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DREW-WWE STATUS, WILL WASHINGTON TO AEW, ALL IN: LONDON, SABU AND MORE

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Any truth to the rumor that All In: London won't be televised?

There is zero truth to that rumor.  AEW has yet to announce their plans but of course they are going to broadcast the show in some fashion.  Whether it's TNT or PPV or hell, HBO Max, remains to be seen but there's NO WAY AEW doesn't want that show to be broadcast live - it's their Wrestlemania III in terms of legitimacy, a massive crowd there, drawn by the company without anything announced.  They NEED to have that celebration live for the world to watch as it's happening.

True or false: Drew McIntyre has left WWE.

100% false as of this writing.  He has many months left on his current deal.  He will return eventually for the Raw brand and then they will go from there.  All it takes is for one conversation to close a deal and my guess is that won't happen until after Endeavor acquires WWE.

After all this time, Tony Khan brings in someone from creative and I have to give a big WTF is Will Washington and why should I care about a dirt sheet writer?  This sounds like such a dumb idea.

First of all, the term "dirt sheet" is asinine, outdated and you pretty much show yourself as exposed as dopey when you use that term as the crux of your argument, especially when you are emailing someone who makes their living writing about this world.

That said, you should care because any hire that can potentially help a company, AEW or not, get better, is a good thing.  Will Washington is a long-time podcaster and writer who most recently was with the Fightful website.  I've never met him but I'm told by mutual friends he is beyond passionate about the business and has an encyclopedic knowledge in terms of date, angles, talent progression, etc. not just for AEW but all of professional wrestling.  Tony Khan is and always will be a stats and analytics guy, so if he's approaching that hire from a "Moneyball" perspective, who cares if you know Washington or not, as long as he can bring something to the table. 

Washington started this week and I was told he was already making suggestions for ideas and angles.  It's always going to be the Tony Khan show but the more people you bounce things off of to enhance or better the ideas, the better things will be.  Paul Heyman had Tod Gordon to bounce stuff off of.  Vince McMahon had JJ Dillon, Pat Patterson, etc.  To me, whether someone comes from outside the business or is well known isn't as important as the aptitude they show or what they bring to the table.  If Washington can do that for AEW and it helps in any way, even ways behind the scenes that most fans will never know about, it's a good hire. 

We will see how it plays out but I don't see it as a negative - and I think for you to see it as a negative before he's even been there a week is pretty silly.  Let the guy succeed or not based on what he does now that he works there, not because of what he did in the past while on the outside writing or podcasting about it.   People said Khan would fail because he had never been in the business and you can feel however you want about creative and the company's decisions, but the reality is they've built a large-scale brand that no one since WCW died has been able to do - and just this week, we can look at the Wembley Stadium sales already as proof of that.  

I hate the idea of crapping on someone before he's been given a chance to show what he could do.  If Dave Scherer had listened to people who crapped on me back in 1995, I wouldn't be here now.  He gave me a chance and it OBVIOUSLY worked out.  Anyone who craps on someone they don't know before he's given a chance to show what's in his arsenal is, again, as asinine as you referring to things as a "dirt sheet."

Why doesn't Sabu wrestle anymore?

His body can't handle it.

There was talk the Mid-South Coliseum was being torn down.  What's the status?

It's still up in the air.  There have been discussions that it was saved but every so often, there's also talk of it being razed.  The last I heard, it was actually cheaper to keep it and renovate it vs. the cost of destroying it, but the longer it sits there unused, the more there is a likelihood of it being gone forever.  I think a big part of the issue is it needs a lot of upgrades at this point.  Obviously, from a nostalgia standpoint, I'd like to see it saved and used in some fashion, even if it's not an event space that hosts pro wrestling and concerts and such.  For more on the battle to save the Mid-South Coliseum, click here.

Whatever happened with the G-Raver arrest?

There is a pre-trial hearing slated for 5/25 in Pennsylvania.

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