WWE: WWE World Tag Titles Dark Match Set for 8/14 WWE SmackDown Show, Johnny Gargano Pays Tribute To His Father After Cancer Diagnosis, Lexis King Pays Tribute To Rebel at 8/11 WWE NXT Show, ESPN Reportedly To Continue To Simulcast First Hour of WWE PLEs Despite SummerSlam Abscense

Aug 13, 2026

WWE World Tag Titles Dark Match Announced for Aug. 14 WWE SmackDown Show

WWE announced one new match for the card of this Friday’s WWE SmackDown show at the TD Garden in Boston, Massachusetts.

This new match announced was a WWE World Tag Team Championship dark match of Cody Rhodes & Oba Femi vs. The Vision (Austin Theory & Bron Breakker) (c).

It was also announced that this match will be taking place following that night’s SmackDown show broadcast.

Get your tickets NOW to witness a massive World Tag Team Championship Match, live in Boston this Friday!

🎟️: https://t.co/aoXPJFJAd7 pic.twitter.com/Ul7tNetxYe
— WWE (@WWE) August 12, 2026

Current card for August 14th WWE SmackDown show:

WWE United States Championship – Carmelo Hayes vs. Baron Corbin (c)
WWE Women’s United States Championship – Jacy Jayne vs. Tiffany Stratton (c)
WWE Tag Team Championship – War Raiders (Ivar & Erik) vs. The MFTs (Tama Tonga & Talla Tonga) vs. R-Truth & Damian Priest (c)
Dark match – WWE World Tag Team Championship – Cody Rhodes & Oba Femi vs. The Vision (Austin Theory & Bron Breakker) (c)

Johnny Gargano Pays Tribute To His Father After Cancer Diagnosis

Johnny Gargano recently paid tribute to his 84-year old father Frank on Twitter and revealed that his father was diagnosed with Stage 4 lung and prostate cancer this past year.

“Gonna take a break from the TV bit for a minute to share some important real life stuff that’s been weighing on me with you all. This is my Dad. He’s 84 years old, and up until a few years ago when our family restaurant unfortunately burned down, he’s worked every single day of his life. He is the most stubborn, resilient, hardest working person I know (definitely where I get it from).
This past year he was diagnosed with Stage 4 Lung and Prostate Cancer. Something I’ve privately known about for a few months, and something especially after Pawdme’s death, I don’t think I’ve actually had time to fully process, but we’ll save my current mental health for a different day, this isn’t a post about me.
This is a post about my Hero.. My Dad. A lot of what I have today is because of my father. He ran an indie show in the parking lot of his restaurant when I was 8 years old just so I could get in a wrestling ring, he waited in line for tickets for me to WWF shows at The Gund Arena. He always wanted the best for me, and I hope I made him proud. Because of our work schedules I haven’t had the chance to see him recently. But with the upcoming calendar we’re able to be in Cleveland for an extended period right now. So I saw him today, a midst finishing chemo and radiation. He still just worried if I was doing okay, how work was going, and when my next match would be.
My Dad had me at 45 years old but you wouldn’t have known it with how active he was with me. Having a crazy 4 year old now.. 7 years younger than he was then.. Man, I don’t know how he did it! But seeing him interact with Quill now (even in this incredibly difficult time) is something I’ll always cherish.
This is a rambling and I’ll have much more to say at a later date, and I definitely need to get better at expressing my feelings but I guess the moral in all of this is cherish the moments you have with the people you love. They won’t last forever. I know that’s cliche’ and I’d like to think I’ve always known that but have somehow learned to appreciate it even more so recently.”

Gonna take a break from the TV bit for a minute to share some important real life stuff that's been weighing on me with you all. This is my Dad. He's 84 years old, and up until a few years ago when our family restaurant unfortunately burned down, he's worked every single day of… pic.twitter.com/glfQxNTlHI
— Johnny Gargano (@JohnnyGargano) August 11, 2026

Lexis King Pays Tribute To Rebel at Aug. 11 WWE NXT Show

This past Tuesday’s WWE NXT show at the Performance Center in Orlando, Florida featured Lucien Price defeating Lexis King in a singles match. This match was notable for King holding up a wristband honoring AEW talent Rebel and her battle with terminal ALS.

Following the show, King reflected on Twitter about him honoring Rebel and thanked those who noticed his tribute to her on the show.

“Thank you for catching this, we love you @RebelTanea ❤️👑”

Thank you for catching this, we love you @RebelTanea ❤️👑 https://t.co/nhqJlsGiTD
— King (@LexisKingWWE) August 12, 2026

ESPN Reportedly To Continue To Simulcast First Hour of WWE PLEs on Linear Networks Despite SummerSlam Abscense

Fightful Select’s Sean Ross Sapp reported that his sources stated that the reason why ESPN did not simulcast the first hour of both nights of WWE’s SummerSlam 2026 event earlier this month was not due to any issues related to their ESPN Unlimited streaming service. Sapp reported that those spoken to stated that the reason was due to “scheduling conflicts” on ESPN instead.

Sapp also reported that ESPN currently plans to continue simulcasts of WWE Premium Live Events on their linear networks in the future, particularly for the biggest events.

Rumors of ESPN dropping their simulcast of WWE PLEs originated from a report by Dave Meltzer in an recent issue of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter who stated that ESPN’s decision to not do a simulcast for SummerSlam 2026 was due to the simulcast approach was not generating enough new subscriptions for ESPN Unlimited.