


The Post’s Joseph Staszewski brings you around the world of professional wrestling every Tuesday in his weekly column, the Post Match Angle.
(The Post Match Angle will return June 6)
How much of a good thing in pro wrestling is too much?
It feels like a question that can be asked as the number of hours of wrestling on television continues to grow and grow.
The announcement last week of AEW adding a two-hour, primetime “Collision” show to Saturday nights on TNT beginning June 17 will bring the combined weekly TV hours of WWE, NXT and AEW to 12 across five of the week’s seven days.
That’s 624 hours a year, which equals 26 full days.
(The last time we had this was WWE and WCW doing a combined 12 hours per week in primetime in the late ’90s.)
Now let’s add in premium live events and pay-per-views using last year’s schedules for the three brands at a rough average of three and half hours per show, totaling 80.5 hours across 23 shows.
That makes roughly 30 full days out of the year sitting and watching pro wrestling, and that is without going and sampling Impact’s two-hour weekly show on Thursdays (another day of the week gone), Khan’s own Ring of Honor promotion, New Japan Pro-Wrestling, Major League Wrestling, Game Changer Wrestling or any of the other smaller independent promotions.
I’m glad the industry is growing at the rate it is — the chances for which I dove into pre-pandemic in 2019 — that more money is flowing in and there is more TV real estate for performers to work on.
But who has time for all that? (Thank God for DVRs!)
I can’t tell you how many times I’m sitting and watching wrestling on my phone, tablet or TV when my wife — who has for now tolerated my wrestling obsession for the past decade-plus — will ask me: “What could you possibly be watching now?”
This column and the fact that I’ve made covering the industry part of my job provides me a little bit of cover and reason not to miss shows.
Hopefully, others in the back half of the 18-49 demo will be so lucky and so driven. Those on the young side may have to glue themselves to screens even more than they already likely do with the expanded lineup of shows, movies and documentaries available to us now across many media platforms. It feels like viewing choices and the time crunch is only growing.
(Or maybe I’m just getting old — approaching 40 — and am starting to yell at clouds?)
AEW is obviously doing something right in Warner Bros. Discovery’s eyes to be given two more hours a week for Collision. As as long as WBD keeps cutting checks, that’s all that really matters for now.
But AEW’s creative and storytelling ability is really going to be put to the test, having to come up with compelling TV over four primetime hours when its ability to do it over two for Dynamites has already been questioned. A roster split could help and Rampage, because of its time slot, hopefully showcases more up-and-coming talent in fresh stories, like the YouTube Dark shows did. They should at least get strong ticket sales for the weekend show.
Saturday nights will come with different types of challenges, from people going out or having company over, primetime college football, WWE premium live events and potentially some UFC and boxing undercards.
Viewing choices will need to be made. Maybe you sacrifice a little of Friday to watch Saturday or vice versa, or you don’t buy a Saturday PPV because you can watch Collision for free. Maybe sneaking in an ROH, Impact, NWA or MLW will be sacrificed?
Whatever the case, two more hours of primetime wrestling is potentially going to create an even bigger viewing crunch for fans, forcing more decisions than ever. The quality of one’s product will become that much more important.
After you’ve watched Cody Rhodes wrestle a match with a real torn pec, overplaying an injury angle to potentially protect him and make him look tough feels totally unneeded. But WWE did it anyway Monday night on Raw, with Brock Lesnar leaving him with a storyline broken arm heading into their match at Night of Champions — one that even Triple H had to oddly come and check on.
Rhodes looked pretty dumb thinking it was a good idea to confront Lesnar a second time after he had already been injured. It also feels like WWE being over protective of Rhodes, needing there to be a reason for him losing to Lesnar in Saudi Arabia to setup a trilogy. Let’s see how it’s executed, but it all felt a bit much much.
One of my previous issues with AEW was they didn’t do enough segments outside traditional wrestling settings on their weekly TV. That has begun to change in a positive way recently. We recently got The Firm Deletion at the Hardy Compound and a fun vignette from the Briscoe Farm.
Then last week on Dynamite we saw Chris Jericho and Roderick Strong take their extremely entertaining falls-count-anywhere match (that included soft-serve ice cream as a weapon) into a stairwell and outside the arena. It allowed Adam Cole to attack Jericho since he was prohibited by court order in storyline from entering the building. Add to that The Elite and the Blackpool Combat Club brawling in the parking lot and this is starting to become a refreshing trend.
Becky Lynch’s hand glasses were incredible and so was her bringing up Trish Stratus having to bark like a dog on Raw in 2001. The Man still spits fire like no one else.
There were a lot of rumors and chatter being thrown around last week about why CM Punk wasn’t included in the “AEW: Collision” announcement. Until Tony Khan announces a venue other than the United Center in Chicago this week for the show’s debut, none of this should matter one bit if Punk is ultimately delivered.
Maybe something forced a change, but the Outcast storyline that has little to do with the AEW women’s championship now leading to a PPV title match between Jamie Hayter and Toni Storm feels underwhelming.
Wishing a speedy recover to Mercedes Mone’ from her ankle injury. If it’s broken as reported, we may be left to wonder would could have been this summer.
It might have been more interesting for Duke Hudson to do a better job running Chase U than Andre Chase — leaving the students to question who should really be in charge. Instead, NXT had him pay zero attention to Thea Hail losing.
While I might have liked a little more drama around a returning “Hangman” Adam Page being accepted back into The Elite, what Don Callis and the Blackpool Combat Club have done probably left little need for it. Kenny Omega nodding and handing him the broom was a nice moment, so was their promo after and segments on “Being The Elite.”
There is a little Shayna Baszler in how Zoey Stark is being presented right now and it’s working.
WWE really seems to have very little luck with its women’s tag team division with real injuries to Liv Morgan and Dakota Kai. Then it goes and spoils Raquel Gonzalez’s mystery partner as quickly as they mentioned it
So Taya Valkyrie comes back from suspension, tells Jade Cargill she will see her at Double or Nothing, and immediately gets a match after losing to the TBS champ because she distracted herself. Got it.
Am I the only one who when I see Karrion Kross threaten someone I think, “Oh that’s the next guy who is gonna to beat him?”
Roman Reigns and Solo Sikoa vs. Kevin Owens and Sami Zayn, Undisputed WWE tag team championships, Night of Champions (Saturday, 1 p.m., Peacock)
This weekend is loaded with three pay-per-views, but when wrestling’s best story appears to be headed for a crisis point, you pay attention. Roman Reigns could leave Saudi Arabia with his third and fourth championship belts and The Bloodline may be still be left hanging on its last thread. Imagine if he loses. The tension between The Usos and the Tribal Chief will be front and center.
Willow Nightingale, AEW/New Japan
Mercedes Mone’s ankle injury put a little bit of a damper on things, but NJPW Resurgence was a career night for the 29-year-old Nightingale. She defeated Momo Kohgo and then Mone’ in the main event to become the first New Japan Strong women’s champion. Her match with Mone’ was superb and got a huge crowd reaction — until the injury slowed things down — and so did her victoty. This could be the start of something for Nightingale.