Originally published at https://www.postwrestling.com/2018/11/20/pollocks-news-update-braun-strowman-dealing-with-legitimate-elbow-injury/
POST IT NOTES
**Monday’s edition of Rewind-A-Raw is up on the site with Wai Ting and I reviewing Monday’s Raw from the Staples Center in Los Angeles. Wai and I went through lots of news items with Braun Strowman’s legitimate elbow injury, notes coming out of Survivor Series, David Arquette’s statement on his deathmatch with Nick Gage, a chat about the WWE’s house show business and a review of Raw. This was a packed and enjoyable show, hope you take a listen.
**We are back tonight with Rewind-A-SmackDown to review SmackDown and Wai will also run through the Mixed Match Challenge. On tonight’s Double Shot for Patreon members, we are reviewing the following:
*AJ Styles on “365”
*Dean Ambrose “Chronicle”
*The L.A. Confidential card feat. Nick Gage vs. David Arquette
*The latest episode of Being the Elite
**The feedback thread for this week’s Rewind-A-Wai is up on the POST Wrestling Forum on AAA’s When Worlds Collide pay-per-view from 1994.
WRESTLING NEWS
**The major angle on Raw was an attack on Braun Strowman to write him out for a few weeks with Strowman requiring elbow surgery. We spoke about the news on Rewind-A-Raw with Strowman going for surgery to have bone spurs removed from the elbow. They won’t know until after surgery if Strowman will be able to wrestle at TLC next month in San Jose, California, although a match was set up for Strowman and Baron Corbin at that event. While it’s not expected to be a long time away, Strowman joins Roman Reigns, Alexa Bliss, Kevin Owens, Sami Zayn, Fandango that are out of action and emphasizes how much the Raw side has been hit this year.**Dolph Ziggler is also dealing with a foot injury.
**Monday’s episode of Raw averaged 2,493,000 viewers going against the most-watched Monday Night Football game so far this season. The first hour of Raw averaged 2.72 million viewers and fell to 2.50 million in the second hour and another drop to 2.26 million in the final hour. The Monday Night game between the Kansas City Chiefs and L.A. Rams did an enormous figure of 16,610,000 viewers, which was an increase of 58% from last week’s game.
**Tonight, is the WWE’s fourth and final night at the Staples Center in Los Angeles with the SmackDown, 205 Live & Mixed Match Challenge tapings. For SmackDown, Daniel Bryan will explain his turn from last week and likely resume his feud with AJ Styles that I would imagine is the direction for TLC. Below are the matches they have announced for tonight’s taping:
*The Bar & Big Show vs. New Day in a Thanksgiving Feast Fight
*R-Truth & Carmella vs. Rusev & Lana on the Mixed Match Challenge
*Bobby Roode & Natalya vs. Jinder Mahal & Alicia Fox on the Mixed Match Challenge
**The WWE has officially announced Ronda Rousey and Nia Jax for the TLC event on December 16th in San Jose, California. The card features the following matches announced so far:
*Braun Strowman (tentative) vs. Baron Corbin in a TLC match
*Seth Rollins vs. Dean Ambrose for the Intercontinental title
*Ronda Rousey vs. Nia Jax for the Raw women’s title
*The finals of the Mixed Match Challenge
**U.S. President Donald Trump issued a statement regarding Jamal Khashoggi’s murder and the relations between the U.S. and Saudi Arabia. Trump acknowledged that the Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman may have known about the plan to murder journalist Jamal Khashoggi stating, “maybe he did and maybe he didn’t. That being said, we may never know all of the facts surrounding the murder of Mr. Jamal Khashoggi. In any case, our relationship is with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. They have been a great ally in our very important fight against Iran.”
**A documentary on the life of the late Owen Hart is in development. Curate Films out of England is working on the film with Keaton Stone as the primary person behind the documentary. Greg Oliver at SLAM Wrestling spoke to Stone about the process they are going through, noting that Martha Hart and the family is working with them. Interviews with Bret Hart and Natalya have been conducted with Stone traveling to Japan this week to seek out people that worked with Owen. The project has been granted access to Martha Hart’s home archive of videos and photos for the film.
**On Monday, David Arquette issued a statement regarding his match with Nick Gage from Friday’s Game Changer Wrestling show. Arquette took responsibility for the match falling apart at the end and cited his inexperience. He said the reason he was cut on his neck was that he panicked and absolving Nick Gage of any responsibility for the injury. He stated he has zero plans to participate in a deathmatch again. He added, “I knew it was violent and potentially bloody, but I truly did not know the extent of what I was participating in. However, I take responsibility for putting myself in that situation.”
I found the match very uncomfortable because it was obvious how green Arquette is and should never have been booked in a match like this. There were several spots earlier in the match where Arquette could have seriously hurt himself during a pair of dives to the floor and almost losing his balance on the top turnbuckle. There is going to be criticism sent towards GCW for booking this match and knowing that the appeal of this match was the car wreck nature it was bound to have. This is also professional wrestling and the cynic in me looks at all the attention this match has received and once it blows over, someone will try and book Arquette and Nick Gage in a match because of the controversy of the first one. I’m not in favor of that and Arquette cannot claim to be naïve moving forward if he opts to capitalize on the attention and do another one.
**During the catering scene on Raw with Drake Maverick, there were several cameo appearances. WWE creative team member Kazeem Famuyide was the one to ask Drake about the peas while standing in line. Former Tough Enough contestant Eric Watts and female independent wrestler Delilah Doom were also in the scene as extras. Doom just wrestled on GCW’s L.A. Confidential card on Friday in Los Angeles.
**Ronda Rousey and Charlotte Flair worked on their Survivor Series match at the Santino Brothers Gym in Los Angeles with Fit Finlay assisting the two with the layout.
**The second season of the Edge & Christian Show will be debuting on the WWE Network next Monday after Raw.
**Total Divas will not be airing this Wednesday and the season finale will air Wednesday, November 28th on E! The season-finale will be centered around the passing of Jim Neidhart this past August.
**The WWE stock closed at $61.69 on Tuesday.
**Here are the current point totals after three days of New Japan’s World Tag League tournament with the point totals in brackets: Guerrillas of Destiny (4), Killer Elite Squad (4), Yuji Nagata & Manabu Nakanishi (4), EVIL & Sanada (2), Tomohiro Ishii & Toru Yano (2), Zack Sabre Jr. & Taichi (2), Best Friends (2), Togi Makabe & Toa Henare (0), Satoshi Kojima & Hiroyoshi Tenzan (0), Minoru Suzuki & Takashi Iizuka (0), Michael Elgin & Jeff Cobb (0), and Hangman Page & Yujiro (0).
**Below are the tournament matches for Wednesday’s show in Niigata that will be added to New Japan World later that day:
*Hiroyoshi Tenzan & Satoshi Kojima vs. Shota Umino & Ayato Yoshida
*Best Friends vs. Zack Sabre Jr. & Taichi
*EVIL & Sanada vs. Hangman Page & Yujiro
**Here are the tournament matches for All Japan’s Real World Tag League show on Wednesday, which will be on their streaming service:
*Kengo Mashimo & KAI vs. Takao Omori & Manabu Soya
*Joe Doering & Dylan James vs. Jun Akiyama & Daisuke Sekimoto
*Kento Miyahara & Yoshitatsu vs. Jake Lee & Ryoji Sai
**World of Sport is set for a European tour in January with Will Ospreay, Rampage, Robbie X, Joe Hendry, Sha Samuels, Viper, Kay Lee Ray, Grado, Nathan Cruz, Justin Sysum, Robbie X, and Crater announced for the shows. Below are the tour dates and locations:
*Friday, January 18th in Southampton at Guildhall
*Saturday, January 19th at Newport Centre
*Sunday, January 25th at Stoke Victoria Hall
*Saturday, January 26th in Blackpool at the Blackpool Tower Ballroom
*Sunday, January 27th in Aberdeen at the Aberdeen Beach Ballroom (Will Ospreay vs. Rampage)
*Friday, February 1st at the Scarborough Spa Grand Hall (Justin Sysum vs. Rampage for the WOS championship)
*Saturday, February 2nd at the Northampton Royal & Derngate (Kay Lee Ray vs. Viper vs. Bea Priestley)
*Sunday, February 3rd at York Hall in London (Will Ospreay vs. Robbie X vs. Martin Kirby)
**MLW has announced that Pentagon Jr. & Rey Fenix will defend the MLW tag titles against the Hart Foundation at the television tapings in Miami on December 13th at the Scottish Rite Temple. The same card will feature PCO vs. LA Park in a Falls Count Anywhere in Miami match, Shane Strickland taking on Rich Swann, and Rush vs. MJF. They are running two straight nights at the venue with the December 14th card headlined by Low Ki vs. Konnan for the MLW heavyweight title in a No DQ match.
**Fozzy is on the last leg of their tour following their shows in Australia. They will be playing Canadian dates, beginning Wednesday in Moncton, New Brunswick through December 4th with the tour wrapping in Calgary, Alberta. The group will be holding a show in Toronto on November 28th at The Rockpile at 5555 Dundas Street West. Chris Jericho was interviewed by Global News in Canada to promote the Canadian tour and discussed Fozzy playing a show next September with Iron Maiden.
**DEFY Wrestling out of Portland, Oregon has a big card this Saturday at the Hawthorne Theatre with Shane Strickland vs. Ravenous Randy Myers for the DEFY heavyweight title, Mike Santiago & Ethan HD vs. Santana & Ortiz of LAX for the DEFY tag titles, Tommy Dreamer vs. Drexl, Willie Mack vs. SCHAFF, and Matt Cross vs. Persian Prodigy.
MMA NEWS
**Rachael Ostovich is officially out of her January 19th fight with Paige VanZant following an attack on Ostovich that led her to be hospitalized and treated for a broken orbital bone. An investigation by authorities in Honolulu, Hawaii has been opened, which police informed MMA Fighting involved a 27-year old female and 27-year old male (the police did not release the names involved). Ostovich’s representatives at Sucker Punch Entertainment released the following statement on the matter:A very unfortunate incident occurred Sunday night with Rachael Ostovich that ended with her suffering a fractured orbital and other injuries. As a result of these injuries she will not be able to compete in her upcoming bout with Paige VanZant on January 19th. Rachael is now home from the hospital with her family and will be going back for further check ups on her orbital. The family would like to ask for some privacy as they sort through this matter. We would like to thank the UFC for all their support on this matter as well as the fans and media for your concern.
**Bellator has added a middleweight title fight to the January 26th card at The Forum in Inglewood with Gegard Mousasi defending his title against Rafael Lovato Jr. The world-class grappler Lovato Jr. began fighting professionally in 2014 and debuted for Bellator in March 2017. He has gone 5-0 with Bellator and defeated Chris Honeycutt, Gerald Harris, and John Salter over the last year. Mousasi debuted for Bellator in October 2017 after leaving the UFC and won the promotion’s middleweight title in his second fight for the promotion this past May defeating Rafael Carvalho. In his last fight, Mousasi fought welterweight champion Rory MacDonald in September in a one-sided fight with Mousasi stopping MacDonald in the second round. Mousasi has won his last eight fights dating back to February 2016. The Bellator 214 card at The Forum will also feature the finals of the Heavyweight Grand Prix between Fedor Emelianenko and Ryan Bader as well as featherweight standout Aaron Pico fighting Henry Corrales.
**The UFC’s Fight Night card on Saturday from Argentina saw a strange outcome with the preliminary fights outdrawing the main card. The preliminary fights averaged 707,000 viewers on FS 1, which had the lead in from the Indiana vs. Michigan football game on the station that did 2,273,000 viewers. The UFC’s main card at 10 pm did 632,000 viewers featuring Santiago Ponzinibbio stopping Neil Magny in the fourth round of their welterweight fight.
**Marc Raimondi at MMA Fighting has a story on the UFC’s expansion into China with the development of a second Performance Institute. The UFC is set to open the $13 million facility around the second quarter of 2019, which will be three times the size of the PI in Las Vegas. The facility will have a dual purpose as an athletic training center and the UFC’s headquarters in China. The announcement of the project coincides with the UFC’s card in Beijing this Saturday, which will be their fifth card in China following shows in Macau and Shanghai.
*****
RAR 11/19/18: Survivor Series fallout, Braun Strowman attacked
WWE returns to L.A.’s Staples Center for the third straight night with the fallout from Survivor Series. We explain what’s going on with the Braun Strowman injury angle, Ronda Rousey defends her title against Mickie James, A-O-PEE-PEE emerges, and Seth Rollins searches for Dean Ambrose for three hours.
https://www.postwrestling.com/2018/11/20/rar-11-19-18-survivor-series-fallout-braun-strowman-attacked/
WWE SURVIVOR SERIES POST SHOW w/ John Pollock & Wai Ting
John Pollock & Wai Ting provide an extensive review of the WWE Survivor Series with a two-hour discussion of the event from Los Angeles, California at the Staples Center.
https://www.postwrestling.com/2018/11/19/wwe-survivor-series-2018-post-show-w-john-pollock-wai-ting/
NXT TAKEOVER: WAR GAMES POST SHOW
The upNXT crew of Braden Herrington & Davie Portman is joined by John Pollock to review the NXT TakeOver War Games event from Los Angeles on Saturday night.
https://www.postwrestling.com/2018/11/18/nxt-takeover-war-games-post-show-with-braden-herrington-davie-portman-john-pollock/
EGGSHELLS Podcast Companion: 2010 w/ Damon McDonald
Episode 22 sees Chris Charlton and Damon McDonald look at 2010. Shinsuke Nakamura faces Yoshihiro Takayama in the main event of a show that also sees NJPW opposite NOAH in several bouts.
https://www.postwrestling.com/2018/11/17/eggshells-podcast-companion-2010-w-damon-mcdonald/
POST MOVIE REVIEW – Thor (2011) & Stan Lee Remembered
John Pollock and Wai Ting review the fourth Marvel Cinematic Universe film, Thor (2011). Brent Chittenden of the True North Nerds podcast joins us for a discussion about the passing of Thor co-creator and Marvel Comics icon, Stan Lee.
https://www.postwrestling.com/2018/11/15/post-movie-review-thor-2011-stan-lee-remembered/
upNXT 11/15/18: War Games Go-Home Show & Predictions
Braden Herrington & Davie Portman chat this week’s episode of WWE NXT featuring Kyle O’Reilly vs. Hanson and Bianca Bel-Air vs. Mia Yim. Plus, the guys give their full predictions for Saturday’s TakeOver: War Games.
https://www.postwrestling.com/2018/11/15/upnxt-11-15-18-war-games-go-home-show-predictions/
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