World Wrestling News round up for Friday 22nd January 2010.

Television

• Rext week's Raw will be guest hosted by "Psych" stars James Roday and Dule Hill. The new season of "Psych" begins on USA two days after Raw, so they will be on show to promote the premiere.
  
  
• WWE has announced that NASCAR driver Carl Edwards will be the guest host of WWE Raw on February 8th.
  
  
• WWE.com has announced that controversial talk show host Jerry Springer will be hosting Raw on February 15th.
  
  
• The Wrestling Observer is reporting that the backstage Raw segments featuring Mike Tyson last week were heavily edited due to the fact that they had to be shot multiple times. This is the reason why you often saw the camera cutting to odd angles at different times during the segments.
  
  

Pay Per View news

• John Cena, Triple H, Shawn Michaels, Ted DiBiase Jr., Cody Rhodes, MVP, The Miz, Kofi Kingston, Mark Henry, Jack Swagger, Big Show, Evan Bourne, Carlito and Santino Marella were all confirmed for this year's Royal Rumble match this week.
  
  
• The Wrestling Observer is reporting that during an interview with a Mexican media outlet last week, Rey Mysterio said that the World Heavyweight Championship bout at The Royal Rumble would be a Triple Threat Match involving him, Batista, and The Undertaker. The match has yet to be changed by WWE, and of course plans could have changed since the interview and WWE is running the announced singles match, but it should be noted that a Triple Threat Match was the originally planned bout for the PPV.
  
  

Other news

• The following is an excerpt from an article from The Toronto Sun:
  
  Don't look for The Rock in a WWE ring any time soon. But you can catch him, as Dwayne Johnson, on the big screen, starring in Tooth Fairy, which opens in theatres next Friday. "The plan was for me to be the (Monday Night RAW) host (Jan. 11)," says Johnson. "But then I had to go to Mexico (to promote the movie). The idea of me going back to WWE is intriguing and exciting. I grew up in the business. "Will I go back? Absolutely. The goal is to go back and do something special. I talked to Vince (McMahon) a couple of months ago and we're trying to come up with something. "After I wrap (filming of action movie) Faster, maybe in the summer I can go back."
  
  
• Randy Orton has posted the following on his official website:
  
  
  "I walked out of Kowloon’s Friday night around 12:30-1 a.m. with Santino and a police officer escort. As I was being rudely hounded for pictures and autos (I had a 6:40 a.m. flight through Minni to Lincoln, then a drive to Omaha, a match, a drive back to Omaha, then a charter to Minni, and a driver to Rochester for the next show the next day, btw), I was confronted by an older women who said: ‘Hey Randy, you spit on my handicapped son a few years ago at a show, what do you have to say about that?’ My replay...`So Sue me.’
  
  
  Then I proceeded to my car, with Santino and the cop and drove back to our hotel by the Boston airport. I know I have been a bit of a hothead in the past, but I DID NOT spit gum and call names to any child. The women is claiming I called her son a `retard’ 3 times, and spit gum in his face. Come on people, even at my worst temperament, I would never call a handicapped child something awful like that. I’ll actually sign anything for any child with any disability. I heard just today from WWE attorneys that this women filed assault charges against me 4 days later?
  
  
  Hmmm, oh, and what about the dozens of cops at the restaurant that were there for crowd control since there were over 100 wrestling fans there? Not to mention the cop that escorted me to my freaking car. I’ll be happy when this is over. I guess if I’ve learned anything from this, it is not to ever challenge anyone to sue me."
  
  
• Variety.com is reporting that Vince McMahon has decided to take full control of WWE Studios, and has signed a new deal with Samuel Goldwyn Films and Vivendi Entertainment for all future WWE films. Goldwyn will be the film distributors and Vivendi will be handling the home video releases. It's also being reported that WWE intends to produce 9 films through 2012 with each film having a budget of about $5 million.
  
  
• For those curious, the woman who's head was shaved by CM Punk on this week's Smackdown taping was FCW developmental diva Mia Mancini (aka - Serena Deeb).
  
  

Ratings

• Monday night's edition of Raw drew a final 3.6 cable rating. The show did hours of 3.52 and 3.63. This is down slightly from last week's 3.7 draw.
  
  
  

Television

• In a move reminiscent of WCW in the mid 1990's (when WCW was taped in front of many prompted paid audience members/plants), TNA Director of Production Steve Small lectured fans at the Impact tapings this week, in lieu of 'bullshit' chants which greeted Hulk Hogan's promo at the start of Genesis (fans booed the decision to lose the six-sided ring), and the same chant on the 1/4 live Impact.
  
  
  

Comings and Goings

• Ken Anderson made his TNA debut at Genesis. Kennedy has signed a per-appearance one year exclusivity deal.
  
  

Other news

• New TNA announced Bubba the Love Sponge generated alot of negativity this week as he made the following comments; "I say fuck Haiti. Why do we have to take care of everybody our country is in shambles. Bubba," Via Twitter earlier this week. "You know what, maybe this is actually a good thing. Here's the thing, we would all agree that Haiti is just in shambles, it's just a horrible country, it's just dirt, it's poverty stricken, they need a cleansing, maybe a half a million Haitians that will end up not being around tomorrow...It's a cleanse," he elaborated on his radio show.
  
  
  
  
  PWInsider.com is reporting that Bubba The Love Sponge was sent home by TNA prior to the Impact tapings yesterday, and AngryMarks.com has provided some new details behind why. Apparently, Hulk Hogan appeared on The Bubba The Love Radio Show this morning and explained that the reason Bubba was sent home yesterday was because TNA Knockout Awesome Kong punched him the face due to the comments he made about Haiti. Below is a paraphrasing of what Bubba said about the incident on his show this morning, written by someone from AngryMarks.com:
  
  "She was wearing wrestling gear, and she came in on me and sucker punched me right on my left cheek, and I was like, what's going on... then she came out me again, hit me again in the mouth, and she goes, 'This if for Haiti! This is for Haiti!' and I'm like 'What is going on?' Finally I put my left hand out and push her away from me, and she comes at me again and I just cover up, because I cannot fight back on a woman. Not only will I be fired from TNA, which I probably am, but my radio career is gone if I take a woman out!"
  
  
  
  Finally, Bubba posted the following on his Twitter account: “I am going to say this one time and one time only. First of all a real man sometimes has to take a step back and maybe look at something they said or did so that being said I would like to apologize for my comments regarding Haiti in the world of live radio that I operate. Sometimes u say things that u can't take back. So I'm man enough now to say I'm sorry for those I offended."
  
  
• From wrestlezone.com: Hulk Hogan called into the Bubba The Love Sponge Show this week during Bubba’s live satellite broadcast and laughed off the entire incident involving Bubba and Awesome Kong. He also believes Vince Russo encouraged Kong to attack Bubba backstage and advised for retaliation against Russo.
  
  
• TNA will be using the six sided ring on the UK tour.
  
  

Ratings

• Last week's Impact got a 1.3 rating.
  
  
• This past Thursday's debut edition of the new "TNA Epics" special finished with a 0.7 cable rating.

• From rohwrestling.com:
  Wednesday, January 20, 2010
  
  
  BRISTOL, Pennsylvania (January 20, 2009) – Ring of Honor Wrestling is proud to announce the addition of a new secondary singles title – The ROH World Television Championship – into active competition. Beginning February 5, 2009 as part of the next HDNet National Television tapings in Philadelphia, Ring of Honor will host an 8-Man Championship Tournament to crown the inaugural champion.
  
  
  “We’ve been talking about adding a secondary championship for some time,” said ROH President Cary Silkin. “Not only will this give the athletes of Ring of Honor another tremendous goal to work towards, it will also give our great partner, HDNet, a championship that is sure to be defended on the television program. We’re happy to publicly give thanks to HDNet for giving us the chance to add this title to the television show, and to All Star Championship Belts for bringing the actual belt to life.”
  
  
  The ROH World Television Title Tournament will play out over the course of the six episodes of “Ring of Honor Wrestling” that are set to be filmed over the February 5th and 6th weekend at the Arena in South Philadelphia. The tournament brackets and seeding will be unveiled over the course of the coming days via release at ROHWrestling.com.
  
  
  ROH Vice President Sydney Eick added, “It’s an exciting time to be sure; the Television title will bring an added level of competition and intrigue to the show, and we’re all looking forward to it.”
  
  

• The following is a press release from RFVideo:
  RF Video launches it's online Video on Demand subscription service. Unlimited views on content at low monthly price. New content added daily. Watch the Jazz & Rodney Mack shoot free with a new paid subscription until Feb 20th.
  
  
  Check it out at http://www.mycontent.com/rfvideo for V.O.D. content.
  
  
  To purchase "Physical" copies from RF Video's extensive professional wrestling and MMA content, including "Shoot", event, "Best Of..'s" and more, please visit http://www.rfvideo.com/.

[BACK]