Jericho later revealed that his dance partner for tonight will be professional ballroom dancer Edyta Sliwinska, who has also appeared on Dancing With The Stars. Here’s a picture of her:
Fandango later followed up with these snarky remarks towards Jericho and Edyta Sliwinska:
[cenachampshirt]- Following Sunday’s Extreme Rules pay-per-view, upcoming RAW-brand WWE live events will still feature John Cena vs. Ryback for the WWE Championship.
– The Rock’s movie “Pain & Gain” was #3 at the U.S. box office over the weekend, behind Iron Man 3 and The Great Gatsby. Pain & Gain, which had a production budget of approximately $26 million, has already taken in over $41,608,000 domestically.
– The Bella Twins have announced on Twitter they will soon be staring in a featured:
So the BIG NEWS #BellaArmy Got the script yesterday for our first Feature Film! Details to come!! @JohnnyRyanJr
Over the weekend, Marvel Studios head Kevin Feige said he’s a huge fan of Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson and would love to have him on board for a future Marvel movie:
“His name has come up in the past. I`m a gigantic fan of his. I think he`s incredible. I might have met him once a long time ago, but I haven`t really met him. I don`t really know him, but I think he`s an unbelievable personality and an unbelievable sort of force of nature.
He`s awesome in `Pain & Gain`. He was great in `G.I. Joe`. He`s really kind of an amazing human being. His Twitter`s always cool and he promotes the hell out of everything he does.
I would love him to be part of the Marvel universe somewhere, someday.”
Discussion: Comment below and tell us which Marvel character you think The Rock should play on the big screen.
Ring of Honor star Jay Briscoe appeared at ROH’s live event from Belle Vernon, Pennsylvania over the weekend and addressed the controversy surrounding his recent anti-gay marriage tweets. To recap, Briscoe tweeted the following last Wednesday:
“The Delaware Senate passed a bill yesterday that allows same sex couples to get married. If that makes you happy, then congratulations!!!!!!”
“… try and teach my kids that there’s nothing wrong with that and I’ll f**ing shoot you”
After a barrage of responses from fans calling him homophobic, he admitted choosing his words poorly and then deleted his Twitter account.
Ring of Honor issued the following statement, distancing themselves from the personal views of Jay Briscoe:
“Ring of Honor Wrestling respects and appreciates every fan regardless of age, gender, race, religion or sexual preference. The recent post by Jay Briscoe does not represent the views or opinions of Ring of Honor Wrestling, its owners, management or employees.”
Santino Marella revealed on his twitter that he is opening a new pro wrestling & mixed martial arts school in Toronto on July 1st, called “Battle Arts Academy”. Here are photos of the new facility:
Tonight’s episode of WWE RAW takes place from Tulsa, Oklahoma and is the “go-home” show before Sunday’s Extreme Rules pay-per-view. Here’s a preview of what we’ll see tonight:
– The final hype leading up to WWE Champion John Cena’s title defense against Ryback this Sunday.
– Triple H and Brock Lesnar will have a face-to-face confrontation before their Steel Cage match at Extreme Rules.
– A dance-off competition will take place between Chris Jericho and Fandango.
– WWE will address the status of Sunday’s scheduled World Heavyweight championship match. With Dolph Ziggler diagnosed with a concussion and retrograde amnesia, there’s a chance that he won’t be medically cleared to wrestle Jack Swagger & Alberto Del Rio in a ladder match this Sunday.
SEScoops.com will have the CHAT ROOM open later tonight – so check back right before RAW goes on the air to discuss tonight’s show with our other readers.
– WWE’s newest Divas Eva Marie and Jo-Jo Offerman were both backstage at last week’s RAW. The duo is currently filming scenes for the new Total Divas reality show, which premieres on E! next month.
– Next Saturday at Busch Stadium in St. Louis, Missouri, WWE Hall of Famer Mick Foley and The Bellas Twins will appear at the St. Louis Cardinals vs. Milwaukee Brewers game.
– No One Lives, which opened in limited release for WWE and Anchor Bay this weekend, took in $45,900 during its opening weekend. The film had a limited release, playing in in only 53 theaters for an $866 per-theater average. The film had a budget of approximately $2,900,000, according to IMDB.com.
$45,900 is low for a typical movie opening, but well above several recent WWE Studios releases, including The Day last year ($10,121 opening weekend), 2011’s That’s What I Am ($6,400), The Chaperone ($12,700) and Knucklehead ($1,000).
After suffering a serious concussion at last Tuesday’s WWE SmackDown tapings from North Carolina, World Heavyweight champion Dolph Ziggler has been diagnosed with retrograde amnesia.
Ziggler spoke to WWE.com over the weekend about the situation:
“I didn’t even remember Monday until I watched Raw when I got home. I don’t even remember traveling from Raw to SmackDown. I don’t remember Tuesday. I remember AJ and Big E taking me to the airport on Wednesday morning. I was told I interfered in a match and tried to get my hands on a ladder. When I bent over to grab it, Jack Swagger kicked me in the head.”
The World Heavyweight champion will meet with doctors again this week to determine how long the concussion will keep him out of action. As of this writing, his status for Sunday’s Extreme Rules pay-per-view is still up in the air.
Ziggler’s ex-girlfriend, comedienne Amy Schumer, performed standup comedy in Durham, North Carolina over the weekend and asked the audience to take a drink in support of him. During a post-show Q&A session, Schumer talked about Ziggler’s concussion and said she spoke to him earlier in the day.
TNA issued the following press release over the weekend:
TNA IMPACT WRESTLING returns to the United Kingdom in January/February 2014 with shows in Glasgow (Jan 30), Manchester (Jan 31), London (Feb 1) and Birmingham (Feb 2). UK Fans – don’t miss your chance to experience IMPACT WRESTLING LIVE! Get the complete tour and ticketing info!
• Fans cans experience TNA live from just £22.50, plus booking fee
• Live events coming to Glasgow, Manchester, London and Birmingham
• TNA President Dixie Carter to launch UK Tour with special fan events (info below)
The Glasgow event will see TNA IMPACT WRESTLING become the first ever company to put on a wrestling show at the gorgeous new Hydro arena.
Fans can be part of the action, and experience the UK’s most popular wrestling company live, from just £22.50, plus booking fee. Tickets are available via the TNA UK Facebook page at www.facebook.com/tnawrestlinguk, www.gigsandtours.com/tour/tna-wrestling, www.ticketmaster.co.uk or direct from the tour venues. Full details of the UK events are:
Thursday 30 January 2014
Glasgow Hydro
0844 811 0051
Friday 31 January 2014
Manchester Arena
0844 847 8000
Saturday 01 February 2014
London Wembley Arena
0844 815 0815
Sunday 02 February 2014
Birmingham NIA
0844 338 8000
TNA IMPACT WRESTLING is broadcast on Challenge in the UK and Ireland every Sunday night at 9pm, as well as on Spike TV in the USA and more than 120 other countries.
The TNA UK Tour launch also includes an exclusive competition with Challenge, where one lucky fan can win a trip for two to Boston to experience TNA Slammiversary live. More details on the fan events and competition can be found at www.challenge.co.uk/wrestling.
According to reports, WWE has petitioned for the lawsuit being brought against the company and Paul “Big Show” Wight by former employee Andrew Green to be removed from the Arizona State Court and moved instead to federal court. Attorneys for WWE argued on 5/9 that since the lawsuit revolves around a video that was posted on the internet on WWE.com, it would fall under federal law.
In the complaint, Green states his job with WWE was to film post-match interviews with wrestlers that were later posted to WWE.com and YouTube. When Big Show refused to take part in an interview, Green informed him that former WWE Senior Vice President Eric Pankowski wanted the interview.
The compaint lists the following incident in detail adding, “In response, Big Show stated with the use of profanely indecent language that if Green wanted an interview then he would give him one, and to turn on the camera. Big Show toward Green enraged, shouting obscenities, and waving his fist in Green’s face. Big Show then grabbed Green by the collar and throat, striking Green in the face and backing him up against a trunk while declaring ‘You son of a bitch … Are you having fun right now … Don’t even come up to me again … I don’t give a shit who you are’.”
The entire incident was filmed and later added to WWE.com and YouTube. It is claimed the clip had over 100,000 views and was later removed on 1/29 by WWE. The complaint noted, “Upon information and belief, Big Show was not feigning his emotional outburst at the time of the attack.” Green was later told to reshoot the interview by Paul “Triple H” Levesque. According to the complaint, “Triple H asked Big Show to muster the same emotional level for the third interview as he had with the original shoot, that being the attack. In response, Big Show said that he did not think he would be able to do that because his emotions in the original shoot had been real.”
Green said he was unable to work with WWE following the incident because he “was uncomfortable working around Big Show and the other wrestlers, nervous, and had ‘a ton of anxiety’ as a result of the attack.” Green also added that WWE “encouraged its wrestlers, including Big Show, to act in a violent and threatening manner both inside and outside of the wrestling ring relative to their appearances and participation in staged wrestling events as a means of entertainment.” Green and his wife are seeking damages for assault and negligence. WWE has yet to publicly respond to the lawsuit.
– Michael Cole has announced that he will climb his first mountain with JBL. They will climb Mt. Whitney in mid-August. Cole revealed on the JBL & Cole Show:
“John and I will attempt to scale Mt Whitney, the highest summit in the contiguous United States at 14,505 feet! The attempt comes in mid-August. Needless to say I need to be in massive shape for that trip and would like to be down 40 pounds to 185 by then.”
– WWE NXT wrestler Bronson posted a series of Tweets over the weekend, revealing that he had to have surgery this past week to fix a spinal injury he’s been suffering through:
“I want to publicly thank Dr. Joseph Maroon for fixing a very dangerous spinal injury I’ve had which has gotten steadily worse since October. 3 days ago I couldn’t walk, now I can walk without pain. Thank you to my friends and family who have supported me through a very dark time. You have my eternal gratitude, love, respect and loyalty. I am grateful for you all, that’s it. Recovery will take a while…ok I’m boring myself, go back to whatever you were doing.”
Solomonster talks Dolph Ziggler’s concussion and how it may affect Extreme Rules, Jerry Lawler’s return to the ring, reviewing the highest rated Raw ever from 1999, how it compares to Raw today and why the numbers are down so much, Brock Lesnar the Interior Decorator, Impact moving back to 9pm on Thursdays, Christy Hemme upset with Austin Aries, the latest on James Storm’s injury, what TNA has to do (and not do) to build its audience, would an A-list celebrity tie-in help, and who is the REAL Mr. WrestleMania, Shawn Michaels or The Undertaker? To view the Owen Hart column referenced on this week’s show, click here!
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– Strong Man competitor Adam “Big Country” Scherr recently told RXMuscle.com that he’s been in negotiating with WWE about getting into pro wrestling. Scherr noted that he could make a lot more money with WWE than he makes doing Strong Man competitions.
– It was announced that TNA signed a deal with YouTube to offer a new paid subscription channel for $4.99 a month, which will include access to all of TNA’s PPV events from 2004-2012 as well as the company’s past DVD offerings. WWE turned down a similar offer, which the Wrestling Observer reports was one of the catalysts that led them to sign a new content partnership with Yahoo!
TNA President Dixie Carter recently spoke with the UK’s Sky News Radio about meeting Stephanie McMahon and Triple H at the funeral of Reid Flair’s:
“It was actually a very sad meeting. We met at the church at Ric Flair’s son’s funeral. She and Hunter were there, and the three of us had never met before. I was there with Sting and we were just kind of put in this back room waiting for each other.
It was a very interesting meeting. They’re lovely people; I just wished them luck personally. They had a big weekend with WrestleMania coming up, and I did so publicly. Look, I have a different philosophy than maybe other people do. I think competition is healthy; I think to not want to have competition is absolutely ludicrous.
I think it’s better for the fans, it’s better for the product and it makes us all work harder. And if we want to grow wrestling to be as big as it can be globally, I think that’s important. So, she did respond. I think there were a lot of tweets between the fans, but she did respond in a very kind manner.”
– The Shield member Dean Ambrose suffered an eye injury at Tuesday’s SmackDown tapings. According to WWE.com, he was checked out by WWE’s medical staff after his match against Daniel Bryan.
– Here are updated breakdowns of Royal Rumble and Elimination Chamber pay-per-view buyrates, courtesy of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter:
Royal Rumble:
2013: 512,000 buys worldwide with 322,000 domestic
– Sin Cara resurfaced at Friday night’s Raw live event in Shreveport, Louisiana, as he partnered with Bo Dallas and Adrian Neville in a tag team match against Michael McGillicutty and Prime Time Players. The masked grappler had been sidelined since March due to a leg injury.
– This week’s SmackDown edition of “Backstage Fallout” is now online. The synopsis reads, “See why Alberto Del Rio is so sure he’ll walk away with the World Heavyweight Title at Extreme Rules. Plus, Mark Henry sends a strong message to Sheamus.”
– Former independent women’s wrestling standout Daizee Haze turns 30-years-old on Saturday.
– James Storm announced on Twitter that he suffered an injury to his groin while officiating the Bad Influence vs. Austin Aries and Bobby Roode tag team match at Thursday’s Impact in Tupelo, Mississippi. The injury occurred when he slid to count a pinfall.
Following Friday’s live event in Birmingham, Alabama, Storm admitted himself to a nearby hospital due to pain.
– Suicide will be returning “soon” to Impact Wrestling. The following video aired on Thursday’s show promoting the reemergence of the character.
The Honky Tonk Man was on Inside The Ropes radio show last night and here are some of the highlights:
Being paired with Greg “The Hammer” Valentine and why it didn’t reach it’s potential: “Rhythm and Blues thing was something that was going to rejuvinate both myself and Greg Valentine. But Greg was always very much “I’m Greg, I’ve got blond hair, my father’s Johnny Valentine, I’m a wrestler” I said “Listen, if you don’t do this, dye your hair black and at least give us a shot, he’s gonna fire both of us” And that’s eventually what happened because Greg just did not try to make it work. But now after all these years, he tells me he wished he’d went with it. We were supposed to get the Tag titles from The Harts. We were going to win the tag team titles, but he just did not want to do it and it showed.”
Why did he go back to WWE now: “I really think it was the fact that they did call me and ask me to come back and do the old school Raw. It was a tipping point. And then the spot that I was given on that show, I could not have asked for any better. If they had asked me, I don’t think I could’ve dreamt of anything better, I was extremely proud of how they did it. It’s hard to describe. And for them to announce me as “The Greatest Intercontinental Champion of all time” I was really taken away with that moment of having them announce me like that on TV in front of a worldwide audience.”
Will he return to WWE TV: “I would love to do something there on a full time basis, whatever they would have for me to do, because I think I can contribute something, somewhere, somehow. Do they need me there full time? Absolutely not. They don’t need anybody. But sure I’ll do some more stuff with them.”
To hear the full interview where HTM talks about the origins of his character, joining the WWF as a babyface, winning the IC title, feud with The Warrior and much more, click here.
[jrshop]WWE Hall of Famer Jim Ross has updated his blog, which you can read in its entirety at JRsBarBQ.com As always, you can buy JR’s delicious line of BBQ products at WWEShop.com. Here are some highlights of what JR said about:
The Next NXT Star To Get Called Up To WWE:
Who’s the NXT big star to matriculate from developmental to a main, WWE roster? No one knows for sure. No one. Too many variables involved in the situation to adequately answer to the satisfaction of any one with an average IQ. However, @WWENXT has several young talents currently training that have a legit shot to make it to the next level. Many don’t want to hear this as it’s not as exotic a story as the” mysterious, powers that be holding someone down” theory but success is largely dependent on who one sees in their mirror. Irresponsible, young wannabe stars who keep shooting themselves in the feet aren’t gonna win any races. It’s really simple…essentially “Do Right” and devote ample time outside the facility to better prepare for what hopefully will come in time. I wonder how many DVD’s the majority of the NXT talents studied this week. Hmmm.
Best NCAA Champion To Become A Pro Wrestler:
Best former NCAA Champion turned pro wrestler? Easy for me but I’m biased…the late, Jack Brisco who lost one match in college was a two time all American at Oklahoma State, National Champion and then had the mountainous task of being the NWA World Champion when the title was arguably the most prestigious in all the biz. No former NCAA Champion Wrestler traveled more miles and had more great matches than did “Handsome” Jack who is considered by any aficionado of the genre to be Rembrandt-like and the wrestling ring was his canvas. That means that I respectfully go with ‘BRISCO’ over Kurt Angle and Brock Lesnar who I both worked closely with at WWE from their star in WWE.
