- Bryan and I did our weekend show last night covering WWE Backlash, UFC 301, WWE cuts, John Laurinaitis, and New Japan Dontaku. We'll be back again Monday night after Raw.
- Regarding the Drew Gulak situation after yesterday's press conference with Paul Levesque, technically his contract is expiring and not being renewed as opposed to firing but that's largely word semantics. The Ronda Rousey story is the reason he stopped being used and wasn't going to be brought back, but with him gone, we're told the stories surfacing are accurate as less experienced talent had not been comfortable talking about a veteran on the roster.
- WWE starts the King and Queen of the Ring tournaments on Raw tomorrow in Hartford, CT. They announced men's bouts with Drew McIntyre vs. Finn Balor, Kofi Kingston vs. Rey Mysterio, Ricochet vs. Ilja Draunov, and Sheamus vs. Gunther. They also announced women's bouts with Ivy Nile vs. Zoey Stark, Shayna Baszler vs. Zelina Vega, Lyra Valkyria vs. Asuka, and Iyo Sky vs. Natalya. Some of these bouts sound great but with eight bouts on a show, they may not get time. Based on what was announced, it appears this will be Raw and SmackDown each having an eight-man men's and women's tournament over the next few weeks and the winners meeting in the finals at the King & Queen of the Ring PPV on 5/25 in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. I don't know that factually. I brought this up to a few in WWE, and the official word was that this will all likely be explained tomorrow night. One other person said that they believed this to be the plan. If they are doing eight bouts on Smackdown in two hours on Friday, that would be rushed. But that will be the focus of TV in the next few weeks.
- We're looking for your thoughts on WWE Backlash as well as the second night of NXT Dontaku, so you can leave a thumbs up, down or middle, best and worst match to dave@wrestlingobserver.com
- Lots of interesting Google search notes for the weekend. UFC 301 last night did 420,000 searches. I felt less interest in this than any UFC PPV ever. WWE Backlash did 100,000, which is the lowest I can ever recall a WWE PPV doing. The Canelo Alvarez fight with Jaime Munguia did 1.5 million, so to the public, it was the one with the most interest of the shows yesterday. For comparison, the Kentucky Derby did 5.5 million. The only other boxing or MMA or wrestling stuff that trended was Ryan Garcia's positive drug test did 200,000 on Wednesday and the death of Francis Ngannou's young child did 100,000 on Monday.
- Jon Jones claimed that he's got a date for his return and upcoming UFC heavyweight title fight with Stipe Miocic, but he'll let Dana White make the official announcement. He said it's nearly a done deal but the contracts have not been issued but said there is a verbal agreement.
- In the flyweight title main event at UFC 301 in Rio de Janeiro, Alexandre Pantoja won a 48-47, 48-47, and 49-46 win over Stev Erceg. Judge Favio Alves gave Pantoja rounds one, three, and five. Sal D'Amato had the same score. Dave Tirelli had Pantoja winning 1, 2, 3 and 5. Media scores were 88 percent for Pantoja.
- In Canada this coming weekend the three-hour Collision & Rampage block from Vancouver will air from midnight to 3 a.m. Eastern, or on a four-hour tape delay on TSN in Canada. Usually, those shows don't even air in Canada except for streaming, but TSN airs shows that are taped in Canada. But it's hardly at a time it'll get much viewership.
- In the U.K., while Joe Hendry's song "I Believe in Joe Hendry" got a lot of viral notice, it did not land in the official charts for the week which takes in data from airplay, YouTube, Spotify, iTunes, and others. Tom Campbell reported that for just sales this past week, it was the No. 6 single, and for downloads, it was No. 4. It was also No. 4 in the Official Big Top 40 based on streams, downloads, and Radio play.
- Jose Aldo, whose fight with Jonathan Martinez probably had the most interest of any bout on the UFC show, said he believes his contract is up but UFC has the right to match any outside offer. Many expected this would be his last fight but he indicated he's not retiring and is hopeful of getting a title shot at bantamweight champion Sean O'Malley. He also said he had an offer to box on the 7/20 Mike Tyson vs. Jake Paul show at AT&T Stadium in Arlington, TX. He also talked about perhaps fighting Henry Cejudo, Dominick Cruz, or Cory Sandhagen and said he brought all those names up for last night's show but none were available.
- All Together Now at Budokan Hall on ABEMA Live PPV at 3:30 a.m. Eastern very late tonight:
Daisuke Sekimoto & Tomohiro Ishii vs. Jeff Cobb & Masa Kitamiya
Sanada & Kai vs. Zack Sabre Jr. & Chris Brookes
Kenoh vs. Kosei Fujita
AZM & Miyu Amasaki vs. Starlight Kid & Natsupoi
Kota Minoura & Mao & Ninja Mack & Hayata & Desperado vs. Yamato & Tetsuya Endo & Alpha Wolf & Dragon Bane & Hiromu Takahashi
Tetsuya Naito & Yota Tsuji & Shingo Takagi vs. Jake Lee & David Finlay & Gabe Kidd
The show is a joint effort of New Japan, NOAH, DDT, Dragon Gate, Big Japan, and Stardom.
- In non-WWE matches that have been recommended highly for the weekend, they were Shingo Takagi vs. Gabe Kidd's Never title match yesterday and Zack Sabre Jr. vs. Jeff Cobb for the TV title on Friday's New Japan show, as well as the Arena Mexico main event was the usual excellent, superheated, great creative moves with Mistico & Mascara Dorada & Templario vs. Flip Gordon & Angel de Oro & Niebla Roja. Kaito Kiyomiya's GHC title win yesterday over El Hijo de Dr. Wagner Jr. was recommended to me as was the Hazuki & Koguma tag title win over Suzu Suzuki & Mei Seira on yesterday's Stardom PPV show.
- A&E tonight has WWE Rivals on John Cena vs. Batista at 8 p.m. and Most Wanted Treasures on HHH at 9 p.m.
- Penta vs. Rey Fenix takes place on tonight's House of Glory show at the NYC Arena in New York for Cinco de Mayo.
- Alex Pereira issued a challenge to Anthony Smith saying he would let Smith get his back and put the books in and that if Smith with that dominant position could choke him out, he'd give him $50,000. It was brought up to Smith last night after his win over Vitor Petrino. Smith said, "If I start on his back, I'll choke the shit out of him, 100 percent."
- Eve results from Friday night in London: Safire Reed & Zizi & Maya Matthews & Chantal Jordan & Millie McKenzie b Sky Smitson & Nightshade & LA Taylor & Session Moth Martina in a War Games cage match, Lana Austin & Ivy b Alexxis Falcon & Lizzy Evo in an I Quit match, Emersyn Jayne & Kanji b Alex Windsor & Rhio, Nina Samuels b Su Yung in the Eve title match. The show drew 400. Will Ospreay was at the show. The next show is 6/7 in Walthamstow with both Charlie Morgan & Jetta retiring in a trios match teaming with Erin Angel vs. Charli Evans & Millie McKnzie & Nina Samuels, plus Miyuki Takase & Haruka Uemuaki
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