THE ROUND-UP
THE LATEST NEWS
ROH Manhattan Mayhem live results: The Kingdom vs. Bullet Club
UFC 222 live results: Cris Cyborg vs. Yana Kunitskaya
NXT Cleveland live results: Johnny Gargano returns to his hometown
WWE reportedly coming to Australia for 100,000-seat PPV
NXT Gainesville, FL, live results: Ricochet teams with Roderick Strong
THE LATEST AUDIO
WOL: Sonjay Dutt interview plus news on WWE and FOX, Brock Lesnar, more! 3/2
Wrestling Weekly: Rousey, Lesnar, another way to do Cena vs. AJ 3/2
B&V&G: Granny, NXT, THURSDAY NIGHT POTPOURRI! 3/1
We’re looking for reports on Raw in Chicago at the United Center with Brock Lesnar and John Cena, Smackdown in Moline, IL, ROH in New York, Lucha Underground in Los Angeles, Northeast Wrestling in Waterbury,CT, Impact/Border City Wrestling in Windsor, ONT, and NXT in Royal Oak, MI and Englewood, FL to [email protected].
UFC 222 PPV FROM THE T-MOBILE ARENA IN LAS VEGAS
Fight Pass at 6:30 p.m. Eastern
Jordan Johnson (206) vs. Adam Milstead (205)
Bryan Caraway (135.5) vs. Cody Stamann (135.75)
Zak Ottow (171) vs. Mike Pyle (170)\
FS1 at 8 p.m.
C.B. Dollaway (185.5) vs. Hector Lombard (185.5)
John Dodson (134.5) vs. Pedro Munhoz (135)
Beneil Dariush (156) vs. Alexander Hernandez (155)
Mackenzie Dern (116) vs. Ashley Yoder (115.5)
PPV at 10 p.m.
Ketlen Vieira (136) vs. Cat Zingano (135.5)
Andrei Arlovski (247.5) vs. Stefan Struve (266)
Sean O’Malley (136) vs. Andre Soukhamthatth (135.25)
Frankie Edgar (146) vs Brian Ortega (145.5)
Cris Cyborg (144.75) vs. Yana Kunitskaya (144) for women’s featherweight title
ROH MANHATTAN MAYHEM ON SATURDAY NIGHT AT 8 P.M. AT THE HONOR CLUB STREAMING SERVICE
Silas Young & Beer City Bruiser & Brian Milonas vs. Kenny King and fans choice partners
Chris Sabin & Alex Shelley vs. Chuckie T & ? vs. Mark & Jay Briscoe vs. Leon St-Giovanni & Shaheem Ali vs. TK O’Ryan & Vinny Marseglia. This will be a four corners match as one of these teams won’t be in the match as they will be in the opener
Soberano Jr. vs. Punishment Martinez
Tenille Dashwood & Deonna Purrazzo vs. Sumie Sakai & Jenny Rose
Flip Gordon vs. Cody
Dalton Castle & Volador Jr. vs. Jay Lethal & Ultimo Guerrero
Young Bucks & Adam Page & Marty Scurll vs. Christopher Daniels & Frankie Kazarian & Scorpio Sky & Shane Taylor
Sunday has Raw in Rockford, IL, Smackdown in Cedar Rapids, IA, NXT in Indianapolis and Impact/Destiny Wrestling in Mississauga, ONT.
Raw is Monday in Milwaukee with Nia Jax vs. Asuka. There is also a Smackdown house show in Lacrosse, WI.
NEW JAPAN 46TH ANNIVERSARY SHOW ON TUESDAY AT 5 A.M. EASTERN TIME ON NEW JAPAN WORLD
Hiroyoshi Tenzan & Jushin Liger & Tiger Mask & Kushida & Ryusuke Taguchi vs. Yuji Nagata & Ren Narita & Tomoyuki Oka & Shota Umino & Tetsuhiro Yagi
Katsuya Kitamura vs. Manabu Nakanishi
Juice Robinson & David Finlay & Toa Henare vs. Hirooki Goto & Tomohiro Ishii & Toru Yano
Sho & Yoh vs. Hiromu Takahashi & Bushi vs. Yoshinobu Kanemaru & Desperado for IWGP jr. tag titles
Seiya Sanada vs. Yoshi-Hashi
Tetsuya Naito vs. Taichi
Minoru Suzuki vs. Togi Makabe for IC title
Kazuchika Okada vs. Will Ospreay non-title
Smackdown, 205 Live and Mixed Match Challenge takes place Tuesday in Green Bay, with Carmella vs. Becky Lynch, Jimmy Uso & Naomi vs. Braun Strowman & Alexa Bliss and cruiserweight title tournament matches with Buddy Murphy vs. Mustafa Ali and Drew Gulak vs. Mark Andrews.
F4W NEWSLETTER: Figure Four Weekly: Recapping Elimination Chamber and the Reigns-Strowman decision
What had been expected for nearly a year became official on Sunday night as Brock Lesnar defending the Universal Championship against Roman Reigns was announced for WrestleMania 34. Reigns defeated Braun Strowman, Seth Rollins, Finn Balor, John Cena, Elias, and The Miz in the main event of the Elimination Chamber pay-per-view to set up him challenging Lesnar at WrestleMania. The match came down to Reigns and Strowman, with Reigns finally putting him down with two spears.
WON NEWSLETTER: March 5, 2018 Wrestling Observer Newsletter: Elimination Chamber review, Jon Jones hearing
An updated look at WrestleMania, explaining the booking of Braun Strowman, the Brock Lesnar angle and plans for John Cena and Ronda Rousey are all in the headline story of this week’s Wrestling Observer Newsletter.
Look at the story behind the Reigns promo, the goal of the promo, what is and isn’t reality about Lesnar, when Lesnar returns, Lesnar’s talks with UFC and his decision making right now and a reality check when we look back three years ago.
Also look at the John Cena interview, Undertaker, Rey Mysterio Jr., how the Rousey angle has gone so far, what the TV ratings said about Rousey’s debut, women’s title plans, as well as the rest of the WrestleMania and Fast Lane show.
Check out the Strowman situation for WrestleMania, flaws in the Elimination Chamber booking as well as full coverage of the show, with match-by-match rundowns with star ratings and poll results on the show.
Find out about Jon Jones’ hearing before the California State Athletic Commission and what it means, as well as the completely befuddling remarks made prior to the hearing.
Look at what may be a WWE drug scandal with the tease of 15 names being involved including one who purchased $140,000 worth of substances. Read the claims out there and teases of what else will be released. Find out about the realities of drug testing and the changing pro wrestling business from when the death rate was so high.
Look at what talent WWE is interested in, WWE signing a deal to do events in Saudi Arabia, lots of news regarding the concussion lawsuits filed against WWE, what happened in a deposition that went badly for the plaintiff in one of those suits, more on Ronda Rousey training, Chris Jericho’s 2018 schedule, why Apollo Crews’ last name was dropped and the Dusty Rhodes tag team tournament.
Examine the secondary market in New Orleans for WWE events, update on a deal to bring WWE into a 100,000 seat stadium this fall, Ric Flair becoming a celebrity in Latin America, UFC talent at WWE event and why they weren’t identified, Bianca Belair injury update, WWE headed to Japan and the most-watched shows on WWE.
ORDERING INFO: Order the print Wrestling Observer right now and get it delivered via mail, by sending your name, address, Visa or Master Card number and an expiration date to Dave Meltzer, or by using PayPal directing funds to [email protected].
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WON BACK ISSUE: February 12, 2001 Wrestling Observer Newsletter: Debut of the XFL, Stan Hansen retires, more
With fan and media reaction after its debut all across the board and a huge buzz leading to a monstrous television rating, the only way to review the debut of the XFL over the weekend is this. Despite what sports people may think and even hardcore fans of sports may think, the majority of people attend sporting events as well as wrestling events based on quality of hype. They enjoy themselves based on quality of atmosphere of the show, and going home happy (either the babyface prevailing at the end or the home team prevailing).
SATURDAY NEWS UPDATE
WWE
Finn Balor missed last night’s Raw house show in Kalamazoo, Michigan due to weather-related travel issues. Balor noted that he was cutting it close but was on his way to Chicago for tonight’s show: “3rd time lucky! YAY 3rd time at the airport in 24hrs. Flights canceled due to weather Sorry to #WWEKalamazoo Cutting it tight but on way to #WWEChicago”
Kane returned to the ring last night for the first time since losing his Elimination Chamber qualifying match to Braun Strowman in January. Kane lost to Strowman last night as well and will face Brock Lesnar in a Universal Championship match at tonight’s show in Chicago.
WWE Network News has the full listing of All-Star Wrestling episodes, which was the WWWF’s television show in the 1970s and early 80s, that are coming to the Network on Monday. The episodes are from 1975-1980.
Former Indianapolis Colts punter Pat McAfee, who will be the special guest ring announcer for Adam Cole, Bobby Fish & Kyle O’Reilly vs. Heavy Machinery & Kassius Ohno at NXT’s house show in Indianapolis tomorrow, cut a promo on Cole ahead of the event.
Al Arabiya English interviewed Sasha Banks about her goals for women’s wrestling in WWE, her relationship with Vince McMahon, and not being afraid to stand up for herself anymore.
Bayley spoke to Newshub about her goals, Banks, and Ronda Rousey signing with WWE.
WWE posted a video about Banks and Bayley continuing their feud on social media.
Samir Singh is continuing to progress in his rehab after undergoing surgery for a torn ACL earlier this year.
WWE has a poll asking fans which Women’s Champion they want to see Asuka challenge at WrestleMania. Charlotte Flair is currently in the lead with over 60 percent of the vote.
Ric Flair appeared in the music video for 21 Savage, Offset, and Metro Boomin’s “Ric Flair Drip.”
Sami Zayn caught up with Matt Sydal last night: “Had a great time last night with one of my favorite people in wrestling, @findevan aka Matt Sydal! Matt is a passionate, abstract, and intelligent person, which may be part of why he’s such an exceptional wrestler. He adds so much to any show he’s on. Great to catch up!”
Natalya interviewed Beth Phoenix about the importance of strong female role models.
Johnny Gargano tweeted about wrestling in his hometown on his “NXT farewell tour” last night: “No matter where I go.. I will always just be a kid from Cleveland, Ohio living his dream. From the bottom of my heart.. Thank you for tonight, #NXTCleveland.”
WWE congratulated Ronda Rousey on being inducted into the National Sports Hall of Fame at the Arnold Sports Festival.
Adam Cole spoke about his time in NXT and friendship with Kevin Owens in an interview for MLive.
Explosive contract signings are the focus of this week’s WWE video top 10 list.
Pro Wrestling
The botched spot where Sami Callihan accidentally hit Eddie Edwards in the face with a baseball bat led to a back-and-forth on Twitter between Jim Cornette and Callihan. Cornette first wrote, “OK, I just saw this for the first time– @TheEddieEdwards should have beat the sh*t out of this stupid f*ck–he set it up shoddy, was careless with his sh*tty swing & they shouldn’t have been doing it to begin with. Who the f*ck “trained” @TheSamiCallihan ? I’m f*cking hot.” Callihan replied that he’s just going to keep watching his bank account go up. Cornette then wrote that Callihan should have been fired. Kassius Ohno got involved, tweeting at Callihan, “Really? Really? There is ZERO correlation between how much money you make & what happened in that ring. You should be embarrassed. ASHAMED.” A report from TMZ noted that Callihan felt terrible about what happened and was emotional about it behind the scenes.
Kota Ibushi will be wrestling for RevPro in New Orleans on April 6th.
PROGRESS Wrestling also announced that Pete Dunne will be on their WrestleMania weekend show on April 6th and that it will be his only independent appearance of the weekend.
Hikuleo appeared to suffer a leg injury at a show for NJPW this morning.
During a Twitch stream, Kenny Omega said he’s having too much fun to go to WWE at this point. Omega said he wants to feel like he’s making a difference and doesn’t want to feel like a robot and be controlled. Omega mentioned that he has friends in WWE and wishes them the best, but being able to tell the kind of stories he’s telling with people who he thinks are the best in the world is what’s most important to him right now.
SoCal Uncensored wrote that Rich Swann has been backstage at this week’s Lucha Underground tapings.
5 Star Wrestling’s show that was scheduled for Aberdeen next week has been postponed until April 12th due to logistical issues caused by severe weather.
ESPN posted a feature on Kenn Doane and the Spirit Squad’s run in WWE.
CBS Local Sports interviewed Flip Gordon about his service in the Army and rise in ROH.
Meiko Satomura vs. Chris Brookes is set for Fight Club: PRO in Wolverhampton on March 30th.
UFC/MMA
The UFC uploaded the sixth and seventh episodes of Embedded for tonight’s PPV.
Dana White told the LA Times about Tony Ferguson and Khabib Nurmagomedov fighting for the “real” lightweight title despite Conor McGregor not being stripped yet: “As soon as one punch is thrown, it’s on for the full title and it’s only fair. They’ve both worked their way up to No. 1 and No. 2. They deserve a shot.”
Jon Jones and Miesha Tate went back and forth on Twitter after Tate said she’s lost faith and interest in Jones.
Daniel Cormier isn’t paying attention to Jones’ issues with his CSAC hearing and upcoming USADA suspension.
Luke Rockhold is the new face of Ralph Lauren’s Polo Blue cologne.
Jon Fitch will make his Bellator debut against Paul Daley at Bellator 199 in San Jose on May 12th.
Today in Professional Wrestling History: Sting wins TNA World title
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