THE ROUND-UP
THE LATEST NEWS
Rey Mysterio confirmed for WWE SmackDown 1000
WWE adds stipulation to Becky Lynch vs. Charlotte Flair rematch
World Cup qualifying matches set for SmackDown, Big Show to return
Women’s title match official for NWA 70th Anniversary Show
UFC 229 Khabib-McGregor brawl fallout: Arrests dropped, NAC withholds purse
VIDEO: UFC 229 post-fight press conference
Khabib submits Conor McGregor at UFC 229 leading to wild cageside brawl
THE LATEST AUDIO
WOL: UFC 229 and WWE Australia fallout show! 10/7
WOR: UFC 229 near-riot, Khabib vs. Conor, WWE Australia, tons more! 10/7
We’re looking for your thoughts on yesterday’s WWE Super Show-down from Melbourne, UFC 229 from Las Vegas and tomorrow’s New Japan King of Pro Wrestling. You can leave a thumbs up, thumbs down or thumbs in the middle along with a best and worst match to [email protected].
NEW JAPAN KING OF PRO WRESTLING AT 4 A.M. EASTERN MONDAY MORNING ON NEW JAPAN WORLD
Yoshinobu Kanemaru & Desperado vs. Tiger Mask & Jushin Liger for IWGP jr. tag titles
Togi Makabe & Tomoaki Honma vs. Juice Robinson & Toa Henare
Young Bucks & Hangman Page & Chase Owens vs. Bad Luck Fale & Tama Tonga & Tanga Loa & Taiji Ishimori
Tomohiro Ishii & Hirooki Goto & Will Ospreay vs. Minoru Suzuki & Taichi & Takashi Iizuka
Kazuchika Okada & Toru Yano & Sho & Yoh vs. Tetsuya Naito & Seiya Sanada & Bushi & ?
Zack Sabre Jr. vs. Evil
Kushida vs. Marty Scurll for IWGP jr. title
Hiroshi Tanahashi vs. Jay White for Tokyo Dome IWGP title shot
Kenny Omega vs. Kota Ibushi vs. Cody for IWGP heavyweight title
Raw will be Monday in Chicago. There will also be a Smackdown house show Monday night in Louisville.
Smackdown, 205 Live and Mixed Match Challenge are taped Tuesday in Indianapolis. Announced for Smackdown are Big Show vs. Randy Orton and Jeff Hardy vs. Samoa Joe in qualifying matches for the World Cup in Saudi Arabia and Becky Lynch vs. Charlotte Flair for the title and if Lynch gets DQ’d the title can change hands. Also announced are Mixed Match Challenge matches with are A.J. Styles & Charlotte Flair vs. R-Truth & Carmella and Braun Strowman & Ember Moon vs. Finn Balor & Bayley.
F4W NEWSLETTER: Figure Four Weekly: Liv Morgan, Brie Bella, and the dangers of wrestling
What should have been a fairly innocuous six-woman tag match on last Monday’s Raw ended with Liv Morgan having suffered a concussion and with a social media controversy that has yet to fully die down. The Riott Squad faced The Bellas & Natalya on last week’s Raw as part of the build to Ruby Riott, Morgan & Sarah Logan vs. Ronda Rousey & The Bellas at Super Show-Down in Melbourne, Australia.
WON NEWSLETTER: October 8, 2018 Wrestling Observer Newsletter: Massive UFC 229 expectations, plus tons of news
Headed up with a major history piece on the 30-year history of Ted Turner’s involvement with pro wrestling and coverage of a week of so many major events, it’s a double issue of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter this week.
Preview UFC 229 and why it is expected to be the biggest non-boxing PPV in history. Look at projections, some real numbers, some comparisons, and why Dana White says it wasn’t in Madison Square Garden.
The big story looks at Ted Turner and how he first got connected to pro wrestling in 1972, the role of Ray & Ann Gunkel, the wrestling war in Georgia that led to the two hour Saturday night block, the roles of Jim Barnett and Ole Anderson, and the first-ever Omni sellout.
Also look at the decision made by UFC and USADA to no longer announce drug test failures and why it wasn’t well thought out, as well as the reputation of USADA taking such a hit and the sad ironies of this.
Look at WWE Super Show-Down, ticket sales and ramifications.
Read the update on the 1,000th episode of Smackdown, WWE plans for NXT and ideas that have been talked about, major execs selling WWE stock.
Look at the big questions facing Bellator as they try and build their brand, as well as surprising notes of the Bellator brand vs U.S. pro wrestling companies and Saturday’s show in particular.
This issue has full coverage of ROH’s Death Before Dishonor with match-by-match coverage, business notes, polls and star ratings for the show.
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].
Rates in the United States are $13 for 4 issues, $32 for 12, $61 for 24, $101 for 40 and $131 for 52. In Canada and Mexico, rates are $14.50 for 4, $35 for 12, $67 for 24, $111 for 40 and $144 or 52. In Europe, you can get the fastest delivery and best rates by sending to [email protected]. For the rest of the world, rates are $16.50 for 4, $44 for 12, $85 for 24, $141 for 40 issues and $183 for 52. If you order by mail with a check, cash or money order (P.O. Box 1228, Campbell, CA 95009-1228), you can get $1 off in every price range.)
If you are a new subscriber ordering 24 or more issues, you can choose one free classic issue or two free classic issues with a 40-issue subscription.
SUNDAY NEWS UPDATE
Obviously there was a ton to say about the incident last night at the UFC show where Khabib Nurmagomedov hopped the cage and went after Dillon Danis, the Jiu Jitsu coach of Conor McGregor. Bryan and I are up here talking that, the UFC show and the Australian WWE show. It’s crazy when one of the biggest international shows in WWE history and what could be the biggest UFC show in history ends up as footnotes on the day for what happened.
The basic stuff now is that the fate of Nurmagomedov rests first before the Nevada State Athletic Commission. I expect a lengthy suspension and a heavy fine. I know there has been a history of leniency with big stars but my gut is because of how big this has become, it won’t happen here. If he’s suspended for a lengthy period, and he should be, UFC would then strip him of the title. I can’t even say it’s too bad because even though he had a spectacular win, he did make the decision of what happened next and at some point you have to be held responsible for your actions. Still, there has been an environment with Conor McGregor and Jon Jones where actions have resulted in slaps on the wrist, and with McGregor, was part of the story that led to this.
Nurmagomedov said today: “This is not the way we want to celebrate such a dominant performance but when you talk about people’s country, family and religion and intentionally try to kill someone like he said and the cornermen are running there mouths after, this is the fight game and shit happens. The fans got an amazing fight and a great show. I want to apologize to the Nevada athletic commission, the Governor of Nevada and I want to thank the Las Vegas police department and security for doing such an unbelievable job. Now everyone understands who is the amateur here.”
Khabib Nurmagomedov’s purse was withheld but Conor McGregor got his $3 million base purse. McGregor also gets a percentage of the PPV revenue. McGregor claimed if PPV numbers are as big as people were saying that he could get $50 million. There’s no way of predicting but it didn’t feel in the Mayweather-McGregor level of public interest. There weren’t the issues with systems crashing due to late buys, although most bar reports we got noted they were full and there were establishments that told us they did record business last night for any sporting event.
McGregor said he was looking forward to a rematch.
Tony Ferguson would have to be in the title match. Ferguson and Derrick Lewis should have been two of the big stories last night with their wins, but a lot of that was overshadowed. Still, they got big wins in front of a huge audience. Whether it would be McGregor or the winner of the Nate Diaz vs. Dustin Poirier fight would have to be determined. It was notable that even Daniel Cormier, Nurmagomedov’s teammate, who along with Luke Rockhold were praised by Dana White for calming things down, said that McGregor didn’t deserve what happened. But this was not an isolated incident but a series of incidents that escalated and what happened in April in Brooklyn was the catalyst which Nurmagomedov said. This was a huge black eye to UFC on what should have been one of the biggest nights in its history.
Dana White after the show talked about how McGregor refused to press charges so there were no arrests. Police at first arrested three people from Nurmagomedov’s team but no charges are being filed. White noted that the Governor of Nevada, Brian Sandoval, was at the show and how he left. There was fear that more fights would break out among fans, and there was at least one, but it wasn’t as bad as feared. For the most part, with the exception of one fight and people throwing drinks at Nurmagomedov just before he got backstage, the crowd was not an issue.
Dana White said that the guys on Khabib’s team in the brawl would never fight for UFC again. One of the guys in the cage, with the black shirt, was believed to be Zubaira Tukhugov, who is scheduled to face McGregor’s training partner Artem Lobov on 10/27 in Moncton, NB in the semifinal of UFC’s next show. So we’ll see what happens but nothing has been said yet.
The WWE crew was on the long flight back from Australia for TV on Monday and Tuesday. The New York Yankees vs. Boston Red Sox division series game three and four go head-to-head with Raw and Smackdown. Under normal circumstances, with those teams plus the NFL, and the ratings the last two weeks, this week’s numbers would be expected to be the among lowest marks of the year, and for Raw, among the lowest in decades if not a new low. But the week after PPVs usually has a little bit of a bump and perhaps the curiosity over the Undertaker & Kane vs. Shawn Michaels & HHH ending of the show will boost curiosity for Monday. Plus, Tuesday they are advertising the beginning of the tournament to build for the Saudi Arabia show.
Obviously the news here regarding Saudi Arabia hasn’t impacted the WWE’s show.
For Google trends, UFC 229 was, with nothing else close, the most searched for term on the Internet with more than 10.4 million searches. Normally this could predict a buy rate somewhat accurately but for obvious reasons a lot of the searches had to do with the brawl. I believe this would be the second biggest in history behind the Ronda Rousey loss to Holly Holm. Aside from the main eventers, who would be listed as UFC 229, the other most searched for fighters off the show were Ferguson, Lewis and Michelle Waterson. The WWE show from Australia was No. 13 yesterday, just behind Waterson with 100,000.
WWE
John Cena is scheduled to appear Tuesday night on The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon. (thanks to Jon Southerland)
A story from Australia on Buddy Murphy being the first Australian ever to win a main roster championship.
A story on two fans doing a WWE themed wedding.
UFC
Dave Doyle did a great piece regarding heels and babyfaces and business regarding last night’s show.
We’ve heard that the piracy of last night’s UFC show on Twitch was at record levels. The streams were taken down but they had tons of viewers beforehand.
MISCELLANEOUS
New Japan should be announcing the teams for their jr. heavyweight tag team tournament over the next few days.
All Hall of Fame voters should read the great piece by Bradley Craig, the leading historian from Scotland, about Jackie Pallo, one of the first television-created superstars of British wrestling.
The Championship Wrestling League out of Detroit that we’ve written about that has TV in Detroit on WADL has already changed ownership. The new owner is John McNeill and they will now start taping regularly in 2019 as opposed to the shows booked now, based out of Brighton, MI and the Legacy Center. All the previously announced shows are canceled and refunds are being offered. (thanks to Shannon Walsh)
River City Wrestling on 11/2 in Kirby, TX at the Turner Club with Jerry Lawler, Colt Cabana, Rebel, Scarlett Bordeaux, Fallah Bahh, Laredo Kid and Hernandez.
Rain’s first Unify Wrestling show on 1/22 takes place in Honolulu at the Aloha Tower Marketplace.
Spectrum Cable Ch. 92 in New York is airing ROH television every Wednesday night at 10 p.m. (thanks to Irwin Markowitz)
Greektown Wrestling on 10/25 in Toronto at the Eastminster United Church.
NECW on 10/13 in Milton, MA at Copeland Field House at the Milton High School.
Melbourne City Wrestling from Friday in Melbourne before a sellout 700 fans the day before the WWE show: Tome Filip & Stevie Filip b Marcius Pitt & Damian Slater, Avary b Kellyanne, Markus Kool won three-way over JXT and Mikey Broderick, Mitch Waterman & Nick Bury won over Jake Andrewartha & Ali, Campbell Crawford & Jake Lindo and Fun Time Phil & Mike Barr in an elimination match to keep the MCW tag titles, Adam Brooks b Slex to win the Intercommonwealth title, Jonah Rock b Caveman Ugg, Dowie James b Lochy Hendricks, Indi Hartwell b Shazza McKenzie, Gino Gambino b Robby Eagles to keep the MCW title. The next show is 11/17 with Gambino vs. Rock for the title and Brooks vs. Slex in a rematch. The show got a great reaction from the local fans who compared it to an NXT Takeover the day before a WWE PPV show, with most talking about Brooks vs. Slex as the best match, and the main event got a lot of praise as well. (thanks to Kevin Chiat)
The other show, Saturday afternoon before the WWE show in Melbourne, called WrestleRock saw: Cletus & Mad Dog & Campbell Crawford b Mitch Waterson & Lochy Hendricks & Taylor King, Alan Payne b Jake Lindo, Avary b Taylah Rose, CK Dowie b Caveman Ugg (both had to wrestle in cat masks), Robbie Eagles b Stevie Filip, Mitch Waterson b Marcus Muffinov (Marcius Pitt) to win the WrestleRock title. Fun Time Phil was scheduled to defend in the main event but the title was vacated because Phil worked as an extra for WWE and had to be at the building early.
There is a Legends of the Ring convention on 10/13 in Monroe, NJ at the Ramada Plaza Hotel from 8:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. built around The Young Bucks, Cody, Brandi Rhodes, Marty Scurll and Hangman Page, plus Kevin Nash, Scott Hall, Sid Vicious, Harley Race, Ted DiBiase, Virgil, The Rougeau Brothers, Mike Enos, Wayne Bloom, Pat Tanaka, Paul Diamond, Eddie Edwards, Eli Drake, Moose, Renee Young, Larry Zbyszko, Warlord, Frankie Kazarian, Christopher Daniels, Scorpio Sky, Tony Garea, Flip Gordon, Tyson Kidd, Tessa Blanchard, Drago, Big Cass and more.
All Star Wrestling on 10/20 in Surrey, BC at the Alice McKay Building at the Cloverdale Fairgrounds with Luchasaurus, Nicole Matthews and more.
Jerry Bostic of World Class Revolution Wrestling gave a very touching tribute on Facebook to Fred Urban III, the owner of Old School Wrestling of Texas who he said passed away unexpectedly. (thanks to Shannon Walsh)
A story on Harley Race. (thanks to Mike Kuzmuk)
NPR did a story about a former pro wrestler. (thank to Mark Schreiner and George Maranville)
Some historical pro wrestling photos.
Daily Professional Wrestling History: WWE No Mercy 2007
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