Matty Breisch Articles - Page 171

Say what you will about CM Punk in the ring, about his occasional botch, or his lack of exceptional cardio, but there’s nobody better on the mic in the industry today. Punk can open a show with nothing but a microphone and 15 minutes of time to kill, and can talk down or up any […]

For weeks, rumors have circulated about just how much money Vince McMahon paid out off the books during his tenure at the head of WWE, with the exact recipients of his payouts largely shrouded in mystery. Fortunately, that shroud has been pulled back ever so slightly, with the Wall Street Journal reporting that $5 million […]

While the WWE Universe is abuzz with the returns of more than a few familiar faces, from Karrion Kross to Hit Row, the same level of love hasn’t been shown to NXT. Sure, Indi Hartwell heavily implied that she was given a love letter from her Kayfabe husband Dexter Lumis, but other than the return […]

For one reason or another, Tony Khan really likes to throw themed AEW shows during the summer. Call it a hangover from the pre-television era of the promotion, where shows like Fight for the Fallen or Fyter Fest cost money to watch, or as a counterpoint to the monthly “Premium Live Events” that WWE runs […]

After seven months away from the ring with an injury, Penelope Ford officially made her way back to the ring on AEW Dark Elevation to match wits with Heather Reckless at the Target Center in Minneapolis, Minnesota. And who, you may ask, was watching her ringside for this long-awaited return bout? Well, that would be […]

Though Trish Stratus hasn’t wrestled in a match since SummerSlam 2019, the WWE Hall of Famer unquestionably remains one of the most popular women to ever lace up her boots and step into the ring. She’s wrestled 500-plus matches, all of which took place inside the WWE Universe, and her efforts were rewarded with not […]

As much as fans didn’t want to see it, Theory is officially back in WWE Universe. While this isn’t technically “news” news for fans in the know, as Theory has wrestled in three matches before making his return to RAW, including a win over Ricochet at the WrestleMania 29 Launch Party in LA, and a […]

WWE’s Kevin Owens is a darn good professional wrestler. He’s had fantastic matches everywhere from Bingo Halls to PWG, ROH, and NXT, and will forever be remembered as the man who wrestled “Stone Cold” Steve Austin in his final match as a professional wrestler as one of the two main events of WrestleMania 38. He’s […]

When A.J. Styles and Bobby Lashley took the ring for their first-ever singles match in WWE, TNA, or any promotion really, fans bucked in for what was expected to be a darn good match. As Corey Graves and company pointed out at the onset of the outing, the two performers are living legends who will […]

For one reason or another, fans have been debating which member of the WWE faction, The Shield, is the best wrestler. Some prefer Roman Reigns, the current Unsidputed WWE Universal Champion who has held the RAW belt for over 700 days and has genuinely dominated the wrestling world for about two years now. Reigns hasn’t […]

WWE giveth, WWE taketh away. For Kevin Owens, the Prize Fighter, to truly come back and represent the best of what wrestling can be, KO had to make a statement. That statement, unfortunately, came at the expense of none other than Ezekiel, the man he’d be feuding with for months due to maybe being his […]

When Konosuke Takeshita announced that he’d be leaving America for a return to his home promotion DDT in Japan, it put a general ennui over the AEW Galaxy. Fans lamented the loss of the homegrown phenom, who went from an AEW Dark Elevation afterthought to the sort of performer who could headline Battle of the […]

“I smell war… and I’m game” these words, laid out over a Dakota Kai Instagram story that also featured a promotional poster for WWE’s Clash at the Castle, pretty well qualifies the relationship between the invading team of Bayley, Kai, and Iyo Sky and Bianca Belair, Alexa Bliss, and Asuka, the babyface trio looking to […]

When Adam Cole turned his back on the Young Bucks on the August third edition of AEW Dynamite, it served as an inflection point in the story of The Elite. After trying to hold strong with their fellow quasi-former Bullet Club member Cole and his Undisputed buddies, the Bucks found themselves bullied, beaten down, and […]

A little over three years ago, Kenny Omega decided to take his talents to a brand new professional wrestling company by the name of AEW and left his long-time, on-again, off-again tag team partner Kota Ibushi back in Japan. At the time, this break-up was sad but expected; Ibushi signed a very long-term contract to […]

If Triple H doesn’t bring back any more wrestlers from the “Great WWE Talent Purge of 2020-22,” he will have already shaken up the roster more than any other booker in the promotion’s history. Not since the launch of The Nexus, the return of the NWO, or even the WCW Invasion angle has there been […]

In case you’re living under a rock, Hit Row has officially returned to the WWE Universe, with the “OG3” trio of Top Dolla, Ashante “Thee” Adonis, and B-Fab all back on the Blue Brand looking to squash some local talent who maybe didn’t read their one-day SmackDown contracts. The return of Hit Row, however, isn’t […]

To call Roxane Perez’s time in professional wrestling charmed might just be an understatement. Since officially embracing her pursuit of a wrestling career full-time after she graduated from high school, Perez wrestled all over the country, signed not one but two full-time contracts with two of the biggest wrestling companies in the world, and ultimately […]

What’s next for Bobby Lashley on RAW? He’s taken care of business against Ciampa, dispelled of Theory, and unless his on-again, off-again house show circuit program with The Miz is magically ripe for a big-time televised run following a win over his “Mizion,” it would appear “The Almighty” might have just found himself without an […]

“I’m not retired; I’m unemployed. That’s what I keep saying. I see things on Tony Khan‘s TV show that appall me – I could help with that. I have been begging him for a job on every platform I can, and I want to know why he won’t hire me. That’s the next big news […]

When WWE officially announced the brackets for the Women’s Tag Team Championship tournament, it featured two very notable names that few expected to see in a RAW or SmackDown ring. No, it wasn’t Sasha Banks and Naomi; while that would have broken the internet and garnered an incredibly animated reaction, the duo have seriously failed […]

As you may or may not know, in addition to being the AEW Interim World Champion, Jon Moxley is also the current GCW World Champion, having held the belt for 344 days and counting since he took it off of one-time AEW performer Matt Cardona on September 4th, 2021.  He’s defended the strap on five […]

As the AEW Galaxy prepares for the World Trios Championship Tournament, which will culminate in a bout at All Out, broadcast live from the Now Arena in Chicago, one of the teams with a first-round spot in the tournament just secured some massive momentum heading into the round of eight. That’s right, the team of […]

Kenny Omega has officially been a contracted member of the AEW Galaxy since February 7th, 2019. He’s wrestled 71 matches for the promotion, has been a part of some of the most exciting makes of the past three years regardless of promotion, and for 346 days, had one of the most consequential championship runs in […]

It’s here, it’s almost, finally here: AEW is about to crown the first ever World Trios Champions. That’s right, after spending literally years teasing the idea of expanding out the championship picture to give an end goal destination for the teams picking up otherwise fruitless wins in trios action, AEW has taken a page out […]

When Walter signed with the WWE back in 2019, it was a pretty big deal. One of the most impressive international performers to come out of Europe in quite some time, Walter had already secured 11 titles, and four five-star matches before he ever signed a full-time deal thanks to his work in PWG, PROGRESS, […]

After months of anticipation – of dark matches, vignettes, and Ring of Honor appearances – Ari Daivari and the Trustbusters have officially landed on AEW television, first in a backstage segment with the Best Friends and again on the subsequent episode of Rampage in a pair of matches versus Sonny Kiss and Orange Cassidy. While […]

When the “OG3” of Hit Row made their triumphant return to the WWE Universe for a quick squash match on SmackDown, it garnered a pretty darn big pop. The fans assembled in the PNC Arena in Raleigh, North Carolina, were very excited to see Top Dolla, Ashante “Thee” Adonis, and most importantly of all, B-Fab, […]

There was a time in the not-too-distant past of WWE history – the then of Then. Now. Forever. – when fans couldn’t escape don’t-call-him-Austin Theory. Though he was initially drafted onto RAW out of NXT in the 2021 WWE Draft as the final pick of Night 1, Theory rapidly became a fixture of both of […]

Sonny Kiss is an AEW original. While the genderfluid superstar who uses she/her/he/they pronouns wrestled 193 matches before her AEW debut at the original Fight for the Fallen and technically wrestled on television before, going by the name XO Lishus in Lucha Underground, Kiss didn’t rise to national prominence until 2019, when she was a […]

Since officially arriving in the WWE Universe earlier this summer, the Maximum Male Models have rapidly gone from a faction booed out of the arena by angry crowds unwilling to have their “juices titillated” to a weird, surrealist masterpiece that grew more and more compelling with each passing week. Fans worried that Max Dupri might […]

As you almost certainly know, Hook is the new FTW Champion. He won the belt off of his fellow former member of Team Taz, Ricky Starks, at AEW’s Fight for the Fallen after the former got a bit too cocky after an in-ring win over Danhausen, took photos with the belt and his father to […]

As, well, basically every fan of professional wrestling surely knows, Friday nights at 8 pm is when WWE’s SmackDown airs on FOX… except during football season, which is when the process of preemption starts to rear their ugly heads and fans suddenly have to scramble for when and where to watch their favorite show. So […]

In the modern professional wrestling world, everyone sort of knows everyone. Sure, some performers are lifers in WWE, AEW, NJPW, or elsewhere, but there isn’t a performer on a major promotion who doesn’t know someone who is either signed to another company or wrestled for another company before their current landing spot. Because of this […]

When the WWE Universe said goodbye to Hit Row, it felt like a mistake. Initially called up to the main roster in October of 2021 as part of the WWE Draft after a very successful run in NXT capped off with a win by the group’s de facto leader, Isaiah “Swerve” Scott, winning the North […]

Once upon a time – read: two months ago – Konosuke Takeshita was considered the best-kept secret in AEW. The pride of Osaka, Japan, Takeshita is one of the most decorated performers in the history of DDT Pro Wrestling – the promotion responsible for a guy you may have heard of by the name of […]

The WWE Universe is in a weirdly good spot at the moment. On one hand, the company’s booking is drawing rave reviews from across the wrestling world, with fans already labeling Triple H a late entrant for Tony Khan’s Booker of the Year award. But then again, just because the weekly additions of former NXT […]

Welp, it’s official: The AEW World Trios Championship Tournament has been announced, and fans, as they say, are stoked. Ari Daivari’s Trustbusters will make their Dynamite debut, the Young Bucks will wrestle alongside a mystery opponent who, by his own admission, isn’t “Hangman” Adam Page, and Will Ospreay and his Aussie Open buddies are heading back to […]

When it comes to being a wrestling fan, of AEW, ROH, NJPW, or even WWE, name changes are just a part of the business. Wrestlers change companies, alliances, and gimmicks all the time, whether due to a change in employer or an attempt to get over with the crowd. Specifically, wrestlers entering WWE often get […]