Daily Update: Weekend show notes, Wanderlei Silva, ratings update
Daily Update
Latest News
- MLW takes shot at WWE’s Saudi Arabia ties during Fightland event
- Chelsea Green says WWE could be doing more with Women’s mid-card titles
- WWE NXT wrestler suffers injury at TNA TV taping
- Additions to WWE Raw lineup announced
- Bryan Danielson ‘infinitely more confident’ about retirement now compared to 2016
- Gail Kim responds to report about AEW contact after TNA departure
- New champions crowned at TNA TV taping
- TNA Impact TV taping spoilers from Edmonton
Latest Audio
- WOL: The All Out angle that should have been on AEW Dynamite
- WOR: Wrestling Observer Hall of Fame discussion kickoff, lessons from last Saturday
Latest YouTube Video
This Week’s Wrestling Observer Newsletter
The new issue of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter is out with the fallout of three major shows this past weekend and what key things we learned from them:
- Reader polls on the weekend shows
- Key points we learned from WWE going after AEW
- Numbers for all three shows and how they did
- Does the price make a difference, how is afternoon vs. evening?
- What we’ve learned about AEW that goes against the grain of 30 plus years of PPV numbers
- Mistico vs. MJF looked at as well as Mistico’s place in Lucha Libre history
- Misconceptions about John Cena vs. Brock Lesnar
- The next big shows from WWE & AEW
- Lots of injury updates
- Advanced ticket sales for the major shows over the next month
- Odds for last weekend and next weekend
- Where wrestling shows stood in the weekly ratings and comparisons with the same week in 2024 and 2023
- Exactly how much the audience makeup has changed for AEW on television this past year
- For every major TV show, what percentage of viewers were women this past week
- Blue Panther wins title at 65 years old
- Big head-to-head battles in Mexico City on Saturday and Sunday this week
- Lineup for the women’s Grand Prix match in Mexico City with talent from RevPro, Stardom and AEW/ROH
- Notes from the Pokemon CMLL crossover event
- Story about the changes in the crowds at Arena Mexico and leading reporter opposes the story
- Lots of health updates
- Real American Freestyle signs first woman gold medalist
- Masha Slamovich controversy
- Zuffa Boxing close to announcing TV deal
- Former WWE developmental talent signs with UFC for November debut
- International promotion in talks with ESPN Unlimited
- Jake Paul vs. Tank Davis silliness
- Cody Rhodes talks Paul Levesque’s successor
- Mark Shapiro talks how WWE & UFC will decide on locations for big shows
- ESPN review of Wrestlepalooza and the controversy allows ignoring the far bigger story
- Jazmyn Nyx turns down WWE offer, says it’s too low
This Week’s Back Issue
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Sunday Update
— Bryan and I will be back tonight talking about the weekend news. We also have a Hall of Fame show up on the site right now from Friday talking U.S. and Canada, Historical and Japan. We will be doing three more categories on next week’s show. I do want to mention that Ethan Tyler has apologized for the terminology used for black wrestlers on the show.
— A few notes from last night. Hologram suffered a knee injury on Wednesday at the show in Pittsburgh. It was to the same knee that kept him out of action. When examined, it was worse than he expected and he will be out of the rest of the year. They shot a phantom angle where Kyle Fletcher attacked him and Clon had a part in it as well. They were about to start the Hologram vs. Clon feud and this could mean Clon is on ice as well waiting for him to come back.
— Ridge Holland suffered what was apparently a knee injury at the TNA tapings last night.
— NXT referee Vicky D’Errico won the Daytona Class Fit Model competition this weekend.
— Kurt Angle was in Quebec City yesterday at the Imperial for Kevin Raphae’s Sana Restriction Chnono on a show that also included Yves Ulysse Jr. a Quebec boxer who fought in Madison Square Garden, in his first pro wrestling match, against Evil Blachard.
— As far as the biggest matches of the weekend, I haven’t seen it yet but Saya Kamitani vs. AZM from yesterday’s Stardom show has gotten a lot of praise as well Mistico & Bandido vs. Mortos & Difunto from last night at Arena Coliseo, Mascara Dorada vs. Capitan Suidida and Templario vs. Villano III jr. from Arena Mexico on Friday and Kyle Fletcher vs. Komander from last nights AEW tapings in Huntington, WV.
— We’re looking for your thoughts on last night’s NXT No Mercy show, so you can leave a thumbs up, thumbs down or thumbs in the middle along with a best and worst match to [email protected]
— There have been a lot of questions about the ratings in Programming Insider for Tuesday and Wednesday. The ratings have come in late (Thursday isn’t up yet). Tuesday’s NXT was first reported at 702,000 viewers and 0.17, which is a very good number, and then PI listed it as 612,000 and 0.12, which would have been a disappointment for the show. We didn’t get a network listing independently from that night. PI did have a number of demos and half hours that indicated that latter number that were also in PI, but given we know the AEW number they listed for Wednesday was incorrect for not just wrestling but other shows leads me to believe the NXT number of 702,000 is the legit one. AEW did 638,000 viewers and 0.14, and we have quarters that confirm those numbers.
I can’t explain the discrepancies but they are not just wrestling shows. The top shows on Wednesday cable were the Mets-Cubs game on ESPN which did 1,161,000 and 0.27. PI has it higher at 1,296,000 and 0.31. Challenge on MTV did 322,000 and 0.14 while PI has it at 312,000 and 0.13. Jesse Watters on FOX News did 3,377,000 and 0.15 while PI has it at 3,468,000 and 0.14. Hannity did 2,600,000 and 0.14 and PI has it at 2,696,0000 and 0.14. Dynamite did 638,000 and 0.14 and PI has it at 554,000 and 0.11. South Park did 613,000 and 0.20 and PI has it at 553,000 and 0.18.
— Last night’s Wanderlei Silva vs. Acelino Freitas boxing match had a scary post-match. Silva, 49, weighed in at 206.7 pounds to Freitas, a former world champion in boxing who weighed 162.7.m Silva ended up being DQ’d for three head-butts. Then the corners hit the ring and a crazy brawl took place. Somebody threw a punch at Silva from the side as he was squaring off elsewhere and he was knocked totally out cold. His face was a mess in the hospital but was released four hours later. Freitas said Fabricio Wedum and Andre Dida in Silva’s corner. started it. Freitas said one of them (believed to be Werdum, who is a big heavyweight) started throwing punches, as did Thor Silva, the son of Wanderlei. Werdum said 20 guys from Freitas’ side got in the ring and only four were on Silva’s side and they came after us. He said Wanderlei Silva suffered a broken nose. Rafael Freitas, the son of Acelino, was the one who hit Wanderlei. Wanderei said he’s very dizzy and has a bad headache.
— For Google searches for the weekend, the UFC show from Perth, Western Australia did 125,000. Wanderlei Silva had 20,000 and Ash by Elegance had 10,000.
— We don’t have an update on what caused Ash By Elegance’s retirement Friday night, vacating the TNA, which Kelani Jordan won in a Battle Royal and then a singles match.
— A crazy story in Omaha is that they had the Terrence Crawford victory parade in his home town last night, and then later that night he was pulled over by police and ordered out of his car at gunpoint at a traffic stop. Police said that they stopped a car at 1:30 a.m. that was driving recklessly and saw a firearm on the driver’s side floorboard and for safety, the four occupants were ordered out of the car by gunpoint. Omaha Police Chief Todd Schmaderer ordered an internal affairs investigation over the incident.
— Arena Mexico tonight is headlined by Volador Jr. & Neon vs. Mortos & Bandido and Esfinge & Star Jr. & Templario vs. Gran Guerrero & Valiente & Stuka Jr.
— Puebla on Monday has Esfinge vs. Valiente in a rematch from the mask vs. mask match that Esfinge won last week, plus the Sky Team faces Barbuza & Difunto & Volador Jr.
— Dragon Lee won the three-way over El Hijo del Vikingo and Grande Americano (Kaiser) last night at Juan de la Barrera Gym in Mexico City when he pinned Americano. I saw the finish. Lee did an incredible tope on Americano on the announcers table. The other notable thing is that in the tag match with Pagano & Psycho Clown vs. Mesias & Mecha Wolf, they used American tag match rules with actual tags being needed and not just replacing the partners.
This sets up Heroes Inmortales, the tribute show to Anotnio Pena, on 10/25 at Juan de la Barrera Gym with Dominik vs. Lee for the Mega title, Pagano & Psych Clown vs. Wyatt Sicks for the AAA tag team titles, and Flammer vs. Natalya vs. Faby Apache for the Reina de Reinas title. I know Natalya beat Faby in Las Vegas for the title shot.
— Zack Sabre Jr. beat Ren Narita in Kobe earlier today to keep the IWGP world title Gabe Kidd beat Shingo Takagi in what was said to be the best match to keep the Global title. Hiromu Takahashi kept the GHC jr. title over Taiji Ishimori. Yuto-Ice & Oskar beat Tomohiro Ishii & Taichi to win the IWGP tag titles and Oleg Boltin beat Don Fale to keep the Never title. Yota Tsuji challenged Kidd. Evil challenged Boltin. Shota Umino & Yuya Uemura challenged Yuto-Ice & Oskar.
— WWE on A&E tonight at 9 p.m. has Greatest Moments of Randy Savage and 9:30 p.m has Survivor Series in the 2000s.
— Syuri returned to Stardom on Saturday’s Korakuen Hall show.
— AAA in Tijuana on Friday before a sellout of 5,000+: Rey Furia & Aztec Fly b Terror Azteca & Khavali, Faby Apache & Lady Shani b La Hiedra & Keyra, Arkangel Divino & Ultimo Maldito b Alas de Oro Jr. & Humilbe Jr., Abismo Negro Jr. & Taurus & Histeria b Octagon Jr & El Fiscal & Rey Horus, Pagano & Psycho Clown b Mecha Wolf & D-Luxe, Alberto El Patron & Mr.. Iguana b Sam Adonis & DMT Azul (thanks to Paul Sosnowski)
— Atlantis turned 63 today. Steve Blackman turned 62 (thanks to Tony Richards)
— Comet TV owned by Sinclair is running a seven hour marathon of WWE Rivals on 10/4.(thanks to Paul Verlander)
