Hectic day for WWE as wrestler tests positive for COVID-19
On Monday, WWE announced that one of its developmental wrestlers had tested positive for COVID-19.
This led to a chain reaction of events, and it meant Wednesday would be similar to what WWE stars in the 1980s went through at TV tapings.
Tuesday鈥檚 tapings were canceled due to the positive test and for the first time, WWE staff and talent were tested for COVID-19.
Prior to Tuesday, those working the TV tapings had their temperature checked and were monitored by WWE鈥檚 medical staff.
There was a huge grouping at the WWE Performance Center Tuesday morning and according to a person there, it was muddled at first, which is understandable.
The longer the testing went, the smoother things were and by the afternoon, talent were tested with no issues.
Wednesday was another story, but first, let鈥檚 go back in time.
Before Monday Night Raw went live each week, WWE would run all-day marathon tapings that would go for hours on end.
These happened elsewhere as well, as I remember doing an all-day taping in 2000 that started at 8 a.m. and ended after 10 p.m.
Talents were able to leave early once their segments were all completed, but for those of us needed through the last match of the night, it was brutal.
Back to WWE鈥檚 tapings back in the day.
For the TV tapings in the 1980s and early-90s, matches would be taped for Superstars, Wrestling Challenge and other shows.
The WWE performers under contract were not paid for these marathon tapings while the enhancement talent were compensated.
The philosophy back then was that the exposure the WWE wrestlers would get was their 鈥減ay鈥� and would bring fans to arenas to see them.
In turn, it would provide bigger paydays.
It is different now as the talent are under contracts that provide low-end guarantees.
None the less, Wednesday was rough.
Tapings were to begin at the Performance Center at 11 a.m. with the following content on the docket: this coming Monday鈥檚 Raw and Raw talk, Friday鈥檚 episode of Smackdown, 205 Live from this past Friday as well as this coming Friday鈥檚 edition and next weekend鈥檚 WWE Main Event.
Then the tapings were to move to Full Sail Live for this past Wednesday鈥檚 NXT as well as the upcoming episode this Wednesday.
The day was expected to break WWE鈥檚 record for the longest TV taping day ever, and that was with it starting at 11 a.m.
However, things were backed up to say the least, and credit goes to www.pwinsiderelite.com for the following timeframe from Wednesday.
PWInsider updated everyone at 11:36 a.m. saying that there were still performers and staff waiting outside for COVID-19 test results and they would not be allowed in the building until cleared.
At 12:32, WWE still had not started their planned TV tapings yet and made the call to cancel the taping of the June 26 episode of Smackdown, with the show now scheduled to be recorded on the 26th.
The next update was at 3:31 Wednesday with it stating that the Main Event and 205 Live episodes had been taped and Raw was being filmed.
In that same update, there were still wrestlers and staff members waiting on their test results.
It was a long day, to say the least, for the wrestlers who had to be on the show.
On This Day鈥�
In 1981, Dusty Rhodes defeated Harley Race to win the NWA heavyweight championship.
This was the second of three world title reigns for Rhodes, and it was surprisingly his longest at just under three months.
His first reign was one week and his final run lasted two weeks.
Considering how much Rhodes had his hand in booking the NWA, I was surprised to see his three world title reigns combined accumulated less than four months.
This week鈥檚 question:
In your Wednesday column, you said you caught lapses of time in the Edge and Randy Orton match from backlash. Can you give an example? Tim, Roscoe.
There were several, and when I asked him via text on Tuesday how many sequences were reshot, he asked me which ones I noticed.
While I saw several, one I will share was at one point where Randy Orton had Edge sitting on the top rope.
They worked their way up and on one camera angle, Edge鈥檚 feet were on the second rope.
They switched camera angles and Edge鈥檚 feet were now on the top rope.
Nonetheless, the match came across well on TV and is one of the best matches of the year thus far, albeit with moves and sequences being reshot.
Email questions/comments to powerhousehughes@gmail.com or tweet them to @BillHughes_III.