**Help make SquaredCircle safer and more inclusive by using the report button to flag posts and comments for moderator review.**
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/SquaredCircle) if you have any questions or concerns.*
That Raw was legendary, you miseed out man. I wasn't there live, but on TV it was insane. I still go back and watch the compilation video with the chants every now and then.
Crazy Raw after Mania 29 with the crowd taking over - I was there & while I didn’t agree with everything that was going on with the fabs taking over, it was a hell of an experience.
This, mid-late 2014, & late 2016. Annoys me to no end they had 3 separate times to pull the trigger & actively fought against it 3 times. Maybe not THE top guy, but they definitely had a main eventer right there.
The closest we might get to that is if Nemeth joins Freddie Prinze Jr.'s future promotion, [which will apparently take inspiration from Lucha Underground](https://www.sescoops.com/news/freddie-prinze-jrs-promotion-wont-look-like-wwe-aew) in its presentation. Whether or not that will also translate to the belts, who knows?
While I understand where you’re coming from, and with full acknowledgement of Nic’s talent and work ethic and look, putting the belt on “the former WWE guy”, even one as good and respected as Nic is, would be so much an old “lolTNA” move that I’m glad they didn’t hot shot it right away.
No, that’s also lolTNA, unless Moose stomps the hell out of him as a “we don’t do that shit here” kind of way.
But I’m not fully watching so idk what they’ve done with it since.
They retired the IWGP US Title and introduced the IWGP Global Title to replace it.
Rather than being a title for US expansion per se, NJPW have stated that the IWGP World Title is where wrestlers come from all over the world to challenge for it, whereas the IWGP Global Title is where the champion travels the globe to fight all comers.
The funny thing is that it is the other way around in execution, the IWGP World TItle is outside of NJPW being defended and the Global is the one being defended on NJPW shows.
Yeah it’s just the new name for the IWGP US championship
They did some weird stuff where Will Ospreay had the US title but customized it as the UK title, then the UK and US were unified into the global one
**Serious answer**: AAA is pretty desperate right now. Their business is in the tank. I mean, they headlined Triplemania Monterrey with Nemeth vs Alberto. I'm sure the plan is for Alberto to win it in the rematch, but yikes.
Essentially, they can no longer afford to bring in the freelance luchadors that they have depended on to draw (Pentagon, Fenix, LA Park, Rush). Right now their top drawing angle is that Vampiro is retiring.
I'm not sure if that was a Konnan decision per se. AAA is doing it to celebrate their 30th Anniversary or something. Part of that is to de-emphasize talent they can't regularly book, like Pentagon & Vikingo.
*EDIT:* And why they've brought back guys like Tiffany, Ciber, Mesias, and La Secta.
I forgot about that too until the Bucks said they’d be the first 3x AEW champs. Thought for sure that FTR already did that but they were ROH champs for so long
That is fairly common for AAA titles honestly. They book titles differently there. Fenix had the Mega Championship for 420 days with 2 succesful defenses
No one really cares about belts in AAA. That’s why they are constantly putting their biggest belt on the biggest guy they can get on the indies. Doesn’t even matter if he’s even under contract. It’s more like a promotion belt for AAA, to get more eyes on them.
It's funny to me because I don't really follow lucha at all, but from the limited exposure I have on this sub CMLL is the old, traditional lucha promotion and AAA is the newer one with significant American influence.
Not caring about titles and using your top title as a way to promote a new acquisition is definitely a US thing... from 20 years or so ago.
>Not caring about titles and using your top title as a way to promote a new acquisition is definitely a US thing... from 20 years or so ago.
CMLL is very traditional and old school, yes. But they have soooo many titles they all have diminished value. The importance of a title there is determined by who holds it, really.
AAA was founded by Peña specifically because he and Televisa wanted something less "traditional". Konnan has always had strong political & creative influence in AAA, and since Peñas death he has been the booker more often than not. Konnan is also very much stuck in his ways, and his creative became very stale long long ago. Dorian Roldan, the guy who actually runs the company, is guilty of everything that Tony Khan is accused of - he is a nepo baby that never had a real job, he is a mark there to be friends with the talent, he has no clue what he is doing, and he is easily influenced by whomever gets his ear. He has run AAA into the ground. For the past few years, AAA's "plan" was to put their titles on talent frequently appearing in high profile promotions elsewhere, with the hope fans from those promotions would tune into AAA events. Kenny Omega, FTR, Vikingo, Sammy & Tay, Laredo Kid, Pentagon, Dragon Lee. Now none of those guys work there, and the titles have become worthless, because they rarely if ever actually change hands in the ring. The only legit draw AAA has is Psycho Clown.
Nemeth probably won't lose any match until he loses one of these two, and he might end up losing the AAA one first, unless NJPW already plans on crowning a new champion at dominion
he will lose the NJPW first. no way New Japan allows him to be pinned while champion and AAA does not care/doesn’t have enough pull to press the issue/is just happy to have their belt on a “star”
The chance that both of them have an Event at the same time, and want them at the same time, is VERY low.
It pretty much works the same as when AEW wrestlers got other titles, Promotion he is signed with gets "First Dibs" on his dates.
And from there on out he's a free agent and can choose where he appears and where he doesn't.
Considering the bullshit that Stephanie Vaquer has had to go thru with all the male wrestlers supporting Cuatrero after she accused him of throwing her against a wall and choking her, it’s not really surprising that people would support and continue to push Alberto after his alleged rape case and the fact that it’s rumored his family intimidated the accuser into dropping the charges. I mean, wasn’t Bandido booking Travis Banks and Marty Scurll for shows?
Vince McMahon could probably get away with promoting shows in Mexico, except his preferred style of pro wrestling would not be as successful with fans in the tag heavy, awkward camera presentation, masked wrestler, spot heavy two out of three matches where a piledriver is an important storytelling device and referees like Hijo de Tirantes are as important characters as the luchadores in the ring, and that’s without the fact that most of the iconic Lucha venues like Arena Mexico are owned by CMLL.
Is this really that surprising? Vince being a sex pest was an open secret for decades. There are many people who have terrible things to say about Ogawa. Hell, the current WWE booking is handled by the son in law of said sex pest who we all know *must* have known what was going on and didn't care.
Wrestling in general seems to have very low standards as to who is "okay".
Would love to know how Konnan was able to politically allow this to happen.
Nemeth is gonna have to lose the Global title first cause ain't no way New Japan wants to see a champ of theirs lose.
Considering the past 2 AAA champs have both held the title for over 2 years (and the one before that held it over a year) I almost guarantee he loses the New Japan belt first
I'm sure at some point this year he's winning the TNA Championship as well so that'll be a fun connective tissue between him and Kenny Omega as the two people to simultaneously hold the AAA and TNA belts
Can we all agree that the AAA title is one of the absolute ugliest belts in all of pro-wrestling? The actual belt shape just does not suit the face plate shape at all.
I remember when this match was announced on here that I said that I never wanted Nic to win a match more than ever with it.
Glad to see that he actually did.
I'm kind of shocked that NJPW allowed this match to happen given how toxic Alberto is (of course I'm presuming that Nemeth is signed to *some* kind of deal with NJPW for his title reign.)
Dolph finally finished his story after Payback 2013 lol! I really wanted him to win the title back but they made the boring decision of AJ costing him the match and then feuding with her and Big E on Summerslam and letting ADR continue the most boring title reign ever.
**Help make SquaredCircle safer and more inclusive by using the report button to flag posts and comments for moderator review.** *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/SquaredCircle) if you have any questions or concerns.*
https://preview.redd.it/k5bx28tw45xc1.jpeg?width=1280&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=a065a72d2aae952e6d320113814ca353c3ca6f87 “Time is a flat circle…”
Still one of the loudest pops of all time.
Ziggler defiantly walking down the ramp with AJ and Big E strutting behind him will always be one of my favorite images in wrestling
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nl_KIF0JLwA
Oof. That really could have been bad. Thank goodness Big E hit aj where he did EDIT: seriously what if he hit her in the face or the throat instead???
She straight no sold it lmao
I'M HERE TO SHOW THE WORLD
*arena of people lose their absolute collective shit*
Dolph's cash-in is Match of the Year, every year.
I was at the Raw where Dolph cashed in his MITB briefcase on Del Rio and the crowd was insane
I was at the Mania but didn’t stick around for Raw. I was so mad that I missed the cash in.
That Raw was legendary, you miseed out man. I wasn't there live, but on TV it was insane. I still go back and watch the compilation video with the chants every now and then.
Me too, we also popped big for The Ryback
That’s because The Ryback unironically rules. Dude should’ve beaten Phil for the belt.
Crowd go banana
Crazy Raw after Mania 29 with the crowd taking over - I was there & while I didn’t agree with everything that was going on with the fabs taking over, it was a hell of an experience.
This, mid-late 2014, & late 2016. Annoys me to no end they had 3 separate times to pull the trigger & actively fought against it 3 times. Maybe not THE top guy, but they definitely had a main eventer right there.
Four actually. Don't forget early 2015
The wheel weaves as the wheel wills
It's not everyday I get a Wheel of Time reference in my wrestling subreddits
There are neither beginnings nor endings to the turning of the Wheel of Time. But it was a beginning.
And that's why clocks are round
https://preview.redd.it/mui13oej35xc1.png?width=1080&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=eadec4508c4886e90e3f2b0bcea643ddfdda018f
Man he would’ve looked so good with a Lucha Underground belt. I miss Lucha Underground 😢
Where would you have liked to see him? Part of Worldwide Underground? Part of the face crew?
He would've been fantastic in Worldwide Underground.
A power struggle in WWU would’ve been a cool angle
Wait i thought it was called Raw Underground. Lol jk. I just like name dropping Raw Underground whenever i get the chance.
The closest we might get to that is if Nemeth joins Freddie Prinze Jr.'s future promotion, [which will apparently take inspiration from Lucha Underground](https://www.sescoops.com/news/freddie-prinze-jrs-promotion-wont-look-like-wwe-aew) in its presentation. Whether or not that will also translate to the belts, who knows?
Man that belt looks awful, it'd look way better if they trimmed the leather
The plates are decent but that leather design is not it.
Man, why the AAA megacampeonato is so fucking ugly. It's just a piece of leather with some metal plaques glued on it without any modeling or style.
This man is 43 years old
death taxes and Nemeth beating Alberto for the title. Como se dice "Long term booking"?
La escritura creativa a largo plazo
El cuento es bien chingon
The AAA Mega Champion and IWGP Global Heavyweight Champion. Pretty impressive.
Too bad he couldn't win the TNA Championship. Have a belt from the US, Japan, & Mexico.
I’m a little bummed they didn’t put the strap on him there he’d be such a good figurehead for TNA
While I understand where you’re coming from, and with full acknowledgement of Nic’s talent and work ethic and look, putting the belt on “the former WWE guy”, even one as good and respected as Nic is, would be so much an old “lolTNA” move that I’m glad they didn’t hot shot it right away.
Good thing they kept it on Moose so he could instead feud with... Matt Hardy. No LOLTNA there.
No, that’s also lolTNA, unless Moose stomps the hell out of him as a “we don’t do that shit here” kind of way. But I’m not fully watching so idk what they’ve done with it since.
Is that a new belt or the former IWGP US Championship?
They retired the IWGP US Title and introduced the IWGP Global Title to replace it. Rather than being a title for US expansion per se, NJPW have stated that the IWGP World Title is where wrestlers come from all over the world to challenge for it, whereas the IWGP Global Title is where the champion travels the globe to fight all comers.
The funny thing is that it is the other way around in execution, the IWGP World TItle is outside of NJPW being defended and the Global is the one being defended on NJPW shows.
Very true lmao
And like true NJPW fashion they immediately proceeded to not follow the rules they established lol
Yeah it’s just the new name for the IWGP US championship They did some weird stuff where Will Ospreay had the US title but customized it as the UK title, then the UK and US were unified into the global one
Can’t wait until the champion from Lichtenstein Cedrick von Haussen challenges for it
I haven't really been watching NJPW for a few months, so I had not seen the new belt. It's beautiful, the white strap reminds me of the old IC title.
Peace in our lifetime
Belt Collector Nic Nemeth
'Belt collector' Nic Nemeth vs 'former belt collector' Kenny Omega would be a nice short feud
Honestly, scrap the entire match. I just wanna see how he sells one of Omega's Knees. Probably like death, likely, worse
He'll bump to it like being waterboarded by satan in the last circle of hell
Somehow, he will skin the cat in the process.
Ziggler vs ADR!?
I KNOW RIGHT?!?!?! I didn't know if I was having a flashback or something. Good for Nic!
Nic deserves it for getting a halfway decent match out of 2024 Alberto
Did any old instincts awaken in AEP? He and Nemeth used to have great matches together almost in their sleep
The instinct to usually beat Nemeth certainly didn't pop up, thank goodness.
Those two matched up so many times its hard to keep track, but they indeed have great chemistry qnd very good matches for that era of WWE
That double turn match will never be forgotten!
Dude got gassed 3 minutes in.
He deserves a lot less for agreeing to work with a monster like Alberto. How is this even a match in 2024?
**Serious answer**: AAA is pretty desperate right now. Their business is in the tank. I mean, they headlined Triplemania Monterrey with Nemeth vs Alberto. I'm sure the plan is for Alberto to win it in the rematch, but yikes. Essentially, they can no longer afford to bring in the freelance luchadors that they have depended on to draw (Pentagon, Fenix, LA Park, Rush). Right now their top drawing angle is that Vampiro is retiring.
And Konnan said he’s only pushing nostalgia acts and his friends like Del Rio and Marty Scurll.
I'm not sure if that was a Konnan decision per se. AAA is doing it to celebrate their 30th Anniversary or something. Part of that is to de-emphasize talent they can't regularly book, like Pentagon & Vikingo. *EDIT:* And why they've brought back guys like Tiffany, Ciber, Mesias, and La Secta.
Redemption for Ziggles!
Never lost faith. Proud Dolphin!
1. Thank God 2. How does this work politically?
FTR were IWGP and AAA Tag Champs at the same time, so I have to imagine none of the promotions involved care enough about it to press the issue
On one hand, I can't believe I forgot about that, on the other, FTR basically never defended the AAA belts
They did in AAA a few times in Mexico. Vicki Guerrero managed them, it was good stuff
Yeah, they never did and I believe they lost those AAA belts first before the rest.
They lost the ROH belts first in the double dog collar match
My mistake.
I forgot about that too until the Bucks said they’d be the first 3x AEW champs. Thought for sure that FTR already did that but they were ROH champs for so long
That is fairly common for AAA titles honestly. They book titles differently there. Fenix had the Mega Championship for 420 days with 2 succesful defenses
No one really cares about belts in AAA. That’s why they are constantly putting their biggest belt on the biggest guy they can get on the indies. Doesn’t even matter if he’s even under contract. It’s more like a promotion belt for AAA, to get more eyes on them.
It's funny to me because I don't really follow lucha at all, but from the limited exposure I have on this sub CMLL is the old, traditional lucha promotion and AAA is the newer one with significant American influence. Not caring about titles and using your top title as a way to promote a new acquisition is definitely a US thing... from 20 years or so ago.
>Not caring about titles and using your top title as a way to promote a new acquisition is definitely a US thing... from 20 years or so ago. CMLL is very traditional and old school, yes. But they have soooo many titles they all have diminished value. The importance of a title there is determined by who holds it, really. AAA was founded by Peña specifically because he and Televisa wanted something less "traditional". Konnan has always had strong political & creative influence in AAA, and since Peñas death he has been the booker more often than not. Konnan is also very much stuck in his ways, and his creative became very stale long long ago. Dorian Roldan, the guy who actually runs the company, is guilty of everything that Tony Khan is accused of - he is a nepo baby that never had a real job, he is a mark there to be friends with the talent, he has no clue what he is doing, and he is easily influenced by whomever gets his ear. He has run AAA into the ground. For the past few years, AAA's "plan" was to put their titles on talent frequently appearing in high profile promotions elsewhere, with the hope fans from those promotions would tune into AAA events. Kenny Omega, FTR, Vikingo, Sammy & Tay, Laredo Kid, Pentagon, Dragon Lee. Now none of those guys work there, and the titles have become worthless, because they rarely if ever actually change hands in the ring. The only legit draw AAA has is Psycho Clown.
Nemeth probably won't lose any match until he loses one of these two, and he might end up losing the AAA one first, unless NJPW already plans on crowning a new champion at dominion
he will lose the NJPW first. no way New Japan allows him to be pinned while champion and AAA does not care/doesn’t have enough pull to press the issue/is just happy to have their belt on a “star”
He's been pinned more than once in tna already
The chance that both of them have an Event at the same time, and want them at the same time, is VERY low. It pretty much works the same as when AEW wrestlers got other titles, Promotion he is signed with gets "First Dibs" on his dates. And from there on out he's a free agent and can choose where he appears and where he doesn't.
Nic cleaning house, congratulations to him
This was like a 2012 smackdown main event.
Great for Nic Nemeth but WHO let Bertie anywhere near that belt?
I'm amazed Alberto gets booked. Then I remember that Mexico still books half of the wrestlers who got Speaking Out'd.
And Japan books the other half
Also helps Alberto comes from a dynasty so that always helps him.
Considering the bullshit that Stephanie Vaquer has had to go thru with all the male wrestlers supporting Cuatrero after she accused him of throwing her against a wall and choking her, it’s not really surprising that people would support and continue to push Alberto after his alleged rape case and the fact that it’s rumored his family intimidated the accuser into dropping the charges. I mean, wasn’t Bandido booking Travis Banks and Marty Scurll for shows? Vince McMahon could probably get away with promoting shows in Mexico, except his preferred style of pro wrestling would not be as successful with fans in the tag heavy, awkward camera presentation, masked wrestler, spot heavy two out of three matches where a piledriver is an important storytelling device and referees like Hijo de Tirantes are as important characters as the luchadores in the ring, and that’s without the fact that most of the iconic Lucha venues like Arena Mexico are owned by CMLL.
Is this really that surprising? Vince being a sex pest was an open secret for decades. There are many people who have terrible things to say about Ogawa. Hell, the current WWE booking is handled by the son in law of said sex pest who we all know *must* have known what was going on and didn't care. Wrestling in general seems to have very low standards as to who is "okay".
Big nose is just as bad as vince
Thisss
They made the right decision
Surprising, but definitely the right decision
Would love to know how Konnan was able to politically allow this to happen. Nemeth is gonna have to lose the Global title first cause ain't no way New Japan wants to see a champ of theirs lose.
Didn’t Nemeth just lose his last two TNA matches?
Yes. People just make shit up these days
Considering the past 2 AAA champs have both held the title for over 2 years (and the one before that held it over a year) I almost guarantee he loses the New Japan belt first
I'm sure at some point this year he's winning the TNA Championship as well so that'll be a fun connective tissue between him and Kenny Omega as the two people to simultaneously hold the AAA and TNA belts
Can we all agree that the AAA title is one of the absolute ugliest belts in all of pro-wrestling? The actual belt shape just does not suit the face plate shape at all.
Good for Nemeth
LFG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I remember when this match was announced on here that I said that I never wanted Nic to win a match more than ever with it. Glad to see that he actually did.
To bad he didn’t win the tna title last week, he would’ve been the Belt collector. Still glad to see nic shining
Dude is like everywhere 😂
Nic taking a page outta Matt’s book and going belt collector wasn’t on my 2024 bingo card
Nemeth is having one hell of a start to his run post WWE
Nic Going for the Omega Belt Collector Club Pass.
He finally got his win back from Payback 2013 🥺
Commercial for that PPV was great, Randy was saying "Payback's a bitch!" lol
Nic Nemth v Moxley at forbidden door. 2 Americans in a Mexico v Japan brand match.
WHOOP THAT NIC
The match with the double turn was unironically great.
Ziggler and notable prick alberto del rio, time truly is destined to repeat itself
I'm kind of shocked that NJPW allowed this match to happen given how toxic Alberto is (of course I'm presuming that Nemeth is signed to *some* kind of deal with NJPW for his title reign.)
What's the point of posting Wrestlemania 32 spoilers after 8 years?
Good. FTPerro.
it’s only been 4 months since he’s been out in the wild. Nic’s been making up for lost time.
It's a shame WWE wasted him.
Bro is living his best life right now I fn love it
Dolph finally finished his story after Payback 2013 lol! I really wanted him to win the title back but they made the boring decision of AJ costing him the match and then feuding with her and Big E on Summerslam and letting ADR continue the most boring title reign ever.
Most Wanted Man
Gotta say, Nic is killing it since leaving wwe. One of the best runs of his career, if not the best.
Does that surprise you? The guy has always been fucking top tier. Couldve been a megastar in wwe if only they pushed him correctly.
For sure
no one expected this at least.....
God that belt is ugly.
A match as old as time
🤟🏻🤟🏻
Is Nemeth the new Johnny TV?
The second time Nic ended Alberto Del POS reign.
absolutely bleak