Steve Austin WrestleMania Match Plans, Best Brock Lesnar Interview Ever, Top IMPACT Star Now A Free Agent – Audio News Bulletin – February 15, 2022

WWE wants Steve Austin to wrestle at WrestleMania and has an opponent in mind, the best Brock Lesnar interview ever, one of IMPACT’s top stars is now a free agent, and more.

It’s Tuesday morning, and what better way to start the day than getting caught up on all the latest wrestling news – I’m Liam Winnard for WrestleTalk.com, and this is our audio news bulletin for February 15, 2022.

Listen to this morning’s round-up here:

 

Steve Austin WrestleMania Match Plans

News broke during last night’s episode of Raw that WWE has been in contact with Steve Austin about wrestling at WrestleMania 38 in less than two months.

The news originally came out via Fightful Select, but there weren’t many details other than WWE had proposed the idea to Austin.

Dave Meltzer then added that a match that has been discussed is Austin vs Kevin Owens. The past couple of weeks on Raw, Owens has insulted the state of Texas, so this would seem to be the direction they’re heading towards.

PWInsider then provided more details, reporting that WWE reached out to Austin back in December or January to gauge his interest in doing a match, but as of now, he has not committed.

There have always been plans for Austin to be involved at WrestleMania in some capacity even if he doesn’t wrestle, because WWE needs to shift tickets. They even did a two-for-one offer on tickets yesterday.

Brock Lesnar Is Amazing

Someone who will be wrestling at WrestleMania is Brock Lesnar, who was the talk of the town yesterday thanks to his appearance on the Pat McAfee Show.

If you haven’t watched the interview, it really is must-see. It’s the happy, jovial Brock Lesnar we’ve seen on WWE TV in recent weeks turned up to 11, and paired with McAfee’s own banter, it was extremely fun viewing.

Among other things, Lesnar praised McAfee and said that his commentary “makes the show”, he spoke about his quote “love/hate relationship” with Vince McMahon and how it differs from his relationship with Dana White, he gave advice to WWE’s young talent, and he spoke about Steve Austin not wanting to wrestle him.

Oh and he also does an amazing Steve Austin impression, an impression of an auctioneer, he broke Pat McAfee’s table within a few seconds of being on set, and the whole thing was just… just trust me, go and watch it.

Josh Alexander Is A Free Agent

Just two weeks ago on AEW Dynamite Brandi Rhodes said to Ethan Page, “Everyone knows the reason that we hired you was to get to Josh Alexander”.

Well, fast forward two weeks later, and it’s time to see if Brandi was telling the truth, because if AEW does want to sign Alexander, he is now available.

Taking to Twitter yesterday, Alexander said: Today my contract expired & subsequently also US work visa. Unfortunately as a consequence I will not be able to honour my commitments to both @TERMINUSpro & @AMLWrestling later this month. I’m disappointed & I’m sorry. Hopefully I’ll have everything in order soon”.

It’s been known since October that Alexander’s IMPACT contract was coming up in February, but obviously we didn’t know he’d end up being a free agent because he could have re-signed, but at least as of now, that hasn’t happened.

Alexander beat Christian Cage for the IMPACT World Championship at Bound For Glory last year, but lost the title immediately to current champion Moose.

Hopefully someone picks up Alexander, because someone that talented definitely shouldn’t be left jobless and work visa-less.

Other Stuff

In other little bits of news…

WWE announced during Raw that Alexa Bliss will be making her in-ring return as the sixth participant in the women’s Elimination Chamber match this coming Saturday.

Before Bliss was announced, there was a gauntlet match last night with the other five, which had Rhea Ripley going from start to finish before being beaten by Bianca Belair, meaning Belair will be the final person let out of her pod in the Chamber match. The winner will get a Raw Women’s Title shot at WrestleMania.

WWE also added another match to the Chamber card, with The Miz taking on Rey Mysterio. The full card can be found at WrestleTalk.com/events if you want a reminder of the other matches.

Last night’s Raw also had an appearance from NXT’s Tommaso Ciampa, who was on guest commentary for the Street Profits vs the Dirty Dawgs, following on from the segment on NXT last week which resulted in him and Dolph Ziggler getting into a brawl. Ciampa also beat T-BAR in a match before Raw that will air on Main Event.

Ring of Honor announced Samoa Joe as the third inductee into its Hall of Fame, joining the Briscoes and Bryan Danielson.

Joe himself posted a somewhat cryptic comment on Instagram about his future, saying “”Enjoyable week up on the mountain with friends and family. As the pieces are beginning to come together”.

Dave Meltzer said he believes Peacock is going to bid for the second-day rights to at least Raw and NXT, which means those shows would be on Peacock and the WWE Network the day after they air live, instead of there being a 30-day delay because of WWE’s deal with Hulu which expires soon.

William Regal filed to trademark Lord Steven Regal and William Regal. WWE does already have an active trademark on William Regal.

AEW announced the men’s and women’s Owen Hart Cup tournaments will begin on the May 11 episode of AEW Dynamite at UBS Arena.

The WWE 2K22 roster graphic for Elias seemed to reveal the scrapped Randy Savage-esque attire he was planned to wear for his return, which didn’t happen.

Speaking of WWE 2K22, we’ll have ongoing coverage and updates of tonight’s roster/ratings reveal on our stats page tonight at https://migration-stage.wrestletalk.com/stats/wwe-2k22-confirmed-roster/. If you didn’t know, that page already has a list of everyone who’s been confirmed for the game as well as the ratings that have been announced so far.

Hit Row is reuniting at the MCW Spring Fever tour show on March 19.

Lio Rush announced last month that his AEW contract would be ending on February 14, and it’s now February 15, which means, unless something has happened that we don’t know about, he’s no longer under contract with AEW.

And tonight’s NXT 2.0 Vengeance Day show on SyFy has MSK vs the Creed Brothers in the Dusty Classic final, Gigi Dolin and Jacy Jayne defending the NXT Women’s Tag Team Title against Indi Hartwell and Persia Pirotta, Pete Dunne vs Tommaso Ciampa in a weaponized steel cage match, Carmelo Hayes defending the North American Title against Cameron Grimes, and Bron Breakker defending the NXT Title against Santos Escobar.

Be sure to stay tuned to WrestleTalk.com throughout the day to keep up with all the news from the world of pro-wrestling, and I’ll see you tomorrow morning for another round-up.

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