Originally published at https://www.postwrestling.com/2020/02/25/pollocks-news-update-samoa-joe-suspended-for-30-days/
POST IT NOTES
**Monday’s edition of Rewind-A-Raw is up on the site with Wai Ting and I going through Monday’s episode of Raw from Winnipeg, Manitoba. Additionally, we also spent the final twenty minutes of the show discussing the WWE Network’s last six years and its effect on the company going back to its launch with the positives and negatives it has provided. I really enjoyed this show.
**Wai Ting and I are back tonight for members of the POST Wrestling Café with the monthly ASK-A-WAI mailbag show as we dedicate two hours to answering every question from this month’s mailbag on the POST Wrestling Forum.
**Andrew Thompson has an interview with PJ Black up on the site discussing his time with Lucha Underground and the atmosphere for shows inside The Temple. his decision to come to Ring of Honor, mentoring Brian Johnson, and his future plans when it comes to teaching younger talent.
**On Wednesday, we will be back with Rewind-A-Dynamite and upNXT.
POST WRESTLING VIDEO
WRESTLING NEWS
**WWE announced that Samoa Joe has been suspended for 30 days for his first violation of the company’s wellness policy. The suspension is effective February 24th and would allow Joe to be eligible to return a week and a half before WrestleMania. It was reported last week by Pro Wrestling Sheet that Joe had been injured during a commercial shoot where he allegedly hit his head during a table break. WWE issued a brief statement announcing news of Joe’s suspension:
WWE has suspended Nuufolau Seanoa (Samoa Joe) for 30 days effective Monday, February 24, for his first violation of the company’s talent wellness policy.
**Rusev is out of the Tuwaiq Trophy Gauntlet Match at Super ShowDown this Thursday. On Raw, the graphic still included Rusev but the announcers stated that Rey Mysterio will be in his place. We can confirm that the switch has been made with Mysterio added to the match with AJ Styles, Andrade, Erick Rowan, and R-Truth.
**The Capital One Arena in Washington, D.C. is advertising an appearance by Adam Copeland a.k.a. Edge on the March 9th edition of Raw to provide an update on his storyline condition.
**As we reported on Monday night, The Undertaker is traveling to Saudi Arabia and is expected to appear on the Super ShowDown card on Thursday.
**Week 3 of the XFL saw numbers continue to decline but not the degree of the first to second-week drop. The Saturday afternoon game on ABC between Houston and Tampa did 1,914,000 and 676,000 viewers in the 18-49 demo. Those figures represented drops of 11% and 18% respectively from the ABC game on Week 2.
FOX’s Saturday night game between Dallas and Seattle averaged 2,051,000 viewers and 788,000 in the 18-49 demo down 12% and 6% respectively. The 18-49 tied a replay of Saturday Night Live for the top program on any network that night. The XFL game on ABC was second for the day with a 0.5 in the demo tying the NBA game on ABC that night.
The FS 1 game on Sunday night did 1,004,000 and 477,000 in the key demo, which was down 26% and 28% from the FS game in Week 2.
ESPN carried the Sunday afternoon game this past weekend and it averaged 1,473,000 viewers and 611,000 in the 18-49 demo. ESPN didn’t carry any XFL games in Week 2. The Week 1 game on ESPN averaged 2,495,000 viewers and 1,211,000 in the main demo.
The ESPN game on Sunday was sixth among cable programming that day and the FS 1 game was eighth.
**The Week 4 lineup has L.A. against New York on ABC Saturday afternoon, Seattle vs. St. Louis Saturday night on Fox, Houston vs. Dallas Sunday afternoon on FS 1, and the Sunday night game on ESPN 2 will feature D.C. vs. Tampa.
**NWA Power returns tonight at 6:05 pm Eastern after last week’s premiere of ‘The Circle Squared’. Below are the matches for tonight’s episode:
*Thunder Rosa vs. Melina for the NWA women’s title
*The Question Mark vs. Trevor Murdoch
*Ricky Starks vs. Matt Cross vs. Zicky Dice in a non-title match
**Below are the matches for tonight’s episode of AEW Dark at 7 pm Eastern from last week’s taping in Atlanta, Georgia:
*Joey Janela vs. Kip Sabian in a Falls Count Anywhere match
*Dark Order vs. CIMA & T-Hawk
*Jimmy Havoc vs. Marko Stunt
*Shawn Spears & Peter Avalon vs. Dustin Rhodes & QT Marshall
**Here are the matches for tonight’s episode of Impact Wrestling at 8 pm Eastern on AXS TV and Fight Network in Canada:
*Ace Austin vs. Tessa Blanchard for the X Division title
*Michael Elgin vs. Eddie Edwards in Match #4 of their best-of-five series
*Rob Van Dam vs. Daga
*The return of ‘Gut Check’
**The following matches and segments have been announced for next Monday’s episode of Raw from the Barclays Center, which is the only episode of Raw before the Elimination Chamber on Sunday, March 8th:
*Beth Phoenix will appear to provide an update on Edge
*AJ Styles vs. Aleister Black
*Andrade & Angel Garza vs. Rey Mysterio & Humberto Carrillo
*Brock Lesnar is being advertised locally for the show
**The heel referee in the main event of Raw was independent referee Jake Clemons, who has done work with EVOLVE, AIW, and Smash Wrestling among others.
**ROH has announced Jonathan Gresham and Doug Williams as the first participants in the 16-man tournament to crown its Pure champion. The tournament begins April 10th in Columbus, Ohio at Express Live and continues the next night at Stage AE in Pittsburgh.
**Ring of Honor is also launching a 16-woman tournament for the vacant women’s championship. The first name revealed is Kellyanne of Melbourne, Australia. The eight first-round matches take place at Quest for the Gold on Friday, April 24th at the 2300 Arena in Philadelphia.
**Last Wednesday’s episode of AEW Dynamite did 402,000 viewers in the 18-49 demographic, which was up from 391,000 the prior week. Overall, the show did a 0.55 rating and 893,000 total viewers on TNT for the episode featuring Cody vs. Wardlow in the steel cage match.
**Friday Night SmackDown did 952,000 viewers in the 18-49 demo last week. That figure was up from 946,000 the week prior. SmackDown finished with a 1.55 rating and 2,484,000 viewers on Fox. They were number one in the 18-49 demo for the night among network programming.
**New Japan Pro Wrestling has released the full card for its 48th Anniversary show next Tuesday from Ota Ward Gymnasium. The card will stream live on New Japan World at 5 am Eastern:
*Tetsuya Naito vs. Hiromu Takahashi
*Kazuchika Okada, Will Ospreay & Roppongi 3K vs. Shingo Takagi, EVIL, Sanada & Bushi
*Hiroshi Tanahashi, Kota Ibushi & Ryusuke Taguchi vs. Zack Sabre Jr., Taichi & Douki
*Hirooki Goto, Tomohiro Ishii, Toru Yano, Yoshi-Hashi & Robbie Eagles vs. Juice Robinson, David Finlay, Satoshi Kojima, Hiroyoshi Tenzan & Toa Henare
*Minoru Suzuki, El Desperado & Yoshinobu Kanemaru vs. Yuji Nagata, Tiger Mask & Gabriel Kidd
*Togi Makabe & Tomoaki Honma vs. Yota Tsuji & Yuya Uemura
**The following day is the beginning of the New Japan Cup that runs from March 4-21 with the winner set to receive an IWGP title shot at Sakura Genesis on March 31st at Sumo Hall. The brackets for the 32-man tournament were released on Monday night with the standout matches in the opening round including Will Ospreay vs. Shingo Takagi (a rematch of one of the best matches of 2019), Kazuchika Okada vs. Jay White, and Kota Ibushi vs. Zack Sabre Jr. The opening round will be spread out over four shows with matches on March 4th, 7th, 8th, and 9th.
**VICE has a feature on David Starr and his quest to bring socialism into professional wrestling.
**EVOLVE has added a match with Oney Lorcan & Danny Burch vs. Eddie Kingston & Joe Gacy for the Accelerate: Conclusion card on Thursday, April 2nd at 4 pm in Tampa at the Bryan Glazer Family JCC. They have also announced Fabian Aichner & Marcel Barthel for the 4 pm show.
**Earlier in the day, EVOLVE will hold the Accelerate: Initiate card at Noon and have announced that KUSHIDA, Mercedes Martinez, Deonna Purrazzo, Isaiah ‘Swerve’ Scott, Taynara, and Cameron Grimes will be competing on that show.
**Downstait is set to perform the entrance song for Cody this Saturday at AEW Revolution in Chicago. The group also provided the song for ‘All In’ in 2018.
**The first match announced for GCW’s ‘For the Culture’ event will see Calvin Tankman take on Will Hobbs. The show is scheduled for Friday, April 3rd at The Cuban Club in Ybor City that is hosting ‘The Collective’ series of events.
**Shark Boy has been added to the TNA ‘No Place Like Home’ show on Friday, April 3rd at The Ritz in Ybor City.
**Impact Wrestling has added a pair of television tapings at the Columbus Expo Center on April 24th and 25th in Ohio with tickets on sale this Friday.
**The WWE stock closed at $48.81 on Tuesday.
**Ric Flair turns 71 today.
POLL RESULTS
Of the two, which match would you prefer at WrestleMania?
Bill Goldberg vs. Roman Reigns: 69.5%
The Fiend vs. Roman Reigns: 30.5%
(1,881 votes)
MMA NEWS
**The UFC has announced that the UFC 251 pay-per-view is confirmed for Perth, Australia at the RAC Arena on Saturday, June 6th. The card will feature UFC women’s flyweight champion Valentina Shevchenko defending the title against Joanne Calderwood, which was reported last week. It’s their first time at the building in Perth since UFC 221 in February 2018 that saw Yoel Romero knock out Luke Rockhold. The promotion’s next pay-per-view is March 7th with UFC 248 headlined by Israel Adesanya vs. Yoel Romero for the middleweight title, then UFC 249 is April 18th with Khabib Nuramgomedov vs. Tony Ferguson for the lightweight title, and UFC 250 is set for May 9th in Sao Paulo, Brazil with Henry Cejudo vs. Jose Aldo for the UFC bantamweight title.
**UFC flyweight Joseph Benavidez appeared with Megan Olivi on today’s edition of Live with Kelly & Ryan to promote his fight with Deiveson Figueiredo this Saturday in Norfolk, Virginia. There was also a brief demonstration by Benavidez with Ryan Seacrest.
**ESPN reports that UFC featherweight Chan Sung Jung will undergo an eye procedure to address issues the fighter has had experiencing double vision. Jung is optimistic that he will be able to fight in the summer and described it as ‘minor surgery’ he will undergo. The 32-year old is coming off a pair of TKO wins over Renato Moicano and Frankie Edgar in 2019 and has spoken about his desire to challenge Alexander Volkanovski for the featherweight title.
*****
REWIND-A-RAW 2/24: The Winnipeg Screwjob, WWE Network: 6 Years Later
John Pollock & Wai Ting review WWE Raw featuring the final episode before Super ShowDown this week. We look back on the WWE Network on its 6th Anniversary.
https://www.postwrestling.com/2020/02/25/rewind-a-raw-2-24-20-the-winnipeg-screwjob-wwe-network-6-years-later/
*****
THUNDERSTRUCK: Jushin Thunder Liger vs. Black Tiger II
WH Park and Mike Murray (POST Wrestling’s ROH reviewer) discuss Jushin Liger vs. Black Tiger II a.k.a. Eddie Guerrero from the final round of the 1996 Best of the Super Juniors tournament.
https://www.postwrestling.com/2020/02/23/thunderstruck-18-jushin-liger-vs-black-tiger-ii-eddie-guerrero-6-12-96-w-mike-murray/
*****
REWIND-A-SMACKDOWN 2/21: Goldberg Returns, Café de Renee, Wai vs. Rogers
John Pollock and Wai Ting are back to review WWE SmackDown featuring Bill Goldberg’s encounter with The Fiend. Plus, Lacey explains her heel turn and the latest in the Wai vs. Rogers saga.
https://www.patreon.com/posts/34237565
*****
BRITISH WRESTLING EXPERIENCE 2/21: Josh Bevan (RIPTIDE Wrestling) Interview
Jamesie is joined by owner and promoter of RIPTIDE Wrestling, Josh Bevan for an in-depth interview about running a wrestling promotion in 2020, the unique “Cinematic Independent Wrestling” look they’ve created, the pros and cons of WWE on the UK wrestling scene, and more.
https://www.postwrestling.com/2020/02/21/british-wrestling-experience-2-21-20-josh-bevan-riptide-wrestling-interview/
*****
Café Hangout: Women’s Wrestling w/ Kristen Ashly & Your Calls
John Pollock and Wai Ting are joined by Kristen Ashly from Bell to Belles discussing the launch of her website, her style of coverage, and the state of women’s wrestling. Plus, your calls, WWE NXT, ratings and more.
https://www.postwrestling.com/2020/02/20/live-link-cafe-hangout-your-calls-bell-to-belles-kristen-ashly/
*****
upNXT 2/19/20: HangOver VIII – “Not Tonight”
Braden Herrington and Davie Portman are back reviewing the February 19th edition of WWE NXT!
https://www.postwrestling.com/2020/02/20/upnxt-2-19-20-hangover-viii-not-tonight/
*****
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