WWE announced today that the Tribute to the Troops broadcast this Sunday will feature a performance by chart-topping Country artist HARDY.
“I am so excited to play WWE Tribute to the Troops,” said HARDY. “As a big supporter of our United States military, I am honored to be able to perform for them. Can’t wait to rock the house and God bless America.”
The Tribute to the Troops show will be taped this Friday along with Smackdown and will take place inside the WWE ThunderDome where servicemen and women and their families from Marine Corps Air Station New River, US Army Post Fort Hood, U.S. Navy Aircraft Carrier USS John C. Stennis (CVN 74), Naval Air Station Fallon and Naval Air Weapons Station China Lake will appear on the screens as fans.
“HARDY is an immensely talented singer and songwriter who has worked with some of the most prolific names in country music,” said Neil Lawi, Senior Vice President and General Manager, WWE Music Group. “WWE is thrilled to have him perform at TV’s most patriotic show of the year as together we celebrate our troops and their families.”
Tribute to the Troops will air adjacent to Sunday’s regional NFL broadcasts. Viewers with an NFL matchup airing at 1PM ET can watch the special at 4:30PM ET while viewers with an NFL matchup airing at 4:05PM ET can watch at 3PM ET.
WWE has let go another long-time employee of over 30 years as cost-cutting measures due to COVID-19 continue behind the scenes.
Kevin Quinn, the former Senior Editor, Director of Editing, Technical Director, Director and Vice President of TV Technology for WWE is the latest casualty and Quinn did a Reddit AMA on the r/SquaredCircle fan forum yesterday to talk about his WWE experience.
Quinn performed every aspect of television production during his three-decade career with the company, from manning cameras, to audio, to graphics, and editing. One thing he had never done live though was edit matches, something that eventually changed when he directed the WrestleMania 29 pre-show at the MetLife Stadium.
“I’ve edited matches since I was a kid but never directed a match live,” Quinn said.
Matches weren’t the only thing he edited, as Quinn also did work on practically every WWE show you saw on television or Network. Asked about his toughest edit, Quinn said it came when Jerry “The King” Lawler was accused of statutory rape and they had three hours of programming with him in it. “We had to remove him from every show already shot. It took 2 over-nights,” Quinn recounted.
Asked what was the most challenging aspect of his job when it comes to adapting new technology to WWE broadcasts, Quinn said people would often think that transitioning from SD to HD would have been the biggest challenge, but no, going from mono audio to stereo sound was the biggest one he faced.
Quinn has no hard feelings towards Vince McMahon or the company for letting him go, describing Vince as very personable behind the scenes and that he loves the people that help him take care of WWE. “But business is business,” he added, noting that Vince invited him to both of his kids’ weddings.
But it’s Stephanie who he enjoyed working with the most, calling her “dream to work with” because she’d tell you what she wants, you tell her what you have to make it, and it’s game on.
If sports games are very present in Europe, this is not the case in Africa where the phenomenon is not very developed. However, some African countries stand out from others with the upsurge in online games and casinos. Thus, in Uganda, Morocco or South Africa and others, betting is a recurring thing. We have analyzed the 5 most developed African countries in terms of sports betting.
Kenya: country par excellence for casinos
Both land-based and online casinos are encouraged in Kenya. No restrictions in this area, which makes the remarkable notoriety of the country which is full of internationally renowned casinos. In Kenya, online casinos offer maximum convenience to players, whether land-based or online. Slot machines, table games, entertainment, and more, there is much to be comfortable with in Kenya when you are passionate about sports games.
Sports games in South Africa: simple or complex?
South Africa is one of the most successful countries when it comes to online gaming. It brings together a passionate multitude, both nationally and internationally. Horse racing, slot machines and other popular games of chance – there’s no shortage of it. However, for online betting, there are regulations in force giving the possibility to players to bet only on sports games and horse racing. Online betting for casinos and interactive games is prohibited at the risk of seeing the structure or the casino concerned suffer the related consequences.
Sports betting in Botswana: a lifestyle?
As in Kenya, no regulations on sports games. If you fancy a good casino in Botswana, opt for the Grand Palm Casino located in Gaborone. With all the gaming machines and tables, not to mention the video poker on offer, you won’t get bored. Sports betting in Botswana is very usual and common, as no less than 7 cities have online casinos in the country.
Morocco: is it an ideal choice for gambling?
Morocco has a whole history linked to casinos. It is also one of the countries that experienced the casino phenomenon very early on, the very first dating from 1952. The legal aspect was not developed until 2002. Casinos are very developed and numerous in Morocco with a variety of games to the delight of players. Whether in Marrakech, Agadir or Casablanca, any gambling enthusiast will find it on his own.
Sports games in Uganda: a booming sector
In Uganda, gambling is booming. Of course, they can be practiced freely and legally, but there are a limited number of casinos. However, players have all the necessary comfort to indulge their passion in the few casinos present in the country. The games are many and varied and perfectly meet the expectations of these players. In this country, online casinos are more developed. Players tend to prefer to play online because they are given a lot of convenience. For example, they can easily get betting bonuses in Uganda.
Africa is likely to become a continent where the casino industry will grow rapidly, along with the expansion of Internet support to various countries there.
Former WWE champion AJ Styles will get another shot at the gold after he won a number one contender’s match last night on Raw.
Styles beat Keith Lee and Riddle in a triple threat match with Riddle taking the pinfall after AJ’s Phenomenal Forearm finisher to earn a ticket to TLC and face Drew McIntyre for the title.
AJ spent 371 days as WWE champion between November 2017 and November 2018, winning the WWE title from Jinder Mahal on Smackdown in Manchester, England, and then losing it to Daniel Bryan on Smackdown as well a year later in St. Louis, Missouri.
He held the title on one other occasion between 2016 and 2017 for 140 days, losing it to John Cena at the Rumble in January 2017.
Dynamite had a rare loss in the ratings on Thanksgiving eve, getting a total of 710,000 viewers, down 140,000 viewers from the previous week. This was the least-watched Dynamite since June 24. Dynamite had a 0.26 in the 18-49 demographic and placed #7 in the top 50 cable chart. The difference between the two shows was of just 2,000 viewers in favor of NXT after Dynamite had 212,000 viewers more the previous week. (Ratings credit: Showbuzzdaily.com)
NXT got a surprise viewership win in the Wednesday night ratings war last week, barely edging out Dynamite on Thanksgiving eve. NXT did a total of 712,000 viewers, up 64,000 viewers from the previous week. The show did a 0.20 in the 18-49 demographic, landing the show in #25 on the top 50 cable chart. (Ratings credit: Showbuzzdaily.com)
Two matches have been announced for tonight’s Monday Night Raw so far as WWE continues its latest tradition of barely announcing anything for its weekly television shows…mainly because most of the time they’re still being written up until the show starts!
The new number one contender for the WWE title will be decided tonight, or so they say, in a triple threat match between Keith Lee, AJ Styles, and Riddle. The winner of this match will face Drew McIntyre at the TLC pay-per-view next month.
Speaking of Drew McIntyre, WWE.COM is also advertising an “exclusive interview,” whatever that may mean, with the champion. Also, Randy Orton will be interviewed by Alexa Bliss during her segment A Moment of Bliss.
The second match announced will be a Symphony of Destruction match between Jeff Hardy against Elias. The match is basically a no holds barred match with musical instruments at ringside available as weapons.
NXT North American champion Leon Ruff has proposed to his girlfriend, NXT referee Aja Smith.
“I SAID YES!,” Smith wrote on Twitter along with a photo of the two together and one showing the bling on her finger.
Smith, real name Aja Perera, is a 26-year-old Brazilian and has been signed to a WWE deal since February of this year. Prior to joining WWE, she was a wrestler and worked for SHIMMER, SHINE, Queens of Combat, and other promotions. Ruff, 24, signed his WWE deal in October although he made various appearances with the company throughout the year.
Smith went public with their relationship when Ruff was destroyed by Karrion Kross a few months ago on NXT. “If you would have told me a year ago I’d be a referee, let alone referee my boyfriend’s match on TV, I woulda neverrrr believed it! Life is so cool. You’re always a winner to me,” she wrote back in May.
Alberto El Patron’s (Del Rio) ex-girlfriend apologized to him and his family in a post on Instagram, taking back everything she said when in May of this year she called the cops and got the former champ arrested for brutally beating and sexually assaulting her.
Written in Spanish, his ex who has the Instagram username of @reynaq_p said that she apologizes to the Rodriguez family for the damages she caused by her mistakes.
The incident came when El Patron, real name Jose Rodriguez, accused her of being unfaithful and became aggressive when she did not admit her infidelity. The police report states that he slapped her across the head, slapper her again, took her to his downstairs bedroom and slapped her eight more times. She was forced to put on a dress and dance for him, but she refused, prompting him to warn her not to cry or he’d take her son and “drop him off in the middle of the road somewhere.” Rodriguez then allegedly tied the woman’s hands with boxing straps, put a sock in her mouth and sexually assaulted her for several hours, using various objects. According to investigators, he also punched her in the back during the assault, causing visible injuries. The victim told detectives she does not remember much after he placed his hand around her throat.
Rodriguez was eventually charged by the Bear County District Attorney‘s office with one count of aggravated kidnapping and four counts of sexual assault and was awaiting trial. It’s not known if charges were dropped yet.
Meanwhile, his brother Hijo De Dos Caras posted a lengthy message on Instagram saying that after many months, the trashy person who accused his brother admitted that she lied. He said he hopes that those who supported his brother do not turn their back on him because he was just a victim of a greedy person.
Multiple sources have confirmed that Braun Strowman was “suspended” on last week’s Raw because he is suffering from a knee injury that will keep him off television for now.
According to Dave Meltzer of the Observer, Strowman was the original number one contender for Drew McIntyre’s WWE title at the TLC pay-per-view but with the injury popping up, it is now down to Styles vs Lee vs Riddle to determine the challenger for McIntyre.
Strowman was “suspended” storyline-wise for attacking Adam Pearce on the show.
Charles “The Godfather” Wright said that the Bone Street Krew rolled back time during their reunion last weekend in Orlando ahead of The Undertaker’s final farewell at the Survivor Series.
Speaking to Sports Illustrated, The Godfather said that when WWE invited him for the show, he got in touch with Taker to bring the gang back together for one more night. And they all came – Savio Vega, Rikishi, Henry and Phineas Godwinn, joined Godfather and two of their closest friends, former referee Tim White and Booker T, for the special occasion.
The photo of all of them together, along with The Undertaker, was posted on the Internet from the group’s hotel in Orlando where they drank beer and whiskey…but no food was served!
“For that one night, the past came back to life,” said Wright. “If you didn’t know any better, it felt like it was 20 years ago. We told stories, we hugged, we cried – and we put Timmy White to bed, just like we used to back in the day!”
The original BSK also included Yokozuna, Mr Fuji, Paul Bearer, and Brian “Crush” Adams, all of whom have since passed away.
Following the report on The Globe and Mail about the plans to tear down the SkyDome for a new ballpark and condo and office towers, Rogers Communications, the owners of the site, issued a statement saying that the plan is currently on hold due to COVID-19.
“Prior to the pandemic, we were exploring options for the stadium but through this year our primary focus has been keeping our customers connected and employees safe, so there is no update on the Rogers Centre to share at this time,” a statement published by the CBC said.
But when those plans resume, city councillor Joe Cressy told The Globe and Mail that he doesn’t predict any opposition to the takedown of the SkyDome.
“From the early conversations, the discussion was how do we revitalize the stadium and think about other city-building objectives alongside it,” Cressy said. The project is more than likely going to win political support because of two reasons: it’s privately funded and it would create more public space.
The SkyDome, now called the Rogers Centre, hosted WrestleMania 6 and 18 as well as an episode of Monday Night Raw.
Smackdown had a drop in viewership this week, getting an average of 1,986,000 viewers in the overnight ratings, down 229,000 viewers from last week’s overnight. Last week’s show ended up with 2,326,000 viewers when final numbers came in.
The first hour had 2,016,000 viewers and the second hour followed with 1,957,000 viewers. The show was #2 in the 18-34, #2 in 18-49, and #3 in 25-54 with 0.3, 0.55, and 0.65 in the ratings respectively. (Ratings credit: Showbuzzdaily.com)
Fit Finlay, the WWE producer who was furloughed back in April, has resumed his duties with the promotion, joining Shane Helms who also returned to work this week.
Finlay’s furlough, due to coronavirus cost-cutting measures, was a big surprise back in April as he was considered to be one of the leading individuals backstage in that department, especially when it comes to women’s wrestling.
The 62-year-old returned to WWE in 2012, a year after he was fired due to a bad judgment call at a non-televised live event. In March of 2011, Finlay was in charge of a house show when he gave the go-ahead to The Miz to interrupt the U.S. national anthem, drawing anger from members of the military who were in attendance.
Duane Gill, the enhancement talent who later went on to play the comedic gimmick of Gillberg, suffered a heart attack this week.
Gill, now 61, retired from wrestling earlier this year after 30 years in the business.
His friend and fellow former WWE Superstar James Ellsworth announced Gill’s hospitalization and on Thursday gave an update saying that he is now out of intensive care and resting in hospital.
“I just got off the phone with the wife of Duane Gill…also known as Gillberg…she wanted to let everyone know what’s going on with Duane. He had a heart attack yesterday, but he is doing good now and just got out of ICU,” Ellsworth said in a video.
Gill wrestled for WWE between 1991 and 1994 as an enhancement talent, or jobber as it was called back then, and then in 1998 he signed a short-term deal and joined the J.O.B. Squad. He won the Light Heavyweight title in 1998 before transitioning to his Gillberg gimmick.
Gillberg came following the popularity of Bill Goldberg in WCW and WWE saw it as a way to mock Goldberg.
Gill made sporadic appearances on WWE television since he left the company in 2000, the most recent one in a February 2017 episode of Raw when he came out as Gillberg and was attacked by Kevin Owens.
The Globe and Mail in Toronto is reporting that the Rogers Centre, the world-famous building formerly known as the SkyDome, is on the verge of being demolished after plans have been submitted to redevelop the 12.7-acre site with a new baseball field, condo and office towers.
Renamed to Rogers Center in 2004 by the telecom company after they purchased it for just $25 million, the site is the home of the Toronto Blue Jays and has hosted two of the most popular WrestleManias ever – WrestleMania 6 and 18.
Opened in 1989 after three years of construction at a cost of $570 million, the-then SkyDome also hosted the Toronto Argonauts of the CFL, Toronto Raptors of the NBA, and hosted the NCAA International Bowl for three years.
But perhaps for wrestling fans, the SkyDome hosted two mega dream matches in the history of professional wrestling: Hulk Hogan vs The Ultimate Warrior and Hulk Hogan vs The Rock.
WrestleMania 18 still holds the biggest attendance for the SkyDome with an announced 68,237 fans in the building. WrestleMania 6 held the previous record with 67,678 fans.
WWE also hosted one episode of Monday Night Raw at the stadium on February 13, 1999 with Steve Austin vs The Corporation in a gauntlet match. That episode of Raw remains the largest one ever with over 40,000 fans watching inside.
The second episode of Total Bellas is filled with as much drama as the previous episode. This time, we see that Nikki and Brie are still dealing with life as two extremely pregnant people during a global pandemic.
I think, that the twins must be getting extremely bored, because they seem to be simply creating drama in order to make their lives more interesting.
First off, Nikki’s boyfriend, Artem, has taken up a new hobby, bicycling. Nikki seems to think that her fiancé cannot enjoy his new hobby alone, because she enlists her mother, Kathy, to be Artem’s new cycling partner. Perhaps, it hadn’t occurred to Nikki that Artem might have enjoyed his solitary cycling adventures. However, he seems to have no problem cycling with his future mother-in-law in tow.
In fact, he and Kathy enjoyed their bicycling adventure so much that Kathy invited Artem to join her on a hike, and for a round of golf. While gulping, Artem and Kathy sent the twins a video showing them enjoying drinks and informing the twins of their plans to play another round. In typical Bella fashion, Nikki and Brie became frustrated by the fact that they were not invited on the golfing adventure. Rather than suggesting that perhaps they would like to be invited next time, they proceeded to go and spy on Artem and Kathy while they were golfing. Does it disturb anyone else that these women are now responsible for the health and happiness of kids when they themselves often behave like children? Eventually, however, Brie and Nikki were discovered by Artem and Kathy and invited to join in the golfing fun.
Meanwhile, Brie continues her attempts to prep Nikki for all that could go wrong during her impending labor. In the process of preparing Nikki, Brie ended up scaring herself. She forced Nikki to watch the video of her labor with her daughter, Birdie. Brie had an extremely difficult labor with Birdie with her birth plan being a natural at home delivery…but she ended up having to have a C-section.
Re-watching her daughter’s birthing video reminded Brie of all they could go wrong during labor. She also made it worse for herself by insisting that she and Nicole participate in a meditation class. In class, the first task the were asked to do was to let go of a few fears that they might have, which Brie was incapable of doing. Her husband, Bryan, came to her rescue by letting her see the end of the video where their beautiful daughter was born. He reminded Brie that it didn’t matter whether or not Brie had a natural birth or a C-section as long as the end result was a healthy baby.
Meanwhile, Nicole was having difficulty letting go of another emotion, anger.
Nicole and her brother, JJ, aren’t seeing eye to eye at the present time. They had recently gotten in a huge debate about politics. In addition, they have an ongoing debate concerning Nicole’s relationship with their father.
JJ has chosen not to forgive their father or the wrongs done to them in their childhood, while both Nikki and Brie have chosen to rekindle their relationship with their dad. This combined with their political disagreement has caused JJ and Nikki not speak for a little while. Brie encouraged Nicole to make up with her brother before the birth of her son however Nicole continued to say that she didn’t want her son exposed to the kind of rudeness which her brother displayed.
All fans can hope is that there will eventually be a reconciliation between the two before the birth of both twin’s babies.
Dave Meltzer of the Wrestling Observer is reporting that Impact Wrestling had a positive COVID-19 test at the last television tapings.
Some of the wrestlers were notified about it but not everyone found out first hand, leading to several talent who were not impressed with the lack of communication.
According to Meltzer, the positive coronavirus test was of a wrestler “believed to be part of a group of several people who all traveled together and were tight.” The individual who tested positive was not named.
This was the first known positive coronavirus test within the Impact Wrestling ranks since the pandemic started.
NXT UK crowned the first Heritage Cup champion yesterday after A-Kid defeated Trent Seven in the final match of the tournament.
A-Kid won the cup after he submitted Seven in sudden death overtime after each of them won one pinfall throughout the six rounds.
Using the British wrestling rules of six rounds, the Heritage Cup involved eight NXT UK Superstars in a tournament and featured Alexander Wolfe, Noam Dar, A-Kid, Flash Morgan Webster, Dave Mastiff, Joseph Conners, Trent Seven, and Kenny Williams.
To win the tournament, A-Kid went through Flash Morgan Webster and Noam Dar before beating Seven while Seven beat Kenny Williams and Dave Mastiff.
“There can only be one ‘first.’ Congratulations to @AKidWrestler on winning the #NXTUK #HeritageCup…incredible match and the beginning of big things for this young man,” Triple H tweeted after the show aired. “Can’t wait to see you represent your country and this brand in the future.”
WWE will be airing its seventh WWE 24 documentary for 2020 soon, and the subject of the new original doc will be former NXT champion Keith Lee.
“Amidst all the currents of this world… I am thankful. The people close to me. The #WWEUniverse. Struggles… victories. All of it built this…so far,” Lee wrote in a tweet. “The people who helped create this little piece of me. I look forward to offering it to you.”
This is the 30th episode of the highly-acclaimed series and the first one revolving around Lee. This year, WWE has already put out episodes on WrestleMania 35, R-Truth, Edge, Ric Flair, WrestleMania 36, and Drew McIntyre.
These episodes are not available on the free version of the WWE Network and a subscription is required to watch them.
