The Wrestling Thread

[MrShawnMichaels]

The winner of the NXT tournament which is tonight at Axxess, will go into the Andre The Giant battle royal at Wrestlemania. Has to be FINN

If you fancy a flight to San Jose, you'll get tickets for Mania, Raw, Axxess still. Only ROH and NXT are sold out over the weekend.

We're possibly looking at Rock v Brock next year. Rock's interested in breaking the all time attendance record for Wrestlemania. Don't let Hogan fool you - he didn't slam Andre in front of 93,000 people.

[Alex]

It was pointed out to me today that almost all of the matches have someone competing who has main evented a Wrestlemania apart from the Divas and Pre Show.

Same with every match having an NXT Alum featuring, apart from Sting v HHH. Which arguably has HHH who runs the whole thing.

Think its a good card as I said. The WWE is in a stronger position that 5 years ago, no matter how woeful the last 2 months have been on TV.

[MrShawnMichaels]

It was pointed out to me today that almost all of the matches have someone competing who has main evented a Wrestlemania apart from the Divas and Pre Show.

Same with every match having an NXT Alum featuring, apart from Sting v HHH. Which arguably has HHH who runs the whole thing.

Think its a good card as I said. The WWE is in a stronger position that 5 years ago, no matter how woeful the last 2 months have been on TV.

Reigns wasn't in NXT. He was kept off TV. He did a couple of dark matches.

They've dropped the ball on several feuds here. Brock v Reigns should have been physical imo. The tug of war was ridiculous as the go home angle.

Orton v Rollins was perfectly set up. I would have got Rollins to cash in MITB for Orton to sabotage him. This serves a larger purpose. Reigns wins the title at Mania. You don't want to make him lose any time soon so you're protecting him. You want to protect Rollins because he's the number 1 or 2 heel in the company and making him lose his cash in, in a straight match damages him.
They dropped the ball on this one. Now they have the Rollins situation still to deal with.

[MrMichael]

Itami (still KENTA to me dammnit) won the spot in the jobber royal, not Balor.

It was pointed out to me today that almost all of the matches have someone competing who has main evented a Wrestlemania apart from the Divas and Pre Show.

Same with every match having an NXT Alum featuring, apart from Sting v HHH. Which arguably has HHH who runs the whole thing.

Think its a good card as I said. The WWE is in a stronger position that 5 years ago, no matter how woeful the last 2 months have been on TV.

That would be with declining tv ratings and attendances and a major stock crash that wiped out half their value?

Nah, I know you're talking about the roster, but I think its half & half. They've massively raided the indies in the last few years and hoovered up almost every fan favourite so yeah, they do have some exciting in ring talent (even if a good portion of it is in the development show),

However ultimately Raw is still terrible at the moment and their business is declining; having watched too much TNA I can definitely say that a talented roster is absolutely not the main thing that makes a wrestling company successful

WWE is a very different beast but I do think they have a serious structural issue with how the company and their vocal fans, not the kids but the guys who nowadays can hijack the shows (because wrestling is not as hot as it was and actual wrestling fans who attend shows are much better educated on the business etc) with CM Punk/Daniel Bryan chants or massively undesired reactions, disconnect with them now in a significant way. That wasn't attitude era booing some mega-heel screw job at the rumble, that was the mega-pushed new face of the company getting a genuine, unscripted reaction. AND The Rock.

Lance Storm had some stuff to say about that I thought was quite interesting - link. But yeah, my point is that I'm not sure they're doing very well at the moment at connecting with their fanbase.

Anyway, other subject in hand, the WM card is a weird one this year. It can be more than saved if they pull almost all the constituent parts off and give each match other than the Jobber Royal the right time, but it could also be a really poor one, I just can't tell now.

[Muddled]

I enjoyed that video.

[Keyser Soze]

Everybody ready?

WrestleMania XXXI Card

Andre the Giant Memorial Battle Royal Featuring The Miz, Damien Mizdow, Kane, Big Show, Mark Henry, Ryback, Curtis Axel, Fandango, Zack Ryder, Adam Rose, Titus O'Neil, Darren Young, Viktor, Konnor, Heath Slater, Goldust, Sin Cara, Erick Rowan, Jack Swagger and NXT Superstar Hideo Itami

Fatal 4-Way Match for the WWE Tag Team Championship: Tyson Kidd and Cesaro vs.

The Usos vs. The New Day vs. Los Matadores

Randy Orton vs. Seth Rollins (with Jamie Noble and Joey Mercury)

Ladder Match for the WWE Intercontinental Championship: Daniel Bryan vs. Dolph Ziggler vs. R-Truth vs. Dean Ambrose vs. Bad News Barrett vs. Luke Harper vs. Stardust

Paige and AJ Lee vs. The Bella Twins

The Undertaker vs. Bray Wyatt

United States Championship Match: John Cena vs. Rusev (with Lana)

Sting vs. Triple H

WWE World Heavyweight Championship Match: Roman Reigns vs. Brock Lesnar (with Paul Heyman)


My Predictions

Ryback wins the Andre the Giant Memorial Battle Royal.
Tyson Kidd and Cesaro retain the tag team titles.
Randy Orton defeats Seth Rollins.
Daniel Bryan wins the intercontinental title.
The Bella Twins beat the Anti Divas.
The Undertaker defeats Bray Wyatt.
John Cena wins the WWE United States title.
Sting defeats Triple H.
Brock Lesnar retains the WWE World Heavyweight Championship.

[spud_gun]

Where does one go about viewing tonights wrasslin' action?

[Keyser Soze]

Where does one go about viewing tonights wrasslin' action?

try one of the links from the following:

http://www.vipleague.is/sports/boxing.html

or buy the WWE network for 9.99

[MrMichael]

At work so can't post links, but the same sort of streaming sites people get the footy on should have it, things like firstrow, stadium live, rojadirecta...

Card seems relatively predictable to me outside of the IC ladder match obviously, and perhaps the Championship match now Brock has resigned. Surely they won't go ahead with Reigns... will they? If they do it'll have to be a screwy finish of some sort. I think Seth will cash in personally.

[Keyser Soze]

Intercontinental match kicking it off.

[MrMichael]

Did they have the tag match on the pre-show? Crikey that's a real double finger up to the tag division especially with an irrelevant divas match still on the card. And the Jobber Royal too? Results of those?

[Keyser Soze]

Did they have the tag match on the pre-show? Crikey that's a real double finger up to the tag division especially with an irrelevant divas match still on the card. And the Jobber Royal too? Results of those?

Yep both on the pre show.

Cesaro/Kid retain

Big Show wins the Jobber battle royal.
The big story from that is Mizdow dumping the Miz.

[MrMichael]

Yep both on the pre show.

Cesaro/Kid retain

Big Show wins the Jobber battle royal.
The big story from that is Mizdow dumping the Miz.

[spud_gun]

try one of the links from the following:

http://www.vipleague.is/sports/boxing.html

or buy the WWE network for 9.99

Works a treat, cheers.

[spud_gun]

Impressive looking stadium