WWE Reaches Out To AEW Star, Brandi Rhodes WWE In-Ring Return, NXT UK Invades NXT 2.0 – News Bulletin – August 17, 2022

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It has been claimed that WWE has reached out to an AEW star, Brandi Rhodes makes her in-ring return for WWE, NXT UK invades NXT 2.0, and more.

It’s Wednesday 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 news bulletin for August 17, 2022.

WWE Reaches Out To AEW Star

As head of WWE creative, Triple H has already been a very busy man, having re-signed Dakota Kai, Karrion Kross, Scarlett, Dexter Lumis, Ashante ‘Thee’ Adonis, Top Dolla, and B-Fab, and there are still no signs of stopping.

It seems even contracted AEW talent isn’t exempt from Triple H’s interest, at least if one particular AEW star’s claim to management is true.

According to Fightful Select, a “notable” AEW talent known to be under contract informed the promotion’s management that they were contacted by WWE about potentially signing them.

The talent, who remains anonymous, reportedly told AEW that they’re happy in the promotion and aren’t interested in joining WWE despite their interest.

The report noted that there would be no mistake that this particular talent is under contract with AEW, but evidently, if the claim is true, that didn’t stop WWE from reaching out.

Brandi Rhodes Makes In-Ring Return For WWE

Yep, you read that right, Brandi Rhodes has made her in-ring return, and she did it in a WWE ring.

First reported by PWInsider, Rhodes wrestled a match at an “in-house live event” at the WWE Performance Center on Friday, August 12.

WWE regularly holds these in-house shows each week as another chance for NXT talent to perform and improve, because they only wrestle on TV once a week as well as the rare weekend house shows.

There were no further details on the match itself as far as the identity of Rhodes’ opponent – although Fightful Select did later update that it was said to have been a “newer talent”.

PWInsider also clarified that Rhodes is not listed as a member of the NXT roster at this time.

It was her first ‘official’ match since January 12 when she wrestled KiLynn King at AEW Dark ‘Elevation’.

NXT UK Invades NXT 2.0

Last night’s episode of NXT 2.0 was the ‘Heatwave’ special edition, and was packed with news as a variety of new faces showed up, and one left forever.

We’ll start with the latter, as Santos Escobar lost in a street fight to Tony D’Angelo, meaning Escobar is now banned from NXT, which all but confirms an imminent main roster call-up.

In terms of the new faces, the first ones that showed up were Joe Coffey, Mark Coffey and Wolfgang, collectively known as Gallus, who attacked Diamond Mine who were seemingly about to implode themselves.

A bit later in the show, Indi Hartwell received a lovely drawing from the returning Dexter Lumis, but said drawing was torn apart by Blair Davenport (Bea Priestley), who also proclaimed herself to be a future NXT Women’s Champion.

And finally, as the show went off the air and after Bron Breakker had just retained the NXT Championship over JD McDonagh, Tyler Bate came out with his NXT UK Championship and confronted Breakker.

In doing this, WWE actually spoiled the result of the pre-taped NXT UK Championship tournament which hasn’t aired on TV yet, after Ilja Dragunov had to relinquish the title due to injury.

Recent months had already seen the likes of Pretty Deadly, Axiom (A-Kid) and Nathan Frazer being brought into the US from NXT UK.

There was also the introduction of the ‘Super Diva’ Quincy Elliott, who has been on NXT Level Up for a few months and looks set to be brought up onto the NXT 2.0 main show.

Other Stuff

In other little bits of news…

Sasha Banks documented on her Instagram Story that she had a car broken into and stolen from, but it seems they only managed to get some “hair products”.

Dave Meltzer reported on Wrestling Observer Radio that there are plans for AEW stars to be involved at NJPW Wrestle Kingdom 17 in January.

WWE reported its financial results for Q2 2022, with $328.2 million in revenue, an increase of 24%.

The company also issued a statement, which said that the board’s investigation into Vince McMahon is “substantially complete”.

WWE announced its newest Performance Center class made up of 17 new signings, with the most notable being former Bellator fighter Valerie Loureda.

WWE Raw viewership continued its momentum under Triple H with 1.978 million viewers tuning in and a 0.53 in the 18-49 demo, and beating the finale of Better Call Saul head-to-head.

Kris Statlander announced on the latest episode of AEW ‘Road To’ that she’s expected to be out for 6-8 months due to another knee surgery.

Tony Khan announced that Ricky ‘The Dragon’ Steamboat will be the special guest timekeeper for tonight’s AEW Dynamite which is presented by House of the Dragon.

And speaking of which, the lineup for tonight’s Dynamite includes Bryan Danielson vs Daniel Garcia in a 2/3 falls match; Toni Storm vs KiLynn King; Andrade El Idolo, Rush & Dragon Lee vs Young Bucks & ??? (presumably Kenny Omega); and the Varsity Blonds vs the Gunn Club.

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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