The challengers in the four-way match for the AEW Continental title were set up last night on Collision.
In the three Continental Contenders Challenge matches, ROH champion Mark Briscoe defeated Lance Archer, Orange Cassidy defeated Bryan Keith, and Konosuke Takeshita defeated The Beast Mortos.
With their respective wins, Briscoe, Cassidy, and Takeshita will now join champion Kazuchika Okada in the match for the Continental title at All Out tonight.
The season premiere of Smackdown on USA Network next week will be headlined by a steel cage match between Cody Rhodes and Solo Sikoa for the WWE championship.
The match was set up during the opening segment of Smackdown last night after Cody tried to drive a wedge between Sikoa and Jacob Fatu. Cody told Fatu to “step up,” and he nearly did, before Sikoa talked to him and backed off.
And then, just about when all of the Bloodline was going to attack Rhodes, The Street Profits and DIY stormed the ring to save Rhodes. Nick Aldis also came down and told everyone that the eight-man tag match is later on tonight, and until then, no violence, but next week, he will book something which was best for business, and that’s the steel cage match.
This will only be the second steel cage match on either Raw or Smackdown this year, with the only other one being Liv Morgan vs Becky Lynch for the WWE Women’s World title which took place in May.
Tonight’s Collision will go head-to-head with Friday Night Smackdown on FOX and AEW is focusing on the Continental Contenders Challenge matches for the show.
Three matches will take place to determine who advances to the four-way match at All Out tomorrow, with Orange Cassidy vs Bryan Keith, Lance Archer vs Mark Briscoe, and Konosuke Takeshita vs The Beast Mortos. Plus, Deonna Purrazzo takes on Hikaru Shida, and another big eight-man tag match with Bryan Danielson, Pac, Wheeler Yuta, and Claudio Castagnoli vs Kauchika Okada, Jack Perry, and The Young Bucks.
Tonight’s show is the go-home episode for All Out.
The final Smackdown on FOX will air in just a few hours and so far only two matches have been announced.
The Street Profits will team up with #DIY to battle Solo Sikoa, Tama Tonga, Jacob Fatu, and Tonga Loa in a huge eight-man tag team match and Bayley takes on Ms Money In The Bank Tiffany Stratton.
Also advertised are Giovanni Vinci’s return and Undisputed WWE champion Cody Rhodes addresses Solo Sikoa’s challenge for the title.
Wesley Eisold of the band American Nightmare, has sued Cody Rhodes, WWE, and Fanatics, for breaking their 2019 settlement agreement over the use of the term American Nightmare according to a story by POST Wrestling.
The lawsuit, filed in the state of California, states that there are trademark infringements, breach of contract, and intentional interference. Eisold is claiming $150,000 in damages and up to $300,000 for trademark infringement plus the cost of all legal fees involved in this lawsuit.
In March 2019, both parties settled for $30,000 when Rhodes trademarked the term for merchandise and he was allowed to use it as long as the term is used in conjunction with his name or likeness and imagery has to be at least 75% larger than the American Nightmare text.
The band leader had to deal with a barrage of wrestling fans and nasty comments online to a point where he wrote, “Listen you f*cking dolts. I already own the name. Doesn’t matter who you like. They licensed it from me. Then violated that agreement.”
Eisold also claims that he tried to contact Rhodes in 2022 and then again to both Rhodes and Fanatics with cease and desist letters.
WWE Hall of Famer Bret “Hit Man” Hart will be appearing on next Monday’s episode of Raw as the show rolls into his hometown of Calgary, Alberta, Canada.
WWE backstage correspondent Jackie Redmond revealed the news on social media, writing, “I can officially confirm through some very legitimate sources that this Monday, on the season premiere of Monday Night Raw, Canadian legend Bret ‘The Hitman’ Hart will be at the Saddledome in Calgary.”
Soon after, WWE Chief Content Officer Paul “Triple H” Levesque added, “When in Hart country… @BretHart joins us for #WWERaw’s massive season premiere, this Monday at 8/7c LIVE from Calgary on @USANetwork. You definitely won’t want to miss this.”
Next week’s Raw goes head-to-head with Monday Night Football for the first time this season so WWE is trying to load up the broadcast to minimize the damage.
Both Smackdown and Collision will share the 8PM to 10PM time slot tonight on their respective network, a rare head-to-head between the two shows.
Collision was moved to Friday night since All Out will air on a Saturday due to the return of NFL on television on Sunday night. A live episode of Rampage will follow the conclusion of Collision, making this a three-hour AEW broadcast.
Meanwhile, Smackdown airs its last ever broadcast on FOX as the show moves to USA Network from next week. Being on network television, Smackdown has the advantage over Collision in terms of reach, but the next time these two shows will go head-to-head it will be an even-level playing field, with both shows on a cable channel.
Collision is coming off its worst number ever on a Saturday night from last week so it might struggle against Smackdown on FOX tonight considering it’s airing on a different day as well.
The next time a WWE and an AEW show will go head-to-head will be on October 8 as the second episode of NXT on The CW airs live from St. Louis while AEW will have its annual Dynamite Title Tuesday on TBS. Last year, NXT beat AEW in the ratings thanks in part to several main roster stars appearing on the show, including Cody Rhodes, Paul Heyman, and The Undertaker.
This week’s Dynamite on TBS drew 660,000 viewers, down 31,000 viewers from last week’s broadcast. In the 18-49 demo, Dynamite scored a 0.19 rating, down 0.03 from the prior week and was #5 on the top 50 cable chart for the night. It was the lowest number since July 31. (Ratings credit: Programming Insider)
The final Smackdown on FOX will air tonight live at 8PM ET and the show will be moving back to cable on USA Network with next week’s broadcast.
Smackdown moved to FOX in October 2019, giving WWE added exposure thanks to the wider reach of network television.
The five-year deal, valued at $1.025 billion, was announced in June 2018.
“At FOX we are thrilled to welcome WWE to the FOX Sports family and bring SmackDown LIVE to broadcast television,” said Eric Shanks, President, COO and Executive Producer FOX Sports at the time. “We are huge fans and know that together FOX Sports will be the leader in live events for the foreseeable future.”
The deal was supposed to end in October, but FOX was going to move Smackdown to FS1 for the last few weeks. Instead of taking the hit, WWE opted to move to USA Network a few weeks earlier.
Smackdown’s premiere on FOX drew 3,869,000 viewers back in October 2019 and to this day remains the most-watched Smackdown on FOX. The only other time the show came close to that number was the Christmas Day episode a year later when Smackdown aired after an NFL game and benefited from the lead-in viewers. That show did 3,303,000 viewers.
Viewership has been up and down over the last five years, with 2020 and 2021 being the worst numbers on the network. In the three months in 2019, Smackdown averaged 2,475,000 viewers. In 2020 it averaged 2,182,000 and it continued to decrease to 2,081,000 viewers in 2021. In 2022, numbers went back up to an average of 2,123,000 and last year it increased further to 2,220,000.
This year, the show has done the best numbers on FOX since 2019 with an average of 2,299,000 viewers and a 0.64 average in 18-49.
The show has consistently ranked #1 on Friday nights among the 18-49 demographic on both network and cable television but that will surely change now as the reach of USA Network is less than that on FOX and shows on network television typically do better than on cable.
It remains to be seen what kind of numbers Smackdown will be able to pull on cable on Friday nights but it’s safe bet that it will be fairly less than what Raw is currently doing on the same channel.
WWE has dialed down the amount of non-televised live events this month compared to previous months and in fact, there are only two shows scheduled for the month of September.
All WWE Superstars will have a much lighter schedule, working just Raw on Monday and Smackdown on Friday for this month, with the only two live events set for September 28 and 29 in Columbus and Huntsville respectively.
This decision was taken to try and bump up even more attendances – and prices – for television shows by offering less shows in the usual markets with the philosophy of “less is more.” In fact, in October, there are no house shows in the United States and four as part of a small tour in England.
In previous months, those on the red brand worked Saturday and Sunday non-televised live events followed by a live taping of Raw on Monday while those on the blue brand started with a live broadcast of Smackdown on Friday and followed with non-televised shows on Saturday and Sunday, with the occasional combined supershow for the larger markets.
The post-No Mercy episode of NXT drew 631,000 viewers, up 16,000 from the previous week. The show had a 0.17 rating in 18-49, the same number NXT pulled in last week and was #3 in the top 50 cable chart for the night. (Ratings credit: Programming Insider)
In a YouTube interview with Luke James Chats, AEW World champion Bryan Danielson said that he received a resistance from WWE after he applied to trademark the “Yes! Yes! Yes” with the United States Patent and Trademark Office.
Danielson said that his manager alerted him that it’s available to trademark and after going over the cost, he gave the green light to trademark it.
But WWE had other plans, and Danielson said he got a legal letter from WWE which wasn’t necessarily a cease and desist order, but a letter letting him know that he’s infringing on their intellectual property.
When Danielson started with AEW, he did not use the chant out of respect for WWE but he began using it lately in the same manner he did when he was in WWE.
The trademark was filed on July 29 and remains live and pending the USPTO process.
Netflix has released the official trailer of the Mr. McMahon docuseries which will premiere on September 25.
In the trailer you get sit-down interviews with Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, Hulk Hogan, “Stone Cold” Steve Austin, John Cena, Bruce Prichard, Eric Bischoff, Jimmy Hart, Bret “Hit Man” Hart, Paul “Triple H” Levesque, and David Shoemaker from The Ringer.
The series is directed by Bill Simmons and Chris Smith serves as the executive producer. All six, one-hour episodes will be available for binge watching on the premiere date.
The last Raw on Labor Day before the return of Monday Night Football next week drew 1,655,000 viewers, down 141,000 viewers from the previous week.
The show started with 1,768,000 viewers in the first hour, decreased to 1,695,000 viewers in the second hour, and finished the night with just 1,504,000 viewers in the third hour.
In the 18-49 demo, Raw did 0.52, 0.50, and 0.44 respectively for an average of 0.48, down 0.08 from the previous week. This was the lowest since January 15 and Raw was #2 on cable TV behind College Football on ESPN. (Ratings credit: Programming Insider)
Former AEW and NJPW commentator Kevin Kelly took to social media to react to the noise that his and the Tate brothers’ lawsuit against AEW is creating.
“I had hoped to settle this fairly and quietly with AEW but they left us no choice,” Kelly wrote.
Earlier, Kelly publicly said that AEW gave him a small severance package when he was fired which was eventually taken away as well.
Reacting to Jim Ross’ comments where Ross said that the lawsuit is “frivolous,” Kelly added, “And to my friend JR, this is not ‘frivolous’ in the least. We look forward to what comes next.”
The lawsuit was filed by attorneys Stephen P. New and Benjamin Baer in the Philadelphia County, Pennsylvania Court of Common Pleas. It “seeks to void the arbitration clause of their talent contracts, as well as requesting the court certify a class-action suit against AEW over claims the company is misclassifying its wrestling talent as independent contractors, rather than employees.”
It’s interesting to note that Stephen P. New is the same attorney that CM Punk and Ace Steel used after Brawl Out.
Kelly was fired in March, just 10 months after he started working there.
Both WWE and AEW classify their talent as independent contractors, with AEW’s wrestlers having much more flexibility in the ability to work other promotions compared to WWE, which is pretty much non-existent over there.
During a podcast with Pro Wrestling Illustrated, Stephanie De Lander revealed that she has extended her deal with TNA until the rest of 2024.
De Lander said that when she originally came to TNA, she had a per-appearance deal and only agreed to work a few dates.
“Recently we’ve extended that through 2024,” De Lander told the hosts. “So, I’ve agreed to the remaining dates for the rest of the year.”
She added that once the new year comes along, she will reevaluate things and move on from there.
The Australian star had a huge angle last month, marrying PCO, an angle which also featured the return of Matt Cardona.
The women’s Speed tournament kicked off yesterday on X as eight women battle in a tournament to crown the first Speed Women’s champion.
In the first match of the tournament, former WWE Women’s champion Iyo Sky defeated Lyra Valkyria. Sky will now meet the winner of Naomi vs Blair Davenport. The other two matches feature Elektra Lopez vs Kairi Sane and Candice LeRae vs Piper Niven.
New episodes of WWE Speed air exclusively on X every Wednesday at Noon ET.
Andrade is currently the men’s WWE Speed champion.
During his appearance on Logan Paul’s podcast Impaulsive, WWE Hall of Famer Hulk Hogan described wrestling fans as “very forgiving” towards wrestlers.
To make his point, Hogan used Chris Benoit as an example of how there’s still a large portion of fan base who love him despite the horrible things he did.
“If Chris Benoit can do the crap he did and the fans still love him, you know, they’re very forgiving,” Hogan said. “I made some major mistakes in my personal life, but they forgive you.”
Hogan’s major mistakes in personal life were topped by his racist rant during a private conversation with his son when he was in jail following an auto accident. Hogan was “Benoit’d” from WWE for several years after the audio of the conversation was leaked, although he found a way to get back in the company’s good graces again.
In the same interview, Hogan also said that he recently signed a five-year deal with the company.
AEW star Saraya will be releasing a memoir next year, titled Hell In Boots, and will be published by Gallery Books, a subsidiary of Simon & Schuster.
Set for release on March 25, 2025, the memoir will give a look at Saraya and her family drama, stardom, despair, and resilience.
“I basically write about from childhood since birth to right now, this very moment,” Saraya wrote in a post on social media. “So I’m really excited for you guys to see what the hell I’ve been up to – good, bad, ugly, everything in between, in and outside the ring. I’m just really excited for you guys to see why I am the way I am.”
The book publisher writes that this is Saraya’s “real, uncensored story” in its synopsis of the book which reads as follows:
“Hell in Boots is Saraya’s real, uncensored, story. From her early days in her famous (and chaotic) wrestling family, to leaving home at fifteen, to forging her own path in professional wrestling, Saraya has been through hell and back. As she fought to make it in the incredibly competitive—and at times sexist—wrestling world, she faced incredible highs and devastating lows. Saraya recounts years of struggling with substance abuse, clawing back her pride after an ex’s sex tape leaked, adjusting to stardom in the WWE, healing from a nearly career-ending injury, a making triumphant return to wrestling as AEW Women’s World Champion. Through it all, Saraya tells her whole truth in a way she never has before.”
It was a bad night for Collision on Saturday night as the show drew just 289,000 viewers, down 153,000 viewers from the prior week. This was the least-watched episode ever on Collision in its regular Saturday night time slot. The show had a 0.10 rating in 18-49, down 0.13 from last week and placed #19 on the cable chart for the night. (Ratings credit: Programming Insider)
