WWE 2025 Releases, Mercedes Mone and more Wrestling Thoughts

I apologize ahead of time but there needs to be something stated that alot of the IWC Sickos and AEW Sickos need to hear. I understand that it might sound snarky and stupid but this is something my dear sainted mother once told me. Plus, I think people need to hear this because this is the mantra of business and pro wrestling.

Life is not fair, never will be fair and damn your feelings. You need to get over it so you can be a stronger person.

I state this because all I have heard this week from the AEW wrestlers complaining about tribalism to the IWC sickos complaining about releases is the same line.

WWE is evil and its not fair that they are doing the releases. Its not fair that people are criticizing AEW.

If you ever want to know why people don’t like the IWC, AEW and the wrestling media, its because their mentality has become a big reason. They are the equivalent of being around small children that misbehave in a restaurant whose parents won’t get them to stop.

You want to run the other way or pray management 86’s them from the joint so you can enjoy your meal in peace.

But lets first start with the AEW talent like Ricochet who this week have done some passive aggressive shot taking at WWE. Ricochet told fans that he “lost his fun and passion in WWE.” and that “They never gave me a fair shake”.

Then you had Fightful go on about how the WWE releases were Paul Levesque’s fault and basically portayed him as the villain. The same website that has several alumni working for AEW, constantly portrays AEW in a positive light and yet claims to be balanced.

And you people complain that Mr. Tito is a big mean troll who is one sided.

So first let me address Ricochet because this one has really set my cheeks on fire.

The cold hard facts for Ricochet and you IWC idiots is that no matter how much you sugar coat it, the truth is simple. WWE tried their best with Ricochet but he is just not a main event star nor is he someone who casual fans can get behind.

His personality is not that engaging, he is a product of lots of aerial moves that once you see them, they start losing their luster and he is not creative. I would argue that he is basically a dork with a hot wife that whines way too much..

Look at his run in NXT and WWE and you can see that WWE tried to make him a big star but it never caught on. In NXT he was pushed as a big deal, feuded with the Undisputed Era, won the North American Title and even the Dusty Rhodes Tag Title cup.

In the main roster, he has reigns with the United States Title, the Intercontinental title, high profile matches with Logan Paul at SummerSlam and even beat Seth Rollins to face Brock Lesnar for the world title. WWE even wanted to resign him but he decided to leave and go to AEW.

Explain to me how that is never getting behind him?

The reality is that AEW has exposed Ricochet for what he truly is; a mid card wrestler who does cool moves but really isn’t a main event star. He doesn’t have an over the top charisma that makes you want to listen to his promos and hang on every word. He looks and dresses like a cross between Prince and Steve Urkel.

He is a guy that screams nerd and dork that you wouldn’t hang out with if he wasn’t a famous wrestler.

Again everyone wants to scream that Ricochet was treated unfairly and that WWE was mean. But the reality is Ricochet was a guy that is a niche wrestler that most regular fans look and go “meh”. WWE tried on several occasions but at some point you are what you are.

I get his frustration because so far his AEW run has been underwhelming and even worse than his WWE run. He has basically been jobbed out in every high profile match, his feud with Swerve Strickland had them incorporating scissors that made both guys look stupid, and he has failed in all his title bouts to win.

But he is getting paid very well, his wife will probably end up joining him on the Main Roster this year and he gets to do whatever he wants in terms of who he wants to wrestler and coming up with his character.

And yet all he has done is whine online to fans who criticize him, bash WWE about how he lost his passion and generally just cry “its not fair”.

Honestly, this is where someone should have pulled him aside, told him to shut up and get off line and just focus on developing a character we care about.

But as we have learned, you can lead a horse to water but you can’t make him drink it.

In this case you can drop hints to Ricochet and the IWC, but if they don’t get it… then well, those are the breaks. Which brings me to my next tangent

WWE RELASES HAVE FANS IN A TIZZY.

Dear IWC, I understand you don’t grasp the real world but here is the stone cold truth. Business companies are going to do what’s best for business and every business has a bottom line that it has to follow.

I know everyone loves AEW but that isn’t a real business; its a rich kid who is playing wrestling fantasy booker with his billionaire dad’s money.

Meanwhile WWE is owned by TKO Holdings which if you look at their board of directors is run by very successful business people. A few of them run private equity firms which are famously known for maximizing profits and focusing on the bottom line.

Their prime objective is to make money, increases profits and reduce wasteful spending.

They are not running a Go Fund Me for wrestler’s career earnings.

If they feel that something is not making them money, compared to what they are spending, they will have it cut or let go of the person.

We can stamp our feet and scream all we want, but that is the nature of business and as I and many other people have learned, you are hired with the notion that you are always expendable. Athletes understand that fact, business executives understand that fact, real workers understand that fact… even alot of wrestlers understand that fact.

The truth is that for years, Vince McMahon didn’t do alot of mass releases between 2011-2019 because it looked bad and there was no reason. The roster was semi manageable, wrestlers were not staying on too long past 40 years old, and unless you were a screw up or not good, WWE kept you.

Then Covid hit and in 2020 and 2021, WWE had to trim the roster because travel was halted, live shows were done with no crowd and nobody knew how long that would last.. Then when Vince sold WWE in 2022, the pro wrestling fans and industry got dragged into the cold reality of corporations running a family business.

I know, I have hurt many of your feelings by not pandering and telling you it will be alright but you need to hear this again for the 1,245th time.

The WWE and AEW are overcrowded and both could use some massive layoffs so that talent can actually get on television.

Raw has FIFTY ONE wrestlers on the roster, Smackdown has FIFTY FIVE and NXT/Development has a grand total of ONE HUNDRED AND ELEVEN.

Stop living in la la land and realize that WWE doesn’t have the time, space or opportunity to continue to just hire wrestlers and do nothing with them.

Again, everybody wants their favorite wrestler to be signed and pushed but nobody advocates for someone to get removed or depushed. But that is the reality of things that unfortunately there is not enough room and this is not a Utopia of wrestling.

Meanwhile, Paul Levesque is the Chief Content Creator and Head of Creative which while its very important and powerful, is not the end all of the company. He has bosses he has to answer to and despite what you read online or saw in a movie, he can’t tell his bosses to “go screw.”

If your boss tells you to do something, either you do it or they will replace you.

Don’t blame him for following orders as this is the ugly truth of the a corporation running a business like… a business.

As far as those who are released;

Braun Strowman is 41, has bad knees and not the athlete he was ten years ago. Credit to him for working his way back into the WWE but this second run showed at times how limited he was physcially. Sucks getting old and you could tell that the pain and wear and tear was catching up to him.

Dakota Kai is similar in that she had become injury prone as her body had betrayed her. Since 2019 she has had two torn ACL surgeries, Torn Meniscus and suffered a serious concussion. Love her work and I am confident she will be in-demand on the free agent market but if you can’t stay healthy, it will be a problem.

Cora Jade got caught in getting injured at a bad time with her torn ACL in 2024 and NXT signing Guilia and Stephanie Vaquer which made her expendable due to a deep roster. At 24 she is still young, and hopefully she can follow the lead of Naomi and Jordynne Grace by going to TNA and flourishing. Her biggest issue is getting more time and reps which NXT doesn’t have anymore.

Shayna Baszler was cursed with the fact she wasn’t really what Vince wanted and even Levesque dropped the ball. The Ronda Rousey win should have led to bigger things but it didn’t and Pure Fusion Collective was a fart in church. The other horrible reality is that in pro wrestling, looks matter and sex sells and that was not what Baszler was about.

Katana Chance, Kayden Carter, Riley Osbourne, Dani Palmer, Javier Bernal, Oro Mensah and Jakara Jackson all fall into the category of just caught in a numbers crunch. A decade ago, you could have moved them to the main roster and have them is mid card to low mid card. But none of the above connected with the crowd and all could also benefit from working the Indy’s, developing a new look and building their brand.

I thought that Gigi Dolin was the biggest victim of just bad timing and getting caught in issues beyond her control. Her, Jacy Jayne and Mandy Rose were MEGA over as part of Toxic Attraction and should have been elevated to the main roster. But Mandy got released due to her OnlyFans, Toxic Attraction got split up and then Torn ACL shelved her right when the women’s division in NXT was getting loaded. I could see her making her way to TNA with her fiancé, Zachary Wentz, and being a major star there.

Again, the blueprint is out there to get released and come back. See Rusev, Naomi, Cody Rhodes and Drew McIntyre for a few examples. But it will come down to being able to putting in work, reinventing yourself and trying to come up with something that will entice the crowd to care about you.

LIV MORGAN CAST IN BAD LIEUTENANT: TOKYO

Honestly, I am incredibly happy for her and congratulate her for being in a legit movie that should help sell her as an actress. With Shun Oguri and Lilly James attached as the leads, and produced by the Academy Award winning studio NEON, this is a legit role and opportunity for her.

Despite her great work as a heel, Liv Morgan is the ultimate underdog babyface when you look at her upbringing and what she has had to go through. Unlike Rhea Ripely, Bianca Belair or Tiffany Stratton, Morgan was never the “it” star in the eyes of management.

She is living proof that just grinding, hard work, perseverance and willing to step out of her comfort zone can lead to great success.

Hopefully this is the start of something big as not every wrestler hits it in Hollywood. For every Rock and John Cena, there are thousands of wrestlers who never rise to bit parts.

Rooting that Liv Morgan is closer to the former and not the latter.

Oh lord… For one, Google is about making money. If something was GOOD, they won’t go out of their way to “shadow ban” something that could ring up massive advertisement

MERCEDES MONE STARTS A CHAT SERVICE FOR FANS STARTING AT $99.99 PER MONTH

The best thing I can say about that and Mercedes Mone right now is that at least she is not going the route of Jordon Hudson, the gf/aide to Bill Belichick. It co”uld have been worse as she could have started dating Tony Khan, have his baby and then take half his stake in his father’s sports franchises.

That is the best thing I can say about this venture.

But at this point, its getting tougher to defend Mercedes as this whole thing makes her look like a money predator for desperate people.

Here is where me and Mr. Tito disagree. I get the whole Only Fans thing but at least with Only Fans, your getting more than just a Chat bot texting you responses that are AI created. Because make no mistake, she sure as hell isn’t going to be answering those texts herself, I guarantee that.

Plus unlike alot of female wrestlers and adult content creators that I know on Only Fans, THEY ARE NOT GETTING PAID MILLIONS AT ANOTHER JOB.

At what point do you have enough money where you don’t have to stoop low enough to hustle suckers out of the money?

This is as bad as a brokerage lawyer with a million-dollar business in real estate deals, selling NFT’s on the side just so he can afford a second Ferrari or a surround sound system for his summer home.

And for AEW fans, at what point do you get embarrassed that your AEW women’s champion is just a vulture who is using the company to get rich and go back to WWE. She has elevated nobody, her matches have been average at best, she doesn’t seem to care about promoting the company outside of being on TV.

Oh and she has creative control; don’t believe me just go to TMZ where SHE ADMITS IT TO THEM.

Mr. Tito has the attitude of “Well, morons will be morons so if they get abused that is their fault”.

For me, this just makes wrestling look bad in general as you don’t see any successful female athlete or actress pulling this.

But again… at least Mercedes isn’t pulling a Jordon Hudson so thank god for small miracles.

TNA BANNING BLEEDING FROM THEIR SHOWS

Again, this is what smart businesses do when they are trying to make their product more mainstream and profitable. They cater towards families and casuals who don’t want to see carnage and wrestler’s looking like they got carved up by Freddy Kreuger.

TNA has been quietly shopping their product to several streaming platforms and TV networks over the last few months. This has been the byproduct of working with the WWE in that they now have access to people who a few years ago, never would have given them the time of day.

And make no mistake about it, TV executives and marketing executives don’t like gore or blood. Its tough to sell advertising spots, families don’t want to get their kids scarred for life and it comes across as low brow and crass.

Ask Dominos Pizza about that after AEW ran that disastrous angle with Nick Gage vs. Chris Jericho and the Pizza cutter. Dominos’ told Tony Khan to take a hike and there went that sponsorship.

I get the IWC loves its hardcore matches, bleeding, TLC high spots and “old school real rasslin” but this is a corporate world and industry.

And TNA is now being run like a business and less like an overgrown mark’s dream plaything.

Which is what you can call… Best for business.

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