Tonight’s WWE RAW will take place from the BOK Center in Tulsa, Oklahoma with more build for the Royal Rumble.
WWE has officially announced the Elimination Chamber Premium Live Event for the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
WWE announced today that they will return to Jeddah, Saudi Arabia on Saturday, February 19 for the next Elimination Chamber event.
Elimination Chamber 2022 will be held at a new venue built in 2021, the Jeddah Super Dome, billed as the world’s largest pillarless superdome. A media report from last year noted that the dome can hold 5200 vehicles, but did not include the number of seats. WWE previously ran the King Abdullah International Stadium when in Jeddah.
WWE’s announcement today noted, “The Elimination Chamber show complements the commitment of the General Entertainment Authority to provide the most famous international events and entertainment shows. This show was preceded by several previous partnerships with WWE to present international shows in the kingdom, which achieved remarkable local and international success, including the recent WWE Crown Jewel show in Riyadh Season 2021 and WWE Super ShowDown in the previous Riyadh Season in early 2020.”
It was reported last week that WWE may be re-branding Elimination Chamber to WrestleMania Chamber, but nothing has been confirmed as of this writing and today’s announcement did not include a name change.
There’s still no word on if WWE will hold a men’s and women’s Chamber match in Saudi Arabia, but we will keep you updated.
WWE and the Saudi General Sports Authority announced in 2018 that they were entering into a 10-year strategic multi-platform partnership to support the Saudi Vision 2030 initiative, which is the Kingdom’s social and economic reform program. The deal called for two events to be held per year, but the COVID-19 pandemic forced delays in 2020 and 2021. WWE visited Saudi Arabia for Greatest Royal Rumble and Crown Jewel in 2018, Super ShowDown and Crown Jewel in 2019, and Super ShowDown in 2020, then Crown Jewel this past October.
WWE said they will announce more Elimination Chamber details in the coming weeks.
Source: Wrestling Inc.
Tonight’s WWE SmackDown on FOX will take place from the CHI Health Center in Omaha, Nebraska with more build for the Royal Rumble.
WWE has not announced any matches as of yet for tonight’s SmackDown, but they have confirmed that RAW Superstar Seth Rollins will be appearing to build to the Royal Rumble match with WWE Universal Champion Roman Reigns.
Regarding Reigns, it’s expected that he will celebrate 500 days as champion tonight. He passed the milestone earlier this week.
SmackDown will likely see more blue brand Superstars announce their spots for the Royal Rumble after Sheamus confirmed his participation last week.
Tammy Sytch, formerly WWE’s Sunny, is currently being held in Monmouth County jail.
Wrestlers winding up on the wrong side of the law is certainly nothing new. However, it seems to happen to Tammy Sytch, better known to wrestling fans as WWE’s Sunny, more often than most. Sytch has been arrested multiple times and spent numerous spells in jail from 2012 up until last year. Now the Hall Of Famer has been arrested again and is currently being held in Monmouth County jail.
According to TMZ, Sytch faces two charges of illegally possessing a weapon, and one charge of making terroristic threats. The only additional information known at this time is that the weapon, or weapons, Sytch had were not firearms. New Jersey classes the weapon possession charges as third-degree, and the terroristic threats as a fourth-degree crime.
Third-degree crimes carry a maximum of five years each in New Jersey, and one year for a fourth-degree crime. That means if Sytch is convicted of all three, she could be facing up to 11 years in prison. As mentioned above, Sytch has spent a few spells in jails, prisons, and correctional facilities. However, she has never come close to spending that long a spell behind bars.
https://mobile.twitter.com/WWEHOFerSunny/status/1480724124100091908
The ins and outs of what happened exactly are unclear at present. However, she did update fans on Twitter earlier this week by revealing she was “going through some shit”. It’s possible whatever Sytch was referring to on social media a few days ago is connected to or has led to what got her arrested on Thursday. Here’s hoping the whole situation sounds much worse than it appears on the surface.
Despite the many returns of female Superstars from the past in WWE over the past few years thanks to the women’s revolution, there has been no indication Sunny will ever appear in WWE again. The last time she was ever openly connected to the company was when she was inducted into the Hall of Fame over a decade ago. It’s unlikely she will ever return to WWE TV in the future, especially if the latest charges brought against her result in convictions.
Source: TheSportster
WWE Hall Of Famer Jeff Jarrett recently spoke with The Business of the Business podcast. During the interview, he discussed Game Changer Wrestling. He revealed that GCW has been on his radar long before 2021.
“I was well aware of GCW through the lens of FITE, long before I’ll say diplomatically, 2021. They have been on my radar for quite some time,” Jarrett claimed. “A lot of folks know them as, ‘oh, the deathmatch,’ and in a lot of ways I think, maybe positively and negatively, they’ve been branded that way.”
Jeff Jarrett then went on to praise the content that GCW has been putting out as of late. Jarrett also spoke about how the promotion has built up a loyal audience that continues to grow.
“But Brett and the team have put out consistent episodic content,” he stated. “All of their programming, they have a very loyal audience, and it continues to grow and grow.”
Jeff Jarrett then looked ahead to the future of professional wrestling. He believes that there is room for another major promotion alongside what already exists. However, for him, it could be about having a home-based promotion that exists around the world, such as in South America.
“Now language is an issue, a barrier,” he admitted. “That goes without saying. But there is room for a — I’ll call it a home-based promotion around the world. It could be South America, Mexico City. Look at the amount of Hispanics in the United States. They absolutely could thrive. So I think there could be a Hispanic promotion, there could be a European promotion.
“The days of it being just looked at from a US lens, in my opinion, they’re long gone. It is a global promotion. It’s just where is the home base going to be. Because I think there’s room for, and I don’t want to get too far down the road, but three, four, five, six, seven of those.”
Source: Wresting Inc. with credit to The Business of the Business podcast
WWE Hall of Famers The Rock & Roll Express are retiring from tag team competition.
Ricky Morton took to Twitter this week to announce that he and Robert Gibson will begin their farewell tour on Saturday, January 22 when they wrestle AAA World Tag Team Champions FTR at a Big Time Wrestling event in Spartanburg, SC.
Morton noted that he and Gibson will continue to make appearances together, but they are retiring from wrestling as a tag team. Morton wants to spend more time teaming with his son, Kerry Morton, and work with other up & coming talent.
“Rock & Roll Express Farewell tour begins January 22nd, 2022. I want to focus more with Kerry and behind the scenes in the wrestling business. #onelastride,” he wrote. “Specify, Robert and I are retiring from tag team wrestling together. Not appearances/signings. I would like to continue to tag team with my son and work with the younger generation in this glorious business.”
After the match against FTR, Morton will then wrestle Matt Cardona at GCW’s The Wrld On GCW the next night from Hammerstein Ballroom in New York City. Morton is also scheduled to team with 2 Cold Scorpio to wrestle Effy and Allie Katch at this Friday’s GCW Notorious event in Detroit. Morton is then scheduled to compete in the 26th annual ECWA Super 8 Tournament on Saturday, March 26 in Morganville, NJ.
Morton and Gibson began teaming together in the early 1980s. The legendary tag team has held gold in more than a dozen promotions. They were inducted into the NWA Hall of Fame in 2006, the WWE Hall of Fame in 2017, and the Professional Wrestling Hall of Fame in 2021.
Source: Wrestling Inc.
Corey Graves was reportedly cleared to return to in-ring action at some point in 2020.
A new report from Fightful Select notes that sources close to Graves claim he was actually cleared by WWE doctors at some point in the last year or so. WWE would not confirm the report, so it’s largely based on behind-the-scenes discussions.
Graves briefly won the WWE 24/7 Title on the November 8, 2021 RAW, despite previously being on a strict internal “no contact” list. It’s now been confirmed that Graves was no longer on that list when he won the 24/7 Title.
There have been several internal pitches made for Graves, but it remains to be seen if those were from WWE creative or just Graves himself. It was noted that none of the pitches for Graves have made it through creative. One source close to the WWE creative team said they were not aware of Graves being cleared, and confirmed that he is off the “no contact” list.
After a run on the indies, Graves signed a WWE developmental deal in August 2011. He suffered two concussions between late 2013 and early 2014, and then announced his in-ring retirement in December 2014. Graves has been a member of the WWE NXT and main roster announce teams since then.
Graves spoke about wanting to come out of retirement during an April 2020 podcast, after being inspired by the WWE 24 documentary on WWE Hall of Famer Edge. In May 2020 he then stepped in the ring to train for the first time since retiring, with his brother Sam Adonis, which you can see in a tweet below. Graves fueled the rumor mill again back in July 2021 when he tweeted, “I was put on this earth to do something. What I’m doing is not it.” He then tweeted about wanting to wrestle again in late November 2021.
Graves stated earlier this month that he wants to declare his spot for the 2022 Men’s Royal Rumble Match.
There’s no word yet on if WWE will allow Graves to return to the ring.
Source: Wrestling Inc.
Court Bauer’s Major League Wrestling promotion has filed an anti-trust lawsuit against the WWE.
The WWE legal team is working overtime this week … and probably for the next few months.
MLW (Major League Wrestling), the New York-based professional wrestling promotion founded by former WWE writer Court Bauer, has filed an anti-trust lawsuit against World Wrestling Entertainment, Inc. MLW is alleging that WWE interfered in some of its business deals and even pressured some third parties to pull the plug on their existing arrangements with MLW.
“WWE’s pattern of predatory and exclusionary conduct has hampered competition in the U.S. wrestling market by deprivingMLW and other competitors of distribution channels, and its conduct has harmed consumers by depriving them of content and keeping prices high,” MLW’s lawsuit states.
MLW claims that WWE sabotaged a “lucrative” agreement between MLW and streaming platform Tubi, which is owned by Fox. According to the lawsuit, a WWE executive contacted Fox and asked Fox to terminate the MLW deal.
As you might recall, WWE and Fox signed a $1 billion broadcast deal in 2018 that facilitated SmackDown’s move from USA Network to Fox. WWE signed another big-money deal with Fox in 2020.
WWE allegedly implied that they would cease doing business with Fox if their demands were not met. Soon thereafter, Fox informed MLW that it had canceled the company’s Tubi contract, which ultimately led to a downturn in MLW’s profits and ticket sales.
MLW also claims that WWE interfered in its deal with VICE TV when WWE senior vice president Susan Levison called VICE to inform the network that Vince McMahon was unhappy that VICE had agreed to air MLW programming As a result, VICE only aired one MLW show.
“WWE has been wrongfully depriving its competitors of critical opportunities for many years, but its latest conduct has been even more unconscionable,” Bauer said in a statement. “I think we speak for the rest of the professional wrestling world when we say that this anti-competitive behavior has to stop.”
In a statement of its own, WWE disputed MLW’s claims.
“WWE believes these claims have no merit and intends to vigorously defend itself against them,” the WWE statement read.
Source: TheSportster
Tonight’s WWE NXT episode on the USA Network will feature fallout from last week’s New Year’s Evil special.
John Cena says he will likely miss WrestleMania 38 in April.
Cena appeared on The Ellen Show this week to promote The Peacemaker on HBO Max, and was asked about his WWE future, and if he will be at WrestleMania 38 on Saturday, April 2 and Sunday, April 3 in Texas.
“WrestleMania is usually in the cusp of late March, early April. I don’t know if I’m going to make it this year,” Cena said. “And that’s a good conundrum to have because there’s a lot of good opportunity coming up, which I would love to take and if all those things line up, I don’t know if I’ll be able to make WrestleMania.”
John Cena continued and said he is far from done with the squared circle.
“But I will tell you and everybody watching, I’m not done with WWE by a long shot,” he said. “That’s my home, I love it. I was able to go back during the summer for a few months and entertain audiences when they welcomed audiences back to arenas, so I’ve far from had my last performance.”
Cena, who turns 45 on April 23, has not worked a program since losing to WWE Universal Champion Roman Reigns at SummerSlam in late August. He returned on September 10 for a dark main event at the SmackDown at Madison Square Garden, teaming with The Mysterios for a six-man win over The Bloodline, but he has been away since then.
You can see footage from his Ellen interview below:
Source: Wrestling Inc.
