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Wednesday, May 6, 2020

Assorted wrestling press, WWE international tour rescheduled, Mike Tyson offered match, more on Taker Network series, DiBiases legal update, Raw audience, Interviews with Riddle/Profits/Otis/ACH/Mox/Ryder/Hawkins/Tino, IWA MS plans return, Knockouts update, Impact contendership tournament set, new AEW match, Foley endorses Impact star, Impact preview, and Questions on McIntyre as a heel, WWE movie parodies, looking back at WM36, Vince's future, WWE caring about ratings, and WWE continuing to air content

The Bella Twins spoke to Women's Health about their pregnancy diets.

WWE's women's revolution book and The Bella Twins' memoir have released.

- The Bellas promoted their memoir on E!

WWE's Australia/New Zealand tour has been rescheduled for July 29 through July 31, 2021.

WWE Network has added Raw's best matches of the past decade in their latest Best of WWE collection.

Mike Tyson is being offered an MLW match for charity. That's clever. I'd love to see it.

Becky Lynch's episode of "Billions" drew 610,000 viewers.

The Undertaker's WWE Network series will debut each Sunday through June 21.

Ted DiBiase, Ted DiBiase, Jr., and Brett DiBiase are named in an audit for allegedly misspending state welfare funds. Specifically the audit alleges the three were paid large amounts of money "for work that was not performed, for unreasonable travel costs, or with little proof the programs helped the needy."

Raw drew 1.69 million viewers Monday, the lowest mark for the show ever. At this point I'm willing to consider them doing "virtual fans" or something.

NWA streamed China's Nick Aldis vs. Colt Cabana world championship match. Cool to see.

Matt Riddle spoke before NXT:
- Joint Manipulation is hilarious.

- Very interesting talk about "heat."

- I hope Riddle can mix it up with Raw and Smackdown names.

- Very frank discussion about Goldberg.

The Street Profits discussed WrestleMania and more. Paul Heyman has done a great job of recognizing unique personalities and letting them shine. Raw and Smackdown needed that for a long, long time.

Otis spoke to Digital Spy. I don't like this angle, but it's over and that's what matters.

ACH discussed his WWE release on a Submission Squad podcast. Pro Wrestling Sheet and Fightful have highlights. I'm glad he's in a better place now after that situation and hope five years from now he's grown significantly.

IWA Mid-South is scheduling dates beginning June 18. We'll see if they end up happening.

AEW is selling face masks. Timely!

Jon Moxley discussed AEW's creative freedom and more:
- Jericho vs. Moxley was really well done in an old school way.

- We'll see if WWE relaxes some of its strict directions due to AEW's success.

Zack Ryder (Matt Cardona) discussed his WWE release on Busted Open.

Curt Hawkins (Brian Myers) discussed his WWE release with Comicbook.com. We'll see if he's able to chart a fresh direction now.

NXT alum Dan Matha launched a podcast. Tino Sabbatelli is his first guest.

Former NXT wrestler Kimber Lee (Abbey Laith in NXT) appeared on Impact Tuesday night as a rival to Jessika Havok. Good to see her have another opportunity to make a name for herself.

- Neither Kimber nor Nevaeh have signed with the company at this time.

Impact has announced a World Championship contendership tournament featuring:
- Trey Miguel vs. Rohit Raju (replacing Moose)
- Sami Callihan vs. Michael Elgin
- Hernandez vs. Madman Fulton
- Rhino vs. Ken Shamrock

Dynamite has added Lance Archer vs. QT Marshall. That's a clever way to lead to facing Cody.

Impact is working on a number of signings. Good. They could use some fresh faces in the mix.

Impact's ring announcer during The North segment was Destiny Wrestling's George Iceman.

Mick Foley endorsed Moose after this week's Impact. From one TNA World Champion to another!

Impact is planning more "TNA" content for AXS. That could be intriguing. I wouldn't mind them looking at something of a brand extension with TNA and Impact having distinct feels.

Impact on July 12 is advertising:
- Moose vs. Suicide
- Trey Miguel vs. Rohit Raju in an Impact World Championship contendership tournament match
- Hernandez vs. Madman Fulton in an Impact World Championship contendership tournament match
- Kimber Lee vs. Havok

For my take on yesterday's PWInsider.com questions:
1. Why would WWE downgrade Drew to MJF's level? He's much better than that generic shtick. Drew definitely needed to build up momentum to get where he is now and fit the pieces together. It's not like he "turned" babyface as much as the fans got behind him, but, yes, consistently playing to his strengths has been key to his rise.

2. Hopefully if (when?) they do those they do all fresh ones.

3. They'll probably just remind us it was the WrestleMania that was "too big for one night!"

4. Honestly I don't really feel comfortable discussing his mortality since I don't know his health well enough to make any kind of judgment on that. I do think he's going to squeeze every last second he can out of life, however.

5. They care as much as NBCU and FOX do! Vince doesn't want them (or anyone) getting involved and telling him he has to change things up. Ratings have come up repeatedly in conference calls. It's something they're very much paying attention to, as they realize TV rights revenue absolutely dwarves WWE Network, PPVs, social media, and the like. The wrestling business is very much still a TV rights business.

6. It would depend on how lenient NBCU and FOX are with the content contracts during the pandemic. Both parties are surely happy to continue to have fresh episodes of WWE at a time when not much else is running.

More wrestling tomorrow.

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