Impact Wrestling has announced that AAA stars El Hijo del Fantasma and Drago will team up at Slammiversary in a 4-way match for the IMPACT Wrestling Tag-Team Championship, now held by the Latin American Xchange (LAX). The match will also feature talent from two other international promotions.
While appearing on Hot 104.1 last week in his hometown of St. Louis, Randy Orton explained why he made his tweets about “dives” on Twitter that got everyone talking. Here is a transcript of what was said:
“I’m putting over AJ [Styles] strong, right? AJ, he has dives. A lot of guys that I work with do dives. I’ve been dived on a lot. I don’t have a problem with dives out of the ring, but when a lot of these guys, who don’t have anything to fall back on, and they’re not making any money doing it, they’re going around town wrestling on these independent shows — which is awesome, by the way. A lot of our guys, like AJ, Kevin Owens, Seth Rollins wouldn’t be here without the indie scene. But they’re smart. A lot of these guys are going to go out there and they’re going to break their neck at 23 years old, doing stuff they shouldn’t be doing.
“It’s a display of athleticism, no doubt, but … I’m not going to watch gymnastics. I want to go watch a story, a fight between a good guy and a bad guy. How many flips they do each, I’m not keeping a tally … But do you know who had my back on it? Guys like AJ. Guys that do dives and know what they’re doing … Kurt Angle texted me after that. He didn’t do dives. If he did, he would put it where it should have went … he wouldn’t have done it just to do it …
“If that’s where our business is going, to where it’s just a preconceived, choreographed match with a bunch of acrobatics — back flips, front flips, gainers off the top rope, shooting star presses, moonsaults to the floor — then I don’t want to be a part of it. But I’ll tell you what: I don’t think that’s where it’s going.”
Here is footage of Orton’s appearance on the show:
It was reported back in March via PWInsider that Eva Marie would not be returning to WWE, however those reports appear to be false.
Eva Marie appeared on today’s installment of Wrestling Observer Live and indicated that she could still pop up on RAW or SmackDown Live at anytime. She mentioned that her return may not be in the near future as she is still working on two filming projects, but the door is still open for her return.
When asked about reports that Lana has received her gimmick on SmackDown, she said that she couldn’t confirm that but hopes that’s not the case.
WWE announced that Seth Rollins will face Bray Wyatt at the upcoming WWE Great Balls of Fire event. Here is the updated card:
WWE Universal Title Match
Samoa Joe vs. Brock Lesnar
Ambulance Match
Roman Reigns vs. Braun Strowman
Cruiserweight Title Match
Akira Tozawa vs. Neville
Bray Wyatt vs. Seth Rollins
Great Balls of Fire takes place on July 9th from the American Airlines Center in Dallas. As always, we will have live play-by-play coverage of the event.
Sasha Banks won the gauntlet on tonight’s episode of RAW to earn her a shot at the RAW Women’s Championship against Alexa Bliss at the Great Balls of Fire event. Here is the updated card for the show:
WWE Universal Title Match
Samoa Joe vs. Brock Lesnar
RAW Women’s Championship
Sasha Banks vs. Alexa Bliss
Ambulance Match
Roman Reigns vs. Braun Strowman
Cruiserweight Title Match
Akira Tozawa vs. Neville
Bray Wyatt vs. Seth Rollins
Great Balls of Fire takes place on July 9th from the American Airlines Center in Dallas. As always, we will have live play-by-play coverage of the event.
Welcome to Monday Night Raw for June 26 2017!
Last week’s Raw was a pretty stacked episode and ended with a shocking reveal: Big Cass was the one who attacked Enzo Amore! Weirdly enough, it was Corey Graves who revealed the information – because he has access to security footage where no one else did – and Cass admitted to it before explaining exactly why he did it. It was hard to disagree with anything Cass said before he planted his big boot in Enzo’s face and walked off to the boo’s of the WWE Universe. The break-up received mixed reactions as some thought the duo had run their course, where others wanted them to get at least one tag title run. Regardless, tonight’s Raw will be interesting to see how Enzo responds to his former brother.
A huge return also bolstered last week’s Raw, as Braun Strowman came back from injury to cost Roman Reigns the match against Samoa Joe. Strowman then walked down to the ring and reverse chokeslammed Roman. The two are set to meet again, at Great Balls of Fire, in an Ambulance Match! The winner of this bout will go on to face Broc….I mean, the winner of the Universal Championship match at Great Balls. Strowman’s return was awesome and the fans exploded for him. Expect more brawling tonight between the two giants.
Speaking of Brock Lesnar, the Champion is scheduled to appear on tonight’s Raw and once again cross paths with Samoa Joe. Maybe they will be kept apart, rather than trying to kill each other again, but one thing is for sure, when Brock is in town, everyone watches. Joe has been fantastic since becoming number one contender and, even if he doesn’t win the strap, at least we get a few more weeks of him being the destroyer that he is billed as!
Bray Wyatt and Seth Rollins have given a lot of lengthy promo’s against one and other recently, which often go around in circles and do little to help either man. Which is why tonight I’d like to see them actually put some actions behind their words and go toe-to-toe! Elsewhere, Finn Balor will be looking for revenge on Elias Samson, and The Miz will put his new entourage to good use against Dean Ambrose, but is Maryse gone for good?
All that and loads more to look forward to on tonight’s show! Let us know what you’re excited to see in the comments and be sure to check out the Ringside News app, and enjoy the show!
WWE announced on social media that Lonzo and Lavar Ball will appear on tonight’s episode of RAW. They will be featured on a Miz TV segment.
EXCLUSIVE: @mikethemiz has MAJOR guests lined up for #MizTV tonight on #RAW in @STAPLESCenter, and their names are @ZO2_ & @Lavarbigballer! pic.twitter.com/Lejp3WJHhw
— WWE (@WWE) June 26, 2017
As always, we will have play-by-play coverage of the event. Coverage kicks off at 8PM ET!
Mike Rome announced on Twitter that Nia Jax, Sasha Banks, Bayley, Emma, Mickie James and Dana Brooke will participate in a Gauntlet match on tonight’s episode of RAW. The winner of that match will move on to face Alexa Bliss for the RAW Women’s Championship at the Great Balls of Fire event.
Also confirmed for tonight’s show is a Miz TV segment featuring Lonzo and Lavar Ball. As always, we will have play-by-play coverage of the event. Coverage kicks off at 8PM ET!
Cody Rhodes is the new ROH Champion after last night’s Best in The World pay-per-view event. However, the Grandson of A Plumber was busted open early on into the match by his opponent, Christopher Daniels.
According to Wrestling Observer, the American Nightmare needed six stitches on his busted upper lip. A headbutt by Daniels is the cause of this minor injury.
Steve Austin was vocal on a recent installment of his podcast regarding WWE booking Naomi to defend her SmackDown Women’s Championship against Lana at the Money in the Bank event. He made the following remarks:
“Naomi deserves better, the title deserves better. Lana wasn’t up for this task at hand, at this point in her career. I thought she had much more mystique as the valet, whatever the term is, with Rusev. Man, they kind of killed her gimmick off, and reinvented her, and I just liked her the way she was. So, if she wants to be in the ring, that’s more power to her, but a lot of the stuff I got on Twitter was, ‘Hey man. For a first match, she did a lot better than I expected.’ Ok. As I say that, good for her. But as a company who’s striving for excellence in sports entertainment/professional wrestling, the best of the best belong on a pay-per-view.”
You can listen to the podcast here.
Seth Rollins made an appearance at Saturday’s WWE Live Event and challenged Jinder Mahal for the WWE Championship. The incident went down while Jinder Mahal was cutting an in-ring promo and Rollins made his surprise appearance and cut a promo as well. This led to a match between the two. The match ended in disqualification when the Singh brothers interfered.
You can check out footage below:
Originally Shinsuke Nakamura was scheduled to face Mahal at the event, however Rollins’ filled in as the replacement.
As previously reported, Alberto El Patron broke up with Paige last night in Orlando. After …