Batista's Surgery A Success, Injured TNA Star Returning Early
By Michael Bluth
-- Jeremy Borash has updated his Twitter page (Twitter.com/JeremyBorash) stating: Today doctors cleared Shawn Hernandez of L.A.X. to return to the ring. He recently underwent successful neck surgery. That's great news. Hernandez' medical clearance comes far sooner than previously expected.
-- WWE.com posted the following this afternoon regarding Batista's injury status:
Batista has undergone surgery for injuries sustained during The Legacy's attack on Raw. The Animal's torn left biceps has been successfully reattached and he is expected to return to active competition in four months.
As previously reported, Batista's WWE Championship has been vacated and a new champion will be crowned on RAW in a 4-way match between John Cena, Randy Orton, Big Show and Triple H.
List Of Past Wellness Policy Violations By Current WWE Wrestlers
By Daniel Pena
As reported earlier, World Wrestling Entertainment is expected to announce some talent suspensions as a result of various Talent Wellness Program violations within the next few days. On Monday prior to Raw, the WWE creative team was given a list of talent not to write plans for as they will be unavailable for the foreseeable future, starting with next week's three-hour "3-For-All" broadcast. This directive is only done when talent is on the verge of being suspended as it's standard company protocol.
As most of you know, WWE's Talent Wellness Program has a "three strike" rule in place, with the first violation resulting in a 30-day suspension; the second violation resulting in a 60-day suspension; and a third such violation resulting in automatic termination from the company.
Here is how the current WWE talent roster stacks as it relates to publicly known Talent Wellness Program violations. There could very well be more current WWE wrestlers sitting on Wellness Policy strikes as a number of suspensions have fallen under the radar, but this is all that's publicly known.
Raw
» Chavo Guerrero is reportedly sitting on two strikes. On August 30, 2007, he was suspended — reportedly for 60 days — for receiving pharmaceuticals not in compliance with WWE's Talent Wellness Program. He received, among other drugs, somatropin, nandrolone and anastrozole between April 2005 and May 2006. His apparent prior suspension remains unclear.
» Drew Hankinson, a/k/a Festus, is sitting on one strike. In October or November 2006, while in developmental, he was quietly suspended for 30 days for his first violation of the company's drug testing policy.
» Randy Orton is sitting on one strike. In August 2006, he was quietly suspended for 30 days for his first violation of the company's drug testing policy — reportedly due to a drug test failure. Starting in September 2004 through February 2007, Orton received somatropin, nandrolone and stanozolol. In August 2007, company officials reasoned that Orton had already served his punishment due to his drug policy violation from the prior year — thus he was not suspended. However, Orton continued receiving pharmaceuticals through February 2007 — well past the date of his initial drug test failure.
» Darren Matthews, a/k/a William Regal, is sitting on two strikes. On August 30, 2007, he was suspended for 30 days for receiving pharmaceuticals not in compliance with WWE's Talent Wellness Program. Between November 2004 and November 2006, he received stanozolol, somatropin, genotropin, and anastrozole. On May 20, 2008, he was suspended for 60 days for his second violation of the company's drug testing policy.
SmackDown
» Charlie Haas is sitting on one strike. On August 30, 2007, he was suspended for 30 days for receiving pharmaceuticals not in compliance with WWE's Talent Wellness Program. He was prescribed anastrozole, somatropin, stanozolol, nandrolone and chorionic gonadotropin between August 2006 and January 2007.
» Nick Nemeth, a/k/a Dolph Ziggler, is sitting on one strike. On October 10, 2008, he was suspended for 30 days for his first violation of the company's drug resting policy.
» Adam Copeland, a/k/a Edge, is sitting on one strike. On August 30, 2007, he was suspended for 30 days for receiving pharmaceuticals not in compliance with WWE's Talent Wellness Program. He received somatropin, genotropin (both HGH), and stanozolol between September 2004 and February 2007.
» Jeff Hardy is sitting on two strikes. In July 2007, he was quietly suspended for 30 days for his first violation of the company's drug testing policy. On March 11, 2008, he was suspended for 60 days for his second violation of the company's drug testing policy.
» James Yun, a/k/a Jimmy Wang Yang, is sitting on one strike. On June 9, 2008, he was suspended for 30 days for his first violation of the company's drug testing policy.
» John Hennigan, a/k/a John Morrison, is sitting on one strike. On August 30, 2007, he was suspended for 30 days for receiving pharmaceuticals not in compliance with WWE's Talent Wellness Program. Between June 2006 and February 2007 he was prescribed somatropin, anastrozole, testosterone, stanozolol and chorionic gonadotropin, a hormone produced naturally during pregnancy. (HCG is taken by anabolic steroid users to stimulate the production of testosterone, which is suppressed as a result of steroid use.)
» Shoichi Funaki, a/k/a Kung Fu Naki, is sitting on one strike. On August 30, 2007, he was suspended for 30 days for receiving pharmaceuticals not in compliance with WWE's Talent Wellness Program. He received somatropin in March 2006.
ECW
» Harry Smith, a/k/a David Hart Smith, is sitting on one strike. On November 2, 2007, he was suspended for 30 days for his first violation of the company's drug testing policy — reportedly due to a drug test failure while in developmental.
» Gregory Helms is sitting on one strike. On August 30, 2007, he was suspended for 30 days for receiving pharmaceuticals not in compliance with WWE's Talent Wellness Program. Between November 2003 and February 2007, he received, among other drugs, testosterone, genotropin (HGH) and nandrolone.
Developmental
» Ryan Reeves, a/k/a Ryback, is sitting on one strike. In July 2006, while in developmental, he was quietly suspended for 30 days for his first violation of the company's drug testing policy. WWE released Reeves on January 19, 2007, but re-signed him in the fall of 2008, making him the first talent with a Wellness Program strike to return to the company after being let go.
Notes
* Dave Meltzer reported in his Wrestling Observer newsletter early this year when Congress' investigation of steroids in professional wrestling broke out that a suspension was issued in April 2008. Peculiarly, there is no record of WWE announcing a suspension during that particular month.
* According to the Waxman report, at least a few suspensions completely fell under the radar in the months leading up to the Signature Pharmacy scandal in August 2007. Suspensions were quietly issued in late November, early December 2006; early to mid May 2007; late April, early May 2007; mid May 2007; and late August, early September 2007.
* Waxman's letter noted that of five wrestlers who failed pre-contract steroid tests during a 14-week period in late 2007 and early 2008, four ended up being hired anyway by WWE. Considering it was not so long ago, chances are some, if not all, are still under contract to the company. Their respective pre-contract drug test failures do not count against the policy.
* If Chris Mordetzky, a/k/a Chris Masters, has re-signed with World Wrestling Entertainment as has been reported, then he would also be added to the list with two strikes against him from his previous stint in the company.
On August 30, 2007, he was suspended for 30 days for his first violation of the company's drug testing policy. On November 2, 2007, he was suspended for 60 days for his second violation of the company's drug testing policy. He was released from his WWE contract, six days later, on November 8, 2007.
WWE Drug Suspensions Expected, Vickie Guerrero's Departure, More
By Daniel Pena
source:
www.f4wonline.com
-- As Michael reported earlier, the WWE creative team has already been given a list of wrestlers not to write ideas for as they will be unavailable for the foreseeable future, starting with next Monday's three-hour episode of Raw. Dave Meltzer said in today's Wrestling Observer Radio show that the company will indeed be suspending some main roster talent within the next few days. Drug testing took place at shows over the weekend, in addition to yesterday's Raw.
Further confirming that some suspensions will be taking place is that it is standard company protocol for head officials to inform creative that certain performers will not be available for the foreseeable future. This fact was publicly disclosed by World Wrestling Entertainment in Henry Waxman's report concerning steroids in professional wrestling released this past January.
Although, there is a lot of skepticism among many in WWE these days in regards to how the company is handling drug test violations. Since the fall of 2007, the official policy on drug test failures has been to publicly announce all failures no matter what, but internally, some believe the company isn't completely abiding by its own set of rules.
For instance, of the four confirmed developmental releases within the past two days (Lupe Viscara, Jon Cutler, Dakota "Maverick" Darsow and Kafu), two were reportedly let go as a result of drug test failures. It is rather peculiar that WWE officials opted against publicly outing the violators when it is company policy to do so.
Early last year, WWE announced the suspensions of developmental wrestlers Derrick Neikirk and Neil "Chet the Jet" Bzibziak, releasing them shortly thereafter. In this new case, the company appears to be circumventing its own set of rules by quietly releasing talent so more unwanted negative attention isn't drawn to WWE concerning drug use amongst its wrestlers — especially due to little known minor league talent when the company is adamantly trying to clean up its image. Had they not terminated the violators in question, they would have had no choice but to publicly announce their respective suspensions, hence the quiet releases, which apparently is WWE's new way of getting around the policy.
-- Regarding Vickie Guerrero's decision to legitimately quit World Wrestling Entertainment, for the record, she handed in her notice to the company about a month ago. Coincidentally, or perhaps not so coincidentally, this is right around the time they started having Santino(a) Marella direct various pig-related insults towards her on television. While there were a few light-hearted jokes concerning Guerrero's physical appearance here and there throughout her near three-year tenure in the company, she was never treated this harshly up until a few weeks ago.
-- The term "FCW Universe" is now being used amongst commentators Josh Mathews and Dusty Rhodes during developmental's weekly Florida Championship Wrestling television show. The move was apparently sudden as a few weeks ago during a show, there were about a half-dozen or so references to the term when it had never been used before.
Solution To Fill Recently Vacated WWE Championship
Written by Ryan Gray
As Luke posted earlier here on the site, WWE announced during tonight's edition of ECW on Sci-Fi that next week's special three-hour edition of Raw will feature a Fatal 4-Way Match to determine who will fill the vacated WWE Championship. The participants will be John Cena, Triple H, The Big Show, and Randy Orton. As mentioned several times here on the site, the title was vacated due to Batista being injured.
