Daily Update: Weekend fallout, Bellator, Alistair Overeem

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• WWE Main Event results: Nikki Cross vs. Kayden Carter
• AEW's Cash Wheeler dealing with injury
• WWE Fastlane review: Not brought to you by Pizza Hut
• Lio Rush pulled from NJPW Destruction, YOH added to IWGP Junior title match
• ROH spoilers from Salt Lake City, Utah
• Triple H WWE Fastlane press conference: Jade Cargill debut, Edge departure
• John Cena says SAG-AFTRA strike end would call him away from WWE

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• Wrestling Observer Live: WWE Fastlane, Adam Copeland, CM Punk return
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This Week's Wrestling Observer Newsletter

• October 9, 2023 Observer Newsletter: Adam Copeland debuts in AEW

The new Observer is up now:

• Match of the week and performer of the week
• Adam Copeland comes to AEW, analysis of he deal, surprises, comments by Copeland, and the positives and negative of it
• Full rundown of WrestleDream, including business notes
• Updates on the last three AEW PPV shows including one major surprise
• What to learn from AEW doing three PPV shows so closely
• Full coverage of WWE NXT No Mercy
• AEW vs. NXT this coming Tuesday as both load up, and what to expect given how things went last year
• Notes on WWE Fastlane
• Russ Francis, the aspects of his pro wrestling career that few know, growing up as the son of a wrestler and promoter, NFL and other sports background, the Francis family in Hawaiian rings, the last big house drawn by the AWA, WrestleMania 2 and 31, his playing in the Super Bowl and the wrestling connection in that game, politics, broadcasting and more.
• Story on Joyce Grable, who passed away this past week.
• AEW & WWE attendance for quarter three
• Matt Riddle update
• The Infernos tag team history
• How many homes are the stations that carry wrestling and MMA programming in
• The most detailed look at the ratings from the past week, comparisons with one year ago, segment numbers, placings, star power and competition to provide information as to the ups and downs
• CMLL Night of Champions as fans pick the card
• Women's tournaments coming
• A show honoring 45 years of Blue Panther in the ring
• AAA Heroes Inmortales
• Stardom Five-Star Grand Prix notes
• Stardom tag team tournament update
• Notes on New Japan U.S dates
• Crush Gals anniversary show
• New pro wrestling documentary notes
• Impact gears up for its biggest show of the year
• Update on AEW and WBD
• Adam Cole on his injury
• Tony Khan talks Jade Cargill
• Why AEW announced 81,305 instead of 85,228 for All In
• Problems AEW had with its last TV show
• Streaming numbers for AEW & WWE
• Ticket sales for upcoming AEW & WWE shows
• International TV ratings
• Star returns from injury
• UFC & Bellator updates
• Canelo Alvarez PPV notes and how many buys came from AEW & WWE fans
• Two wrestlers being inducted into Louisiana Hall of Fame
• C.M. Punk notes
• Why WWE stock is down
• WWE in Japan update

This Week's Retro Observer Newsletter

• July 24, 2006 Observer Newsletter: WWE Raw, Brock Lesnar

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Sunday Update

- Bryan and I did our show last night for the weekend covering Fastlane, Collision, SmackDown, AEW injuries and business and a lot more. We also did our weekly news in review show with Garrett Gonzales up on the site. Bryan and I will be back Monday night after Raw and will be doing our midweek show on Tuesday this week rather than Wednesday because of Dynamite & NXT head-to-head that night.

- There were no major angles coming out of Fastlane. The matches were good with two great bouts. They really did a five-match show with only one super long match and spent so much time between matches it still passed three hours for the show. The next PLE is 11/4 from Riyadh, Saudi Arabia with Roman Reigns defending his title. The only guy that it seemed to be set up for is LA Knight but whatever angle they are doing will likely take place Friday night.

- Collision on the fast nationals from last night did 333,000 viewers and a 0.08 demo rating, numbers similar to last week. I guess it's good that the main roster big show didn't hurt them any worse than NXT did but two weeks ago you'd have called numbers like that pretty bad. The final numbers won't be in until Tuesday and are usually a little higher, but not much.

- Scott Coker was asked about the future of Bellator last night after Bellator 300. He basically didn't give an answer, saying he's not the owner. They only have one show left on the schedule, an 11/17 show in Chicago at the Wintrust Arena. But they did promotion during the show for a couple of matches for next spring.

--Alistair Overeem, who is the only man to hold two major organization world heavyweight titles in MMA at the same time as well as the biggest kickboxing title (K-1 Grand Prix winner) also at the same time, announced his retirement today. Overeem said he was going into Dutch politics. He had a very storied 24-year career which also included a European championship in submission wrestling. During his career he had wins over Peter Aerts, Gokhan Saki, Tyrone Spong and Badr Hari in kickboxing and Vitor Belfort, Igor Vovchanchyn, Sergei Kharitonov, Mark Hunt, Gary Goodridge, Kazuyuki Fujita, Fabricio Werdum, Brock Lesnar, Frank Mir, Stefan Struve, Roy Nelson, Junior Dos Santos, Andrei Arovlovki, Sergei Pavlovich and Augusto Sakai in MMA.

- New Japan Destruction in Ryogoku is at 4 a.m. tomorrow morning Eastern and 1 a.m. late tonight Pacific time.

• Yoshi-Hashi & Toru Yano & Tiger Mask & Ryusuke Taguchi & ? vs. Takeshi Masada & Kazumi Sumi & Kengo & Jun Masaoka & Takahiro Katori - The opponents are a series of non-New Japan guys with Masada & Sumi from DDT, Kengo & Masaoka as indie guys and Katori for Eagle Pro.
• Taichi & Douki & ? vs. Sho & Yujiro Takahashi & Yoshinobu Kanemaru - The ? will be the new fifth member of the Just Five Guys stable. Taichi will announce the new member.
• Tanga Loa vs. Chase Owens
• Shingo Takagi & Tetsuya Naito & Yota Tsuji & Bushi vs. Jeff Cobb & Great O'Khan & Henare & Callum Newman
• Clark Connors & Drilla Moloney vs. Kevin Knight & Kushida for the IWGP Junior Heavyweight Tag Team titles
• Shota Umino & Master Wato & Yuji Nagata vs. Minoru Suzuki & Desperado & Ren Narita - This is the final match of their best-of-seven series. Nagata's team is up 3-2 with one 30:00 draw.
• Hikuleo & El Phantasmo vs. Alex Coughlin & Gabe Kidd for the New Japan Strong Tag Team titles
• Kazuchika Okada & Hiroshi Tanahashi & Tomohiro Ishii vs. Josh Alexander & Chris Sabin & Alex Shelley for the NEVER trios titles
• David Finlay vs. Tama Tonga for the NEVER title
• Hiromu Takahashi vs. Mike Bailey vs. Yoh for the IWGP Junior Heavyweight title. Yoh is a late replacement for Lio Rush.
• Sanada vs Evil for the IWGP Heavyweight title in a lumberjack match where the lumberjacks will be the Just Five Guys and House of Torture members.

- Kidd, Coughlin, Cobb, Hikuleo, Rush and Knight all missed yesterday's NJPW show due to illness and Rush has been off a few days. Rush is the only one not announced for tonight's show. But everything else was still listed the same on the website.

- Our weekend polls this week will be on Fastlane from last night as well as for the New Japan Destruction in Ryogoku show which takes place tomorrow morning. You can leave a thumbs up, thumbs down or thumbs in the middle plus a best and worst match from each show to dave@wrestlingobserver.com

- Fox has a Top 25 moments in SmackDown history special today. It's aired already in most markets but some West Coast and Central time markets it will still be airing. Check your local Fox station listings.

- We're looking for reports on the two GCW shows in Atlantic City with results and notes to dave@wrestlingobserver.com

- AEW on 10/21 from Memphis will have a three-hour Saturday night show from 8-11 p.m. on TNT with the regular Collision followed by Battle of the Belts from the Fedex Forum. This show has a very weak advance. Dave Brown, the longtime Memphis announcer and perennial Hall of Fame candidate will be at the show.

- As far as stuff that trended on Google this week, Fastlane was 12th yesterday with 100,000 searches. Although he didn't really have much to do with pro wrestling past being the referee of the battle royal at WrestleMania II and worked for Vince McMahon's XFL as an announcer with Jim Ross and Jonathan Coachman, Dick Butkus' death was first on Thursday with 1.5 million searches. The death of Russ Francis was on the Monday listing at 100,000 but later it was no longer there. AEW on Sunday for the Adam Copeland debut was 11th but it was only 20,000.

- Warrior Wrestling from Friday night in South Bend, IN: Sabni Gauge defeated Koda Hernandez, Missa Kate defeated Rachel Armstrong, Jordan Kross defeated Jack Vaughn, Skye Blue defeated Trevor Outlaw to evidently win the Women's title, Konosuke Takeshita defeated Storm Grayson, Mike Santana defeated Bryan Keith, KC Navarro defeated Encore Moore to keep the Warrior title. In the Skye Blue match, Outlaw came out wearing the Women's title and saying it's been almost a year since Athena, the champion, has defended it, and claimed he was the new champion. The announcers then said Athena was still champion but the company hasn't been able to book her due to her busy schedule. They called Outlaw the self-proclaimed champion and Blue beat him for the title. (thanks to Shannon Walsh)

- The Sukeban promotion announced a second show in Miami in December but did not give a date. They announced the Cherry Bombs vs. Vandals 2 for that show.

- The new Observer Hall of Fame ballot is out. Newcomers to the ballot include the Iron Sheik, Young Bucks, Jon Moxley, Seth Rollins and Blue Panther. We'll have more on this on shows coming up the next few weeks.

- Stefon Diggs of the Buffalo Bills was fined $13,659 and charged with unsportsmanlike conduct for his touchdown celebration copying Steve Austin in the Bills 10/1 win over the Miami Dolphins.

- Kirk White's Big Time Wrestling from Friday night in a sold out Newark, CA Pavilion: Jherri Giggalow defeated Eliza Hammer, Brooke Havok defeated Mylo, Viva Van defeated Su Yung, Big Fonz defeated JR Kratos, QT Marshall defeated Vinnie Massaro to retain the Latin American title, Too Fresh won tag tiles over The Freaks, the Honor Society and Eddie Cuervo & True X, Marcus Lewis defeated Dave Dutra to win the vacant Heavyweight title, Johnny TV & Aaron Solo defeated Jacob Fatu & Starboy Charlie in a match with interference from Mick Foley with Mr. Socko and QT Marshall. The next show is 12/8 with Jinx vs. Jeckles, long-time partners, in a hair vs. career match. Bret Hart will be doing a fan Q&A on 11/24. (thanks to Jim Davis)