Topic: Pro Wrestling Thread

Was kind of surprised to see we didn't have one of these, and with the Royal Rumble now in the books, the road to Wrestlemania has truly begun, so it seems like the perfect time to start one.

I've seen some pretty mixed things on this year's Royal Rumble, but as someone who has been out of the loop for most of the year since the last 'Mania, I was just sorta in awe as to how improved the product feels. A really nice melding point of that 2015ish golden era NXT stuff, with what you would expect both from modern WWE but also a modern wrestling promotion in general, hitting WWE really in about a perfect of a place as it can land (at least for me).

How did you all find it? And will you be following the road to this year's 'Mania? Or do you have your eye instead on AEW, New Japan or something else?

Drew McIntyre needs behaviour lessons.

I saw the reports coming out of the Rumble he was really mad about something that went down, I just kinda assumed it was a storyline.

He was eliminated by L.A Knight.

@Pizzamorg Well we did have a thread for wrestling

https://www.pushsquare.com/forums/ps_general_discussion/the_p...

But for some reason it got locked, not sure why as it wasn't breaking any of the forum rules.

Anyway I havent followed WWE in a very long time just because I got tired of the same old ***** with Vince's booking and such. Yeah I know he hasnt been in charge for awhile now but now I just dont have the time for it. As it is I can barely keep up with AEW I am seriously six months behind on that as it is. I just might clear out my DVR and I just pick it up where it is currently one of these days but I dont have any clue whats going on currently lol.

@Tasuki 6 months behind, try beating 7 years behind.

Happy with Charlotte winning. Not so much with Jey.

I get that he’s ‘over’, but his matches suck. I can only hope it’s a short ‘transitional’ reign.

Also I love that Smackdown, Raw & NxT + old PPVs are on Netflix. AEW is on ITVX. Not for me, but for my dad. Don’t live at home, but nearby, so when my sister is away I used to come around & put the wrestling on. Not anymore😁

This is honestly what burnt me out as an adult fan the first time. Considering pro wrestling is still considered a niche thing, there is an absolute tidal wave of content basically every second of every day. All the big promotions tend to run multiple weeklies or side shows, and then if you get into indies or like New Japan or one of the medium ones like ROH or whatever, you can easily fill every waking moment with new wrestling content and never run out.

This was fun for a while, but it gets exhausting, cause you take even an evening to do literally anything else and you've now fallen so far behind you'll never catch back up again. Eventually it just hit critical mass for me and I needed some new hobbies.

The good thing about WWE is for returning fans at least, is that almost every story that really matters these days appears to be booked long term, so I can jump in every road to 'Mania, and its still mostly the same landscape of people, still mostly in the same feuds or on the same trajectories. Must be absolutely maddening for people who watch weekly, it must feel like the show never progresses, but great for me!

Yeah we saw that problem at that 'Mania match where Jimmy and Jey just hit each other with super kicks for ten straight minutes. I also don't think Cody is all that interesting in the ring either, so maybe lets hope Jey picks Gunther who I am sure can drag a good match out of him in the way I just couldn't imagine Cody doing (unless its some sort of gimmick match like the Owens match at Rumble was, to add in some gnarly bumps to make up for the lack of great in ring work).

@Pizzamorg Right. I was doing that for awhile a few years ago. I was watching NXT, AEW and NJPW and it was just crazy. Then on top of that I was watching YouTube videos on wrestling, Wrestling with Wregret and Jim Cornette being my favorites I didn't have time for anything else. Lucky for me I was burnt out on video games so that helped. But as soon as I started watching other programs and got back in to gaming not to mention Dungeons and Dragons and I couldn't keep up. Now I just watch when I can.

My take on wrestling is that I liked wrestling when all of the wrestlers had second jobs because WWF was presumably not paying them very well, so there was like a wrestling race car driver, and a wrestling plumber, and my personal favourite, the wrestling guy who worked for the IRS whose initials were also coincidentally I.R.S.

Imagine that. Your name is Irwin R. Schyster. Probably got bullied at school for it. Kids can be so cruel. And he's clearly smart. Good with numbers and stuff. And then he goes and gets a job for the IRS - an institution everybody hates. No wonder he was so bitter. I feel kinda sorry for him honestly. That doesn't excuse the terrible things he did, like that time he tried to make Tatanka pay a gift tax on the feathers in his traditional native American headdress. But still. There were reasons, damn it.

Some random thoughts for the Royal Rumble Fallout Raw from 03 February:

I know in a technical sense Jey's promo was awful, but I kinda liked how raw it all felt (for a lack of a better term that doesn't sound like I am just making a bad pun).

While the match was actually pretty fun, I kinda expected Penta to have more mystique - at least to begin with. I wanna see him break some arms for a bit, building to a match where he is pushed to go a distance.

Sky/Morgan felt overbooked, and was sloppy at times in the ring, but I thought it was still a fun match overall.

I thought Zayn / Punk would be better, let us hope they were saving a gear or two for a PPV banger in the near future.