The Elite Bids Farewell To Ring Of Honor After Final Battle

Members of The Elite bid farewell to Ring of Honor after the conclusion of Friday night’s Final Battle pay-per-view from New York City.

The Young Bucks, Cody, Hangman Page and S.C.U. (Christopher Daniels, Kazarian and Scorpio Sky) were all in action on the card. All of them are rumored to be departing Ring of Honor and all of them lost their matches Friday night. You can check out our full breakdown of the Final Battle pay-per-view here. The main event saw the Briscoe Brothers defeat the Young Bucks and S.C.U. in a Ladder War to capture the ROH world tag team championships for the 10th time.

After the show went off the air, The Elite hit the ring to address the live crowd. Matt Jackson thanked everyone for their support and said the Manhattan Center is their favorite venue to wrestle in. Fans chanted, “January 1st” in reference to The Elite teasing a major announcement regarding their future after the new year.

Jackson said this was not going to be some emotional farewell speech or anything like that, which brought on more supportive chants. The Young Bucks started in Ring of Honor 10 years ago and this past 2-year run as best the best time of their lives. They thanked Ring of Honor executives and their families for joining them each step of their journey.

Matt Jackson then asked, “We’re all elite, right?” He said “the timer is ticking” and something big is about to go down. He encouraged everyone to stay tuned and keep watching their Youtube series, Being the Elite, for details on their next moves.

Fans chanted “Double or Nothing” as The Elite signed off and promised they will return to New York City again.

Update On The Evolving Landscape Headed Into 2019

As we head into 2019, there are plenty of unanswered questions surrounding what the pro-wrestling landscape will look like in the new year. One of the most burning questions is where will members of the Elite end up?

Cody, the Young Bucks, Hangman Page, and eventually Marty Scurll (he’s under contract to ROH until the spring) are expected to form the nucleus of the All Elite Wrestling. Still, many members of the Elite are hoping to continue working with New Japan Pro Wrestling next year.

What could possibly prevent the Elite from returning to NJPW, is the promotion’s approach to talent-sharing deals. This issue was addressed in the most recent edition of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter.

“Obviously, both AEW and ROH will want a business relationship with New Japan,” Meltzer wrote. He would continue to say every promotion in the United States would like to have such a relationship.

“New Japan has blocked its talent from working for Impact, even though Don Callis is an announcer for New Japan, because of the ROH relationship,” he continued. “They have not blocked people from working for MLW.”

The question then becomes whether NJPW will allow their talent to work for All Elite Wrestling as they do for MLW or if they will block them from doing so, as they have done with Impact Wrestling.

A possible sign the Young Bucks could be staying occurred this week, however. The popular tag-team announced they are finally being flown first-class to Japan for NJPW shows. This was something the brothers had complained about on their YouTube series in recent weeks.

“New Japan could work with both AEW and ROH,” Meltzer concluded. “The ball really is in their court.”

We expect to hear some big announcements out of the Elite camp after New Japan Pro Wrestling’s Wrestle Kingdom 13 event on January 4th.

Young Bucks Comment On All Elite Wrestling Trademarks

From our first report to being an actual registered company who is preparing for its official launch next year, All Elite Wrestling has traveled very far in the last couple of months.

However, the main people involved with the promotion are still playing with the report. Some of them are like Chris Jericho and Cody Rhodes who are just having fun.

Then there are people like the Young Bucks who also have legal limitations since they are still under contracts.

However, this is not going to stop people from discussing it. It also means that whether or not they can answer the questions, the people who are involved with the promotion are still going to be asked about it.

This was the case during the latest episode of Wrestling Perspective podcast, where the host Petey Williams talked to the Bucks about the promotion, asking them what they can say on the situation.

Answering the question both the brothers tried to protect the information and work around the question.

Matt Jackson said that they are in a situation where they don’t really know what they are going to do. Though he accepted that after All In they have offers from investors which they are still thinking about.

Nick Jackson took a slightly different route and accepted that they have offers from every major company in the world. He explained that they have not said no to anyone since they are keeping their options open.

Although whether or not they accept it, AEW has already become one of the hottest topics of discussion among fans. It doesn’t look like these discussions will be cooling down anytime soon.

Cody Hints “All Elite Wrestling” Announcement Coming In January

Cody, the Young Bucks, Marty Scurll, and Adam Page are all finishing up commitments in ROH and NJPW at the moment. When 2019 hits, however, it’s looking as though the group will be part of a new promotion, All Elite Wrestling.

Cody was asked recently at a Meet in Greet for World Series Wrestling in Australia about the promotion. He indicated an announcement would be made in January. Cody also stated the announcement will be bigger than expected.

Cody’s answer to the question was covered in this week’s Wrestling Observer:

“At a meet and greet in Melbourne, Australia, Cody was asked about a new promotion and said to wait for January as an announcement will be made, and said the announcement would be bigger than anyone expects,” Dave Meltzer wrote.

Cody has also doubled-down on his statements that he will be finishing up with Ring of Honor after Final Battle. He has said his title match with Jay Lethal will be his final match with the promotion. The angle is if Cody wins he’ll bring the title with him into free agency.

Cody also appears to be scouting talent. He sent the following out on Tuesday evening:

"Curious. Who are some of the hottest male/female independent acts not signed anywhere?"

What top unsigned talent would you like to see Cody bring to All Elite Wrestling??

Jim Ross Comments On The Elite Potentially Leaving ROH & NJPW

On the latest episode of The Jim Ross Report, Good Ol’ JR gave his take on the likelihood of Kenny Omega and The Young Bucks leaving the ROH and NJPW promotions in January.

“As I said early on, the card for the Ring of Honor Madison Square Garden Show, with New Japan, will probably look entirely different then, compared to what one would assume it look like if it was booked today,” Ross said. “I think there’s gonna be a lot of movement with some of the biggest stars in the game.”

While not betraying anyone’s confidence, Ross implied that his opinion is informed, and not just speculation. “Just picking up a little bit here, a little bit there, and I’ll keep you apprised,” Ross said.

“I’m talking to a lot of these cats that have opportunities to do other things, casually… I think some people’s motors are running and the wheels are turning,” he said.

The Young Bucks Ending “Being the Elite”?

Last week, Bullet Club’s “the Elite” released the 100th episode of their YouTube series, “Being the Elite”. Although they had previously been releasing episodes on Monday nights, no episode was released this week. As the last episode was named “Finale”, there is speculation the popular series is done.

Matt and Nick Jackson recently spoke with the Sporting News about the future of the series. They recorded the interview backstage at ROH’s TV tapings in Pittsburgh on Saturday.

“I think it’s poetic if we did end it at 100 episodes,” Nick Jackson told the Sporting News, “but everyone else says we shouldn’t.”

“We’re like, man, 100 episodes, we can end it when it’s the hottest,” Matt Jackson added. “It almost feels like we should end it.”

“On the other hand, it’s kind of undecided, but I feel like we’d be crazy not to bring it back at some point. It’s become such a popular tool for us now.”

The series has been widely successful and provides a platform for members of the faction to tell stories. Much of what has been built up in terms of the Bullet Club 2018 Civil War has taken place on “Being the Elite”.

“We had a guy at the airport on our way here stop me, and he puts his hand out and says, ‘I love your YouTube videos,’” Matt Jackson added. “He didn’t mention anything about pro wrestling.”

Originally, the series was just meant to follow the Young Bucks around as they travelled to shows.

“We did that for like six months,” Nick Jackson said. “Then Matt had the idea of adding stories to the mix. … People started to love it and it grew a lot faster. I think we found our calling.

“It started with me getting sick in real life. We knew Adam [Cole] was leaving the Bullet Club, so Matt said, ‘Why don’t we say Adam poisoned you?’ I said, ‘That’s a brilliant idea. Let’s try it.’ The fans loved it. From there we just went nuts.”

The last episode of Being the Elite ended with Cody finding himself alone in the Elite locker room. While he had defeated Kenny Omega, Cody was left to ponder all that he had lost along the way.

The Young Bucks Going “All In” To Recruit CM Punk?

The Young Bucks aren’t going to give up recruiting CM Punk. In fact, it appears the tag-team is going “All in” in their efforts.

Punk and the Bucks recently had a back-and-forth on Twitter which some fans took as an attempt to get Punk to wrestle at the planned “All-In” event in September.

"Flying now from Sydney to Perth, wrestling in the opening match, then right back to the airport for red eye flight to Brisbane, flying to LAX, home for 18 hours, then going right back to LAX and flying to Tokyo.  Staying at the top is harder than getting there." - Matt Jackson

"Run a marathon after all that then come talk to me." - CM Punk

"Let's run one together in September." - Matt Jackson

Punk then pretended to not get the reference.

"Probably doing Chicago in October.  I'll do a half with you in September." - CM Punk

Punk and the Bucks have teased fans like this before. Matt Jackson has told fans they’ve done everything they can to get Punk out of retirement and the ball is in his court. Jackson has also told fans that Punk told him he’d be the first one he’d call if he does decide to come back.

Chicago is one of the cities heavily-rumored to be hosting All-In on September 1st, 2018.

Cody & Bucks Planning Self-Financed 10,000 Seat Event In 2018

The Young Bucks and Cody Rhodes are planning something big for 2018.  Word around the wrestling world is the Bullet Club members are in talks with multiple venues to put on a 10,000 seat event.

You may recall, The Wrestling Observer's Dave Meltzer tweeted earlier this year saying Ring of Honor wouldn't sell out a 10k seat show "any time soon" and Cody responded saying he'd "take that bet."

Sources tell us the wrestler has been dedicated to making it happen since, so the trio recently decided to take things into their own hands by self-financing the event - which is tenatively being called "All In" - and things have rapidly progressing the past few weeks towards an official announcement.

We are being told the current front-runner locations for the show are Chicago, London, San Francisco and Ontario, California.

Sources say The Bucks and Rhodes are looking to partner with Ring of Honor, who they have exclusive domestic contracts with, but it's unclear if an official deal has been worked out yet.

Cody's "Spend it now, Make more later" catchphrase has never been more appropriate.