On one of the 83weeks podcasts Eric Bischoff addressed this.
Essentially Lanny getting a deal was a contingency of Randy signing. When Eric said no, Randy said, take it out of my deal.

So Randy paid Lanny for 5 years

I don't know if New Japan makes any sense but I think Poffo is a very underrated wrestling personality. I've heard him on a few podcasts, and now he has his own podcast and posts on reddit - he's clearly trying to get out there. He's nuts, but he has a great memory, he's an excellent storyteller, he was close to so many of the legends of the 80s, and he recites those ridiculous poems off the top of his head. And he's self-aware, so it's not uncomfortable listening to him, he understands what his place was in wrestling history.

He also took part in one of my favorite random WWF comedy matches of all time v. Hulk Hogan on Saturday Night's Main Event. The Genius won and proved that brain prevails over brawn!!

Funny Match Hulk Hogan vs The Genius - YouTube

And that right there is the issue I've got with it.

It's not the place for on the job training, it's been painful enough to listen to Rocky Romero learn his way around the announce desk as it is (and he's got history & an understanding of the culture at least). By Poffo's own recent admission, he's literally never been to Japan before.

His cameo on BTE was fine, it was an amusing tip of the cap to the Lethal storyline. This? This is not fine.

fwiw ... Petey Williams (who was the official producer for the Aries match) says it was the final appearance for Aries under his current contract. He kind of kayfabes it while being mostly neutral in his comments otherwise, taking a "he's not here now so we move forward" position

IMPACT Producer Petey Williams Talks Austin Aries' Bound For Glory Exit - Wrestlezone

I know that politics resembles wrestling these days but, umm ...

:D

Almost 20 years at FOFC and I still fuck up and post in the wrong thread.....:)

Damn

When I first saw this, I wondered if something happened to Ron Simmons.

But no, you're obviously referring to this:

Roman Reigns reveals he has leukemia - Cageside Seats

Well that sucks.

That's terrible.

Very sad.

:(

A redditor found this 2015 article referencing a "serious illness" that Reigns had in the time between getting released by the Jaguars and playing in the CFL. Which matches up with the 11 year timeline he mentioned tonight.

Detroit Lions' Calvin Johnson looking to score WWE ringside passes to cheer on college teammate | MLive.com

(And this writer tweeted tonight that Calvin Johnson actually told him about Reigns' leukemia back when he wrote the article, but he didn't report it that specifically)

Just ... damn :(

Unpopular opinion. I only liked one match last night and it's the obvious one.

I know that people online act like it was a great PPV but half the matches had women too old to move. Two matches had obvious interference but no DQ (I know, it's for the story but still...)

You know the only comment I've seen "organically" (i.e. that I came across without specificallylooking) on YT about it all day: how cool the dance break was.

I literally have no idea what serious matches, story developments, or outcomes occurred ... but I know somebody flossed. Or something.

I didn't think it was that bad. I don't follow it much though these days.

The NXT match was really good. Whoever Kairi Sane is might be the best female wrestler the company has. And I know Baszler is real green, but she plays a great heel and gave it a real feel. I thought that match was good.

Becky and Charlotte was real good too. Still can't figure out why they want Becky to be a heel so bad when she's so over with the crowd. Kind of has a Stone Cold thing going for her while Charlotte is built to play a heel.

I know Rousey is a huge star but I can't get into her for some reason. The feuds seem weak and you never get the feeling that anyone they match her up with is a threat.

Outside of that it was just kind of there. Cool to see some of the old faces in the Battle Royal. Thought the announcing reminding everyone how monumental this was every 30 seconds got annoying.

I also kind of like the idea of a women's only PPV once a year because it's different. The event had an NXT style vibe to it. Everything in WWE is so generic and repetitive these days that anything that goes outside that bubble is great.

But the event should only be 2 to 2.5 hours. They just don't have enough talent to go over 3.

Plus ya know, they had to keep the women busy while the rest of the roster goes to Saudi Arabia.

Rest of the roster minus Cena and Bryan

Cena makes sense. He has a big movie coming out and at his age, likely wants to transition more toward Hollywood. Unless they're paying him Brock money to appear, I'm guessing the people who handle that side of his career have told him to stay home.

Some of those booking decisions. Yikes

I understand people love the old guys and they still draw, but you have to mix them with some guys who can work. That match was brutal. Looked like complete amateur hour. Also appears HHH tore his pec muscle.

Will give them a little slack if the Miz injury is real and they had to improvise. But why not just have Dolph win the dumb thing?

My biggest takeaway from the clips I saw is that Shawn Michaels has finally embraced his baldness.

And I wonder if Brock will now "confront" Daniel Cormier tomorrow night after d.c. presumably retains his title. Brock is lined up as cormier's next title defense, and there's been a lot of talk that Fox wants Cormier to be a commentator for Smackdown when the new TV deal kicks in. So we could see a lot of cross promotion. The WWE and the UFC play very nice when it comes to Brock.

(Though I'd love to see Derrick Lewis ruin all these plans)

Pretty sure this is leading to the Authority 2.0 as Miz wrestled 2 matches just fine and Shane had a big speech on the go home smackdown show.

David Arquette vs Nick Gage deathmatch got downright weird at the finish.

If you haven't seen the clip there's at least one floating around out there (make sure you see it from before Arquette starts to walk out, it adds a good bit of context to the ending).

I'll say this for Arquette -- who I think was dumb a.f. for doing this particular match in the first place -- he clearly wanted out of there but he came back long enough to take the pin. I might think he was stupid but I have a fair amount of respect for him coming back to finish, enough that I'll completely forgive the no-sell. I think being worried you had a major neck wound is sell enough in that situation.

what blows me away is that DA wasn't even booked for that match - Joey Ryan was but couldn't wrestle due to injury - he was a replacement.

which may or may not be a work, but anyway

I think him getting out fast after the finish was concern he had nicked his carotid. For all the crap he has taken, he has a lot of respect for the business.

And Jon's correct that doing that kind of match is dumb as fuck for a non-trained wrestler (although I'd argue even a trained wrestler shouldn't be taking shots to the neck with a glass tube).

For all the types of wrestling I like, I just can't get into the deathmatch stuff.

Marko Stunt also broke his leg real bad in one of the matches that night.

By the way, has anyone picked up WWE 2K19? Haven't played one of those games in years but saw someone on Twitch playing it and it kind of looked fun. Noticed it goes on sale on Black Friday for like $24 at Best Buy, although there's some season pass you need to buy to get all the wrestlers?

I think good ol' JR got the worst out of all of them.

It's pretty nasty:

hxxps://twitter.com/JRsBBQ/status/1063816792911552512/photo/1

Ricochet is crazy.

I haven't picked up a copy but if you haven't played it in the past few years I assume it's just as good. I think all you need is the accelerator packet to open up all the players at once minus late adds to the game but I doubt you would miss them. I think Lashley, Richocette, and EC3 were the main ones in the 2 expansion packs but there should be plenty of ones made by fans that you can download for free. I think there is usually 100 slots to download other people and you can download 20 things (wrestlers, rings, etc) every 24 hours. People will create new old retired wrestlers, NJPW or Impact wrestlers that you can add to your universe or use in solo matches. My kid enjoyed doing it for the Royal Rumble as it would be one involving every territory if you downloaded enough guys usually.

Enzo ... gonna Enzo

So this was pretty cool. One of the winery owners on our wine trail is also a professional wrestler. He had his WWE debut last week against the Lucha House Party. Of course, his team lost, but it was amazing to see him get his first chance on the big stage. Here's the Youtube of his match. He's in the black leotard.

The Lucha House Party vs. Mike Karma & Kraig Keesaman: WWE 205 Live, Nov. 14, 2018 - YouTube

I just heard about it. Guessing it's not a WWE work?

Doesn't seem to be.

Watched the annual turkey suit episode of Impact.

I think the fans chanting "This is Impact" might be the best fan chant diss in history.

Tragic life for a guy who gave so much. He was my best friends favorite back in the day. I remember hearing about his injuries and downhill slide, but I had no idea the extent of it until yesterday. RIP to a real hero of the ring.

NJPW Tag League brought Excalibur in for commentary for the final three shows. Not bad at all.

On the whole, I've been content to follow WTL with highlights. Just felt incredibly lackluster overall to me.

Big Cass had a seizure at an indy show tonight, apparently there were tweeting to see if there was a doctor around because there wasn't one working the show.

https://gfycat.com/DefinitivePeriodicGoldfinch

David Onda on Twitter: "Interested. Dreamer addresses the crowd and says Cass “suffered a seizure,” and makes a point of saying it’s “not drug-related.”… https://t.co/lOt9YD0r7Z"

Damn, that Cass thing was rough.

Good news is that follow up reports indicate he was responsive for the ambulance crew.

Meanwhile, in Japan, I've now seen everything: Ospreay is selling injured ribs.

Not sure I've ever seen him sell anything.

The rumors about All Elite Wrestling (or whatever it would be called) strike me as just crazy enough to be true.

I can't see that working to any good end honestly.

They lack the roster width/depth to do much more than one-off shows, the matchmaking at All-In was among the most questionable things about the event even needing to pull off just one show.

And, in conjunction with the AEW rumors, good God the roster at ROH is near decimated at this point.

We've got tickets for the January TV taping in Atlanta but I'm not sure how much of interest will be on the card by that point.

Oh. Sweet. Jesus.

Mixed Match Challenge final might have actually been worse than an Impact gimmick match.

Oh dear God.

So far this PPV is the worst I've ever seen. It's all a joke, and everything has been terrible.

They have the pick of nearly any wrestler in the entire world, and this is the best they can do.

2+ hours into TLC and Rousey/Jax has been the best match of the night.

Fine, credit Rousey for her growth & potential (and she worked well tonight, elevating Nia's work with her) but good God, all this talent available and that's the best thing you can put together in over 120 minutes.

Ambrose v Rollins drew chants of both "Boring" and "Becky".

I thought that was a bit harsh -- kid said "plodding? yes. boring? no." -- but there was no interest in this match in the building.

How the hell they've fucked up Rollins arc is just stupifying.

Season 2 of The Edge & Christian Show on WWE Network has upped its game considerably.

"Subversive" doesn't do it justice, but it makes Camp WWE look like 3pm fare on Nick Jr.