Tag: reaction

AEW Double or Nothing 2023: Predictions for every match in Las Vegas

See who we expect to win every match at AEW Double or Nothing this weekend in Las Vegas.

AEW has been in the headlines for many reasons outside of wrestling lately between its new television show and the daily behind-the-scenes soap opera that involves its most marketable star.

But there is business to attend to this weekend with Double or Nothing, which has a main event that features the promotion’s famed “Four Pillars.” Can those pillars hold up the annual extravaganza or will an anarchic match steal the show?

I break it all down with my predictions:

AEW World Heavyweight Championship: MJF (c) vs. “Jungle Boy” Jack Perry vs. Darby Allin vs. Sammy Guevara

AEW tried really hard — I mean really hard — to convince people that the three challengers in this match have a real chance of walking out of Vegas with the world title.

Unfortunately, that effort was all for naught, in my eyes.

For starters, I don’t see a reason to take the title away from MJF. On top of that, I don’t see any of the other three pillars being in a position to carry the mantle of being the world champ. Maybe they will be one day, but it doesn’t feel like they are at the moment.

Because of that, MJF is a good bet to retain.

Winner: MJF

Anarchy in the Arena: Blackpool Combat Club vs. The Elite

This is the match that I am most looking forward to watching on this show, and it is by a wide margin.

I can’t wait to see the wild antics these wrestlers will have up their sleeves. Oh, and you better believe there will be blood. This will not be for the squeamish.

I wrestled (no pun intended) with who I was going to pick to win this match, but at the end of the day, I think The Elite will walk away with a win at Double or Nothing. Since Kenny Omega already lost to Jon Moxley in a cage match on Dynamite, I feel like picking up the win here would be a good way to even the score without beating Moxley.

Winners: The Elite

Unsanctioned Match: Chris Jericho vs. Adam Cole

Unsanctioned matches always make me laugh because they always still look pretty sanctioned, and I always find that odd.

What I find even more odd is the inclusion of enigmatic ECW legend Sabu. I have no idea what to make of Sabu being involved in this story. Judging by my timeline’s reaction, I don’t think I’m alone in that feeling.

However, I am eager to hear how AEW explains the connection between Sabu and Adam Cole. Not because I need the gaping hole in the plot to be filled, but because I simply want to hear how absurd the promotion’s explanation is going to be.

As far as a winner. I’m going with Cole.

Winner: Adam Cole

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AEW Women’s World Championship: Jamie Hayter (c) vs. Toni Storm

If you asked me last week, I would have quickly chosen Jamie Hayter to retain the title.

However, Hayter is apparently injured and her status is still seemingly up in the air as of this writing. AEW CEO, GM and Head of Creative Tony Khan was non-committal when asked whether Hayter will defend her title at Double or Nothing during a recent conference call, only adding to the mystery behind Hayter’s status.

Because of this, I’m going to go with Toni Storm to become a two-time champion.

Winner: Toni Storm

AEW World Tag Team Championship: FTR (c) vs. Jeff Jarrett & Jay Lethal

Here we are in the year of our lord 2023, and Double J has a chance to become a world tag team champion. Ain’t he great?

The most intriguing part of this match is the fact that Mark Briscoe is the special guest referee, and judging by him slapping everyone in sight on the most recent edition of Dynamite, he’s got heat with both sides.

By the way, I’ve probably watched Briscoe slap Jeff Jarrett’s hat off at least — at least — 78 times.

At least.

It was giving Bernie Mac in “Head of State” vibes.

As far as a winner, I just couldn’t imagine AEW putting the tag titles on Jarrett and Jay Lethal. I guess the promotion could always go in that direction for the heat alone, but it would feel more like a decision WWE would make. Copying WWE isn’t always a bad thing, but in this case, it would be horrible.

Winners: FTR

AEW TNT Championship (Ladder match): Wardlow (c) vs. Christian Cage

I know Christian Cage is supposed to be the master of the ladder match, and rightfully so, but Wardlow winning should be the only outcome here.

Maybe, just maybe, this could prove to be the catalyst that sparks Wardlow again.

Winner: Wardlow

AEW TBS Championship: Jade Cargill (c) vs. Taya Valkyrie

In my opinion, Taya Valkyrie represents the biggest threat to Jade Cargill’s title to date.

Under ordinary circumstances, I would still go with Cargill to retain. But with the uncertainty surrounding Hayter and the world title, maybe this could be a good time to move Cargill away from the TBS title and on the path to finally winning the division’s top prize.

So yes, I’m making the bold prediction of Valkyrie finding a way to dethrone the dominant champion, but only because said champion is moving on to bigger and better things.

Winner: Taya Valkyrie

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AEW International Championship: Blackjack Battle Royal

The list of participants as of this writing are as follows:

• Orange Cassidy (c)
• Blade
• Butcher
• Bandido
• Komander
• Lee Moriarty
• Big Bill Morrissey
• Ari Daivari
• Tony Nese
• Chuck Taylor
• Trent Beretta
• Kip Sabian
• Fenix
• Pentagon
• Swerve Strickland
• Brian Cage
• Ricky Starks
• “Switchblade” Jay White
• Juice Robinson
• Keith Lee
• Dustin Rhodes

Since the story is that Orange Cassidy is practically being held together by duct tape, it feels like a good time to have him drop the title. It’s also a battle royal, meaning that he doesn’t even have to get pinned to lose.

That means a new champion will be crowned and I think that person will be …. *drumroll please*… Jay White.

I know Starks is the sentimental favorite heading into the match, but putting the title on White with Starks pursuing it could make for great television throughout the summer. I could even see Starks being the last one eliminated at Double or Nothing after some dastardly tactic by White.

Also, it could elevate the International Championship to another level. Cassidy has done all he probably can with the title. But White and Starks are capable of doing something special.

Winner: “Switchblade” Jay White

Six-man tag: Ethan Page and The Gunns vs. Matt Hardy, Jeff Hardy and Hook

I must admit, Hook teaming with the Hardy Boyz is pretty wild. It doesn’t feel that long ago when Hook’s father, Taz, was wrestling the Hardys during his as an in-ring performer for WWE. Now, they’re teaming up with his adult son.

It’ll be so wild that they will come away with the victory.

Winner: Matt Hardy, Jeff Hardy and Hook

Cowboys News: Top OTA observations, kicker tracker, McCarthy avoids fines

From @ToddBrock24f7: A Tyron Smith debate, Turpin and Vaughn do double duty, Pollard participates, and Micah Parsons gets tutelage from a Hall of Famer.

Thursday wasn’t the first day of OTA work, but it was the first day with a portion open to the media. We’ve got a full recap of the day’s session: unusual choices along the offensive line, a Tony Pollard sighting, Micah Parsons getting one-on-one pass-rush lessons from a new Hall of Famer, and two electric playmakers both getting double duty. We’re also keeping track of practice kicks and getting into the dollars-and-cents reason why the day’s work might have seemed less than intense.

Meanwhile, Mike McCarthy explains why a new coaching staff around Dak Prescott isn’t really a huge change, Kelvin Joseph may have a new way to prove he deserves to keep his roster spot, and one Cowboys defender gets an all-too-rare shoutout for his on-the-field contributions. All that, plus a good old-fashioned point-counterpoint debate on Tyron Smith: are fans rushing him out the door, or is there something to the criticism? Here’s your News and Notes from a busy Thursday.

Michigan football at Penn State time, channel set

This really worked out for #Michigan. #GoBlue

Michigan football avoided a very difficult happenstance when it travels to Happy Valley in 2023.

The third-to-last week of the season used to be safe when it came to night games in the Big Ten. However, with NBC and Peacock entering the fray, along with CBS, the times are changing. There was significant concern in Ann Arbor that the Wolverines could go to University Park and face one of the most hostile environments in sports: the Penn State white out.

However, that’s not going to happen according to a new report. According to Action Network’s Brett McMurphy, the game will be a noon kickoff on Fox.

Michigan has won the last two in the series, with the last being in Ann Arbor, and the 2021 contest taking place in Happy Valley.

The night game that week looks to be MSU against Ohio State, which will appear on NBC-Peacock.

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Browns WR Isaiah Weston placed on reserve/retired list

The injuries may have taken too big of a toll

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After multiple ACL injuries, including one a summer ago during training camp with the Cleveland Browns, wide receiver Isaiah Weston appears to have hung up his cleats. The team placed Weston on the reserve/retired list today as OTAs continue to trek along. Weston has been on the sideline during OTAs, but the recovery may have just been too much for him.

An undrafted free agent out of the University of Northern Iowa, Weston is a freak athlete who just could not stay on the field throughout his collegiate career. We wish Weston the best of luck as he looks toward his life after football.

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20 veteran free agents who could help the Falcons in 2023

Julio Jones and Rashaan Evans are among 20 veteran free agents who could help the #Falcons in 2023

The Atlanta Falcons haven’t been shy about adding talent this offseason. Even after signing numerous big-name free agents, the team still has over $10 million remaining in salary cap space for 2023.

Since there’s no reason to think the Falcons will stop tinkering with their roster anytime soon, let’s check out 20 remaining free agents who could help the team this season.

Cowboys RB Tony Pollard participating in OTA walkthroughs, McCarthy says

From @ToddBrock24f7: The Cowboys RB is making strides in his recovery from a fractured fibula and high ankle sprain; he’s benefiting from the OTAs’ slower pace.

Just four months after being carted off the field in a playoff loss at Levi’s Stadium, Cowboys running back Tony Pollard is participating in OTA sessions with the team.

Dallas head coach Mike McCarthy made the revelation Thursday while speaking to reporters at a pre-practice press conference.

“Tony’s doing the walkthroughs and things like that,” McCarthy said from the podium at The Star in Frisco on the third day of organized team activities.

Pollard suffered a fractured fibula and high ankle sprain on Jan. 22 during the divisional-round matchup with the 49ers. He was dragged to the ground from behind by San Francisco safety Jimmie Ward, who employed a “hip-drop” tackle that many called to be outlawed by the league’s owners moving forward.

That effort may have stalled, but Pollard is plowing full speed ahead in both his rehab and his new role with the offense. He signed his franchise tag tender in March and is set to earn $10.09 million as the club’s uncontested RB1 after the offseason release of Ezekiel Elliott.

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Pollard is not yet up to full game speed, of course, but it’s still early. League rules prohibit live contact during OTAs; McCarthy described the work currently being done as coming at a “walkthrough or jogthrough” pace.

Apart from OTAs, the team will have a four-day “ramp-up” to this summer’s training camp, McCarthy said, that will be designed to help players like Pollard and offensive lineman Terence Steele, who are coming off injury.

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Mike McCarthy on new Cowboys coaches around Dak Prescott: ‘It’s a continuation’

From @ToddBrock24f7: The Cowboys look to build off the past 2 seasons offensively, but with an entirely new staff of assistant coaches around Dak Prescott.

Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott finds himself surrounded by a lot of new faces as OTAs get going in Dallas. And not just guys in the offensive huddle, like Brandin Cooks or Luke Schoonmaker or Deuce Vaughn. Even when Prescott gets back to the sideline or the meeting room, he’ll notice there’s been a lot of turnover since last season.

Kellen Moore is gone. So is Doug Nussmeier. As offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach respectively, theirs were the voices Prescott heard most often under head coach Mike McCarthy’s tenure over the past three seasons.

Now McCarthy is also his play-caller. Brian Schottenheimer has the OC title and is working with him on installing the game plan. Scott Tolzein is his new quarterbacks coach.

It’s a lot of change, even if most of it is behind the scenes.

But McCarthy doesn’t see it that way.

“I wouldn’t say it’s a transition; I think it’s a continuation,” the coach told reporters Thursday from The Star.

The system, McCarthy stressed, is still designed around Prescott, right down to keeping familiar terminology as the 29-year-old (he’ll turn 30 in July) enters his eighth season under center for the Cowboys.

“We’re still in Dak’s language,” McCarthy confirmed.

And although the assistants speaking that language are new to their day-to-day roles this year, they both have plenty of experience operating within a coaching philosophy that McCarthy has built over three decades in the NFL.

One of McCarthy’s first gigs at the pro level was on the offensive side of the ball for the 1993 Chiefs, supporting none other than Joe Montana.

So McCarthy understands all too well the significance of putting Tolzein, who quarterbacked under him in Green Bay, in the same position now with the field general of the Cowboys’ offensive attack.

“The quarterback room is a critical room in your coaching operations, as far as the design of it, the responsibility,” McCarthy continued. “Really, it’s no different than it was back in the early ’90s: the way I view it, the way we define it, the job description, job responsibility. The quarterback coach is a very significant component of that, maybe one of the most important components. The quarterbacks coach does the heavy lifting. That’s the way I’ve always set it up. That’s the way I was fortunate to go through it when I was a quarterbacks coach. All the extra time on the phone that you spend communicating with your quarterbacks, the little things..”

On the field, Tolzein never exactly lit it up over just ten game appearances in four seasons, going 88-of-146 passing for 1,065 yards, two touchdowns, and nine interceptions as both a Packer and a Colt.

McCarthy brought him to Dallas for his mind, though, rather than his arm.

“Scott is built for this. He was the quarterback, as a player, that if everybody was averaging 150 minutes a week on his iPad, Scott was at 480. Just the way he’s wired. And he has the magnetic personality. Brian Schottenheimer has a great personality. The way that room’s structured is similar to the way I’ve always done it in my past experience. It was a little different with Kellen and Doug, but I just look at it as more of a continuation of what’s already been established.”

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What’s been established is that the Cowboys under Prescott are capable of being among the NFL’s elite. Dallas led the league in total yards, yards per game, total points, and points per game in 2021. Those numbers dipped slightly in 2022, but the team still went 12-5 in the regular season and scored 28 points or more in seven of their outings.

That’s a wheel that McCarthy isn’t looking to re-invent, either.

“If you just look at the history of our offense here, 2020 was really trying to figure out who we wanted to be, with all the pandemic and all the injuries and so forth. I think the evolution from ’21 to ’22 is really the direction we want to continue to build off of. If you look at the statistics of those three years of offense and the area of how we’re going, we’ll continue in that direction.”

It all starts with the quarterback and getting Prescott to make some adjustments to his game, particularly in the interception category. McCarthy is banking on the revamped coaching staff around him being the key.

And he made it perfectly clear- even while fulfilling his media obligations by addressing reporters- that’s where his real focus is.

“I’m here right now,” McCarthy complained. “I’m missing a damn quarterbacks meeting.”

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Year in review: Maia Engelkes

Engelkes ended her senior season by recording a career-high in batting average and slugging percentage.

Auburn’s season came to an end on Sunday when the Tigers fell 5-1 at the hands of the Clemson Tigers in the final game of the regional hosted by their opponents.

Auburn had a productive year. The Tigers won 43 games for the first time in the Mickey Dean era and finished third in the SEC.

The final senior to highlight in our Year in Review series is [autotag]Maia Engelkes[/autotag].

Over the last four seasons, Engelkes has appeared in 55 games, with eight starts. She has also built a resume that includes a career average of .159 with 10 hits, two home runs, and 14 RBI.

YEAR IN REVIEW: Aspyn Godwin | Carlee McCondichie | Lindsey Garcia

Here’s a look back at the season that was for Maia Engelkes.

Former Auburn QB finds new home within the ACC

A member of Auburn’s 2018 signing class has committed to his fourth college program.

Remember [autotag]Joey Gatewood[/autotag]?

Gatewood, who signed with Auburn as a quarterback during the 2018 recruiting cycle, has found a new home by committing to the Louisville Cardinals. Louisville is the fourth stop in his college journey, previously playing for Kentucky and UCF in addition to Auburn.

Gatewood signed with Auburn as the No. 36 player in the 2018 ESPN 300 rankings and was the No. 3 quarterback of the class, trailing only former Georgia/Ohio State quarterback Justin Fields and UCLA’s Dorian Thompson-Robinson.

He has been a quarterback for three programs but has not entirely found an identity as a QB1. Between his stops at Auburn, Kentucky, and UCF, Gatewood has passed for just 180 yards on 24-of-51 passes with three touchdowns. As a member of the UCF roster, Gatewood moved to wide receiver for the 2022 season but failed to record any receptions.

It is unclear how head coach Jeff Brohm plans to use Gatewood’s talents, but here is to hoping that Gatewood finds success in Derby City.

Contact/Follow us @TheAuburnWire on Twitter, and like our page on Facebook to follow ongoing coverage of Auburn news, notes, and opinion. You can also follow Taylor on Twitter @TaylorJones__

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Michigan football trending for another 2024 four-star EDGE from DMV

All the defensive linemen are belong to us! #GoBlue

Michigan football continues to be on a heater on the recruiting trail. And you never walk away from the table when you’re on a heater.

The Wolverines are trending for multiple edge rushers and defensive linemen of late, with former Notre Dame commit Owen Wafle and highly coveted EDGE Darien Mayo looking more and more like they’ll wear winged helmets in their future.

Another appears destined to end up in Ann Arbor according to some new predictions.

Both E.J. Holland and Zach Libby over at The Wolverine (On3) have logged predictions for Michigan football to land Devon Baxter, a 2024 Brandywine (Md.) Gwynn Park four-star edge rusher. Baxter is rated the No. 373 player in the country according to the On3 Industry Ranking and the 26th-best edge rusher, as well as the 12th-best player in the state of Maryland.

According to the On3 Recruiting Prediction Machine, Michigan football has a 94.3% chance of landing Baxter.

Baxter is expected to visit Ann Arbor next month, as well as Virginia Tech. Rutgers appears high on his list, but he also has offers from the likes of Penn State, Tennessee, Maryland, and Minnesota.

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