated Ric Flair for the NWA title at the David Von Erich Memorial Parade of Champions show at Texas Stadium. Dave Meltzer called it one of the bigger matches in US wrestling history.
There was a video going around of Jack Evans seemingly suffering a seizure during a match in Mexico last night. It’s believed that was only an angle.
PROGRESS Wrestling co-owners Jim Smallman and Jon Briley were pictured in a photo that Triple H tweeted prior to today’s UK tapings.
PROGRESS confirmed Flamita as an entrant in this year’s Super Strong Style 16 tournament.
Togi Makabe visited Tomoaki Honma as Honma recovers from his neck injury.
Memorabilia Guy has interviews with Vickie Guerrero and Martina the Session Moth.
UFC/MMA
Conor McGregor’s girlfriend Dee Devlin gave birth to their son last night, who is named Conor Jack McGregor. McGregor’s father announced the news in the Irish Mirror.
Dana White said in an interview with TMZ that Anderson Silva isn’t going to get an interim middleweight title fight against Yoel Romero. Silva previously claimed that he would retire if he didn’t get the fight.
Gegard Mousasi was critical of Ronda Rousey’s fighting ability in an interview with Today Online in Singapore.
John Lineker told MMA Fighting that he’s looking to return in July after getting surgery for a broken jaw.
Today in Professional Wrestling History (5/6): Kerry Von Erich wins NWA title at Parade of Champions
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