ROHWorld.com Forum

A special taping of NXT will take place at the November 22nd episode of SmackDown in Ottawa.

Right now the plan is for the NXT women's tournament, which will be similar to the cruiserweight classic with an international field and a weekly WWE network show to be taped in either January or March. The funny thing is there are women who have been contacted that don't work for WWE for the tournament, and some have been told January and some have been told March regarding being available. But several women have been contacted and told they are in, and dates to be available. It could also be like the cruiserweight tournament where they tape over a series of months, but the talent wasn't told that and some talent contacted have dates on overseas tours they have to get rearranged if they are to be in the tournament.

Speaking of women, it now looks like Kairi Hojo is coming with Io Shirai. Stardom knew last week that Shirai was leaving and Hojo was on the verge, and was pushing for Hojo to stay noting she'd be their top star. Right now both are scheduled to stay with Stardom through about April of next year. Shirai will have her 10th anniversary big show on 3/20 at Korakuen Hall and that will be her last major event. Hojo will have a homecoming show in April and then also probably be leaving, although Stardom is trying to convince her to stay because losing one won't be so bad but losing both will be devastating, in particular because they have nobody at their level to elevate to take their places. The promotions' big three of late have been those two and Mayu Iwatani.

Akira Tozawa will be moving next this week as he finishes with Dragon Gate on their 11/3 show in Osaka and will start in a few weeks. Like the other cruiserweights, the idea is to work Raw TV's and NXT on the road

The situation with Io Shirai and Kairi Hojo reported here originally, where both were contacted by WWE and told the Stardom office they were going to leave around the spring of 2017, has changed again. Shirai, whose leaving was believed to have been a definite the way she told the company, is reconsidering. Hojo, who had gone back-and-forth on the decision before last week saying she was going, is also reconsidering. Both received new offers to stay and are thinking that they have sure things in their home country if they stay, and if they leave, it’s a shot in the dark and uncertainty. The big picture is that NXT is going to need some quality women wrestlers to work with the less experienced wrestlers, unless they never bring up Asuka (and at first Asuka was not brought in for the main roster, but simply to have her in NXT). Shirai and Hojo are both pretty, and are excellent wrestlers, smoother technically than almost anyone, men or women, now on the roster. But they still may leave. The situation is also that there is the sense of loyalty in Japan to their company. They realize if both leave, the popularity of Stardom will fall greatly because there are no replacements. Shirai and Asuka also have past heat and Shirai has had people tell her that Asuka being in NXT will limit her upward mobility since Asuka got there first and is already a star, with the idea Asuka may be going nowhere, and that WWE isn’t going to push two Japanese women to be dominant on a roster at the same time. Shirai is a lot younger than Asuka, which works in her favor, and wrestles well, but doesn’t project the badass aura that Asuka is so good at getting over even though Asuka is not very big

NXT tickets in Australia must be slow as they’ve announced that in every city on the tour, for every ticket purchased, you can bring a buddy for free.

An interesting note for this past week is that the 11/16 NXT TV show was not even in the top 20 for WWE programming this past week, as people skipped it to watch Takeover. Of the top 20, four of the shows related to Goldberg historical matches. The top ten were: 1. Survivor Series; 2. NXT Takeover; 3. WWE Storytime debut; 4. Survivor Series pre-show; 5. Untold History of ECW (the new show with Heyman, Tommy Dreamer, Dudleys and Taz); 6. NXT Takeover Toronto pre-game show; 7. Hell in a Cell; 8. Renee Young interview with Jericho; 9. WrestleMania 20 (which had the first Goldberg vs. Lesnar match); 10. WrestleMania 32.

There were a number of interesting athletes in camp this week trying out for spots. Robbie Smith, 29, represented the U.S. in Greco-Roman wrestling at the summer Olympics was one. He’s 6-feet and 286 pounds and kind of a thick bowling ball kind of powerhouse. He didn’t place at the Olympics, but was fifth in both the 2013 and 2015 world championships. Chi-Lewis Parry, 33, who is a 6-foot-9, 243 pound kickboxer and MMA fighter out of London who trains in San Jose. He’s 6-0 with 1 no contest in MMA in fights between 2012 and 2014. His age is a little on the old side as WWE didn’t sign Jeff Cobb a few years ago who was an Olympic athlete with tons of potential because of age and Cobb was younger. Then again, they are always into the tall guys, especially if they are athletic. Travis Stevens, 30, was a silver medalist from the U.S. at 178 pounds in judo at the 2016 Olympics. He also competed but didn’t medal in the 2008 and 2012 Olympics in that weight class. Ben Proviser, 26, represented the U.S. in Greco-Roman wrestling at 187 pounds (the same weight class Chad Gable represented the U.S. in 2012) in 2016 and was also on the 2012 Olympic team, and was national Greco-Roman champion in 2011 and 2013.

The reason that Sawyer Fulton hasn’t been around in Sanity and the team has become Alexander Wolfe & Eric Young, is due to an injury that will keep Fulton out for several months. It’s not clear what the injury was, but it had to do with the arm, either shoulder or biceps. There was a tease at the TV tapings of putting Big Damo into the Sanity group, and Damo & Wolfe teamed up as Sanity at both the Florida house shows this weekend, so that would seem to indicate Damo is taking his place on the team.

Several of the guys at the most recent tryout camp were sent e-mails that right now the company is not looking at hiring anyone who is heavier than 205 pounds for the time being. Talk about a change in thoughts on business.

From the recent tryout of Olympic athletes and other athletes scouted by Gerald Brisco, WWE appears to have the most serious interest in Travis Stevens, who took the silver medal at 180 pounds at the 2016 Olympics in Rio de Janeiro and Chi Lewis Parry, the kickboxer fighter from AKA, who is 6-foot-9, and fights at 254 pounds. Stevens was offered a deal and is expected to accept it, and Parry is also in talks regarding a deal, but we haven’t heard that he’s agreed to terms. Parry was Daniel Cormier’s sparring partner to get ready for the fight with Jon Jones that ended up not happening. Parry, 33, who is from the U.K., has fought MMA, and kickboxing. He’s been fighting of late with Glory, and has an 8-1 record as a kickboxer with four knockouts and is ranked No. 6 in Glory’s heavyweight division. He fought MMA from 2012 to 2014 and had a 6-0 record with one no contest and with fighting with the One FC promotion in Asia. Parry is originally from the U.K. and we were told he made a great impression just running the ropes with people saying the top brass loves his potential because of his size, athletic ability and he apparently did well in talking and they believe he’s got tremendous potential charisma. One person who trained with Stevens said he was surprised he’d sign with WWE given his personality, but said that if he does come in, he may be one of the all-time greats because nobody is more driven, which sounds like how Kurt Angle was described. The negative on Stevens is that even though he’s only 30, he has a lot of mileage on him because he has been competing in judo and driven at that since the age of six. Stevens also placed fourth in the 2012 Olympics and made the Olympic team in 2008 as well.

Another Olympic medalist, Erica Wiebe, 27, who captured gold in women’s wrestling at 165 pounds, is coming to Orlando for a tryout. She was only the third Canadian in history to win a gold medal in wrestling. Wiebe currently lives in Calgary and attended the University of Calgary, and in 2014 took a gold medal in the World University games as well as the Commonwealth games.

While they haven’t made an official offer (or at least hadn’t as of last week), WWE is more open to Matt Riddle than a few months ago. Everyone knows he’s one of the best prospects to come along in the sense not many in modern history have ever gotten so good in so few matches. Riddle is under contract to Evolve, but that means nothing as Evolve’s policy is always to release guys if WWE wants them. I have no idea why New Japan doesn’t go after him now although it probably is inevitable than he’ll be in WWE and probably a major star, at some point.

DBSommer wrote:Are they doing anything with Biff Busick yet. It's been over a year and the only thing I saw was a name change for him to something considerably worse than what he was currently going by.