Jul 5, 2018 They didn't strap a rocket to AJ. He put over Roman Reigns twice and lost to Jericho at WM. Toiled around in the upper mid card forever and now he's getting a good title reign as a legacy thing because Roman isn't getting over and he (AJ) will probably retire soon. And this is a guy who was the face of a televised wrestling promotion in America for 10 years. He was multiple times more popular than every other non-WWE worker at the time he came in to the company so all it took was for Vince to confirm his popularity and take advantage of it. Kenny would require actual trust and work to establish himself It's just not the same
Jul 5, 2018 At the end of the day ironically AJ was a Vince guy all along. He watched him man the competition as the ace for years wishing he signed him back in 2001
Jul 5, 2018 Yeah..every post after my initial post solidifies that's I would not watch them get misused. I however would watch if hhh was in control AND there was a lengthy catalogue of good television to back up the quality of the show
Jul 5, 2018 This isn't true in the slightest AJ was a generic create a wrestler for most of TNA. The epitome of the vanilla midget cruiserweight who does flips and has crazy X division matches. It wasn't until he got put with Flair and was the guy for a bit where he started really improving on his promo and finding a character. The Lone Wolf gimmick led into New Japan and the rest is history. If he was on their radar as someone they actively wanted, it would have been and was in the last few years. The money was never worth it and it was a different business back then. As for WWE, he showed up in January and won the title in like September or October. The Jericho feud, the Roman feud, then the Cena feud were entirely about proving himself to Vince. You're the best wrestler in the world? Prove it. Jericho talked about it. Cena talked about how Vince would always know based on whether they cheered the other guys name or just said Cena sucks. He's now held that title for longer than guys like Edge and The Rock, he's doing all types of promo for them, he's on their game cover... aside from having better programs, we literally couldn't have asked for more from this run. The sky's the limit with Kenny. Roman's like 32. It's not that big of a difference
Jul 5, 2018 New Japan, and Kenny, are much much much more popular in the business now than they were when AJ came in. Edit I've now seen Buddy Murphy whip out some absolutely disgusting V Triggers on 205, so I'm honestly not too worried about him being neutered anymore either.
Jul 5, 2018 Are you saying Kenny and NJPW are popular than Kenny and NJPW were in 2015? Um yeah sure definitely but what's your point? To casuals and non-Internet fans AJ is/was more popular and recognizable than Kenny or NJPW is/was in 2015 or now. That's my point. AJ's saga with Vince and wwe was as simple as proving you are what we think you are and that you're are as popular as you should be and or we think you should be. And he was, so he got put into a good position. Look at other stars that came over, look at a guy like Samoa Joe who on main roster under Vince control hasn't amounted to anything
Jul 5, 2018 And for the record I wasn't saying AJ fit or grew to fit the McMahon mold physically. I'm just saying over the 2000 decade Vince saw him become the clean cut baby face that could hold a company down and Vince knew he could use him effectively how he wanted. And he did
Jul 7, 2018 Probably whatever acting gig is keeping him out of G1 Dragon Lee/Hiromu gonna set the world on fire tonight. Hate that I can't see it live.
Jul 7, 2018 I really should've made a thread for this show and hyped it up but I'm in the midst of moving states right now and forgot , sorry bros
Jul 8, 2018 What the f--- happened with the commentary in the Switchblade match? Probably being worked but they just went off Alright Ishii & Yano vs Suzuki & ZSJ - 3.25 Hangman & Marty vs Tanahashi & Kushida - 3.75 Goto/Jeff Cobb - 3.25 The Young Bucks vs Sanada & Evil - 4.5 Okada & Ospreay vs Naito & Bushi - 3.75 Hiromu vs Dragon Lee - 4.75 Switchblade vs Juice Robinson - 4.75 (commentary debacle aside, one of my faves this year) Cody vs Kenny Omega - 4.75 Best show they've done in the US so far. Not sure what the walkup was but the crowd looked closer to sold out than anticipated.
Jul 9, 2018 Crowd was about 7000 with a substantial amount of those tickets being local. Success! Much better. Less story stuff/stalling early on and obviously didn't have the convoluted f--- finish the Supercard match had. Cody had his best performance, felt like less the Omega show in between Cody's antics and more like both guys having a hard main event. The Bucks and Brandi got more involved as it got to the later stages, but never directly interfered. Some crazy spots. Maybe hurt a bit considering there was no chance Cody was winning and everyone knew it, but they had about as good a match as they could have had given the circumstances. You look at a match like Juice/Jay where the crowd was REALLY pulling for one guy and it helps the match out a lot. One thing to look for - Cody hits a move with no reaction whatsoever from the crowd, immediately starts doing push-ups and gets booed before they go into their next sequence. Phenomenal performer. Don't think so, but we don't know much right now. Make sure you watch that Juice/Switchblade match. Probably the highlight of both guys careers and their was soooooo much heat.
Jul 10, 2018 The Barnett/JR thing wasn't a work. Get these clowns off commentary. Between this and Hiromu's neck WWE marks are losing their s--- at New Japan being unsafe and unprofessional. s--- my d-ck.
