Breaking Ground

The Spotlight On Billy Gunn’s Firing From WWE

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Well,  unfortunately I’m not coming to you with happy news to end the week in WWE but as reported by f4wonline.com earlier today, “Monty “Kip” Sopp, better known as Billy Gunn, was fired today as a trainer by WWE due to testing positive for elevated levels of testosterone in a powerlifting meet from July 25.”According to the report, “Sopp’s drug test  came up with a 37-1 testosterone/epitestosterone ratio, well over the 4-1 limit, and he was suspended from powerlifting for four years.”

At 52 years of age, it is unlikely that Sopp will be able t compete in powerlifting again.  This is obviously unfortunate as Sopp had been working both an agent and a trainer down in NXT over the past few years.  With Sopp being chosen to be a trainer on the most recent season of Tough Enough, coupled with how prominently he’s featured on Breaking Ground (the new docuseries on the WWE Network), it would be reasonable to assume that Sopp was one of the more trusted people down at the performance center and within WWE auspices.

Sopp had one of the more accomplished careers as a member of WWE, and member of D-Generation X during the Attitude Era, as a former 2 time hardcore champion, a former king of the ring winner, a former intercontinental champion and a former (unprecedented) 11 time WWE Hardcore champion.  Sopp even had a run with the tag titles as a member of the New Age Outlaws as most recently as 2013 in a run that culminated in a six man tag with Corporate Kane against the Shield at WrestleMania 30.

As of this writing, Sopp is still listed on the superstars section of WWE.com and no official statement has been released by WWE.  As mentioned earlier, Sopp had been featured time to time of the new Breaking Ground series on the WWE Network, so it will be interesting to see if he is edited out of any further material that’s been taped for that series moving forward.  It should be noted that while Sopp did fail that test for powerlifting back on July 25th, WWE was not made aware of it until very recently. You really have to give WWE a lot of credit for releasing Sopp immediately upon this being discovered and showing zero tolerance amongst their trainers as it pertains to PEDs.  At the end of the day, Sopp is training the future of WWE down in NXT and should be a role model for these trainees.  It would be setting a bad example to keep Sopp on as a trainer, despite his accomplishments, so WWE’s hands were tied in that regard.

Hopefully, if this is an issue in which Sopp has a problem, and I’m not one to judge, he’s able to get the help that needs to overcome the problem.  If any further details are released on this matter, we’ll have them for you right here on thedailyspotlight.com

The Spotlight On The Week Ahead In WWE: 11/9-11/15

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Hello everyone and a happy Monday to each and every one of you. With a new week upon us I figured it would be a fun idea to take a look at the week ahead for WWE. Please note that at the end of this piece I’m going to have some (hopefully) fun bits of news regarding this website and the wrestling material that I have planned for all of you over the week as well. Let’s get right into it with some highlights of the week ahead in WWE.Highlights:

Manchester Mayhem: WWE heads to the United Kingdom to tape both Raw and Smackdown. Now for those of us in the New York City Area, Manchester is actually 5 hours ahead of us and so as I type this piece up right now, WWE is preparing to tape Raw live in just a little under two hours. With the tape delay, I’ve noticed in the past that while the Raw tapings in the UK often have strong in ring work (often stronger than many of the matches taped for Raw here in the States), there often isn’t as much storyline development when Raw heads to the UK. I don’t know if that’s because of the time difference and the fact that, with the way social media works, many spoilers get out prior to Raw airing on television or what but this is what I’ve noticed. Well, I don’t expect that to be the case tonight as tonght’s Raw will be the first live WWE broadcast since the news broke of Seth Rollins’ injury and it was announced that a tournament would be held to crown a new world champion at the Survivor Series on November 22nd. Here is what we do know right now in regards to Raw and Smackdown this week, WWE.com has confirmed that the tournament for the world title would kick off tonight on Raw and continue into Smackdown for the rest of the week. While not confirmed, I would think there would be 16 superstars competing in the tournament and they’ll have 2 first round matches on Raw and Smackdown both this week and next then hold the final 8 of the tournament live on the Survivor Series. It is certainly possible that the tournament would only have 8 participants or that they would do the first round this week and the second round next week then have the final four of the tournament at the Survivor Series but that remains to be seen. Personally I think this is great idea for WWE as it drives up the interest of Smackdown and makes that show a more “must see” program so that you can see the tournament matches. There hasn’t been any brackets released as of yet but I personally hope that we don’t see the brackets and instead they announce each matchup as they occur. I also know, and this is a bit of a SPOILER, that the Undertaker is locally advertised for tomorrow’s Smackdown taping and so it’ll be interesting to see if he is simply there for the live crowd following the taping or if perhaps he’ll get involved in the tapings this week to respond to the actions of the Wyatt family and continue the build for his involvement at the Survivor Series. 

Why, Joe, Why?: From an NXT, one of the big questions going into this week’s NXT is why Samoa Joe turned his back on former tag team partner and NXT World Champion, Finn Balor at the end of last week’s NXT television. If you haven’t seen last week’s NXT, I suggest going out of your way to do so. There is a really strong main event between Finn Balor and Apllo Crews for the NXT world title and the turn by Joe at the end was so well done and seemed to really shock the crowd. Also during that match, Baron Corbin attacked Crews, costing him the match. One would assume that the build for NXT Takeover:UK would continue this week and push towards a world title match between Balor and Joe (A match that on paper looks incredible) and, perhaps, a number one contender match between Crews and Corbin. Not bad at all and I’m interested to see how we get there on NXT this week.  
New Network Programming: There is also a good amount of original programming coming to the WWE Network this week. For starters, a brand new episode of WWE Breaking Ground will air on the Network immediately following Raw. If you haven’t seen the first two episodes so far. , I suggest you check those out as Breaking Ground is a really unique show as the WWE Network cameras peal back the curtain and really gives fans behind the scenes access to NXT that we’ve never seen anything like in WWE before. It almost reminds me of what the NFL does with Hard Knocks, especially the scene last week where Devin Taylor gets fired.  Aside from that this week, a new episode of Table For Three will debut featuring William Regal, Wade Barrett and Sheamus. Table For Three is a lot of fun and an easy watch if you have an extra 20 minutes to do so. Finally, the piece I’m actually looking most forward to checking out on the WWE Network is the First Look at the WWE Christmas DVD that’s going to be released tomorrow, hosted by Mick Foley. As you will all find out next month, I’m a huge fan of Christmas and have always enjoyed seeing the holidays tied into WWE. This should be a fun release, albeit a little short, especially with Foley’s involvement in the project. There are few more passionate about Christmas than Mick Foley.

The Spotlight On The Survivor Series: Alright time for my big announcement regarding this week on the site. I’m sure most of you scrolled past the WWE stuff to read this section here (more like will skip this part). In any event with Survivor Series taking place in just 13 days, I thought it would be fun to take a look back on some of my memories of the different Survivor Series past, starting with tonight. I’ll warn you that some of the events will be covered briefly with a thought or two about what I remember about the shows but there will be posts dedicated to specific Survivor Series events that took place either near my hometown of New York City, had historical significance or that attended live. We’ll kick off this unique retrospective tonight looking at the first 9 Surivor Series events from 1987-1995. This should be a lot of fun and then this weekend, the retrospective will conclude with a countdown on the top 10 Traditional Survivor Series of all time. 

That’s going to do it for right now but enjoy the week in WWE and keep it locked in for all of your wrestling needs to thedailyspotlight.com!