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Thursday, February 9, 2017

ROH names working EVOLVE soon, another Fast Lane title match, cruiserweight injury updates, legend's daughter at Smackdown, new main roster producer, CMLL names set for Supercard of Honor, WWE's UK tour expands, HoF collection, more on Impact-NOAH deal, TNA press note, Adamle announced diagnosis, another WWE name getting surgery, Smackdown audience, NXT charity, journalist on Chamber panel, and Questions on the Rumble booking, PPV bonuses disappearing, the NXT Title at WM33, and Joe vs. Nakamura at WM33

Michael Elgin and Donovan Dijak will work for EVOLVE on March 30, marking both talents' debut there. This would seem to solidify Elgin not working with ROH anymore as well as reports of Dijak testing the independent waters soon in order to get on WWE's radar without being under WWE contract. I think both men would be solid pickups by WWE, but Elgin will likely stick in Japan for now.

Neville vs. Jack Gallagher is official for Fast Lane. I assume Neville will continue as champion going into WM33.

Tony Nese suffered a minor heel injury during Raw, but he and Rich Swann aren't expected to miss much action. Both men have been soldiers for the cruiserweight division, so I'm sure they want to get back into the mix.

Andre The Giant's daughter was backstage visiting at Smackdown. Cue speculation of her ending up on WWE's radar as a wrestler at some point. Time will tell.

Sarah Stock, formerly Impact's Sarita, worked as a producer at Raw. Good to have some female faces in the mix there.

CMLL's La Amapola and Marcela will work ROH's Supercard of Honor XI. The WM33 weekend show will feature some big names from outside of ROH and potentially set the stage for more crossover with CMLL, NJPW, and Impact.

WWE has added two more dates to its UK tour. They will run May 4 in Scotland and May 5 in Wales. I wholly expect some UK tournament talents to work those events.

WWE Network will see a 2017 Hall of Famers collection, growing as more inductees are announced. If WWE ever does get the Impact tape library, they'll have a lot of Kurt Angle material for the service.

Impact's new working agreement with Pro Wrestling NOAH was partially a Scott D'Amore move. With Jeff Jarrett back in Impact, D'Amore is back in the picture. D'Amore had been an important part of the company's international endeavors for some time. Impact using Jarrett and D'Amore should bode well for them given their experience.

Eddie Edwards was part of a UK media tour for Impact Wrestling. It looks like the company's relationships are starting to come back together now that money is not an issue.

Mike Adamle announced he is suffering from dementia and CTE in addition to the epilepsy he has dealt with for close to 20 years. I wish him the best in dealing with those issues.

Darren Young is undergoing elbow surgery. There is not yet an estimate of when he will return to the ring. I hope he's able to bounce back and continue to contribute to WWE.

Smackdown drew 2.63 million viewers this week. Hopefully they'll get another bump after Elimination Chamber.

A number of NXT personalities are raising money for Special Olympics Florida.

Sam Roberts will be part of Kickoff at Elimination Chamber. It's good to see him and Peter Rosenberg get to be part of WWE like that.

For my take on yesterday's PWInsider.com questions:
1.a. With Reigns, Cesaro, and Sheamus already losing earlier in the night, I can see why they wanted to get back in the title pictures by entering the Rumble! Cesaro and Sheamus have the stamina to still convincingly add to action in the ring, and Reigns at number 30 was a good misdirection for the fans in attendance.

b. It definitely made sense to put all the Wyatts in given their feud with each other, and New Day needed something to do in January since they're not in the title hunt. They're over; it made sense to include them on the card.

c. I also love surprise entrants from the past, so I'm also a little bummed there. It makes sense to have the full-timers in the title picture instead of, say, Brooklyn Brawler, though.

d. Lesnar, Goldberg, and Taker got in, did what they needed to do to sell their big Mania matches, and got out. No big complaints there.

e. Orton vs. Bray at WM33 works from a storytelling perspective. I don't believe they'll go with Cena vs. Orton for the title. Cena is expected to team with Nikki against Miz and Maryse at WM33.

2. It's a sign of the times changing! WWE is giving away a lot of content pretty cheaply and that cuts into how much talents take home from working a big show like that.

3. Unless one of them gets seriously injured or something, that's the direction they've set. I wouldn't hold out hope for it becoming a triple threat or anything.

4. While it would certainly elevate NXT to be featured at Mania, they have their own big show the night before. They should worry about that being a draw instead of it being secondary to WM33. And I really don't like the idea of the Mania card potentially changing the night before.

5. It could potentially be pretty great if they can convince the WWE universe at large to see that as a big match. Most fans don't watch NXT or other promotions, so WWE would have its work cut out for it making that seem Mania-worthy. I think I'd do Joe vs. Balor and keep Nakamura for the week after WM33. I'd lean toward putting Nakamura on Smackdown since we've already seen him face Joe plenty of times.

More wrestling tomorrow.

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