Speaking to Sam Roberts on the Notsam Wrestling podcast, Blake Monroe said she’s in no rush to get to the main roster and is loving her time in NXT.
Many fans online have criticized the way she is booked and how WWE have “fumbled” her after a strong showing in AEW. But the former Mariah May is not sweating it.
“I don’t know why there is some kind of…’I need to be called up.’ I’m not in any rush,” she said. “As I said, I still have so much to do. I’ve hardly feuded with any of the women. I mean, Jordynne Grace wasted a lot of my time, and now Jaida Park is chasing me around, but there’s so many women I want to wrestle.”
Monroe added that she hasn’t even gotten to the NXT Women’s title scene so there’s still a lot of things to do in NXT for her.
The British star arrived in WWE in June 2025 after a highly-successful run in AEW where she was the AEW Women’s champion as well.
There could be changes for Raw tonight due to the bad weather which has affected the north east of the United States with a major blizzard dumping a lot of snow in certain areas of the country, making traveling a little bit more difficult.
Raw is in Atlanta, Georgia, which is not affected by the blizzard, but getting to it from certain states is proving to be difficult. The airport is also experiencing a lot of delays and flight cancellations both to and from.
One person who will definitely not be on Raw is backstage correspondent Jackie Redmond. However, her no-show has nothing to do with the weather. Redmond was over in Italy for Winter Olympics coverage and with the Olympics wrapping up yesterday, she will not make it in time for the broadcast.
Appearing on The Jim Rome Show, Ronda Rousey criticized TKO and UFC for no longer having the priority of putting up the best fights where priority now is spend as little money as possible.
Talking about her upcoming fight against Gina Carano on Netflix, promoted by MVP, Rousey said that they did take the fight to Dana White first and he did give her a deal which would have made her more money than anyone in history.
“I went to Dana White and said, ‘Dude…you always say that I’m the best fighter you ever worked with. Like, reward me for it. Don’t punish me for being easy to work with. Give me the best deal you ever gave anybody,” Rousey said. “He came back and he literally brought me a deal where I would make more per pay-per-view buy than anybody in history!”
But with no PPV model and now just streaming, the way fighters are paid has changed and Rousey said that they did not want to set a precedent of giving her the guaranteed money because once she’s paid for that, then they have to do it for the rest as well.
“It’s in their best interest actually not to put on the best fights possible, but to spend as little as money as possible so that they can keep it,” Rousey continued. “It no longer made sense for for me to go over there because they didn’t want to pay us the money that we deserve because then for the rest of the the time of the deal, they’re going to have to pay everybody else more. And so then I decided to look elsewhere.”
In the post UFC Fight Night 267 press conference, UFC President Dana White was asked about it and quizzed if he’s disappointed that they’re not promoting but happy that Ronda is getting back into the sport.
“Yeah, her and I have been talking about this since last year and, hm, yeah…it just didn’t work out,” White said. “I’m happy…listen, me and Gina are in a really good place, we weren’t at one point and I’m happy for both of them.”
A stipulation with rather high stakes have been added to the AAA Mega title match between champ Dominik Mysterio and El Hijo del Vikingo at the upcoming AAA Rey de Reyes event.
The no disqualification main event match now has the stipulations that if Dominik wins, then Vikingo cannot challenge for the title again as long as he is the champion while if Vikingo wins, then Mysterio has to depart AAA forever.
In other Rey de Reyes related news, The War Raiders earned a shot at the AAA Tag Team titles and will be taking on champs Pagano and Psycho Clown on the show as well.
Rey de Reyes takes place on March 14 at Auditorio GNP Seguros in Puebla, Mexico. More WWE Superstars will be involved in the event.
The show is almost sold out with only seats in the third level remaining.
Collision last night ended with FTR flattening the brother of The Young Bucks with a piledriver.
The show took place from Oceanside, California, close to where The Bucks are from and their family was at ringside to watch the show.
The main event featured The Rascalz vs FTR in an AEW Tag Team title eliminator match, with the stipulation that if The Rascalz won, they would get a shot at the tag titles at a later date.
The match saw The Young Bucks come out to distract their Revolution opponents, and the tactic work as The Rascalz hit their finisher on Dax Harwood for the victory.
But then chaos erupted, with GoA coming out to attack The Young Bucks. Their father, sitting in front row, shoved Harwood, and Stokely Hathaway retaliated by throwing powder in his face. The dad spit at Hathaway and Cash Wheeler then pushed him down hard. The two then dragged Malachi, The Young Bucks’ brother, and beat him up.
Jack Perry ran out to save the day but was cut off by Ricochet, wiping him on the aisle. GoA then each held Matt and Nick down and made them watch as FTR delivered a piledriver on Malachi to end the show.
NXT referee Victoria D’Errico made her Smackdown debut last night, taking the match between Oba Femi and Kit Wilson.
The former boxer joined WWE in November 2024 following a tryout a few months earlier at WrestleMania week in Philadelphia.
D’Errico, who is only 25 years old, is the third female WWE referee on the roster, following Jessika Carr and Daphanie LaShaunn.
She posted a photo on Instagram raising the hands of Femi, writing “First #Smackdown” along with a blue heart and a checkmark. Several of her NXT colleagues congratulated her on this milestone, leaving her comments.
The next NXT premium live event, Vengeance Day, will not be on the road and instead it will stay in Orlando, Florida at the WWE Performance Center.
Shawn Michaels announced that the the March 7 PLE is “so big” that they’re “bringing it home” where NXT was built.
The show is currently headlined by Joe Hendry vs Ricky Saints for the NXT title and the only other match announced is Izzi Dame vs Tatum Paxley for the NXT Women’s North American title.
The show airs on Peacock in the United States, and could very well be the last one on there as the NXT PLE media rights deal expires in the beginning of April. No updates have been given as to where NXT will reside after the Peacock deal expires. Internationally, NXT airs on Netflix.
WWE announced that the Elimination Chamber Superstore in Chicago will be located at The Carter Chicago on 1948 W Fulton Street, just a few blocks north of the United Center.
Opening hours will be Thursday from 1PM to 7PM, Friday from 10AM to 9PM, Saturday from 10AM to Midnight, and Sunday from 10AM to 2PM.
Store entry is free to the public.
The store and the photo ops locations are in different areas this time around, approximately 1.7 miles apart, a six minute drive or a 30 minute walk. Photo ops will be at 401 North Morgan Street.
The police bodycam footage from the Vince McMahon car crash back on July 24, 2025 was released by the Connecticut State Police Department and published by The Sun.
McMahon was at the wheel of a Bentley Continental GT Speed and caused the multi-car crash, ramming into the back of a BMW while a third car, a Ford Fusion, was also damaged in the same accident after debris from both cars landed on the other lane.
After a State Trooper caught up to McMahon in his crashed car, he told him that he hit almost 115 miles an hour when he was trying to reach him.
“I’m trying to drive. I haven’t been driving my car in God knows how long,” McMahon responded. “God damn it. Stupid f*cking fool.”
McMahon was ordered to hand over his insurance documents and license and did so while he told the officer that he was visiting his grand daughter for her birthday. The cop noted that the car was fast and McMahon said that it was “too f*cking fast.”
The former WWE chief was not injured but did ask the State Trooper if anyone else was injured on the scene. He then walked over to apologize to the driver of the BMW.
McMahon was charged with reckless driving and following too closely and in October, a judge said McMahon can enter a pretrial program if he can make a $1,000 charitable donation. All charges would be dropped if he completed the program within a year.
NXT last Wednesday drew 744,000 viewers, up big by 107,000 viewers over the previous week and their best number since July 22, 2025. The show, however, dropped in the 18-49 demo, getting only a 0.09 compared to the 0.12 of the prior episode, a drop of 0.03. (Ratings credit: Programming Insider)
The final two Elimination Chamber qualifying matches for Smackdown took place on last night’s episode.
In the first qualifier, Kiana James picked up a surprising victory over Charlotte Flair and Nia Jax. Flair had the match almost won after she locked in Jax in the Figure Eight but James managed to wiggle her way in and pinned Flair for the victory.
Later in the show, Trick Williams bested his former tag partner Carmelo Hayes and Damian Priest to advance to the Chamber after he pinned Priest following the Trickshot knee finisher.
Two more spots are left, one in each match, and those will be decided this coming Monday on Raw.
The women’s match so far has James, Tiffany Stratton, Alexa Bliss, Rhea Ripley, and Asuka while the men’s match features Williams, Cody Rhodes, Randy Orton, Je’Von Evans, and LA Knight.
Smackdown is back on SyFy tonight at 8PM ET due to USA Network’s coverage of the Winter Olympics. The show returns to USA Network next week.
The Elimination Chamber qualifying matches continue on the broadcast with the final qualifiers for the Smackdown brand. In the women’s qualifier, it will be Charlotte Flair vs Nia Jax vs Kiana James while the men’s qualifier features Carmelo Hayes vs Damian Priest vs Trick Williams.
Also set for tonight, Giulia vs Iyo Sky in a non-title match, Ilja Dragunov vs Tama Tonga, and Oba Femi takes on Kit Wilson.
WWE uploaded a 22-minute vlog chronicling AJ Styles’ final four months in WWE.
The bulk of the footage obviously comes from the Royal Rumble in Riyadh, where Styles had his final match against Gunther.
The vlog shows Styles interacting with the likes of Roman Reigns, Randy Orton, CM Punk, and many other WWE stars before his match and then coming back to a weeping and silenced Gorilla Position after his loss.
After going through Gorilla and going to a private area away from everyone, Styles is then hugged by everyone on the roster, some of whom, like Xavier Woods, Charlotte Flair, Rhea Ripley, R-Truth, and others, all emotional just like him.
WWE will pay tribute to Styles this coming Monday on Raw live from his hometown of Atlanta, Georgia.
ESPN is airing a three-hour version of the 2026 WWE Royal Rumble this Sunday, February 22 on their main ESPN channel.
The show, according to TV guides, is slated to start at 8PM ET and will run until 11PM.
This is the first time that ESPN is airing a premium live event replay on their linear channel, with their contract with WWE also calling for certain live WWE broadcasts to air simultaneously on ESPN linear.
WWE moved to ESPN in September 2025, with the sports network being the home of all WWE premium live events for the next five years.
An emotional Janel Grant took the stage at the Connecticut Alliance Survivors Speak Event yesterday and delivered a rare 15-minute public speech.
Grant, who is the subject a big lawsuit against Vince McMahon, WWE, and others, was there as survivors, advocates, legislators, and state leaders gathered to call on the legislature to codify the federal Prison Rape Elimination Act into state law and reform state non-disclosure agreement policies which are used to silence survivors.
“I really shouldn’t be here. By a series of miracles that I can’t account for, I’m alive today,” Grant said to open her speech. “On June 15 of 2022, my life was rewritten into someone else’s storyline. And I was globally outed in the Wall Street Journal.”
Grant detailed the tumultuous time she had following the WSJ story, with requests from WWE that she declined to take. She spoke about the NDA she had signed and how she was given the status of a whistleblower by the Securities and Exchange Commission after the federal criminal investigation into Vince McMahon took place.
She said that she got the subpoena and status a couple of days before Vince McMahon and Endeavor’s Ari Emanuel appeared on CNBC together to announce the sale of WWE.
“Color me the most surprised person on planet Earth,” Grant said regarding the news.
Her speech closed with a message to TKO and its leadership.
“To the board of TKO, if you didn’t know this part of your origin story, now you know. I hope you will have conversations with us. I will hope you have conversations amongst yourselves, and I hope that you don’t rely on old instincts with new insight,” Grant said. “All of you have some say in how my life turns out from here, including how quickly I may be able to move on and find help and healing.”
Her speech is available below starting at the 10:30 mark. A U.S. IP address is required to watch.
ROH Women’s Pure champion Deonna Purrazzo aired her frustration of not having defended the title once since she won the inaugural belt at the ROH Final Battle event last year.
It’s been 77 days since Purrazzo won the title, but she only wrestled three times since then, and just once in 2026, with all of the matches coming in the form of tag team bouts.
In a recent interview with BCP+, Purrazzo said she’s disappointed she has not defended her title yet and she’s been trying to see what more can she do and give to the business.
“For that not to be reciprocated in any environment, not just in Ring of Honor, is really defeating for me,” she wrote.
Purrazzo is also taking independent bookings to stay busy and active considering her work in Ring of Honor has been very limited lately.
“It’s really defeating. It’s really upsetting. But at the end of the day, this is a business and I have to continue to run my own, at whatever stakes that costs,” she wrote when announcing her indie availability.
Bianca Belair is on the road to recovery after undergoing surgery to fix her broken knuckle this week, 10 months after suffering the injury during a triple threat match at WrestleMania 41.
An injury which was supposed to last just a couple of months is heading towards a full year as complications derailed the former champion’s comeback.
“10 months post injury, 8 months of rehab, 5 Dr’s Later…And we are FINALLY here,” Belair wrote in a post on Instagram, adding some graphic photos of her finger. “Now I can finally start to put this behind me. Thank you so much Dr. Desai for hearing me and fixing me!”
Belair also posted two videos receiving rehabilitation, almost crying from pain as her finger is stretched.
“Fingers and JOINTS are complicated, frustrating, confusing, essential… if you don’t get it… consider yourself lucky and I hope you never have to find out,” she continued. “Maybe one day I’ll go into detail but it’s a lot. Thank you to those who have sent so much love my way and continue to.”
Former WWE Diva Eva Marie sat down with Chris Van Vliet in Orange County, California to discuss how she was fast-tracked to the main roster after signing her contract and the resulting backlash, being on Total Divas and how much of the resentment was real, her signature red hair, why her 2 runs with WWE came to an end, helping others battling with addiction, and more!
So how long after you started training did you have your first match?
“No one will ever walk into WWE the way that I did, I can almost guarantee it, because it’s insane, in a good way, though, for me. Because it’s like I’m so blessed that I was able to have that opportunity. Because if I didn’t, I don’t know what I would be doing. So that’s why I’m so thankful. So after those four weeks, I get my developmental contract. Me and JoJo actually got it together. They told us together. I was so excited. I was like, Oh my gosh. And they’re like, Okay, well, you guys have a couple months to get your things together, because you’re gonna have to move to Tampa. No problem. I ain’t got sh*t out here, I was sharing a bed with a girlfriend of mine, because I had too much pride to move back in with mommy and daddy. So I was just like sharing a bit with her, because that’s how bad my life was, or my decisions, I guess you could say had put me. But then I get a call because I was in LA and they go, ‘How do you feel about going in for this audition? We can’t really tell you much about it. We don’t know about this project if we were gonna green light it, or whatever it is, but they want to see you.’ I was like, Yeah, sure, no problem. I don’t care. So I sit down, green screen, shout out to Russell, the producer of the reality show Total Divas. I had no idea that’s what the casting was for. But cameras kind of like this, and you’re sitting in front of a camera, he’s drilling you a million questions, just like who you are, where you’re from, family, this, that and the other. Three hours later, interview is done, and he goes, ‘Just so you know, this project is moving really, really fast, and if you do get it, your life will be changing pretty quickly.’ So it’s only happened to me probably twice in my life, this being one of them. When I walked out of that interview, I was like, I motherf*cking murdered that! I just had that feeling of wow, I think I just killed it, for sure. So I ended up leaving that interview and drove back up to the Bay Area. It was a Friday night. Drove up to where I’m from, was with my parents, got a call on Saturday. It’s Russell saying, congratulations, you got the job, and they mentioned something about my hair. Totally go deaf, because I don’t care, because now I’m like, you have to think I’m a chick that had all these hopes and dreams of being a soccer player, then that kind of shattered. Got heavy into my addiction, went to rehab, just got out maybe five weeks or so ago, and now I’m getting a call saying that I just got this opportunity to not only be in the WWE, but now I’m going to be on this reality show that showcases what that looks like on the road. So I get the call Saturday. So that’s 24 hours after my interview, saying that, ‘Congratulations, you got the job. First day on the job is going to be New York WrestleMania. You’ll be on a flight on Monday morning.’ So my life changed within 48 hours, just like that.”
So how long were you on Total Divas before you actually worked a match?
“So my first match? Not long at all. That’s why I was f*cking terrible, which played in my favor character-wise. But it was so horrifying because I hadn’t had a real match in practice or anything. I barely even knew how to take kind of a back bump. So I think, what happened, because things were happening so quickly that Total Divas started to air, and then immediately they were like, Oh my gosh, we need to put these girls on and kind of coincide with them on Monday Night Raw. But you have to remember too, when Total Divas started airing, women did not have the time they have now on WWE TV. So it was even more difficult to kind of paint a picture and paint a story. Because, I mean, the first year or first season, you get to watch the disappointment and then you have to think The [Bella] Twins and the Funkadactyls, they were just valets for the guys at the time for WrestleMania, and they got cut. Their match got cut during that first season. But that’s kind of how it was for women at that time too.”
How long do you think it took you to really start to figure out the moves in the ring, to really start to feel confident with putting together a match?
“I don’t think until I decided when I went to Vince and asked him to go back down to NXT. I was probably already on the road for like a year and a half or two before I went. I made a rocky decision by going and asking him. No one steps down, but we were on the road so much, and we were filming so much that I didn’t really have the time to put energy into training because our time was really limited at that moment. Then you can work on the road at house shows and stuff, but it’s really a big ask to ask some of the other Superstars to kind of get to the arena early and try to roll around with you, and it’s not the same either, and they have a show that night. Trust me, there was a ton that wanted to, Nattie was great, Fit was also awesome, because he would always get there early. But usually people are getting there early to try things, and they already know how to wrestle. They already know how to put together a very basic match. So it’s a little bit different than what I really needed.”
When you were filming Total Divas, was there legit beef?
“Oh, that sh*t was real. I mean, we’re all good now, but that’s why I can laugh and talk about it, because that sh*t was [real].”
Was it the idea that you don’t belong here, you’re an outsider coming into our world?
“For sure, and I totally get it. ‘Pay your dues. Who is this b*tch? We’ve been going hard for the last X amount of years…’ You have to think too. Not only were there two-minute matches, there is one storyline for the girls, so it’s a dog-eat-dog world. When you’re on TV, that’s also how you get paid, and also how you get known, how you get [fans], which the WWE has the best fans in the world, and when you’re on TV, you get the love or the hate from the Universe. So you want to be on television, and that’s the whole point of being in the WWE and on a show, so that you can go perform. So now all of a sudden, they have two new girls stepping into the locker room. They know that they don’t know how to wrestle. So there’s one ping against us is that they’ve been putting in their blood, sweat and tears for years to get up on the main roster now that they think they have the opportunity for their time to shine. Now we have these two new girls that know nothing about the business. Don’t even barely know how to do a back bump or a suplex or run the ropes, and you expect us to, one, help them, and two, ‘I’ll be damned if they think they’re going to take my spotlight.’ So you already had that, which I completely understand, that like, how could you not? But at the same time, when opportunity knocks, you better be ready to f*cking take it, because nobody else is going to do it.”
Why did your first run with WWE come to an end?
“It was actually odd. I still don’t know exactly. The timing of it was, I mean, I got my first movie, so that’s also kind of what happened, is I stepped away to do that. Inconceivable, you can still watch it on Netflix. Had an amazing time on that film. So when I left for that, I kind of still have a feeling of if I didn’t leave for that movie, maybe I would still be in the company, because I think that probably was as much as they gave me their blessing, I’m sure it hurt me internally in some capacity.”
What led you to go back to WWE in 2021?
“I love the business. I love it. There’s nothing like it. I owe everything to WWE. I’ve learned so much. I’ve grown as an individual. I feel like I have a love-hate relationship too, because I feel like I never really got a solid shot, a solid storyline. I never did. I never even had a title run. I went for the NXT title. But when you really look at the grand scheme of things, of storylines, and me on the main roster.”
So why did the most recent run with WWE come to an end?
“That one is actually f*cking a little bit odd, because it was supposed to be longer than that, and it wasn’t. But I think there is going to be changing of hands in management, and that’s kind of what happened with my contract. So it kind of got messed up within kind of that communication.”
