AS I SEE IT
Bob Magee
Pro Wrestling Between the Sheets
PWBTS.com
This week, AEW decided to fight back after a Wrestlemania
weekend where it seemed that WWE spent as much time taking
shots at them than promoting their tremendously successful
weekend of events; including Paul Levesque telling free
agents that hadn't signed with WWE that they were lazy, Pat
McAfee telling Rhea Ripley on his show that the other
company (that her partner works for) only draws 600 per
show, and Michael Cole snarking about internet wrestling
marks....
So this past Wednesday, AEW aired footage from what's been
called Brawl In...the backstage incident between Jack Perry
and CM Punk that caused CM Punk's firing.
Now....was the idea to do it as a ratings ploy? Of course.
Did it work?
Viewership was up 29% from last week, and up 17% over the
prior 6-week average. It saw the highest viewership since
February 28 and the highest 18-45 since January 17.
But that's for this week.
It'll have to help bring viewers to next week's Dynamite,
and more importantly, to Dynasty. Then we'll know if it was
worth it. Not before...and not because some website told you
it meant AEW was dying for the 65,987th time.
Beyond that, the only point IN airing the footage was to
further the GTR-Bucks match at Dynasty...and to (re?)
introduce the Scapegoat Jack Perry character. It did just
that. The obvious next step is for The Young Bucks winning
the Tag Titles over FTR at Dynasty, presumably with the help
of Jack Perry.
First, though, the airing helped draw a crowd for NJPW's
Windy City Riot show in Chicago this weekend that drew
double their last Chicago event. where Perry came out draped
in the Chicago flag, only to drop it to show a jacket with
"Cry Me A.River" on the back and pants in a broken glass
pattern.
Then, there were those who whined about Will Ospreay's promo
on Paul Levesque's snarky answer as to why WWE hadn't gotten
more big free agents recently when he said
“If you’re not in it for the grind at that point early in
your career, you have no business being here.”
Speaking with Renee Paquette in an interview on Dynamite,
Ospreay fired back at Levesque: “Normally I wouldn’t rise to
this type of bait. But seeing as the guy who said it is only
in the position he is in because he was grinding on the
boss’s daughter, you are in no position to tell me what the
grind is all about, my friend, because you have no idea what
I fight for...So let this be a painful little jab back and a
gentle reminder, that you do not throw stones at an assassin
with a machine gun"
Put yourself in Will Ospreay's position. You're the top free
agent available. You (and later Kazuchika Okada) choose to
sign for more money and better work-life balance...and
you're called lazy...oops, "not embracing the grind".
As for WWE defenders who say Levesque is right and Ospreay's
lazy? Will Ospreay has earned enough travel miles to earn a
free trip to the damned moon. He went back and forth from
Japan monthly for 8 years. This includes during COVID, when
wrestlers had to isolate for weeks after landing in Japan.
So he's anything but lazy.
Don't believe me? Here are the actual numbers from previous
years (courtesy: Cagematch) from 2016 forward: he has years
of 150, 158, 121, 124, 52 (2020/COVID), 78, 73, 70 matches.
He traveled from the UK to Japan to the United States and
back again for as many as 27 different promotions.
It came down to money and not wanting to move his family to
America. If YOU got a choice of more money and getting to
allow your family (including a step-child who's in primary
school) to stay where they know or moving to America,
uprooting their lives with no guarantees...wouldn't you?
Dave Meltzer added clarity to this when he reported that
Ospreay's partner, Alex Windsor, and her son had endured the
suicide of her previous husband in 2020, so staying in the
UK where she had family support was a major priority.
So with all that...wouldn't you be pissed? I know I'd be.
So, despite what you've read on Prowrestlingnewz.com, the
Ospreay promo against Triple H wasn't Tony Khan's idea, but
was Ospreay's Ospreay felt that when he'd talked business
with Levesque, who then mocked his work ethic and dedication
to the business, he had to respond. Khan cleared his promo
when Ospreay brought it to Khan, and was willing to take all
the heat for it...but Khan went all in with the promo.
Ospreay came in early to get it right because it was
important to him. He worked so hard to get it right because
with all his greatness, he deals with the challenges of
being on the spectrum, and having ADHD and dyslexia. He's
mentioned it before, but it was detailed during a HeyEW
interview with RJ City that's available on social media this
weekend.
