6/1/2025

© WWE

WWE

Saturday Night’s Main Event
24/05/25
Yuengling Center, Florida, USA
Announced Attendance:
WrestleTix Distributed Estimate:
Watch On: NBC / Peacock / YouTube

Review by David Hayter

During my decade-long career as a journalist, I have had the pleasure of reviewing some truly surreal material, from albums comprised entirely of abstract noise and music festivals where every act was cancelled due to bad weather to absurdist art house films and comedy sets with no jokes, but Saturday Night’s Main Event might just take the cake.

Before we can even begin to talk about the wrestling, the promos or the production, we have to address the elephant in the room: the commercial breaks. This largely enjoyable two-hour event was completely blighted by incessant interruptions, which was doubly frustrating as an international viewer, as I found myself staring at a blank screen over and over and over again.

Unlike with most torture techniques, I did not become numb to NBC’s intermittent yet incessant advertising assault with repeated exposure, in part because past experience with WWE programming had given me false hope. Watching along online, you could see fans rationalising their pain in real time: “oh don’t worry, it’s like when they do a commercial-free hour of SmackDown, they must be loading up the first hour with extra ad breaks so the World Title match or John Cena segment can be broadcast uninterrupted.”

We were wrong, so very wrong. The commercial breaks were relentless; they happened before matches, during matches (multiple times), after matches, after video packages, and sometimes even between entrances. From the opening monologue to the final ring bell, there was no escaping the advertisers’ insidious grasp. It was impossible for any of the wrestling matches, or the show itself, to gather momentum or organically flow because the viewer was being jerked hither and yon between fleeting glimpses of action and these impenetrable waiting screens.

If you are ever asked what’s worse than being stuck in purgatory for all eternity, you can answer: being taken out of purgatory for seven minutes at a time only to be thrust right back the second you start to feel or enjoy anything. It truly is the hope that kills you.

My apologies if you find yourself infuriated that this review has started with six straight paragraphs describing the experience of not watching wrestling. I appreciate that I have not, as of yet, said a word about anything that actually happened on “Saturday Night’s Main Event” (a show which, for the record, I enjoyed), but that is precisely because I wanted this review to in some small way replicate the torturous frustration of being denied the content you came to see. Just count yourself lucky that I’m not sadistic enough to make every other paragraph a commentary on the commercials themselves.

Now let’s get on with the show.

© WWE

Cody Rhodes returns to thwart John Cena and save Jey Uso

The headline coming out of “Saturday Night’s Main Event” is that WWE’s ace is back and will be immediately resuming his feud with John Cena. Jey Uso and Logan Paul were in the midst of a fun sprint of a main event for the World Heavyweight Championship when Jey hit the Uso Splash eight minutes into the match, only for John Cena to pull the referee out of the ring just before he could count three.

With just over two minutes of TV time remaining, WWE ran through one of its biggest angles of the year at preposterous speed. Cena was busy laying in an embarrassingly soft beatdown on Jey as Paul looked on smiling – then Cody’s music hit and the Yuengling Center erupted. If the viewers at home were having a frustrating evening, it’s clear this great-reacting crowd were having the time of their lives, as Rhodes charged to the ring to give Cena a Cross Rhodes. The final seconds of the show were soundtracked by a pandemonium of screaming as Logan swung and missed with brass knucks, allowing Jey Uso to hit the spear and the Uso Splash to retain his title.

With time ticking away, Cody sprinted to grab a microphone and cut a fiery return promo in thirty seconds flat, challenging Cena and Paul to a tag team match with Rhodes and Uso at Money in the Bank. It was an incredible ending to the show and it’s a testament to the timing and talent of all four workers that they managed to get through so much content, so effectively, in such a short window of time.

The live crowd were absolutely eating out of the palms of their hands, but it has to be noted: only a fraction of this experience was relayed to the audience of millions watching at home, as the final segment of the show involved three commercial breaks, including one slap bang in the middle of the match. Logan Paul had just ever so slightly over-rotated on a flying blockbuster when we cut to commercial, only to return for the final moments and near-falls. What we saw was good, but we saw

© WWE

R-Truth cosplay brings the limited best out of Heel Cena

Three matches into the heel Cena experiment and it is abundantly clear that the way to get something (anything!) out of this aged, immobile and inaccurate husk of a main eventer is to load up on the smoke and mirrors. Cody tried to deliver a modern main event at WrestleMania and it was a catastrophe, whereas Randy Orton used his innate slickness alongside every table spot, ref bump and false finish in the book to massively exceed expectations at Backlash—but what could comedy jobber R-Truth possibly get out of Cena on SNME?

The answer was a surprisingly large amount. Despite being a combined 101 years old, this match never felt decrepit as Truth brought so much energy and enthusiasm to the affair. The crowd 100% bought into Truth as a doomed underdog the second John Cena’s music hit for a second time and “Ron Cena” (Truth) charged to the ring recreating Cena’s classic babyface entrance routine. The match itself was not as comedic as you’d expect from Truth. Instead, he let the macro joke (that we were watching Cena vs Cena) do the heavy lifting. After Cena used a slow-motion version of his five moves of doom for heel heat, Truth returned the favour, hitting Cena’s signature offence, including the FU for a near-fall, at full speed. By the time Truth had Cena locked in the STF, the match felt like a minor triumph, with the crowd coming alive for a Truth victory that they knew was an impossibility.

The finish was predictable, but perfect. Cena grew frustrated, went to use his title belt. Truth reasoned with him as his “biggest fan” to do the right thing, and Cena handed the belt over to the referee. Of course, it was all a ruse: with the referee’s back turned, Cena would hit the low blow and FU for the victory, before laying Truth out with the world title for good measure after the match.

It was a simple story, well told. Truth deserves credit for knocking it out of the park and really rallying the fans behind him in what is likely to be the last major and meaningful match of his career. The crowd fully played along with the heel/face dynamic until Cena made his exit, at which point the “Thank You Cena” chants began, confirming that this heel run is pure wink-and-a-nod fan service.

© WWE

Bronson Reed is the Third Man

The show got off to a hot start in large part due to the sheer overness of CM Punk, Sami Zayn, Seth Rollins and Bron Breakker. This was a classic main event-style tag match focusing on milking the extremely heated crowd for all they were worth in between big flashy spots and finisher sequences. Sami Zayn and Punk, both decked out in what appeared to be new pro-Palestinian ring gear, were the most creative in-ring. Punk pulled out a surprisingly solid Code Red for a near-fall in the early going, before Sami Zayn paid tribute to Sabu with a glorious Arabian Press to the outside. Not to be outdone, Breakker hit a crunching box jump lariat from the apron onto the commentary booth, while Seth played glue guy, holding the match together by bumping well for both babyfaces.

The thirteen-minute opener was interrupted by two commercial breaks, but everything we were shown on TV was excellent. Just as the match was peaking and Sami Zayn was preparing to hit the Helluva Kick, Heyman grabbed his ankle and, in the background of the shot, we saw Bronson Reed emerging through the crowd. He would charge and crossbody Punk through the barricade on the outside as Sami turned around in-ring to be cleaned out by a spear from Bron for the pinfall victory.

Post-match, Bron would stare down Bronson, but Seth quickly reassured him that this was all part of the plan, as Reed was welcomed as the third man of Seth’s new faction. Bronson would finish proceedings by hitting the Tsunami on Punk and wisely ignoring the crowd’s chants of “one more time”. The addition of Reed to Rollins’ emergent faction appears a great choice on paper. He has good reason to feud with CM Punk (given he can blame Punk for causing his injury during War Games when Punk pulled Roman to safety, leaving Reed to crash through a table and break his foot). This addition also gives Seth’s group a sense of overwhelming power and physical heft; they feel invincible in kayfabe with Breakker and Reed protecting Seth. They even started the angle with a hint of future dissension between Breakker and the new recruit, as it was clear that Heyman hadn’t clued Bron in on this scheme.

Bronson Reed certainly deserves his big break. He was one of the standout stars of Triple H’s revamped Raw in 2023/24 and felt like a natural fit in the main event scene when given the chance to stand alongside the Bloodline at War Games. This will be his chance to prove whether he truly can make that step up from chaotic undercard monster to serious main event player as part of the faction which will no doubt dominate Raw programming for the next year.

© WWE

Jesse Ventura fumes as Drew McIntyre is written off WWE TV

It wouldn’t be a “Saturday Night’s Main Event” without Jesse Ventura flying off the handle for no apparent reason. Tonight, he lost the plot when Damian Priest decided to walk out of the door of the steel cage match after leaving Drew McIntyre for dead in the middle of the ring following a con-chair-to. Jesse seemed to take this decision by Priest as one of cowardice, at first raging that he should have pinned Drew, but then changing tack and saying he shouldn’t be able to leave via the door and that Priest should have climbed over instead.

Even putting Jesse’s bizarre desire to see Priest escape via a slower and more elongated route to one side, it is clear that Jesse has simply forgotten his wrestling history. This match and this finish were a clear tribute and reference to Bruno Sammartino’s classic cage match main events, where, after months of running, the heel would be trapped in a cage with Bruno; a brutal beating would ensue, with Bruno getting his revenge until he and the fans were satisfied. At which point, with his foe thoroughly defeated, he’d calmly walk out of the cage leaving no doubt as to who was the better man.

Due to time restraints and commercials, Priest and McIntyre couldn’t really have the epic cage match many would have hoped for. There was no blood, but there was plenty of hard-hitting action and big meaty slams in this easy-to-enjoy thirteen-minute war. However, unlike the Bruno matches, Drew was not presented as a coward; he was positioned as a worthy rival equally capable of destroying Priest (as he did at WrestleMania). They teased the same finish here, with Drew lining up a Claymore against a steel chair propped up in the corner, but this time Drew would miss and crash knee-first into the chair. Leaving no doubt, Priest immediately hit the South of Heaven before delivering the Con-chair-to, leaving Drew completely immobile.

The presentation was certainly interesting. If you could drown out Cole and Ventura’s bickering, you’d notice that Priest’s actions were framed in an ambiguous light. He could be seen as taking things too far (and there was certainly a heelish edge to his cruelty here), but he could also be seen as a righteous babyface finally getting complete revenge on a heel who had made his life hell by giving Priest storyline “concussions” on two occasions. Cole was sure to note that Priest had dealt with Drew the same way he had his former mentor Edge, which hints at the potential for a double turn. It has since been confirmed that McIntyre will be taking an extended leave of absence to recover from various injuries, and this finish certainly set up a potential babyface return.

© WWE

The Women’s US Championship Remains an Embarrassment

There is no way to sugar-coat this: the Women’s US Championship has been an unmitigated disaster from its very inception. A poor relative of Lyra Valkyria’s Women’s Intercontinental Championship (which was won in a strong tournament and has gone on to produce a host of excellent star-making defences), the US Title is a weekly lowlight on SmackDown and may have reached its most pitiful ebb here.

This five-minute match was awful. The wrestling was soft, slow and reminiscent of the Divas era of US women’s wrestling – and then it got worse. Zelina lined up a 619, didn’t have the speed, got hung up in the ropes and, having missed the move and lacking any momentum, she decided to stick out a foot and boot Chelsea in the face. Blood spurted everywhere, Chelsea’s nose was a mess and, tragically, the match continued. The flashy second rope Code Red finisher was the big spot we were supposed to come away from this match buzzing about, but it was forgotten within seconds.

Zelina is not over and, despite being a good promo, her wrestling is simply too far below the standard expected of a women’s champion in 2025. Chelsea is very over by way of comparison and is a great comedic performer, but her matches are bad – there’s no getting around this fact. There have been positives to her push, in that Piper Niven and Alba Fyre routinely get ring time thanks to Green’s star power, but that hardly makes up for these pitiful title matches. The US division currently consists of Michin, B-Fab, Zelina Vega and Chelsea Green – that is thin gruel. NXT call-ups are urgently needed to plug this gap, but I would hate to see the likes of Giulia, Jordynne Grace, Sol Ruca or Kelani Jordan wasted on such an uninspired division.

Final Thoughts: Good Content sometimes makes for Bad TV

I do not doubt that if I had attended this event live I would have had a damn good time. All the main men’s matches were good, fast-paced, entertaining and meaningful – the nostalgic presentation, wrestling legends in attendance and retro-futuristic production were absolutely tremendous; and, to top it off, there were two hugely newsworthy returns leading to meaningful storyline developments. What’s not to love?

Well unfortunately, the sheer volume of the commercial breaks chopped this spectacle into frustratingly pitiful slivers that were almost impossible to truly enjoy. I’m sure those live in the arena will be baffled to see “Saturday Night’s Main Event” being universally slammed by fans and critics alike, but truth be told, I can’t remember a show that was so simple, fun and enjoyable on paper and so utterly unpleasant in execution.

Full Results

Dark Tag Team Match:
American Made (Brutus Creed & Julius Creed) defeat LWO (Cruz Del Toro & Joaquin Wilde)

Bron Breakker & Seth Rollins defeat CM Punk & Sami Zayn (13:13)

WWE Women’s United States Title:
Zelina Vega (c) defeats Chelsea Green (5:10)

John Cena defeats R-Truth (4:25)

Steel Cage Match:
Damian Priest defeats Drew McIntyre (12:22)

WWE World Heavyweight Title:
Jey Uso (c) defeats Logan Paul (9:46)

© WWE

NXT Battleground
25/05/25
Yuengling Center, Florida, USA
Announced Attendance:
WrestleTix Distributed Estimate:
Watch On: Peacock / Netflix

Review by David Hayter

It’s a genuine shame that, due to WWE’s insistence on counter-programming AEW, this really rather excellent PLE will be among the least viewed and most sparingly discussed major wrestling shows of 2025. There is no world in which the mere existence of NXT “Battleground” will cause any meaningful damage to the buyrate of “Double or Nothing”. It will be a minor annoyance at most, a few thousand lost buys that will barely make a dent in the AEW accounts come the end of the year, but it has robbed Stephanie Vaquer, Myles Borne, Sol Ruca and Kelani Jordan of the limelight they would have surely basked in on any other weekend.

Putting the pettiness of corporate rivalries to one side, NXT “Battleground” will no doubt go down in history as the night a WWE-contracted talent won the TNA World Heavyweight Championship live on WWE television. The close ties and near-complete integration of the NXT and TNA products is no longer a novelty and now represents normality in 2025, but there was still something markedly surreal about hearing Trick Williams announced as the new TNA Champion, as the company’s president Carlos Silva looked on distraught. It would have been impossible to imagine Wade Barrett defeating Sting with Dixie Carter watching at ringside in the 2010s, but it is amazing how time flies and circumstances change. And it’s fitting that on the night WWE effectively subsumed TNA, Tony Khan concluded the “Double or Nothing” post-show press conference by confidently, but understatedly, assuring fans that despite WWE’s anti-competitive practices, things will end up “a lot differently” this time.

© WWE

Trick Outshines Hendry in High Stakes Main Event

It’s easy to be cynical about WWE and TNA’s working relationship and what (if anything) it means to have the TNA World Heavyweight Championship defended on WWE television, but one thing is clear: the rowdy crowd in the Yuengling thought this match meant the world. Despite Trick Williams’ continued attempts to subtly turn heel by adopting a more egocentric persona, the crowd heartily cheered both competitors, from their glitzy singalong entrances until the final bell.

In this battle of the two promotions’ golden boys, Joe Hendry adopted the traditional babyface role and was clearly beloved. Whatever WWE/TNA tension might exist, it did not result in Joe Hendry being booed or rejected. The crowd was with him through every stomp-and-clap, turn-and-grin and, most importantly, through all his in-ring work. TikTok memes may have propelled him to superstardom, but the fans are accepting him as a legitimate main eventer.

Trick Williams, on the other hand, played heel and was booed lightly when appropriate (when he sought to cheat or was too cocky), but WWE continues to find themselves in a tough spot where Trick is simply too damn charismatic and entertaining to boo. There may come a time when the NXT brain trust have to decide how committed they are to his heel turn, because if they actually want fans to boo Trick, they will need to see him do something despicable to a character the fans actually love.

Given that this momentous main event featured a green ex-athlete and a journeyman often dismissed for his mediocre work, I’m pleased to report that the match was by and large a success. Although, when it comes to assessing top prospects it’s clear that Trick Williams is light years ahead of Joe Hendry. Trick was dynamic and explosive in this match; he is constantly adding new state-of-the-art offence to his arsenal and it’s clear that he’s committed himself to a more direct and aggressive style of work. He is simply faster, crisper and vastly more charismatic. He also knows how to have fun – using Booker T’s Harlem Side Kick, Book End, Scissor Kick and Spin-a-roonie, Trick kept the crowd fully engaged during the heat.

© WWE

Hendry, on the other hand, had a mixed evening. His over-ness was unquestioned and he sustained the reaction throughout, playing a good, hard-working babyface in peril. Likeability is half the battle for a babyface and he has it in spades, but nevertheless he clearly lacks something in the ring. During the second half of the match, he noticeably fell off the pace and struggled to maintain his ring positioning, either crowding or arriving a touch too late for Trick’s offence. Despite putting together a well-crafted and drama-rich match, Joe’s performance certainly had a Miz-like air to it. You sense that if he is to thrive beyond TNA, he needs to learn from LA Knight’s example and double down on his in-ring intensity, but whether Joe has the strength, conditioning and natural athletic ability to do that remains to be seen.

When the match reached the final stretch, it became apparent just how invested the fans were in either the WWE vs TNA or Trick vs Hendry dynamic, because when Trick flapjacked Hendry onto the TNA title and followed up with the Trick Shot knee strike for the 1-2-3, something strange happened. Half the crowd, in dispersed little pockets, started jumping up and down with glee as if their team had just won the World Cup, while other large sections sat solemnly and politely clapped. This is the type of reaction you rarely see in 2025, especially in what was nominally a babyface/heel match. For all the inherent cynicism towards this NXTNA relationship, it’s clear that winning and/or losing this title meant a lot to those in attendance.

Fears that WWE is running roughshod over TNA will multiply in the online commentary following this result, but any such panic is premature. The ongoing storylines within TNA (and now within NXT) are positioning Santana as TNA’s saviour and next champion. He should be the one to dethrone Trick; if he fails, then the alarm bells should ring.

Oba and Myles Masterfully Manipulate the Crowd

NXT made a very interesting creative choice in May when they decided to pluck Myles Borne from the midcard, just as the fans were just starting to get behind him, and thrust him into the main event picture. Make no mistake, he was presented as a doomed underdog challenger facing the immovable Oba Femi, but in stepping up to the World Champion, Myles was given the full freedom to get over on his own terms. Myles was allowed not only to present himself as a deaf wrestler overcoming his disability, but as a rounded human being. He’s funny, cocky, confident and self-deprecating and, in letting Myles be Myles rather than being a two-dimensional champion for the deaf community, he got over huge – in the Performance Center.

Unfortunately, the Yuengling Center is a huge arena where the majority in attendance are not diehard NXT fans and probably haven’t seen many (or any) of Myles’ promos. Essentially, when the ring introductions were made, it was clear that Oba was a huge star and Myles was a guy no one disliked, but no significant majority appeared to truly know or appreciate. In short, it was back to square one for Myles Borne.

© WWE

Mercifully, not only was Myles up for the challenge in-ring, he was paired with Oba Femi, who is fast establishing himself as a can’t-miss prospect who simply delivers in any situation he’s thrown into. This match was structured masterfully. Perhaps Oba, Myles and the agents predicted how the crowd would react and constructed a match to slowly win them round. Early on, they gave the crowd exactly what they wanted – Oba being an absolute badass, hurling Myles Borne around with one gargantuan slam after another. The crowd were chanting and singing for Oba as he laid on an impressive beatdown, but with each near fall, with each improbable kick-out and with each fiery hope spot, the crowd slowly began to flip in Myles’ favour.

Myles clearly just has something. By presenting himself both as an uncanny valley replica of Randy Orton – right down to the way that he walks – but also as a modern, dynamic wrestler with a flashy moveset, Myles appears to encompass the best of both worlds. He already has the knack for dramatic main event selling and timing (no doubt from watching Orton so religiously), but he’s not lumbered with an overly safe moveset. Where Randy would rely on his cachet to get the crowd to pop for a clothesline or DDT, Myles can wow the crowd with a flip dive. By the end of this story-rich 17-minute match, the crowd were riding for Myles. Of course, it wasn’t to be; Oba overcame the near falls, avoided the flash pins, and then destroyed his opponent with a huge throw and two Falls From Grace for the win. It was a decisive victory for Oba, a star-making turn for Myles and a triumph of a match.

© WWE

Vaquer and Grace Steal The Show

Stephanie Vaquer is ungodly over, but what’s remarkable about her popularity is that it translates into direct investment in her wrestling matches. When Stephanie and Jordynne Grace first locked up for this excellent NXT Women’s Championship match, something strange happened: this WWE crowd turned into a classic Japanese audience. As Stephanie and Grace exchanged clever holds, grappling counters and hard strikes, the audience burst out in rounds of applause – they weren’t popping for spots, they were simply appreciating the wrestling. This trend continued as the match steadily built and Grace began to take control using her eerie power and athleticism.

Suffice it to say, when Stephanie made her comeback, they had the crowd in the palm of their hands, but it’s worth noting this match was not perfect. There were clear communication and positioning issues during Stephanie’s penultimate comeback, with the workers clearly having to take their time and talk through some sloppy moments. However, these slips never threatened to undermine the match as a whole and, in some ways, added a sense of rough realism that played into both women’s tough and steely aura. The finishing sequence was tremendous, as the crowd absolutely lost their minds when Jordynne Grace kicked out of the SVB backbreaker at 2.9999. This reaction felt like one of genuine shock and it led to a feverish final few moments, with the crowd now believing Grace would win. However, it was not to be, as Stephanie instead came out on top with a gorgeous corkscrew moonsault to top off another excellent title defence.

Dalys la Caribeña and Chik Tormenta of AAA were shown in the crowd and got into a heated Spanish exchange with Stephanie Vaquer backstage post-match to set up a likely tag team match with Lola Vice at “Worlds Collide”. Why the 50-year-old (and not particularly good) Dalys was selected to represent AAA in such a key spot on a big show is a mystery.

© WWE

Sol & Lani’s Flashy Gymnastics Are Underwritten by Genuine Improvement

Stephanie was certainly the most over act on the show, but the match that drew the best reactions came in the opener as Sol Ruca and Kelani rematched their infamous, heavily choreographed, flip-filled, gymnastic spectacular from “Heatwave” 2024. Suffice it to say, the improvement from their original encounter was phenomenal. The pair started with a farcically contrived sequence of handsprings and gymnastic counters, but soon settled down into a hard-hitting and compellingly structured battle for the NXT Women’s North American Championship. Kelani is still green and is at times slow, soft and out of position, but the pair clearly focused on upping the intensity of their work and coming up with good, plausible kayfabe reasons for their spectacular flips and dives to take place.

With the pretext of a match where it felt like both women were going hell for leather for a victory, the incredible spots (Sasuke Specials, flip counters to top rope poison-ranas, backflip meteoras and a top rope Sol Snatcher) had the crowd screaming with delight. Make no mistake, there were still sloppy moments, weak strikes and plenty of mis-timed music between the notes to critique, but it would be churlish to deny that this opener was an absolute home run. Sol Ruca and Kelani Jordan are clearly being positioned as generational rivals – the new Becky vs Charlotte or Sasha vs Bayley. The match ended with Sol complaining about Zaria’s unwanted interference, which may have cost Lani the victory (although Sol was also distracted), so it appears a Zolruca split and a possible triple threat match is on the horizon.

The Middling Midcard

It’s a credit to Hank & Tank’s remarkable enthusiasm and penchant for fiery babyface comebacks that they managed to drag a surprisingly exciting party match out of The Culling – Shawn Spears’ tediously generic faction. The action was fast and frantic without being particularly blow-away, but the entire purpose of this tag team match was to build up some good vibes in the audience. The babyfaces overcame the heels’ cheating, and Inamura returned “from Japan” to thwart Izzi Dame and save Briggs from both defeat and the potential of an unnecessary heel turn.

Tony D’Angelo’s clash with Channing “Stacks” Lorenzo had been sufficiently built up to the point where this battle for control of “the family” could have been an intense TV main event, but it was clearly wrestled knowing that it was merely the backdrop for more storyline to come. The 15 minutes of work they put in was solid and crisp, with Tony D nailing some lovely spinebusters and suplexes, but nothing really mattered until Luca Crusifino made his return to… erm… stand and watch the match. This was enough to distract Tony, allowing Stacks to cheat to win yet again. The drama will no doubt continue, as Luca’s intentions were left ambiguous. Expect a better blow-off match with a big stipulation down the line.

“Battleground” was ultimately an exciting and exceedingly easy-to-watch two-and-a-half hours of action, but it also feels like a fond farewell to the current era of the product, given the events of this week’s NXT television and the rumoured call-ups coming hot on the heels of this PLE.

Full Results

WWE NXT Women’s North American Title:
Sol Ruca (c) defeats Kelani Jordan (12:59)

Hank And Tank (Hank Walker & Tank Ledger) & Josh Briggs defeat The Culling (Brooks Jensen, Niko Vance & Shawn Spears) (9:26)

Channing Lorenzo defeats Tony D’Angelo (15:15)

WWE NXT Women’s Title:
Stephanie Vaquer (c) defeats Jordynne Grace (16:08)

WWE NXT Title:
Oba Femi (c) defeats Myles Borne (16:50)

TNA World Title:
Trick Williams defeats Joe Hendry (c) (15:00)

© WWE

WWE TV News

PWInsider are the first to report that WWE “Smackdown” will not be returning to a 2 hour format in the summer, as had been claimed previously. Internal listings for the USA Network continue to list the Friday night show as 3 hours and reflects the value of the content to the network amidst its current offering. The shows have not been critically popular with fans, but the 3rd hour continues to draw well in comparison to the previous 2 in the ratings and that may be a large influence in the decision. The unknown question in this matter is whether WWE are being paid anything additional for the extra hour of content per week, or if this is part of their original deal with the USA Network, which would now be overvalued in regards of its rate of increase from the Fox deal if it was for 52 more hours of content per year than what was reported at the time the agreement was announced.

The next WWE main roster PLE is already here, as the flooding of their big show calendar continues with “Money In The Bank” on June 7th from the Intuit Dome in Los Angeles, California. The PLE will have both men’s and women’s Money In the Bank matchups, with Solo Sikoa, LA Knight, Seth Rollins and Penta having qualified on the men’s side whilst Alexa Bliss, Rhea Ripley, Roxanne Perez and Guilia have booked their places for the women’s match.

The NXT TV taping on May 27th was moved back to the WWE Performance Center in Orlando, after poor ticket sales for the show at its original location at the Yuengling Center in nearby Tampa, Florida. The tapings for WWE’s 3rd brand were set to be the 4th straight night of WWE content from the building, but sales were slow, with Wrestletix estimating around 1,700 tickets distributed at the time of cancellation.

The move does provide a minor blow to WWE’s ability to demonstrate the economic value of four straight nights in a market without one of their big name PLE’s, as they look to generate site fees in future from more than their very biggest shows.

Roxanne Perez has been officially announced as part of the Raw roster, where she will soon be joined by Stephanie Vaquer, as main roster call ups kick in now that WWE are post-Wrestlemania. Jordynne Grace is expected to go to Smackdown, whilst Ricky Saints is also expected to join 1 of the 2 brands in the near future, after dropping the NXT North American Championship to Ethan Page on NXT this week. Vaquer had been offered a main roster position from the start but had chosen to go to NXT whilst adapting to life in the US. She put over Jacy Jayne for the NXT Women’s Championship on Tuesday night.

Bronson Reed returned from injury on May 26th, aligning with Seth Rollins after previously feuding with WWE’s new top heel. Liv Morgan also returned on the same show having been away from television over the last month whilst taking part in filming for future movie release “Bad Lieutenant: Tokyo”.

© WWE

Bianca Belair was pre-announced for her first appearance post-Wrestlemania, as she returns to TV for Smackdown in her hometown of Knoxville, Tennessee, on May 30th. Belair had been sidelined with broken fingers since Wrestlemania weekend.

Kairi Sane also returned to WWE on May 19th, having been out of action with a torn thumb ligament since December 2024. It was not the best of returns though, as she lost the 3-way “Money In the Bank” qualifier to Rhea Ripley, and a positioning issue between Sane and Zoey Stark led to Stark trying to correct in mid air on a Sniper missile drop kick and being unable to do so, leading to an awkward clash between the two that saw Stark immediately grabbing her leg in serious pain.

It was a horrific injury that required immediate knee surgery for Stark, who had previously suffered a knee injury back in 2021, whilst part of the NXT roster. Even crueler for the wrestler is that it was her first match on WWE “Raw” since January and came after the other members of her Pure Fusion Collective faction had been released from the company.

Stark would post later on the week on X the following;

Also suffering an injury was Chelsea Green, who had her nose broken at last weekend’s “Saturday Night’s Main Event” show in Tampa during a match with Zelina. Green suffered a clean break and will therefore be able to continue to compete whilst wearing a face mask for the foreseeable future.

Drew McIntyre is taking some time to recuperate following the show, in what Fightful described as “contractual time off” for the Scottish wrestler who has been working with a number of smaller injuries for the past several months.

Trick Williams will defend the TNA World Championship he took from Joe Hendry last weekend on NXT TV on June 3rd. He will face TNA’s Mike Santana, with the winner facing Elias back in the belt’s home promotion next weekend. It will be Williams’ first defense of the Championship. Mike Santana made his in ring NXT debut on this week’s show.

Lince Dorado appeared on the May 28th edition of WWE “Evolve”, wrestling against Jordan Oasis and Jackson Drake. This was Dorado’s first televised WWE match since 2021. The wrestler also works as a coach for NXT.

A & E Network will premiere the 2nd series of “Legends & Future Greats” on Sunday, June 22nd at 10pm ET. The coaches for this season will have a single adjustment, with Michelle McCool replacing Mickie James.

WWE News

Janel Grant has dropped John Laurinaitus as a defendant in her civil suit, in a story broken by Post Wrestling this week.

A statement by Grant’s team stated the following:

“Plaintiff Janel Grant hereby stipulates with Defendant John Laurinaitis that the above-entitled action is voluntarily dismissed, with prejudice, against Defendant John Laurinaitis.

John Laurinaitis has agreed to cooperate and provide evidence in Janel Grant’s lawsuit against Vince McMahon and WWE. His agreement to a confidential settlement is a pivotal next step toward holding McMahon and WWE accountable and bringing justice to Ms. Grant after years of sexual abuse and trafficking. Mr. Laurinaitis looks forward to moving on with his life. We cannot provide any additional details at this time.”
Laurinaitis has essentially flipped for a 2nd time since the suit was filed, having originally placed himself as a victim after the initial filing before aligning himself later on with Vince McMahon. He has now agreed to provide Grant with evidence, according to Grant’s team, as part of a confidential settlement. In return, he cannot be re-added to the case by Grant or have further civil action brought against him.

The move comes shortly after Grant’s team had their amended suit approved by the judge in this case, as well as before a key ruling over whether proceedings can continue in civil court and into discovery or are required to go to arbitration has been made.

WWE and Vince McMahon are the remaining defendants in the case and are required to re-file their motions for arbitration by June 13th to avoid the case immediately heading to discovery.

McMahon’s attorney, Jessica Rosenberg, offered the following statement to Post Wrestling in relation to these events:

WWE’s counter programming efforts towards AEW can no longer be ignored by even the most loyal pundits at this point, after WWE announced a weekend of shows in July to directly oppose AEW “All In” off the back of running the “WWE Battleground” PLE directly against AEW’s “Double or Nothing” PPV.

WWE had originally only announced “Saturday Night’s Main Event” for July 12th at 8pm ET but had withheld a location, with people in both companies suspicious of a Dallas arena booking. WWE have avoided a booking within the Metroplex and will instead run in Atlanta, Georgia, for the weekend.

AEW responded to the countering by smartly moving their “All In” show in North Texas to a 2pm central start time, with WWE unable to follow as their event is part of a deal with NBC that means it is required as part of Saturday night primetime programming. In a second set of measures, WWE have now added a 2nd WWE PLE on July 13th, in the form of “Evolution” and an NXT PLE on the afternoon of July 12th, which will begin at 3pm eastern, meaning directly head to head with AEW’s tentpole show.

The addition of “Evolution”, an all women event that has only been run once back in 2018, was announced without the same fanfare the previous event received. It also seems to have been moved in date and location to act as part of these counter programming efforts. A July 5th date at the Mohegan Sun Resort in Connecticut, a much smaller arena than State Farm where this event will now be held, was scrapped with the re-location.

© WWE

Whilst it is positive that WWE are committing to the show in a full size arena and combo tickets should aid in its sales in the same way “Money In the Bank” has done for AAA/NXT crossover show “When Worlds Collide” on June 7th, the event will face additional challenges in being the second major show of the weekend (with Saturday night likely to hold Goldberg’s retirement match) but will also have additional local issues with Beyoncé playing at the stadium next door and the MLB All Star Weekend running its Futures Game, as well as a host of other activities on the same day.

WWE’s strategy of flooding the market with big name events, in particular when it comes to attempting to minimise AEW shows, will mean a split in media attention as well as a choice for the crossover fan base between the two shows; however, it also means that an event like “Evolution” is being used more as a pawn rather than a show highlighting the number of great female talent the company has been able to produce over the last decade.

© WWE

Wrestlenomics broke the news on May 22nd that WWE is moving “Wrestlemania 42” away from New Orleans. The weekend long event and the corresponding week of activities had been announced by the Rock on “Friday Night Smackdown”, with a press conference confirming the location choice occurring immediately after. The shows that were scheduled for April 11th and April 12th look to be moving to Las Vegas, as first reported by NOLA.com. The event is also likely to move dates, with the 18th and 19th of April the targeted dates at Allegiant Stadium.

A video was aired on May 23rd across all of WWE’s social media to confirm the cancellation whilst also promising “Money In the Bank” for August 29th, 2026 (the same weekend as when AEW’s “All In” PPV is expected to occur), as well as plans for a future Wrestlemania, but without any year announced.

This is the first time that Wrestlemania has been moved from a city after the announcement had been made as a purely business reason. There were heavy suggestions that an agreement had been in place for Minnesota a few years back but the event was never officially announced. The city is now hosting a 2 night edition of “Summerslam” on August 1st and 2nd in 2026.

The NOLA.com story on the event moving to Las Vegas was followed up by Dave Meltzer of the Wrestling Observer who wrote that TKO now plans on returning to Las Vegas on a frequent basis:

The Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority has not commented on the story as yet. This year’s event saw the body pay a $5 million site fee to TKO in order to bring the event to the city, in addition to the $4.2 million in tax credits WWE qualified for from the Nevada State government. The New Jersey Sports and Exposition Authority have agreed a fee of $7.1 million to host this year’s “Summerslam” on the 1st and 2nd of August.

The ability of these key destination events to drive ever-increasing site fees is a key part of TKO’s strategy for both WWE and UFC, with a further aim to extend beyond just PPV in generating this income. It is an attractive proposition for a location such as Las Vegas, which is struggling with a decline in both domestic and international visitors. The ticket costs ensures that the majority of visitors are also likely to have significant additional funds to expend upon local hospitality, whilst the length of the event ensures there is demand for accommodation. Whether the demand will be as high for repeated visits to a single location is a key question when looking forward.

The sheer amount of income generated by these events is clearly visible from just the gates of the supporting TV tapings alone, with Pollstar reporting last week that the April 18th “Smackdown” in Las Vegas did a gate of $2.503 million, whilst “Raw” on April 21st was worth $3.48 million in ticket sales.

The move is a further reminder that every decision under the TKO umbrella is made with generating as much income as possible, even if it comes at the cost of smaller partners and direct consumers.

Some of the most significant costs will be to the wider industry that operates off of the back of these events but also increase lengths of stays in the host city. Events such as Wrestlecon sign venues well in advance and are likely to be affected by such a move, depending on the conditions of hire.

PWInsider are reporting that there is the potential for NXT Europe to become a reality by the end of 2025, after news broke of a number of intended signings in the follow up to the tryouts held for the continent in the UK back in March. Zozaya, who came to prominence after getting picked up by Revolution Pro Wrestling this time last year and toured over the new year period, is expected to sign later in the summer upon the completion of his current studies.

Aigle Blanc and Mike D Vecchio, both recent participants in All Japan’s Champion Carnival, are also expected to join the company in September. Vecchio has stepped back from his European commitments in order to rehab injuries in the meantime.

WWE signing news over the past two weeks has not been to Europe alone, with former Olympians Shady Elnahas, Aaron Fara and Francois Prinsloo all reporting to the WWE Performance Center.

Shady Elnahas represented Canada in the 2020 Tokyo Olympics and won a Gold medal in judo at the 2022 Commonwealth Games in Birmingham, England. The 27 year old was born in Egypt before moving to Canada and had announced his retirement from judo in February this year.

Aaron Fara is another judoka, this time having represented Austria at the 2024 Paris Olympics, where he exited in the 1st round. The 27 year old is a former European Junior Championships Gold medalist.

23 year old Francois Pinsloo also competed at Paris 2024, representing South Africa in the discus event, following success whilst at college at the University of South Alabama, where he became an NCAA Division I Champion. Kenyan-born Prinsloo finished 23rd in Qualification in Paris, failing to make the final.

Roman Reigns is in discussion for a role in a live action version of “Street Fighter”. Jason Momoa and Andrew Koji are the big names currently being associated with the project. Reigns is said to be in consideration for the role of Akuma, according to Fightful Select.

The Rock has also added another project to his filming schedule, with psychological thriller “Breakthrough” announcing him as a co-star. The film will be written by Zeke Goodman.

WWE will tape both “Raw” and “Smackdown” on June 30th in Pittsburgh, in what will be somewhat of a logistical challenge due to the expected length of each show. This avoids a July 4th “Smackdown” taping for what will likely be the show’s lowest TV rating of the year so far by a substantial margin.

John Cena has been confirmed for Saudi Arabia PLE “Night of Champions” on June 28th, with promotional material labelling it as his last WWE match in the country before his retirement.

Freedom Ramsey is the first person to announce a departure from the WWE ID program, putting out the following after the move took place:

“This did not happen publicly. Some things are meant to be handled behind closed doors. WWE has always been a dream of mine. It changed me. Wrestling on WWE EVOLVE, training at the Performance Center, meeting everybody I used to see on TV. I learned, I grew, I developed. Now, a new chapter begins,” said Ramsey.

Kevin Owens carried out some recent promotion for “Fight Forever: The Ballad of Kevin and Sami” (by J.J. McGee) to mark the book’s release and confirmed that he is yet to have neck surgery as they look at what is the best course to move forward with. He hopes to have a path forward in regards to dealing with injury within weeks.

All Elite Wrestling

TV News

The May 17th episode of “Collision” was riddled with technical issues, with the live broadcast on TNT ending 30 minutes early, and replaced with an airing of the Rock’s film “Black Adam”. The show had been pre-taped at the Now Arena on the outskirts of Chicago the Wednesday previous, with the issue being put down to a corrupted file. Tony Khan posted to X to apologise for the issue and state that the show would air in full on TNT’s West Coast offering at 8pm PT and be uploaded to MAX that evening but neither was able to be achieved.

The show also began at 9pm ET on Triller, which has not been unusual for pre taped shows as of late, particularly when awaiting the end of a sports broadcast that leads to Collision being preempted to outside of its normal timeslot. The original Triller broadcast was under 2 hours with no ad breaks but this has since been updated to the full broadcast with ad spaces included. Pre-taped shows, at one point, were airing on Triller without ad breaks and starting at the same time as the TNT broadcast, leading to Triller viewers seeing the later parts of the show much earlier than viewers on TNT. The streaming service notified its customers 40 minutes after the TNT broadcast had begun that the show would be starting an hour later on its service.

Triller was also the centerpoint of another discussion last week when the “Double or Nothing” PPV was made available by outlets such as Amazon and PPV.com, but not on the home of AEW+ whilst TV listings for forthcoming shows for AEW+ had failed to be updated in their regular fashion. Neither AEW or Triller commented publicly on the issues but the PPV became available for international purchase on May 20th outside of North America and the AEW+ listings were updated on the same day. The decision not to allow PPV purchases in the US, Canada and Puerto Rico on the platform does raise significant questions about its financial viability going forward.

Triller TV’s parent company, Triller Group Inc, received a delinquency report from the NASDAQ stock exchange, where its shares are currently floated, on April 17th after failing to submit their annual report for the 2024 year and being given 60 days to submit a plan on how they will regain compliance. This has led to reports that Triller is now seeking to facilitate a buyout of the ailing group as well as of non-payment of employees. Triller shares now sit under $1 after it was revealed that a $14 million private placement deal they announced in January had never been closed and had been replaced with a new arrangement after the value of their stock had fallen significantly during the interim period. At current, no actual funds have been received from KCP Holdings by Triller.

If Triller was to be lost it would leave AEW having to find another outlet for its international distribution outside of signed TV deals internationally but would cause a much bigger blow to companies such as GCW, TNA, on top of a string of other independents which use the platform to stream their events live and on demand to audiences globally, taking the cost of hosting their own platforms away from promotions for the most part.

© AEW

WBD has released the AEW schedule for June, which will begin with a 4 hour block from 8-12pm on June 4th for the branded “Fyter Fest”. Kenny Omega defending his International Title in a 4 way is the only current matchup on the card but there is an expectation that bigger matches will be added, particularly for the Dynamite/crossover portion of the show, and that it will then be mirrored for “Summer Blockbuster” on June 11th. The 2 week run of 4 hour programming blocks avoids “Collision” being completely removed from scheduling during the NBA and NHL Finals, whilst also acting as somewhat of an experiment as to what a weekday 4 hour block can draw.

The shows will split the following week, with the June 18th Dynamite taking place from Arena Mexico in Mexico City for “Grand Slam” and Collision airing live from Kent, Washington, on June 21st. Collision will move again the next week, with a Thursday airing on June 26th.

AEW PPV’s “All Out 2021”, “Full Gear 2021”, “Forbidden Door 2022”, “All Out 2022”, “Full Gear 2022”, “All In 2023”, “All In 2024” as well as the Dynamite archive for winter 2020 will also be added to MAX on June 20th.

© AEW

Thekla debuted on the May 28th edition of “Dynamite”, attacking Jamie Hayter during an interview after the lights had been turned out. The Austrian had been teased over recent weeks through the presence of a spider on screen during separate episodes and was backstage at last weekend’s “Double or Nothing”, ahead of her debut. Mina Shirakawa has also now had her permanent status with AEW publicly acknowledged with the posting of her graphic last week.

Juice Robinson was also backstage at the show, with Fightful reporting that he is “further away from a return than was anticipated” at this time. Alex Hammerstone was also there visiting.

A number of talent suffered small scale injuries over the past week, with the Dynamite in ring line up on Wednesday night put together on the day depending on who was able to be cleared. The Young Bucks are temporarily out of action, with Nick Jackson suffering a blow to the head following a dive during “Anarchy in the Arena” and Matt Jackson dealing with a short term injury. Neither are expected to be on the shelf for a significant amount of time.

Harley Cameron was written off on this week’s Dynamite after picking up an injury also at the PPV. The bloodied face at the end of her No DQ matchup is to write her off for an unknown amount of time.

Action and Ring of Honor presented Action Dean 2 in Glendale, Arizona, on the 24th May. The show paid tribute to the late Dean Rasmussen, a contributor to the DVDVR site and sadly passed away in 2023. The show featured talent from Action Wrestling, CMLL, the US and Mexican independents and Ring of Honor, and it also included an appearance from Bryan Danielson. It is available in full on the Ring of Honor Youtube channel.

Swerve Strickland threw out the first pitch for the Arizona Diamondbacks as part of promotion for the “Double or Nothing” PPV in nearby Glendale, Arizona. His appearance at Chase Field was followed by the Costco Guys at Globe Life Field in North Texas, as AEW ramps up its promotion for the “All In” event in July.

News

Mariah May has been removed from the AEW roster page and is expected to show up in WWE as soon as her contract expires. First reports of her potential departure circulated in March, with the wrestler making it known prior to AEW’s “Revolution” PPV that she was not looking to sign with the company at the end of her current 2 year deal.

The wrestler was part of one of AEW’s biggest stories in company history alongside Toni Storm, capturing the AEW Women’s World Championship at last year’s “All In” event in Wembley Stadium. She is believed to have always had WWE as an overall goal. WWE have said that nothing is currently signed or agreed (and she is still under AEW contract at the current time) but have not denied having interest in the 26 year old in regards to her services going forward.

Also departing the company will be Abadon, who announced their departure at the end of her current deal in June. Abadon has been with the company for the past 5 years but has not appeared on any associated programming since Ring of Honor back in February and has not appeared on AEW television since December 2023.

The Wrestling Observer Newsletter had reported back on March 7th that both Nick Comoroto and Abadon’s contracts were to be allowed to expire without renewal. Comoroto has wrestled on “Dynamite” once since that report was published.

AEW’s “All Out’ has been confirmed for the Scotiabank Arena in Toronto, Canada, for September 20th. It will be AEW’s first visit to the city since March 2024 and the second PPV to be held at Scotiabank, following on from June 2023’s “Forbidden Door”. It will also be the first time “All Out” will be held outside of Chicago in company history. The confirmation also provides credibility to the full year calendar that was released by new South East Asian partner SPOTV Now, which also lists “Wrestledream” for October 18th, “Full Gear” for November 22nd and “World’s End” for December 27th.

© AEW

Darby Allin and the team accompanying him reached the summit of Mt. Everest on May 18th and will now begin the climb down towards base camp. Ang Dorjee Sherpa, Pasang Bhote, Tashi Thundu Sherpa, and Pemba Sherpa climbed alongside Allin, who was climbing a mountain of this magnitude for the first time. Allin held an AEW flag at the summit alongside the other climbers and posted later in the week on the experience:

“Mount Everest summit. What a ride thanks @aew for everything in life. Thanks to the amazing team at adventure consultants and the Sherpa squad this shit was wild!”

He became the first pro wrestler to ever achieve the feat and one of only just over 7500 people to have climbed the mountain overall.

Konosuke Takeshita and Yuka Sakazaki have revealed that they are married publicly for the first time. In a post on Takeshita’s instagram he wrote:

Matt Jackson and Dana Massie’s travel series “Never Not Jetlagged” premieres its 4th episode on June 1st, this time covering O’ahu in Hawaii.

Jim Ross underwent surgery on Tuesday as part of treatment for cancer following his recent diagnosis. Ross told co-host Conrad Thompson on his “Grilling J.R.” podcast that he expected to have a 6 day stay in the hospital following the procedure and a lengthy amount of follow up treatment. The commentator is targeting “All In” in Texas as an event he hopes to be in attendance for and has no plans to retire. We wish Jim all the best in his recovery and ongoing battle with the illness.

Hikaru Shida is currently renewing her visa for the US back in Japan. Kenny Omega, speaking on his regular gaming twitch stream, said that the process was taking longer than expected. Visa issues are expected to become even more prominent within the US industry as a whole due to the US political climate. Shida last appeared for AEW on November 20th 2024, when she wrestled Kris Statlander on “Dynamite.” Her last match in Japan was for Pro Wrestling WAVE on May 4th in Tokyo.

© TNA Wrestling / Steve Argintaru @SteveTSN

TNA

Under Siege 2025
23/05/25
CAA Centre, Brampton, Ontario, Canada
Watch On: TNA+/ Youtube

There were a lot of shows last weekend that rewarded the viewer for choosing to watch them; this was not one of them. TNA’s latest TNA+ special was an overbooked, messy affair where gimmicks and poor wrestling ended up overshadowing some of the genuinely over acts in the promotion.

The show started out OK, with Mike Santana receiving a strong welcome from what was a lively crowd at the start and end of the show (in line with the content). AJ Francis was soon out for one of many pre match promos on the night to set up a match between Santana and KC Navarro, as he continued to avoid the man in the ring whilst running through a number of cheap hockey jokes. Navarro was volunteered for the match by Francis, with the bigger man providing assistance from the outside in order to help counter the strength of Santana. It wasn’t a stellar affair before Santana was able to hit the Spin the Block lariat for the win and a post match beat down (which would become a theme).

Cody Deaner’s task in the night’s second match was to achieve his first singles win since August 2023 in order to keep his place in the promotion. Standing in his way was Eddie Edwards of the System. There were flashes of hope for Deaner but they were ended thanks to repeated interference from Alisha Edwards, leading to him being put away with a Boston Knee Party.

The System beat down Deaner after, with Moose running him down even further by a microphone, before the Northern Armoury came out to set up a tag match right after. The match was a bland affair where the crowd busied themselves with renditions of the Canadian national anthem and somehow needed the involvement of the Brampton Board of Trade outside of the ring. Eric Young pinned Moose after the piledriver to set up a potential X Division Championship challenge in a completely forgettable affair.

Things went downhill pretty quickly from there. A street fight for the TNA Knockouts Tag Team Championships between Champions Ash and Heather By Elegance and Dani Luna and Jody Threat was a complete mess that seemed to be more about getting pops for the heel manager than the wrestlers themselves and had one really scary spot, where Dani Luna was supposed to be pushed from the apron through a table but ended up short, clipping her head on the wood on the way down. Ash by Elegance ensured the team retained their titles by actually managing to put someone through a table the next time, but this was not good.

Next up was Mustafa Ali’s new group, Order 4, in an 8 man mixed tag with Indi Hartwell, The Rascalz and Raj Singh, where practically nothing interesting happened before we got to the real low point of the card.

For a long time, the TNA Knockout division was heralded as one of the strongest women’s divisions in the West, it had often been far ahead of WWE in promoting female talent in the previous 2 decades and has still been a celebrated part of the company in recent years. It was, therefore, pretty horrific to watch the 2 women’s matches that followed on this card. First up was Arianna Grace and Tessa Blanchard. Blanchard chose to give Grace practically nothing, barely selling a thing before getting the win whilst the arena fell into silence. Blanchard was kept from in ring action at the TV tapings the next night due to suspicions of a concussion suffered during the match, but you honestly cannot say there was a period in it which was good in any sense.

© TNA Wrestling / Steve Argintaru @SteveTSN

Following that was TNA Knockouts Champion Masha Slamovich defending against Victoria Crawford (formerly known as Alicia Fox). The issue in this one was not on the stronger wrestler but instead on the one he looked completely lost. In addition to the awful in ring, both matches and the main women’s title were secondary to a feud between authority figures Robert Stone and Santino Marella. It is perhaps ironic that TNA are now partnered with AAA, because this was something right out of their playbook.

TNA ran a Sabu tribute video before the music of the Hardys woke up the crowd, with Matt Hardy once again getting the pop of the night. With brother Jeff unable to cross the border, he teamed with Leon Slater to challenge for the TNA Tag Championships against Nic and Ryan Nemeth. Slater put in the best in-ring performance of the entire night to make this one a fine match on a card filled with less before Hardy took the pin and the loss.

The tag match main event did keep up the energy gathered by the previous match, as Trick Williams and Joe Hendry faced off in a tag alongside Frankie Kazarian and Elias respectively before their TNA World Title match on the NXT PLE 2 nights later. Joe Hendry really does come across as the biggest star in the promotion, and it will be a significant loss when he inevitably joins WWE when his contract comes up in the autumn. Champion and challenger faced off to end the show after Hendry had gotten the win, pinning Kazarian.

The show was put up in full on Youtube a day after it was screened live on TNA+ to ensure as many people saw the build for the title match before the NXT PLE on Sunday night. It will be interesting to see if this continues to occur again in future and how that affects the value of TNA+ as a platform.

Full Results

Mike Santana defeats KC Navarro (9:53)

Eddie Edwards defeats Cody Deaner (10:40)

The Northern Armory (Eric Young, Judas Icarus & Travis Williams) defeat The System (Brian Myers, JDC & Moose) (12:00)

TNA Knockouts World Tag Team Titles:
Ash By Elegance & Heather By Elegance (c) defeat Spitfire (Dani Luna & Jody Threat) (12:10)

Order 4 (Jason Hotch, John Skyler, Mustafa Ali & Tasha Steelz) defeat Indi Hartwell, Raj Singh & The Rascalz (Trey Miguel & Zachary Wentz) (9:50)

Tessa Blanchard defeats Arianna Grace (8:05)

TNA Knockouts World Title:
Masha Slamovich (c) defeats Victoria Crawford (6:55)

TNA World Tag Team Titles:
The Nemeths (Nic Nemeth & Ryan Nemeth) (c) defeat Leon Slater & Matt Hardy (16:00)

Elijah & Joe Hendry defeat Frankie Kazarian & Trick Williams (19:20)

© @ohsnapalliemac

Ace Austin is departing the promotion after his contract expired. His departure was announced in unique fashion, with it first being acknowledged in the blog of previous TNA booker Scott D’Amore.

Indi Hartwell made her in-ring debut for the promotion on the May 15th edition of TNA ‘Impact!”, defeating Kelsey Heather.

The recent reports of TNA scaling back the usage of blood in their matches have been followed by even more restrictions being added. Fightful reported that slaps are no longer to be used unless approved by an agent and that throat slashing is now completely banned, with an automatic $100 fine for any performer who carries it out.

TNA’s next TNA+ special, “Against All Odds”, follows very quickly after “Under Siege”, taking place in Tempe, Arizona, on June 6th. Elias will face the winner of Trick Williams and Mike Santana for the TNA World Championship whilst the Nemeths will defend the TNA World Tag Team Titles against the Rascalz and Masha Slamovich will defend the Knockouts Title against Lei Ying Lee.

MLW

Janai Kai announced her departure from the promotion on X (formerly known as Twitter) on May 20th, having appeared with the company since September 2023. Kai was part of long term lead heel stable Contra Unit and is a former MLW Featherweight Champion.

Kai is expected to be the first of a number of releases to be made over the coming month, with MLW telling the Wrestling Observer that they plan to replace them with other big name freelancers and recent WWE releases.

The “War Chamber” show that was filmed in Chicago earlier in the month will be aired on beIN Sports in the US and free on Youtube globally on June 7th. The War Chamber match will be the main event of the programming, and this year sees Matthew Justice, Alex Kane, Mr. Thomas and Paul London face off against the Rogue Horsemen. The supporting card features Shoko Nakajima making the first defense of her MLW Featherweight Championship against former Champion Delmi Exo and a tag team match between Satoshi Kojima/ Okumura and Dark Panther/Blue Panther Jr.

Wakana Uehara vs Yuki Kamifuku has been announced for the “Summer Of The Beasts” show from the Melrose Ballroom in New York on June 26th, as the promotion looks to increase its usage of TJPW talent.

© Deadlock Pro

US Independents

DEADLOCK Pro-Wrestling

Limit Break
18/05/2025
Durham Armory, North Carolina, USA
Watch On DPW On Demand

DPW comes off two excellent “Spirit Rising” shows in Tokyo straight into another solid show back home in North Carolina. “Limit Break” was advertised around the debut of Cedric Alexander.

Former DPW Worlds Champion Bojack won in a three way match up against Manny Lo and Morgan Dash. This was Bojack’s first match in DPW in a year. This was a good match where all 3 looked great. There was a nice spot where Bojack picked up Dash in a gorilla press and threw him from the ring all the way over the guard rails. Later in the show while Dash and Lo were arguing backstage, Bojack stepped in to back up Dash.

© Deadlock Pro

The “Queen of the Indies” Hyan took on Maya World in the next matchup. Hyan is coming off a loss at “DPW Forever 2025” to Dani Luna in a Dog Collar match for the DPW Women’s World Championship and is looking to fight her way back to another challenge. Maya World is raising her profile on the US independent scene and trains with ROH Women’s World Champion Athena. Hyan dominated the match up early, but Maya World had some great comebacks and strikes. Hyan picked up the win by pinning Maya World using the ropes. Hyan later announced herself as the first entrant in the Battle of the Best 2025 tournament.

BK Westbrook beat Kevin Blackwood with a roll up in a National Title Eliminator Qualifying match to advance to the next round.

Thomas Shire stepped up to face Mad Dog Connelly in a Relaxed Rules match. Shire struggled to get a dog collar on so Connelly, the “King of Dog Collars”, decided to put it on himself. Connelly won the match by hanging Shire with the dog collar.

© Deadlock Pro

Off the back of their bloody, brutal match against Violence is Forever in Las Vegas, the new DPW World Tag Team Champions, Grizzled Young Vets (James Drake & Zack Gibson) successfully defended their title against Miracle Generation (Dustin Waller & Kylon King) with High Low. There was a great nearfall where Drake put his foot on the ropes at the last second after eating a superplex and frog splash combo from Miracle Generation. The crowd were on their feet thinking they were going to see a title change.

While not the main event, next up was the match that this event was advertised around, the debut of Cedric Alexander against Andrew Everett in a National Title Eliminator Qualifying match. Alexander looked great in this match and got one of the biggest reactions of the night. Alexander won with the Lumbar Check. Alexander advances in the tournament to face BK Westbrook next.

Alexander at the start of the match mentioned to Everett that he “likes to hurt people”. Combined with his black and gold attire, he isn’t very subtle in signalling that he wants to team up with the Hurt Syndicate in AEW. Alexander was a part of the original Hurt Business faction in WWE with Bobby Lashley, MVP and Shelton Benjamin.

The current standout of DPW and the DPW National Champion, LaBron Kozone, teamed up with Colby Corino to take on the new DPW Worlds Champion Adam Priest and Trevor Lee. The start of this match was all about Lee & Priest getting a lot of heat beating up Corino and then building up to the Kozone hot tag. Kozone hit a double spinebuster (Priest on Lee’s shoulders) into a Swanton Bomb from Corino for a nearfall. They teased a time limit draw and the pace picked up quite a bit. Kozone accidentally hit Corino with the Ball Game lariat, which led to Lee picking up the win on Corino with a leaping double foot stomp. Lee now gets a shot at the National Championship. Jake Something returned to prevent a post-match beatdown on Kozone. He was wearing a sling but took it off to a massive crowd pop, and ran into the ring to chase off Lee & Priest.

DPW’s next event is the “UNIT3D” event on 1st June in Los Angeles. The show is co-promoted by Prestige Wrestling and West Coast Pro Wrestling. Matches currently advertised are Cedric Alexander vs. Trevor Lee, Kevin Blackwood vs. Shane Haste for the West Coast Pro Heavyweight Title, and Alan Angels vs. Jordan Oliver for the Prestige World Title.

Indie News

NWA Women’s Champion Kenzie Paige defeated WWE’s Natalya at the NWA’s “Crockett Cup” event in Philadelphia on May 17th. Natalya, who is wrestling as ‘Nattie Neidhart’ during her recent independent appearances, was shown after the match in clips on social media attacking a “fan” in the crowd but there have been no claims as of yet that the person was anything but a plant.

Gail Kim, who had been due to officiate the matchup, posted a statement to social media on Saturday listing that she would be absent from the event having failed to recover from severe flu/covid-like symptoms.

West coast lucha promotion, PW Revolution, will hold the first ever lucha libre show in Dubai this weekend, with Super Astro Jr, Kid Lynx, Diablo Azteca and Lady Apache in THE SPACE Events and Sports in the UAE on May 31st. The promotion also announced this week that they will run a series of small events as part of game days for minor league baseball team the San Jose Giants and also that they will team with ICW Legacy for the “Queen of the Indies” Tournament in Denver, Colorado, on July 13th.

Koguma and Yuka Sakazaki have been announced for the Spark Joshi show in Texas on June 29th. They will be joined by Spark Champion Hazuki for the show. The event will take place at the Baytown Community Center.

Wrestling REVOLVER will honour Jerry Lynn on August 9th by holding the “Jerry Lynn Invitational Tournament”. The long tenured wrestler sent in a video message for the announcement and will be present for the event in Dayton, Ohio. Lynn will referee the tournament final on his dedicated show.

© Glory Pro

Glory Pro Wrestling raised $2340 for the St. Louis Tornado Response Fund during a weekend of shows on the 24th and 25th May. The “Road Warriors Cup” was the central piece of the two days, with the final of the tag team tournament seeing The New Guys (Jake Bosche and Scott Stanley) defeating The Premier (Campbell Myers and SK Bishop) to take the cup. Kody Lane also improved his Crown of Glory Championship record to 6-0 after defeating Mike Outlaw by count out in the semi main event of night 2. The promotion’s next show in St. Louis will be on July 27th.

GCW will run two shows at the Williams Center in Rutherford, New Jersey, on August 1st and 2nd, near to WWE’s “Summerslam” 2 night event at Metlife Stadium. August 2nd will also see a Bloodsport show from the same venue. Saraya, Tony Atlas, Rikishi and Kazuchika Okada have been added to the Wrestlecon Newark lineup for the weekend as well.

House of Glory have announced their key matchups for “Puerto Rican Weekend” on June 7th. The headline match on the island sees HoG Champion Mike Santana wrestle New Japan’s Tomohiro Ishii. Doran Richardson will also defend his HoG 6 way Cruiserweight Championship against his former teacher Amazing Red.

Laredo Kid and Dan Muff have been added to the lineup for their July 11th event in Halton City, Texas.

Paramount Global Content Distributions have announced the launch of a FAST Channel entitled “Wrestling Central” which will be available on Roku in the US and Canada. The NWA and Women of Wrestling are confirmed content for the channel.

AAA

News

Less than a month after it was reported that WWE would not be making sweeping creative changes on a promotion it does not own yet, they are doing just that.

The May 31st card had raised suspicion of significant title changes brought upon by AAA’s impending new owners, especially seeing as Alberto el Patron and El Hijo del Vikingo had seemingly completed their program, with the last televised show in Mexico City seeming to suggest something with Psycho Clown going forward. Alberto’s program with Niño Hamburguesa was also quietly wrapped up on a non-televised show.

© AAA

The question thereafter was: is this just AAA playing into speculation or is the writing on the wall for the current heel Champion? The answer came in strange fashion but also displayed a lack of understanding of the Mexican marketplace, as a graphic (for El Hijo del Vikingo vs Chad Gable for the “When Worlds Collide” event in Los Angeles on June 7th) appeared on Monday night’s WWE “Raw” broadcast on Netflix, showing the match to be for the Mega Championship. This graphic was shown everywhere outside of Mexico, where it was geoblocked, but this is also not the 1970’s anymore, meaning word of the image reached Mexico pretty instantly, with a number of Mexican journalists noting that a large number of Netflix watchers in the country pirate the US version.

Vikingo had been in the crowd on Monday night and is clearly being positioned as the central crossover AAA wrestler for WWE, but all the mess illustrated exactly how the booking is being altered, which is in a much different way to how Konnan talked up, immediately after the acquisition was announced. AAA attempted to create some other attention this week in order to create some sort of uncertainty to a foregone conclusion, with Alberto involved in a worked angle on a Mexican TV show that, in fairness, did make headlines without really changing anything.

© AAA

Psycho Clown and Pagano will also challenge for the AAA Tag Titles on May 31st. They are the 2nd and 3rd most prominently advertised talent for the joint event with NXT, so it feels highly likely that they will also pick up gold on Saturday night. The pair are positioned in a 6 man on June 7th, with Angel and Berto on the other side. A pin for either of the WWE talents could lead to a Tag Title match at “Triplemania Regia”, but it is also still AAA in some form so we will see.

“When Worlds Collide” will be aired solely on Youtube, which is a step up for AAA distribution in recent years.

© CMLL

CMLL

News

Mistico, Mascara Dorada and Neon, who are collectively known as Sky Team, won the CMLL Trios Titles in Arena Mexico on May 16th, defeating Averno, Mephisto and Euforia. Rocky Romero also joined Los Depredadores on the same show.

Arena Coliseo Guadelajara claimed another sell out on May 27th for the Tuesday night show headlined by Mistico challenging Averno for the CMLL Lightweight Title. Averno retained through a distraction/low blow/roll up finish (how about that for protection?) which had Mistico so incensed he demanded a mask vs hair match with Averno in the aftermath.

© CMLL

CMLL have announced the line ups for Fantasticamania week, beginning with the “CMLL vs AEW and Ring of Honor” show on Tuesday, June 17th in Arena Mexico. Tuesday night is headed up with Mascara Dorada vs Bandido but also features Neón vs Hologram, Atlantis Jr. vs Josh Alexander and Persephone vs Red Velvet. The card is rounded out by Action Andretti and Lio Rush challenging Ángel de Oro & Niebla Roja for the CMLL Tag Team Titles as well as a 6 man between Averno, Hechicero, Último Guerrero and Konosuke Takeshita, Kyle Fletcher and Rocky Romero of the Don Callis Family.

Friday’s “Fantasticamania” show is a lot less CMLL vs New Japan than in previous years, with Último Guerrero vs Yota Tsuji and the 6 man between former LIJ members Hiromu Takahashi, Shingo Takagi and Titán facing off against Francesco Akira, Templario and TJP of the United Empire.

The rest of the card feels more like a continuation of Tuesday night, with Red Velvet vs Kira, La Jarochita facing Thunder Rosa and Volador Jr. vs Ricochet. There are 2 six mans on the card, with Difunto, Magnus, Rugido, Zandokan Jr. against Action Andretti, Lio Rush, Robbie X, Rocky Romero before the main event for the CMLL Trios Titles between the Sky Team and Bandido, Hologram and Komander. That last one feels very much like something to look forward to.

Mexico News

Fuerza Guerrera announced his retirement via a press conference, as well as announcing that his final show will be September 28th at Arena Ciudad in Mexico. The show main event will see Guerrera team with El Hijo del Solitario and DMT Azul against Blue Demon Jr. and Tinieblas Jr.

Guerrera’s retirement has targeted an ambitious venue of 20,000 in regards to Arena Ciudad, which feels incredibly ambitious considering the attendance of the last El Hijo del Santo retirement show in Mexico City drew around half of that number, with a fair bit of papering. El Hijo del Santo’s next part of his retirement tour will be in Tijuana on June 20th. The show is being promoted alongside the Crash.

The Hardys will not be at “Triplemania Regia” but Jeff is now booked for the OKPlay convention in Monterrey on December 13th and 14th. The tag team have cited a prior convention booking for not being part of the AAA show next month, and there are not the same border crossing issues for Jeff going south as there are with getting into Canada.

Aramis withdrew from the Riot Lucha Libre’s “Por Aquí Estaba El Jungle Jim’s?”* show on May 17th after suffering a minor injury during the AEW TV tapings a few days earlier. The promotion will be bringing him back for a future date to make up for this one.

*English translation: “Was Jungle Jim’s Around Here?”

Canada News

Maple Leaf Pro have announced a partnership with Santino Marella’s Battle Arts Academy, where they will hold regular tryouts, scouting combines and training camps. It is the second agreement the promotion has made with a training school, having already chosen to team with Josh Alexander’s Can-Am Dojo in Windsor, Ontario, and is aimed at creating their own pipeline of talent from Canada into the company.

© MLP

The next major event for Scott D’Amore’s group will be “Resurrection” on July 5th in Montreal. Dan Muff will face PCO after attacking him with a fireball during the main event of “Northern Rising”, whilst they are also setting up an NWA World Title match between Thom Latimer and Matt Cardona. The Good Brothers return to the promotion to face the War Dogs team of David Finlay and Drilla Maloney, in a follow up from the recent NJPW “Resurgence” show, whilst new MLP Men’s and Women’s Champions, Josh Alexander and Giselle Shaw, are also scheduled to compete.

Stu Grayson, Billy Gunn, Kylie Rae, Mike Bailey and the recently departed from TNA, Ace Austin, are all announced for the show.

C4’s “10 Minutes to Midnight” on May 30th in Ottawa is headlined by a 4 way match up for the C4 World Championship, as Evil Uno looks to see off Jordan Oliver, Ortiz and London Lightning. Sheldon Jean vs Brandon Cutler and Bear Bronson vs Dom Garrini will also take place on the card, which will air on IWTV next Tuesday.

Mark Wheeler is the new Number 1 contender for the Smash! World Championship after winning the 2025 Northern Tournament on May 25th in Toronto. He will challenge for the group’s top belt at their upcoming “Super Showdown” event.

A Wrestler You Should Know About: Chi Chi

Never Judge A Book By Its Cover, even if that book’s entrance music is Barbie Girl by Aqua.

By Chris Whitehead

NOAH Star Navigation

Kaito Kiyomiya made for an electric challenger to OZAWA in the main event of “Star Navigation” in Korakuen Hall as 1,562 roared through 23 minutes of action, with their allegiances changing throughout the bout.

Recommendations From A History Man

In his latest look back, Peter Edge takes us to some of the wrestling world’s most historic venues and discusses a classic match for each building.