iWiN4PreP

Here is what I will say on Sami Zayn: I was 100% against turning Zayn Heel when they did it. He is a natural babyface in a company that doesn't have natural Baby faces in abundance. However, they weren't using Zayn. I feel like they were not going to let him rise as a babyface, so turning him heel has allowed Zayn to consistently be in the main event picture/main story picture, even if it is being used as the heel that gets owned on every PPV. He has been able to show some of his talents, which is nice.

One of my favorites, Sami Zayn, will be out for the rest of the year with a shoulder injury. One of the only reasons to tune into Raw (even if they misused him terribly).

lol, Both Ronda and Bliss kick ass. Ronda has the star appeal from being a celebrity and champion while Alexa is pure bliss on the microphone and character wise. If only the writers could perform coherent storylines that helped the other females, it would help all in the division including Ronda and Bliss.

Wow, this is great news! However, the Sox must be weary to not trade Abreu for a JD Martinez-like return. The astros are loaded with prospects that they can't seem to find positions to play. Abreu makes a lot of sense for them and they know they have another WS championship caliber team. Give me Tucker + JD Davis for Abreu + ____ (RP?). Am I crazy? PRobably. But I DO NOT trade Abreu just because. As others have stated -- he is the white sox soul. I go to the park to watch Abreu (and moncada). If you are trading Abreu, you need to get a return worthwhile. Bottom line and I don't care what 'standards' are set in place from previous trades.

Those guys hate each other... or at least haven't talked since they had a very bad segment together. http://rajah.com/node/62823

Also Charlotte is posing nude in an ESPN thing. It's a no make up no filter type thing for empowerment. That's pretty damn awesome. She is truly the Queen and one of the best in WWE. Her legacy may go down as the very best in this era's / generation's talent pool.

That's a really bad reason to say no thanks to it. In 5-10 years those teams might be cellar dwellers.

There was a report a few weeks ago that Big Cass did something off script that he was specifically told NOT to do. He has been noted as having 'severe heat' backstage due to that incident. https://www.cagesideseats.com/wwe/2018/5/10/17340856/wwe-upset-big-cass-going-off-script Anyway, this servers to re look at his career and what could have been. If only WWE did not prematurely end Enzo and Cass. Now they both are gone when they had a very hot tag team there. WWE does not care about the tag team division (not my understanding, it is literally their own dictations). If they had any care for their tag division, then teams like Enzo and Cass and Gallows and Anderson would have been very successful a year or two ago. Ah well.

Day off today so lets go with YOAN MONCADA

You guys either missed the point, didn't read the post, or are just trolling. I actually complimented MITB PPV in my post (for the most part). The wrestling hasn't been the problem with WWE, but rather the horrific storylines and logical consistency there of. I merely made a comment based on reading the 'play-by-play' that all the matches feel the same on PPVs. Think of matches like Rollins/Elias, Rollins/Miz, and other IC title feuds of recent memory... there's no spice. What I mean by spice I think can better be explained with two notes. 1) Finisher spamming is done to death in WWE. No longer are finishers protected (other than the F5). This hurts match storytelling a lot. Also, there's no in depth storytelling going on in the ring. Think of workers like Ric Flair and Brett Hart. When these guys wrestled, you watched them tell a story in the ring where it did not need to be conveyed via words. That's what I'm missing in WWE PPV match quality, otherwise -- things are OK/Good in terms of match quality. While Alexa has a ton of skill when it comes to entertaining/being on the mic, the reason this statement is true is not because of that, but rather how badly every other woman on the roster is booked (Ronda maybe the exception).

Abreu

NXT Takeover - Even with a meh card, the matches performed extremely well (as usual). I am a huge fan of the story and matches of Gargano/Ciampa, but the overall feud seems to be dragging to die. Matches are phenomenal, so w.e. MITB - I wasn't able to watch this (kinda glad I didn't). The matches seem on par (based off what I read) with the normal WWE PPV quality. WWE PPV Matches these days seem to do the same formula over and over.... hit some moves in the early opening (slow going), build up to a fast pace, hit some finishers, and build to an eventful finish. While that is nice and all, it's very repetitive. They need more spice in their shows. The booking decisions were good last night. Albeit, they booked themselves horribly going into it. Having Bliss win and interupt Ronda/Nia's match was the smart thing to do to avoid Ronda or Nia as champion. Having Ellsworth cost Asuka the match was a good way to keep Asuka strong against a very weak Carmella. Having Strowman win is a great step towards possibly dethroning the useless beast in Brock Lesnar (and NOT having Reigns face Lesnar : Note reigns is DONE). Having Lashley destroy Zayn was the right choice due to their storyline. Maybe it's a step in the right direction, but man things were bad going into this PPV.

Yolmer Sanchez

Tim Anderson

Yoan moncada

Abreu

That would be ideal. The wife and I would enjoy that on what is likely going to be a hot day game.

Yo all, Any tips on eating/drinking on a budget at Guranteed rate field? I will likely be going to tomorrows game. The wife and I don't drink alcohol (she might have one drink, but that im not expecting to find deals on), but rather things like pop/soda? I hate spending the insane like $8 for one small soda.... is there any refills (free) anywhere or any large drinks for cheap? Thanks.

Some fantastic discussion so far. I'm not sure where I stand on the issue of playoffs, but I am leaning towards no additions being made, or the only addition being a 3-game wild card playoff instead of the 1 game.

Happy I get to watch this one. Been working a lot. Let's go Moncada.

I want to pick Moncada.

Hate to say I told you so, but wow, what a boring playoffs. Everybody and their mothers could have predicted GSW vs. CLE and GSW winning pretty easily many months before this.

You make excellent points throughout your entire post. I think this quote could be said for a lot of the wrestlers (maybe over 90% of them). Lack of direction is a huge problem. The streak ending leading to no pay out is probably the biggest failure on the booking team since they destroyed Bayley at the hands of Bliss (mainly the 'this is your life Bayley' segment). You are damn right. If there was a company that I felt put out a compelling wrestling product and was head to head with WWE, I'd choose it 10 times out of 10 over the current product. The key thing that WWE has is its time slots are great for viewing. I have no idea how to watch things like TNA or even when they are on. I want a weekly show that I can sink my teeth into, and unfortunately, WWE does that well by having MON/TUE and then the PPVs on Sat/Sun.

Absolutely. The talent is there by far, I just can't tell if the writers are the main problem or if its upper management. I can't imagine anyone is this bad at writing storylines on a week to week basis. It's shockingly bad. I'd take a third graders essay-story over most of the writing in wrestling right now.

Abreu