Vince McMahon

WWE Chairman Vince McMahon continued to dangle a WWE Championship opportunity in front of Kofi Kingston, only to rip it away at the last minute.

Kingston was originally supposed to challenge Daniel Bryan for the WWE title at Fastlane, only for McMahon to replace him with Kevin Owens. After The New Day lobbied on his behalf, McMahon told Kingston he'd get a championship shot after all, making the WWE title match a Triple Threat affair.

However, Kingston got to the ring and learned he was instead pitted in a handicap bout with The Bar. Kingston showed a lot of heart but was no match for Cesaro and Sheamus.

Xavier Woods and Big E attempted to come to Kingston's aid but were met on the entrance ramp by Shinsuke Nakamura and Rusev. Woods and Big E had defeated Nakamura and Rusev on the Fastlane pre-show.

Kingston received a groundswell of goodwill from WWE fans in the buildup to Elimination Chamber, a feeling that carried through that pay-per-view after he pushed Bryan to the limit.

Although many in the WWE Universe want to see Kingston get another crack at Bryan's title, McMahon seems intent on preventing that from happening.

WWE Hall of Fame announcer Jim Ross confirmed Wednesday he will depart WWE when his contract expires March 29.

Speaking on The Jim Ross Report (h/t John Pollock of Post Wrestling), Ross said he and WWE Chairman Vince McMahon made the decision mutually. JR has been under contract with WWE for the past two years, as they brought him back shortly after the death of his wife, Jan, in 2017.

Ross still has interest in continuing his work in wrestling, and he opined, "I don't think I'll be out of work long."

The 67-year-old Ross joined WWE in 1993 and worked for the company almost uninterrupted until 2013. During that time, he became the voice of WWE and the Attitude Era, which is why he is now widely considered one of the best play-by-play men of all time.

Ross did some announcing for New Japan Pro-Wrestling on AXS TV after leaving WWE and continued to work in that capacity until 2018, even after rejoining WWE.

In an emotional moment, Ross called the WrestleMania 33 main event between Roman Reigns and The Undertaker on commentary just weeks after his wife's death. He also called the inaugural Mae Young Classic alongside fellow WWE Hall of Famer Lita and made additional sporadic appearances as an announcer and pre-show panel member.

While Ross hasn't had a significant presence on television in recent years, he made it clear Wednesday that he wants to continue as a play-by-play man outside WWE:

"I'm 67, I still feel I can get the job done doing wrestling play-by-play, and I want to explore that opportunity and possibility. I'll be moving on in a positive way; nothing but good things to say about everyone involved.

"You know, I have my critics in WWE, as we all do, as people do when you're there for very long. It's a very unique community, and I have no regrets. The smartest thing I ever did was come to work for Vince McMahon in 1993."

There are options aplenty for Ross with the end of his WWE tenure approaching. All Elite Wrestling, Ring of Honor, Impact Wrestling and Major League Wrestling are just a few of the promotions that could potentially bring him in.

AEW appears to be an especially strong possibility, as Ross had Chief Brand Officer Brandi Rhodes on his podcast Wednesday, and AEW has yet to make an announcement regarding its lead play-by-play announcer.

While AEW has already made waves in the wrestling business by signing big names like Chris Jericho and Kenny Omega, supplementing that with an announcer such as Ross who commands so much respect from the viewing audience could go a long way toward establishing the company as an even bigger player in the wrestling business.

Listen to Ring Rust Radio for all of the hot wrestling topics. Catch the latest episode in the player below (warning: some language NSFW).

Vince McMahon might be the chairman of WWE, but he wasn't the company's most well-compensated employee during the 2018 fiscal year. 

In a filing to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, WWE revealed the salaries for its top executives (h/t Wrestling Inc's Marc Middleton). McMahon earned a $1.4 million salary and took home a little over $5.6 million in overall compensation.

Co-presidents George Barrios and Michelle Wilson both eclipsed McMahon. Barrios received $9.1 million, with Wilson just edging past him at $9.18 million.

Triple H, who continues to be a part-time active performer in addition to the executive vice president of talent, live events and creative, earned just over $5 million between both roles. His wife, Stephanie McMahon, got $2.8 million in compensation.

For comparison, John Cena was the highest-paid wrestler based off the most recent data. According to Forbes' Chris Smith, he was estimated to have collected $10 million in 2017, a figure that includes income from outside of wrestling.

On Monday's episode of WWE Raw, Ronda Rousey did a full-on heel turn.

Stephanie McMahon came to the ring, with the Raw Women's Championship belt in hand, and claimed the former UFC star had vacated the title the week prior. She then arranged an in-ring contract signing: Becky Lynch and Charlotte Flair would do battle at Fastlane for the vacant title.

Rousey marched to the ring, full-on scowl in place. She insisted she hadn't dropped the title and was still the champion. She demanded her belt back, and McMahon acquiesced, though she added a caveat while doing so.

At Sunday's Fastlane, Flair and Lynch would still face each other but instead of competing for the title, they would be fighting for The Irish Lass Kicker's WrestleMania 35 spot. If The Queen wins, Lynch won't get to compete for the title at The Show of Shows on April 7. 

If Becky wins, though, she would get added to the WrestleMania title match between Flair and Rousey, making it a Triple Threat. Stephanie then turned to Rowdy, assuming these new stipulations would make her happy. They didn't.

Instead, The Baddest Woman on the Planet lost her cool. She lashed out at everyone, and after highlighting how hard she had worked to gain the respect of the locker room and the fans, she turned her back on all of them and said she was done "pretending."

"I'm no longer here to entertain you," Rousey said. "I'm not your dancing monkey, not anymore. Damn your fantasies, damn The Man, screw The Woo and no more Mrs. Nice B---h."

It was at this point that she attacked both Flair and Lynch, but she then focused almost exclusively on The Man—the most over babyface on the roster—thus solidifying her heel turn.

Had she distributed the beatdown evenly, one could have made the argument she was a tweener, who indiscriminately took down anyone who happened to stand in her way.

This felt more personal, though. It came on the heels of a week-long Twitter war between Lynch and Rousey that had blurred the line between fiction and reality by discussing WWE's "fake" and "scripted" nature.

WWE made the right call here. They deduced (correctly) that the MetLife Stadium crowd at WrestleMania would be unified in its support of Lynch. And rather than trying to force Rousey as the smiling, happy-to-be-here champion she's portrayed for the past year, WWE decided to go with the fans' preference.

When John Cena and Roman Reigns were vociferously booed despite their babyface booking, and fans wanted them to turn heel, WWE made a dubious argument: If the fans were already booing them, then there was no need to change anything.

However, this misses the point. The fans don't want to jeer characters who are doing the right thing, or cheer those who are doing the wrong thing. It creates a weird cognitive dissonance that breaks the crowd's suspension of disbelief.

It's much better when WWE changes their booking to match the fan response, such as when WWE made Vince McMahon into the boss from hell following the Montreal Screwjob. The fans wanted to boo him, and the company made it easier for them to do so.

This also turns Lynch into a more sympathetic underdog headed into WrestleMania. Assuming she wins at Fastlane and forces the Triple Threat at The Show of Shows, she now has two villains gunning for her. She'll have to overcome the longest possible odds to emerge victorious.

And best of all, it shows WWE has committed 100 percent of its faith in The Man to carry this feud for the next month.

It's become the story of her struggle, not of Rousey's desire to be accepted as a sports entertainer. And that's a narrative turn befitting of Lynch.

WrestleMania 35 can't come soon enough.

Bleacher Report catches you up on the latest news from the WWE Universe.

The Undertaker Discusses Relationship with Vince

There has been speculation recently that the Undertaker is on bad terms with WWE since he removed "WWE Superstar" from his Twitter bio. As well, he is set to take part in Starrcast, an event that occurs on the same weekend as All Elite Wrestling's Double or Nothing in Las Vegas.

Even so, the Deadman still speaks glowingly about WWE Chairman Vince McMahon. In an interview with Ed Young at the C3 Conference on Feb. 20 (h/t Stephen Cabrera of WrestlingInc.com), the Undertaker discussed his relationship with McMahon, which began way back in 1990 when he signed with WWE:

"He's awesome, you may see him on TV and think, 'Man, I do not like that guy,' but he's awesome. He would never ask anybody to do something he wouldn't do, and he's really built an empire on hard work, dedication and energy. When you see that man and see what he puts into it [WWE], you feel like, 'Well, I at least have to try and match that.' He's an awesome leader, and I call him boss, but I think we're more friends now than we are employee and company owner."

While many jumped ship from WWE to WCW during the Attitude Era in the mid-to-late 1990s, the Undertaker stayed and has always been loyal to the company that made him a star. Because of that, he is as synonymous with WWE as perhaps anyone to ever step foot inside a ring.

He is also synonymous with WrestleMania, as he once held a 21-0 undefeated streak at the Showcase of the Immortals and hasn't missed a WrestleMania since 2000.

No match involving the Undertaker has been announced for WrestleMania 35 in April yet, but his comments suggest there is no ill will between him and McMahon that would keep it from happening if both sides are interested.

Prichard Talks Return to WWE

On Friday's episode of the Something to Wrestle with Bruce Prichard podcast, Bruce Prichard confirmed he has returned to WWE as part of the creative team.

According to Raj Giri of WrestlingInc.com, Prichard said his exact role isn't yet certain beyond lending his expertise:

"I'm extremely proud and extremely happy to be back in the family at WWE. I had my first TVs back this past week. I had an absolute blast seeing everybody.

"I'm not being coy, but a lot still needs to be worked out as far as what my role will be. I'm going to come back and help out wherever I can be most valuable. We're working through it, we're figuring out where I might fit best and how and what and why and everything else. It's something that happened pretty quickly with me going to TV.

"A lot has changed in 10 years. I have to see where I fit in and they have to see where I fit in. There's still a lot of questions to be answered, and I'm looking forward to an incredible journey."

The 55-year-old Prichard was a creative writer and producer for WWE from 1987 to 1991 and then again from 1992 to 2008. He also played the character Brother Love, who was a heel personality and manager that hosted his own segment called The Brother Love Show.

Since leaving WWE in 2008, Prichard has worked for several other wrestling companies, but his greatest success has come on Something to Wrestle alongside co-host Conrad Thompson.

The podcast has obtained a huge following over the past two-and-a-half years because of the interest in Prichard's behind-the-scenes stories from his time in WWE as Vince McMahon's right-hand man.

With regard to the podcast, Prichard said it isn't ending, although the format and other aspects of it may change: "We're going to figure out what it's going to be, where it's going to be and all of that good stuff. All those questions are still to be answered. We're working our way through it. We're going to experiment with some things and have some fun and see where we go."

Prichard did confirm, however, that Something to Wrestle will no longer hold live shows across the country and the globe, which had become a staple of the show.

Although Prichard will undoubtedly place a great deal of focus on his new gig with WWE, the announcement that his podcast is here to stay likely led many within the wrestling community to breathe a sigh of relief.

Batista's WWE Return Generates Major Interest

Batista made a surprise return to WWE programming on Monday's episode of Raw by roughing up Ric Flair and ruining his 70th birthday celebration.

The Animal's return created some waves as over 7.2 million people have watched the YouTube video of the segment:

According to Giri, that makes it the most viewed clip from a current WWE television show since November.

Aside from an appearance on the 1,000th episode of SmackDown in October, Batista hadn't been on WWE programming in four years.

Batista planted the seeds for a feud with Triple H on SmackDown 1000 when he mentioned that The Game had never beaten him. On Monday's Raw, Batista asked if he had gotten Triple H's attention by attacking Flair.

Triple H, Flair, Batista and Randy Orton once dominated WWE as the stable known as Evolution, but Batista and Triple H have had their fair share of run-ins. At WrestleMania 21, Batista and Triple H main-evented, and the Animal came out on top and won the World Heavyweight Championship.

The roles are reversed this time around with Batista as the heel and Triple H as the face. All signs now point toward a match between them at WrestleMania 35.

While Batista wasn't well-received during his previous stint with the company before and after WrestleMania 30, the interest in his return suggests things may be different this time around.

Listen to Ring Rust Radio for all of the hot wrestling topics. Catch the latest episode in the player below (warning: some language NSFW).

Kofi Kingston was replaced in the WWE Championship match at Fastlane by CEO Vince McMahon on Tuesday's SmackDown, and needless to say, some members of the WWE Universe thought this was an unfair decision by WWE management.

However, anyone who has ever paid attention to storylines involving the McMahon family knows this is the start of a storyline that likely ends with Kingston winning the WWE title at WrestleMania 35.

We saw something similar with Daniel Bryan leading into WrestleMania 30, and with the kind of response Kingston has received from the WWE Universe, he appears to be experiencing the same kind of push.

Let's take a look at how Bryan and the Yes Movement helped pave the way for The New Day member to potentially win the WWE Championship.

A Groundswell of Support

When it comes to how WWE Superstars are pushed, it usually happens because McMahon or someone else in the right position sees something in a certain person.

When the company decides it wants someone to be a top star, it stops at nothing to get them over with the crowd. As far as Bryan and Kingston are concerned, they were never meant to reach the level they are at.

Granted, Bryan had already won the World Heavyweight Championship earlier in his career, but the WWE title was always looked at as more important when they existed simultaneously.

Both men are valuable to the company in different ways, but it took the WWE Universe's fervent support before they were given real opportunities to do so.

With Bryan, it all started when the Yes Movement began to catch on. He was already well-respected by fans, but he didn't start getting the biggest pops at every show until the "yes" chants began.

Becoming a Target for the McMahon Family

As we got closer to WM30, Bryan began feuding with the McMahon family. Stephanie McMahon called him a "B+ player," and Triple H gave him a nearly impossible task if he wanted to win the WWE Championship.

He had to beat The Game in a singles match before facing Randy Orton and Batista in a Triple Threat bout for the title. Needless to say, it was an uphill battle.

With Kingston, the fans got behind him more than ever began when he lasted over an hour in a Gauntlet match on SmackDown. He was a last-minute replacement for Mustafa Ali and ended up stealing the show.

He continued to gain momentum with another stellar performance at Elimination Chamber, when he lasted until the end of the match with Bryan.

After he secured another title shot at Fastlane, it was hard to tell whether WWE was giving him some spotlight to appease the fans or whether it would end with Big E and Xavier Woods carrying Kingston on their shoulders as the newly crowned WWE champion.

By choosing to replace Kingston with Kevin Owens, McMahon kicked off what could turn out to be the entire McMahon family feuding with The New Day.

If you are a target for the McMahons, it means you are worthy of being in one of the top storylines on Raw or SmackDown.

Defying the Odds

When Bryan finally won the WWE Championship at WrestleMania XXX, WWE created a moment fans will never forget. With Kingston, it could be even bigger.

Bryan spent more time in the business than Kingston before reaching the top of the mountain, but when it comes to time in WWE specifically, The New Day member has The Beard beat with an impressive 11-year run.

Some fans have been calling for Kingston to be taken seriously as a top competitor as far back as his feud with Randy Orton in 2009. He might not have been ready 10 years ago, but he has improved by leaps and bounds since then.

Now that the wheels have been set in motion, the McMahon family needs to keep stacking the deck against Kingston so he can keep building sympathy with the WWE Universe while continuing to jump over every hurdle Vince, Stephanie and Triple H put in front of him.

WWE already has the perfect roadmap for how to push Kingston because it did something similar with Bryan when he started gaining momentum with the fans.

Why This Matters

As fans, we like to think we have some influence when it comes to WWE programming, but the truth of the matter is that WWE has a poor track record of capitalizing when a Superstar organically builds a large following.

Just look at Zack Ryder. When his Z! True Long Island Story YouTube show was making him the most popular star on social media, WWE didn't jump on the opportunity to make him into a huge star on television.

Fans were chanting "We want Ryder" when he wasn't even booked to compete. That's how over he was with the crowd. WWE gave him a reign with the U.S. title and a few high-profile storylines, but he soon faded back into the lower-midcard scene despite his popularity.

A more recent example is Rusev. The Bulgarian was gaining more and more fans each week with his Rusev Day gimmick alongside Aiden English, but for some reason, WWE never pulled the trigger on a new push for the former United States champion until.

For every time WWE has changed its plans because of the way the WWE Universe is reacting to someone, it has failed to do the same with other people 10 times. 

If Kingston ends up winning the WWE Championship at WrestleMania 35, it will give us hope that the McMahons are listening to fans and wasn't just blowing smoke when they said we would see changes to the product in 2019 and beyond.

Four months after taking a sabbatical from WWE to receive treatment for leukemia, Roman Reigns will be back on next week's episode of Raw to update his status.

WWE Chairman Vince McMahon shared the news of the former universal champion's return on Twitter:

Reigns opened the Oct. 22 episode of Raw by announcing he had to relinquish the title because his leukemia had returned after originally being diagnosed with the disease 11 years ago:

In January, actor and WWE legend Dwayne Johnson announced The Big Dog completed filming a role as his brother in the upcoming movie Hobbs & Shaw. 

After The Rock's announcement, Reigns posted on Instagram he was hoping to get back in the squared circle "as soon as possible."

If Reigns is close to making his in-ring return, it comes at an opportune time for WWE. The company has one more pay-per-view—Fastlane on March 10—before filling out the card for WrestleMania 35 on April 7.