On Sunday night Samoa Joe would surprise fans by announcing via a video on Twitter that he was relinquishing the NXT Championship less than a month on from winning it at NXT TakeOver 36. He wouldn’t give any specific details other than he was injured and would be out for a “brief but undetermined amount of time.” The video was done in character, and he would offer condolences to the next champion as he would be coming for them.

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The fact Joe is vacating the title is somewhat concerning, considering Finn Balor broke his jaw while NXT champion and WWE gave him three months to recover. This seemingly suggests that Joe will be out longer than that. With him only wrestling once since suffering two concussions, everyone will be hoping that this injury is not concussion-related.

This past April, Joe was actually released by WWE after the company reshuffled their commentary teams. With him not being cleared to wrestle at the time, he was deemed surplus to requirements. However, it’s believed Triple H did not agree with this decision, and following a meeting at the Performance Center, he was brought back and quickly put on NXT. His return to the brand would see him initially become an authority figure as General Manager William Regal’s enforcer, giving him the additional time he required to get medically cleared.

This past Monday, Jeff Hardy briefly appeared following a 24/7 Championship match to help catch Reginald along with Shelton Benjamin, Humberto Carrillo, and Jaxson Ryker. It was the blink-and-you-miss-it cameo, and seeing the former WWE Champion chasing the least prestigious title in WWE resulted in him trending on Twitter with fans saying he should join his brother Matt in AEW.

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Now in an interview with 98.5 The Sports Hub’s Wrestling Inside The Ropes, Hardy would briefly address how WWE is booking him. Somewhat surprisingly, he didn’t appear to be unhappy and said he did what he was asked to do.

While Hardy would almost certainly be welcomed by AEW, he signed a contract extension with WWE in 2020. At the time, he was in a decent position on the card, winning the Intercontinental Championship from AJ Styles, and then worked a program with Elias. Recently, though, he has been losing matches to wrestlers you would typically expect him to beat and appearing on Main Event. While it would be understandable if he was frustrated, he seems OK with how his career is going based on this interview.

In 2020 Bronson Rechsteiner, the son of Rick Steiner, who was previously with the NFL’s Baltimore Ravens as an undrafted rookie, had a WWE tryout. It was a no-brainer for WWE to look at the 6ft 230lb athlete based on his proven sporting ability and who his father and uncle are. Later, during a media conference call ahead of NXT TakeOver: Vengeance Day, it would be confirmed by Triple H that the 23-year-old had been hired.

With an NXT revamp coming next week, it is believed fresh talent will soon be introduced to the show, with Rechsteiner among them. Based on his college and NFL career, it had been assumed that he would be going by his real first name and the shortened version of his famous surname. However, he has now updated his social media accounts, confirming that he will be wrestling with the ring name Rex Steiner.

Since signing with WWE, the second-generation wrestler has been training at the Performance Center and made two brief cameo appearances on WWE television. The first was as a zombie during the much-maligned lumberjack match between The Miz and Damien Priest at WrestleMania Backlash. The second was as a security guard trying to restrain Samoa Joe, and he was put in the Coquina Clutch.

WWE likely has high hopes for Rechsteiner because he is a high-caliber athlete and has grown up around the business. However, being the son of a legendary second-generation wrestler doesn’t guarantee success, as the careers of David Flair, Ray Gordy, Scott Putski, and Shawn Stasiak prove.

SmackDown this week was remembering the tragic events of 9/11, which took place twenty years ago. WWE was running a show in New York for the first time in two years, and scheduled to compete on the show was Zelina Vega. This was a very special event for her as she lost her father, Michael, at just ten years of age as he was on the 103rd floor of the North Tower when it collapsed.

In a recent article with Yahoo Sports, she would deem the show “one of the most important days of my career.” This was due to her father getting her interested in wrestling and taking her to shows at MSG where SmackDown was taking place. Additionally, she had new gear made for the occasion and was considering paying tribute to him subtly by writing his name on her outfit.

Sadly for Vega, SmackDown would run long, and WWE decided to cut her match along with a segment with Kevin Owens. This resulted in fans across social media expressing their displeasure with WWE. Vega herself hasn’t commented, although she did go on to Tweet out a photo of her gear with the caption “nevermind.“

nevermind. pic.twitter.com/xyyrIA1wYR

— ZV (@ZelinaVegaWWE) September 11, 2021

Vega would thankfully get to pay tribute to her father as she participated in a memorable event that took place on Saturday. She would say she loves and misses him, hopes he is proud and asks him to look after her and the rest of the family. You can watch an excerpt of this emotional moment below.

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Vega made her return to WWE two months ago after previously being fired for breaking their rules regarding making third-party deals. Due to her father, her dream had always been to wrestle for WWE, and except for when she was signed with TNA, she would try out for the company every year after becoming a wrestler in 2010. She eventually got her opportunity to wrestle in a WWE ring in 2016, facing then NXT Women’s Champion Asuka on a 2016 episode of NXT. Nine months later, she was offered a WWE contract and took on the name Zelina Vega.

TMZ has reported that former WWE star Al Snow saved a child from drowning this past Thursday. The incident occurred at Santa Rosa Beach in Destin, Florida, and Snow says he was alerted to the boy in danger by their screaming. A lifeguard was on the beach, however, Snow didn’t believe they would make it in time, so he took the initiative and saved the boy himself. Thankfully both Snow and boy were uninjured, and it’s fair to say Snow officially qualifies as a hero.

The 58-year-old wrestling veteran is best known for his time in WWE in the ’90s and early 2000s, where he got over thanks to carrying a mannequin head. Despite his now advancing years, he remains an active wrestler, and many people remark that he looks better now than in his prime. Nowadays, though, his main focus is on training talent and running Ohio Valley Wrestling which he previously owned.

Jonathan Coachman, also known as “The Coach,” has a long history with WWE after starting with the company in 1999 as a backstage interviewer. He’d go on to make make a shocking transition from behind the announce desk to being an occasional competitor and even the interim General Manager of Raw. However, after almost a decade with the company, he decided to take up a new challenge and went to work for ESPN. After eight years away, he began making occasional appearances and re-signed with the company in 2018.

Unfortunately, this second full-time run wasn’t as noteworthy as his previous one, and he’d end up being replaced by Renee Young as a Raw commentator.  Now in what is being advertised by AdFreeShows as his final wrestling interview, he has blamed Corey Graves for his departure from the company. He’d state his former Raw announce partner didn’t want him there and wanted to work with Young as they were good friends.

After leaving Raw, he would host pre-PPV preview panels and then worked on the short-lived reboot of the XFL but since then has had no further interaction with Vince McMahon’s companies. He would go on to say in the interview that he’ll never work for the company again due to them having him forgo time with his family but not being there for him at the end.

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Sadly WWE has a track record of asking their talents to go above and beyond and then not standing by them when they’ve deemed them of no further use. Thankfully for Coach, he doesn’t need WWE to make a living due to his time with ESPN establishing him as a legitimate sports broadcaster. He currently works for NBC and provides coverage of golf tournaments on PGA Tour Live. Additionally, he does voiceover work for the Madden NFL games.

Before departing WWE, Adam Cole had a meeting with Vince McMahon prior to an episode of SmackDown. It was believed to have gone well, and McMahon tasked creative with coming up with ideas for bringing him to the main roster. While all these proposals aren’t known, Dave Meltzer has reported on Wrestling Observer Radio the concept WWE wanted to use was to make Adam Cole a manager on their SmackDown brand.

He would have been the mouthpiece for a heel Keith Lee, similarly to how  Bobby Lashley worked with Lio Rush previously, with the dynamic being Cole would talk trash and hide behind Lee. Meltzer would add that the former NXT Champion would have likely undergone a name change due to Michael Cole being on SmackDown.

Cole became a free agent on Friday, August 27th, after failing to agree on a new contract with WWE. Meltzer would speculate that Cole wasn’t even aware of this pitch which it’s doubtful would have impressed him. The actual belief is the sticking point with Cole staying with WWE was wanting to keep his Twitch channel, which went against WWE’s policy of allowing main roster talents to have third-party deals. By not allowing that, WWE essentially handed Cole over to AEW, where he is now part of The Elite, having debuted at All Out.

Kevin Owens began teasing leaving WWE earlier this week. Initially, he tweeted and then deleted the coordinates for Mount Rushmore. This is relevant because, in 2013, he was part of a PWG faction called “The Mount Rushmore of Wrestling,” along with the Young Bucks and Adam Cole. He then would update his Twitter to read “Almost there,” while the Young Bucks had theirs set as “There.” Obviously, this doesn’t mean he is definitely headed to AEW. Still, with his contract expiring in January as initially reported by Fightful Select, it is a realistic possibility.

Now adding more specific detail, Dave Meltzer on Wrestling Observer Radio has reported that Owens’ deal expires on January 31st, 2022. This means, as of writing, he is signed with WWE for just 144 more days if he doesn’t re-sign. It’s hard to imagine WWE won’t offer him a new deal, considering how heavily featured he has been since debuting on the main roster and losing another talent to AEW will only add to the perception that AEW is the pace to be. Therefore Owens appears to be in a great position to negotiate a great deal regardless of where he ends up.

Owens spent over a decade on the indies before signing with WWE in 2014. He’d join the Raw roster in 2015 and work a program with John Cena, defeating him at WWE’s Elimination Chamber pay-per-view. However, arguably his most memorable feud in WWE so far came when he was aligned and then feuded with Chris Jericho, which featured the Festival of Friendship segment. Currently, he is working with Happy Corbin on SmackDown, and a match with controversial YouTuber Logan Paul is currently being teased.

WWE has issued a statement on WWE.com revealing that Triple H underwent a procedure last week following what they described as a cardiac event. This is usually another way to say heart attack, and the statement says a genetic heart issue caused it. Thankfully he is expected to make a full recovery.

While best known for his legendary in-ring career, Triple H currently works for WWE as their Executive Vice President of Global Talent Strategy Development and COO. On a day-to-day basis, he is heavily involved in running NXT as an executive producer. However, it was recently reported that Vince McMahon and Bruce Prichard are now handling the bigger picture.

Hopefully, the 14-time world champion does indeed fully recover and can return to what he loves doing as soon as possible.

Not since the days of The Mondy Night Wars has there been so much speculation on wrestlers switching promotions. At present, the jumps have been one-sided, with AEW in acquisition mode, while WWE seems happy to let talent leave. That said, WWE did put up a fight to keep Adam Cole, and just as his situation has been resolved, another wrestler’s future appears now to be in question.

That is because Fightful Select has reported that Kevin Owens’ WWE contract is expected to expire in January, and while that alone may not mean much, there has been a couple of clues that Owens may be looking to join AEW. The first came when he tweeted and then deleted the coordinates for Mount Rushmore. This is relevant because he was part of a PWG faction in 2013 called “The Mount Rushmore of Wrestling,” along with the Young Bucks and Adam Cole. Secondly, his location on Twitter is set as “Almost there,” while the Young Bucks have theirs set as “There.“

Of course, this doesn’t mean Owens is definitely AEW bound. He could simply be having fun on social media with his friends teasing fans, or like Randy Orton, flirting with AEW to get a better deal from WWE. Vince McMahon will likely offer Owens a very generous contract to keep him away from AEW as the perception currently is that AEW is the place to be. This puts Owens in a very favorable position where he could set himself up for life.

Owens has been with WWE since 2014, and since then, has held the Universal Championship, NXT Championship, and both the Intercontinental and United States Championships on multiple occasions. Overall, he has always been prominently featured and worked with the company’s biggest stars, including John Cena, Roman Reigns, and Randy Orton. It’s believed despite his body type not being typical of what McMahon is a fan of, he is very highly valued in the company. However, a fresh set of opponents and the opportunity to reunite with old friends may be too much for Owens to turn down.

Mick Foley is a WWE legend and firmly in the WWE family, working on multiple projects with them over the last year. So given that, it was unexpected to find out he has questioned the promotions creative process in a video shared across his social media accounts. In the video, he explains that WWE needs to take AEW seriously when attracting new talent, specifically mentioning the poor job being done with Karrion Kross. But, most surprisingly, he even reveals that he isn’t sure he’d trust WWE today with his career if he were an aspiring talent.

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The sentiment isn’t unique, with countless fans sharing similar opinions, however coming from Foley, given his relationship with the company, it is shocking. It’s clear from the video Foley cares for WWE and just wants them to do better by their talents. Perhaps given his legendary status, WWE management will actually listen because AEW is becoming the place to be.

CM Punk made his triumphant return to the wrestling ring this past Sunday, wrestling Darby Allin. While fans in Chicago were delighted to see him in action for the first time in almost eight years, his unfamiliar attire did cause some discussion. Punk was wearing long tights with stars down the side, and while there was nothing wrong with them, it was strange seeing him wearing that style of gear for many.

Seemingly Punk heard about the debate as he would post a poll on Twitter asking fans if they preferred the long-style tights, short trunks, or possibly an Andre the Giant singlet. Voting was only available for a few minutes before the poll was deleted. Still, as you can see in the below screenshot, short trunks were comfortably winning.

It will now be interesting to see whether Punk takes the feedback onboard and reverts to short trunks like fans remember him wearing in WWE or sticks to the new long style. Punk has previously stated that he wore short trunks to appeal to Vince McMahon after recognizing that most of the wrestlers he pushed wore them. Obviously, he no longer needs to appeal to McMahon, so he can wear what he wants, and with him contracted for 10-12 matches per year, fans will get plenty of opportunities to become accustomed to his decision.