Andrade Future Plans Revealed! | WrestleTalk News

Andrade Future Plans Revealed! | WrestleTalk News

Written by Luke Owen: As I mentioned in yesterday’s WrestleTalk News, there has been a lot of chat about Andrade in the wrestling world as of late. It was reported that the former NXT Champion asked for his release a couple of weeks ago, which the man himself confirmed on Twitter. And while many felt that WWE would “Brodie Lee” this situation – i.e. keep Andrade under contract until it expired so they couldn’t go to the competition – he was surprisingly released from WWE shortly after Fastlane went off the air this past Sunday.

Since then, Dave Meltzer reported via Wrestling Observer Radio that Andrade was working without the traditional 90-day non compete clause, which means he could show up at any wrestling promotion as of right now. However current QuizzleMania Champion and all-round sweary bloke Sean Ross Sapp noted on his Fightful podcast with Denise Salcedo that he hadn’t heard the same information, and that Andrade *did* have a 90-day non compete. He didn’t say Meltzer’s report was wrong, just that there is a lot of conflicting information out there on the situation.

What is perhaps more clear, though, is what Andrade will be going as in his post-WWE life. Prior to requesting his WWE release, Andrade applied for the trademarks “El Idalo” and “La Sombra”, the latter of which was his previous in-ring name in promotions like CMLL, and Meltzer noted in the Wrestling Observer Newsletter that, “it does seem like his goal is to use that name”. And now Andrade has posted on Twitter an image from those days, apparently teasing a return of La Sombra, and maybe even a return to CMLL.

What would you like to see Andrade or La Sombra do next? Head back to CMLL, wait until he can go to New Japan and reunite with Tetsuya Naito? Or maybe even head to All Elite Wrestling? Let me know in the comments down below, as I’ll be replying to people FROM MY DESK WHERE I WORK STILL FROM HOME I CAN’T BELIEVE IT’S BEEN OVER A YEAR NOW.

Huge Keith Lee Update

Andrade had been missing from WWE screens since before the Draft last October, and someone else who’s been off TV for a while is WrestleTalk’s favourite boy Keith Lee, who was originally supposed to be challenging Bobby Lashley for the United States Championship at Elimination Chamber with Matt Riddle, but was quietly pulled from the match before the PPV. Instead there was a match to crown his replacement, and Matt Riddle picked up the win and the belt.

Lee hasn’t even been mentioned since then, which is bizarre as he came into the main roster of WWE with so much pomp and circumstance. While fans were critical of WWE’s choices to put him in a vest, change his music, and then send him back to the Performance Centre to “learn how to work”, he did beat Randy Orton clean on his PPV debut and seemed to be floating around the feud between Drew McIntyre and Sheamus when Drew was still champion.

The speculation was that Lee was injured, which is why he was pulled from the Chamber match, but according to Ringside News, there may be something more to it. They posted yesterday that they’d asked about Keith Lee disappearing from TV and were told that he’s not even been at the Thunderdome as of late for television tapings.

Keith Lee isn’t the only one who has disappeared from TV as of late.

Aleister Black Update

Aleister Black has been missing from TV since last October. He turned heel and feuded with Kevin Owens for a brief spell, was drafted to SmackDown and then that was it. It has previously been reported that Black was a favourite of Paul Heyman, much like Angel Garza, Andrade and Buddy Murphy, and once Heyman lost his creative power on Raw that spelled the end of pushes for those lads. It’s also been reported that Black – like Keith Lee – is on the list of wrestlers that Vince McMahon just “doesn’t get” which is why they’re not featured on TV. There was also some speculation that his vanishing from TV coincided with his real-life wife Thea Trinidad’s leaving WWE, but that hasn’t been confirmed.

However according to Dave Meltzer on Wrestling Observer Radio, there’s more to Black’s disappearance than just a lack of McMahon approval or Trinidad’s departure, but because he’s dealing with “minor injuries and stuff”. Just “stuff, eh Dave? Nice and vague as per usual.

The “stuff” that Dave is chatting about could of course be the frustrations that WrestleVotes reported back in November, following Black requesting to go back to NXT like Finn Balor and Ember Moon did, but had his request denied, who added there was, “Dissension amongst the parties involved.”

Paul Heyman Update

In another interesting note from Wrestling Observer Radio, Meltzer noted that Paul Heyman might be possibly working with WWE without a contract.

Heyman left from TV screens after Brock Lesnar lost at WrestleMania 36 to Drew McIntyre, but then returned to be the advocate for Roman Reigns in his new Tribal Chief gimmick. However, Meltzer notes that Heyman’s previous contract is either up already, or is up soon perhaps as early as May. Paul Heyman to AEW confirmed.

Before we get too excited with “Paul Heyman to AEW confirmed”, Meltzer adds “I can’t even imagine him not being signed, he’s with Roman Reigns in the top act, so I just would presume that’s a formality.”

NXT Star Injured, Vacates Championship

Sadly from the world of NXT, another injury has forced a champion to relinquish their title – which is starting to feel horribly frequent on the black and gold brand.

It was reported last week that Danny Burch separated his shoulder last week during the main event tag match where he teamed with Oney Lorcan to take on Finn Balor and Karrion Kross, being evacuated from the match leaving Lorcan to finish the match alone.

NXT General Manager William Regal announced on Twitter yesterday the sad news that Burch and Lorcan would have to vacate the NXT Tag Team Championships, adding that he will address the state of the titles on tonight’s episode of the show. And in a very unusual non-caps lock filled tweet, Oney Lorcan demanded a match with Kross to avenge his fallen tag partner which was later confirmed.

NXT Update

The Wednesday Night War of AEW vs. NXT could be coming to an end next month after WrestleMania, which means Bryan Alvarez won’t have to deal with idiots anymore in his Twitter mentions for simply posting the viewing figures for both shows.

The news first came about a few weeks ago when Mat Men Podcast posted on Twitter that they’d heard NXT was moving to Tuesday nights, which was later corroborated by the likes of Alvarez and Meltzer, with the latter saying it wasn’t to do with All Elite Wrestling and rather the NHL and their Wednesday night games airing on USA Network.

However, nothing was officially confirmed by WWE. And, really, nothing has still been confirmed by WWE. But according to PWInsider, WWE’s internal production schedule has NXT listed as a Tuesday night production following WrestleMania, which means the first episode of the new era will air on Tuesday the 13th of April, the day after Monday Night Raw.

From a personal standpoint, this feels like the right move. We’ve seen in the past when NXT and AEW air on separate nights that they both prosper, so this can only be a good thing. Way back in 2019, the report was that NXT was moved from the WWE Network to USA Network, not to grow the brand, but to eat into AEW’s viewership. And I think you can argue that was successful. But it also ate into NXT’s audience too, and the brand hasn’t been as hot as it was pre-USA Network. And… could it mean the return of NXT reviews? Only time will tell. You’ll just have to ask Oli. He’s on Twitter at Oli Davis. Go and ask him on there. I mean he won’t check, but it’s a bit funny.

Speaking of ratings!

Raw Viewership Down… Slightly

Despite coming off the back of Fastlane and the debut of Kentucky Fried Fiend, Raw was slightly down in its viewership this week, pulling in 1.82 million – down from the 1.84 last week. Interestingly, though, the all-important 18-49 demo actually climbed slightly through the show, which means the draw of Randy Orton summoning The Fiend in the main event did bring in some interest from viewers.

3 years ago by Liam Winnard

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