00:00A WWE legend thinks Jey Uso is being held down, CM Punk wants an AJ Lee return, was
00:06Joe Hendry buried and more. I'm Luke Owen and this is the WrestleTalk News.
00:17While the Triple H era of WWE has been a major upgrade over the previous era, one of its
00:22crowning achievements did come from that previous era. The Bloodline formed as a group during
00:26the Thunderdome times of WWE, and have been a dominant and featured force on Raw and Smackdown
00:31ever since. They've headlined PPVs, main-evented WrestleManias, and its Tribal Chief Roman
00:36Reigns was WWE Champion for over 1,000 days. Well, that's if you truly believe that Roman
00:41is the Tribal Chief, I think that's currently up for debate.
00:44Not only that, but Jimmy and Jey Uso also had success, holding the tag titles for over
00:49300 days. The Rock returned to WWE, turned heel and joined the group. And since Roman
00:54left our screens following WrestleMania, Solo Sakoa has become Smackdown's top heel
00:58with a new Bloodline around him, featuring Tama Tonga, Jacob Fatu, Tonga Loa and Tonga
01:03Loa's botched spots.
01:04The Bloodline has been the most talked about story, faction and angle in WWE for years,
01:10and the fan speculation is that we might see Roman return at Summerslam, which will lead
01:15to his original Bloodline reuniting to take on Bloodline 2000 in WarGames come November.
01:20But all of that isn't quite enough for one member of the Bloodline family tree. Rikishi,
01:26the father of The Usos and Solo Sakoa, has been very vocal over the last few months about
01:30a perceived lack of push for Jey Uso.
01:33Jey has been one of the more overactive of 2024, with his Yeet merchandise selling very
01:38well at live events and on WWEShop.com, but he hasn't had a proper storyline since he
01:43beat his brother at WrestleMania, a match that he himself admits was a disappointment.
01:48He fought Damian Priest over the World Heavyweight Championship at Backlash, but that's about
01:52it. He's only wrestled 10 times on Raw since WrestleMania, two of which were King of the
01:57Ring tournament matches.
01:58And now Rikishi has spoken out again against WWE and their treatment of Jey Uso, feeling
02:03that he's being held down. He said on his Off The Top podcast,
02:07They're not doing a damn thing with Yeet. My opinions, why? Why do you not push or give
02:12the most popular babyface, in my eyes, be it my son or not, if the Yeet Master or Yeet
02:17Man is over, why? How come? What is the problem? Not giving this guy some type of title. Something.
02:23Win something. It'd only be good for business, wouldn't it?
02:27Rikishi argues that Jey Uso is over, he's selling merchandise, he's pushing ticket
02:32sales but WWE are not capitalising on that momentum that Jey Uso worked for. In particular,
02:39Rikishi feels like he shouldn't have been left off the Summerslam card, and is quite
02:42insulted by the most recent developments where he's been flirting with Rhea Ripley.
02:46That's the best those writers got? Let's write this guy into a relationship with mummy?
02:51What are y'all trying to do, break his marriage up? Y'all can't put him in a good storyline,
02:55so what are you going to do now? God forbid you guys try to sell tongue kiss each other
02:59on Raw. S***, that better not happen.
03:02What do you make of Rikishi's comments? Do you think that WWE are not doing enough
03:06with Jey Uso? Let me know in the comments down below.
03:09And while you're checking out the comments, why not check out this clip from this past
03:12weekend's Who Really Killed The Original NXT?
03:18The following month Barrett got his prize for winning the first season of NXT, a shot
03:22at any title he wanted, and he cashed that in for Night of Champions 2010 against WWE
03:27Champion Sheamus… in a match that had 4 other guys. He did not win.
03:32Caval, for the record, cashed in his title shot opportunity on the Intercontinental Championship
03:36at that year's Survivor Series. He lost, and then was released one month later.
03:42Someone who did make it onto the SummerSlam card is one CM Punk, who announced on this
03:46past episode of Raw that he's now officially medically cleared and will be facing Drew
03:50McIntyre with Shawn Michaels, I mean Seth Rollins, as the special guest referee. Of
03:54course CM Punk gets to be the Bret Hart in this storyline.
03:57After a rather, shall we say, tumultuous time in AEW, CM Punk in his WWE return has been
04:04a different story. And one of the big positive reports to come out about Punk since his return
04:08has been his spending time down in NXT, particularly with Cora Jade and Roxanne Perez, and the
04:14current NXT Women's Champion has spoken about working with Punk and how they both
04:18want to see a certain someone return to WWE. Perez told Pro Wrestling Illustrated that
04:24wrestling AJ Lee, CM Punk's IRL wife, would be a dream match, and that she's doing all
04:30she can to convince her to get back in the ring. And so is CM Punk.
04:35She said,
04:36"...Punk tells me that he's doing the same thing. He's trying to get her to, like,
04:39come back, pulling her in. But I hope one day she decides to come back and have a match
04:43with me."
04:44Would you like to see AJ Lee return to WWE? Maybe have a run down in NXT? Let me know
04:48in the comments down below.
04:50And if she does come back, there will be some new faces for her to… face, as Fightful
04:54Select are reporting that WWE have signed a deal with another free agent.
04:592024 has seen WWE pick up Julia and Stephanie Baker, the latter of which had an offer from
05:04AEW that she turned down in favour of WWE.
05:08And now Corey Brennan of Fightful is reporting that Australian wrestler Delta has signed
05:12a deal with WWE.
05:14Delta got attention from the company during her tryout ahead of Elimination Chamber, which
05:17was held in Perth this year, but oddly feels like years ago, and Brennan reports that she
05:22has been given the all clear to finish up her Australian dates before moving to the
05:26US to work with WWE full time. But, um, Stephanie Baker had to pull out of her New Japan and
05:32Repro dates, huh?
05:34Brennan adds that Delta is scheduled to head to the US next month, and while there is no
05:38time frame on her WWE debut, she will report to NXT along with Baker and Julia.
05:43What's been really cool about this news on Twitter and stuff like that is that a lot
05:47of people are now looking to find out more about Delta, and get an idea of what she's
05:51like before she debuts. To be honest, I don't know all that much about her. The only Australian
05:56wrestler I really know is Simone Williams, and that's because she was on The Traitors.
06:00So if you do have any recommendations for Delta matches, let everyone know in the comments.
06:05But while Delta is making moves to the US, All Elite Wrestling is looking to stay exactly
06:10where it is.
06:12The ongoing talks between AEW and Warner Bros. Discovery have been a big talking point for
06:16a lot of 2024, especially if you're a wrestling star of the 1990s looking to stay relevant
06:21in 2024 by talking about it on a podcast hoping to get headlines on websites and aggregation
06:26on Twitter.
06:27But while WWE sewed up all of their TV deals late last year and early this year, Smackdown
06:31to USA, NXT to CW, Raw to Netflix, AEW are yet to announce their TV deal. Tony Khan has
06:38spoken about being approached by other networks, but he wants to remain loyal to WBD as they've
06:43had such a good relationship over the last five years. But that negotiation period is
06:48almost up.
06:50So what's the latest?
06:52Fans noticed over the weekend that AEW's content library started appearing on Mac's
06:56Warner Bros. Discovery streaming platform, which looked to be a positive sign between
06:59the two parties. And that, well a new deal announcement must be imminent, right? Fightful
07:04Select are reporting that an announcement won't be imminent as the deal is expected
07:08but not done. Sean Ross Sapp reports that the framework of a deal is in place, it just
07:13hasn't been agreed to by both parties. He writes both AEW and WBD expect a new deal
07:19to be reached and the relationship to continue and say things continue to be amicable. SRS
07:24adds that Tony Khan and WBD's David Zaslav are scheduled for a meeting in Paris during
07:29the Olympics, but that is not a guarantee a deal will be signed there. Fightful add
07:34that WBD offered a deal to AEW a few months ago, but AEW didn't agree to it so they're
07:40still negotiating.
07:41Someone who won't be around for that new deal should one get signed is Frankie Kazarian,
07:45who was one of the first people to sign with All Elite Wrestling back in 2019. He signed
07:50as part of the group SCU with Christopher Daniels and Scorpio Sky. The group were a
07:53heavily pushed act in the early days of Dynamite, with Sky and Kazarian winning the tag titles
07:58and Sky pinning Chris Jericho on TV to set up a world title match. However the group
08:02was split up in 2021 when they ran an angle that if they lost to The Young Bucks, Kazarian
08:06and Daniels wouldn't team up again. By this point, Sky had turned heel and split away
08:10from the group and started tagging with Ethan Page. SCU lost that match to The Bucks and
08:14Kazarian would leave AEW in 2023 to rejoin TNA where he wrestled a lot in the 2000s and
08:212010s.
08:22And now, Kazarian has taken a shot at his former employer, responding to a fan on Twitter
08:26who said that AEW dropped the ball with SCU saying, should have never been broken up,
08:32along with a gif of Chris Jericho saying that it was, a stupid idea from bad creative.
08:36Kazarian has had more success since his return to TNA, even appearing on NXT in their Battle
08:41Royal to crown a new number one contender where he eliminated Joe Hendry. And last night's
08:45NXT saw a video appearance from Hendry because someone must have said his name. But he did
08:50not have the TNA World Championship with him. In what could be argued as the most TNA thing
08:55possible, TNA looked at one of the hottest acts in all of professional wrestling and
09:00decided to put their world title on Dolph Ziggler, the ex-WWE guy. I absolutely adore
09:06you TNA.
09:08Dolph Ziggler, who now wrestles under his real name Nick Nemeth, has defended that choice
09:11on Busted Open Radio, saying that The Lost did not bury Joe Hendry. He said, a lot of
09:16people going, Joe Hendry got buried. The least thing you could ever say about anyone in that
09:21match was someone got buried. What an amazing moment. We set up a bunch of stories for a
09:26bunch of people. Joe Hendry is coming for the world title.
09:30Nemeth argues that putting the title on Hendry might have got more views on YouTube, but
09:34he wants to work with him now to make sure that he'll be ready to be the top guy when
09:39TNA does pull the trigger.
