Category: Combat Sports

Ryan Garcia really downed a beer at his ceremonial weigh-in with Devin Haney

We’re not kidding. A beer…was drank…in the middle of a weigh-in.

Ryan Garcia had one of the wildest weigh-ins in quite some time. At the ceremonial procedure Friday with Devin Haney, the boxer he’ll face on April 20, Garcia promptly downed a beer mid-weigh-in.

Fighters do all kinds of wild things at weigh-ins to get into their opponents’ minds: trash talk, shoving, staring them down, etc. You know, the typical stuff we’ve come to expect.

But Ryan Garcia was so amped for his weigh-in with Devin Haney that he didn’t even wait for Haney to get on stage. He hopped on the scale with a random beer that he brought with him and totally chugged it. Making matters worse, Garcia also lost over $1 million for being overweight.

Sting’s retirement match was a beautiful, bloody spectacle that left fans in awe

Sting’s retirement match was proof he understood wrestling better than 99.9 percent of his peers.

Sting is one of the greatest professional wrestlers of all time. Not just because he was an icon, but because he was never afraid to change.

The WCW, TNA and AEW icon wrestled the last match of his storied, five decade career at AEW’s Revolution pay-per-view event. It was pure spectacle, a main event befitting a legend from the moment the 64-year-old wrestler walked onto the ramp to the guitar riff of his first entrance song; Metallica’s Seek and Destroy.

What followed was a match replete with Sting tributes — including from his sons decked out in different eras of Sting fear, wrestling legends like Ric Flair and Ricky Steamboat and a litany of broken glass and shattered tables.

The match was unrecognizable from the ones Sting put on in the 80s or 90s. It was unfathomable to dream up when he appeared to be winding down his career in the 2000s. But there he was, in his 60s, crashing through pressed wood and panes of glass.

This wasn’t a man who coasted to his finish. He kept his foot on the gas, evolving with the game and leaving as one of the most compelling figures in the sport. In the end, Sting and Darby Allin retained their world tag team championship over the Young Bucks, surviving some truly absurd bumps on Allin’s part and an extended two-on-one beatdown from the AEW executive vice presidents on the sextagenarian opposite them.

A scorpion deathlock iced the deal, but the crowd watching at home was treated to one last touching throwback. In true WCW fashion, the pay-per-view broadcast cut off exactly at midnight ET as Sting was still winding down his retirement speech. For the former face of the company that mastered the “folks, we’re out of time” finish on Monday Nitro and who once had to re-air a pay-per-view headliner on cable TV the next day after running long, it was a fitting inconvenience.

Fortunately for us, one fan at ringside captured his full monologue:

Sting can always return on Wednesday’s AEW Dynamite for a proper goodbye alongside a Darby Allin who, at least theoretically, will have fewer open wounds. But if he doesn’t, fans took to Twitter to express their appreciate for a man who spent nearly 40 years in the ring before going out on top.

WWE Raw’s $5 billion price tag at Netflix means most of the sports you love will be streaming soon

Get ready to watch Big Ten football on Crunchyroll, or whatever.

Soon you won’t be able to find the WWE’s flagship weekly program on cable television. Beginning in 2025, Raw — formerly Monday Night Raw — is headed to Netflix.

The longtime cable staple was a ratings tentpole for the USA, what used to be TNN and, briefly, Sci-Fi Networks. Now it’s headed to streaming thanks to a megadeal that will put the WWE belts alongside Bojack Horseman, Stranger Things and Bridgerton next January. All for the price of $5 billion over 10 years.

This is a story with two narratives. The first is that pro wrestling’s wide appeal is the strongest its been since WWE’s Attitude Era where “Stone Cold” Steve Austin, The Rock, Degeneration X and various versions of The Undertaker and Mick Foley battled in the squared circle. The world’s biggest promotion has been operating at a different level from both an in-ring and storytelling level, creating a product that’s worth $500 million annually for 52 three-hour programs.

The other is that streaming services aren’t ceding any growth when it comes to live sports — or, in this case, sports entertainment. Raw marks Netflix’s first major foray into both sports and live streaming. It’s far from the first platform to break into the field.

Netflix could not ignore the success of Amazon Prime’s Thursday Night Football simulcasts. Or the loud grumbling and eventual submission to Peacock’s exclusive broadcast rights of the 2024 Wild Card showdown between the Miami Dolphins and Kansas City Chiefs. And while those programs were handled very differently — Prime’s ability to mesh live advanced stats and predictive analysis added a unique layer to its coverage, while Peacock offered fans the opportunity to see plays three plays behind the box score and various buffering screens — they both served as drivers for new signups in an increasingly fractured streaming landscape.

That’s a big deal for Netflix, who’ll bid adieu to its most-watched property — Stranger Things — this year. Live sports was the one genre missing from its lineup, and while pro wrestling doesn’t have the cache of the NFL or NBA or MLB (streaming, occasionally, on Apple TV in the past and likely on Prime going forward) it’s more than a niche broadcast. It’s a part of the zeitgeist, a product that maintains a steady viewership and occasionally reaches greater heights on the shoulders of larger-than-life stars. It’s also a property that won’t be folded into Disney’s empire as the parent company of ESPN and all the over-air and streaming broadcasts that come with that.

This $5 billion deal is another cannon blast in the war for live broadcast rights. It’s terrible news for basic and premium cable channels. The only reliable driver of traditional Nielsen ratings — the metric through which advertising slots are priced and sold — is live sports.

Losing Raw is a bitter pill for the USA Network to swallow, but what happens when Prime or Max or Paramount+ or Netflix make a play for the NBA rights that will be up for bidding in 2025? Prime already has access to the regional networks that carry local MLB and NBA games following the bankruptcy of the brand behind Bally Sports Network; is the company whose goal is to be ubiquitous with selling everything you could ever want going to stop there?

The Pac-12 fell apart, in part, because a television deal with Apple TV couldn’t match the revenue more stable major conferences could offer schools via more traditional media rights deals. That’s something that is going to change significantly by the time Big Ten broadcast rights reset in 2030 or Big 12 rights do a year later. It’s possible we’re looking at a future where Wisconsin-UCLA is shown exclusively in seven minute clips on Quibi (I’m kidding, of course. Quibi died, if I remember correctly, because it couldn’t bear to part with its prosthetic golden arm).

This is great news for sports leagues and a further step into Darwinian survival for traditional networks. Major conference college sports and NFL games could be headed for a streaming service that doesn’t yet exist. Raw’s move to Netflix isn’t the start of this trend, but it’s a sign it won’t slow down.

And as long as the broadcasts are more Amazon Prime Thursday Night Football than Peacock, uh, anything, that’s good for sports fans too.

Sean Strickland and Dricus Du Plessis take their vicious UFC 296 fight in crowd to social media

The two fighters went at each other as fans at UFC 296.

One of the biggest fights at UFC 296 wasn’t in the octagon.

Nope, it was in the crowd. But it was between two MMA fighters who will be facing each other in the future.

Sean Strickland and Dricus Du Plessis will face each other at UFC 297 in January, and they had words for each other at a recent press conference. Oddly, the pair were seated near each other and came to blows in the crowd — MMA Junkie reports Dana White and security broke up the melee and Strickland was forced to leave.

But the fight didn’t stop there: The two called each other out on X (formerly Twitter):

And here’s footage of the fight:

Jake Paul actually waved goodbye to Andre August after vicious Round 1 knockout

That’s cold.

Well that didn’t take long.

Jake Paul stepped into the ring in Orlando at Caribe Royale and was only in the middle of the first round when he hit Andre August with a left jab to the face that opened up August’s defenses.

Then? The YouTuber turned fighter came with a right uppercut to the jaw of August … and just a couple of minutes into the fight, it was a knockout for Paul and a pretty incredible one at that.

What’s more: As soon as August hit the canvas, Paul waved goodbye to his opponent, quite a troll job too:

Mark Zuckerberg tore his ACL training for a competitive MMA fight (not likely against Elon Musk)

Mark Zuckerberg was training for a fight early next year.

For those hoping the fight between Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk will still happen at some point, don’t expect to see it anytime soon.

In a post shared to Instagram Saturday, Zuckerberg said he had surgery to replace a torn ACL suffered while sparring as part of his training for a competitive MMA match early next year.

https://www.instagram.com/p/CzMx731POlJ/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link

It’s unclear who the Meta boss was preparing to fight, but he said the bout will now be delayed.

In August, it seemed like a cage match between Zuckerberg and Musk was finally coming together after a bunch of back and forth. Musk even offered details of a location, saying it would take place in Rome. However, a few days later, Zuckerberg called off the fight, claiming Musk wasn’t being serious.

“If Elon ever gets serious about a real date and official event, he knows how to reach me,” Zuckerberg said.

There hasn’t been much word on the matter since, so I doubt Zuckerberg was preparing to fight Musk. But whoever he was preparing to fight, they’ll have to wait a little longer.

Brock Lesnar had an awkward wardrobe malfunction at SummerSlam

Brock Lesnar needs a new pair of shorts after SummerSlam.

Brock Lesnar and Cody Rhodes finished their feud in Detroit at SummerSlam on Saturday night, with “The American Nightmare” winning at the end of a brutal match.

After surviving what felt like dozens of suplexes, Rhodes rallied and hit Lesnar with a series of Cross Rhodes finishers to the delight of a massive crowd at Ford Field.

In the final minutes of the match, though, Lesnar suffered an awkward wardrobe malfunction, as his signature shorts ripped apart.

The rip occurred at the end of the match, or we might have quickly seen Lesnar wrestling in his underwear.

A huge brawl erupted after Floyd Mayweather’s exhibition against John Gotti III ended in disqualification

This was WILD.

Floyd Mayweather Jr. is retired from boxing, but every once in awhile he hops in a ring for an exhibition bout to give fans a glimpse of the fighter who went 50-0 in his professional career.

That was the scene Sunday in Sunrise, Florida, when Mayweather was in the ring with John Gotti III and all hell broke loose in the middle of the sixth round. Apparently, the tactics Mayweather used to become an undefeated fighter were as sharp as ever because Gotti got himself disqualified for repeatedly grabbing.

Unsatisfied with the result, Gotti rushed past referee Kenny Bayless to throw more hands, which prompted each fighter’s team to rush the ring and turned into absolute chaos.

The best part of this whole thing is how calm Mayweather remained as a clearly irate Gotti rushed him. It’s almost as if they were fighting already and Mayweather knew there was nothing to worry about.

It’s especially impressive considering Mayweather, 46, is 16 years the senior of Gotti, whose name sounds familiar because he’s the grandson of an infamous New York mobster.

Gotti is 2-0 in his professional career and also has a 5-1 pro MMA record.

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See the Gervonta Davis body punch that knocked out Ryan Garcia in the 7th round

What a punch to end this epic battle.

The lightweight fight that had the boxing world buzzing going in had quite an ending.

In the seventh round of the bout between Gervonta Davis and Ryan Garcia in Las Vegas, the two undefeated boxers faced off … and it was the man known as Tank who walked away with a knockout win in the seventh round.

The two traded blows before Davis hit Garcia in the body. Garcia seemed ready to keep going, but a second later, he fell to one knee and didn’t get up as he was counted out.

Check out the video below to see that moment:

For more, head over to MMA Junkie.

El Hijo del Vikingo had his Rey Mysterio Jr. moment with a dazzling AEW Dynamite debut

The 25-year-old Mexican wrestler had an absolute star-making AEW debut against the great Kenny Omega.

As a primetime competitor to WWE, Tony Khan’s All Elite Wrestling promotion was always going to bring easy comparisons to Ted Turner’s WCW. Another thing AEW does to carry that banner into the 2020s is shine a bright spotlight on high flying, lesser known wrestlers from international backgrounds.

On Wednesday night, El Hijo del Vikingo had his Rey Mysterio Jr. moment.

The 25-year-old Mexican wrestler is a big deal in his home country’s Lucha Libre AAA promotion. As the reigning Mega Champion, he’s the company’s top star. He backed up this billing on AEW Dynamite against one of the greatest, most accomplished grapplers in the world, Kenny Omega.

AEW made sure to present Vikingo as a big deal. The headliner was referred to as a “dream match” throughout the broadcast. Omega made it a point to announce the match was going to be special, telling Sports Illustrated’s Justin Barrasso “no know does it like [Vikingo].”

This was on full display Wednesday.

Every move Vikingo did felt like one difficult maneuver wrapped inside an even more ridiculous one. He didn’t want to hit Omega with a regular hurricanrana, he needed to turn it into an implosion with a front flip first. That move above, by the way? That came less than a minute into the actual match.

Time for a reverse hurricanrana? Better bounce backward from the top rope first.

Here, he opts to ratchet up the difficulty of a dragonrana to the floor by doing it from the narrow base of the ring post.

Then there’s … actually, you know what? Just watch it. I can’t really explain it with words.

In a vacuum, this may have seemed excessive. None of it was. El Hijo del Vikingo wasn’t just playing to the largest American crowd of his career, but he was coming in as the underdog. He’s the guy billed at 5-foot-6 and 161 pounds going up a multiple time world champion who clocks in at 6-feet and 220. He needed to throw the kitchen sink at him.

Good god, did he ever.

Omega, as he typically does, proved the perfect foil. He was a sturdy, sure-footed base for all Vikingo’s attacks. He flew across the mat with a perfect understanding of video game physics with each one. He carried multiple moments where it looked certain someone got very, very hurt — just to carry on the match as planned like a true damned pro.

Almost three decades ago, Mysterio and a handful of luchadores made their names in WCW by putting on masterclasses in the lucha libre style. They opened up American wrestling, then mostly ruled by lumbering, muscled-out goons, to a whole new landscape of moves. Mysterio stole the show from the undercard with matches against fellow overlooked studs like Psychosis, Dean Malenko and a pre-WWE Eddie Guerrero. He forced wrestling fans to pay attention because looking away for even a moment meant missing something incredible.

That’s the feeling I got Wednesday night.

A great wrestling match tells a story. Vikingo and Omega accomplished that across 20-ish minutes while making me audibly say “what the [expletive]” in my own dang living room multiple times. Omega has been reliably must-watch TV for about a decade now. Now Vikingo joins him on that tier.

Even if you’re only a casual wrestling fan — even if you’re a WWE or New Japan loyalist — do yourself a favor and watch this whole match. You know what to expect. Trust me, you’ll still wind up surprised be it.

El Hijo del Vikingo is gonna be a star.