For Raw, the Baron Corbin GM era on Raw is officially over. After losing to Braun Strowman at TLC, Corbin asked for one more opportunity to get the chance to be permanent GM. All of the McMahons decided to give him that chance, but it was a 4-on-1 no disqualification match against Kurt Angle, Apollo Crews, Bobby Roode, and Chad Gable. It was basically the same result as TLC as they all took turns hitting Corbin with a chair and then Angle pinned Corbin after an Angle Slam. Even though it was very similar to what happened at TLC, seeing a bad authority figure get what is coming to him is always entertaining.
For Smackdown, the tag match between AJ Styles and Mustafa Ali vs. Daniel Bryan and Andrade Almas was a solid main event and a good way to end their show. Each of these guys got to show their skills in their respective time and surprisingly, Mustafa Ali ended up pinning the WWE Champion for the win.
The Bad
For Raw, while it is nice to move forward with Ronda Rousey and her championship, having an hour long gauntlet match to determine who will face her next isn’t really the best way to go about it. This closed out the show and it just felt like it was dragging on after about half way through. In the end, Natalya ended up making Sasha Banks tap out to the sharpshooter and these two women will face off next week for the championship.
For Smackdown, for some reason, Paige was relieved of her duties of GM. This doesn’t really make sense as they didn’t really give a good reason as to why. This opened up the show as their McMahons promise to deliver new things going forward for both brands. Getting rid of somebody who was doing a great job like Paige in her role doesn’t seem like it will help though.
The Final Verdict
With both brands moving on from TLC, a shakeup is an interesting way to go immediately after the PPV. Along with that, with the Royal Rumble a few weeks away, it will be interesting to see how WWE integrates who goes where and how that plays a factor. In regards to this week though, I will have to say that Smackdown had the better show this week. A good main event, trying to bring other tag teams back to relevancy, and solid buildup for next weeks show make Smackdown still the better brand going forward for this shakeup. But, with new superstars arriving and some coming back, WWE has a lot in front of them going forward.
AEW superstar Adam Cole has opened up about what he calls a “scary” recovery from a second concussion that he suffered at AEW and NJPW’s ‘Forbidden Door’ event back in June 2022, with Cole set to make his return to the ring soon.
Cole specifically talked about memory loss as the most troubling aspect of his recovery:
”The memory stuff is the really, really scary part to me” Cole said, during an appearance on Wrestling Observer Radio (h/t CagesideSeats). “When you’re in the middle of a ring and there’s thousands of people around you and I have no idea what I’m supposed to be doing. That was really scary. So, I knew pretty early on after my memory started going that something was wrong.”
Cole’s road to recovery as an especially long one.
“The crazy thing was that after even a month, it was like that’s when real serious side effects started happening” he said. “Everything I said in my return in-ring promo that I did all of that was true, and more. There was a lot of stuff that was happening very late into the healing process, or, what I thought was late, like a month-and-a-half, two months.”
Cole is gearing up for his return to AEW, with all signs pointing to him stepping back into the ring at Revolution next month.
NXT Vengeance Day was a rousing success for WWE on Saturday which saw a number of headlines come out of the event that was well-received by fans, including an injury suffered by Donovan Dijak during his match with Wes Lee for the North American Championship.
Dijak suffered an apparent broken finger during the match, which was seen on camera and shared on social media.
Following the event NXT general manager Shawn Michaels provided an update on Dijak, stating he did not suffer a broken finger – “Yeah, everybody is good” Michaels said. “I announced it at gorilla, it’s got to be a miracle, It’s not broken.
“We got him x-ray, they said it’s not broken and so yeah, I guess what you do is you kind of numb it and put it back in place and that’s what’s happening now. But it is, again, a modern miracle because we all saw it, it was pretty gnarly looking. But, apparently, he’s going to be okay, which is obviously fantastic news for us and him.”
AEW owner and booker Tony Khan is certainly open to the idea of AEW and WWE working together for a potential crossover supershow, despite Khan’s consistent blasting of WWE over the last few years.
“It’s something I would certainly be open to and I think it’s an interesting thing for the future” Khan said during an appearance on WTF with Marc Maron. “It’s not something that’s ever really been done. They’ve kind of existed in their own space. We are working with a lot of wrestling promotions.”
Khan’s AEW has already worked with a number of promotions such as Impact Wrestling and NJPW, and WWE has even warmed to the idea of working with other promotions, as they have with Impact Wrestling, NJPW, and NOAH recently.
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