Bryan Rose is an editor from California that has been covering professional wrestling for well over a decade. He officially joined F4WOnline as an editor in 2017.
The EVOLVE Women’s Champion scored the shock win at Saturday’s Deadline, moving on to face Jacy Jayne on January 6. The finish of the match had everyone in a five-way tie in the final minute. Sol Ruca hit the sol snatcher on Lola Vice outside of the ring, but was attacked by Kelani Jordan as she left the penalty box and hit a 450 splash. Jordynne Grace broke up the pin as she and Jordan brawled out of the ring. As Vice recovered, Grey launched off the top rope and hit the shades of Grey for the pinfall, putting her in the lead with three pins right at the 25 minute mark.
As Grey and Wren Sinclair celebrated, Jayne and the rest of Fatal Influence appeared on the rampway, having a staredown with the Iron Survivor Challenge winner.
After Charlie Dempsey left for Japan, he left Wren Sinclair on her own, who decided to form a friendship with EVOLVE Champion Kendal Grey. In the weeks since then, Grey has scored wins on NXT television including successfully defending the EVOLVE title against Laney Reid during the NXT Gold Rush last month.
NXT New Year’s Evil (January 6):
NXT Championship: Oba Femi defends against TBA
NXT Women’s Championship: Jacy Jayne defends against Kendal Grey
The date for the first NXT special of 2026 has been confirmed.
During NXT Deadline on Saturday, it was revealed that New Year’s Evil will take place on the first Tuesday of the year, January 6, and will air on The CW.
The show is set to feature two big championship matches that will be determined at Deadline in the Iron Survivor Challenge. The winner of the men’s match will challenge Oba Femi, who defeated Ricky Saints to become the new two-time NXT Champion on Saturday. Meanwhile, the winner of the women’s Iron Survivor Challenge will face NXT Women’s Champion Jacy Jayne.
Earlier this year, New Year’s Evil took place on January 7 in Los Angeles. Giulia defeated Roxanne Perez to win the NXT Women’s Championship, while Oba Femi defeated Trick Williams and Eddy Thorpe in a three-way match to win the NXT Championship for the first time.
NXT New Year’s Evil (January 6)
NXT Championship: Oba Femi defends against TBA
NXT Women’s Championship: Jacy Jayne defends against Kendal Grey
Femi defeated Ricky Saints in the opening match of Saturday’s Deadline event to win the NXT Championship for a second time. Saints had dropped Femi twice with a tornado DDT but Femi still kicked out. After Saints kicked out of one of Femi’s pop-up powerbombs, Femi hit another and successfully pinned Saints to become champion once again.
With the win, it will now be Femi that faces Cody Rhodes next weekend at Saturday Night’s Main Event in a battle between the NXT and WWE Champions. Femi and Saints met with Rhodes on SmackDown where he revealed the winner of their match would face him next Saturday in Washington, D.C..
Saints defeated Femi at No Mercy this past fall to become champion. After his loss, Femi vanished from television for a while until re-merging in November, staring down Saints after he successfully defended the title against Trick Williams. The two agreed to a match at Deadline, with Ava revealing on Tuesday that for the first time, the NXT Championship match would open the show.
WWE Saturday Night’s Main Event lineup | Saturday, December 13 | Washington, D.C.
ROH & AEW starts spoke to the media following ROH Final Battle.
Red Velvet, Ricochet, Athena, Shane Taylor Promotions, Bandido, and Tony Khan took questions following Friday’s event on Honor Club. Here are the highlights:
Red Velvet
Regarding her surprise win, Velvet said she was going to beat Mercedes Mone and she did, accepting that she would be the underdog going into the match despite being a former champion. The loss shook her, but everything happens for a reason.
She said that Mone is someone he looked up to growing up, so going up against someone like her is “such a blessing.”
Ricochet
Tony Khan announced a AEW National title match featuring Ricochet for tomorrow’s Collision. Ricochet didn’t like the idea of that.
When asked about more members to add to his crew, Ricochet said it was about quality, not quantity.
Athena
Tony Khan pushed hard that with her victory at Final Battle, Athena will now reach the three-year mark as the ROH Women’s Champion.
A lot of the segment was designated for Athena to scold Billie Starkz for failing to win the Women’s Pure Championship.
She said she would love the opportunity to wrestle in New Japan, as there’s so much talent in Stardom.
Shane Taylor Promotions
When asked about his heroes, Moriarty named Bryan Danielson, Nigel McGuiness, and Katsuyori Shibata. He said he made his wrestling debut on December 5, and all these years later, he’s now faced all of them.
This turned into an angle where Shane Taylor started to argue with Moriarty, pushing that tonight was too close for comfort and winning is an expectation, not a surprise. He told Moriarty to follow the game plan.
Moriarty said that to see Nigel McGuiness come out with the original ROH Pure title and handing it to him after the match was such a great moment.
Bandido
Bandido said he consideres himself a winner because he’s had a great year.
Tony Khan said the originally planned ROH World title match between Rush and Bandido will happen when Rush returns to action.
Bandido says he’s putting effort into learning English and hopes people can understand him now.
Tony Khan
First question was about possible AEW events at the Arnold Classic, which will be held at the same arena next year. Khan said it was a great idea and will re-evaluate.
Would love to have Persephone back, she was great and an incredible challenger.
Khan was asked if there were plans for more ROH big events for next year, mentioning previous events like Glory by Honor and the anniversary shows. Khan pivoted to talking about bringing in more Global Wars events this year and mentioned the upcoming Boxing Day Brawl event on ROH television.
Someone asked for his reaction to Netflix potentially acquiring Warner Bros. Khan said that it was “too early to comment on anything that’s pending” and stressed his great relationship with Warner Bros., continually saying there was still a lot of time on their deals with TBS, TNT, and HBO Max. He called David Zazlav a friend of AEW. He’s excited about the future.
He also said that in regards to all of the publicly known bidders for WBD (Netflix, Paramount, and Comcast) he’s had great relationships all of them via his NFL dealings. He said there’s over two years to go in their deals with WBD.
About a potential all-women’s pay-per-view, Tony Khan was open to the idea, mentioning how many new women’s championships he’s introduced.
Khan called Zayda Steel a professional and would love to have her back.
An enraged Mone tore Grey up and down, but Grey responded by saying she’d be the next TBS Champion and asked Mone what she was doing tomorrow. Mone walked off upset as Tony Khan quickly made the match official.
After spending most of the year accumulating titles, Mone has seen a string of back luck since Full Gear, where she was unable to win the AEW Women’s Championship from Kris Statlander, the only championship Mone has failed to win.
During the post-show press conference, Khan told Ricochet that he would be defending the National title on tomorrow’s Collision, though he didn’t specify who he’d be facing.
It was announced earlier on Friday that Swerve Strickland would also be appearing on Collision.
AEW Collision lineup | Saturday, December 6
Swerve Strickland will appear
TBS Champion Mercedes Mone defends against Leila Grey
AEW National title: Ricochet defends against TBA
Continental Classic Blue League: Claudio Castagnoli (6 points) vs. Mascara Dorada (0 points)
Continental Classic Blue League: Jon Moxley (3 points) vs. Konosuke Takeshita (3 points)
Continental Classic Blue League: Orange Cassidy (0 points) vs. Roderick Strong (0 points)
Sammy Guevara and The Beast Mortos defeated Tommy Billington and Adam Priest to win the titles at Final Battle on Friday. With the win, Guevara now becomes a three-time ROH Tag Team Champion, while Mortos has won the title for the first time. The finish had Hechicero climb on the apron and interfere, allowing Guevara to hit a low blow on Billington and Mortos pinning him with a moonsault to become the new champions.
Earlier in the night, Hechicero approached Guevara and Mortos about working together in the Survival of the Fittest match for the ROH World Championship. The three came to an understanding that Hechicero would be in their corner for the Tag Team title match, then would look out for one another in the main event.
Guevara and Rush vacated the titles when it was announced that the latter would be out of action dealing with a knee injury. Rush was also set to challenge for the ROH World Championship at Final Battle and as a result, the match was changed to a Survival of the Fittest match that also includes Blake Christian and Komander.
Red Velvet regained the ROH Women’s Television Championship at Final Battle on Friday, defeating Mercedes Mone in a surprise. The finish had Mone locking in a crossface, but Velvet used the ropes to kick herself over and pinned Mone to win the Television title for a second time. After the match, Velvet retreated up the entranceway in celebration as a stunned Mone tried to get herself back together.
The loss on Friday continues Mone’s string of bad luck since Full Gear, when she failed to defeat Kris Statlander in a match for the AEW Women’s Championship, the one title she has been unable to capture.
Mone defeated Mina Shirakawa on an episode of Dynamite on October 18 to win the interim version of the Women’s TV title. In the days leading to Full Gear, Red Velvet made her return from injury and looked to unify the ROH Women’s Television Championship on the November 19 edition of Collision. Mone won that match, becoming the undisputed champion.
The first-ever ROH Women’s Pure Champion has been crowned.
Deonna Purrazzo defeated Billie Starkz to become the first-ever Women’s Pure Champion Friday at ROH Final Battle. After Starkz used all three of her rope breaks, the two traded submissions until Starkz got caught. With no other course of action, Starkz submitted.
The path to crown the first-ever champion was hammered with delays and injuries. The title and tournament were first introduced in April of this year, with the finals originally set to take place at Supercard of Honor in July. The tournament was then delayed due to timing issues. The first round finally started at Death Before Dishonor in August and continued through the fall. Starkz defeated Olympia and Yuka Sakazaki to make it to the finals.
Before the finals were set to take place at Final Battle, Queen Aminata had to be pulled from the semifinals at the last minute due to injury, allowing Purrazzo to advance to the finals via a bye. After Purrazzo won the title on Friday, Aminata emerged at the entranceway in a neckbrace and had a staredown with the new champion.
AEW on Friday announced that the former AEW World Champion would be appearing on Saturday’s show in Columbus, Ohio.
“The last time we saw Strickland, he was standing side by side with Hangman Adam Page against The Opps! We’ll hear from Swerve, TOMORROW!,” they wrote.
After taking time off for surgery, Strickland returned at AEW Full Gear last month, confronting The Opps and Samoa Joe, who offered Swerve the chance to attack Page further. Despite their history, Swerve instead chose to attack the Opps, sending them reeling to close out the show. On this week’s Dynamite after Page laid out the Opps, he issued a tag team challenge for next week pitting himself and a mystery partner against Powerhouse Hobbs and Katsyuori Shibata, hinting that they know who’s coming for them.
AEW Collision lineup | Saturday, December 6
Swerve Strickland will appear
TBS Champion Mercedes Mone defends against Leila Grey
AEW National title: Ricochet defends against TBA
Continental Classic Blue League: Claudio Castagnoli (6 points) vs. Mascara Dorada (0 points)
Continental Classic Blue League: Jon Moxley (3 points) vs. Konosuke Takeshita (3 points)
Continental Classic Blue League: Orange Cassidy (0 points) vs. Roderick Strong (0 points)
Paul Wight thinks a former WWE star could be what AEW needs.
Speaking to Notsam Wrestling Live (h/t: WrestlePurists) Wight said he feels Bishop Dyer, aka the former Baron Corbin, could be someone that AEW needs.
“l’ve told everyone this — if you look at Tom [Pestock]’s footwork, he’s got some of the best footwork of any big man in wrestling,” Wight explained. “If we give Tom the right character, he could be such a great heel. He’d be such a great heel for us. He knows how to work. He can talk on the microphone. When I look at people that can help AEW, Tom is a guy that I think could help our product. I really do.”
Dyer had a long tenure in WWE, where he held the United States Championship and is a former King of the Ring and Money in the Bank winner. When Triple H took over WWE creative in 2022, Corbin was briefly associated with JBL before eventually going down to NXT. In the 2024 WWE Draft, he was called up to SmackDown and remained there until WWE chose not to renew his contract in November of that year.
In the year since his release, Dyer has continued to wrestle, making appearances for MLW.
Ricochet’s opponent for Final Battle has been revealed.
ROH confirmed on Tuesday that Ricochet will defend his newly-won National title at Final Battle this Friday against Dalton Castle. It will mark the first time he’s defended the title since winning it at Full Gear last month.
The first AEW Championship ever on an ROH PPV will be defended, as the champ Ricochet will face the challenger Dalton Castle at Final Battle! pic.twitter.com/uY8VFFylhx
It was previously announced that the first-ever National Champion would be defending the title at Final Battle. Ricochet emerged as the winner in the Casino Gauntlet battle royal at Full Gear, pinning Kevin Knight.
When introducing the title, it was said that the National title would be defended across various promotions, including ROH, CMLL, and NJPW. Following Full Gear, Tony Khan revealed that the latter two companies expressed interest in future title matches.
ROH Final Battle (December 5)
Survival of the Fittest for the ROH World Championship: Bandido defends against Blake Christian, The Beast Mortos, Sammy Guevara, Komander, and Hechicero
ROH Women’s Championship: Athena defends against Persephone
Finals for the ROH Women’s Pure Championship: TBA vs. TBA
ROH Women’s Television Championship: Mercedes Mone defends against Red Velvet
ROH Tag Team Championship: The Beast Mortos & Sammy Guevara vs. Adam Priest and Tommy Billington
ROH Six-Man Tag Team Championship: Shane Taylor Promotions (Shane Taylor, Carlie Bravo, and Captain Shawn Dean defend against Skyfight (Scorpio Sky, Dante Martin, and Darius Martin)
AEW National title: Ricochet defends against Dalton Castle
30-minute Iron Man match: Nigel McGuiness vs. Lee Moriarty
We have the largest issue of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter in our history up on the site today because we are covering two very newsworthy weeks:
*Full coverage of Full Gear. The good, the bad, the reaction, the business notes, reasons for the surprisingly good PPV number, thoughts on the world title change, long title reigns and how they create legends, and early Continental Classic thoughts.
*Notes and odds regarding upcoming matches
*UFC announces its first two shows of 2026, changes that the company is making and why the first two main events are so controversial
*Full coverage of UFC 323
*The life and times of Bob Caudle, the voice of Mid Atlantic wrestling and a Hall of Fame candidate
*A detailed look at how and why the ratings have changed, why the explanation makes no sense, exactly how much the new panel and big data ratings have hurt each show and in particular where.
*The most in-depth look at the ratings for all the shows over the past two weeks, placings for the week, placings in the time slot, men vs. women, how the placings compare to 2024 and 2023, and each show compared with the prior year and prior week, as well as the leading competition for each show.
*Claudio Castagnoli, Wheeler Yuta, Daniel Garcia, Komander, Mortos, Mike Bailey and Kevin Knight go to CMLL, draw big crowds and a look at their key matches
*CMLL ready to honor a milestone it is close that no company has ever done in history
*Notes on AAA’s new TV deal in Mexico and Latin America and who they are pushing as the top stars
*WWE tag team taking the name of one of Mexico’s greatest tag teams in history
*Updates on tag team tournaments in Stardom, New Japan and All Japan.
*Wrestler suspended after getting in car accident and messing up a tournament
*Update on Tokyo Dome ticket sales
*Fantastica Mania 2026 notes
*Battle of the Generations
*RAF new philosophy and update
*Santo’s final matches
*Sting’s son has first singles match
*Headbangers farewell tour
*The oldest male wrestler in history has a match last week
*Opera Cup notes
*TNA business notes as well as notes on the next PPV show and the last major show
*AEW TV changes
*Final Battle updated card
*Tony Khan on multiple subjects
*Ticket sales for upcoming WWE, AEW and TNA shows
*Two best in the world at their specific sport athletes are on UFC’s radar
*Becky Lynch’s comments
*Update on stockholders lawsuit against WWE
*New WWE signings
*WWE star talks about her domestic violence issue
*WWE engagements
*Bret Hart talks McMahon and Michaels and our thoughts on it
After Alicia Taylor on social media reflected on her final ring introduction of John Cena at Survivor Series, he responded: “Matches and moments are only memorable if we ALL believe in them. Thank YOU for being a driving force to help audiences around the world enjoy and invest in these moments. NO ONE does it alone. Your professionalism, passion, presentation and overall love of the business lay the foundation for lifelong memories.”
Reacting to her Survivor Series loss, Nikki Bella wrote on Instagram: “I want a rematch! When my face heals this week I will be more than ready! Her foot?! The ref! That match was mine! That title is mine!”
On Monday night, AMC posted a teaser video on social media showing a date of January 15, 2026 with a live crowd cheering. That would fall on a Thursday when TNA normally airs Impact on AXS TV. Shortly after, Jon Alba of Sports Illustrated reported that the belief is that TNA’s programming is heading to AMC Networks.
Fightful reported that the television deal could be announced as soon as Tuesday. TNA is scheduled to have a talent call that day to address the issue.
Back in October, President Carlos Silva said that TNA was now in active negotiations for a television deal. Reports throughout the year indicated that the CW was among the potential landing spots. The following month, Alba reported that TNA was expected to announce a new deal by the end of the year, citing “high-ranking industry sources.” He was also the first to report that AMC Networks had emerged as a potential home for the promotion.
AMC has a reach of around 60 million homes and has aired blockbuster television shows such as ‘Breaking Bad’ and ‘The Walking Dead.’ Sister networks include BBC America, Sundance TV, We TV, and IFC.
The finals of the Last Time is Now tournament are now set.
LA Knight and Gunther won their semifinal matches on Monday’s Raw and as a result have advanced to the finals of the tournament that will take place on Friday’s SmackDown. Whoever wins the finals will become John Cena’s final opponent for Saturday Night’s Main Event on December 13 in Washington, D.C..
Knight was the first to advance, reversing a pin attempt by Jey Uso to pick up the win. After the match, a despondent Jey Uso sulked at ringside and destroyed the Prime Energy display nearby. As he was walking out of the arena, Jackie Redmond attempted to interview him, but Uso wouldn’t answer any questions. He eventually said titles looked better on Roman Reign’s shoulders before leaving.
In the second semifinal, Gunther defeated Solo Sikoa. The finish had Talla Tonga at ringside grab Gunther so Sikoa could work him over, but Gunther countered with a low blow on Talla. He then took Sikoa back into the ring and pinned him after a powerbomb.
WWE SmackDown (December 5)
Last Time Is Now tournament finals: LA Knight vs. Gunther
The first Raw of 2026 will have a big time title match.
It was confirmed during Monday’s show that Bron Breakker will challenge CM Punk for the World Heavyweight title on January 5. This comes after Breakker pinned Punk during the men’s WarGames match at Survivor Series.
After Heyman made the announcement, Breakker cut a promo saying he thought it would be tougher to take out Punk, but after pinning him he realized that Punk was nothing but a “soft a** bitch.” He promised to go after every good memory the fans have of Punk and recalled a backstage moment after WrestleMania where Punk told Breakker he wondered if he could ‘cut a promo with the big dogs now.’ Breakker said consider that promo cut and called himself the real best in the world.
Breakker scored the pin for his team after a mystery wrestler in a hoodie ran in and gave Punk Seth Rollins’ stomp, eventually falling prey to Breakker’s spear. On Monday, Heyman feigned ignorance when it came to the identity of the masked man.
WWE Monday Night Raw (January 5)
World Heavyweight title: CM Punk defends against Bron Breakker
