The WWE Network is set to stream the EVOLVE 131 card live on the platform on Saturday, July 13th.
The news was first reported by The Wrap that the EVOLVE show, which is being promoted as its tenth-anniversary card, will be streaming on the network at 8 pm Eastern.
WWE is lending out several performers for the card, including NXT champion Adam Cole who will defend the title against 205 Live performer Akira Tozawa. There will also be a match between former Catch Point stablemates Drew Gulak and Matt Riddle. The Wrap is also listing Arturo Ruas, Babatunde, Austin Theory, Joe Gacy, and Eddie Kingston for the card.
The card will take place from Philadelphia at the 2300 Arena on the eve of WWE’s Extreme Rules event in the same city.
EVOLVE was launched in January 2010 with its first show headlined by Davey Richards against Kota Ibushi. Its founder Gabe Sapolsky signed on with WWE as a consultant in January 2018 with WWE continually loaning talent for EVOLVE. Over the past year, a restriction regarding the streaming of matches involving WWE’s talent had been lifted.
I know that this has absolutely nothing to do with Fight for the Fallen being on the same day. They’re just being a great company to us loyal subscribers and just happened to pick this Evolve show, over many of the other ones, to be the first one they stream.
Talent has been loaned to EVOLVE for over a year and NOW they want to show the event on the Network? Lol, this is also too on point. This company is accidentally hilarious sometimes.
But whatever I’m glad it’s goinf to be streamed. I rather watch Evolve and NXT shows than Raw and SD
Huge news, and I’m even more pumped that a bought a ticket in advance (before they announced Riddle vs. Gulak), but the ulterior motives are not lost on me. Not only competing with AEW, but also being convenient for WWE with Extreme Rules in town the following night.
I thought that show was going to be free to stream like Fyter Fest? Even if the Evolve show takes away some viewership, (I doubt it will be a dramatic change) how is this hurting the fund-raising ability of the AEW show?
I love Omega, but oh boy. If this is the type of thing that sets him off, what happens when WWE actually tries to be competitive towards them instead of putting their 2nd and 3rd level NXTs on only their digital platform?
I get the charity portion being a little bit of a sore spot (I’m still unclear if any of the PPV portion goes towards it…if not…it’s irrelevant, I guess), but they’ve declared their intention to be an alternative/competition to WWE. They’ve spent months taking potshots at them. One of their active wrestlers has done a few interviews burying the company. Another has been taking direct shots at the main events of WWE PPV (well deserved or not) on Twitter and his podcast. They’ve kind of made this open season. WWE’s mildest attempt to hit back at them seems like fair game.
And as a fan? This is kind of what you want out of this competition. WWE doing some things they otherwise wouldn’t do. Now we get Evolve shows on the network! Kind of like how TNA tried to stand up to WWE and we got Bret Hart back on Raw. Hard for me to be upset today with this news.
I can’t believe all of these company’s are trying to overshadow the big show that night…ECCW Ballroom Brawl XII. Kevin Sullivan vs Brian Pillman Jr, 24 years in the making!
The hypocrisy from Kenny Omega is crazy. For one, Jericho, Moxley and possibly Spears took that blood money. Also, I’m pretty sure the Khan family has had many business deals with the KSA as well as some possible human rights violations with a Chinese company. (It’s on Reddit). WWE does gross things, but most of the richest of the rich have done similar things. It’s probably why he deleted the tweet. Also, not one single person who wanted tickets to that AEW event is going to decide to watch Evolve instead. Frankly, both events are streamable, so I’m not sure what Kenny is going on about. Their charity event will be unaffected.
Kenny doesn’t hit it on the head. In terms of WWE wanting to undermine their show for charity, fair enough, WWE are being assholes. At the same time, doing a charity event has never meant that everyone else has to play along. That part of his comment isn’t the issue though.
The issue is Kenny Omega, like a lot of wrestling fans, doesn’t seem to have a clue what the term “blood money” means but thinks it’s perfectly fine to accuse people of accepting “blood money”.
Saudi Arabia have money through oil. They spent that oil money for WWE to put on a show. They didn’t get that money through killing people and they didn’t pay WWE to kill people. Not blood money.
Saudi Arabia spending money to buy bombs from other governments to kill thousands of people in Yemen is a case of those governments accepting blood money as they’re accepting money despite it leading to people being killed.
The fact that Kenny Omega, and a lot of wrestling fans, hear the term “blood money” being used to legitimately describe government dealings with Saudi Arabia that lead to people dying and think that WWE must be doing the same thing or think “let’s just accuse them of doing the same thing just to have a go at them” is either incredibly stupid or incredibly disgusting.
If people actually cared about blood money regarding Saudi Arabia, they wouldn’t be using it to describe this situation. So fuck Kenny Omega.
Ugh, Kenny.
I love Kenny. I admire him. He inspires me. He’s my current favorite wrestler. But damn, he was wrong on this one and I worry he sometimes is too emotional about things and can turn people off. Not so unlike a previous personal favorite CM Punk.
It’s funny, because for me, the passion I love in a performer usually is what then winds up cooling me off to them.
