Greetings and welcome to the weekend news and rumors here at The Lair. We are only one week away from the Armageddon and only two matches have been confirmed. Anyways, enough with the side chat, let’s begin.
According to Jim Ross from the latest Ross Report, Rey Mysterio’s knee operation was sucessful and he is only expected to miss a month of action. Mysterio has been working with the pain for a bit now and it was believed that now was the best time for his knee to be ‘scoped. Mysterio will undergo rehab for the next few weeks before being cleared to return to action.
Also coming from Jim Ross, Edge is suffering from a sore knee as well. At this time, it is not excpted that Edge will need surgery, as a lot of rehab is now believed to be enough. Edge is not wrestling this weekend nor will be wrestle at the house shows next weekend. If the rebab Edge undergoes now fails to cure his knee, surgery will definately be considered not too far down the line.
This week’s Smackdown scored a final broadcast rating of 3.4. The number is not great but not too far from average of what Smackdown usually scores each week. The 3.4 rating placed UPN in third place on Thursday night behind NBC and CBS.
It is rumored that Matt Hardy is upset due to a switch that was made involving him and Albert. It is believed that the original plan for Smackdown was to have Matt Hardy be the person to injure Rey Mysterio following their match, while Albert was to wrestle on Velocity that week. Vince McMahon decided to switch it as it made more sense to him to have a big man injure Rey. Matt Hardy discussed in his recent commentary that he would love to work a program with Rey Mysterio. Speaking of his commentary, you may read it by clicking here.
As reported earlier this week, WWE has released The Godfather from his contract. When you think about it, it really was a no-brainer as to why he was released. Since his return at Royal Rumble earlier this year, how many times has he been on Raw or Smackdown? I can only remember four times, possibly five at the most. Two or three segments shortly after Royal Rumble come into mind, his surprise appearance at the same-sex wedding on Smackdown a few months ago, and an appearance on Raw not so long ago. I have read he wrestled on either Velocity or Sunday Night Heat, but other then that, he really had no future in WWE. It is believed that he may make occassional appearances for the company when they want him for something.
Ron Simmons, known by most as Faarooq is believed to have retired sometime last week. Simmons at this time is scheduled to stay in WWE as a road agent, much like Michael Hayes, Terry Taylor, Arn Anderson, and Dean Malenko are. Simmons had nothing left to prove in the ring, and the last he was on was when he was tagging with D-Von before switching to the Raw brand.
Former ECW play-by-play announcer Joey Styles recently was interviewed by No Holds Barred radio. He had a lot of interesting things to say, stating that he refuses to work for WWE since he does not want them to “own” him. He also mentions the death of ECW, working for ECW’s rival XPW, and plenty more. You may read his interview by visiting NoHoldsBarredWrestling.com.
Rowdy Piper appeared on this week’s NWA TNA Pay-Per-View in what appeared to be a shoot rant by himself on Vince Russo. He basically claimed he hates the influence Vince Russo has in the wrestling business, and blaimed him in the death of Owen Hart. I’m not a firm follower of TNA, though I believe it stays alive and well, but it sounds to me like TNA is going in the similiar direction WCW went in with the shoot interviews and stuff. You think they would have learned from WCW’s mistakes, but I guess not.
Former WWE employee, Paul Bearer made his debut at the end of this week’s TNA Pay-Per-View. It is believed that he will write for their Web site, while making appearances on the show in upcoming weeks. Bearer has not been on television for years, since he last appeared with Kane (yes it was Kane and not Undertaker. ‘Taker was actually out recovering from injuries when Bearer made his last appearances in WWE).
Sting wrestled earlier this week at the World Wrestling All-Stars (WWA) Pay-Per-View taping. Sting wore red and black, however, he lost to Lex Luger, who was described as looking really out of shape. We have the entire report of the WWA tapings which I believe will air on PPV in the future.
Anyways, it’s time to wrap this one up. In the last week, you probably have noticed the tweaking that was done to the design of this site. All were small yet effective changes Joe and I believe. Also, big pop for Joe as he “carried” the site for the better part of this week while I had personal issues at hand.
A few other site update notes, yesterday Joe added our new Discussion Forums to the site. They are still in the early stages of being completed but the WWE and NWA TNA sections are up and open for all of you to start discussing in. For those of you that read my work at TPWW, you should remember how fun the forums can actually be. Anyways, with that all said, as promised, Pardon The Ring returned this weekend with Session No. 9, along with the debut of PTR’s new look. Speaking of PTR, Session No. 10 promises to be one of the best yet. Adam Gorzelsky and our guest Monsterbowler (who writes our our Raw Review) are set to go at it. Let me tell you, these two have not met yet but I have heard more classic insults between these two, more then Tyson and Lewis possibly. Moving on to my final note, either on Tuesday or Wednesday this week, Michael Blaszkowski debuts his new section to the site. He will no longer be writing N&R reports on a consistent basis, but if you loved his writing style, then his new section is a MUST see. He will continue to write his column, Unspoken as well. With nothing more to add, that means I am now finished. Either myself or Eddie T. will be back during the week with another N&R report, so until then, watch the Headlines Board for the latest news and all the other good stuff. Until next time, later.
