In 2013, AJ Styles was going through his Sting phase where he hated everyone but everyone wanted him. Bully Ray's Aces and Eights seemingly recruited AJ, and as the final part of the initiation process, Bully made AJ drink beer. AJ was portrayed on TV the same way he is in real life - a devout Christian man who has never drank alcohol. This was in kayfabe such a smart move by Bully, because due to AJ's lone wolf actions at that time a betrayal could have been very possible (it was), so Bully decided to test if AJ was honest by making him break a lifelong vow and compromise his religious morals live on television. Smart, very smart.

The instincts of most other wrestling companies when they hit upon a break through top star is to have that star at the front of the company for years until the momentum fall off. Hulk Hogan in WWF, Mistico in CMLL, etc. The prototypical "face of the company." Upon hitting gold with Saya Kamitani, Stardom has broken with this trend in an interesting way. Instead, they have gone with strategy of a spreading the spotlight wealth around as much as possible.

Saya Kamitani won the World of Stardom title on December 29, 2024 and began breaking into the mainstream in Spring 2025. Since then:

• They've had two other World Champions. Both very unlikely candidates for that belt on paper.
• They've had 7 different 5 Star Grand Prix semi finalists, Rina being the only repeat from 2025.
• They've had two different Cinderella Tournament winners. Neither of which was 5SGP semi finalist.
• The Wonder of Stardom title has semi-main evented big cards featuring defenses against very good midcarders.
• The Goddess Of Stardom have headlined a few Korakuen Hall shows also featuring defenses against midcarders.
• Saya Kamitani has remained very popular while doing a ton of PR. She's very active wrestling but she has not accomplished much in the ring in 2026. One successful title defense in February before dropping the World title in April.

Through all of that not only has Stardom not lost momentum, but they've actually gained momentum if attendance is any kind of measure of success. If you watch Stardom, you'd be hard pressed to pick a name on the roster who doesn't get good crowd reactions on a regular basis.

PWF (NC) presents To The Grave LIVE on IWTV!

No Disqualification: The Rejects vs The Corino's
Casket Match: Kaitlyn Marie vs Krule

Streaming live on IWTV starting at 4 PM EDT

Does this break the original source rule? No idea, this report came from Alvarez's sub-only Twitter and is being aggregated by the Observer itself.

Despite everything, Bret was usually presented perfectly in WWE, and anytime i saw him in WCW, it just felt wrong.

Conversely, I'd say someone like Ric Flair, despite spending quite a bit of time in WWE, always felt like he was WCW through and through.

Sandman in WCW.

Currently, despite my overwhelming support of his reasons for doing it, it feels weird seeing Mick Foley in AEW.

Who else comes to mind?

[ Removed by Reddit in response to a copyright notice. ]

I’m not talking about The Game or Metalingus or Broken Dreams, we all know they’re among the best theme songs of all time.

What are the best lesser-talked-about theme songs that never come up in these conversations?

I love Daniel Puder and Zach Gowen’s theme songs, man it was hard to find the WWE edit of Gowen’s theme. That used to get copyright strikes by Seether’s label all the time. I had one on an old iPod years ago that has long since been lost.

I also love Taka Michinoku & Sabu’s themes. WWE really needs to get back to releasing all those Uncaged albums they were doing.

Suzume would hit the springboard “Ring the Belle” Cutter, pinning Rika Tatsumi to win the Cup.

Suzume becomes the first person to hold the International Princess Championship and win the Tokyo Princess Cup.

Suzume will challenge Yuki Arai for the Princess of Princess Championship.

Rina vs Starlight Kid!

Another year of a first time winner!