Edge Hints SmackDown Bout Could Be His Final Match; Wrestling News August 18th 2023

AEW All In is less than 200 tickets away from becoming the largest-attended wrestling event of all time in terms of paid attendance.

The historic Wembley Stadium event has continually broken records over the last few weeks with the show’s ticket distribution surpassing WWE’s own record-breaking Wembley Stadium event, SummerSlam 1992, to become the highest-attended wrestling event of all time in Europe.

Now, the show is creeping ever closer to achieving the biggest attendance record it can possibly obtain, overtaking WrestleMania 32 to become the highest-attended wrestling event of all time in terms of paid attendance.

Dave Meltzer noted in the latest Wrestling Observer Newsletter that All In has distributed 80,544 tickets at the time of release – meaning it is just 165 tickets from surpassing WrestleMania 32’s official attendance.

The only events that would eclipse All In in general attendance at that point would be WCW & NJPW’s Collision In Korea shows back in April 1995. Those events attracted 150,000 and 165,000 attendees across the first and second night respectively, although it’s been noted in the past that most who attended were “ordered to” by the North Korean regime and did so for free.

There are currently nine matches announced for All In. Most notably, Adam Cole and MJF will headline the event for the AEW World Championship and FTR defend the AEW World Tag Team Championship against The Young Bucks – though the current status of the latter match is unknown due to Cash Wheeler’s arrest.

Further details have been revealed regarding the reasons behind Kairi Sane’s decision to return to WWE!

Sane initially departed WWE in December 2021 after working as an ambassador and trainer for the company behind the scenes. The former NXT Women’s Champion was an active performer on the main roster until July 2020 when she announced her exit from the company via X (formerly Twitter).

Nearly two years on, it was reported that Sane will be returning to the promotion and now new details have come to light over what led her to the decision.

Writing in the latest Wrestling Observer Newsletter, Dave Meltzer noted that Sane wanted to work more dates but Bushiroad wanted exclusivity on those dates. The success of Iyo Sky, potential regrets in later life and Triple H being in charge of WWE creative are said to have influenced her decision.

“Regarding the return of Kairi Sane, the basic issue is that she was and still is very close to Rossy Ogawa. Bushiroad wanted her exclusive. She wanted to work more dates but Bushiroad wanted exclusivity regarding the more dates which would also mean more money. Other things also came up as mentioned last week.

She then talked about returning to WWE and had thoughts about returning, particularly with the success Sky has had there. She talked with those close to her who supported her leaving with the idea that if she doesn’t, she later in life would always have questions or regrets about it. She also felt things for her would be better with Levesque in charge of creative”

Kazuchika Okada may have missed out on a record-setting third consecutive G1 Climax win earlier this month, but The Rainmaker still broke another huge record thanks to his G1 finals clash with Tetsuya Naito!

Dave Meltzer rated Okada and Naito’s bout 5.25 stars, meaning Okada has now obtained the record for the most amount of matches awarded over five stars by Dave Meltzer at 12. Hot on his heels are Will Ospreay and Kenny Omega with 11 each.

Does this make Okada the greatest wrestler of all-time? Let us know your thoughts by sharing on Twitter or Facebook down below!

Becky Lynch and Bianca Belair are the latest WWE superstars to be added to the wildly-popular online video game Fortnite.

Fortnite has become one of the biggest video games in the world since its launch in 2017. The third-person multiplayer shooter has seen several crossovers with a range of pop culture icons including Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson and John Cena, who have both been added to the game previously.

Now, WWE are once again crossing over with Fortnite to add two new stars to the game: Becky Lynch and Bianca Belair are now available as player skins in the game’s item store.

Players can purchase a bundle including two skins for Lynch and Belair respectively, two unique Back Blings and a Superstar Celebration emote, which sees your character hold up the now-defunct RAW Women’s Championship in celebration.  The bundle costs 2,400 V-Bucks in-game which equates to around $19/£16.

By comparison, WWE’s first collaboration with Fortnite in July 2022 cost around $11/£9, netting players a John Cena skin. Various skin options and extras were also purchasable separately.

And New: Bianca Belair and Becky Lynch make their entrance to the island.

Purchasable in the Item Shop now! pic.twitter.com/xs8K0jLF4w

— Fortnite (@FortniteGame) August 17, 2023

The working plans for Bryan Danielson’s match at AEW All In prior to his injury have been revealed.

The American Dragon has been out of action since his match with Kazuchika Okada at AEW x NJPW Forbidden Door 2023 this past June when he broke his forearm around 15 minutes into the main event bout. The injury has forced Danielson to miss several key AEW events including Dynamite: Blood & Guts and the company’s biggest event yet, All In.

Rumors have circulated over the last few weeks over potential pitches made for Danielson at Wembley Stadium but now a new report has revealed what AEW’s plans were for the multi-time WWE Champion at the historic event.

Dave Meltzer wrote in the latest Wrestling Observer Newsletter that the company’s official working plan was for Danielson to reignite his rivalry with Kenny Omega, leading to a singles rematch between the two in London.

This would have marked Danielson and Omega’s second singles match against each other after Danielson made his AEW in-ring debut against Omega at Dynamite: Grand Slam 2021. The bout ended in a 30-minute time limit draw and a decisive winner was never determined.

“The story that had Bryan Danielson not been injured his most likely match at Wembley Stadium would have been a singles match with Kenny Omega has been pretty much confirmed. It was never a sure thing, but it was the working idea before the injury.”

Damian Priest’s time in The Judgement Day could be coming to a close as WWE reportedly plans to remove him from the faction.

The current Mr. Money In The Bank was one of the founding members of The Judgement Day alongside Edge when Priest helped the group’s former leader secure a victory over AJ Styles at WrestleMania 38. Following the event, the two formed the group which later added Rhea Ripley and Finn Balor to their ranks before Edge was turned on by the rest of the group and subsequently deposed.

With Dominik Mysterio joining last September and Balor’s protege JD McDonagh looking likely to follow suit, the faction looks to become one of WWE’s biggest and most dominant in years. However, they could soon become one member smaller if a new report is to be believed.

In the latest edition of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter, Dave Meltzer noted that WWE has a long-term plan for Damian Priest to exit the group. It was also noted that it was likely, but not for definite, that McDonagh will replace Priest in the faction’s ranks.

“While this could easily change, the long-term plan is Priest out of Judgment Day. Whether that means McDonagh is in, that’s a probable but not 100 percent.”

CM Punk was said to be “like a mad man” during a backstage confrontation with a fellow star at AEW Dynamite.

The so-called ‘real’ AEW World Champion has been embroiled in controversy once more following last week’s edition of Collision which saw him cut a scathing off-air promo on Hangman Page. In the days following, Punk apologized to Page via text message.

Following the incident, reports emerged on several incidents involving Punk since his return to the company including a backstage confrontation between him and Ryan Nemeth at the June 21st edition of AEW Dynamite, the week after Punk’s return to the promotion. The incident stemmed from a tweet Nemeth made targetting Punk, calling him “the softest man alive.”

Dave Meltzer has now shared more details on the incident in the latest Wrestling Observer Newsletter, noting that Punk asked Nemeth if they had to “take it outside” to settle their issues. One side of the story is that Punk was particularly aggressive and was “ranting like a mad man.”

“The story we were told was that Punk came up to Nemeth as he was against the wall in the locker room, brought up the tweet and said, “Do we have a problem or are we good or do we have to take it outside.” The version was, this was aggressive. One person called it ranting like a mad man and another, defending Punk, told us at the time that Punk was handling business like a man and that all was taken care of and things were settled.”

WrestleMania 40 presale tickets officially went on sale earlier this week and we want to know if you managed to grab tickets!

If you did, what match would you LOVE to see in Philadelphia next year?

Let us know your thoughts by sharing on Facebook or Twitter down below!

‘The Tribal Chief’ can now add yet another accolade to his historic three-year championship run, this time due to his more recent WWE Championship reign!

Roman Reigns added yet another title to his collection when he defeated Brock Lesnar at WrestleMania 38 last year to win the WWE Championship on top of retaining his Universal title. Reigns has since ‘combined’ the titles into the Undisputed WWE Universal Championship, though the belts themselves remain separate entities now held by Paul Heyman.

On August 16th earlier this week, Reigns surpassed a major milestone in his WWE Championship reign specifically – having now held the belt for over 500 days. This makes Reigns the sixth longest-reigning WWE Champion in history, behind Bob Backlund, Pedro Morales, Hulk Hogan and Bruno Sammartino. Backlund and Sammartino have two separate title reigns each that surpass Roman’s in length.

Roman’s next major milestone would be for his Universal Championship reign to eclipse 1,474 days. Doing so would mean his reign would surpass Hulk Hogan’s first WWE Championship reign and make ‘The Tribal Chief’ the third longest-reigning champion in WWE history.

To do so, Reigns would need to remain Universal Champion for over a year from the time of writing as he would surpass Hogan on September 14th 2024.

Ahead of competing at the largest wrestling event ever held in Europe next weekend, Sting shocked fans with a surprise appearance at an independent event.

At AEW All In, Sting is set to team up with his long-time ally Darby Allin in a Tag Team Coffin match against The Mogul Embassy. The event will feature the largest crowd that The Icon has ever competed in front of, with tickets distributed currently standing at over 80,000.

One of Sting’s opponents at Wembley Stadium, AR Fox, competed at an event in Atlanta last night for World Wrestling Alliance 4, the promotion where Fox initially trained to become a wrestler. The AEW star had recently attacked Allin’s close friend Nick Wayne at his training school alongside Swerve Strickland, as showcased a few weeks ago during the 200th episode of AEW Dynamite.

In what seems to be a measure of revenge for Mogul Embassy’s attack on Wayne, Allin and Sting made a shock appearance at WWA4 and attacked Fox. Sting choked out Fox with his baseball bat before holding him down whilst Allin delivered a devasting Coffin Drop. Footage of the incident spread on social media shortly after.

@DarbyAllin & @Sting HAVE CRASHED @WWA4ATL TO ATTACK @ARealFoxx OHHHHHH MYYYYYYYYY 🤯🤯🤯 #A4THURSDAY pic.twitter.com/L2r4yf1A5I

— Justin McCant (@McCant4Life) August 18, 2023

Click here to learn more about this story.

Edge has confirmed the possibility that his match on SmackDown tonight could be the final match of his legendary wrestling career.

The Rated-R Superstar is set to take on Sheamus during tonight’s SmackDown from his hometown of Toronto, Ontario, Canada. On top of the match being celebrated as his 25th wrestling anniversary, the match is also significant due to comments Edge made this time last year.

Following an episode of RAW in August 2022, Edge stated that he would return to Toronto in August 2023 and “in a perfect world, we all say goodbye to each other that night,” hinting that he would retire in his hometown. One year on, that day has seemingly arrived.

Speaking to ET Canada ahead of SmackDown, the WWE Hall of Famer confirmed that his match with Sheamus is the final match of his current WWE contract and he is unsure if it will continue his career following the bout:

“Here’s what I can honestly say, and this isn’t the answer everyone wants. I truly don’t know. I really really, with 100% truth can say I don’t know. That’s strange for me, but I don’t. I really don’t. I’ve put some thought into it, but not a lot. This is the last match on my current contract. I don’t know.”

Click here to read Edge’s comments further.

Morning everyone, happy Friday!

Welcome back to the TJRWrestling live blog! I’ll be with you from 7am to 1pm EST covering the latest stories & breaking news from WWE, AEW, NJPW and elsewhere across the wrestling world!

We’ve got some big stories headed your way today including:

• Edge Hints SmackDown Bout Could Be His Final Match
  
• Sting Makes Surprise Appearance At Independent Event
  
• Roman Reigns Surpasses Huge WWE Title Milestone