The latest WWE and AEW News and Results
Dave Meltzer and I are back with our Friday episode of Wrestling Observer Radio, talking about all the big news from today’s Wrestling Observer Newsletter, including a recap of the category A awards for 2024.
Here were some of the things we covered:
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Image: AEW
There is lots to discuss this week on a new Wrestling Weekly with myself and Les Thatcher.
That list includes WWE roster cuts, Ricky Starks (if that is in fact his name) arriving in NXT, and a preview of AEW Grand Slam Australia.
Thanks for listening and have a great weekend~!
John LaRocca and I are back to talk about the major topics in the world of wrestling on this week’s Fight Game Podcast.
We kicked off the show with our Thumbs Up/Thumbs Down winners and losers of the week which included a spirited discussion on Ricky Starks’ NXT debut before going through our Top Five topics which included:
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Ricky Starks will not be performing for Turnbuckle Championship Wrestling this weekend, but he could be free to show up at NXT Vengeance Day.
Starks was scheduled to wrestle Aaron Solo on Saturday in Buford, Georgia, for the promotion founded by Dusty Rhodes in 2000 and revived in 2023 under Cody Rhodes’ Nightmare Factory LLC. The event was scheduled for the same night as NXT Vengeance Day.
On Wednesday, TCW announced that due to circumstances beyond their control, Starks would no longer be appearing.
“Due to circumstances beyond our control, Ricky Starks will not be in attendance on Saturday, February 15th at the Tannery Row Ale House.”
“However, you can still expect the same incredible evening of Georgia’s premier star-studded, action-packed, family-friendly, independent professional wrestling that TCW Live has to offer! We will see you at the matches!”
🚨Important announcement🚨
— Turnbuckle Championship Wrestling (@Turnbuckle_CW) February 12, 2025
Due to circumstances beyond our control, Ricky Starks will not be in attendance on Saturday, February 15th at the Tannery Row Ale House. However, you can still expect the same incredible evening of Georgia’s premier star studded, action packed, family… pic.twitter.com/LyQXDQ2gkh
Starks made his NXT debut on Tuesday, appearing in the crowd and delivering a promo. He stated that if NXT is the future of professional wrestling, then it needs a true superstar of the future.
“And everyone’s been begging the question, when will the revolution be televised again?” he said. “I’m here, ain’t I?”
Starks had been with AEW since 2020 but had not appeared on AEW programming since March 2024. He’s a former FTW and World Tag Team Champion in the promotion.
WWE has yet to make an official announcement regarding Starks’ status with the company.
The Undertaker says Ricky Starks’ WWE NXT debut last night caught him off guard
While last night’s episode aired, Taker was interviewed by Bully Ray on Busted Open Radio with NXT on in the background. When Taker noticed Starks’ debut, it led to a discussion about how they first met.
Taker shared that they met at a gym in 2015, and years later, Starks helped his wife, Michelle McCool, train for her Royal Rumble return.
Taker said:
“Yeah, so I’m training at this gym. I noticed this kid is there every day. Doesn’t say anything, really respectful. As the training went along and we needed different spotters and different help, he was always like right there. Finally, we struck up a conversation and he told me that he was trying to break in the business and I’d kind of talked to him about different things.”
“For one of the Rumbles where Michelle was a surprise guest, she wanted to get in the ring, so he came down and trained with her. And I’ve seen him a few times here and there, and I’ve always had great, great conversations with him. He’s such a good kid, such a respectful kid.”
Reacting to Starks’ debut, Taker said it took him by surprise.
“Yeah, so that caught me completely off guard. I hadn’t seen him in probably a year, year and a half maybe. And then I just looked up and saw him there. But yeah, that’s how we met. We met in a gym while I was getting ready for Shane (McMahon) in WrestleMania.”
We got LIVE reaction of @undertaker & @bullyray5150 when they saw @starkmanjones show up on #WWENXT !👀👀👀
— SiriusXM Busted Open (@BustedOpenRadio) February 12, 2025
Full Interview coming on the #bustedopen247 Podcast! pic.twitter.com/hyNoq8i1Vu
Starks made his debut for a major promotion in 2018 at the NWA 70th Anniversary show. He later won the promotion’s TV title in 2020, shortly before making his AEW debut. That summer, Starks answered Cody Rhodes’ open challenge for the TNT title, leading to Tony Khan signing him after the match. He went on to win the FTW title and AEW World Tag Team Championships with Big Bill before AEW stopped using him last March.
You can listen to the full interview below:
A big free agent has made his first appearance on NXT.
Shortly before Tuesday’s main event, Ricky Starks appeared in the crowd. They instantly recognized the former AEW star, who wasn’t mentioned by name by the announcers.
Starks said that if NXT is the future of pro wrestling, they need an absolute superstar of the future. If this is the hottest brand, they need the hottest free agent.
“And everyone’s been begging the question, when will the revolution be televised again?,” he concluded. “I’m here, ain’t I?”
After being off AEW television since March of last year, it was reported on Monday that Starks had been released from the company. It hasn’t been made public why AEW stopped using Starks or what led to his release. In one interview, Starks himself said he wasn’t sure why he had been off television, though he had his theories.
Last fall, he began making independent dates but was pulled from all GCW events following comments made by Effy regarding the Khan family. Despite that, Starks has continued to make independent dates for the likes of House of Glory and Defy, where he won the latter’s top championship this past weekend.
Welcome to another episode of The Latest with Denise Salcedo breaking down the biggest wrestling news headlines of the week so far.
TOPICS:
— Miro and Ricky Starks released from AEW
— Ari Emanuel says WWE ‘numbers are up’ on Netflix, ‘thrilled’ with relationship
— Vince & Shane McMahon, Undertaker attend Super Bowl 59
— Karl Anderson, Luke Gallows, Giovanni Vinci released from WWE
— Elektra Lopez has been released from WW
— Isla Dawn appears to be finished with WWE
— More WWE releases from over the weekend
AEW has released both Miro and Ricky Starks.
On Monday, PWInsider reported AEW and Miro had come to a mutual agreement on his release from the company. It was also noted that Ricky Starks no longer appeared on the company roster page. Our own Dave Meltzer has since confirmed both Miro and Starks have been released from AEW.
Miro publicly requested his release in September and has not wrestled since Worlds End on December 30, 2023. Starks, who has been absent from AEW programming since March 2024, reportedly asked for his release last month but was denied.
Malakai Black is also no longer listed on the AEW roster page, with reports indicating his contract has expired.
Miro debuted in AEW as Kip Sabian’s “Best Man” in September 2020. He won the TNT Championship in 2021 but was used sparingly in 2022 and 2023 and not at all in 2024. Starks debuted for AEW in June 2020 and is a former FTW and AEW World Tag Team Champion.
It’s another busy day on Wrestling Observer Live.
Ricky Starks is the new Defy World Champion, ending KENTA’s 615-day title reign in Seattle Friday night. I talk about a big win for the current AEW star.
I also cover a firing in AEW and some releases in WWE.
Solo Sikoa made his return on WWE SmackDown and a number of people qualified for next month’s Elimination Chamber.
Plus: a preview for tonight’s AEW Collision, AEW’s image problem, and the controversy over AEW Grand Slam Australia.
It’s a packed show so check it out.
Click Here to Listen (sub needed)
A new champion was crowned, and an AEW rivalry played out at DEFY Hundredth on Friday night in Seattle.
Ricky Starks defeated KENTA to win the DEFY World Championship at the promotion’s eighth-anniversary event, ending KENTA’s 615-day reign.
in the main event, Ricky Starks pinned KENTA to become the NEW DEFY World Champion! @defyNW #defy100 pic.twitter.com/mPPJ4sxtT7
— NY-TALL-GUY (@tall_ny) February 8, 2025
Swerve Strickland and Ricochet’s AEW feud continued at DEFY Hundredth. Ricochet made an unannounced appearance, entering to Strickland’s theme music while wearing the robe he stole from Prince Nana on AEW Dynamite this week. Ricochet cut a promo calling out Strickland while the crowd taunted him with chants of “you’re bald.”
The lights went out, and when they came back on, Strickland was in the ring. The two brawled, but Ricochet ultimately escaped by shoving Nana into Strickland and running away.
Footage of the angle was shared on social media.
At DEFY 100 tonight… Ricochet trolled everyone in Washington by coming out to Swerve's music.
— Drainmaker 🌧️ 💵 (@DrainBamager) February 8, 2025
ONLY TO GET CONFRONTED BY SWERVE, GET HIS ASS BEAT WITH SOME HELP FROM PRINCE NANA. LMFAOOOOOO.
AEW feuds crossing over to the indies is genuinely amazing. pic.twitter.com/RDzKlEjqkO
Ricochet previously defeated Strickland in the main event of AEW Dynamite this week, countering a Swerve Stomp with a low blow before hitting The Spirit Gun to get the win.
DEFY Hundredth results:
Image: AEW
New reporting out in the last 24 hours has Ricky Starks reportedly requesting his AEW release which was then denied by Tony Khan.
The news was reported by both Ibou of WrestlePurists on Tuesday and then by Chris Featherstone on Wednesday.
Ibou said “things happened” between AEW and Starks that will never be reported, leading to a falling out. He said Starks will wait out the rest of his deal and the situation “is what it is.” Featherstone confirmed the release request, saying it was “due to frustrations with the current creative process and not being used” since March 2024.
He added, “I have also been informed that Starks has never turned down any creative ideas throughout his entire 10-month television absence, and he is simply just not being utilized.”
When asked during media calls, Khan has never directly addressed why Starks isn’t being used. Starks himself did an interview last year where he also said he wasn’t sure.
The date when he requested said release was not reported. Fightful previously reported his deal lasts through either the spring or summer of 2025.
The 34-year-old has been with AEW since June 2020 when he challenged then-TNT Champion Cody Rhodes on Dynamite and was eventually signed. While he never held singles gold, Starks was part of the AEW Tag Team titles with Big Bill. His last bout was in a tag team loss to Top Flight on a late-March edition of Collision.
Starks has been working his way back onto the indie scene in the interim despite being pulled from working with GCW after some inflammatory comments Effy made about Khan during a podcast appearance.
Ricky Starks addressed the live fans in Chicago after making his House of Glory debut on Friday.
HOG Champion Mike Santana defeated Starks via disqualification in the show’s main event. After the match, Starks cut a promo and told fans that many of them “have not seen anything yet” from him.
“Every time I grab this (microphone), I somehow get in trouble,” Starks joked to start his promo.
“I’m going to say this as plainly as this: I cannot thank each and every one of you from sitting over there, the meet and greet, from reading your messages, asking that I’m mentally OK, asking if I’m good, checking on me. You don’t know me from —-, but that’s the thing about this wrestling s–t is that, hey, it don’t matter. We’re all a part of one thing, right?”
Starks noted during the promo that his last few years in wrestling have allowed him to purchase a home for his mother, which was a lifelong goal of his.
“I have loved wrestling since I was seven. I told my mom I would buy her a house off of this, and God damn it, I have done that, and I am close to giving her everything else that she wants. I don’t take anything easy. I take it the hard way. I take things the way that I want to. If the road ain’t paved for cement, guess what? I guess I’m putting on my construction hat and I’m going to work.”
“If you thought that I was somebody less than a year ago, guess what? You’re sadly mistaken because now I’ve evolved to a man four years from today. And that’s saying something because a lot of y’all, a lot of y’all have not seen anything yet from me.”
“With the last dying breath in this New Orleans heart, I tell you this: I’m gonna stay absolute till I D-I-E.”
Friday’s HOG event was Starks’ first match since a Glory Pro event in St. Louis on November 24. It’s been close to 10 months since he’s wrestled for AEW. His last match took place on the March 30, 2024, episode of AEW Collision.
In November, Starks made a surprise appearance at a GCW event and appeared to be building an angle in the promotion with Matt Cardona. However, AEW later pulled Starks from any future GCW appearances.
Our own Dave Meltzer has since reported that comments GCW’s Effy made on his podcast about Shad Khan led to Starks’s removal from the show.
“While nobody officially said anything, the strong belief, actually confirmed to us, is that it was the comments from Effy of GCW on Tony Khan, particularly a line he said about Khan’s father paying him to stay away, led to Khan feeling he didn’t want to do business with GCW,” Meltzer wrote.
Image: AEW
The Josh Nason’s Punch-Out pro wrestling year in review series arrives in November with returning guest Rich Kraetsch of Voices of Wrestling.
Even though we cover things that happened just last month, there was a lot to dissect and talk about including:
Click here to listen (no sub needed)
Here’s the rest of the series thus far:
Ricky Starks continues to tour the indies.
The AEW star made a surprise appearance at the end of Defy’s Blueprint event on Sunday, confronting KENTA after he successfully defended the Defy title against Schaff. It isn’t known if or when the two will meet, though Defy is currently promoting their upcoming 8th Anniversary show that will take place on February 17.
Starks has been off AEW television since March, with no clear reason as to why he hasn’t been used. In recent months, he has instead appeared at various independent shows. A well-publicized situation saw Starks, who had just made his GCW debut, being pulled from all future events by AEW after GCW star Effy in an interview was critical of the Khans and AEW for running shows at the Hammerstein Ballroom just weeks before GCW was set to make their return.
Starks has an upcoming House of Glory match against Mike Santana next month.
Elsewhere on the show, actor Paul Walter Hauser appeared via video and challenged Joey Janela to a match for the 8th Anniversary show. Joey Janela accepted, making the bout a street fight.
AEW head Tony Khan spoke to the media for nearly an hour Friday to help promote Saturday’s Worlds End with a line of questioning that was much different than last week’s much-maligned media call ahead of ROH Final Battle.
Here’s a few key items Khan was asked about, the full audio of which can be streamed below:
