Hello, and welcome to the first news and rumor report of the month of July here at TPWW.net. I'm not feeling too creative at all right now, so that should do it for the intro. Anyway, here are today's news and rumors.
The big story today is the apparent return of Jerry "The King" Lawler tomorrow night on Raw is War. According to Dave Scherer, Lawler has come to some sort of agreement with the WWF and may in fact be back on television as early as tomorrow night as a part of the WCW invasion angle. I'll admit that I'm not Lawler's biggest fan, but he is the perfect guy for the WCW invasion angle, since he could come to "work for WCW" now that he's "out of the WWF". It had been reported a few days ago that Lawler had come to an agreement with the WWF, but Lawler posted a message on his web site basically denying the story. Obviously, it wasn't taken seriously, since the WWF has been known to plant fake stories to keep angles a surprise. There's not much else to report on this story, but we should hopefully have more info soon. As far as Lawler's wife, Stacy "The Kat" Carter, she may also make some sort of appearance on WWF television in the near future, but her complete status is not known at this time.
As previously reported, the WWF will have WCW matches starting at today's house show in Spokane, Washington, and will also air WCW matches tomorrow night on Raw and most likely Tuesday on Smackdown. This is basically due to the WWF's inability to come up with a television slot for WCW programming. Maybe they should have thought of that before they bought it. Anyway, the WWF will continue to have WCW matches at WWF house shows through July, August, and September, according to Jim Ross. The WWF hopes to give WCW their own separate house shows starting in October, depending on whether or not WCW gets off to a good start.
In injury news, Stone Cold Steve Austin's hand injury is much better now, according to Jim Ross, but his back is still bothering him after the bump he took at King of the Ring, being put through an announce table by Booker T. Austin may or may not work in the ring at this week's TV, but either way, he will be at the shows and will have a large role, according to JR. There are rumors that Austin was scheduled to take on Tazz this week on Raw, but that may be scrapped now due to Austin's injury. We can only hope that the WWF continues any Austin-Tazz angle they had planned once Austin is ready to return to the ring.
In other injury news, Chris Benoit underwent successful neck surgery yesterday in San Antonio, Texas. Dr. Lloyd Youngblood, the same doctor who performed Stone Cold Steve Austin's neck surgery, also performed Benoit's. Benoit will begin rehab soon and is expected to make a full recovery. However, he won't be able to return to the ring for at least another six months, maybe even longer depending on his rehab schedule.
Staying on the subject, Triple H's rehab is apparently going very well as expected, and his return to the ring is still scheduled for around October or November. The WWF does not want to rush his return and risk another injury.
Kurt Angle has a slight tear in his meniscus ligament in his knee, according to Jim Ross, but will not require surgery, at least for the time being. Kurt may require surgery sometime down the road when it's a conveniant time, but for now, doctors say that it isn't anything major.
Rikishi is continuing his rehab on his injured shoulder and should be back in the ring in three to four months.
A big story over the last couple of days is that the WWF is apparently strongly considering airing WWF Smackdown live each week starting in August. In fact, this was basically confirmed this week by the WWF and Smackdown is expected to begin airing live on Thursday, August 16 from Salt Lake City, Utah. The second will take place the following week in Denver, and the next the following week in Detroit. There's no word if the WWF plans on continuing to air Smackdown live each week after that, but only time will tell. In a recent media conference, Linda McMahon blamed Smackdown's dwindling ratings on Internet sites posting spoilers. Honestly, that logic really makes no sense to me, since Internet sites have been posting spoilers of Smackdown since the beginning of the show's history and ratings have just started going down recently, along with Raw is War's ratings, which aren't affected by spoilers at all.
Speaking of Smackdown's ratings, Thursday's show drew a 3.7 rating, which has to be a bit of a disappointment, but the WWF will still take it.
Tough Enough on MTV scored a strong 2.2 rating for its second week. That's a good number, considering the show airs on cable TV. It was the highest rated cable program on Thursday.
The WWF has opened a web site for their upcoming PPV on July 22, Invasion. To check it out, visit WWFWCWInvasion.com. It's interesting to note that the PPV is being dubbed as WWF/WCW Invasion and not just WWF Invasion. Sort of reminds you of the WCW/nWo days.
Profiles of each WCW wrestler who has debuted on television have been put up at WCW.com.
The Rock's upcoming film, The Scorpion King, is now scheduled for an April 19th, 2002 theater release date. As for The Rock, it's expected that he'll be back in the WWF in time for SummerSlam.
According to 1wrestling, Stacy Keibler has been causing a few "headaches" backstage in the WWF. I don't know what that means exactly, but anyway...
Mick Foley has been in the United Kingdom since Tuesday taping episodes of a new TNN show called "Robot Wars." Foley will do play by play for the show. Sounds like another play off of Comedy Central's "Battle Bots".
The WWF has put up an article on Edge's King of the Ring victory, which can be checked out HERE.
TPWW's own Rob Harvey sent word that in a recent interview with Live Audio Wrestling, Carl DeMarco, president of the WWF's operations in Canada, had a few interesting things to say. DeMarco reportedly is trying to get UK-only PPVs airing in Canada. Also, he noted that TSN doesn't want to edit Raw, but laws are forcing them to and people are sending e-mails to the wrong people. Also, the WWF hopes to have Tough Enough airing on Canadian TV sometime in October.
That just about wraps things up for today's report. Not much else to say, but for those wondering, we are finally almost done looking over and choosing new columnists from our recent columnist application. We received a good 400 or so applications and have been narrowing them down, which is why it has taken longer than expected. We should have a final decision soon on the final columnists and when we do, they will debut here at TPWW. That's pretty much it for now. Until next time...
Triple A
TripleA99@aol.com
Previous News Update >>> Update on the WWF-WCW invasion angle, WCW matches on WWF TV this week, WWF wrestlers defecting to WCW? WWF financial report, Tough Enough, thoughts from MSG Smackdown tapings, and more. >>>