I hope everyone had a wonderful Pride Month. As a reminder Professional Wrestling is for everyone. June brought several fantastic matches and moments to our screens, both WWE and AEW having major shows. NXT and TNA now have a working relationship. The Forbidden Door was opened. One of the biggest factions in STARDOM was forced to disband. June might end up being one of the most head spinning months of the year!
I stopped in for two matches on Monday Night Raw to kick off June, I tuned in right as the bell rang for Sheamus and Ludwig Kaiser, who beat the absolute hell out of each other. Ever since Gunther lost the Intercontinental Title, and kicked out Giovanni Vinci, Imperium has felt like they are floating and waiting for their next big moment. Sheamus on the other hand came back from injury and has been prominently featured, but still hasn't grabbed onto a story yet either. I'm curious where they will all be by the end of the year. The other match on this show I was able to catch was Dragon Lee and Finn Balor, which left me feeling frustrated as both men are so talented and SHOULD be on top of the world, yet are given a quick nothing match.
AEW that week kicked off with MJF returning, and then being interrupted by RUSH, which is fine. Christopher Daniels showed up later in the show and announced that since Adam Copeland had t0 vacate the TNT Championship, a new Champion will be crowned in a ladder match at Forbidden Door! Then very quietly AEW announced that Mercedes Moné will face Stephanie Vaquer at Forbidden Door, Title for Title.
Shamefully Mariah May lost a match to Saraya... during Pride Month no less. It progressed a narrative so it is fine I suppose. The post match angle lead to Mina Shirakawa and Toni Storm trying to get in each others face with Mariah trying to separate them. Swerve had his last title defense before Forbidden Door against Roderick Strong, I didn't doubt for a second that Swerve was retaining here, but wow this was a fun match to watch.
The first weekend of June came to an end with NXT Battleground! From the UFC APEX Arena in Vegas. The show was also hosted by Sexyy Red, which I believe only happened because of @HaangEmHiigh on Twitter, after he made an edit of Jey Uso with one of her songs. We love a domino effect in wrestling. Battleground's card on paper was pretty exciting. A huge Ladder match for a new Women's title, A strong triple threat, and the world title matches of the show both looked great.
The show began with the Ladder match to crown the first Women's NXT North American Champion, a great looking white leather belt with red and gold plates. The match was full of fun spots, of the girls in the match, I was expecting Lash Legend to leave with the title, and if not it would've been Sol Ruca. Somehow my predictions were very wrong, Kelani Jordan climbed the ladder and wrote her name in history.
The highlight of the show for me was Jordynne Grace of TNA challenging Roxanne Perez for the NXT Women's Championship. The contest fell just short of 14 minutes, as fun as this was to watch, I felt frustrated as this match absolutely deserved at least another 5 minutes. It's TNA's biggest star of the Women's division against NXT's Champion. The match was back and forth and left us believing that maybe Jordynne could leave with the title.
Dynamite opened that week with Dustin Rhodes against Jack Perry, which unsurprisingly ended with Dustin bleeding... a lot. Jack looked like a real sicko here, wiping his opponents blood on his chest with a devilish smile on his face. Following the match we got a backstage segment with Kyle O'Reily, Orange Cassidy and Mark Briscoe. These three have had some of the most fun segments this entire month. Mark politely asked Renee for the microphone and exclaimed inspiring words.
"...it is within the linked arms of me and my brothers that we find strength. Let us band together – me, with my rugged attributes, Kyle with his violent nature, my clementine friend, Cassidy..."
Briscoe's words each week have left us speechless, truly must see TV. In preparation for Mercedes Moné's match at Forbidden Door, her opponents tag team partner Zeuxis arrived to challenge Mercedes for her TBS title. As someone who has never watched Zeuxis perform before this, holy shit, she is a scary competitor. This was an enthralling match, if Mercedes had a contest like this with Vaquer's partner, what will happen when they meet?
This week's show ended with Ospreay defeating Fenix to retain his International Championship and Swerve threatening Ospreay about their upcoming title match.
WWE continued their international PLE run with Clash at the Castle in Scotland! This was the pinnacle of June for WWE, from start to finish this show was engaging and exciting to watch. The show opened with an I Quit Match between Cody Rhodes and AJ Styles which ended after a cornered AJ Styles uttered I quit in fear of being bludgeoned by Cody who was standing over him with the steel steps high above his head. A reasonable ending, I too would probably quit there too.
The next match was a triple threat tag team match for the Women's Tag Team Championship. Bianca Belair and Jade Cargill defended against Shayna Baszler and Zoey Stark and Scotland's own Unholy Union: Isla Dawn and Alba Fyre. Their families all front row got to see them perform and WIN the tag team championships. The two newly crowned champions were given bouquet's of flowers and held their new titles high.
The long running feud between Sami Zayn and Chad Gable has continued into Scotland. I'm disappointed Gable didn't get his win here, I'm sure he will get it at some point, but he needs to break away from the Alpha Academy who played a role in his loss at this show. Otis and Maxxine refused to help Gable cheat to win. I think it would've been more interesting here to see Otis and Maxxine actually fully claim they are done with him and Chad still win the match, leaving him with what he wanted, The championship, but at the cost of his family. Either way, Sami retained here this was a really fun match and worth a watch.
Another Scotland native Piper Niven challenged Bayley for the Women's WWE Title, The match itself was fine, but the highlight was Chelsea Green who stole the spotlight. After getting removed from ringside by the referee, she returned later on donning a Rey Mysterio Mask to attempt to distract Bayley. This attempt was in vein and Bayley retained.
The main event was another Scotland native: Drew McIntyre challenging Damian Priest for the World Heavyweight Championship. I'm gonna be honest, the ending of this match was beyond stupid. After the referee is knocked out Drew attempts a pinfall on Priest, when a new referee enters... and it's CM Punk. Who sends Drew once more into a spiral, costing him the World Heavyweight Championship. To clarify: my issue with this angle is not that Punk cost him the match, it was that Punk's plan was to fly to Scotland, and hope that a referee got knocked out, to then take another ref's shirt and then taunt Drew AS the referee. I think it came across as over thought, I would've felt more natural if when the ref was knocked out he just came out and distracted Drew. It's hard being a McIntyre fan in 2024 I guess.
Over the past few month's strange messages have been playing on Monday Night Raw, with cryptic warnings, QR codes that lead to strange sites. Coordinates were posted, Names were decrypted. On 6/17 Raw was the target for the finally arriving faction "The Wyatt Sicks". Uncle Howdy was a character we are familiar with, We saw him alongside the late Bray Wyatt last year. The house lights crashed out, leaving the arena in darkness before the "fireflies" arrived. The audience lit the arena up with their phone lights. A mysterious door opens, and a scary looking woman crawls out. She simply stands and points for the camera to move on. The camera heads through a tunnel leading to a pile of unconscious security guards. Standing atop them, a large tattooed man in a rabbit mask wielding a hammer, with the word HELP scratched onto the head of the tool. The camera shakely continues onward to the backstage area, the ceiling lights broken, fog rolling across the floor. Several people lay bloodied. Sitting on a production crated perched over the destruction a man in a Vulture mask. As the camera continues we are created by a man in a pig mask, standing next to a bloodied unconscious Chad Gable. Finally at the end of the long tunnel is Uncle Howdy himself. Who walks through the destruction we witnessed collecting the strange characters along the way. They join the scary looking woman in front of the audience. Uncle Howdy lifts Bray Wyatt's lantern high above his head. This is their guiding light it seems. This was a fantastic moment that should go down in the history books as one to remember.
On the less supernatural side, AEW continued the beginning of their Owen Hart Cup Tournament. The highlights of this show were both Kris Statlander and Nyla Rose, as well as PAC and Claudio Castagnoli. Kris has just turned Heel and the Owen is building to their inevitable match with Willow. Anytime Nyla Rose is on screen, it's almost guaranteed to be a good time. Cruelly a large chunk of this match was in picture in picture, with commercials that I couldn't care less about.
The main event of the night was PAC versus Claudi0, two talents who I consider to be the best in the world, but neither of which who have seemed to truly get their flowers yet. At one point during the match, the two competitors were ringside, as PAC charged at Claudio, he was launched into the air, purely by Claudio's strength. This match is worth watching for that visual alone.
June 22nd was PACKED with Wrestling, Josh Barnett's BLOODSPORT began the wrestling I watched that weekend. For those who are unfamiliar, Josh Barnett is a versatile athlete, Starting his career in the early stages of UFC and would eventually become the youngest UFC Heavyweight Champion. Barnett has a long history in Japan not only as the final PANCRASE Champion, but wrestling for NJPW on and off since 2003. BLOODSPORT is a twist on typical Professional Wrestling, every match must end in either a knockout or submission and the wrestling ring is replaced by a ring canvas with no ropes or turnbuckles. This was BLOODSPORT BUSHIDO, in Ryōgoku Sumo Hall in Japan. Each of the matches on the card we're as hard hitting as expected. Many only lasting a few minutes. The main event was Jon Moxley against Josh Barnett himself. I was left speechless after this match, I couldn't believe what I was watching. In typical Moxley fashion, he was bleeding buckets. This was a contest between Kaiju, two dangerous giants. If you can stomach the blood and violence. This is a MUST WATCH for June.
On the same night was STARDOM's The Conversion. A show with huge implications for the future of STARDOM. Long time factions Queen's Quest and Odeo Tai collided in a hectic 5 on 5 match. Where the stipulation evolved from the losing team must disband to, the losing team disbands except for the last remaining member of the team in the match. The sole survivor left to bare the flag. This was definitely an interesting twist, but the execution of the match felt so chaotic, I couldn't really keep track of who was already eliminated since they all stayed around and continued to participate in the match. There was chaos and then it ended. I feel like if they were forced to leave when eliminated it would've created so much more tension. Odeo Tai was victorious here leaving Queen's Quest in shambles. Leaving Saya Kamitani to carry the faction by herself.
The Wonder of STARDOM title was defended by Saori Anou against Mika Iwata. This 21 minute match was a fight and a half. Mika is a champion in Sendai Girls, so many people did not expect the ending we got. The match ended with Mika Iwata as the new champion after a modified piledriver. Following the match, Saori was dejected and crying ringside, when Natsupoi came out and gave an impassioned speech begging Saori to not give up and fulfill the promise she made to her. I'm definitely intrigued Natsu and Saori are some of the best around and I hope we can see this story come to an end.
The main event of the show was the World of Stardom Championship defended by Maika against Xena, who is relatively unproven in Stardom. An unstoppable force and an immovable object. Two powerhouses set to crash. The first minutes were Maika testing Xena's limits. Xena matched each shoulder tackle, each chop, each punch, blow for blow. Both women even took a brutal suplex onto the exposed concrete. This match to me, felt like a break through moment for Xena, I had expected the result, but that's alright! This match felt back and forth and hard hitting. 22 minutes of powerhouse's colliding. Maika remained Champion here, which was the right call.
The go home Dynamite for the Forbidden Door was a fun show overall, We found out that at Beach Break the following week Daniel Garcia will challenge Will Ospreay for any titles he owns following Forbidden Door. Los Ingobernables De Japon literally crashed into Blackpool Combat Club building to their matches at the PPV. The multi-man tag match ended in disqualification and a huge brawl. Leading Testuya Naito to appear and stand face to face with Moxley before their fight in Long Island.
Mariah May brought Mina Shirakawa to dynamite to join her and Toni Storm against Saraya, Harley Cameron and Anna Jay. Mariah put a lot of effort into trying to make sure they get along. After several acts of jealousy from both women, they managed to pick up the victory. Mariah attempted to break the tension with a champagne toast. Mina jealous of Mariah dancing with Storm, tried to hit Storm with the champagne bottle. Storm ducked, and Mariah took the blow with glass shattering into a million pieces. Heartbreaking...
The best in ring performances of the night was for Kyle O'reily and Zack Zabre Jr. A match that might literally have been made just for me. Ultimately ZSJ won with an arm bar. The aftermath featured many AEW and NJPW talent, including TMDK members, Roderick Strong, and Tomohiro Ishii!
June 28th Friday Night Smackdown emanated from Madison Square Garden in Manhattan, New York. I figured I have nothing else this Friday night, and casually bought tickets less than 6 hours before the show. Ignoring the people I was sitting around, I actually had a great time. There was a decent amount of wrestling that was fun and entertaining. The show opened with a huge brawl between Cody Rhodes, Randy Orton and Kevin Owens against the New Bloodline. Kevin lost his shoe within a minute of this breaking out. He dove off a platform with only one shoe. it wasn't until a crew member found it at the top of the stage during the commercial break that Kevin could get it back. Sadly the dark main event match was set to be Damian Priest and Jey Uso in a street fight. Unfortunately Damian missed his MSG main event because he was stuck on the tarmac of an airport who knows where. As a New Yorker I can't imagine how defeating and heartbreaking it is to miss a Madison Square Garden appearance. Hopefully he will have more opportunities in the future.
The main event of all of June, Forbidden Door! A show I wish I could've seen live, but I can't afford to get home at 3am and have a full day of work the next day. This was an insanely long show. If I broke down every match, I think it'd be as long as this whole article is and more. Some matches that deserve recognition are: Bryan Danielson and Shingo Takagi, Orange Cassidy and Zack Sabre Jr., and the TNT Championship Ladder Match. Each of these were insanely fun to watch and I'd be doing a disservice to you, if I didn't tell you these were great.
Forbidden Door had 3 Match of the Year contenders for me. Starting with Toni Storm versus Mina Shirakawa. The buildup for this match has been heart pounding the whole ride. Mariah came to the ring with Mina, to sprint back to the stage to also walk out with Toni. The match was a back and forth war that somehow only went 12 minutes. Every was waiting with baited breath for Mariah to get involved and finally pick a side. but she didn't and there was no underhanded tactics from either woman. Toni retained the title following a piledriver. Mariah encouraged Toni to embrace Mina, which they did. Mina shouted "Thank you!" the two hugged. Mariah wasn't satisfied. The three of them all shared a kiss together and left the arena holding each other.
Happy Pride!
The next marquee match for me was a title for title match, Mercedes Moné and Stephanie Vaquer. This was 17 minutes of WRESTLING. That the Long Island crowd didn't give a shit about, they were too busy chanted about sports teams, as Mercedes is from Boston. Normally something this would hamper my experience watching a match, but not here. This was a technical masterpiece from Vaquer and Moné. Ultimately Mercedes picked up the victory and became TBS Champion and NJPW Strong Women's Champion. I couldn't be happier. Mercedes' couldn't celebrate for long, when Britt Baker returned after several months away.
The main event for the show was Swerve Strickland putting the AEW World Championship on the line against Will Ospreay. Which went 27 minutes. Every moment felt like it could end the match. Swerve hit a devastating double foot stomp from the top turnbuckle to the outside announcers table, that made my jaw fall off in awe. The match came to a climax when the referee was knocked out and Don Callis came out and handed Ospreay a screwdriver, wanting Ospreay to take advantage of the chaos and strike Swerve. Ultimately Ospreay reiterated that he is not that man anymore. The two continued to fight until swerve hit several House Call kicks to retain his championship. For a show that featured narratives from multiple companies, No one left looking weak, or cheated. Every competitor on the show looked like a million bucks. a tough thing to do with 15 total matches on the card.
June was a huge month, even though I feel like I have said this about every month so far. We are now halfway through the year, which is insane to even think about. Professional Wrestling is in a a bit of renaissance. More companies have been working together than ever before. Wrestlers have choices in where they want to grow their careers now. Shows are selling out and breaking records left and right. I covered so many shows and matches each month, and there is still SO MUCH MORE. It feels overwhelming at times, but I'm so grateful the thing I've loved for so long, is changing for the better.
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