He defeated Chad Gable to retain the title in a match WWE posted to X on Saturday. Lee picked up the victory after hitting his opponent with Operation Dragon at 4 minutes and 22 seconds into the five-minute time limit.
It was Lee’s first defense of the title since defeating Andrade for it in November.
The match was Lee’s first in six weeks. He has been away from the company on paternity leave as he and his wife Lupita recently welcomed the birth of their second daughter. His last match had been on December 16 in a loss to Pete Dunne taped for Main Event.Â
Gable was coming off having defeated Charlie Dempsey and Chris Sabin in two tournament matches to earn the title shot.Â
A match pitting Zoey Stark vs. Kayden Carter is scheduled for the next episode of WWE Speed.
Penta is grateful that Chad Gable helped make his WWE debut such a success.
Following his departure from AEW, Penta debuted for WWE in impressive fashion with a victory over Gable on the January 13 episode of Raw. While appearing on Busted Open Radio ahead of the Royal Rumble, Penta reflected on what a special moment his debut was for him. Penta called it an amazing night, a dream come true, and a turning point in his career. He had huge praise for Gable, calling him one of the best wrestlers in the world.
“Chad Gable, this match with Chad Gable — turning point in my career. Because Chad Gable is one of the best wrestlers in the world,” Penta said. “Oh man, very professional. He has something like me. The very passion for this business, you know? Thank you, Chad. I said after my match: Thank you, Chad. Because you is the person — the turning point in my career.”
The match was also a special moment for Gable, who said he “felt so alive” facing Penta and was reminded why he fell in love with wrestling as a child.
Penta is set to compete in his first Royal Rumble tomorrow (February 1). Gable has also been confirmed as one of the entrants for the men’s Rumble match.
Chad Gable is the new number one contender to the WWE Speed Championship.
A first-time-ever matchup aired on WWE Speed today with Gable taking on Chris Sabin in the finals of a number one contender’s tournament. In the final minute of the match, Gable applied an ankle lock outside of the ring. He saw time winding down and got Sabin back in, where Gable went for another ankle lock. Sabin reversed it into a pin attempt, but Gable escaped and hit a Chaos Theory German suplex to get the victory with 19 seconds left of the three-minute time limit.
Dragon Lee vs. Gable for the WWE Speed Championship will air on a special edition of Speed on X/Twitter at noon Eastern this Saturday (February 1) — the day of the Royal Rumble. The match should be taped either before or after SmackDown this Friday.
This will be the first title defense Lee has made since winning the Speed title from Andrade in November.
Lee has been away from WWE programming in recent weeks as he and his wife Lupita prepared for the arrival of their new daughter. She gave birth on January 23.
A new number one contender’s tournament began on WWE Speed today with Chad Gable and NXT’s Charlie Dempsey facing off for the first time ever.
The two technicians nearly went to a three-minute time limit draw, but Gable got the victory with three seconds remaining. He hit a Chaos Theory German suplex with time winding down and pinned Dempsey just before the clock expired.
Charlie Dempsey and @WWEGable battle it out to see who will advance in the No. 1 Contender's Tournament. Who will punch their ticket to the #WWESpeed Semifinals? đ¤ pic.twitter.com/CtVOZLtJOF
Of note, Corey Graves was not the commentator for WWE Speed this week. He had provided play-by-play for every episode of the show since it debuted in April 2024, but Blake Howard was instead in that role for Gable vs. Dempsey. Howard is a commentator for WWE Main Event and formerly called NXT Level Up.
Graves also did not appear on NXT this week after hyping that he would have “a lot to say” on the episode. Late Monday night, Graves posted a tweet voicing his displeasure with being moved off main roster commentary and demoted to NXT. Graves claimed that he was told he wasn’t famous enough for Raw or SmackDown. He has since deleted the tweet.
The Speed tournament continues next Wednesday (January 22) with Chris Sabin vs. Grayson Waller. The winner of that match takes on Gable in the next round to determine who will challenge Dragon Lee for the WWE Speed Championship.
Chad Gable has commented on his match against Penta from WWE Raw on Monday.Â
The debuting Penta was revealed as Gable’s mystery opponent in the opening contest of last night’s show. Penta won the match with a Penta Driver in just over 13 minutes, with his family seated in the front row at ringside.Â
On Tuesday morning, Gable took to social media to say he “felt so alive” last night.Â
“I detest Penta, luchadores, and losing. But last night was a reminder as to why I fell in love with this beautiful artistic expression of physicality and the sport of Professional Wrestling when I was 5 years old and have been obsessed with it ever since. I felt so alive.”
I detest Penta, luchadores, and losing.
But last night was a reminder as to why I fell in love with this beautiful artistic expression of physicality and the sport of Professional Wrestling when I was 5 years old and have been obsessed with it ever since.
The Gable vs. Penta match on WWE Raw this week was covered by our own Bryan Alvarez and Dave Meltzer on last night’s edition of Wrestling Observer Radio.
“I thought the match was great. It was the right crowd. They kept shooting (Penta’s) daughters crying at ringside. They were so happy. He was clearly so happy,” Meltzer said on the show.
“Man, this guy came off as a megastar,” Alvarez added.
The former Penta El Zero Mideo made his debut on Raw as the surprise opponent for Chad Gable, though Michael Cole did note that it was the worst kept secret in WWE. Although Gable put up a fight, Penta got the win after hitting the sacrifice (snapping armbar) and the Penta driver.
After the match, Penta cut an interview saying everyone has been waiting for this moment, but he has been waiting for this moment as well. He concluded by saying that this just wasnât the new WWE era on Netflix, it was the new Penta era.
Earlier on Monday, WWE essentially confirmed Pentaâs incoming arrival by highlighting new merchandise already available on WWEShop.com.
Penta became a free agent late last year after his AEW contract expired. His brother, Rey Fenix, remains under AEW contract as time was added to his deal while he was recovering from an injury, and won’t become a free agent until sometime in 2025.
Members of American Made and the LWO will square off on next Monday’s WWE Raw.
In a new match for the Monday, November 4 episode, American Made’s Chad Gable will take on the LWO’s Dragon Lee in singles competition.
The match stems from Gable’s interference in the tag team number one contender’s match on this week’s Raw as he put Lee’s partner Rey Mysterio in an ankle lock on the floor in the bout eventually won by the War Raiders. Gable was at ringside to support the Creed Brothers who also took part in the triple threat number one contender’s match.
The bout was officially announced for next Monday’s episode on the Raw Talk show streaming on Peacock following Raw’s conclusion each week.
Next week’s Raw will also feature the fallout from this Saturday’s Crown Jewel pay-per-view.
It was announced on Monday that the leader of the Wyatt Sicks will be in action, taking on Chad Gable. The group has focused on Gable and the rest of American Made since their reintroduction. During a match between Ivy Nile and Maxxine Dupri, the group interruped the match with Nikki Cross laying out Nile. The male members went after American Made as Howdy gave Gable the Sister Abigail.
Another match will see Bronson Reed take on Braun Strowman. After Reed defeated The Miz in a no disqualification match with a tsunami, he went to go for another one when Strowmanâs music hit. The two faced off, but didnât touch.
It was also announced that the start of a tournament to crown a number one contender for the Intercontinental title would take place next Monday. Bron Breakker in an interview said that it wasnât his fault that he was a badass and a genetic freak, but he warned his next challenger that heâll spear him to the floor, and that will be his fault. In another promo, Jey Uso said he would be entering the tournament.
Here is the updated card for next Mondayâs Raw:
Uncle Howdy vs. Chad Gable
Bronson Reed vs. Braun Strowman
Tournament to crown Intercontinental title number one contender begins
The length of Chad Gable’s WWE contract has been revealed.
Gable noted during a recent interview with Chris Van Vliet that the deal he signed with the company in June is for three years.
“I just re-signed with the company for three more years,” Gable said on the show. “To extend my relationship with the company that’s done so much for me, afforded me the things that I never thought I would have been able to do, travel around the world and back a hundred times it feels like, see things I never would have saw, meet people I never would have met, and just live a childhood dream which so many people don’t ever get to do, how could I not be grateful for that?”
“To continue that relationship, I’m so excited,” he continued.
“If you ask me, I have 10 years left in me. I feel physically as good as I ever have but to be hitting a peak, I feel, of my career at this point is awesome.”
Gable first signed with WWE in November 2013 and made his NXT TV debut in January 2015. He’s won the NXT, Raw, and SmackDown tag titles but has not won a singles championship yet in his WWE career, something he also spoke to Chris Van Vliet about.
“I also am disappointed in the fact that I didn’t (win a singles title) during that whole run (with Sami Zayn). Because I also don’t want to give the fans the impression that like, well he’s great, but he’s also just the guy that can’t win the big one, where I know I am and I know I can. But what this is doing is I think for me building that first one to mean almost as much as maybe it’s ever meant for anybody. I’ve come so close so many times, the Gunther stuff, what it did for my career, what Gunther did for my career can’t be overstated. I have him to thank for so much the way he elevated me. Then moving on to the stuff with Sami, from a storytelling perspective alongside the in-ring perspective, we got so much accomplished in such a short amount of time. I feel like for both of us that it left just the right amount on the table for me as a singles guy to be like he did so much there, he got so much done, but he didn’t win the championship. So we’ve got one piece of the puzzle left to fill in, and I’m almost happy it didn’t happen then, because of what we got done there. It didn’t need it. I didn’t need it. But now I do and so now it’s still on the table.”
Chad Gable opened up about being involved in an angle with the Wyatt Sicks during a recent interview with Chris Van Vliet.
When Uncle Howdy’s faction debuted on Raw nearly two months ago, they attacked several people backstage including Gable. The Wyatts’ victims were motionless and some fans took this to mean they were dead. Triple H later revealed on the Pat McAfee Show that Gable was still very much alive.
Gable says the segment led to an interesting situation that week when he attended church.
“Yeah, that was that was quite a night,” Gable said of the June 17 episode of WWE Raw. “Out of everything I’ve done over the past couple of years, the response to that was so out of this world insane. People thought [I was dead], I can’t tell you the amount of people that thought something actually happened to me. I went to church that Sunday and ran into a little kid who was watching. I was kind of hiding my head from him and he was like making his way around me to get a look at my head. And he’s like ‘Where did it [the wound] go?’ I’m like, ‘Well, I mean, I fixed it bud, I went to the hospital and stuff, it was bad.’ And he’s like ‘What did they do to you?’ I’m like, ‘You’ll have to tune in tomorrow night.’ They were into it, it was really interesting.”
“What the storyline has done is it came at this awesome time when I had just done the turn. I had become this abusive coaching character, which people got a whole new look which I thought did wonders for me. Then all of a sudden at the same congruently the Wyatts came in and forced me to be vulnerable. So we get Chad Gable, who’s this abusive over the top, shows no vulnerability, and now he’s forced to. So you’re getting these two dynamic stories at the same time. I benefit from this and not a lot of people get to dip their hands in so many different stories at one time.”
Gable also revealed during the interview that initially it was supposed to be just him that the Wyatts attacked when they debuted on Raw.
“It was going to be that I was going to be the lone guy kind of laid out. Initially, we didn’t really know to what degree. But when we got it ready to go, we’ll say we were blown away, like, holy crap, what exactly happened to me here? We’re not sure and we just ran with it. There was no plan, we kind of saw how it worked out. And it worked out, I think, to our advantage better than we expected. Because the response to that from an audience standpoint was just out of this world. I think it just helped the whole intro of the family and their aura and they’ve been doing so great with that. You can tell the audience they’re just taken aback by them. Every single week, the vibe in the crowd, you’ll see it tomorrow night when you’re there, maybe you have already. But it’s something else when you’re out there in the arena, and they show up man.”
Gabe continued to say that working with Bo Dallas and playing a part in his carrying on of Bray Wyatt’s legacy is a special position to be in. He opened up about what Wyatt meant to his career and working with Dallas on his first WWE program in five years.
“That’s special for a number of reasons. Bo, he’s so excited about this, and he should be, but I feel his energy and his anxiety, the good anxiety, he has his pacing back and forth before watching him. And it’s similar to watch, eerie in a way, but also so comforting because Windham was very similar and I had the very good fortune to work with Windham when I first got called up to SmackDown. We were on a European tour, my first ever, and he was with Randy (Orton) at the time. We were over there, me and Jason Jordan as American Alpha, we’re doing some other match, I don’t even know what it was. But then they watched us work the first night and requested to work with us like the rest of the tour. So the whole card got flipped around. So for 9 or 10 days straight over there in the UK and in Europe, we worked with Randy and Bray every night, and it was awesome. They just had nothing but the nicest stuff to say about us afterwards. They dropped the tag team titles to us about a month later, which to me was just like a nod to us as you guys are great. But I learned a lot from Bray in that time and just gained the utmost respect for him. Because he’s one of those guys that when he speaks his mind or gives you feedback you listen. Nothing he says feels like he’s just saying it. Hey, kid, here’s a piece of advice. It’s like he’s looking at you, and offering you his real piece of mind. And something I found about myself that I’ve kind of discovered over the past few years, and this happens with Randy too, or I find with people that I hold in very high regard. I don’t always have like these, I’m not texting him all the time. I don’t have those types of relationships where I’m constantly staying in touch every day and I’m talking to them. But when they say something to me, I store it somewhere in here, and it means so much to me. Bray was one of those people and Randy’s one of those people. So now, like you said, to your point, to be selected as the first guy to have to work with Bray or to work with Bo as he carries on Brayâs legacy. To me, I get to play a small part in carrying on the legacy, which is so special. So when he gave me Windhamâs old finisher the other night. I wanted to make it look good, put some stank on it and make it look a little extra special to go that was for you my friend and now also for Bo as he carries it on. So I think all of us that are playing a part in this right now are in a very special position and a very delicate one to carry it on and do it in the right way. So it’s balanced like a golden egg, take care of it. It’s a cool, cool thing.”
Gable’s full interview with Chris Van Vliet is available below.
The beginning of the end came when Lumis, Gacy and the Creeds were on the outside of the ring and Gable hit a big belly-to-back suplex on Rowan on the inside. He got distracted by calling for the Creeds who subsequently got hit with double uranages on the announce table. Gable then turned around into a Rowan claw slam. Gacy followed that up by powerbombing Lumis onto Gable before Lumis went to the top for the big splash and pin.
Uncle Howdy and Nikki Cross watched the match from the entranceway and the entire group posed in the ring to close the show before the group’s logo appeared followed by what appeared to be a flash of Cross.
The new faction to honor the late Bray Wyatt debuted on a mid-June Raw and have been terrorizing Gable ever since that night.
At one point, Rowan honored the late Jon Huber (Brodie Lee/Luke Harper) by saying “Yeah yeah yeah yeah” and blowing kisses before springboarding into the ring.
Chad Gable has two new allies in Julius Creed & Brutus Creed following Monday’s WWE Raw.
The Creed Brothers provided backup for Gabe in a segment where he called out Bo Dallas/Uncle Howdy on Monday’s WWE Raw, ending months of speculation as to if and when The Creeds and Gable would form a new faction.
Reports as early as April speculated that The Creeds & Ivy Nile would align with Gable as a new heel group after Gable turned on Sami Zayn.
Nile was not part of the presentation on Monday’s Raw, where Gable called Dallas out, only to have The Creeds ambush him. The lights in the arena went down as Dallas was attacked by the new faction, and The Wyatt Sicks made their way to the ring to save Dallas. The segment ended with Dallas and his group laughing as Gable and The Creed Brothers ran off.
Prior to aligning with The Creeds on Monday’s Raw, Gable teased a reconciliation with his Alpha Academy group of Tozawa, Otis, and Maxxine Dupri, only for that trio to rebuff him.
Chad Gable opened up about re-signing with WWE during a recent interview.
Gable first signed with the company in 2013 and signed a five-year contract in 2019 that expired recently. He revealed last month that they’d come to terms on a new deal to remain with WWE, although the length of the agreement has not been disclosed.
With Gable arguably experiencing the hottest period of his career at the moment, he was asked about the timing of his contract negotiations during an appearance on Cheap Heat with Peter Rosenburg.
“The timing is unbelievable, I’ve reflected on it so much,” Gable said about his contract coming due when it did. “These are the kinds of things that when they happen like this they make you question, like, there’s something to this, someone was looking out for me or fate or something because the stars just aligned. It was just too perfect.”
Gable continued to say that he’s a loyal guy who always wants to finish what he starts. However, just a few years ago, finishing what he started in WWE looked a lot different than it does now.
“This is where I want to be. I’m like a loyal guy, right? So, I start somewhere I want to finish there. If I start something, anything, I want to finish it. I’m just so happy and fortunate that the idea of finishing it now looks different than it would have a few years ago, which would have just been like fulfilling my contract would have been finishing it because I wasn’t really doing anything. Now, finishing it means accomplishing things, winning championships and leaving a real legacy.”
Gable’s full appearance on Cheap Heat is available below.
Two more have qualified for the upcoming Money in the Bank ladder matches.
Lyra Valkyria and Chad Gable have qualified for the ladder matches that will take place on July 6 in Toronto. In the first qualifier, Valkyria defeated Shayna Baszler and Kairi Sane after pinning Sane with the nightwing (Michinoku driver). Later in the show, Chad Gable defeated Bronson Reed and Braun Strowman when Gable pinned Reed with a moonsault.
After the match, the lights went out and the Wyatt Sicksâ Nikki Cross emerged. Gable left before he could be attacked like on last weekâs Raw. Later, he attempted to make amends with Otis and the rest of his former Alpha Academy students, but failed. The Creed Brothers and Ivy Nile then walked up to him as they started to talk.
The current card for Money in the Bank set for Saturday, July 6 â
World Heavyweight Champion Damian Priest defends against Seth Rollins
WWE Intercontinental Champion Sami Zayn defends against Bron Breakker
Cody Rhodes, Kevin Owens, and Randy Orton vs. The Bloodline
Menâs Money in the Bank ladder match: Jey Uso vs. Andrade vs. Carmelo Hayes vs. Chad Gable vs. TBD vs. TBD
Womenâs Money in the Bank ladder match: IYO SKY vs. Chelsea Green vs. Lyra Valkyria vs. TBD vs. TBD vs. TBD
Though it had been announced that he wouldn’t be able to compete, Chad Gable is back in the Money in the Bank qualifying mix.
WWE posted a video tonight with Raw General Manager Adam Pearce announcing that Gable is cleared to wrestle and will be competing in his scheduled Money in the Bank qualifier this Monday. It will be Gable vs. Braun Strowman vs. Bronson Reed.
Gable was destroyed by the debuting Wyatt Sicks in the main event angle of Raw earlier this week. As part of the group’s introduction, it was revealed that Gable had been laid out and left bloodied backstage. Uncle Howdy (Bo Dallas), Erick Rowan, Nikki Cross, Dexter Lumis, and Joe Gacy have been confirmed as Wyatt Sicks members.
The video posted by Pearce included some technical difficulties caused by the Wyatt Sicks. The faction also “hacked” Pearce’s X/Twitter account earlier this week.
Jey Uso, Carmelo Hayes, and Andrade are the first three wrestlers to qualify for the 2024 men’s Money in the Bank ladder match. There will be a qualifying match on SmackDown next Friday with Logan Paul vs. LA Knight vs. Santos Escobar. Money in the Bank takes place on Saturday, July 6.
WWE Raw (Monday, June 24) —
Menâs Money in the Bank qualifying match: Braun Strowman vs. Bronson Reed vs. Chad Gable
Womenâs Money in the Bank qualifying match: Lyra Valkyria vs. Shayna Baszler vs. Kairi Sane
