Daily Update: Soberano Jr., Kazuchika Okada, NJPW

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This Weekâ€s Wrestling Observer Newsletter

A larger than usual issue with a wide variety of stories and tons of history:
*The fixed fight accusations from Saturday’s UFC show, what happened, how Dana White and UFC handled it, fixed fights in the early days of MMA and the different motivations then vs. now, and a look back at history with a former world heavyweight boxing champion who later became one of the biggest stars of his era in pro wrestling.
*A look at the third quarter TKO business, covering mostly UFC and WWE.  How each category is doing and explanations as to why.
*Nick Khan talks WWE ticket prices and  booking decisions on live events
*Full coverage of Saturday Night’s Main Event and business notes on the show
*Hiroshi Tanahashi’s Farewell in Gifu and 30 minutes that capsulized the best aspects of the past, present and future of pro wrestling
*Notes on the Tokyo Dome advance
*Finals of the Best of the Super Juniors tag team tournament
*Notes on the upcoming heavyweight tag team tournament
*Lots of notes regarding AEW Full Gear
*The real history of the original NWA national heavyweight championship
*Matches likely to happen at Full Gear
*The final installment of our Hall of Fame series, covering international and non-wrestlers, where we talk about the cases of people including Spyros Arion, Dominic DeNucci, George Gordienko, Ted Boy Marino, Billy Joyce, The Royal Brothers, Dave Brown, Zane Bresloff, Bobby Bruns, Bob Caudle, Joe Higuchi, Jim Johnston, James  Melby, Bill Mercer, Gorilla Monsoon, Rossy Ogawa, Reggie Parks, Morris Siel, Tony Schiavone, George Scott, Kevin Sullivan, Mike Tenay, Ted Turner, Jesse Ventura, Roy Welch, Stanley Weston, The Grand Wizard and Koichi Yoshizawa.
*Notes on the death of Victor Conte Jr.
*Tank Davis kills his last payday and Netflix’s big fight for the fall is out the window and thank God for that
*DDT has one of its biggest shows of the year
*Betting odds for pro wrestling matches last week and this week
*The most complete look at the television ratings of wrestling shows over the past week.  How these numbers compare in placings to past years, where other than pro wrestling is hurting with the new ratings, competition for each show and placings for the time slot
*CMLL has four straight sellouts and coverage of the main matches including a major return this week
*What wrestler is having the best year for someone their age in wrestling history
*Notes on a very confusing tournament coming up
*What young wrestler sold out in a singles with Mistico this past week
*Notes from the last AAA tapings
*AAA booking huge arena for a taping
*Stardom big show plus notes on the tag team tournament
*Will Vince McMahon write a book?
*Former pro wrestling star elected Mayor
*How network, cable and streaming numbers have affected NASCAR in 2025
*Update on Blue Demon Jr.
*More on Smashing Machine including Dwayne Johnson comments
*Jerry Lawler returns to WMC
*Athletic commission in trouble over a sponsored women’s championship
*El Hijo del Santo retirement tour hits Europe
*More WBD sale talks
*Blood & Guts news
*A poll on AEW viewership and how people watch the TV and PPV shows
*Advance ticket sales for WWE, AEW, TNA, MLW and RAF
*BJ Penn arrested again
*WWE sets gate records
*Paul Levesque’s booking
*How much Dwayne Johnson’s TKO stock is worth
*Notes on the WWE arena business going forward
*The Ridge Holland story

This Weekâ€s Back Issue

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Sunday Update

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— My weekend show with Garrett Gonzales talked about all the news of the last week, including the fallout to the UFC fixed fight, Saturday, 2025 Awards, Full Gear, Victor Conte, weekly ratings, AEW creative and more. I’ll be back with Bryan Alvarez tonight talking about the weekend news.

— The return of Soberano Jr. after knee surgery led to a surprise sellout of Arena Mexico on Friday night with 16,000 fans. Soberano Jr. & Angel de Oro beat titan & Atlantis Jr. in the main event. Austin Aries was also there wrestling Mascara Dorada. Anyway, Soberano Jr. is a huge star, probably more than most recognized. There were banners and many with his masks. The unique aspect is that he’s a rudo and he was cheered like crazy by the women. I compare him to Gino Hernandez except he’s a far better wrestler and Gino as a heel never got cheered like that.  

— Kazuchika Okada will be facing Hiroshi Tanahashi in Tanahashi’s retirement match on 1/4 at the Tokyo Dome. Okada flew to Japan to appear at Anjo and come out after Tanahashi beat Yuto Ice.  He was also at a press conference today  saying that Saturday was a throwback with his old music and Gedo, and Gedo will be with him  at the Tokyo Dome,  but he’s coming as AEW Okada not New Japan Okada.  He said he might beat Tanahashi with a low blow and humiliate him in his retirement match.

— New Japan did talk to Tetsuya Naito about the match. Naito, who is in Japan and met with Okada, said New Japan discussed it with him and he was willing to do it.  But they chose Okada for the spot. As far as Shinsuke Nakamura goes, the only thing I know is he was interested in doing it.

— Added to the Tokyo Dome is Sho vs. El Desperado vs. Kosei Fujita vs. Taiji Ishimori with the winner becoming the top contender for Douki’s IWGP jr. heavyweight title. Why that match isn’t at a show in the next few weeks and Douki’s title defense against the winner isn’t at the Dome is an unanswered question.

— The Sarah Sweeney movie on Christy Martin opened on Friday and almost nobody that I know was even aware of it.  I didn’t even know until Thursday. Anyway, the estimate is that it will do $1.3 million on 2,011 screens. Smashing Machine did 4.8 million in its opening weekend and was considered a bomb. It is believed to be the worst grossing full national release movie (2,000 screens) in its opening weekend in 13 years.

— Mercedes Mone was in Rome, Italy, today defending the BetYa women’s title over Queen Maya, with the match ending when The Beat Mortos speared Maya.  

— Konosuke Takeshita worked for DDT today in Kumamoto, Japan, teaming with Sanshiro Takagi & Harahsima over To-y & Daicdhi Sato & Yuki Ishida.

— Also in Japan, Megan Bayne & Hanako won their tag team tournament match over Ami Sohrei & Lady C in Kissei. They also beat Aya Sakura & Sayaka Kurara yesterday in Gunma.  They are 2-0 so far. Bayne will be back in the U.S as she becomes the first person to do both a tag team tournament in the U.S. and Japan at the same time.

— Yoshiki Inamura beat KENTA yesterday at Korakuen Hall in Japan to win the GHC title. This and yesterday’s Ace Austin vs. Kyle Fletcher were the matches I’ve heard the most about.  Hank Walker & Tank Leder won the GHC tag titles from Masa Kitamiya & Takshi Sugiura.  Inamura defends against Kaito Kiyomiya on 12/7 at Korakuen Hall

— The deal with Miranda Alize & Stephnie Newell from last night at Collision is that they walked out before the match with Anna Jay & Tay Melo because they felt it was going to be a squash match. It was not about doing the job so  much as wanting a longer match and not doing a second match after what they believed was a squash match earlier. Still, people were shocked that they walked out. They were evidently told they’d get some offense in but they felt people would see it as a squash because it was going so short. They left and Hyan & Maya World were put in the match instead.

— While few caught it, for those in the Boston area who did, Dynamite will be in Boston on the 19th. They had a wrong graphic up that Tony Schiavone read listing the 19th for Reading, PA.  I’m not sure exactly what happened but AEW confirmed the show is in Boston and there was a mistake made. They weren’t even aware of the mistake until after the show was over. One year ago this week they ran Reading, PA for Dynamite and somehow something went wrong and that ended up on the air. The other cities in that read for the next few weeks were correct.

— The Observer Hall of Fame issue will be out on Friday. Multiple new people were voted in.  Most of the people who have to be in got in and there were some, I wouldn’t say surprises, but vote totals. We will also do a show covering it on Friday.

— Solofa Fatu (Rikishi) said that his emergency surgery was six hours long but didn’t go into details past saying the experience has changed his outlook on life.

— Google trends for a quiet weekend from a mainstream standpoint saw 20,000 for Charlotte Flair which was No. 149 for the weekend, based on a wardrobe malfunction and another 10,000 for Smackdown likely related to that. The UFC show yesterday had 40,000 which is very low.  Josh Hokit got 5,000 for doing his promo which sounded like he was imitating Chael Sonnen imitating Superstar Billy Graham.  

— Claudio Castagnoli was at the New Jersey Devils hockey game last night to promote Full Gear.

— Stephanie Vaquer was at the Rangers vs. Islanders hockey game last night to promote the Raw show on the 17th in Madison Square Garden.

— Joe Hendry worked last night’s NXT show in Tampa teaming with Je’Von Evans & Tavion Heights to beat Dark State’s Dion Lennox & Saquon Shugars & Cutler James.

— Regarding the Newell story, Truth Magnum did a comedy post this morning relating to that saying “Turbo and I almost walked out last night when there was no Caesar’s salad in catering.”

— Invicta will be airing a highlights show on Friday night at both 6:30 p.m. and 11 p.m. Eastern time airing some of the best recent fights. Tom Hannifan of TNA will host the show.

— A correction from Friday’s Observer. In the coverage of Yoshihiro Takayama we mistakenly wrote his paralysis was in 2007 but it was in 2017. (thanks to Jose Santana)

— With Jerry Lawler coming to Memphis Wrestling for the taping of the Christmas show, he would be the only person to appear in every incarnation of Memphis TV Wrestling from the WHBQ days through 1977 to the modern incarnation. Jimmy Valiant has been in every incarnation post the Jarett-Gulas split in 1977.

— Prestige and West Coast Pro in Los Angeles for the final Prestige show: Aiden Andrews & Bryce Kouza & Kaori Leon b Hadar Hovits & Ori Gold & Jiah Jewell, Travis Williams b Alpha Zo, Maya World b Miko Alana, Andrew Cass b Adrian Quest to retain the West Coast Pro Golden Gate title, Johnnie Robbie b Amira to retain the West Coast Pro women’s title in the match of the night, Titus Alexander & Starboy Charlie b Michael Miro & Vishnu Akli to keep the West Coast Pro tag titles, Kevin Blackwood b Judas Icarus to  keep the Prestige title, Vinnie Massaro b Royce Isaacs to keep the West Coast Pro title (thanks to Chris Champol).

–Ricochet appeared at last night’s Chicago Wolves minor league hockey game to promote World’s End.

— Today is the 28th anniversary of the 1997 Survivor Series with Bret Hart being manipulated into losing a match he was expecting to win via DQ. It ended up becoming one of the most talked about controversies in wrestling history and is to this day one of the five most famous U.S. matches of all-time.  

— David Otunga did a show on this and said that in his opinion Hart didn’t have creative control because Vince had already told him he was prepared to breach his contract prior, so thus the creative control stipulation and contract were invalid. Vince had not yet breached the contract in actuality but had said at one point he would if Hart wouldn’t negotiate a lower deal. He also said the clause was vague.

— And speaking of referees screwing up a famous match, Nick Patrick turned 66 today. Chris Jericho turned 55 and posted a photo of him with abs showing. Pete Dunne turned 32.  So I guess that means Rayo of Los Americanos is also 32. Rube Wright, who was also Lu Kim, a giant powerhouse who Stu Hart thought was one of the toughest wrestlers of his era, passed away on this day 42 years ago. Joe Scarpello, a legendary NCAA champion who had a long pro career passed away on this day 26 years ago. He was the guy killed by the Bombs Away by Ray Stevens in the original movie “The Wrestler” in 1974. Today is also the 40th anniversary of the interview Arn Anderson did when he was out there with Ric Flair, Tully Blanchard and Ole Anderson where he used the term Four Horsemen, just as a throw away line. (thanks to Tony Richards)

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Bryan Rose

Bryan Rose is an editor from California that has been covering professional wrestling for well over a decade. He officially joined F4WOnline as an editor in 2017.

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