The WWE Thread

[tlova86]

WWE World Heavyweight Championship Tournament

Spoiler: show

* Roman Reigns vs. Big Show
* Cesaro vs. Sheamus
* Alberto Del Rio vs. Stardust
* Kalisto vs. Ryback
* Titus O'Neil vs. Kevin Owens
* King Barrett vs. Neville
* The Miz vs. Dolph Ziggler
* Tyler Breeze vs. Dean Ambrose

[supersonic]

Pic = 1000 words

[jordidebaas]

This tournament really shows how thin their roster is now.
And I miss the New Day in it.

[TYFDK]

Big fan of Kalisto. So misplaced in that tourney. As is Titus.

[IchaelMelgin]

Ignoring the roster, they could have at least swapped around Kalisto and Stardust ffs

[supersonic]

The lack of star power and three hour length of Raw took its toll last night as, even with a lower-rated NFL game than in recent weeks, Raw set another modern audience record low mark last night.

Raw was down from last week's 3.24 million viewers to 3.16 million this week, with the lowest viewed hour (hour three) in modern non-holiday history, even on a night built around the first round of the WWE title tournament. When the brackets for the tournament didn't list outside stars, and the most pushed star in the tournament, Roman Reigns, had already wrestled in the first hour, interest fell greatly.

The three hours were:

8 p.m. 3.48 million viewers

9 p.m. 3.18 million viewers

10 p.m. 2.86 million viewers

[supersonic]

Royal Rumble tickets for the January 24th, 2016 show in Orlando, FL officially go on sale this coming Friday.

[supersonic]

[supersonic]

Observer:

The Rollins injury means that HHH’s opponent for WrestleMania has now changed twice in a short period of time. HHH vs. Rollins, always a planned destination when Rollins was given the pedigree as his finisher and linked so strongly with him, had just replaced HHH vs. The Rock as one of the planned Mania main events.

WWE creative had been told that both Rock and Ronda Rousey are not going to be available to wrestle, and they were the two headliners hoped to be the mainstream draws for the show. Rousey is filming a movie in Indonesia at the time and would also need UFC clearance. Rock is currently wrestling with an insurance issue, as a movie he will be filming next year, was having an issue with insurance coverage if Dwayne Johnson did any pro wrestling before the movie was filmed due to the injury risk. Johnson can and may very well be on the show in some form, probably similar to the past two years, but not in a match situation, unless that issue is worked out, and that’s why the match was changed. With the show on the network at a $9.99 price, him not in a main event match won’t have as much effect as if it was still an expensive PPV show. But it does leave the show missing a lot as far as the “special” match feel for a WrestleMania.

Reigns vs. John Cena for the WWE title was scheduled as another key main event before the Rollins injury. Whether Reigns would have gone heel, or this would be a face vs. face match with Cena doing the ultimate passing of the torch was not clear. The show’s goal was to establish Reigns as the company’s top star going forward, just as was the original goal for the show last year. Keep in mind that Undertaker vs. Brock Lesnar was also scheduled, but that’s off the books when the blow-off match was moved to the Hell in a Cell show. It is still unclear who Lesnar and Undertaker will be facing. There have been reports, denied to us, that Cena would face Undertaker instead. By process of elimination, that would lead to Reigns vs. Lesnar, which could happen given the television tease this week of the idea that we don’t know who would have won that main event match at this past WrestleMania. It’ll be clear in January, as if Reigns wins the tournament, his opponent will likely be the winner of the Rumble.

[DXvsNWO1994]

So this happened....

[supersonic]

There is a Royal Rumble (1/24 in Orlando) pre-sale going on right now using the code RRORL. Tickets go on sale Saturday morning to the public. It should be an immediate sellout.

[Mike0284]

[supersonic]

[Big Red Machine]

Pretty awesome show last night, IMO, although I seem to be in the minority regarding both the Reid Flair stuff and Charlotte's mic skills in general.

[DXvsNWO1994]

BIG NEWS broke this morning, as La Sombra from CMLL has officially signed with WWE:

Manuel Alfonso Andrade Oropeza, of Mexico City, has signed with NXT and WWE, joining the WWE Performance Center in Orlando, Fla.

Formerly known as “La Sombra,” Oropeza is a third-generation luchador whose grandfather, father, uncles and cousins all competed in Mexico. Oropeza signed with Consejo Mundial de Lucha Libre (CMLL) in 2007 at age 17, where he trained under El Satanico. While there, he held many titles, including the CMLL Trio and Tag Team titles and the NWA Welterweight and Middleweight titles.

The WWE Performance Center’s newest luchador also brings experience from Japan; Oropeza made multiple trips to Japan for New Japan Pro Wrestling (NJPW), winning the organization’s Intercontinental Championship in 2013.

[supersonic]

@JRsBBQ: Hearing that @WWECesaro is having shoulder issues that will likely require surgery soon. If true, we wish him our best. Quality person.

[jordidebaas]

Would suck if that were true.
Just realised the other day that out of the 5 last world champions, Lesnar is the only one who's not out with an injury or dealing with personal issues (in the case of Cena, I believe?). Then there's also Rusev, one of the Usos was out, Sami Zayn and Hideo Itami in NXT, Tyson Kidd, just saw Nikki Bella's out too, and now Cesaro added to that list as well? They've really been having an insane amount of bad luck with injuries over the last few months.

[Mike0284]

[supersonic]

Cena is hosting a reality TV program.

[DBSommer]

A question for WWE older timers. Just saw some of JBL's matches against Eddie. Did he usually suck that hard all the time? I swear he had two moves, a crummy Samoan drop and a decent clothesline, and just the usually punch and kick stiff anyone can do. Eddie looked great, of course, but you can only carry someone like that so far.