We had a slow holiday week for autograph returns with 7 successes coming back this week.
We had WWE NXT wrestler Karmen Petrovic, Eagles great Bill Bergey, and Cardinals Hall of Fame Jim Hart.
We post these every Wednesday & Sunday on our YouTube channel, so if ‘through the mail autographs’ are something you’re interested in, please subscribe to our YouTube channel.
All Elite Wrestling has had a cloud over their heads since CM Punk and The Elite had a backstage brawl in 2022. Ratings for their flagship show “Dynamite” have been stagnant and their newest show, “Collision”, is having trouble cracking 600k viewers most weeks. Things aren’t as hot as they’ve been in the past and the tension between Punk and The Elite still continues. They desperately needed a big, successful show to help cleanse themselves of some of the last year’s stench.
AEW has been eyeing the UK market since before their debut episode of “Dynamite.” Owner Tony Khan spends a lot of time there due to his family’s ownership of Fulham Football Club. The pandemic ruined their plans of having a big show in Fulham’s home stadium. Now that things have returned to normal, they swung for the fences in their UK debut.
There’s usually a buzz that surrounds any of WWE’s Big Four pay-per-view events. I did not feel any buzz this past weekend when WWE had their second-biggest event of the year, the 2022 Royal Rumble.
You could make excuses as to why this event didn’t feel very big, but the biggest one is that WWE no longer has larger-than-life stars.
WWE is getting paid big money for their weekly television, pay-per-views premium live events, and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia pays them handsomely for two big shows every year for the foreseeable future. They just had an investor call on Thursday and announced their first-ever year $1 billion+ in revenue ($1.095 billion in 2021). They aren’t motivated to make big stars right now. If they made another guy as big as The Rock or Steve Austin, they would have to pay them more and wreck their pay structure. They had their biggest profit ever and they still cited ‘budget reasons’ when they fired dozens and dozens of on-screen talent, and even more off-air employees.
This weekend, WWE had their 2021 ‘Survivor Series” pay-per-view from the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York. It was panned as a boring show by most, and for me, the only thing worth watching was the opening match between Becky Lynch and Charlotte Flair.
The “Survivor Series” used to be one of the biggest, most-anticipated shows of the year, but it hasn’t been that in a long, long time. WWE didn’t dedicate much time building up this PPV as they’ve been hot-shotting title matches in hopes of keeping their ratings above all-time record lows. They really only focused on the upcoming PPV over the last two weeks, and it wasn’t a successful build.
Late last month, Ring of Honor Wrestling announced they will be taking a hiatus to regroup and assess a new vision for the company. All contracted talent will be let go from their contracts at the start of 2022.
ROH is expected to resume tapings in April 2022 and will essentially become a super-indie by paying top independent stars on a per-show appearance. Many of their wrestlers may still appear for them on those deals while also taking a steady diet of indie bookings. There are a dozen or so wrestlers/teams that will have significant interest from the other top wrestling companies in the world.
It’s been awhile since I posted about upcoming Funko releases. I think I may have skipped the last series, but the upcoming toys to be released in early-2020 are must-haves.
We have reviewed a lot of Mattel’s WWE Elite figures, but Funko has also released solid figures in the past. I’m a big collector and you can see some of my collection on my Instagram, @vintagetoybob.
This upcoming set has a couple chase figures and exclusives that can be found at Amazon and Wal-Mart. We will also see the first Hulk Hogan Funko figure since his racist remarks were made public years ago.
Here are some pictures of Funko’s Winter 2020 WWE POP! vinyl releases.
It’s been awhile since we added to our ‘Sports Crush’ list.
We’ve written over a dozen ‘Sports Crush’ posts since we launched AmericasWhiteBoy.com. We have spotlighted a ton of WWE Divas (Becky Lynch, Mandy Rose, Sasha Banks, Alexa Bliss, Liv Morgan and others). The readers still keep those among the some of the highest traffic on the site, so we will keep delivering.
Cathy Kelley got her start on AfterBuzz TV, which is owned by WWE mega-fan Maria Menounos and her husband. Kelley was part of many WWE recap shows and also contributed to radio shows on Sirius XM. She was signed to WWE in 2016 and has been the host for many WWE shows on their YouTube channel and has been a mainstay on NXT in recent years. You can now see her every Wednesday night on NXT on the USA Network.
Check out why we are crushing on Cathy Kelly with our picture gallery.
WWE chose the absolute worst time to book what may go down as one of the worst pay-per-views of all-time.
I’m sure WWE were walking with a little extra pep in their step after a strong debut on FOX on Friday. They scored their biggest rating in years and they are now rolling in dough with their new television deals kicking in this week.
This pay-per-view may have been doomed from the start since they spent the final Smackdown celebrating themselves, and they only officially announced three matches prior to ‘Hell In A Cell’. They also made it clear that they didn’t care about this pay-per-view as they used Smackdown to build towards the show in Saudi Arabia on October 31st.
All Elite Wrestling officially put on their third-ever event during Labor Day weekend. They crowned their first Heavyweight champion and set the table for their first women’s title holder.
‘All Out’ was one of the most anticipated wrestling shows to happen since their ‘Double or Nothing’ pay-per-view during Memorial Day weekend. The show sold out within minutes, even if there were rumors that some tickets bypassed consumers and went straight to the secondary market (the rumors have been unfounded).
There were a few hiccups that happened that were out of their control just days before the show. They lost one of the wrestlers in the co-main event when Jon Moxley announced that he was battling a reoccurring staph infection in his elbow and had to pull out of his advertised match with Kenny Omega. AEW wasted no time and filled the void with PAC, which was an equivalent talent for the spot. Also, Fenix of the Lucha Brothers tweaked his knee the previous weekend and threatened his participation, but he battled through the injury and was able to wrestle The Young Bucks in a banger of a match.
It’s been three years since the WWE aired its Cruiserweight Classic tournament on the WWE Network. It was meant to give fans some nostalgia of the great Cruiserweight matches on WCW. All-time greats like Rey Mysterio, Eddie Guerrero, Ultimo Dragon and others helped WCW feel different than WWF, which then almost exclusively featured large, hulking wrestlers.
The Cruiserweight Classic was critically-loved as the action was high-flying and some stuff was never seen on a WWE-branded product before this tournament. The actual streaming numbers aren’t known, but it helped launch the new cruiserweight division.
Many of the wrestlers in this tournament have went on to have careers in WWE and a few have gained stardom elsewhere.
Where are the Cruiserweight Classic wrestlers now?
Back in early 2014, when the WWE signed Japanese pro wrestler KENTA, it was a huge deal. He was one of the biggest stars in Japan and an in-ring wizard. It was also a sign of things to come for WWE’s NXT developmental brand.
Kevin Steen, El Generico, Prince Devitt and KENTA were early coups for the NXT brand. Those four performers were supposed to be the foundation for bringing the NXT brand up to the level of Ring of Honor and other upper indies. Three of the four performers met or exceeded expectations, but KENTA never really even stood a chance to succeed.
KENTA is an innovative wrestler. He invented and popularized many moves that other wrestlers imitated, which is one of the many reasons for his short-lived WWE career.
Steroids have strict regulations depending on the country or the sport in which athletes are engaged. For today, let’s talk about the popular sport of wrestling. As people discuss this activity, the topic of steroids has to come up especially when discussing the physique and strength of the gigantic wrestlers. According to the rules and regulations of these wrestling organizations, the wrestlers should be free from the use of certain steroids that give them advantages over wrestlers who do not use steroids.
But truth be told, some wrestlers have been tempted to use these steroids, and some of them have been caught and punished. The anti-doping agencies have their eyes wide open looking for signs and clues of steroid use. To prove to you that steroid use is real, here are ten wrestlers who have tested positive for steroid use.