Extreme Rules airs tonight
Now that WrestleMania Season is farther away in the rearview mirror, WWE is in the midst of presenting two 鈥淧PV鈥� events on the WWE network.
Raw鈥檚 Extreme Rules is tonight on the WWE Network, and the card is headlined by a Fatal Fiveway match to determine the No. 1 contender for Brock Lesnar鈥檚 Universal title.
Roman Reigns, Samoa Joe, Finn Balor, Bray Wyatt and Seth Rollins square off with the winner facing Lesnar at the Raw鈥檚 WWE network show in July.
There are four title matches on the card.
Alexa Bliss defends the Raw Women鈥檚 title against Bayley in a Kendo Stick on a Pole match, The Hardys defend the Raw tag title against Cesaro and Sheamus in a Steel Cage match, Neville defends the Cruiserweight title against Austin Aries, and Dean Ambrose defends the Intercontinental title against The Miz in a match where the title can change hands via DQ.
Also on the card is a mixed gender match pitting Sasha Banks and Rich Swann against Alicia Fox and Noam Dar.
Goldberg praises Asuka
When Asuka retained the NXT Women鈥檚 title against Bianca Blair at a show on May 14, the win improved her WWE record to 174-0.
The win is significant because it moved her past Goldberg鈥檚 173 鈥渨ins鈥� to start his career, and the former three-time heavyweight champion congratulated her on Twitter noting that the streak 鈥渋s in good hands.鈥�
Funny thing is, Goldberg lost his first-ever match in WCW. However, the result was struck form the record books.
In the match, Goldberg teamed with two other guys to lose a handicapped match to Roddy Piper, although Goldberg was not known as Goldberg then.
Also, there may be mention in Goldberg鈥檚 book that he lost a dark match before he debuted on WCW TV, but I have never read the book so I can鈥檛 confirm. If you have, please email me and confirm that it is in there!
Raw ratings continue to plummet
Raw drew a 1.75 rating Monday night, which is one of the lowest of all-time for the show and barely ahead of the record low of 1.74.
WWE cannot be happy with the numbers, and the USA Network has to be even more upset.
More on this development next week.
Update on fact from last week
In last week鈥檚 column, I mentioned how WWE had two PPV鈥檚 scheduled within three days of each other, but played it off that the power went out.
Well, James Machinia of Smithfield emailed me Monday with an update.
鈥淚 found my June 1996 WWF Magazine and can clear up the confusion,鈥� he emailed. 鈥淭uesday, May 28, does indeed list In Your House but it was probably just a printing error in that the PPV should have been listed for Sunday, May 26, which is blank on the calendar.鈥�
Thanks, James, for being a loyal reader and for helping clear up the confusion from 21 years ago!
WWE鈥檚 first female ref in 30 years
Thursday night at the NXT show in Orlando, Florida, Kennadi Brink made her official debut as a referee. She is WWE鈥檚 first female referee since the mid-1980s.
On this date鈥�
We go a ways back for this week鈥檚 look into the past.
In 1979, WWE ran a house show at Madison Square Garden in NYC.
The second match of the night was a 20-man, $10,000 battle royal where the winner would get a title shot at Bob Backlund鈥檚 WWE title later in the evening.
The winner was Hussein Arab, and although you are probably wondering who that was, he would later be known in WWE as the Iron Sheik.
Backland won in 30:40 after an atomic drop, but the Sheik would get the last laugh 4陆 years later when he defeated Backlund to win the WWE title.
This week鈥檚 question
When will Goldberg return to WWE? Ryan, Smock.
My guess would be, if Goldberg is returning, that it would be one of the 鈥淏ig Four鈥� shows (Royal Rumble, WrestleMania, SummerSlam, Survivor Series.
More than likely it would be at a Mania.