Former World Champion Back! – I’m in a rare few apparently but I love Davey Richards. He’s one of the best in the business and God, I hope he returns to IMPACT Wrestling. Why? Because the former ROH World Champion has formally announced on Twitter that he’s returning to pro wrestling in 2019, and is not only set to make his return but he’s also letting promoters know that he’s ready to make up dates he had to miss due to injury. Davey messed up his knee and ended up leaving early from pro wrestling. Richards had intended on taking at least a year off regardless to finish his pursuit for his doctorate in medicine. The EMT and firefighter has not made it clear if he’s looking at returning full time to pro wrestling or if this is just a weekend thing, ala fellow firefighter Scotty Too Hotty.
Eddie Edwards, Will Osprey and LAX’s Santana all tweeted their support for Ricahrds’ return. I’m hoping beyond hope we get The Wolves vs. oVe or LAX.
Why Did David Arquette Return to Wrestling – David Arquette is back and wrestling more now than he did 18 years ago. The 47 year old has wrestled a couple times in the last few months and has started to earn a lot of fans respect for doing just that. When speaking to Fox News, he was asked why he returned and Arquette revealed the reason, saying;
There’s never really been a fan champion. I mean, now there has, there’s a little kid that won at WrestleMania, which I got compared to a lot. I am literally the low bar for all things wrestling, so that’s kind of the reason I’m coming back too, to sort of, you know, show them that… I never had an opportunity to train before, and I’ve been training every day.
]When I first won the title, there was no internet really. No Twitter craziness, so it just increasingly got more venomous, and when they changed the IHOP to IHOB, Bubba Dudley wrote: “that’s the worst idea since making David Arquette the champion.” So, it’s just like a way of shutting everyone up. It’s been great to get in shape and learn the moves and learn some chain wrestling and top of the rope stuff. I grew up loving it, I grew up going to house shows and seeing Andre the Giant and Hulk Hogan and just being amazed by the whole production. There’s a real performance element to it and I don’t think it gets the credit it deserves. Wrestling has always been sort of the red headed step child …. sorry to all the redheads out there, but they sort of got the short end of the stick in the entertainment world.
Although The Rock has sort of come out and shown some of the value in it, I still think there’s so much more. That’s sort of just the ignorance of Hollywood, which I also want to sort of help to try to shine a light on. The other thing is putting over wrestlers that are in the independent circuit and are coming up. Like RJ City, I’m teaming up with them now and just getting them some publicity and, you know, have people be aware of them.
WWE Signs Former Top Knockout – WWE has signed former IMPACT Knockouts Champion Mia Yim to a deal. Yim, who wrestled as Jade in IMPACT was considered to be one of the next big stars in the Division before leaving a few years back. She’s been in Mae Young Classic the last two years, and is close friends with Shelton Benjamin and is currently dating NXT star Keith Lee.
Quick Hits – Confirmed for the Chris Jericho Cruise will see Bullet Club’s Cody Rhodes, The Young Bucks, Marty Scurll and Adam Page taking on IMPACT Wrestling’s Sami Callihan, LAX, Brian Cage and johnny Impact. Jim Cornette will join Tony Schiavone for the NWA’s 70th Anniversary event on commentary. Both Jordynne Grace and Joey Janela suffered knee injuries over the weekend, but the extent of which have not been revealed. YOSHI-HASHI suffered a pretty big head injury over the weekend, getting busted open and may have suffered a concussion in the process. Former NWA World Champion Rob Conway will guest train down at the WWE Performance Center this week. Matt Hardy is filming a pilot for his WWE Network show, that will feature the Woken Universe concept, according to Ryan Satin.