The “Brawl For All” remains one of the most questionable booking decisions by WWE during the Attitude Era, when there were already insane storylines, like Mark Henry’s entire “Sexual Chocolate” run or the “Higher Power” angle with The Undertaker and Vince McMahon.

Infamously, the “Brawl For All” put the pro wrestler’s credibility on the line to have a legitimate shoot fight, with Bart Gunn walking away with a victory and having his pro wrestling career ended by WrestleMania XV. As one of the contenders in the “Brawl For All,” Marc Mero tested his mettle and had the opportunity to finally knock out a man he legitimately disliked at the time. 

“I’m gonna be really honest, I couldn’t stand Bradshaw back then,” he admitted during an interview on “INSIGHT with Chris Van Vliet.”

John ‘Bradshaw’ Layfield has always gotten under the skin of those around him, and continues to do it today, but according to Mero, he believed his dislike was warranted because JBL was a bully in those days. 

“When we wrestled each other, he didn’t like me, and he would take liberties,” Mero further claimed, admitting that he was happy to step into the ring in a shoot fight with JBL to teach him a lesson, finally. “He knew I had no fear of him.”

As history tells, Mero ended up losing to JBL due to the judges’ decisions, leading to more animosity between the two. However, today, they have a much different relationship. 

“We couldn’t stand each other back then, [now] I love that guy,” he interestingly admitted, explaining that he’s gained a lot of respect for JBL due to what he’s done since wrestling. “If I see him now, [I’d] just give him a big hug or something!”

If returning to the UFC is in Nate Diaz’s future but a third bout with Conor McGregor isn’t on the cards, who could Diaz possibly have in mind? At the age of 40, it’s been largely agreed upon by fans that he won’t ever get back in title contention, or even be a ranked fighter again. With that said, there is one belt that exists in the UFC that Diaz knows very well. In fact, he’s part of the reason why it exists in the first place, the BMF Championship.

“I’m like, I want to fight f****** BMF motherf*****, who’s claiming my belt running around, Charles Oliveira. I’m like, “Right you’re rocking with my belt now and you’re running around like you’re the baddest motherf*****.’ So that’s where I’m like, ‘Yo, what’s popping with the UFC.’ So I’m like, ‘Let’s link up and get this fight popping.’ And then I go back to talk to them about it and they’re all ready for me to come back and fight Conor. I’m like, ‘Whoa, whoa, whoa, listen to what I’m talking about. I want to fight the best of the best when they are the best of the best.’ Conor is great, but I’m not trying to go kill of Conor when he’s on his last dying f****** leg…Like, we ain’t friends. ain’t none of that. But I ain’t trying to finish this dude off.”

Oliveira defeated Max Holloway at UFC 326 to win the BMF Championship, and with Diaz looking to win the belt that helped create in 2019, the future of the symbolic title could be very interesting.

Please credit “This Past Weekend” when using quotes from this article, and give a H/T to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.

After months of rumors, Chris Jericho has returned to All Elite Wrestling, and he made his presence known immediately in the opening minutes of “AEW Dynamite,” live from his hometown of Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada on Wednesday Night. Jericho’s return came after a report earlier in the day that he could be headed back to Tony Khan’s company sooner rather than later.

Tony Schiavone was in the ring attempting to introduce the contract signing between AEW World Champion MJF and number one contender Kenny Omega for their match at Dynasty, when rogue pyro started to go off, interrupting him. The second or third time, the camera cut to the stage, and “Judas” started playing. Jericho strolled out, a smile on his face, and he got into the ring. He let the crowd continue to sing his song for a few more minutes and poised for the audience as cheers rained down. When he got on the microphone, he only had four words for the fans.

“Winnipeg! AEW! I’m home,” Jericho declared, before “Judas” hit once again. 

He left the ring, hugged a few folks seated at ringside, and made his way to the back before the broadcast cut to a backstage brawl between Will Ospreay and Jon Moxley. The contract signing would then get underway with no Jericho involvement.

Jericho had not been seen on AEW programming for almost a year, after dropping the ROH World Championship to Bandido at last year’s Dynasty. On the “Dynamite” following the pay-per-view, he told his former stable, The Learning Tree, he needed to go away for a while. Rumors of his return to AEW, or possibly even WWE, began swirling again last week when Jericho filed a trademark for the name “The Cornerstone.”

After “WWE NXT” ended in chaos Tuesday night when Lola Vice and Kendal Grey both looked to have the number one contender’s match for Jacy Jayne’s NXT Women’s Champion won, they’ll both now be going on to Stand & Deliver. “NXT” General Manager Robert Stone announced in a video post to X (formerly Twitter) that the premium live event match for the gold will be a triple threat.

“Look, I know there was some confusion in the main event between Kendal Grey and Lola Vice,” Stone said in the video. “Kendal had Lola pinned, while Lola had Kendal in a submission hold, and as the referee in the ring was counting three, our head referee on the outside of the ring saw Kendal Grey tapping out.”

Stone said that after talking to “NXT” head Shawn Michaels, who got in the ring as the episode went off the air from the Infosys Theater at Madison Square Garden, they decided that Jayne will defend her title against both women. As of this writing, Jayne has yet to comment on her new situation on X. Following the show, she posted that since there was no winner, there was no number one contender, so “no title match.”

The show went off the air with Grey and Vice arguing in the ring with Michaels and the referees, pleading their cases. Wren Sinclair and Fatal Influence, Jayne included, stood by, also confused. After almost 24 hours, Stone made his call official, and Grey, Vice, and Jayne will fight for the brand’s top women’s title in St. Louis on Saturday.

UFC Fight Night 271 was not a good night for former UFC Middleweight Champion Israel Adesanya. “The Last Stylebender” headlined the card against Joe Pyfer in what was Adesanya’s first fight in nearly 14 months, but he was left laying on the mat as Pyfer scored the TKO victory towards the end of the second round, marking Adesanya’s fourth consecutive loss. 

Whenever a fighter goes on this sort of losing streak, questions start being raised about whether they should be in the UFC to begin with, but in eyes of the latest UFC Hall of Fame inductee Demetrious Johnson, Adesanya needs to hang up the gloves for good. “I would like to see him retire,” Johnson said on “The Ariel Helwani Show.” “There’s nothing else for him to do in mixed martial arts. I think he’s done everything, and you’re not even considering the kickboxing matches he’s had as well.”

Johnson explained that when he was an active fighter, money was one of the main motivators for him. He didn’t care how much weight he had to cut, he was going to make weight because he needed to the money, and that when you are broke, you tend to have a different mindset. “Mighty Mouse” explained that Adesanya might have reached the point where he doesn’t need the money, and if that’s the case, what is he even fighting for?

“I’m not saying that now that he has money, his mindset has changed, but he’s fighting somebody else who’s trying to get to his level. So for me, I’m just like, ‘You’ve done everything, just walk away from the sport.’ But I think that’s so hard for any professional athlete.” Going beyond his last four fights, Adesanya has only won one in his last six, as opposed to his first 24 professional MMA bouts, where his sole loss came against Jan Blachowicz at UFC 259 in March 2021.