UFC Previews This Saturday’s Northcutt vs Gall Fight
UFC has released the above video to their official YouTube page featuring a preview of this upcoming Saturday’s fight between Sage Northcutt and Mickey Gall. This will be Gall’s follow up fight since defeating CM Punk at UFC 203.
Related: Mickey Gall Says CM Punk Is ‘Ballsy’ To Attempt UFC Comeback
WWE Interested In Signing Current TNA Wrestler?
The Wrestling Observer Newsletter is reporting that there is interest on WWE’s part about re-hiring current TNA wrestler Eli Drake (aka Shaun Ricker). Ricker formally worked for WWE from 2006-2008 working dark matches before and after shows. He was then signed to a WWE developmental deal in 2013 and even debuted on WWE NXT as Slate Randall before being released in August 2014.
The hold up here is that Drake is currently signed to a contract with TNA. Dixie Carter announced back in May that Drake had been signed to a new contract but did not give the length of time for the new agreement.
There has been interest in bringing Drake to WWE ever since he appeared on the reality show The Hero on TNT, hosted by The Rock, back in 2013. He is said to have the charisma that WWE is looking for but apparently there were some issues with his Twitter use and an email he sent while working with WWE last time around. Exact details about the email have not been confirmed but whatever the contents were they were said to have buried him with management.
Back in June 2015 Drake spoke with the Pancakes & Powerslams podcast and addressed his rumored heat with WWE:
“I was on the black list there for a while. One of the guys who used to work in Talent Relations – I’ll leave him nameless – he got fired around early 2012, apparently not very liked in the back anyway; I guess he was kind of a jerk to a lot of people, for whatever reason, would bury me in the office. So I was kind of just, nobody could touch me; nobody would touch me. So for a lot of years it was frustration and wondering what I’m working toward and why isn’t these guys taking my calls. And I finally started getting some of the details of why this guy was burying me. There was talk of them picking me up in 2011, I was there for SummerSlam, and then and the follow-up Raw and SmackDown, and everything went incredibly well. But all of a sudden it was like radio silence on their end and I hadn’t quite understood why until I spoke to this person, and he was like, “Well, we’re gonna go in a different direction.” I’m like, “OK?” and he’s like, “You can check out Ring of Honor or TNA or whatever.”
“So I think maybe five months after I had spoken to him on the phone, he’d gotten fired, which was a great day for me. I don’t wanna see anyone lose their job, but if you’ve keeping me out of a job, here’s to ya. So, I was more than happy to see him go. And so this new guy comes in, and the beauty of it is that with the footage I had from (Championship Wrestling from Hollywood), I would take some of this great-looking television footage that was on every week and put it together with a short little paragraph just introducing myself and a resume and some photos. Emailed it to this guy and he immediately responded to me and was interested but then found out that I was on this blacklist or whatever. So for the next few months I had to just wait and keep trying to establish this rapport. Eventually, these tryouts kept getting pushed off. First he offered me a tryout until he found out that I was on the blacklist. Then, a few months later I got offered a tryout but simultaneously, I also was offered a TNA tryout. So, my TNA tryout was on a Thursday and my WWE tryout was actually that following Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. I was ecstatic because I have the two biggest companies vying for me and it’s perfect. Thursday I go into Impact and that goes well, then Sunday I get an email and I’m told that I can’t come to the (WWE) tryout. They couldn’t say why, but I’m pretty certain it was because there was a lawsuit going on between TNA and WWE at the time.”
