Hello and welcome to the WrestleTalk News – I’m Oli Davis, and today’s episode is sponsored by The Ridge!
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Anywho, today is a big day over here at WrestleTalk HQ, because over on ScreenStalker later today, you can find both Oli and Luke as they run-down all the happenings from San Diego Comic-Con! It’s a new format for ScreenStalker, and one we’re very proud of and as of today, doing every day Monday-Friday! So subscribe to ScreenStalker for Oli and Luke’s video later today about Comic-Con!
Speaking of Comic-Con…
A whole host of WWE wrestlers were to be found at Comic-Con, including Xavier Woods, Drake Maverick and 24/7 Champion, R-Truth, the latter of which conducted an interview with IGN. During the course of the interview R-Truth was interrupted by none other than The Hurricane, who arrived with WWE referee John Cone.
Then this happened.
Unfortunately Hurricane was unsuccessful, but the shenanigans didn’t stop there, as, once Truth attempted to restart the interview, Drake Maverick would appear from out of nowhere, in a banana costume, and attempt to roll Truth up too. He was also unsuccessful, as Truth would scamper away still holding the championship.
Maverick, not the Top Gun one, would then take to Twitter to showcase his frustration, posting a video of him leaving San Diego dejected and championship-less, still in his banana costume. God bless Drake Maverick.
But now we transition from the micro, being 24/7 championship shenanigans to the macro, being WWE’s continued struggles with attendance and interest in the product.
It was previously reported that WWE will be returning to their spiritual home, Madison Square Garden, on September 9th and 10th to run televised episodes of Raw and SmackDown. This is just days before AAA make their debut at MSG on September 15th. This is the first time WWE will have taped a show at MSG since November 2009.
While this seemed like a decent idea on WWE’s part, if recent reports are anything to go by, it’s not gone all that well for them.
On the latest Wrestling Observer Radio, Dave Meltzer stated that the ticket sales for the MSG shows were “not good”, although specific numbers were not provided. Neither show has currently sold-out though.
For some reason, WWE officials were expecting Raw to be an instant sellout, and it’s being seen as “exceedingly disappointing” that it didn’t. It’s like they haven’t been watching the product or something.
According to Meltzer, the goal with hosting these TV tapings at MSG was to have instant sellouts, like the G1 Supercard did this past April when New Japan and Ring of Honor came to town. They were hoping to have a 15-minute sellout to showcase interest in the product, but that doesn’t seem to be the case. At all. You don’t just create interest by saying “look, it’s this place!” when the TV show you put on in the different arena is the same quality that has been driving fans away in droves.
It’s not only fans that have been driven away though, with several WWE wrestlers growing increasingly frustrated about their company, as reported pretty much throughout the entirety of 2019. If WWE isn’t careful, they may be about to lose one of their top stars…
New Japan star Will Ospreay took to Twitter this morning to post a little inspirational message, perhaps regarding his recent move to Japan to work more for the Japanese promotion.
But then, as he always is on Twitter, WWE’s Randy Orton slithered in FROM OUTTA NOWHERE to respond to Ospreay, saying “good luck with that s***”
Orton then followed up on this by saying “Realistically speaking, there’s nothing that you can ‘plan’ that makes you ‘smile every single minute of every single day’. But WWE IS all about putting smiles on faces. SMILEY FACE EMOJI. #ospreayvsorton 06/2020
06/2020? This is urgent! Does anyone know when Orton’s contract expires?! Get big Dave on the phone right now!
The tweets continued back and forth, with Ospreay inviting Orton over to New Japan for the bout, which Orton responded to by saying:
“Sounds like $ to me. I’ll ask Tuesday at #SmackdownLive since I’m not on the #RAWReunion #raw #wwe #wtf”
If Orton shows up in New Japan…from outta nowhere…hoo boy.
Marvel has revealed their entire lineup for Phase 4, and more! Click the video to my right to be taken to Oli and Luke discussing that on ScreenStalker, right now! Before you go, press the thumbs up, subscribe and bell icon to enable notifications and leave us a comment! A special thank you to our pledgehammers on Patreon, some of whom you can see scrolling below me right now! I’ve been Chopper Pete Quinnell, and that, was wrestling.
