Originally published at Rob Van Dam clarifies his situation with IMPACT Wrestling
If any of the quotes from the following podcasts or video interviews are used, please credit those sources and provide an H/T and link back to POST Wrestling for the transcriptions.
** Hannibal TV hosted an interactive Q&A with Rob Van Dam. RVD had a per-show agreement with IMPACT Wrestling and he further clarified his situation with the company. RVD said it’s not necessarily true that he’s sticking around in IMPACT but he was simply not booked for TV for the month of October.
“Where did you get that I just finished an IMPACT run because I’m not even — maybe you know more than I do, or you’re just going with the headlines. Come on man, you know how many headlines have misinformation? People just grab ‘em. Man I’ve heard that I’m blind, I can’t see out of one eye, can barely move and there’s all kinds of stuff. I very rarely correct them and on this one, it’s fun having the energy out there and things that come from it, but it would be incorrect to say that what I read which is that Katie and I, that our contracts expired, that would be incorrect.
And that’s not necessarily true either . It is such a no-news kind of news, because I have a different situation than Katie does and so with my situation, I’m there per-show. We had a few shows ahead on the list of obligations scheduled before the pandemic and during the pandemic, nobody was running and afterwards, made up some of them and I’m just not on the TV in October so, after that, who knows? Nobody knows, except the marks that read the headlines.”
** Colt Cabana released his interview with Joey Janela. Janela recalled having a match scheduled with Bill Dundee for the GCW W.O.M.B.A.T. show in the Summer of 2019. According to Janela, Dundee was planning to bring a knife to their match and possibly use it on Janela because Dundee had been alerted by Jim Cornette fans that Janela was an unsafe worker and might try to hurt him.
“But leading up to the match before that, people were telling me that Dundee, he was bringing a knife with him, he was gonna put it in his boot and if I tried anything, he was gonna stab me to death in the ring because a bunch of Cornette fans told him that I was reckless and a backyarder and I was gonna try to hurt him in the ring. So, people were telling me that Dundee said, ‘He’s gonna stab you to death in the ring if you try anything,’ so…”
** AEW Co-Executive Vice President Cody Rhodes joined Busted Open Radio prior to the 10/14 episode of AEW Dynamite. Cody discussed Jon Moxley’s appearance at Bloodsport over the weekend and AEW being the type of environment where talents can venture into other places to work.
“Absolutely. You can’t put a saddle on a mustang. People need this. They wanna experience other worlds and no contract in AEW is a blanket contract. Everybody can go different places, the bridges are down, the doors are open. It makes for a — I know the classic saying in wrestling is, ‘Perception is reality’ but in 2020, 2021, it kinda feels more like reality is reality because we can see so many more wrestlers, just via social media and just these different platforms so, you can’t just say you’re the best anymore, you have to get out there… I love when Jon makes the move out there and does something like that. He always represents AEW really highly because he always represents himself really highly so that was a cool thing and I think you’ll see that as long as AEW is around. I can never see the doors closing or the bridges going up. It’s just not the type of culture Tony’s helped create and not the type of place we work.”
** Isaiah “Swerve” Scott and Teasy’s ‘Swerve City Podcast’ is now going to be on the WWE Network beginning October 23rd. Their first guest under the WWE umbrella is Drew McIntyre.
** WFLA in Florida has footage up on their site of John Cena and Shaghayegh Shariatzadeh outside of the courthouse after their private wedding ceremony.
** Former WWE Universal Champion Goldberg noted on Instagram that he’ll be in the ThunderDome to watch the Season Premiere of Friday Night SmackDown.
** Chris Featherstone of Sportskeeda hosted a Q&A with Paul Ellering and the two discussed AOP (Akam & Rezar) who were released from WWE in early September. Ellering said he communicates with them monthly and as far as in-ring work goes, they won’t be able to do anything until their non-compete clauses run out in December.
“Yes, we speak maybe once a month and right now, they’re both home and they can’t do anything until December , so we’re just biding our time, but I do talk to them.”
Ellering added that while he’s not active, he’s still a part of the WWE roster but as far as a return goes, nothing has been said to him.
“Nothing’s been said to me , but I still remain with them… on their roster. Not active, but still listed there.”
** Per the Wrestling Observer Newsletter, a WWE representative was present at Josh Barnett’s Bloodsport event during The Collective weekend to shoot footage of Davey Boy Smith Jr., whose father Davey Boy Smith, was set to be inducted into the WWE Hall Of Fame this year. WWE filmed Smith Jr. the entire Collective weekend.
** Parrow is returning to Major League Wrestling for the organization’s restart.
** Sportskeeda posted their interview with former WWE Universal Champion Braun Strowman. Strowman is scheduled to take on Keith Lee during the ‘Season Premiere’ of Monday Night RAW. Strowman recounted coming back to the locker room after SummerSlam and seeing Keith Lee taking care of the locker room area.
“And you know honestly, Keith’s been one of the very few guys that have stepped up and showed that they want to be here, that they deserve to be here. Not this complacent, ‘Oh I made it.’ Keith Lee’s hungry. I came back after killing myself with Bray Wyatt in the main event of SummerSlam. Keith Lee was the only guy left in the locker room, wearing a three-piece suit, picking up trash, to wait to thank us for going out there, putting our bodies on the line, and paying the bills. At the end of the day, we’re in the main event. We’re why the lights were on in that building and that was nice to have that respect and have that young — not even young. He’s been in the business for a long time, but, I’m a firm believer when you come to the main roster, you start over, and for him to do that, he earned a lot of my respect.”
** According to PWInsider, Chris Guy, also known as Ace Steel has returned to WWE as a coach. He was furloughed back in April. Also, Blake Christian, Anthony Henry and Colby Corino partook in WWE tryouts recently. Within that same report, it’s noted that Tino Sabbatelli is back under contract with WWE. Sabbatelli was cut from the company in April. Fightful Select reported on 10/15 that Sabbatelli was back at the Performance Center.
** New Japan Pro-Wrestling commentator Kevin Kelly joined VOC Nation’s ‘In The Room’ podcast and one of the topics that came up was New Japan no longer being featured on AXS TV. Kevin leveled it to Anthem Sports & Entertainment not wanting a competing wrestling company on the same network that they have majority interest in.
“At the tail end of last year when AXS was bought by Anthem, and the TV deal came to an end, we knew that was going to happen once they had purchased it. They own Impact, so there’s no way they’re going to have a competing brand on. (So we wondered) will we have television in the United States. And everything of course immediately shut down (due to COVID-19) and I would imagine that any conversation that were being had were probably put on hold as well, because there’s not one business that hasn’t been impacted by COVID-19, and the television business certainly has been impacted. So that changes everything… (After a few months of strategizing, we) put together a television show that we could record here in the States, with wrestlers of New Japan that were basically sitting at home, but (we would) bring them in, bring everyone to a closed set, strict testing…and that became the New Japan Strong Show which is airing on New Japan World.”
** WWE Women’s Tag Team Champion Shayna Baszler joined Corey Graves on the After The Bell podcast. Shayna reflected on having a RAW Women’s Title match at WrestleMania but not exactly feeling like she had a WrestleMania moment because of the circumstances.
“At first, obviously, everyone was like, ‘What? No,’ and I think there’s still a side of me at least that’s like, ‘That’s the most important match of my career that I’ve had thus far,’ obviously. Title match at WrestleMania. It doesn’t get bigger than that but I still feel incomplete, like I haven’t had my WrestleMania moment and I think just the circumstances…
It’s hard. There is a magic that’s missed about it not being 80,000 people and a roaring crowd and all that. At the same time, I talked about the different style of wrestling that I have. I think in some ways, it was a blessing to have that big moment of mine first, before whatever big moments come next, because I think having an empty sort of arena and a camera up-close — there’s some things that I do in the ring that person in the stands way up in the rafters can’t see.”
Shayna talked about the kickoff to her feud with Becky Lynch where she bit Lynch’s neck on RAW. Initially, Shayna was not too sure about the segment but later came around when she saw how many people were talking about what happened.
“So, even I felt mixed about it, as it happened. But, the fact of the matter is you can’t argue with — you already said — true, true, but it’s a good gauge as far as what’s gonna get people talking. So, this goes back to — I was talking to Kevin Owens. When I was still in NXT, he was there, had an injury or something, I don’t remember. But he was there at the Performance Center and he was telling me, ‘You forget being in NXT because NXT has a very loyal fanbase, that you forget that the majority of maybe the RAW and SmackDown audience doesn’t necessarily watch NXT,’ so he was NXT Champion and it was a real eye-opening experience that when he kinda started dabbling up on RAW and SmackDown while he was still champion, there were some crowds that didn’t know who he was and it kinda blew my mind so, what’s gonna be the thing if I’m moving from NXT to RAW and SmackDown? You have to do something that’s gonna make you stand out. What am I gonna do? Just come out and do the thing and have a regular match? You know what I mean? So, I think in the end, I came around of being like, ‘Okay, people are talking about this. Yeah, that’s what I wanted anyway so, it worked.’”
** Chris Van Vliet conducted an interview with Chris Jericho recently. Jericho talked about fans being allowed back into AEW events and them singing along with his theme song. Jericho shared that on taped shows, audio from past occasions where fans are singing ‘Judas’ are added to the audio file.
“But I’ll tell you what, the first week we had those 500 people in Daily’s Place and they remembered and continued to sing it, it was like, ‘Thank God, this is great. They remembered.’ The only thing is they used to sing the chorus twice, now they only sing it once so on the taped shows, we always add the chorus, we double it to try and get people to remember that you’re supposed to sing it twice, but singing it once is good for now but you gotta get back into it again.”
Jericho discussed taking a hiatus from WWE in 2005. He explained that it came down to him being mentally burned out.
“Yeah, absolutely. I mean 2005, SummerSlam with John Cena, I wasn’t done-done but I was mentally done and burned out and I walked away and my contract was up, there was no contract negotiations. I said, ‘Don’t even give me a figure’ because I felt they were gonna give me a downgrade in pay just from the way my career was at the time. I knew it was time to get away so that’s why I left the business for two-and-half-years. I think people forget that…”
** The Wrestle Buddies podcast welcomed Sonny Kiss onto their show. Sonny talked about how characters like Goldust and Adrian Street were representations of false narratives in a way of what LGBTQ+ performers were/are.
“The authenticity of just being these people and not just them being characters and even Dustin , he’s one of my role models, he’s amazing, he’s fantastic and one of the best workers ever, but his character was simply just a character and a lot of times, people try to say, ‘Hey, you’re like the new Goldust’ or like, ‘You’re like the new Adrian Street’ or whoever, but the thing is, people don’t realize that-that’s not exactly who we’re trying to be like because they were playing off what they thought… like those kind of gimmicks or whatever. They thought that’s what we were trying to be, and that’s not what we were trying to be. We’re trying to be ourselves and we’re trying to be authentic and we’re trying to portray that people are actually like us, and a lot of times that sucks because those gimmicks in a way, I don’t wanna say they ruined, not ruined. How do I explain this… so those gimmicks in a way, set a standard for what quote-unquote LGBTQ workers are like and actually kind of a false narrative. It’s false because it’s not exactly true. It’s not honest.”
** Sports Illustrated chatted with Sheamus ahead of Sheamus’ match tonight on Friday Night SmackDown. Last week, Sheamus worked with Big E in a Falls Count Anywhere match. He spoke highly of Big E and added that E will be a star in wrestling for years to come.
“Big E is the full package. He’s one of the strongest guys I’ve ever seen in the gym, and he’s one of the most charismatic guys in WWE. He will be a star in this business for years to come.
The world saw a different side of Big E, a guy that should be world champion. I hit him as hard as I could last week, and he hit me back even harder. That’s a credit to him. He brought it, and I still have the marks on my back to prove it.”
Sheamus talked about his program with Shorty G earlier this year. Sheamus feels that their match being placed on the 2020 Royal Rumble Kickoff show was a “kick in the balls”.
“The preshow, that was a kick in the balls. But I just keep pushing forward. I’m not going to complain, I’m just going to work harder. And though it was different without a crowd at the Performance Center, and now at the ThunderDome, it’s given me an opportunity. You have to adapt and make the most of the situation. Cena had a great line in a Celtic Warrior Workout, ‘Always be comfortable in the uncomfortable.’ I feel so natural out there. Nothing is forced.”
Sheamus also discussed his feud with Jeff Hardy and said it is one of his favorite feuds that he’s ever been a part of.
“The Jeff Hardy story hit so many raw nerves. It is definitely one of the favorite feuds of my career. That was very, very personal, and it’s one of my favorite feuds in my career.
For me, the pandemic has really given me a chance to be who I really am. I’ve never been afraid of cutting to the bone and saying things that put people in an uproar. The match with Jeff at the end, the barroom, that brought out this new shady side of Sheamus.”
** Major League Wrestling signed Bu Ku Dao. DAZN has an interview up on their site with him discussing his signing.
** Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, Ring of Honor planned on running a tournament to crown a new ROH Women’s World Champion. While speaking with Bell To Belles, Session Moth Martina stated that Ring of Honor has informed their roster that once more talents are able to be brought in, the plan is to move forward with the tourney.
“They’ve been keeping us in the loop, and they keep saying, ‘As soon as we can safely get people across, you’ll be over. We’re gonna keep looking’ because they know we all really, really want to get back. But obviously, they don’t want to do anything until it’s safe to do it, you know? So, but they definitely have said that obviously once things can kinda resume and it’s safer to get more females over that the plan is to go ahead with everything that they had planned. It’s just now it’s put on pause for the moment, you know?”
** Paul Heyman made the media rounds to promote the Season Premiere of Friday Night SmackDown. One of the outlets he chatted with was the New York Post and during that conversation, Heyman shared what he enjoyed the most from his time as Executive Director of Monday Night RAW.
“To be the Raw executive director, you have to be in the absolute highest level of the inner sanctum of WWE. There is an expectation of confidentiality or secrecy even that I believe goes with that job and I refused then and still believe in the refusal to violate that part of the responsibility of that position.
That being said, my favorite part of being the Raw executive director happened after my time as Raw executive director when Vince McMahon, that chairman of the board, on a quarterly investors call, was asked about Paul Heyman no longer being the Raw executive director and the only comment Vince had was how much he liked the creativity I brought to the job. When someone has been replayed from an executive position that high up in the company and the chairman of the board has nothing but praise, it speaks to the level of satisfaction he had with the job that I had done in an overall sense … and I mean that very sincerely by the way.
In a general sense, my favorite part of the job was doing the job. I love working with talent and I love developing talent. I always did. Loved developing talent in an unofficial capacity in WCW, certainly loved it in ECW and built my reputation on it. Working with Brock Lesnar or Ronda Rousey and developing them in this industry and as the Raw executive director, it was a crucial part of my job, a crucial component of my job to develop talent and I loved every single moment of it.”
** AEW’s Rebel was the latest guest on Vickie Guerrero’s podcast. During her appearance on the podcast, Rebel told the story of how she got paired with Britt Baker on AEW programming.
“What happened was Britt was doing a segment, showing her dental office, and that was a long day. It was ten hours, and they wanted to have someone speak on her behalf so she pushed me in front of the camera and Tony Khan saw that right away and was like, ‘This duo is dynamic and we gotta keep having them together.’ So, that’s how it all happened.”
** Over The Top Wrestling released a tribute video in memory of the late Ryan Smile.
** The 10/16 episode of 205 Live is taking place from the Capitol Wrestling Center. Dewey Foley remains the lead writer of the show, per PWInsider.
** Original GLOW wrestler Hollywood joined David LaGreca and Bully Ray on Busted Open Radio. Hollywood discussed the cancellation of the GLOW series on Netflix and hopes that if the crew gets an opportunity to make a film to close out the series, original GLOW talents are included.
“And that’s why it hit so much home for all of us, because I’m thinking, ‘We didn’t get that either.’ We got no closure. It was just a phone call saying, ‘We’re not doing the seasons anymore’ and it was done. So let’s hope with on social media and with a petition and everybody sharing, that maybe we can get that show a movie or you know what would be even great? I hate to say it but I’m gonna say it. This time if they do a movie, how about incorporating original GLOW girls. Just little cameos here and there. I think it would make it badass. It would just do it justice.”
Hollywood shared that some of the original GLOW members were not too pleased about their director, Sam Sylvia being portrayed as a drug addict in the series because according to her, he never did that in real life.
“I think I’ve talked about it before when Marc Maron, who’s their director, doing cocaine. Our director never did drugs or drink. He liked to gamble a little bit but, some of the ladies, GLOW girls were not happy with that. But, you guys, it’s Hollywood. You have to have drama. You gotta bring in an audience to come back and they did. They did three seasons, you know? And some of the ladies were up for Emmy’s, so, kudos to them. I think they did a really good job.”
** IMPACT Wrestling announced the following names for the 20-person ‘Call Your Shot’ Gauntlet match at Bound For Glory: Heath, Rhino, Hernandez, Acey Romero, Larry D, Tenille Dashwood, Taya Valkyrie, Brian Myers, Tommy Dreamer and Havok.
** Dr. Tom Prichard is joining Ad Free Shows in November.
** CBR.com ran their interview with Brodie Lee.
** Shane Helms joined The Wrestling Inc. Daily Podcast. Helms was furloughed from the WWE back in April and he shared that his situation is still the same as it was several months ago. He talked about working with Vince McMahon and one specific occasion he brought up was Vince deciding that the 2019 Elimination Chamber match for the WWE Title needed to come down to Kofi Kingston and Daniel Bryan while others were pitching for their respective partners to get involved.
“It was on the rise of Kofi. It might have been Elimination Chamber, and it was going to come down to Daniel and Kofi. And I know I had an idea and so did Daniel about involving Rowan New Day to bring up all of these extra added elements to the Elimination Chamber. And Vince was like, ‘No, it needs to come down to them.’
Just them and we were all like – because we had all these other ideas for spots, spots, spots with this guy and that guy and that guy, but then at the end of the night, as it built, what the audience wanted to see was just Kofi and Daniel. And when we came through the back, we were like, ‘He’s absolutely, 100% correct. It was him.’ There’s still a lot of the basics that he grasps. He’s still a big picture guy, and when a lot of us and when I do a progress report, we dissect it show by show by show.”
** Booker T shared his thoughts about New Day being split in the WWE Draft:
** Titus O’Neil guest appeared on WDAE 95.3 with Ronnie and TKras.
** The following video is from the Reality of Wrestling YouTube channel:
** Heath Slater was the most recent guest on David Penzer’s ‘Sitting Ringside’ podcast. Heath reflected on his days as a part of The NEXUS and recounted Daniel Bryan being fired from WWE after choking Justin Roberts at ringside.
“The following next day or the next week on RAW said, ‘Oh my goodness. You’re choking this dude, you’re spitting everywhere. This is uncalled for,’ you know what I mean? So they had to do something.
That’s a fact. Not his fault at all. He was in the moment and it was great. I mean it was great and then next thing you know that happened. Of course we would say, ‘Man that’s bullsh*t.’ But thank God they brought him back, for like the whole next little piece for SummerSlam, for WWE and everything. But, they still shouldn’t have beat us at SummerSlam. They should’ve let us take over, let us dominate WWE. ‘Holy crap, they’re in jeopardy. NEXUS is on top of the mountain looking down on everyone, hahaha!’ Even have Vince come in and be like, ‘Yeah! This was my master plan. It was me.’ Anything.”
** To promote the season premiere of Friday Night SmackDown, Braun Strowman joined BJ & Migs’ Daily Podcast.
** The following video is from the WWEPC YouTube channel:
** Denise Salcedo of Instinct Culture hosted an interactive Q&A with Thunder Rosa.
** Here’s the latest ‘Shot of Brandi’ episode on the All Elite Wrestling YouTube channel:
** Gary Cassidy of Inside The Ropes conducted an interview with Marshall and Ross Von Erich. Marshall told the story of when he and Ross climbed to the roof of a venue in Japan after their match to reflect on the match and their careers in wrestling. While on top of that building, they marked their names onto it and also saw the signatures of David and Kevin Von Erich carved into a spot on top of the venue.
“Yeah, I’m not 100 percent sure if it was Korakuen Hall. I’m, like, 80 percent sure because it happened at the beginning of our career, but it was more of what happened or what we saw. I’m pretty sure it was probably Korakuen Hall.
Our thing is we always go to the roofs of venues. If we’re at the venue before the show, we go to the roof. Get away from everybody, it’s quiet, just calm down and talk about the match, say a little prayer.
We went to this building, went up to the top – and it was at the time in our careers, we’re wondering if we’re doing the right thing, if we should be in wrestling, if we’re good for it, because we’re losing a lot of matches. We were young, dumb, and so we were sitting there and I got on his shoulders and we carved, we scratched our names in the wall – ‘Ross and Marshall, 2012, Von Erich.’
We went and had our match, had a decent match. We still had those feelings. We came back to that spot after the show was over, sitting there talking, and on the other side of the building, on the brick wall, we saw another scratching, another scratch mark. We didn’t really think anything of it. Then we said, ‘Let’s go check it out,’ got on his shoulders and it said, ‘Kevin, David.’ My dad always draws an alligator. My whole life, he’s done that. And he drew a little alligator with sharp teeth and I knew my dad’s signature. It said, ‘Von Erich.’ It was confirmation, knowing that we were in the right place at the right time, it’s where we’re supposed to be. That was the moment that kept us in wrestling.”
** 10/16 is the birthday of Kenny Omega.
** Tyler Breeze and Cesaro took on Dakota Kai and Mia Yim in ‘Among Us’.
** WrestleTalk uploaded their interview with Ricky Starks to their YouTube channel.
** Toni Storm did an interview with Comicbook.com.
** Faye Jackson joined the Women’s Wrestling Talk podcast.
** D-Von Dudley welcomed Natalya onto his Table Talk podcast.
** MLW World Middleweight Champion Myron Reed was interviewed by 411Mania.
** AEW World Tag Team Champions FTR (Dax Harwood & Cash Wheeler) were guests on the AEW Unrestricted podcast.
** Shazza McKenzie did an interview with Bodyslam.net and discussed her WWE tryout from 2016 and rooming with former NXT Women’s Champion Rhea Ripley:
“My tryout was in Melbourne, Australia in 2016 and they haven’t done a tryout since but they’ve had people come down to our independent matches as opposed to holding an actual tryout.
My tryout that I did was the one that Rhea Ripley got signed from. She was my roommate, she thought I was crazy because I would get up at like 5AM to do my hair and makeup because I was like, ‘This is it!’ And she would just wake up like 10 minutes beforehand because she’s naturally beautiful and just like put her hair up and ate a bloody cake and went to the tryout and I was like, ‘Cool, cool…natural, I get it!’”
** Drew McIntyre made the media rounds to promote WWE Battlegrounds and he chatted with SunSport.
** Gabriel Kidd’s latest blog post is up on NJPW1972.com.
** DSTV in South Africa is airing four hours worth of Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson matches on their network.
** Drew McIntyre joined the Sports Guys Talking Wrestling radio show ahead of the WWE Draft.
** Here’s the newest episode of Reality of Wrestling TV:
** ‘Metro’ released their interview with David Arquette.
** Braun Strowman was a guest on the ‘In The Kliq’ podcast.
If any of the quotes from the following podcasts or video interviews are used, please credit those sources and provide an H/T and link back to POST Wrestling for the transcriptions.