wrestling / Columns

Truths And Lies 05.06.14: WWE/TNA Week In Review

May 6, 2014 | Posted by Justin Watry

Aaron won the contest last week, so here is his opening:

“I wanted to be a part of your column for the first time even though I’ve emailed you before about an argument on Facebook that you loved and why. The same thing applies, that I’m a big fan of your work and your process of thinking has molded mine for the better, and I can’t thank you enough for it. I’ve even started writing for myself and became a blogger for RingsideNews and I’m having a lot of fun with it.

I wanted you to know that WWE and TNA superstars aren’t the only inspirations in the wrestling world, writers can be too. And you Justin Watry are an inspiration to me and my future work. Thank you very much for everything that you do. I look forward to reading your work on NoDQ and 411mania every week.”

Excellent. Thank you sir for your entry and win! Now be sure to keep reading, as I have a MAJOR ANNOUNCEMENT below…

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Comments

Note: I will happily respond to comments, as long as they do not have insults or cuss words. Sadly, most still do not grasp the very simple concept months later. Here are some of the best from last week!

Strawberry Swing: I get your argument about Batista’s physique but surely the point isn’t that the people behind their computers are better, it’s that they AREN’T expected to be performing to a certain standard, on an international level for the WWE. Not to mention, the main event of Wrestlemania.

Whereas, Batista is. It’d be like Batista criticizing their ability at WoW.

Says StrawberrySwing with a picture of a strawberry representing himself/herself on the internet…

My point (and Batista’s) stands.

Rob: Well I technically already bought Extreme Rules. Through the WWE Network. The whole Network is worth the money.

Same here. I rarely even watch WWE Network content during the week, to be honest. Just the live pay-per-views alone gives me the $10 per month value. As long it keeps running properly, I will keep tuning in. Payback is next…

Ronnie O’Murphy: Dear Mr Watry, I comment with the upmost respect and with no curse words in the vein hope you reply to this, You said in you “Truth or Lies” article of last week:

“Eric Young is Eric Young. I have NOTHING against the man personally, but the decision to put the TNA Title on him was wrong on 1,000 different levels”

Can you list the 1,000 different levels? Or at least, say, the top 50?

Please don’t bail out and say “you were being sarcastic”, I know as a proper wrestling journalist you are above that. So, please, I look forward to your response.

Proper wrestling journalist? Is there such a thing? Seriously, I was being sarcastic…

…okay, just kidding. How about this? The first couple hundred reasons is for how many people that actually show up for TNA live events. The next few thousand is for each of their remaining PAYING customer for Sacrfice watching him in the main event. The next couple hundred is for every non-paying tourist who got in the door for FREE. The next 400,000 reasons are for the amount of people who did NOT watch Impact the week after he won the TNA Title. With no NBA Playoffs that week, so save the excuse. Need I go on? At the end of the day, it is a business. Eric Young can have 50 fishing television shows for all I care. None of that is going to help TNA with increase ratings, live event attendance, PPV buy rates, etc. Absolutely none of that. This is just the latest in a long line of baffling moves made by TNA Impact Wrestling. Just yet another chapter to the inevitable Fall and Fall of TNA DVD…

SpankyHamm: Who thought to bring in a children’s choir? Who thought to put the sheep masks on them? Who thought about having one of the kids sitting on Bray’s lap to close the segment?

Because that person deserves a raise and a promotion to head of creative.

Unless it was Stephanie or HHH because we can’t give them credit for anything.

Yep, pretty much! Seems about right. Seriously though, that choir was so great. Could be the best Raw segment all year!

Dan: Curtis Axel won a match. – Why?

To set Rybaxel up as legitimate contenders?

Welcome to the column! Must be your first time reading.

Jason Andreas: Wasn’t Drew de-pushed because of backstage shenanigans due to his wife, though, Justin, rather than ability in the ring?

I’m trying to think of the last time he was allowed to look good. Was it Elimination Chamber, when he hurled Rey Mysterio through the chamber plexiglass like a lawn dart?

Yeah, he has had moments of greatness every once in awhile. The Drew-Taryn situation was in August 2010. By that time, The Chosen was not so much the “chosen one” anymore. It seemed the de-push was already beginning BEFORE his wife was arrested. He did even have a match scheduled for the Summerslam pay-per-view. After nearly four years, it is water under the bridge…and still nothing but 3MB stuff for Drew McIntyre. That tells me there are likely other things going on behind the scenes or maybe, juuuuuuuust maybe he is not destined to become the main event talent many predicted.

Adam Wright: Justin, I have a legitimate question about Impact’s low ratings, I don’t ask this as a TNA hater, or superfan but just someone who is confused.

WWE has had it’s 3rd tier show, Main Event, dropped by the network for low ratings, just like every other 3rd tier show it has run over the last decade .(Superstars, Saturday Morning Slam, Heat, Velocity & ECW). These shows had a viewership of around 1 million, yet even with the WWEs bargaining power they were dropped.

How is it that TNA with surely less bargaining power has remained on the air for 5 years when they have also only been averaging about a million viewers?

Fair question. There are two main reasons.

1. WWE is likely charging more. No idea what TNA makes off television revenue from Spike, but it is obviously MUCH less than anything WWE related. Thus, network will want more than one million viewers. Main Event was just recently more in the 1.4 million range, but ION probably wanted more. Remember the show started with CM Punk vs. Sheamus in a non-title WWE vs. World Champion match. Then it slowly faded from there. Just liked Superstars on WGN in 2009. The first episode saw THE UNDERTAKER wrestle Matt Hardy! Then it slowly faded from there. My guess is WWE was making good money, while the networks were expecting Smackdown or Raw like numbers. When the contracts were up, they bolted. Long story short – WWE has bigger expectations, which brings me to reason two…

2. Spike TV is content with those numbers. A couple of shows on Spike TV do better than TNA Impact. If TNA Impact was on USA Network, TNT, TBS, or any ‘major’ cable network, they would have canceled by now and shown the doors. Their ratings would not be acceptable in prime time for them. USA Network, TNT, and recently VH1 have all canned shows getting 3-4 million viewers in the past few months. Yet, TNA can survive on Spike TV with one million viewers.

TheDisqusInferno: You know TNA is in deep trouble when Watry makes valid criticisms about their direction.

Or TNA has always been in deep trouble (on air), and my criticisms on their direction have always been valid? Think about that. Hey, Dixie Carter ‘playing wrestler’ on TV and Eric Young as TNA Champion! Who am I to argue?

Are you all getting excited for my MAJOR ANNOUNCEMENT now? Do not scroll down just yet…

*everybody scrolls down*

*There were tons of great comments last week. Lots of fun stuff discussed. However, a few choice words made it impossible to warrant an actual reply. Oh well…*

Truths: TNA Impact Wrestling (5/1/14)

Note: My commitment to covering this show full-time ended in January. However, I will watch from time to time. For those curious, I will be tuning in to the pre and post TNA Sacrifice episodes.

1. Dixie Carter is still the worst thing on all of television. – Why is Dixie Carter back in the spotlight? Did this not all wrap up at Lockdown? if MVP can simply throw her out of the building, why has this all been going on? Just ban her and move on. Oh right, Dixie wants to be a”star” and ‘play wrestler’ on TV. Right, I forgot. It is past the point of being bad, terrible, or even dreadful. I just feel sorry for her and am embarrassed by whoever is writing these segments. What makes it worse is Dixie is feuding with a face pandering to the crowd named BULLY Ray! One of the top heels is a good guy feuding with Dixie FREAKIN Carter? Yet, fans wonder why TNA is back in the Impact Zone with 400 non-paying tourists…

2. Ethan Carter III is officially a comedy character. – So much for the long awaited Kurt Angle vs. EC3 match. Instead of actually building it up for Slammiversary and at least trying to get pay-per-view buys, it will happen next week. For FREE! Of course, it will happen next week. Color me surprised. Kurt Angle just sounds so bored and unenthusiastic about this all. He is openly talking about a WWE return and with his body in shambles, not much good can come of this. Oh, and Rockstar Spud can join Dixie Carter in getting off television. Just mind boggling he is even on Impact, much less wasting time every week with his ‘comedy’ that is not funny and only dragging EC3 down from being a legitimate threat. Sorry but w

3. The Wolves and Sanada win a six person tag. – Short filler match as expected. No issues there…but Jessie E and Robbie E can join Rockstar Spud and Dixie Carter in getting OFF television as soon as possible. DJ Z is okay – just not in his current role. I know TNA is forced to use cheap/new talent these days with all the budget cuts. I get that, but really? Bro Mans? With no other teams though, that would leave The Wolves to battle themselves. Do not worry though. The Bro Mans will get their rematch in a ladder match next week for FREE! Sure, why not? Slammiversary is only a month away. Why bother creating interest in something? Just throw it on the following Impact show, like everything else.

4. Magnus feuding with Abyss is NOT interesting. – It seems Magnus has a friend looking out for him. He came from NXT, and I have no idea if he is any good. As noted above, TNA is not exactly breaking the bank on new guys, so it is par the course for the company in 2014. What I do know is that Magnus vs. Abyss does not interest me in the least. It is confusing enough that Abyss still gets this much attention in 2014, but they had a match last week on Impact. Remember that 0.69 quarter hour rating? Yeah, that should sent a loud and clear message. Instead, it is more of the same with two guys who recently turned heel, one going back face at the drop of a hat, one having somebody backstage yelling at him, yet we already saw the match last week…and I did not care. A week later, I still do not care.

5. The Beautiful People segment rings hollow in 2014. – Gail Kim, Madison Rayne, Velvet Sky, and Angelina Love in a segment with the Knockouts Title? It think it is May 2014. I think. I thought there was someone new involved (Brittany), but it was so sudden I can not be sure. Seems like the same four girls in TNA for the past decade. Besides the obvious cheap ratings ploy of seeing two girls strip, none of this made sense. Gail Kim was upset over The Beautiful People disrespecting the division, only to cheer getting their clothes ripped off? Huh? Whatever, enjoy the ratings “pop” here.

Lie: Eric Young lost the TNA Title. – Hey look! Yet another TNA Championship match on FREE television! That is five since Lockdown I believe. Maybe more, I have lost track. Who buys their PPV events for $40 again? Anybody still out there? Just watch their television show. Next week is ECW/Angle, a ladder match, and probably another TNA Title match! Then pay up $40 for Slammiversary! YAY! Or just illegal stream it. Or just not care. Either way, the entire set up was ridiculous. MVP makes Gunner. Bobby Roode, and Mr. Anderson pick ‘high card’ for a mini-tourney and a title shot. That is what it has come to. Gunner wrestler twice in the first hour, which I never, EVER want to see again. James Storm is still hanging around. Then Roode ends up getting the title match against Eric Young, only to lose clean. To add to the mess, Roode shakes hands with Young afterwards in a sign of respect. Please tell me he is not turning face. All of this happened in two hours. Yep, two hours instead of a few weeks allowing it all to settle in. Why not do one match per week, leading to Young vs. Roode at the PPV next month? Oh, silly me. TNA hates PPV buys and must toss everything out there on TV in a rushed, untimely fashion. Sorry, I forgot. Eric Young is still their top champion, and it is still as bad as it was last month. He can defeat the entire roster and be a fighting champion all he wants. At the end of the day, it is Eric Young holding a (not) “World” Championship.

*Blah show. Nothing as bad as last week but still the usual nonsense. Anything with Dixie Carter on my screen automatically gets a fail. Add in Spud and Bro Mans, and you have a surefire way to derail any kind of excitement. I can only imagine what Knux will do next week with his carnival friends. With Samuel Shaw off television, it seems TNA wanted to replace that nonsense with even more over the top nonsense that does nothing but waste precious TV time. Oh well, start the count down to Slammiversary. Start the count down to gimmick matches on FREE TV and nobody caring about the actual pay-per-view in a month. My Thursday night viewing goes to the NFL Draft this week. No Impact reviews for me until June. Maybe even later than that.*

One step closer to my big, huge, monstrous, enormous announcement!

Truths: WWE Smackdown (5/2/14)

1. The Wyatts defeat Sheamus and The Usos. – Good way to start the show. The Usos do not not a match at Extreme Rules. Sheamus is not wrestling on Sunday. Thus, logic says Bray Wyatt picks up the pin fall victory. Simple formula. Nice backstage promo from the group later on as well with that creepy song playing. Whole world in his hands…

2. Dean Ambrose is still the United States Champion. – Just merge the US and IC Titles. I appreciate the effort into making me care about Dean Ambrose main event Smackdown defending his gold, but it rang hollow. The title is hardly even seen much less defended. The Shield stood tall heading into Extreme Rules, so that was good. Not sure Ambrose had to retain though. Felt like a perfect time to move the strap on to somebody else.

3. Rob Van Dam vs. Jack Swagger was too short to matter. – Right when it started, it ended. I hope that is not an omen for Sunday night with Cesaro in the mix. Give these guys some time. I have confidence in each of them to deliver a quality outing. With nothing truly on the line here, it would not hurt to produce a great match over a ‘filler’ match. Still not sold on Paul Heyman being the biggest heel in the world…yet hyping up Cesaro for crowd cheers. No sense.

4. Titus O’Neil looked better than Big E on Smackdown. – What was up with this thing? A giant brawl and disqualification finish? For what? Who was the face here and who was the heel exactly? I thought Titus actually looked good here, not Big E. If some effort is put into his heel turn in the coming months (not likely), it may be worth a try.

5. Daniel Bryan is ready for Kane. – This was something I wanted to see out of Daniel Bryan MORE in the past few months. The ‘Yes!’ chants are great. The matches are great. The promos against The Authority are great. All of that is great, but Bryan rarely gets fired up and shows anger! He does once in awhile but not nearly enough with all of the screwjobs he had to deal with. After Kane went after Brie Bella on Raw, he showed awesome fire (no pun intended) and got me pumped for their match at WWE Extreme Rules. Job well done. That promo alone may have gotten a few extra fans tuning in on Sunday.

Lie: This was a wonderful go-home show. – Eh, it was decent. Daniel Bryan got me excited for Extreme Rules. The Wyatts looked strong. The Shield looked ready for Evolution. Rusev did his thing with R-Truth and Xavier Woods. Then came the Hornswoggle/El Torito contract signing hyping up their pre-show match. Damien Sandow lost to Dolph Ziggler. The two hours did not come together very well, even if there were a few bright spots. With it being very important for WWE to hit one million subscribers to their network by the end of 2014, it would have been nice to see a *bit* more incentive to sign up.

As noted above, the big stuff was entertaining. The filler stuff had nothing to do with Extreme Rules, so that served zero purpose this week. Like I said on Twitter though, the Blue Brand centered around The Wyatt Family, The Shield, and Daniel Bryan on Friday night. Hey, that sounds good to me in May 2014…

Getting closer. You can just feel the tension build. My announcement is almost here.

Truths: WWE Extreme Rules (5/4/14)

1. Cesaro keeps winning. – Good! There was no other option here. Cesaro defeated Rob Van Dam, after Jack Swagger was already eliminated. Not just find a way to fix Paul Heyman being a huge heel yet managing Cesaro at the same time, and we are talking. Also, shame on Michael Cole and Jerry Lawler for not knowing this was an elimination rules match. Pretty bad moment there when RVD pinned Swagger.

2. The Bray Wyatt creepiness is only just beginning. – As I wrote last week, my belief is WWE liked the very strong reaction to the choir on Raw. I know I was creeped out. Thus, it was easy to suspect some kind of wackiness was coming with a kid at Extreme Rules. If this is not your type of thing, you probably just shook your head in disgust. If you are a fan of the Wyatt Family, then this is right up your alley. Do not be surprised to see even MORE of this “Children of the Corn” stuff…

3. It was time for a new IC Champion. – It really was. Big E went nowhere fast. Despite his guarantee to keep the IC strap in a recent interview, it rang hollow. Too little, too late. Bad News Barrett was a great character on the JBL & Cole Show, and it was cool to see him finally put all the pieces together to make the gimmick work on Raw/Smackdown each week. That brought him the Intercontinental Title at Extreme Rules. Now, hopefully, he does NOT lose countless non-title matches and go nowhere with the belt in the coming weeks.

4. The Shield defeated Evolution. – You think this would finally stop all the complaints, right? Nah. Batista came back to win. He will not lose. Randy Orton must win for his championship rematch. Triple H needs to get his victory back after losing at WrestleMania XXX. Blah, blah, blah. Same stuff, different day. The Shield can wrestle six person tag matches better than any six men. Ever! Surprise, surprise. The trio beat Evolution as clean as can be. Great work all around.

5. All the winners were the RIGHT winners! – Credit WWE. It is real easy to bash/trash the program and “fantasy book.” It is another to actually do follow through with the correct choices. Every single winner at Extreme Rules was the RIGHT winner! Cesaro beat RVD. Rusev won. Paige defeated Tamina. Barrett became the new IC Champ. The Shield went over Evolution. Bray Wyatt got a win over John Cena! Daniel Bryan retained his WWE World Championship. Perfect slate of outcomes there. Gives props when it is deserved. WWE hit a home run at WMXXX last month and came through again at Extreme Rules with every single match result.

Lie: Daniel Bryan did NOT main event the show. – Remember how WrestleMania XXX seemed to prove many theories wrong and shut up a lot of critics? Now we arrive at the laughable “Bryan will not be booked well as champion” claims. The fact that this was the final match of the evening was a welcome sight and surprised me. The Shield vs. Evolution looked to be the real main event of Extreme Rules, with Daniel Bryan vs. Kane being beneath that. Of course, that immediately brought out all the conspiracy theorists about Bryan’s WWE World Title reigns being secondary, tossed to the side, and all that jazz. Well, go in the corner and sit down. Daniel Bryan was (again) firmly placed in the final slot of the show.

*I did not see the pre-show, so I can not comment…but Hornswoggle vs. El Torito read pretty well. Maybe I will check it out tomorrow. Otherwise, the three hours were well worth the $10 per month subscription fee. Was it worth $50 for those who bought it on PPV? Maybe, maybe not. Either way, it is cliched to say, but the future is bright in WWE. That is two for two under the WWE Network. Stream worked perfectly. Picture was clear, and the wrestling delivered.*

Truths: WWE Raw (5/5/14)

1. I am trying to be nice here… – …but do we really need more Daniel Bryan vs. Kane silliness? Extreme Rules was fine. It gave the new WWE World Champion a good title defense and allowed the veteran another main event match. To do this for another month? That is asking a lot. The stuff with Brie Bella and Stephanie McMahon has been pretty distracting and nothing I want to see from Daniel Bryan. Hopefully, these two do indeed have the rumored Buried Alive match at Payback to end this feud once and for all! The one, one, one, one, ONE bright spot in all of this is that fans can rest easy in knowing that Bryan is going to remain WWE World Champion.

2. Wrestlers competed twice on the same show. – This is just one of my (rare) pet peeves in wrestling. Despite the obvious safety concerns, I have no desire to see guys compete twice on the same episode of Raw/Smackdown. A Money in the Bank cash-in or something like that is okay. What we saw on Monday night…no thanks.

3. Sheamus is the new United States Champion. – At Extreme Rules, Dean Ambrose literally threw down the United States title belt and kicked it during his entrance. Yes, go watch the replay of The Shield coming to the ring on Sunday night. The WWE Universe has hardly even seen the championship for the past year. It was a few months overdue, but we finally have a new US Champ. Sheamus is an interesting choice. I would have settled for just about anybody at this point. Raw was held in New York, so it is hard to judge the crowd reaction to The Celtic Warrior winning the 20 man battle royal. Heel? Face? Whatever. The Shield rolls on, and the US Title is far away from Dean Ambrose. Win-win situation.

4. Adam Rose debuted. – Some are going to call this a bust on his first night. Others are going to call it fun. No matter what side of the coin you fall on, I am going to enjoy watching WWE play this out. Does it fall flat and get taken off TV in a few weeks? Hello Kizarny! Does it work for awhile (Fandango) and win over fans? Or will it have staying power? I have no clue. What I do know is that just because something worked in NXT (Emma) does NOT mean it will work on a much bigger stage. Good luck Mr. Adam Rose!

5. The Shield vs. The Wyatts was the Raw main event. – Another good outing from the six wrestlers, no shocker there. In the end, Evolution provided a distraction, just enough for Bray Wyatt to win for his team. I guess that means another Shield/Evolution showdown is coming. The heels took out Roman Reigns, Dean Ambrose and Seth Rollins. That was probably the right call. Batista, Randy Orton, and Triple H DO have to look strong at some point, if they keep losing on pay-per-view. Big gimmick match at WWE Payback? Sounds good to me.

Lie: The Cesaro/Paul Heyman story is growing on me. – I am ready to just throw my hands in the air and accept that Cesaro is a heel. He destroyed Rob Van Dam in a one on one match and continues to have the backing of Paul Heyman 100 percent. While he gloats about Brock Lesnar ending The Streak at WrestleMania XXX. Cesaro was doing great work in February and Match of this year. Did WWE really have to partner him up with Heyman and keep him as a heel? Seems like a strong face was about to emerge. No doubt, Cesaro is talented enough to make this work, as is Heyman. I am just not on board with the duo.

*Good show. Sheamus is the new US Champ. The stable wars continue on. Adam Rose made his debut on the main roster. The Kane nonsense was not very good; Bryan beating Alberto Del Rio was solid though. Los Matadores and 3MB can move on to other things. The rest was fairly routine. WWE Payback is in four weeks, so the card should be set next week. I look forward to it.*

Ask Yourself

The next time you read an online report, ask yourself if the story actually makes sense…or is your typical gossip with no truth whatsoever. Just from the past week or so, let’s take a look:

Raquel Diaz (Shaul Guerrero) released from WWE – She already quit once before, and Vickie Guerrero (her mother) is rumored to be thinking about leaving as well. My guess is both may just want to move on from the business, at least for awhile. WWE would likely hire them back.

Mason Ryan released from WWE – How could this be true? WWE only likes big guys with huge muscles. Duh! The very intelligent internet fans tell me this every day. Where have you been?

WWE signing KENTA and Prince Devitt? – How could this be true? WWE only like big guys with huge muscles. Duh! The very intelligent internet fans tell me this every day. Where have you been?

Bill Goldberg interested in WrestleMania 31 match – Oh, goodness gracious. Not another year of this…it has only been a FULL DECADE since his last WWE match!

Hulk Hogan added to WWE-Japan live events for ticket sales? – See, now this I buy into. Perfect use of Hulk Hogan in 2014. Perfect! Put his name on the advertisement, sell more tickets, have him come out to the ring and cut a promo, then pose before leaving. Very simple logic.

WWE Smackdown takes a massive viewership/ratings hit last Friday night – Ouch! This was not just a small decrease or little increase that is irrelevant. The Blue Brand lost a huge amount of viewers from the previous week (and previous weeks as well). We will see if it is just a one-time thing or what happens next. Sheamus defending his newly won US Title is the only thing advertised. I doubt that does much.

John Cena to appear on Main Event – WWE is still trying to draw attention to their Tuesday night program. Any little bit of effort helps. Can not blame them for sticking to their guns.

Original plans for Batista at Payback – Ah yes, I love the “original plans that never end up happening, but here it is anyways well after the fact” news bites. Good old fashioned made up BS online. Always worth a good laugh. Let me get this straight: Batista has a problem losing to Daniel Bryan at Payback before taking time off but tapped out CLEAN in the MAIN EVENT of the BIGGEST show of the year at WRESTLE FREAKIN’ MANIA! Okay. Then WWE has ‘no other plans’ for him, despite the obvious Evolution reunion taking place and being teased for awhile now. Riiiiight. Why is this junk reported again? Oh right. Batista is a big, stupid Hollywood meanie head poopy face, Bryan is perfect, and WWE hates small guys! Just HATES them all. Clearly…

Edit: Oh look, Batista lost clean on PPV Again! He will. He will not. He may. He may not. He could. He could not. So embarrassing this is presented as news. Props to Batista for the clean loss and shutting up his critics. Again!

Backstage thoughts on Daniel Bryan right now – *sighs* I thought we were done with this nonsense. Yet, here we are in May 2014 still trying to spread it. After nearly a full year of Daniel Bryan being in the main event scene and getting clean wins over Sheamus, Randy Orton, Kane, John Cena, Batista, The Shield, Triple H (and others), garbage reports are still coming in about his standing in the company. Still.

Bar Rescue drew 1.898 million viewers on Spike TV – Wow, that is a pretty big number. A re-run of Bar Rescue also grabbed over a million viewers on Sunday. Same as a new Catch A Contractor episode. Needless to say, those are a lot more viewers than TNA Impact Wrestling, and both more than doubled/tripled them in the main demographics as well.

Ink Master drew 1.453 million viewers on Tuesday. – Plus doubled TNA Impact Wrestling in the main demographics. Even Tattoo Nightmares does equal to TNA Impact these days. Add on to the Sunday night lineup (discussed above) for Spike TV too absolutely crushing anything on the network. All the while, Impact scored a whooping 1.1 million viewers (again falling out of the Top 100 in demos while a rerun of COPS made it). Still no television renewal for TNA announced. I assume it is coming at some point, but nothing yet…

Have any more examples? Please share them below in the comment section. Until then, just remember the next time you click on an article to ask yourself first how much will be truth and how much will be fiction.

The stalling is over. Here is the big announcement I have been teasing all week on Twitter…

This Is My FINAL Truths & Lies Column!

In case you have been living under a rock the past few weeks, you may have noticed a few small things changing here on 411wrestling.com recently. News is being treated differently. The schedules are switching up. Columns are going to have style changes. Some things with the mobile version/comments were being tested out and such. Some of you probably even helped out with the process. If so, props to all of you. Many things will indeed be staying the same going forward, but please be on the lookout for new features.

What does that mean for this column? Well, that was foreshadowed last week when I asked for a reader to provide the opening. It seemed like a good way to send this thing off into the sunset. Truths & Lies is officially no more. Relax, I am not going anywhere. Do not worry, I will still be writing columns. I will still be here each and every week discussing wrestling. This particular column though, in its current format, will be going bye bye. To tie up any loose ends, I will do my usual reader feedback from the comment section in an edition of Jay’s Ways (on another website) later this week. If you wish to read my reply to any comments made below, it will be later this week in Jay’s Ways.

My next column on THIS website (about Extreme Rules/WWE Network subscribers) will be posted soon! Stay tuned.

Fashion Blog

My sister just started her own fashion blog. Everybody should go check it out immediately. Click it. Read it. Love it. The brand new Twitter account to follow is right here! The actual website is right here!

Ink Master On Spike TV

Another successful week. So far, so good.

Self-Promoting Finale

Finally, here are some “ME!” plugs for all of you…

Just Google my name.

The Layfield Report Columns – NEW COLUMNS ADDED
Read Jay’s Ways – READER FEEDBACK LATER THIS WEEK
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Justin Watry