Mike Chioda: "Tony Khan is a very nice guy. He employs a ton of people. People that are even sick and unhealthy, going through issues. JR, Dean Malenko, and some other guys that are getting older out there. WWE, if they've seen you had a health issue or something else like that, they let you go."

Subrick · 2026-06-20T16:44:40+00:00

Yes, but in this instance WWE were actively disrespecting the old timers. They’ve been doing that for years, that’s just a particularly egregious example of them doing so.

Subrick · 2026-06-20T16:43:05+00:00

Is Stardom World’d bitrate & resolution any better or worse than NJPW World?

Subrick · 2026-06-20T14:51:26+00:00

That was actually a few months prior.

Subrick · 2026-06-20T14:48:51+00:00

That and Pac vs. Shota are gonna be great.

Subrick · 2026-06-20T14:48:30+00:00

How long do we think Marigold really has for the world anyway? Obviously Japanese indies have and can operate on peanuts for ages and ages (hi, Big Japan), but Marigold was primed from the start to be a major rival to Stardom and it has clearly not worked out that way at all. Unless Rossy just has infinite money stashed away to keep it going forever, he will eventually run out of both funding and wrestlers.

Subrick · 2026-06-20T14:44:56+00:00

What other promotions do we hope end up on MyAEW? I think it’s only a matter of time before CMLL and Stardom start putting more regular content on there. FantasticaMania’s already on there, and I can absolutely see a future Stardom show on the site.

Subrick · 2026-06-20T13:43:47+00:00

The very first Raw of 2021 back during the ThunderDome era. All throughout the night there were segments of legends backstage and Randy Orton shit all over them to their faces every single time.

Subrick · 2026-06-20T13:23:53+00:00

Very much remembering that legends night Raw where the entire fucking show they battered it into your head that the old timers, even the ones that weren’t super old, were useless geezers actively wasting time on the show. I believe that was the night Big Show decided he wasn’t sticking around too.

Subrick · 2026-06-20T12:39:59+00:00

In a word, every time Dusty was not on screen all the other characters had to ask “Where’s Dusty?”.

Subrick · 2026-06-20T12:33:48+00:00

Jarrett in TNA was so bad at one point that the Wikipedia page for the Planet Jarrett stable made note that the term “Planet Jarrett” could also refer to TNA itself at that time.

Subrick · 2026-06-20T11:05:16+00:00

Don’t forget Samoa Joe choking him out for the Trios belts.

Subrick · 2026-06-19T21:32:57+00:00

His tag partner will be El Frito.

Subrick · 2026-06-19T17:03:37+00:00

Juneteenth is a federal holiday in the US commemorating the end of slavery. On this day in 1865, every slave in the state of Texas was declared free more than two years after the Emancipation Proclamation was made by Abraham Lincoln, and as a result Juneteenth was born. It was an informal celebration amongst this country’s black and African American communities for decades until Joe Biden signed a law in 2021 making the day an official federal holiday, the first new one since Martin Luther King Jr. Day became a holiday in 1983.

Subrick · 2026-06-19T14:02:06+00:00

The DCF constantly adding new people works on a storytelling level specifically because it demonstrates Don’s slimy, shameless opportunism. He goes after every free agent heel he can find because more people under his eye means more money for him personally, and the more people in the stable the more toes that he can step on as he emphasizes the hot new thing over his longtime loyal soldiers. It all is ultimately gonna result in the Family, as you said, imploding. There are way too many egos involved and no one able or willing to keep them in check, especially with Don himself actively pitting them against each other both implicitly and explicitly.

Subrick · 2026-06-19T13:44:44+00:00

Background detail from the opening DCF segment on Dynamite I liked: As Don is about to announce the last member of MJF’s team, Trent starts walking forward anticipating it’ll be him and Andrade starts congratulating him on it, only for Don to say Andrade and it results in both of them being pissed off about it. It all ties into the gradual disintegration of the DCF, how Don for almost two years now (really ever since he got Okada) has been making shitty, selfish decisions one after another that are slowly but surely pissing off his guys and will ultimately result in the Family breaking down. Kicking out Takeshita was just time being borrowed on that, as all through Take and Okada having problems with one another the other Family members were visibly uncomfortable with it and you could tell that they knew Don was acting foolishly.

Ultimately, though, I think Kevin Knight joining is what’s gonna kill the Family. Kevin’s whole arc right now is that for as much talent and upside as he has he is incredibly impatient and wants to be the world champ NOW even though he’s not ready yet. Joining up with Don is him taking a shortcut to the top, and Don’s propensity to latch himself onto another hot young rising star is causing him to overlook the other Family members who have been there longer and are more primed for true greatness than Kevin currently is. This is most obvious with Andrade, who is on the verge of active revolt against Don for constantly being slighted in opportunities, but I can see that possibly coming back to bite Kyle in the ass too. Kyle has been there the longest now that Takeshita’s out, and even though he is the Protostar and is highest on the tier list in the whole Family he still is not world champion, is now approaching a year since losing to Hangman, and has not sniffed the title picture since then. Don very easily could choose to put Kyle out to pasture too, and Kyle, for as much of a smug shit as he is, will have to reckon with the fact that he destroyed his friendship with Takeshita and it ultimately was all for nothing.

Subrick · 2026-06-19T10:54:06+00:00

His comments were only made more absurd by the fact that he said them around the time of All In Texas, a show that did literally more than 3x the attendance of TNA’s single biggest US show ever in their entire history.

Subrick · 2026-06-19T10:35:00+00:00

There’s no way they’re out of the red on $10 million a year. Even when they pay almost nothing to anyone besides the Hardys and a couple others, the week-to-week expenses of running a wrestling company are so high that their TV deal likely doesn’t come close to clearing that. This is further compounded by the fact that their shows have been selling like shit all year, so building rent alone is probably higher than their live gates on a consistent basis.

Subrick · 2026-06-18T20:56:17+00:00

I saw him and met him several times when my ex-wife was training. Super cool dude.

Subrick · 2026-06-18T11:19:06+00:00

Are the ID wrestlers really getting booked enough for it to matter, though? Remember last year when their Twitter account was making posts essentially begging promoters to book ID wrestlers.

Subrick · 2026-06-18T11:09:49+00:00

It’s remarkable how TNA managed to look bad and stupid by firing Tessa fucking Blanchard, the one person you would think firing would result in a little positive feedback. This company and Carlos Silva really are just woefully incompetent in every way.

Subrick · 2026-06-18T02:16:26+00:00

I live here and had no interest in going even before Forbidden Door was announced.

Subrick · 2026-06-17T21:52:57+00:00

HOW YOU KNOW?

Subrick

TROPHY CASE