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Bleacher Report catches you up on the latest news from the WWE Universe.
Balor Reportedly Nursing Minor Injury
Finn Balor is reportedly dealing with a minor injury that kept him out of action Tuesday.
According to PWInsider (h/t WrestlingInc.com’s Marc Middleton), Balor did not wrestle at the WWE live event in Nottingham, England, as a precautionary measure related to the injury.
Balor was in action one night earlier when he beat Sheamus at the live event in Leeds, England. Balor also teased a potential future match against WALTER during that show.
The Irishman was kept off Monday night’s episode of Raw so WWE could keep him in Europe for one of the company’s first European tours since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.
While Balor was not on Raw, he still figures to be a huge part of the red brand’s storylines moving forward.
Over the weekend, he was named part of the Raw men’s traditional elimination five-on-five Survivor Series team for the pay-per-view later this month.
Joining Balor on the team are Seth Rollins, Kevin Owens, Rey Mysterio and Bobby Lashley, the latter of whom beat Dominik Mysterio in a match to earn the last spot.
Balor has been a key figure since getting called back up to the main roster from NXT in July, even challenging Roman Reigns for the Universal Championship twice before being moved from SmackDown to Raw as part of the WWE draft.
Provided Balor’s injury isn’t significant, he figures to be back on Raw in the coming weeks as part of the build toward Survivor Series.
Details Regarding UpUpDownDown Holdout in WWE
Xavier Woods and other content creators for the UpUpDownDown YouTube channel are reportedly holding out on producing videos until Woods receives a better deal from WWE regarding the channel.
According to Fightful Select (h/t Middleton), Woods receives “little to no” additional money from WWE related to UpUpDownDown.
WWE reportedly applies some of the money earned from the channel toward the downside guarantee in Woods’ contract, and that will be the case with his hosting job on the G4 channel as well.
Fightful noted that other WWE Superstars who are part of UpUpDownDown have a similar deal in terms of revenue being applied to their downside guarantees.
WWE has reportedly always owned UpUpDownDown, and Woods has reportedly never received a significant amount of money from it despite contrary beliefs from outsiders.
Woods and the other UUDD content creators are standing in solidarity until a new agreement is reached with WWE. If that happens, the expectation is that content will resume being created for the channel.
The UpUpDownDown situation hasn’t had any impact on Woods from a creative perspective, as he was booked to beat Balor in the finals of the King of the Ring tournament at Crown Jewel.
Woods has hit the ground running with his king character and is set to face Universal champion Roman Reigns in a non-title match on Friday’s episode of SmackDown.
Additionally, Woods will be part of Team SmackDown in the Survivor Series men’s traditional five-on-five elimination match, teaming with Drew McIntyre, Jeff Hardy, Sami Zayn and Happy Corbin.
RVD Shoots Down Rumored Reason for Not Wrestling in WWE
Rob Van Dam denied a rumor that has been making the rounds regarding why he has not wrestled for WWE since getting back involved with the company earlier this year.
Appearing on Insight with Chris Van Vliet (h/t Subhojeet Mukherjee of Ringside News), RVD said he will likely wrestle for WWE again and also denied the notion that WWE won’t let him wrestle due to concussions:
“I definitely have matches in me. I am not sure if they will be in WWE or not. I think probably because why not? At the same time, maybe there is a why not that I do not know about. Despite it all, I’ve kept in touch with Vince [McMahon]. I know we have a good relationship. Specifically, when certain things happen, there was something nobody knows about that got thrown around and got back to me that [former WWE employee Mark] Carrano said I was part of the concussion suit against WWE, complete bulls–t. It seemed to stop me from doing something I wanted to do. Very shortly after, I talked to Vince, he did not mention anything.
“There was rumors that went out that WWE had told me I could never wrestle for them again because of concussions, and most people believed that was true. but I have never talked to WWE about any concussions.”
The 50-year-old Van Dam last wrestled at an independent show in September, but his most recent televised match was last year when he was under contract with Impact Wrestling.
RVD resurfaced in WWE earlier this year when he was selected as part of the WWE Hall of Fame class of 2021.
The exact details of his deal aren’t public, but Van Dam is known to have signed a contract with WWE, as he has two new WWE Mattel action figures scheduled to come out soon.
As such, it stands to reason that WWE has the option of using him as an in-ring performer if it so chooses.
Van Dam won’t be a full-time performer at this point in his career, but the former WWE champion is still popular, and there could be value in utilizing him on a part-time basis.
A logical target date for his in-ring return could be in late January as a surprise entrant in the 2022 men’s Royal Rumble match since he would undoubtedly receive a huge pop from the live crowd.
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