Casual Friday + The Let's Watch Some Wrestling King of Kings of the Ring Tournament Announcement!

Good Morning!

What an odd week for pro wrestling that was. I felt like neither Raw nor Dynamite did a lot for me, possibly due to both feeling a little off theme. Raw felt weird because there was almost too much wrestling on the longest wrestling show of the week, and Dynamite felt odd because of its pacing and storyline beats that just didn’t work for me. That AEW Edmonton crowd didn’t help matters – I was equal parts annoyed when they were too quiet and annoyed when they started trying to get themselves over. Enjoy your hockey team elsewhere, Oily fans. Except for that guy who harassed Skye Blue to the point that ref Aubrey Edwards called for security to yeet the guy out – that guy can eat a bag of tacks and fall down the Exorcist staircase.

But let’s talk some actual wrestling instead, shall we? The beginning of the King of the Ring tournament gave us a lot of wrestling on Monday night, and plenty of it was good to great! There have already been some injury substitutions, with Kofi Kingston filling in for Xavier Woods (I think this one is storyline), Asuka being replaced with Dakota Kai (legit), Jey Uso replacing Drew McIntyre (real), and Angelo Dawkins taking Bobby Lashley’s spot on SmackDown tonight (also real). Monday saw Jey Uso defeat Finn Balor, Ilja Dragunov beat Ricochet, and Gunther move on at Sheamus’ expense. We also got Zoey Stark over Ivy Nile, former Women’s champ Iyo Sky beat Natalya, and birdperson Lyra Valkyria won over the aforementioned King Kota. The tournaments are off to a solid start, with Gunther being my pick for the guys – and my pick for match of the night, too. I guess that was a given, considering the history he and Sheamus have, but goddamn do those two know how to GO. 

We also got some feud pushes and storyline developments in the rivalries between CM Punk and Drew McIntyre, Becky Lynch and Liv Morgan, and Sami Zayn, Bronson Reed, and Chad Gable. The Judgment Day continues to slowly crumble, but not in any really pressing way. 

I dunno…like I said, there were a bunch of matches, most of them good, but nothing really resonated with me. The same can be said of AEW: despite some truly good wrestling, I just kept thinking to myself that if I had anything else to do, would I really feel like I missed out if I didn’t get the Double or Nothing show?

Again, don’t get me wrong. Trent Beretta and Orange Cassidy opened the show with a hell of a fight, and while Orange got the slippery win I think we’ll see these two face off at the PPV again, possibly with a stipulation to encourage some violence and shenanigans. And the main event between Adam Copeland and Brody King was some hard hitting, bloody violence the likes of which we haven’t seen in some time. 

It was everything else that didn’t click for me. Serena Deeb just isn’t compelling as a good guy, especially when pitted against Toni Storm’s charismatic character. The crowd didn’t help, as they literally started a “Let’s go Oilers” chant while Deeb was recounting her horrific experiences with unexplained seizures. But at the end of the day, a better build (or a better talker) might have made things go more smoothly. 

The Young Bucks popped on screen for four segments to cement that they are a) douchebags and b) in charge. I know a lot of people love this version of their characters, I just am not one of them. I do think Jack Perry is doing great heel work right now, however.

Those Elite appearances were peppered throughout midcard matches between Mariah May and Harley Cameron, Rocky Romero and Jay White, and Big Bill & Chris Jericho and *checks notes* Mo Jabari and Harlon Abbott. If you need me to tell you who won those matches, I … well, I would gladly do so, because I’m a nice guy. It almost felt like the show, bookended by some real AEW action, existed to get these promos and stories told. For me, though, aside from Christian Cage and Swerve Strickland building their Double or Nothing title match, it was just people wrestling and talking on my TV. I’ll say this – at least my weekend watches are delayed, so I can jump forward past commercials and speed up matches a bit.

I hate to sound negative, though! I’m looking forward to Cage vs Strickland. And the New Elite in an Anarchy in the Arena match against FTR, Eddie Kingston, and Brian Danielson should be a blast, possibly ending with someone getting lit on fire before the bad guys steal the victory. Mercedes Mone’s in-ring debut (FINALLY, because these promos ain’t working for me) is a big deal for the show. But right now, the product just isn’t where I know it can be, you know? I’m not mad, just disappointed. 

Enough with that, though. Let’s get into something a little more fun. NXT!!! We saw Wes Lee miraculously return to action after last week’s shocking appearance, around six months ahead of schedule. He picked up a win and has his sights set on Oba Femi’s North American title – the old “title that I never lost” situation, or Rule Four of my wife’s reasons for wrestling matches. HE WANTS THAT CUMMERBUND.

Shayna Baszler won over Natalya’s newest pal Karmen Petrovic, and some highlights from the NXT Combine – the pre-qualifier for the new Women’s North American Championship ladder match – were shown. The beloved mafia guys who may have literally murdered Drew Gulak continue to be the good guys in their feud against No Quarter Catch Crew, who found themselves in a match with some great-looking rookies in Tyriek Igwe and Tyson DuPont. Said mafiosos told the NQCC that the ref for the match was unavailable, but fortunately Stacks, right hand man to NXT Don Tony D’Angelo, happened to be available, and had a stripey shirt on too! How convenient. Good guys won after some questionable officiating, and later we’d see the mafia guys straight up kidnap two of the three remaining members of No Quarter Blah Blah to make sure Tony gets his match against current Heritage Cup champ Charlie Dempsey.

Tough guy Michin visited from the main roster and murdered beauty queen Ariana Grace, which is kind of a bummer since Grace has been doing some fun work with Gigi Dolin. Trick Williams learned the contents of the mysterious envelope that Lash Legend was carrying was a photo of Noam Dar with his shoulder up when Trick pinned him several weeks ago. Dar claimed that Trick was therefore a fake champ, since Trick’s winning streak started with that match, so Trick granted Dar a championship match. Should be fun – Noam’s group, Meta4, are a very silly lot, but that doesn’t mean Noam can’t put on a solid match when the story calls for one. 

Fallon Henley won her first match as a bad guy, Roxanne Perez retained her championship in the main event against a visiting Chelsea Green, and Lexis King defeated Duke Hudson in one of those impromptu matches that we always seem to make time for on wrestling shows. All in all, it was a fun, dumb show with its fun, dumb characters doing fun, dumb stuff.

The Let’s Watch Some Wrestling King of the Kings of the Ring Invitational Tournament!

Alongside our usual Friday banter, I decided I wanted to do a King of the Kings of the Ring tournament! Since it’s KOTR (and QOTR) season in real life, I wanted to put together a tournament to decide, once and for all – or until next year when we have another name to add to the pool – who is King of the Kings of the Ring. There are three brackets, with the first chunk of entrants requiring a bit of fudging to make even sets of eight. Fortunately, the ‘80s featured a ton of just such fudging. 

There were actually double Kings of the Ring after Harley Race took the tournament and the crown in 1986. See, even though the tournament was an annual event from 1985 to 1989, once Race won the title of King of the Ring he really took it to heart. Much like more recent kings Booker T or Baron Corbin, Race fully adopted the King name and mantra, wearing a crown and cape. 

Even though Randy Savage won 1987’s King of the Ring tourney, Race kept the gimmick until he went out with an injury in 1988. After that happened, Race’s manager, the beloved Bobby “the Brain” Heenan decided that he could just name the next King of the fed, and chose Haku.

 “King Haku” ended up losing the crown to “Hacksaw” Jim Duggan in May of ‘89, but then “Hacksaw” lost it to “Macho Man” Randy Savage in late August of that year. The Macho Man celebrated according to tradition, giving birth to the “Macho King” gimmick in the process. 

Hence, we fill out our bracket using King Haku, King Hacksaw, and – since he’s the only two-time winner ever – a double Bret Hart. Fortunately, the game gave us two Brets by default, and I’ve found some great CAWs (or are they CASs now?) for the guys who aren’t in the game. And so, I came up with three divisions and randomized the entries rather than trying to seed the entrants the way any true nerd would – I rolled an eight-sided die and kept rolling until I got the numbers to sync up.

BRACKETS!

Credit where credit is due: WWE 2K24 creator HonchosLegends did Muraco, Haku, Hacksaw, and Santana. DrGorillaNuts (LOL) created Owen, SuperBob made King Mabel, AttitudeCreationz built Mr. Ass, ViceroyFlair put Edge together, and WittyWitterson rounds out the Create-A-Superstar group with his young Brock Lesnar. I also grabbed a King of the Ring belt, made by HeatWave, to award the winner when we get to the Triple Threat Finale.

As you can see, I divided things up from 1985-1991, 1993-2000, and 2001-2021. It worked out that our double-Brets at least are separated by eras. We’ll decide the winner in a triple threat match, but the tournaments will all be simulated by the computer, and we’re turning on the damage retention option to reflect the one-night tournament aspect of King of the Ring that was a thing until its more recent resurrections.

I have a little experience with both brackets and sims, so this is a fun exercise for me. When I was writing for Tilt Magazine, I wrote a piece ranking the Elimination Chamber matches up to 2022 – the 2023 event was about to take place, and that means interest was up in the old Search Engine Optimization stuff. Anyway, if you’re interested, here’s a link to that article.

As for brackets, well…I’ve mentioned before (I think) that I ran a 2k22 Universe featuring the cast and crew of the animal hospital that my wife works with. I even uploaded some of our events on YouTube, and while my camera isn’t the best, my wife and I had a lot of fun making those little videos. She even went fully in character, joining me on commentary for a few of the shows as if she’d just gotten out of the ring from her matches. It was a great time, and even though a lot of those coworkers have moved on to other adventures, I still get the occasional text asking if I’d ever do another.

I totally would, by the way. I just don’t know how to run it outside of the animal hospital environment. But I digress.

How to run these brackets is the next question. Do I try livestreaming the game and watching along with you? Or just sim through and post the results, leaving more time for writing and maybe giving some backstory into the matchups? And what about the finale? Do we go nuts and make it a Ladder Match, or just keep it a traditional triple threat? I’d love any feedback you might have. Let me know, dear reader.

Closing Up Shop

…in which I say goodbye for now

And that’s it! No pay-per-views or premium live events this weekend, so it’s SmackDown on Saturday morning, and then I’ll be playing catch-up with AEW on Sunday morning due to some prior commitments.

I’ll see you next week for the usual Casual Friday and Untitled blog posts. If you have questions, concerns, or comments, drop 'em in the comments section below! And follow me on Twitter (X), Facebook, BlueSky and/or Instagram using the links on the right.

Thank you so much for reading. If you liked what you saw, consider telling your friends, mentioning Let’s Watch Some Wrestling on social media, or even buying me a hot cup of coffee using the Ko-Fi button. Have a great week, and I’ll see you back here next time, dear reader. Until then, Let’s Watch Some Wrestling!