Ric Flair was hospitalized today after he fell outside a restaurant in Tampa, Florida according to a story by TMZ.COM.
Flair was at the Wagamama restaurant in the morning and according to eye witnesses, got up from the bar, left his phone and drink, and crossed the street, where he fell and suffered injuries to his face and head.
A photo published by TMZ showed Flair on the pavement with four EMTs surrounding him. Flair had a nasty cut on his eye, which was bleeding heavily and also had a cut on his head. Another photo showed Flair’s face bandaged up and being loaded in an ambulance on a stretcher.
This morning, Flair issued a statement on social media saying he couldn’t attend Horror Con in Washington due to a blood clot in his leg which is preventing him from traveling more than 3-4 hours. Flair also wrote that he’s scheduled to undergo a procedure to “strip the affected vein,” after which he could resume regular travel.
AEW announced that the New Year’s Smash episode of Dynamite will take place on Friday, January 1, head-to-head with WWE’s Smackdown.
The Gateway Arena in Atlanta, Georgia will play host to this very rare Friday edition of Dynamite. A Collision themed episode of New Year’s Smash will also be taped from the same arena the following night in Collision’s regular time slot.
Tickets for these two events go on sale on Friday, October 30.
It looks like WWE will not be live that day as the January 1 episode of Smackdown is scheduled to be taped on Monday, December 28 following Raw.
Cody Rhodes sat down with Chris Van Vliet in Atlanta, Georgia to discuss playing Guile in the new Street Fighter movie, dressing up in costume complete with Guile’s hair at the movie’s premiere, signing his last WWE contract, how long he intends to wrestle for, reacting to Dan Soder and Will Sasso’s impressions of Dusty Rhodes, reflecting back on WrestleMania 40 and the idea of “peak wrestling”, calling out The Rock for a one-on-one match, his Mount Rushmore of films, and more!
I wasn’t sure today if you’d be dressed as Guile. You’ve been doing so much stuff as Guile. How do you decide if you’re going to be dressed as Guile or wearing a Cody Rhodes suit?
“This is going to sound crazy, and no, it won’t sound crazy. But Guile, when I do Guile, I want to respect the writers on the movie, because the writers did such an incredible job putting Street Fighter together and the character. I also want to respect Capcom in that I don’t ever want to catch myself creating dialog for Guile. I’m an actor on this beautiful piece of business right here, and I was honored to even don that flat top and be part of this. But I don’t want to add any context or equity because my hope is this becomes Street Fighter One turns into Street Fighter Two. Every one of us had a blast playing these characters, and I think we want them to grow. So I keep it very limited. A lot of grunts, a lot of thumbs up, a lot of Uncle Sam points, a salute occasionally.
But yeah, it’s limited, things that I do as Guile would be tough, because then your question about when are you not in character? Well, what are we doing? It’s one thing if you’re wearing a helmet or a mask because you can almost be you under it and explain it. Guile is such an iconic thing. This is a scary thing about this movie, and it was always going to be a scary thing. I can’t imagine how Callina [Liang] felt, or [Andrew] Koji, or Noah [Centineo]. These characters mean so much to people, and you see them and generational feelings, and cosplay and the fighting game community-they mean so much, man. We cannot do this wrong. Which is thank gosh we had Kitao [Sakurai] to direct this movie because it was about getting it accurate and Capcom being there as a partner. It’s a big amount of responsibility.”
WrestleMania 42. You take the punt from Randy. What was the actual injury?
“I think we skated by with a little bit of an orbital fracture, and that’s not on anyone’s fault but my own. It was bad. I think we skated by a little bit of an orbital fracture, and I think I am mad at myself for doing so because it’s affected my work since, super slowed down.”
Peripheral vision?
“Yeah, just to a degree, to a little bit, and I feel like that’s you can’t go out there QB 1 and saying you’re in your prime, and you’re the best you’ve ever been if you’re dealing with something that’s a bit of a hindrance like that, but at this point we’re out the woods. I got through it. I showed up the next night. I am toxic as can be when it comes to physical stuff. Toxic as can be. ‘I can go. Tape it up. I can go’.”
Like the pec muscle?
“I’m letting you know that’s not good. If you’re a young wrestler, don’t do it. Don’t! Live to fight another day. Something about me can’t not want to go. I don’t know what it is. I love it too much. Maybe it’s ego. I don’t know, but I just can’t not. Yeah, that was a nasty one.”
Maybe you haven’t made it public, but do you think about how much longer you want to do it?
“I just signed my last contract. I say last contract, but that’s going to go for a while, and if I’m able to do what I’ve been able to do, because I would love this year not to be just one movie, but perhaps two movies, and I’d love to kind of be able to share that at some point, get that going, and be in that. With all that said, my time with WWE could go. I mean, just to give you a real answer here, and not politic around you, probably seven years. Six, seven? I didn’t mean it like that, but yeah, you know that’s a kids’ thing, right? Had to have Carmelo Hayes explain to me what that was, and I still didn’t get it. Yeah, six, seven years. I’d say so. Yeah, and I don’t want to say that in a final sense. I just know that I don’t want to overstay my welcome.”
AJ Styles made it clear when we talked he didn’t want to wrestle into his 50s. Do you have that kind of feeling?
“Well, I definitely don’t want to wrestle into my 50s. No shame to anyone who wrestles in their 50s. I don’t want to overstay my welcome in a sense of this, right? So, I have been given so much from wrestling, and you have to think about my career in its totality. The things that we don’t talk about, the things that I don’t get asked about anymore. You have to think about all that. I have shed so much of my skin for the industry, but I have also been given so, so, so much. I think there’s a point where you have to stop taking. I’m not there, but there’s a point, and I think that’s in that time frame, a point where you just have to stop taking. It’s giving me everything. I am talking to you today, the first time I talked to you, I was a mid-card talent at WWE, and no shame to anything in the mid-card. Mid-card’s beautiful. I heard Triple H explain mid-card in a way that changed my perception of it forever. But I was a mid-card talent with a ceiling that was right above my head, and I’m talking to you today as someone who got to play Guile from Street Fighter, created by Capcom, a game that I played growing up as a little kid. Again, be careful what you wish for, but also I don’t know how many moments like this I can take, and I can get hopefully more, hopefully a lot more. But I’ve been so lucky so far and so blessed so far that I think wrestling, I mean, Cody fatigue is already pretty set in.”
You feel that?
“Well, no, maybe. But I think you can only go so far, and you’re only supposed to go so far.”
You previously called out The Rock for a one-on-one match. Were you going to have a one-on-one match with The Rock?
“Oof. It’s not that I’m evading that answer. It’s that I don’t really know how to answer because I think personally he has a couple of matches probably left to do. I think that personally, but I also know looking at WrestleMania 40 and another guy who he’s given all, continues to give all as part of the board. He could easily say that was a great final piece as a performer in a wrestling ring. That’ll be up to him. That’ll certainly be up to him if there’s more and what those matches might be. I don’t think any wrestler would ever look you in the eye and tell you they wouldn’t want a match like that.”
Deadline.com is reporting that Chris Jericho will be portraying Gorgeous George in the upcoming historical drama titled The Greatest, a limited series chronicling the life of Muhammad Ali.
The series, featuring eight episodes, will be released on November 4 exclusively on Prime Video.
Gorgeous George was one of the biggest professional wrestlers of his time with his flamboyant character and was a major celebrity in the 1940s. He passed away in 1963 at the age of 48.
Apart from his role in The Greatest, Jericho will also appear on Dexter: Resurrection’s second season and was recently on CBS’ Tracker.
Facing the opening night of the NBA, NXT took a bit of a dive in the ratings this week, drawing 655,000 viewers, down 77,000 viewers compared to the prior week. The show had a 0.10 rating in 18-49, a drop of 0.04 from the previous episode. (Ratings credit: Wrestlenomics)
Professional wrestling delivers a unique combination of athleticism, storytelling, and live entertainment. Fans see dramatic entrances, championship rivalries, spectacular moves, and unforgettable moments inside the ring. Yet the finished product represents only a small part of the work required to create a successful wrestling show.
Behind the scenes, wrestlers follow demanding schedules involving physical preparation, travel, rehearsals, media appearances, and personal responsibilities. Production crews, trainers, medical professionals, and event coordinators also contribute to performances that appear effortless on television.
For major organizations such as WWE and AEW, maintaining consistent entertainment standards requires careful coordination between numerous departments. Wrestlers must remain physically prepared while managing the realities of performing in different cities throughout the year. Understanding these less visible responsibilities provides a fascinating look at the dedication, planning, and teamwork behind professional wrestling.
Eating Habits Become Essential During Constant Travel
Professional wrestlers frequently travel between cities, making consistent eating habits an important part of their preparation. Early flights, late-night performances, and limited time between commitments can complicate meal planning.
Many performers organize their meals around protein intake, energy requirements, and personal training goals. Convenient food choices become especially useful when access to a kitchen is limited.
Exploring the best low carb snack options can provide inspiration for portable foods that fit into busy schedules. Protein-rich meat snacks and other convenient choices offer practical possibilities for wrestlers who want satisfying food between workouts, appearances, and travel commitments.
Some performers prepare meals in advance, while others develop reliable restaurant orders that suit their preferences.
These routines reflect an important aspect of professional wrestling that rarely appears on television: maintaining consistent habits despite constantly changing surroundings.
Appearance and Skincare Are Part of a Wrestler’s Presentation
Professional wrestling places considerable emphasis on visual presentation. Hairstyles, costumes, entrance attire, and distinctive character details help performers establish recognizable identities.
Television lighting, stage makeup, frequent travel, and intense physical activity also make personal grooming a regular consideration.
Many performers develop routines involving cleansing, moisturizing, and other everyday skincare practices. Choosing suitable skin care products can help wrestlers maintain comfortable personal care routines while preparing for televised appearances, promotional photography, and public events.
For wrestlers whose characters depend on carefully developed appearances, grooming becomes another element of professional preparation.
Costume designers, makeup artists, and hairstylists may also contribute to creating the distinctive looks audiences associate with particular performers.
These details demonstrate how wrestling combines physical performance with the visual demands of television entertainment.
Wrestlers Spend Hours Preparing for Minutes in the Ring
A wrestling match may last only several minutes, but the preparation behind it can involve extensive physical and technical work.
Performers regularly practice wrestling techniques, conditioning exercises, and movements that require coordination with their opponents. Maintaining strength and mobility is particularly important because matches involve repeated impacts, rapid changes of direction, and demanding physical sequences.
Experienced wrestlers also develop an understanding of positioning, timing, and communication inside the ring.
Before major events, performers may discuss the structure of their matches and coordinate important moments with producers.
This preparation helps ensure that individual performances contribute to the wider storyline while maintaining the rhythm expected from professional wrestling.
The physical demands continue beyond individual matches, making recovery and training management essential parts of a wrestler’s schedule.
Backstage Communication Keeps Live Shows Organized
Photo by Claudia Raya on Unsplash
Televised wrestling involves many moving parts that audiences rarely notice. Match producers, referees, camera operators, stage managers, and technical crews must coordinate their responsibilities throughout an event.
A live show follows a carefully structured schedule that includes matches, interviews, entrances, promotional segments, and commercial breaks.
Timing is particularly important when a program is broadcast live. Unexpected delays or changes may require production teams to adjust upcoming segments quickly.
Referees do more than enforce the rules within wrestling’s entertainment format. They also help maintain communication during matches and contribute to their orderly progression.
Backstage producers work with performers to coordinate storytelling and presentation.
The ability to adapt under pressure is one of the defining skills of an experienced wrestling production team.
Travel Schedules Create Challenges Beyond the Arena
Professional wrestling careers can involve considerable time away from home. Performers may travel between cities several times a week, sometimes combining televised appearances with live events and promotional commitments.
Airports, rental vehicles, hotels, and unfamiliar training facilities become regular parts of their working lives.
Managing these arrangements requires organization and flexibility. Delayed flights, changing schedules, and long journeys can interfere with established routines.
Many wrestlers travel with essential training accessories, personal care items, and equipment needed for their performances.
Maintaining relationships with family and friends can also require additional effort during extended periods on the road.
These challenges help explain why professional wrestling demands personal discipline beyond the physical abilities audiences witness during matches.
Character Development Requires Creativity and Collaboration
Memorable wrestling characters rarely develop through athletic ability alone. Successful performers combine appearance, speaking skills, storytelling, and audience interaction to establish distinctive identities.
Creative teams may develop storylines months in advance, coordinating rivalries and championship narratives around major events.
Wrestlers contribute through interviews, promotional segments, and their performances inside the ring.
Audience reactions can influence how characters develop. A performer originally presented as a villain may become popular enough to inspire a different creative direction.
Costumes, entrance music, gestures, and catchphrases reinforce these identities.
The collaborative process resembles television production, with performers interpreting characters while adapting to the unique unpredictability of live audiences.
The Team Behind the Wrestlers Makes Every Show Possible
Although individual wrestlers receive most of the attention, professional wrestling depends on a large network of supporting professionals.
Ring crews assemble and inspect equipment, lighting specialists create dramatic entrances, and camera operators capture important moments from different angles.
Medical personnel and athletic trainers support performers dealing with the physical demands of wrestling.
Travel coordinators, merchandise teams, security personnel, and venue employees contribute to the broader operation.
Every department must complete its responsibilities within a demanding schedule, especially when productions move between arenas.
This cooperation allows major wrestling organizations to maintain recognizable presentation standards across different events.
Ultimately, professional wrestling is much more than the action fans see inside the ring. It is a demanding entertainment business that combines athletic preparation, creative storytelling, personal discipline, and sophisticated production management.
The next time a wrestler walks toward the ring beneath bright lights and roaring crowds, the performance represents countless hours of preparation by people working both in front of and behind the cameras. That collective effort is what makes professional wrestling such a distinctive form of live entertainment.
Appearing in a seven-minute segment on FOX News, TKO Executive Chairman Ari Emanuel was asked about the upcoming TKO events in Saudi Arabia and its region considering the war going on and the travel advisory by the U.S. Department of State not to visit the area.
“Is that show gonna go on?” FOX News host Bret Baier said, referring to Crown Jewel
“Right now, everything is still set,” Emanuel said. “This weekend coming up in Abu Dhabi, we have a UFC fight. We have in the middle of November a Frieze art show. So far so good. Nothing’s been cancelled.”
Asked if he’s getting briefings from the government or if there’s a scenario where they pull the plug on the show, Emanuel responded, “We have a whole team kind of working on this, and if that doesn’t happen, where we can move it. It’s a daily monitoring.”
Crown Jewel is set for Riyadh on Saturday, November 7.
WWE has uploaded the full dark match between Sami Zayn and Cody Rhodes from after Raw on the Club WWE platform.
Zayn and Rhodes battled for the WWE championship and the match was advertised in promotional material leading up to the show to bring in extra ticket sales as only those inside the arena were able to watch it.
Club WWE remains available only to those in the United States for $99 per year, giving fans premium content, discounts on live event tickets, merchandise, and ability to chat with WWE Superstars and more in addition to a rewards system.
NXT will be going head-to-head with AEW Blood & Guts Dynamite on Wednesday, November 4.
The move comes due to the U.S. mid-term election which will take place on Tuesday, November 3, NXT’s regular day. NXT would have been pre-empted in several markets due to ongoing election coverage.
Netflix, which airs NXT internationally, already lists the show for 8PM ET while TV guides in the United States were also updated showing that “episode 44 of season 20” of NXT will air on November 4.
NXT and AEW went head-to-head earlier this month when AEW presented Grand Slam: France versus a regular episode of NXT with no main roster stars appearing. This time around, things could be different though as they take on AEW on their regular night featuring one of their biggest episodes in Blood & Guts.
For the October 6 episodes, NXT had 532,000 viewers with a 0.10 rating in 18-49 while Grand Slam: France had 495,000 viewers with a 0.11 rating in 18-49.
Jim Ross is back home but still sick following a chest cold which resulted in yet another trip to the hospital after low blood oxygen.
Conrad Thompson, JR’s co-host on his Grilling JR podcast, said that Ross is suffering from an infection in his chest and after spending a night at the hospital, JR was discharged and is back home and on the mend.
“He’s just under the weather right now,” Thompson said, adding that the shunt inserted in his brain was not connected again for now after he had to undergo a second brain surgery due to bleeding which caused him massive headaches.
“But we’re hoping, knock on wood, that Good Ol’ JR will be back here next week,” Thompson added regarding the podcast.
The U.S. Department of State has ordered all non-essential diplomats and family members to depart Saudi Arabia as attacks from the Houthi group remain ongoing.
The news from the Kingdom, where WWE are set to stage Crown Jewel on November 7, continues to get worse by the day, with serious questions about the feasibility of putting on a large-scale event in Riyadh while there are ongoing attacks and threats.
The DoS warning also said that operations at Riyadh’s King Khalid International Airport, where the WWE charter flight is supposed to land, remains suspended.
WWE collects a $50 million paycheck every time they go to Saudi Arabia for one of the “B events,” which is more than what WrestleMania usually pulls in terms of revenue. Failure to hold this event will therefore result in a $50 million hole in TKO’s Q4 2026 earnings, something which they are trying to avoid while also pleasing Turki Al-Sheikh, the Saudi chairman of the General Entertainment Authority, who recently posted on X that they will know who their real friends are during these difficult times for the Kingdom.
Al-Sheikh is also a partner in Zuffa Boxing, another branch of TKO Group.
Smackdown last Friday night drew 1,327,000 viewers, down 25,000 viewers from the prior week. The show had a 0.32 rating in 18-49, the same number it pulled for the October 9 episode. (Ratings credit: Wrestlenomics)
The first matches for the next AEW pay-per-view, Full Gear, were announced on Dynamite yesterday.
The AEW Tag Team champions, who lost an eliminator match on Dynamite, will now defend their titles against Mark Davis and Jake Doyle. The Bucks did the job in a squash match much to the surprise of everybody, and Davis and Doyle punched their ticket to Phoenix in the process.
The Brawling Birds, the team of Jamie Hayter and Alex Windsor, will also defend the AEW Women’s Tag Team titles at Full Gear. The two will face Kris Statlander and Harley Cameron. Hayter has been injured since All Out and the titles were not defended at WrestleDream.
Two other matches were teased, but not officially announced yet. These are Mercedes Mone vs Marina Shafir for the AEW Women’s title and “Hangman” Adam Page, Brody King, and Bandido vs Swerve Strickland and The New Level in a Texas Death Match for the AEW Trios titles.
Full Gear takes place on Saturday, November 14 live from the Mortgage Matchup Center in Phoenix, Arizona.
The 12 individuals who will form part of the men’s Blood & Guts match were announced last night on Dynamite.
The faces will have AEW Wold champion Will Ospreay, the AEW Tag Team champions The Young Bucks, TNT champion Darby Allin, Adam Copeland, and Steve Borden and they will square off against AEW International champion Kazuchika Okada, Wardlow, Kyle Fletcher, Kevin Knight, Mark Davis, and Jake Doyle.
The match was set up on the show after Fletcher and Knight defeated Ospreay and Copeland and all hell broke loose.
A women’s Blood & Guts match is also expected to take place on this November 4 episode of Dynamite.
Current TNA X Division champion and Hall of Famer Amazing Red is officially back under a TNA contract reports PWInsider.com.
The 44-year-old is on his third stint with TNA, working with the promotion first between 2002 and 2004, and then again between 2009 and 2011.
He returned to TNA at Slammiversary this past June and was then inducted into the TNA Hall of Fame at Bound For Glory earlier this month. Later in the night, Red also won the X Division title in a seven-way scramble, kickstarting his fourth reign with the championship.
The first images of Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson from the movie Lizard Music made their way online.
In the movie, Johnson plays the role of a 70-year-old man nicknamed The Chicken Man. Using prosthetics and a considerable weight loss, The Final Boss surely does look different from his usual roles.
To achieve the old man look, Johnson is undergoing five hours of makeup and prosthetic work every single day he’s on set.
The American fantasy adventure film is directed by Benny Safdie and based on the book of the same name by Daniel Pinkwater. Safdie is the same director from The Smashing Machine movie.
Joining Johnson on the cast are Theo Clark Leber, Tim Heidecker, Alicia Silverstone, Regina Hall, and Andrew Dice Clay, with the voices of Colman Domingo, Jeff Goldblum, Rachel McAdams, and David Krumholtz.
Raw on October 12 drew 2,500,000 global views on Netflix, up 100,000 views from the prior week and the same average of the past four weeks.
The show barely made it on the Netflix global top 10 chart, coming in at #10 with 4,500,000 viewing hours based on an episode edited down to 1 hour and 46 minutes. A bunch of new seasons which premiered in the same week took the bulk of the other spots.
Raw only charged in the top 10 in nine different countries including Bolivia, Canada, El Salvador, India, Mexico, Nicaragua, Saudi Arabia, Trinidad and Tobago, and United States. It’s the first time in probably since moving to Netflix that it did not chart in the United Kingdom.
PWInsider.com is reporting that WWE has re-signed Dragon Lee to a new, long-term contract believed to be in the region of five years.
The 31-year-old has been working for WWE since 2022, starting in NXT and then moving on to the main roster where he has lately been enjoying much better creative and earning praises from big boss Paul “Triple H” Levesque.
Lee is a former NXT North American champion and also a former WWE World Tag Team champion with Hall of Famer AJ Styles.
