Brian Gewirtz, the former WWE creative writer who now serves as the Senior Vice President of Development for The Rock’s Seven Bucks Production company, will be releasing a book from his time in WWE.
Gewirtz was part of the WWE creative team from 1999 until 2012 and later changed to a consultant until 2015. He worked very close with The Rock on all his material and eventually The Rock hired him as part of his team. When Johnson returns to WWE, Gewirtz is heavily involved in whatever The Rock is doing, including coming up with ideas and promos.
Titled Heels and Heroes, the book will take readers behind the scenes for an unprecedented look at the chaotic, surreal, unbelievable backstage world of the WWE.
“With untold stories from a career spanning over 15 years and featuring the biggest names and controversial moments in wrestling history, Heels and Heroes is an honest, unflinching look on how an introverted life-long fan unexpectedly became one of the most powerful men in all of professional wrestling,” the synopsis for the book reads.
The book will be published by Twelve Books and is set to be released in August 2022.
Hook, the 22-year-old son of Taz, made his AEW debut last night on Rampage, taking on Fuego Del Sol in his first match.
While he has appeared on the show numerous times as part of his dad’s stable of Team Taz, AEW welcomed Hook with an “All Elite” graphic on social media. “It’s official! Welcome to the team, @730hook and congratulations on your tremendous debut win tonight on #AEWRampage,” tweeted AEW President Tony Khan following the match.
His father tweeted that he was so proud of his son and Khan also added to the tweet that he looked “out of this world” in his debut match.
Alberto El Patron, the man also known as Alberto Del Rio in WWE, is now a free man after his sexual assault and kidnapping case was dismissed yesterday.
After four postponements dating back to January of this year, the case finally went ahead but the witness, a woman he was in a relationship with, failed to appear to substantiate her case.
He was originally arrested in May 2020 after the accused said that she was tied, sexually assaulted with various items, forced to dance for him, and beaten up after El Patron accused her of cheating on him. He also allegedly told her that he would take the accused’s son and drop him somewhere in the middle of nowhere.
El Patron was charged with four counts of second degree sexual assault and one count of aggravated kidnapping and was facing up to life in prison if convicted.
With his accuser no-showing, the case was dropped and all charges against El Patron have ben removed.
AEW Rampage will be airing on Christmas Day on Saturday, December 25 instead of Christmas Eve due to scheduled TNT Christmas programming.
The Christmas Day Rampage will be taped following the live Dynamite on December 22 from Greensboro, North Carolina and it will be headlined with Sammy Guevara defending his TNT title against Cody Rhodes in a rematch from the first-ever match on Dynamite from 2019.
Getting an audience that weekend is going to be difficult but AEW decided to go ahead with an original episode regardless. WWE is also going ahead with the Christmas Eve episode of Smackdown but that will be a taped show from Chicago which will be recorded with next Friday’s broadcast.
Chris Jericho, who is currently in the United Kingdom doing a 12-date Save The World tour with Fozzy, was hospitalized yesterday and kept overnight.
The hospitalization means that today’s Fozzy show in Swansea, Wales, has been canceled, with the promoter saying that all tickets for the show will be refunded. The shows for Saturday in Nottingham and Sunday in London are still up in the air at this point but more news will be given shortly.
“Chris was checked into hospital by doctors, with a non-COVID related, treatable health issue,” the band said in a statement published on the Sin City Swansea venue Facebook page.
The tour will end on Sunday and Jericho is expected back with AEW after returning to the United States.
Cartoon Network Latin America announced that Rey Mysterio vs The Darkness, a new series featuring WWE Superstar Rey Mysterio, will debut in 2022. The animated series will have a first order of 10 episodes.
The project was originally announced back in September 2020 and Mysterio will serve as an Executive Producer as well.
The synopsis for the series reads, “Rey Mysterio vs. The Darkness tells the story of Oscar, a wrestling fan, who will team up with his idol, Rey Mysterio, to face supernatural beings and fight against the forces of evil; villains from the world of wrestling and characters from Mexican traditions and the world of fantasy. Behind these extraordinary opponents is Uroboros, an evil fighter who uses dark forces that he does not fully understand. Rey Mysterio and Oscar must work together and do their best to defend the city and themselves from his evil plans.”
This week’s Dynamite on TNT drew 872,000 viewers, up 11,000 viewers from last week’s broadcast. It’s the seventh straight week that the show has failed to break the million viewership mark after successfully doing that for several weeks in a row. The show did 0.33 in the 18-49 demo and was #5 on the top 50 cable chart for the night. (Ratings credit: Showbuzzdaily.com)
Impact Wrestling on AXS TV drew 90,000 viewers this week, down 8,000 viewers from last week’s broadcast. The show did a 0.03 in the 18-49, a rare up-tick of 0.01 from the prior week, placing #136 on the chart. (Ratings credit: Showbuzzdaily.com)
In an interview with Robbie Fox on the My Mom’s Basement show, AEW President Tony Khan revealed that he recently had a call from WWE to see if there’s a possibility to use some of their former talent for interviews in upcoming WWE Network documentaries.
Khan said that “they were very nice” and he’s considering the offer and open to talking to them. He did say that he has not spoken to Vince McMahon directly yet regarding anything.
“They are doing a lot of biographies and they wanted to use some of the people here and I think that’s the thing, it’s probably going to come out sooner or later in interviews,” Khan said. “Or, they want to interview some of the people that wrestle here that used to wrestle there and some people that have had a history in the other libraries that they own.”
Khan noted that he did work with WWE for the Jericho interview on the Steve Austin Broken Skull Sessions and said that as long as everything stays classy, he’s open to it.
“The way they approached me was very classy. So I have nothing bad to say about that,” Khan said. “I don’t know if we’ll see that competition head-to-head, but I am considering some of these requests on some of these biographies. It was actually a very nice call I received the other day.”
The Dynamite Diamond Battle Royal saw Dante Martin and MJF ending up being the final two participants and will now be facing each other during the Winter is Coming episode of Dynamite next week.
Joining Martin and MJF in the 12-man battle royal were Frankie Kazarian, Jay Lethal, Lee Johnson, Lee Moriarty, Lio Rush, Matt Hardy, Matt Sydal, Powerhouse Hobbs, Ricky Starks, and Wardlow.
MJF won the Dynamite Diamond over the past two years and he’s been the only winner so far since the concept was introduced. The winner of the one-on-one match will now get the diamond ring as the prize.
The next AEW pay-per-view, Revolution, will be held on March 6, 2022 and will take place from the Addition Financial Arena in Orlando, Florida.
The PPV will cap off a weekend of AEW activities, with Rampage on March 4 and a fanfest interactive event on March 5 also held in the same location.
The arena is on the main campus of the University of Central Florida, around 16 miles off downtown Orlando, and can sit just under 10,000 fans.
Tickets for Revolution 2022 will go on sale on Friday, December 17 at 10AM ET. There will also be limited combo tickets for both Rampage and Revolution available.
The post-WarGames episode of NXT had just 590,000 viewers, down 47,000 viewers from last week’s broadcast and the second least-watched episode of NXT 2.0. The show did 0.11 in the 18-49 demo, down 0.04 from last week and barely made it in the top 50 chart, occupying #48. (Ratings credit: Showbuzzdaily.com)
Just a month after admitting to Steve Austin in his Broken Skull Sessions interview that he has zero room for mistakes, Jeff Hardy found himself in a yet another unfortunate situation and was released by WWE again.
The news was reported by Sean Ross Sapp of Fightful Wrestling who added that Hardy was offered help and rehab by WWE but he turned the offer down, effectively ending his WWE career.
Jeff was sent home from the WWE tour last weekend after he walked out midway through his six-man tag team match where he teamed up with Xavier Woods and Drew McIntyre to take on Roman Reigns and The Usos. Hardy made the hot tag during the match and exited the arena through the crowd and never came back. Jeff was said to be “sluggish” during the match.
Hardy recently signed a new WWE deal which would have kept him there for the next few years. He had been signed since making his surprise return with his brother at WrestleMania 33.
During his interview with Steve Austin, Hardy spoke about his drug and alcohol addiction and said he disappointed Vince McMahon far too many times, but was grateful for the latest opportunity, saying he was told there there would be no more chances if he messes up again.
Blackjack Lanza, the 86-year-old former pro wrestler, passed away yesterday on December 8. No cause of death was announced.
WWE Chairman and CEO Vince McMahon issued a rare tweet following his passing, writing, “Our hearts go out to the family and friends of Jack Lanza. He was a man’s man, respected and beloved by all. He worked for and loved WWE for many years. His loyalty and dedication will never be forgotten.”
Lanza’s wrestling career spanned over three decades, from his early days wrestling in St. Louis to the AWA, Mid-Atlantic, WWWF, Georgia, and other federations. As part of The Blackjacks with his long-time tag team partner Blackjack Mulligan, Lanza won the AWA World Tag Team Championship, the WWA World Tag Team Championship, and WWWF World Tag Team Championship and in 2006 he was inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame by Bobby “The Brain” Heenan along with his partner.
After his in-ring career was over, Lanza joined the WWE in a backstage role working as a road agent.
Speaking to TVInsider.com, WWE Hall of Famer Shawn Michaels discussed his increased responsibilities in NXT, saying that he went from working two hours a day, three days a week to now working 23 hours a day, seven days a week.
After Triple H suffered that cardiac event, the responsibility of running NXT fell in the hands mainly of Matt Bloom and himself, and while people think that Vince McMahon and Bruce Prichard are running production, Michaels says they only give them direction and Triple H’s original team is in charge of implementing that vision.
“I love learning and growing in the different aspects of WWE, but I have a greater appreciation for everything he took on. I now understand how you can not return a text when you get it. I’ve never had so many emails, learning computer stuff. Things I swore I would never want to do. But have since learned to do that. It has been a blast. To be able to step in for my friend is my honor to do,” the former WWE champion said.
Triple H has still not returned to his day-to-day duties with NXT and continues to recover while doing light work.
HBK added that he knows people hate change but he’s excited about NXT 2.0, and while it was very tough, he’s thankful for the NXT veterans who keep delivering consistently and helping the up-and-comers on their journey.
Monday Night Raw had another bad day when it comes to numbers this week with the show receiving 1,599,000 viewers on average for the three-hour show. That is down, 79,000 viewers from the previous week.
The first hour drew 1,669,000 viewers, then dropped to 1,636,000 viewers in the second hour, before crashing to 1,494,000 viewers in the third and final hour. The night was dominated by the NFL on ESPN which drew 13.2 million viewers.
What’s even more worrying is that Raw registered the lowest 18-49 demo number in its history, with just a 0.35 average this week. Raw was #8, #9, and #10 in the top 50 cable chart with 0.38, 0.35, and 0.33 ratings respectively. (Ratings credit: Showbuzzdaily.com)
Former WWE and WCW star “Hacksaw” Jim Duggan announced that he has beat cancer – again – and is now cancer free.
“We just want to share with everybody the news that I received, with my cancer was all encapsulated inside my prostate,” Duggan said in a video posted on his social media. “The check on my bones came out all clear, the surrounding tissue came out clear, the lymph nodes came out clear, so thank God I’m cancer free!”
Duggan was diagnosed with prostate cancer this year and underwent surgery in October. This was Duggan’s second bout with cancer after 20 years ago he faced kidney cancer as well.
AEW Dynamite is back from the brand new UBS Arena in Long Island, New York tonight and the company has done something rare so far – outselling WWE in the same arena within a week of each other. Over 9,000 fans will be on hand tonight, and while far from a sell out, it’s still more than the around 6,000 that WWE managed to pull for Raw last week.
Set for tonight is the Dynamite Diamond battle royal where 12 AEW stars will feature and the remaining two will then compete in a regular match. The winner of this battle royal gets the Dynamite Diamond ring, currently held by MJF for two consecutive years.
Other matches announced are Bryan Danielson taking on John Silver from The Dark Order, Jamie Hayter versus former AEW Women’s champion Riho, and The Young Bucks vs Rocky Romero and Chuck Taylor.
There have been some incredibly gritty and competitive fights in the UFC’s women’s division over the last decade. Here we’ll be taking a look at what we think are the 5 best in the UFC’s history.
Since the women’s division began back in 2011, we’ve been treated to so many amazing bouts featuring some of the best athletes in mixed martial arts, regardless of gender. Since then, the standards of women’s MMA have increased drastically, and these athletes are now equally respected as fighters as the male competitors.
Dana White has even changed his stance, as he once stated to TMZ in an interview that “women will never fight in the UFC”. One of the women responsible for White changing his position on this matter was Ronda Rousey. It was Rousey who paved the way for the amazing female champions we’ve seen since 2011, some of whom you’ll see in our list.
Let’s kick off our list with the bout that started it all:
5) Ronda Rousey vs. Liz Carmouche (UFC 157)
This bout at UFC 157 was a critical moment in the history of mixed martial arts. Ronda Rousey’s arrival at the UFC also marked a pivotal point in the growth of the UFC as an organization. As the first female bout in the company’s history, it drew a lot of attention and a lot of discussion from new and old fans of UFC alike.
Both competitors were equally fierce as they were technically skilled. Carmouche seemed to be in control early on in the first round as she took Rousey’s back and sinched in a nasty neck crank before Rousey turned things around, submitting Carmouche with her unparalleled jiujitsu skills. She won this bout as she did in her previous 5 bouts in Strikeforce; with an armbar. Rousey was victorious in the first round before 5 minutes had even elapsed.
4) Holly Holm vs. Miesha Tate (UFC 196)
It seemed as if Miesha Tate would always be playing second fiddle to her rival Ronda Rousey. She was the first competitor to make it past the first round against Rousey but, unfortunately for her, she found herself in Rousey’s signature armbar, resulting in her submission.
Holly Holm, on the other hand, managed to finish Ronda Rousey off in one of the biggest upsets in UFC history. This history lays the groundwork going into this awesome bout, as Holm was the clear favorite.
Holm appeared to dominate the majority of the fight, using her stellar footwork to maintain distance from her opponent. Tate, however, was clearly more in control when it came to grappling.
As proceedings entered the fifth round, it was evident that Tate was losing on points, and she was well aware of this.
Then, with a mere 90 seconds remaining on the clock, Miesha found a sudden burst of energy. She managed to capture Holm in a rear-naked choke to secure the victory in one of the most stunning comebacks in the sport’s history.
3) Amanda Nunez vs. Valentina Shevchenko 2 (UFC 215)
In their first bout, these women went 3 rounds before Nunez landed the victory. Their second encounter, however, was different. This time the pair went for 25 minutes in a fiercely competitive and close bout.
Before Nunez fought Shevchenko for the second time, Nunez had already defeated Miesha Tate and Ronda Rousey, and she was really building up her resume and her reputation as one of the greatest female fighters.
Nunez began this bout by setting a relatively slow pace for the Brazillian. This was to preserve her endurance, as her cardio had been a chink in her armour in past fights. Nunez saved her characteristic agression for the later rounds.
Nunez managed to perform two takedowns against Shevchenko in the final round, and she ended up getting the win by split decision 47-48, 48-47 and 48-47. It was a very close bout, but Nunez successfully defended her title for the second time.
2) Rose Namajunas vs. Joanna Jedrzejczyk 2 (UFC 223)
The first fight between these two competitors ended suddenly when Namajunas knocked her opponent out in the first round. Jedrzejczyk, however, felt that her victor got lucky, and sought to enact her revenge the second time around.
This fight was a real strike fest and took place mainly on the two athletes feet before Namajunas finally scored a takedown with only 25 seconds to go in the fifth round. This was the difference maker for her and she won by unanimous decision, successfully defending her title for the first time.
1) Weili Zhang vs. Joanna Jedrzejczyk (UFC 248)
Joanna Jedrzejczyk makes it onto our list for the second time with her instant classic battle against Weili Zhang.
Both competitors displayed a valiant performance, but this was the bout that solidified Zhang as a true champion in the UFC.
After a close and ruthless bout, Zhang managed to secure her victory by unanimous decision. Her power and aggression was on full display here, despite slowing down slightly and fatiguing towards the end of the fifth round. Her sheer will and determination was her path to victory.
WWE today unveiled 15 college athletes who will be among the first to participate in the company’s newly formed NIL (Name, Image & Likeness) program that provides a clear pathway from collegiate athletics to WWE.
The inaugural Next In Line class includes athletes from 13 universities, seven NCAA conferences and four sports. In addition to the United States, the class includes representation from myriad countries spanning from Canada and Nigeria. The following 15 athletes join Olympic gold medalist Gable Steveson in WWE’s first-of-its-kind NIL program:
Carlos Aviles (Track & Field), Haley Cavinder (Basketball), Hanna Cavinder (Basketball), A.J. Ferrari (Wrestling), Lexi Gordon (Basketball), Aleeya Hutchins (Track & Field), John Krahn (Football), Glen Logan (Football), Isaac Odugbesan (Track & Field), Mason Parris (Wrestling), Masai Russell (Track & Field), Jon Seaton (Football), Joe Spivak (Football), Dalton Wagner (Football), and Riley White (Track & Field).
