Welcome to the December 13th Inside The Ropes Live blog, bringing you the latest news from WWE, AEW, NJPW, IMPACT Wrestling and more.
Today’s biggest stories:
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CM Punk = numbers.
Since ‘The Second City Saint’ returned to the WWE he has been a consistent draw for the company both in the ratings and online.
His latest achievement drawing 1,500,000 views on a face off against Seth Rollins this Monday on Raw.
If you haven’t already you can check out this incredible moment below!
WWE’s The Bump gets into the Christmas spirit as Mick Foley joins the show! Plus, Drew McIntyre discusses his recent actions on Monday Night Raw and his upcoming match with World Heavyweight Champion Seth “Freakin” Rollins at Raw Day One.
Check it out at 6pm UK below!
During last night’s episode of NXT, a new faction was officially named.
Drew Gulak, Charlie Dempsey, Myles Born and Damon Kemp have been teaming in the White and Gold brand for several months now, however, until last night the faction did not have a name.
During the start of last night’s episode of NXT it was announced that The Family would be taking on Charlie Dempsey and Drew Gulak who were representing the “No Quarter Catch Crew”, on NXT Level Up.
Despite the new name, Dempsey and Gulak were unsuccessful with Channing Lorenzo and Tony D’Angelo picking up the win.
What do you think of this new name? Let us know by hitting the thumbs below!
Jey Uso talks to Alex McCarthy about WWE’s creative direction and otpions, the landscape moving forward, main eventing Wrestlemania, working with Roman Reigns and his brother and much more.
Check it out below!
The numbers are in for this week’s episode of Monday Night Raw and is good news or bads news for Triple H and his team? Well let’s take a look and find out.
The numbers, courtesy of Wrestlenomics, are as follows:
Raw drew 1.466 million total viewers with a 0.46 score in the 18-49 demographic.
This is a 4% drop in overall viewership compared with last week (1.533 million) and a 6% drop in the key demo coming down from 0.49 last week.
The December 11th episode of Raw was the first show to face direct competition from the NFL since early September which may have had a knock on effect on the show numbers.
What did you think of this week’s episode of Raw? Let us know hitting the thumbs below!
This Friday, December 15th, Ring of Honor will present it’s annual Final Battle PPV.
Here is everything currently announced for the marquee event.
– Dalton Castle vs Komander vs Kyle Fletcher vs Lee Johnson vs Lee Moriarty vs TBD in a Survivor of the Fittest Finals match for the ROH World TV Title
– Keith Lee vs Shane Strickland
– Athena vs Billie Starkz for the ROH Women’s Championship
– Tony Nese vs Ethan Page in an I Quit Match
– FTR & Mark Briscoe vs Blackpool Combat Club in a Jay Briscoe Memorial Fight Without Honor
Will you be checking out the PPV? Let us know by hitting the thumbs below!
While at a promotional event to promote his Prime drink, Paul was picked up by fellow YouTube star KSI and given an Attitude Adjustment through a table on the stage as the crowd cheered on.
Check out the bonkers moment below!
The moment KSI threw logan Paul on the table 😳 pic.twitter.com/nBnNkmGurw
— KSI NEWS (@ksinews_) December 10, 2023
How would you rate Logan Paul’s WWE run so far? Let us know using the thumbs below!
What do Dominik Mysterio, Randy Orton, The Harts and The Rock all have in common?
Well, according to one WWE Hall of Famer, an understanding of the business and the art of wrestling that you can only get through coming from a family of wrestlers.
Speaking on SiriusXM’s “Busted Open Radio” show, Mark Henry would compare Dominik Mysterio to the likes of The Rock, praising the former North American Champion for his understanding of the business.
Henry would note:
“I put him in the same category as The Rock and the Harts and people that come from pro wrestling…
They have [a] legacy — Randy Orton.
There are things that Dominik does that are just intuitive. You can tell he just picked it up. It’s not trained. I mean, you have a lot of reps, so I guess you can consider it to be trained, but he just does stuff that I’m like, ‘That’s a kid out there playing with his toys.’
He knows what he’s doing. And all those years of watching his dad…and all those years of knowing what the bad guy did, knowing all of those things of what his dad had to fight through to get to be who he was. I think it’s paying dividends for him.” [h/t WrestlingInc]
Do you agree with Mark Henry? Let us know by hitting the thumbs below!
MJF and Adam Cole have been ROH Tag Team Champions for 108 days, despite this Adam Cole has defended his Championship just once before suffering a serious ankle injury during AEW Dynamite Grand Slam.
MJF has continued to defend the titles on occasion, once in a 2-1 handicap match and the other teaming with rival Samoa Joe.
However, Tony Khan did, at least for a moment, give some consideration to stripping Cole and MJF of the titles.
Speaking during the ROH Final Battle 2023 media call, Tony Khan responded to a question on the matter from Bleacher Report’s Chris Mueller.
Khan noted that although he did consider vacating the titles he felt it more important to have Cole and MJF maintain the belts as they are a great tag team for the company and have been a huge part of AEW’s success in 2023.
Do you think Tony Khan has made the right decision? Let us know by hitting the thumbs below!
CM Punk’s First WWE Match Confirmed
CM Punk is set for his WWE in-ring return and it’s not against who you might have expected.
Punk is currently engrained in a heated feud with WWE World Heavyweight Champion Seth Rollins with the pair finally coming face-to-face during this week’s episode of Monday Night Raw.
However, CM Punk will be making his in-ring return during a WWE Live event on Boxing Day 2023 and his opponent is not ‘The Messiah’ but instead a former prison convict and no it’s not Nailz.
At Madison Square Garden on December 26th CM Punk will face off against Dominik Mysterio in the former WWE Champion’s first WWE match in nearly a decade.
The iconic venue would announce the match via social media.
Taking to Twitter, MSG wrote:
“JUST ANNOUNCED: CM Punk will be live at The Garden on Dec 26 for his first match in WWE in over 9 years as he goes one on one with ‘Dirty’ Dominik Mysterio at the @WWE LIVE Holiday Tour.”
It was also recently announced the CM Punk’s return has made a major impact backstage in the WWE.
Are you excited to see CM Punk back in the WWE? Let us know by hitting the thumbs below!
WWE Superstar Nikkita Lyons has made her long-awaited return to in-ring action after almost a year side-lined with an ACL injury.
During the December 12th episode of NXT, Lyons returned to the ring in tag team action.
The Lioness would team with NXT Women’s Champion Lyra Valkyria to take on Blair Davenport and the returning Cora Jade in the shows main event.
Davenport and Jade would eventually come out on top with The Sorceress of Sin pinning the NXT Women’s Champion and making her title intentions known.
Are you excited to see Nikkita Lyons back in NXT? Let us know by hitting the thumbs below!
One top AEW star has heard the speculation online and find responded to claims that they are romantically involved with WWE star Liv Morgan.
CJ Perry, FKA WWE Superstar Lana, took to social media to share a behind the scenes video from her time at the recent Iron Claw movie red carpet event.
In the video MJF is being photographed with Liv Morgan whilst the pair are complimented for looking good by the former Ravishing Russian.
Morgan would comment that she is just here to support MJF, whilst the AEW World Champion, ever the troublemaker, would comment that he on the other hand is here to start more dating rumours.
I had an incredible interview with two great #wrestling stars @YaOnlyLivvOnce & @The_MJF at the @ironclawmovie @A24 movie premiere!!!! pic.twitter.com/EZKcvO7Ypg
— CJ Perry (@TheCJPerry) December 12, 2023
Morgan and MJF had previously been photographed together at a part back in 2022, this was then followed by an online hoax reporting that Liv Morgan was pregnant with MJF’s child…something Liv Morgan decide to get a laugh out of by liking and laughing at the report publicly over on Instagram.
MJF was recently confirmed to be dating former MLW talent Alicia Atout.
Good Afternoon!
I hope everyone is doing well and had an awesome weekend!
I will be with you from 2pm to 6pm BST (9am – 1pm ET) covering all the biggest stories from WWE, AEW, NJPW, IMPACT and more.
We will be kicking things off today with the biggest stories from the last 24 hours including:
