Speaker 1: It's business time.
Speaker 2: Baby.
Speaker 1: You are listening to Solo Monster Sounds Off. I love
Speaker 1: you so mama monster dude, I want your soulier a woman.
Speaker 2: You got grown ass wrestlers in the back going on Twitter.
Speaker 1: Come over here. I have the best move set. You
Speaker 1: have legs. They've made Solo a monster. I was ninety
Speaker 1: nine percent positive it was just chessed up. Now I
Speaker 1: want out of my contract if I don't care what
Speaker 1: I want. This is episode nine oh two of the
Speaker 1: Solemn Monster Sounds Off. It is Sunday, February twenty third,
Speaker 1: twenty and twenty five. I am the Solen Monster. You
Speaker 1: know it's WrestleMania season. Because the Rock has decided to
Speaker 1: descend from Rock Mountain. He has come down to grace
Speaker 1: us with his presence yet again here on the road
Speaker 1: to wrestle Media. We got a lot to get into
Speaker 1: this week, not just with the Rock, about a lot
Speaker 1: of other things as well. If you would like to
Speaker 1: support via PayPal, as you well know, you can always
Speaker 1: do so Ontosolomonster dot com ten dollars or more, we'll
Speaker 1: get you a nickname. In a shout out, I want
Speaker 1: to say thank you to Big Bee Brian Pisera, The
Speaker 1: Diamond Dallas Dance Machine, Harrison's Soep, Velvet Revolver, Robert Murray,
Speaker 1: the Portland pop Star, Paul Hamilton, the Man Himself, The
Speaker 1: Chicago Slayer, Willie Eicherd, Knight Stalker, and if Alsaphar Killshot,
Speaker 1: Keith Hart, Robert Loverboy Lopez. It has been a while.
Speaker 1: Thank you, man, Carlos, Man of Steel, Manuel Big Homie,
Speaker 1: Jonathan Burton, Thank you for the note, Jonathan, I appreciate it.
Speaker 1: Peacemaker Steve Cliff, who is recovering from his second knee
Speaker 1: surgery on the same knee, but he is enjoying the
Speaker 1: sound off as he convalesces. Steve. Get well soon and
Speaker 1: shout out to Nathan from Wressell Addict Radio, Brace for
Speaker 1: Impact and The Game Changer podcast. His colleagues are celebrating
Speaker 1: four hundred episodes. They are The Kings of the Ring
Speaker 1: podcast hosted by King Ricky Rose, Queen B. K. Murphy.
Speaker 1: I hope it's k I was gonna say, Kai. I
Speaker 1: hope it's k IF not I apology. I apologize to
Speaker 1: the Queen, but we have we have the Queen and
Speaker 1: we have Willie t So Congrats to the crew. You
Speaker 1: could check out their four hundredth episode this Tuesday. Again.
Speaker 1: That is the Kings of the Ring podcast. It's WrestleMania season,
Speaker 1: which means that it is time for The Rock to
Speaker 1: show up two months before the show to take things
Speaker 1: in a completely different direction, for better or worse. This
Speaker 1: is now the second year in a row that this
Speaker 1: has happened. Last year, it all worked out in the end.
Speaker 1: It gave us some much more exciting WrestleMania. I'm hoping
Speaker 1: for the same this year, especially since I mean I
Speaker 1: was be honest. I know we still have eight weeks,
Speaker 1: but the road to Mania has been pretty dull so far.
Speaker 1: But that segment I'm Friday with The Rock and Cody
Speaker 1: Rhodes was honestly one of the weirdest segments that I
Speaker 1: have ever seen in all my years of watching wrestling.
Speaker 1: Like I've seen great promos, a lot of them from
Speaker 1: The Rock, I've seen bad promos. This was just fucking bizarre.
Speaker 1: And it wasn't the first time that Rock and Cody
Speaker 1: have shared the ring and it evolved into something very awkward.
Speaker 1: This was actually the second time that this has happened,
Speaker 1: but it was the only real interesting thing that happened
Speaker 1: on SmackDown. I thought the main event was solid, and
Speaker 1: there was a Kevin Owens video that was good. It
Speaker 1: was brief, but it was good. But outside of that,
Speaker 1: this was one of the worst Smackdowns that I have
Speaker 1: seen in years. Even with Rock on the show, SmackDown
Speaker 1: has been awful. And so it was with great curiosity
Speaker 1: and excitement that I saw on Thursday the breaking news
Speaker 1: that The Rock would be appearing on Friday's episode from
Speaker 1: New Orleans. And when I realized where the show was
Speaker 1: taking place, I thought, well, this is probably tied into
Speaker 1: the announcement of next year's WrestleMania, because the chatter has
Speaker 1: been that media was coming back to the Big Easy.
Speaker 1: You know, there were rumors of there being another kickoff
Speaker 1: event very similar to the one they did in Las
Speaker 1: Vegas last year, and then that never happened. Rock said,
Speaker 1: originally they were going to make the announcement at the
Speaker 1: Super Bowl, but there were a few hiccups and it
Speaker 1: ended up not happening. He didn't say what those hiccups were. Yeah,
Speaker 1: the NFL said, you're not taking the shine away from
Speaker 1: our end. You could take that wrestling shit somewhere else.
Speaker 1: That's what happened, so it only made sense that they
Speaker 1: would announce that, and they did. Rock said the WrestleMania
Speaker 1: forty two in twenty twenty six will be returning to
Speaker 1: the Superdome in New Orleans, the same Superdome where brock
Speaker 1: Lesner ended the Undertaker streak, the same Superdome where Charlotte
Speaker 1: Flair ended Osca's undefeated streak, and the same Superdome where
Speaker 1: braun Stroman won the tag team titles with a nine
Speaker 1: old Boy. A lot of history in that building. Now,
Speaker 1: I love New Orleans. I love that they're coming back there.
Speaker 1: I hope to be back there myself. Saturday April eleventh,
Speaker 1: Sunday April twelfth, those are the dates. At least next
Speaker 1: year it won't fall on Easter Sunday like it does
Speaker 1: this year. But that wasn't the only reason that the
Speaker 1: Rock was there. Now, I said that this was not
Speaker 1: the first time that Rock and Cody shared the ring
Speaker 1: for a very weird segment, Let's go back to the
Speaker 1: night after WrestleMania last year. Cody finished his story, the
Speaker 1: Rock joins him in the ring on raw. He's got
Speaker 1: his Brahma Bull belt over his shoulder, and Rock asked Cody,
Speaker 1: can I hold your title? I would like to hold
Speaker 1: your title, the WWE title, And Cody is weirded out
Speaker 1: by this and says, basically, I'll let you hold mine
Speaker 1: if you let me hold yours. And people think there's
Speaker 1: something wrong with me that I said the other night
Speaker 1: that there were sexual undertones to that segment on Friday,
Speaker 1: and so they swap belts, and the crowd that night
Speaker 1: breaks that into a chant of this is awkward. Yes,
Speaker 1: yes it was awkward. But Rock told Cody, your story
Speaker 1: with Roman Reigns is over, but our story has just begun.
Speaker 1: And everybody cheered because they assumed that we would be
Speaker 1: getting a match between them, probably at this year's WrestleMania
Speaker 1: and Cody that night he told him, you're my boss, right,
Speaker 1: you're on the board of TKO, You're my literal boss.
Speaker 1: But just remember I'm the champion, which means I'm your champion,
Speaker 1: which is very interesting given what Rock said on Friday
Speaker 1: about wanting Cody to be his champion. They already established
Speaker 1: last year that Cody is Rocks champion. Rock said, you
Speaker 1: are my champion, and there's one more thing, and he
Speaker 1: pulled out a Rolex watch that Cody had gifted him
Speaker 1: before their WrestleMania match, and he handed it back to
Speaker 1: Cody and he said, don't you ever break my heart again.
Speaker 1: That was the last time that the these two men
Speaker 1: shared a ring together. Okay, fast forward six months. The
Speaker 1: Rock returns. After Cody and Romans match against the Bloodline
Speaker 1: at Bad Blood, he stands on stage, he flashes the
Speaker 1: one two three, he does the throat slash, and that's it.
Speaker 1: No follow up, no nothing, completely pointless outside of getting
Speaker 1: people talking, which I guess was the point, but it
Speaker 1: led to nothing. He wasn't seen again until New Year's
Speaker 1: Day Raw debuts on Netflix. We get the Rock, but
Speaker 1: we get corporate Rock. We got Dwayne the board member
Speaker 1: who's breaking the fourth wall, and he's talking about how
Speaker 1: great business is and what a great relationship they have
Speaker 1: with Netflix and Cody my god looks over at Cody
Speaker 1: in the front row. Cody's standing in the front row
Speaker 1: like he's a fucking fan, and he looks over at him,
Speaker 1: and he's talking about what a great champion he is
Speaker 1: and what a great friendship the two of them have
Speaker 1: been able to forge. He's given the man his flowers.
Speaker 1: He even shared some Tereremana with him in the back.
Speaker 1: People flipped out over that because it felt like they
Speaker 1: were killing dead any potential match between the two of them.
Speaker 1: Fast forward to SmackDown, Rock invites Cody Rhodes out to
Speaker 1: the ring. Rock gives him a hug, and he gives
Speaker 1: him a kiss, and again he lavishes praise on this man.
Speaker 1: He talks about what a great champion he's been and
Speaker 1: how they've become great friends over the past year. Even
Speaker 1: our mothers have become friends. Right, It's just one big
Speaker 1: love fest. But then he reminds Cody that he's a
Speaker 1: director on the board of TKO. TKO happens to own WWE,
Speaker 1: and that makes him the most powerful man in WWE,
Speaker 1: which of course is not true, but that's the story
Speaker 1: they're telling. And he says Cody is a great champion,
Speaker 1: but he wants him to be more than a great champion.
Speaker 1: He wants him to be his champion, which Rock already
Speaker 1: acknowledged last year on that Postmania Raw that Cody was
Speaker 1: his champion. So I'm not sure what changed from then
Speaker 1: to now. A Rock said he was talking about something
Speaker 1: bigger than just the WWEE title, and then he started
Speaker 1: comparing Cody's Instagram followers to the number of followers that
Speaker 1: he has. You know, you've got all these many millions
Speaker 1: of followers, but I've got half a billion. And that's
Speaker 1: what I want for you. And if Cody agrees to
Speaker 1: be his champion, he can make all of Cody's dreams
Speaker 1: come true. Even though Cody's dream already came true last
Speaker 1: year he finished his story, he won the title that
Speaker 1: was taken away from Dusty. But Rock said he needs
Speaker 1: Cody to be his champion. He doesn't offer any good
Speaker 1: reason why he needs Cody to be his champion when
Speaker 1: he already established last year that Cody is in fact
Speaker 1: his champion, and he acknowledges how great of a job
Speaker 1: he's done, like he checks all the boxes, talks about
Speaker 1: WWE's business has been booming under cody five billion dollar
Speaker 1: Netflix deal, right, they got fucking new Gate records being
Speaker 1: set every month, sellout crowds. But for some reason, he
Speaker 1: desperately needs this man to be his champion. He said
Speaker 1: Cody could be the one thing that Rock never had,
Speaker 1: his brother, and that last year it was supposed to
Speaker 1: be Rock and Roman for the title, and Cody fucked
Speaker 1: it all. Up and then he ended up slapping the
Speaker 1: Rock on that road to WrestleMania. And so for all
Speaker 1: those reasons he needs Cody to be his champion. None
Speaker 1: of that really makes any sense, but that's how he
Speaker 1: tried to explain it as far as why he needs
Speaker 1: him to be his champion. And he gave Cody until
Speaker 1: the elimination Chamber in Toronto next weekend to give him
Speaker 1: his answer. Go home, talk it over with your wife,
Speaker 1: and you give me your answer. Like they're running for
Speaker 1: office together, and he wants Cody to be his vice president.
Speaker 1: He wants him to be his running mate. You know
Speaker 1: what's scary about it, though, honestly, one day I could
Speaker 1: see that when Cody is done in the ring. I mean,
Speaker 1: I could easily see Cody getting into politics. Rock of course,
Speaker 1: has said I don't want to run for president. I
Speaker 1: got too many skeletons in my closet. But you know,
Speaker 1: people still talk about Rock, but one day he might
Speaker 1: run for president. It's scary, but I can envision a
Speaker 1: ticket one day of the Rock and Cody Roads legitimately
Speaker 1: running for off. That's what this felt like here. It
Speaker 1: felt like he was making the pitch to Cody. To
Speaker 1: do just that, Go home, talk it over with your wife. Yes,
Speaker 1: because it's such a big life change from Cody. You
Speaker 1: know what he's already been doing on the road every
Speaker 1: single week, wrestling and doing media and make a wish
Speaker 1: and meet and greets and everything else that this guy does.
Speaker 1: Rock says, the thing that he wants more than anything
Speaker 1: else in this world is that. And he's pointing at
Speaker 1: the WWE title over Cody's shoulder, and Cody's like, is
Speaker 1: that what this is all about? He goes, no, no, no, no,
Speaker 1: it's not about that. That's not what I want, Cody.
Speaker 1: I want your soul. There was a lot of mixed
Speaker 1: opinion online about this segment. Some people thought it sucked.
Speaker 1: Other people were throwing around the usual words like cook
Speaker 1: and cinema. That segment was cinema because you know, of
Speaker 1: all the things that it could potentially lead to, which
Speaker 1: I'll get into and it could end up going in
Speaker 1: a very interesting direction. But no, this segment did not cook.
Speaker 1: And anyone who thinks that this was cinema has never
Speaker 1: seen a fucking movie in their entire life. If you
Speaker 1: took this scene in context or not, and you put
Speaker 1: this in a movie, it would be battlefield Earth level bad. Okay,
Speaker 1: the wrestling bubble is real, folks, Okay, it is a
Speaker 1: very real thing. I'm in it too because I have
Speaker 1: to be, but I still try to keep my head
Speaker 1: outside of it a little bit so I can still
Speaker 1: get some you know, oxygen to my brain. Rock was
Speaker 1: trying to manipulate this man here in this segment, right.
Speaker 1: He reminded him about the power that he has. He's
Speaker 1: the board, and he's on the board, he's the director,
Speaker 1: all to try to get him to be, you know,
Speaker 1: his champion, whatever the hell that means, to attain a
Speaker 1: level of fame and fortune that one would think Cody
Speaker 1: already has. Right, Yes, he's not you know what Rock
Speaker 1: is in Holly would but he is the top guy
Speaker 1: in the company. He's the WWE Champion. I guess that's
Speaker 1: not enough because you know, it's the Rock, and so
Speaker 1: the Rock. Nothing is bigger than the Rock, as we
Speaker 1: all know. The segment itself was not good, Okay, it
Speaker 1: was It was meandering. Rock was out there repeating himself
Speaker 1: over and over again, which is a thing that he
Speaker 1: does in all of his promos now, and the crowd
Speaker 1: in New Orleans did not react all that much to
Speaker 1: any of this. Once he got the Superdome announcement out
Speaker 1: of the way, they were very excited for that. When
Speaker 1: Cody came out, they were loud. They liked Cody, They
Speaker 1: obviously like Rock and you know, him being back on
Speaker 1: the show. But they sounded after a while, they sounded
Speaker 1: bored and confused by a lot of this the longer
Speaker 1: it went. You know, one thing that it did do
Speaker 1: is it added a big hook to the elimination chamber
Speaker 1: by letting you know that Rock is going to be
Speaker 1: on that show and Cody is going to be on
Speaker 1: that show. Adding Rock to the show is smart, right,
Speaker 1: It'll drum up even more interest in it. It should
Speaker 1: sell more tickets. Right now, they've got around twenty seven
Speaker 1: thousand tickets out in the Rogers Center. Okay, that's the
Speaker 1: old skydough. That building fits a hell of a lot
Speaker 1: more than twenty seven thousand, So this should help goose
Speaker 1: ticket sales a little bit. Where I think the story
Speaker 1: is going is Rock wanting Cody to be his corporate champion.
Speaker 1: I talked a little bit about this on Friday night
Speaker 1: in the review. Rock wants Cody to be his you know,
Speaker 1: quote unquote corporate champion. It doesn't make a lot of sense.
Speaker 1: It really doesn't. They did this story years ago with
Speaker 1: Rock himself becoming the corporate Champion, but that made sense
Speaker 1: because you know, Vince McMahon hated Stone Cold Steve Austin.
Speaker 1: Austin was the antithesis of what he wanted in his champion, right,
Speaker 1: Southern redneck, drinking beer, cussing, thumbing his nose at authority.
Speaker 1: He wanted that title off of him and onto somebody
Speaker 1: who would better reflect what he was looking for in
Speaker 1: his champion. The Authority right didn't want Daniel Bryan as
Speaker 1: their champion. He was a B plus player. He looked
Speaker 1: like a goat. He wasn't what they saw as championship material.
Speaker 1: So he won the title anyway. But a few months later,
Speaker 1: seth Rollins joins the authority. He was more in line
Speaker 1: with what they were looking for. They groomed him for
Speaker 1: that spot. Cody carries himself already like the quintessential corporate champion.
Speaker 1: He looks the part, he sounds the part. He's the
Speaker 1: first one to the buildings, the last one to leave.
Speaker 1: He does all the media, all the charity stuff. He
Speaker 1: is that guy. So I'm gonna need a little more
Speaker 1: explanation coming out, and now this was only the first segment. Yes,
Speaker 1: but I'm gonna need a little more explanation as to
Speaker 1: why he wants Cody, of all people, to be his
Speaker 1: champion after already acknowledging previously that yes, you are my champion,
Speaker 1: if he still had heat with Cody, if he didn't
Speaker 1: want Cody to be the champion. You stole my match
Speaker 1: with Roman Reigns, you blew up the biggest WrestleMania match
Speaker 1: of all time. Then you beat my cousin, and you
Speaker 1: took the title away from my family. And he enlisted
Speaker 1: someone else to be his champion or his corporate stooge.
Speaker 1: That would make more sense to me, And that may
Speaker 1: be where things end up going when Cody ultimately gives
Speaker 1: his answer and says no, I won't be your champion,
Speaker 1: it may be somebody else in that spot. And that's
Speaker 1: where I think this story could get very interesting. So
Speaker 1: I'm not saying this can't wind up being a really
Speaker 1: fun story, but this being you know, chapter one, let's
Speaker 1: call it, or maybe chapter two if you consider last
Speaker 1: year chapter one. Right now, I could only judge it
Speaker 1: by what we saw and what we saw on Friday
Speaker 1: was not the home run that some people said it was,
Speaker 1: but it can be eventually. It can be that now.
Speaker 1: They actually held a post show press conference on Friday
Speaker 1: after SmackDown, the way they do for their plees, and
Speaker 1: it was Rock sipping his tequila and killing k fab
Speaker 1: as he answered questions about the storyline, saying that it
Speaker 1: doesn't even necessarily need to lead to a match between
Speaker 1: him and Cody. He said, in the world of pro wrestling,
Speaker 1: as we all know, everything will culminate in a match.
Speaker 1: Whatever happens, it'll end up being in the ring. What
Speaker 1: I really love about this rare air space that we
Speaker 1: have gotten to with this character of the Final Boss.
Speaker 1: It's like this white whale unicorn in that with the
Speaker 1: Final Boss and Cody Rhodes, it's not about the WWE title,
Speaker 1: it's not about having a match. It never has to
Speaker 1: culminate in a match. That's a really special place to be.
Speaker 1: I think creatively, and just think character wise and how
Speaker 1: much fun you can have to be able to have
Speaker 1: a storyline and two characters who are very popular to
Speaker 1: never have to get into the ring for a match,
Speaker 1: but yet still hold this really unique, compelling off putting
Speaker 1: kind of weird. He wants his soul. What does that mean?
Speaker 1: I love it? And then he said that he and
Speaker 1: Cody had a few tequilas after their segment. That's nice.
Speaker 1: He got to plug his tequila and his movie during
Speaker 1: that segment. By the way, on Friday, you can't rule
Speaker 1: out Rock against Cody down the right, Yes, he said,
Speaker 1: it doesn't have to culminate in a match. That doesn't
Speaker 1: mean Rock and Cody is not gonna happen. At some point.
Speaker 1: It could very well still happen, but it's not happening
Speaker 1: this year. I don't think it is happening this year.
Speaker 1: It's not happening because we have an elimination Chamber match
Speaker 1: coming up this Saturday, which was kind of lost in
Speaker 1: all the noise of this. John Cena is trying to
Speaker 1: get to WrestleMania to win his seventeenth World Championship. Seeampunk
Speaker 1: is trying to get his very first WrestleMania main event.
Speaker 1: Drew McIntyre is in it, seth Rollins is in it,
Speaker 1: Damian Priest is in it. Logan Paul is there. One
Speaker 1: of those six men will be challenging Cody for the
Speaker 1: title of WrestleMania so let's take this one by one. Okay,
Speaker 1: is Cody Rhoades going to take the rock up on
Speaker 1: his offer? I don't see it. I know people are
Speaker 1: infatuated with this idea that Cody is gonna turn heel
Speaker 1: and we're gonna get heal. Cody, Cody is the man
Speaker 1: right now. It would be foolish to turn him heal.
Speaker 1: This isn't a John Cena situation where he's getting mixed
Speaker 1: reactions and they're sick of him being on top and
Speaker 1: being babyfaced for so many years. Right, you got to
Speaker 1: turn heel? Right The fans have stuck with Cody, you know,
Speaker 1: and he's only been back for two years. The fans
Speaker 1: have stuck with this guy. They have not soured on him.
Speaker 1: They believe in him, they like him. There's no need
Speaker 1: to turn Cody roadse heel right now. And frankly, there
Speaker 1: are more compelling stories that you could tell with some
Speaker 1: of the names in the chamber ending up his rocks again.
Speaker 1: I'll call him corporate champion however they want to describe it.
Speaker 1: But there's a lot more compelling names. John Cena. Now,
Speaker 1: I dismissed the idea in my review on Friday, but
Speaker 1: as I went back and forth with people later on
Speaker 1: in the stream that night. Somebody pointed out that promo
Speaker 1: that he cut after the Royal Rumble where he declared
Speaker 1: for the Elimination Chamber because he didn't have to qualify.
Speaker 1: He said, I'd like to think, with all my equity
Speaker 1: and you know, me being who I am, I could
Speaker 1: just declare for the match. And I thought it was
Speaker 1: very odd how Sena argued in that speech that he gave,
Speaker 1: like what's best for business is for him to go
Speaker 1: to WrestleMania. It'll win his seventeenth world title. Sounded very
Speaker 1: self serving, which is out of character for the John
Speaker 1: Cena persona that we see on TV. But I've also
Speaker 1: pointed out to you how long this losing streak is
Speaker 1: that Sena has been on. The man has not won
Speaker 1: a singles match in like seven years. He went to
Speaker 1: the Royal Rumble and he lost. He sees the chance
Speaker 1: to win number seventeen slipping away. If he's feeling desperate enough,
Speaker 1: maybe we get Heal Sena siding with his old rival
Speaker 1: for one last run before dropping the title back to
Speaker 1: Cody at SummerSlam. I still think it's unlikely that we
Speaker 1: get Heal Sena during his retirement tour. But you can
Speaker 1: at least try to make sense out of it. It's
Speaker 1: basically the Steve Austin He'll turn at WrestleMania seventeen, which
Speaker 1: didn't turn out too well for the company. Even Austin
Speaker 1: admits it was a mistake. But you wouldn't have that
Speaker 1: problem now really, because Sena is not the guy anymore. Right,
Speaker 1: Austin was the guy he was It was him and Rock,
Speaker 1: But Austin was the guy back then, right, full time,
Speaker 1: most popular babyface on the roster. John Cena, this is it,
Speaker 1: This is it. This is a retirement tour. I can't
Speaker 1: even call him part time. He's less than part time, right,
Speaker 1: I mean, soon he may be part time, But so far,
Speaker 1: I mean, how many times you can count on fucking
Speaker 1: one hand in the last three years how many times
Speaker 1: you've actually seen him. So you can pretty much do
Speaker 1: anything you want with him. It's not like it's going
Speaker 1: to have a major impact on the roster or a
Speaker 1: major impact on business. If anything, you know, business would
Speaker 1: probably boom for a short John Cena, he'll turn. He's
Speaker 1: no longer their lone top babyface like he used to be,
Speaker 1: or everything Vince McMahon built everything around this guy, many
Speaker 1: many times at the expense of others who could have
Speaker 1: gotten over and potentially ended up in a spot like that.
Speaker 1: It was all about John Cena. They actually turned, by
Speaker 1: the way they turned Steve Austin at the same time
Speaker 1: that Rock was leaving to go film a movie, which
Speaker 1: left them with the Undertaker and Cane as their top babyfaces.
Speaker 1: I don't think there was a lot of forethought put
Speaker 1: into that, Like, there's a lot of reasons why that
Speaker 1: was a bad idea. But again with Sena, that's not
Speaker 1: going to be an issue. They have other baby faces
Speaker 1: they can plug in there to fight him, Cody Roman, Punk,
Speaker 1: Orton aj Styles, right, they have lots of options there.
Speaker 1: Then there's cm Punk And this is another one that
Speaker 1: I dismissed the other night. But you talk about blowing
Speaker 1: things up, this would blow a whole wide open into things,
Speaker 1: and it wouldn't really fit for Punk to cozy up
Speaker 1: to the Rock of all people, or for Punk to
Speaker 1: go corporate. But if he's desperate enough to get that
Speaker 1: Wrestlemanium main event, and if he's desperate enough to win
Speaker 1: that championship, and he sees that window closing. You know,
Speaker 1: it can make people do crazy things, or it would
Speaker 1: just prove that Seth Rollins was right in what he
Speaker 1: said about this guy all along. Andrew McIntyre was right
Speaker 1: and what he said Punk said it when when he
Speaker 1: first came back, he's here to make money, not friends.
Speaker 1: That last promo he did with Cody that was great TV.
Speaker 1: That was right before the rumble. I would love to
Speaker 1: see Punk against Cody at WrestleMania more than I would
Speaker 1: Sena against Cody. This would add a wrinkle to things
Speaker 1: that nobody would see coming. Punk would just have to
Speaker 1: explain the why because remember he still got that favor
Speaker 1: from Paul Hayman that he hasn't cashed in yet. But
Speaker 1: the idea of Punk winning the title and going heal,
Speaker 1: it's not like he wouldn't have, you know, he wouldn't
Speaker 1: have enough people to work with. Yeah, it's funny. Years ago.
Speaker 1: I pitched the idea of having Sena go corporate in
Speaker 1: like early twenty twelve, after the whole summer of Punk,
Speaker 1: flip the entire dynamic and have Babyface anti authority. See
Speaker 1: I'm Punk trying to take the title from Heel corporate Sena,
Speaker 1: and here we are talking about just the opposite possibly happening.
Speaker 1: But I'm intrigued. You know, if they focus on the
Speaker 1: whole I'm here to make money, not friends. I'm here
Speaker 1: to do business. To me, that's really the only way
Speaker 1: you can make this work without completely betraying everything about
Speaker 1: the CM Punk character that we've come to know over
Speaker 1: the years. And then you can build to a John
Speaker 1: Cena CM Punk match one last time. Maybe Punk is
Speaker 1: the one that's seen a beats to win number seventeen.
Speaker 1: Maybe it's not Cody just getting his belt back. Or
Speaker 1: SummerSlam is where you do Punk against Roman Reigns with
Speaker 1: Paul Hayman caught in the middle, right, You've got a
Speaker 1: couple of different options there. The only thing is if
Speaker 1: Punk doesn't cash in that favor with Hayman to headline
Speaker 1: WrestleMania and win the title, I don't know what else
Speaker 1: the favor could even be. Like once he does that,
Speaker 1: what's left that he would even want? But I look
Speaker 1: at the makeup of this elimination Chamber match, it is
Speaker 1: easier to envision some of the other names in the
Speaker 1: chamber ending up in the spot of Rocks Corporate Champion
Speaker 1: Drew McIntyre would actually make a lot of sense, even
Speaker 1: though he hates the bloodline. It was Rock who announced
Speaker 1: that Drew had signed his new contract. Remember he gifted
Speaker 1: him that sword all those years ago, right, anointed as
Speaker 1: the chosen one. Now he truly would be the chosen one.
Speaker 1: I just don't think it packs the same punch if
Speaker 1: you do it with an existing heel. Right, If they
Speaker 1: want that shock factor, it has to be a babyface
Speaker 1: seth Rollins could work, obviously, we know the history with
Speaker 1: him and Cody, but John Cena is winning number seventeen
Speaker 1: this year. I don't think it needs to happen at WrestleMania.
Speaker 1: If he's going heel, then it almost has to so
Speaker 1: that he can drop it in time to turn back
Speaker 1: and then get a proper send off. With Punk, you
Speaker 1: don't have those issues, right. Either one of them would
Speaker 1: make for some compelling TV so long as they're actually
Speaker 1: on TV. Right, that's not going to be an issue
Speaker 1: with Punk as much as it might be for Sina.
Speaker 1: Cody going heel though you know to do it right now,
Speaker 1: I think that would be a big mistake, and it
Speaker 1: takes us into this weekend elimination Chamber at the Rogers
Speaker 1: Center in Toronto, where things will become a lot clearer
Speaker 1: as WrestleMania directions go. We already know Jay Usso is
Speaker 1: challenging Gunther and Charlotte Flair is challenging Tiffety Stratton at WrestleMania.
Speaker 1: But after this, all of the key championship matches will
Speaker 1: be set. So let's run through the card and give
Speaker 1: some predictions. It's a four match card, plus Cody Rhodes
Speaker 1: gives his answer to The Rock. Will he surrender his soul?
Speaker 1: Will he sell his soul to the final Boss? I'm
Speaker 1: gonna say no, and The Rock will find himself a
Speaker 1: different corporate champion by WrestleMania. I don't know that they
Speaker 1: would shoot the angle on this show where let's say,
Speaker 1: by the end of the Chamber match, somebody goes heel
Speaker 1: and Rock has his guy and it's not Cody. I
Speaker 1: almost feel like they would want to say that as
Speaker 1: like a shocking moment in the main event at WrestleMania.
Speaker 1: So I don't know exactly what else is going to
Speaker 1: happen in this segment other than Cody saying yes or no,
Speaker 1: you know, yay or nay, But I do think his
Speaker 1: answer will be known. We have the women's elimination Chamber match,
Speaker 1: with the winner challenging Rhea Ripley at WrestleMania for the
Speaker 1: Women's World Championship, with liv Morgan, who is very familiar
Speaker 1: with Rhea Ripley, Alexa Bliss, Bailey, Bianca, Bela Air, Naomi,
Speaker 1: and Roxanne Perez competing in her very first chamber. This
Speaker 1: is a tough one because I think it's Live or Bianca,
Speaker 1: and I've gone back and forth here and Bianca is
Speaker 1: more my personal pick. I would love to see Aria
Speaker 1: Bianca match of WrestleMania, but so much of this comes
Speaker 1: down to what happens in that tag team title match
Speaker 1: on Monday Night when Bianca and Naomi defend their titles
Speaker 1: against Live and Raquel. Naomi is not winning this, okay,
Speaker 1: neither is Roxanne, who I think is I think might
Speaker 1: be wrestling Bailey at WrestleMania, so if so, they would
Speaker 1: cancel each other out. Alexa was just moved to SmackDown,
Speaker 1: so her challenging for a Raw championship doesn't really even
Speaker 1: makes sense. So that leaves Bianca, bell Air and Live Morgan.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna go at Live Morgan to win the chamber,
Speaker 1: but with a little Star next to it, depending on
Speaker 1: what happens tomorrow night. If Livi and Raquel win the
Speaker 1: tag team titles, then I think Bianca wins. Otherwise I'm
Speaker 1: going with Live Morgan. I think the title match between
Speaker 1: Ria Ripley and Eosky on next week's Raw ends without
Speaker 1: a winner, and maybe Living Raquel get involved. We end
Speaker 1: up with a triple threat match of WrestleMania. It's gonna
Speaker 1: be Rea Ripley defending her title against liv Morgan and Eosky.
Speaker 1: We have Tiffany Stratton and Trish Stratis taking on Naya
Speaker 1: Jackson Candace Lay and I don't see this as anything
Speaker 1: other than Trish and Tiffany getting the win in Toronto.
Speaker 1: Trish gets the fall on Candace as a way to
Speaker 1: protect Naya because she's gonna have one more title match
Speaker 1: on TV with Tiffany. We still got time between now
Speaker 1: in WrestleMania, and Naya is still talking like I'm going
Speaker 1: to take that title from you, so we're gonna get
Speaker 1: another championship match on TV at some point soon between them.
Speaker 1: I don't see Naya, even if her team loses, taking
Speaker 1: the losing fall her match with Tiffany last week for
Speaker 1: the title ended on a DQ But I think the
Speaker 1: baby Faces go over here. I think Trish in Toronto
Speaker 1: getting the win makes sense. Sammy Zain takes on Kevin
Speaker 1: Owens in an unsanctioned match. A lot of history between
Speaker 1: these two. You don't need me to tell you that
Speaker 1: this taking place in Canada. It feels very appropriate. The
Speaker 1: only question is is this unsanctioned because we're gonna have
Speaker 1: a proper match between them at WrestleMania, or is this
Speaker 1: happening now to pave the way for the return of
Speaker 1: Randy Orton. Owens and Orton go off and do their thing.
Speaker 1: Sammy z Ain ends up, you know, working with Carrion
Speaker 1: Cross because Carrion Cross is still cutting promos on him
Speaker 1: and calling them out. They're gonna have a match at
Speaker 1: some point. I just don't know if that's gonna be
Speaker 1: a television match or if that's gonna be a WrestleMania
Speaker 1: match as a way to try try to heat up
Speaker 1: carrying Cross. So we'll find out what they do here.
Speaker 1: I think because I'm looking at this and thinking this
Speaker 1: is the perfect place in the time for Randy Orton return,
Speaker 1: and it's unsanctioned, so anything goes and if Randy Orton
Speaker 1: wants to drop Kevin Owens with an RKO, if he
Speaker 1: wants to punk kick him into oblivion, if he wants
Speaker 1: to hit a pile driver on him the way that
Speaker 1: Owens did to Randy, he can do it and it's
Speaker 1: all legal because it's unsanctioned. I'm going with Sammy Zain
Speaker 1: to get the win with an assist from a returning
Speaker 1: Randy Orton. I think it might even be a case
Speaker 1: where Orton. I don't think that if Orton gets involved
Speaker 1: and attacks Kevin Owens, it's going to get him heat
Speaker 1: just because they're in Canada and people are gonna love
Speaker 1: Kevin Owens. But I think you know one way to
Speaker 1: try to avoid anything like that happening. Because I said
Speaker 1: that back in November, because Cody and Ko were not
Speaker 1: at Survivor Series, and Survivor Series was in Canada, and
Speaker 1: I'm like, I wonder if they are not doing the
Speaker 1: match on that show because they may be worried that
Speaker 1: in a match in Canada between Cody and Ko, Owens
Speaker 1: might get more cheers or Cody might get some booze. Right.
Speaker 1: I wonder if that was the logic behind holding off
Speaker 1: On like a proper match until Saturday Night's main event.
Speaker 1: But if you want to avoid any risk of that,
Speaker 1: not that I think there is much, but you have
Speaker 1: him save Sammy from a package pile driver. Owens is
Speaker 1: about to murder Sammy's a He's about to drop him
Speaker 1: on his head, maybe on the announced desk or something
Speaker 1: with a package pile driver. Here comes Randy Orton to
Speaker 1: save the day. Big Pop gets his revenge or a
Speaker 1: measure of revenge. Sammy wins Orton and Ko. They go
Speaker 1: off to continue their story and they have a match
Speaker 1: at WrestleMania and in the men's Elimination Chamber match for
Speaker 1: a shot at Cody Rhodes and his Soul and the
Speaker 1: WWE Championship. At WrestleMania, we have John Cena, CM Punk,
Speaker 1: Drew McIntyre, seth Rolls, Damian Priest, and Logan Paul. Like
Speaker 1: the women's match, I'm torn between two names. I'm torn
Speaker 1: between John Cena and c I'm Punk, Damian Priest and
Speaker 1: Drew McIntyre. They are likely gonna end up having that
Speaker 1: match a WrestleMania. I don't know that they're gonna deviate
Speaker 1: from that plan. There's history between them going back to
Speaker 1: last year's WrestleMania priest eliminated McIntyre. Priest is still insulting
Speaker 1: MacIntyre and some of his promos, like calling him a
Speaker 1: cry baby and stuff like that's gonna come back around
Speaker 1: on him. So I think that those two were going
Speaker 1: to Mania, so they'll kind of cancel each other out here.
Speaker 1: You know, I was thinking when I was going back
Speaker 1: and forth, like if it's not Sena who wins, right,
Speaker 1: you have Logan Paul eliminate John Cena after Sena eliminated
Speaker 1: him at the Rumble, and we get that over exaggerated
Speaker 1: expression on John Cena's face of shock and dismay and
Speaker 1: oh my god, what am I gonna do? That's it
Speaker 1: Number seventeen down down the toilet, And I could envision
Speaker 1: a final two of CM Punk, who was actually dumped
Speaker 1: out of the Rumble by Logan, and this time it's
Speaker 1: Punk who puts Logan down. That's kind of what I
Speaker 1: was starting to think before, But I keep coming back
Speaker 1: to this damn favor. It's like I said before, if
Speaker 1: Punk has that favor from Paul Hayman, I don't know
Speaker 1: what else it would be if not him using it
Speaker 1: to get a main event spot. At WrestleMania or get
Speaker 1: a shot at the championship at some point. And if
Speaker 1: he wins the chamber and he gets that on his own,
Speaker 1: I feel like it basically negates the need for the favor.
Speaker 1: So Sena could win. Punk could get Hayman to use
Speaker 1: whatever influence he has with the Rock, him being so
Speaker 1: close to the family at all, to get Rock to
Speaker 1: add CM Punk to the match at WrestleMania to make
Speaker 1: it a three way. That's how he gets in. He
Speaker 1: doesn't win the chamber to get in, but Punk Cash
Speaker 1: is in that favor. He gets added to the mat.
Speaker 1: And if Punk is going heel you do the turn
Speaker 1: there and you keep the fans guessing who's going to
Speaker 1: the dark side right by the time that match is over.
Speaker 1: Is it John Cena, Is it CM Punk Or maybe
Speaker 1: it's Cody and then boom, it's CM Punk and it's
Speaker 1: wrestle Maybe he is seventeen all over again. It's fun
Speaker 1: to think about and play out all the different scenarios.
Speaker 1: I'm going with John Cena. He was my original pick
Speaker 1: after he lost the Royal Rumble. I'm gonna stick with that.
Speaker 1: I think John Cena wins the elimination chamber, and then
Speaker 1: I think Punk uses the favor from Hayman to work
Speaker 1: his way into things. Desperate times call for desperate measures.
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Speaker 1: America's number one meal kit. There was some news this
Speaker 1: week on mounting frustration in the WWE women's locker room,
Speaker 1: at least with some talents, maybe not all of them,
Speaker 1: but certainly some of them. Speaking on Fightful's YouTube channel
Speaker 1: on Wednesday, Sean ross Sapp stated that he has spoken
Speaker 1: with many women in WWE who were frustrated with how
Speaker 1: the women's division was being booked. He said, somebody asked
Speaker 1: me about women's booking, and I said, yes, I have
Speaker 1: spoken with plenty of women in WWE who were frustrated
Speaker 1: with how the women's division is booked. This isn't a
Speaker 1: new issue, but it's nowhere near the level of frustrations
Speaker 1: seen around the Royal Rumble in twenty twenty two. Royal
Speaker 1: Rumble twenty twenty two was so bad that I developed
Speaker 1: sources because of how bad it was booked. This is
Speaker 1: nowhere near that now. The twenty twenty two Rumble, for
Speaker 1: those of you who may have forgotten, is the one
Speaker 1: where Sasha Banks came out at number one, dressed the
Speaker 1: Sailor Moon. She had been gone for like a month,
Speaker 1: so this was like her return, and then she was
Speaker 1: eliminated ten minutes into the match by Zelena Vega. Tamina
Speaker 1: lasted longer than Sasha Banks did. It was fucking ridiculous.
Speaker 1: So Sean said that one of the Vince McMahon pitches
Speaker 1: for that Royal Rumble was to have Ronda Rousey come
Speaker 1: back and eliminate the entire field all by herself. Thankfully
Speaker 1: that did not happen. She did win the Rumble that year,
Speaker 1: but she entered at number twenty eight. I don't need
Speaker 1: any convincing, but because some people do, it's nice to
Speaker 1: be reminded every now and then why that company is
Speaker 1: better off not having Vince McMahon running creative anymore. When
Speaker 1: we hear about shit like this, can you imagine Ronda
Speaker 1: Rousey coming back and eliminating twenty nine other women to
Speaker 1: win the Royal Rumble as awful as that second run
Speaker 1: was when she came back, That's how it kicks off.
Speaker 1: The fact that it was even pitched in the first
Speaker 1: place should have gotten him barred from the building at
Speaker 1: Titan Tower. They should have revoked his key card for that.
Speaker 1: Sap continued, though, he said there was a situation where
Speaker 1: one Women's WWE performer reached out to me and said, dude,
Speaker 1: can you find out if I'm listed internally as a
Speaker 1: heel or a babyface? And I was like, damn, okay.
Speaker 1: I also that's what I was wondering on Monday when
Speaker 1: Roxanne wrestled Riquel, I wouldn't be surprised if it was her.
Speaker 1: I was like, wait a minute, rox Emperez is a
Speaker 1: heel in NXT, and yet in that match with Raquel,
Speaker 1: you know, especially the way they were talking about her
Speaker 1: on commentary, you would think that she was a babyface.
Speaker 1: He says. I also know that there have been wrestledmany
Speaker 1: of pitches that were rejected because some talents don't want
Speaker 1: to be just in a token tag match. They want
Speaker 1: things put on a more even plane. In the women's division,
Speaker 1: contracts are going up, viewership is adjusted accordingly for when
Speaker 1: women are on screen. You're adding more titles, add more matches,
Speaker 1: all that stuff. There's not that element of where a
Speaker 1: lot of the men not only have one thing going on,
Speaker 1: they have a lot of different things going on. And
Speaker 1: that's just not the way it's been for the women.
Speaker 1: And I don't know if that's a triple H thing
Speaker 1: or what says. There's a lot of people that have
Speaker 1: been parked. For example, I'm not going to say Natalia
Speaker 1: is frustrated, but they signed Natalia, they wanted to keep Natalia.
Speaker 1: They had creative plans for Natalia. What has Natalia done since,
Speaker 1: hasn't been on NXT, hasn't been doing anything. Now, whether
Speaker 1: or not you're a n Italia fan, you can understand
Speaker 1: why she or anyone else would be frustrated, right, It's
Speaker 1: not hard to see why if she is. You know,
Speaker 1: he's not outing her as a source, he's just using
Speaker 1: her as an example. Here. They threw a lot of
Speaker 1: money at her to resign her. She obviously wants to
Speaker 1: keep wrestling. I can see her being a very important
Speaker 1: part of training future female stars, maybe ending up with
Speaker 1: a coaching role at the performance Center or with NXT
Speaker 1: at some point. But she wants to wrestle. And so
Speaker 1: if they resigned you with the understanding that you would
Speaker 1: still be wrestling, and you're not wrestling, then yes, that
Speaker 1: would be pretty frustrating as an example. And by the way,
Speaker 1: you know, when Sean says, I don't know if that's
Speaker 1: a Triple H thing or what, I can't imagine that
Speaker 1: there was some edict from Ari Emanuel and the people
Speaker 1: above Triple H and Nick con that said, hey, we
Speaker 1: want less women's wrestling on the show, or you can
Speaker 1: feature it, but don't feature it as as cohesively as
Speaker 1: you do the man like. No, when we're talking about
Speaker 1: creative issues like this, you could say it it's okay
Speaker 1: to say it's a triple H thing now or whether
Speaker 1: or not there's a method to the madness or not,
Speaker 1: I don't see what it is. But when you're the
Speaker 1: head of creative and you're the chief content officer, I'm
Speaker 1: sorry for all the people, myself included, who would lay
Speaker 1: all the shit at Vince McMahon's feet when he was
Speaker 1: in charge of creative right, and he was in charge
Speaker 1: of everything right. It was his company and he had
Speaker 1: his hands in everything, good, bad or indifferent. It starts
Speaker 1: and stops with whoever is in charge of creative in
Speaker 1: that case, for many, many, many years it was Vince McMahon.
Speaker 1: There would be good stuff and it's like, okay, even
Speaker 1: if he didn't come up with it himself, he green
Speaker 1: lit it, he allowed it on TV, so you can
Speaker 1: give him credit for that. But for the bad shit
Speaker 1: that we saw, whether he came up with it himself
Speaker 1: or he okayed the idea from somebody who thought that
Speaker 1: he would like it, that's his responsibility. That's on him.
Speaker 1: You want to blame Vince, go ahead. It's no different
Speaker 1: with Triple H. I don't know why some people, you know,
Speaker 1: and I'm not saying Sean is doing but I definitely
Speaker 1: see people who will treat him with kid glove. People
Speaker 1: accuse me of doing that and I just laugh, like,
Speaker 1: I can't take you seriously if if you say something
Speaker 1: like that, because numerous times I've called Triple H out
Speaker 1: for things I don't like or things that I do like. Right,
Speaker 1: there are things he does that I do like and
Speaker 1: I think are great. But there are people out there
Speaker 1: and it goes back to the tribalism where if you
Speaker 1: say anything bad or anything negative about the company, about
Speaker 1: Triple H, about Tony Kahn, about aaw they can't handle it.
Speaker 1: They can't and they leap into defense mode. But it's
Speaker 1: okay to say that Triple H. He's not infallible. There
Speaker 1: are things he does that are not good or that
Speaker 1: the women's division or the tag division. There are certain
Speaker 1: aspects of the show and of the roster where improvements
Speaker 1: can absolutely be made. He is the head of creative,
Speaker 1: He is the chief content officer. If you have issues
Speaker 1: with that, then you lay it at his feet. So, yes,
Speaker 1: it is his responsibility. Now, Fightful Select had additional details
Speaker 1: about this Kashawn. Initially he brought this up. It was
Speaker 1: during a show that he was doing. It might have
Speaker 1: been a super chat or something that came in. So
Speaker 1: now they had a formal report about this whole thing,
Speaker 1: and he said, we were asked to expand on some
Speaker 1: of the frustrations of the women's division. It's important to
Speaker 1: note that it does not reflect the entirety of the division,
Speaker 1: but was echoed by numerous talent. Several women on the
Speaker 1: WWE roster spoke with Fightful and noted the lack of
Speaker 1: focus on developing contenders the tag team division and screen
Speaker 1: time for women outside of the top of the division.
Speaker 1: This was said to be specifically in comparison to NXT,
Speaker 1: where main roster women's talent have noticed how much screen
Speaker 1: time and focused those talents get and how emotional investment
Speaker 1: then follows. It was also a point of redundant storylines,
Speaker 1: with the same talent not only being featured at the
Speaker 1: top of the card, but even in the mid card
Speaker 1: title scene. Those that we spoke to were happy for
Speaker 1: those who get that screen time and said that it
Speaker 1: shouldn't be a they're getting too much time conversation. It
Speaker 1: should be give other people more time. In addition to them, conversation,
Speaker 1: those that Fightful spoke with pointed to Sonya Deville effectively
Speaker 1: being cut while negotiating a new deal is something that
Speaker 1: didn't instill confidence when they are not being used by
Speaker 1: the company. We're told that Deville had been told as
Speaker 1: recently as four days prior to her release that the
Speaker 1: company was looking to keep her. Several who have inquired
Speaker 1: about their creative plans were told that their time would
Speaker 1: be coming, and they were asked to be patient. I
Speaker 1: understand not all of the women can be featured in
Speaker 1: prominent roles at the same time. Some of them are
Speaker 1: going to have to wait. And if they have ideas
Speaker 1: for them and they're just waiting for one story to
Speaker 1: end and then theirs begins, I totally understand that. So
Speaker 1: is it a case or triple h or whoever you
Speaker 1: Are they being honest when they say that, or are
Speaker 1: they just trying to get them off their backs? I
Speaker 1: don't know. There are only so many segments on one show,
Speaker 1: and you're sharing time with the men as well, and
Speaker 1: the men's ross are on Raw, the men's roster on SmackDown.
Speaker 1: It's bigger than the women's but this is not a
Speaker 1: new problem. This has been an ongoing problem now for
Speaker 1: a while. The lack of focus on the tag team
Speaker 1: division since they insist on keeping those titles, the lack
Speaker 1: of attention to stories outside of the top handful of
Speaker 1: women in the division, Rhea Ripley, Live, Morgan Nya, Jack's
Speaker 1: Charlotte Flair now that she's back, Tiffty Stratton, Right, they
Speaker 1: get all the attention. I'm not saying they shouldn't, but
Speaker 1: you know, or at least in most cases, but they
Speaker 1: get all the attention. But now you have mid card titles,
Speaker 1: two of them that you just introduced, and nobody cares.
Speaker 1: Nobody cares. Triple H has done a terrible job of this.
Speaker 1: Look at fucking Ivy Nile. Ivy Nile has been talking
Speaker 1: about challenging Lyra Valkyria for the Intercontinental title, then has
Speaker 1: a match on Monday with Dakota Kai to determine a
Speaker 1: number one contender. You would think that Tomaso Champa snuck
Speaker 1: out there and asked for a moment of silence. It
Speaker 1: was so quiet in that building. Nobody cared. Why should
Speaker 1: they to number one contenders match for a title that
Speaker 1: nobody gives a shit? About because they haven't been given
Speaker 1: a reason to care. And this is not a problem
Speaker 1: unique to the women, by the way, It's the same
Speaker 1: reason the men's I see and the men's US titles
Speaker 1: were in the doldrums for so long. You know, Gunther's
Speaker 1: run in the way that they protected him, that really
Speaker 1: elevated that Intercontinental title to a place that it had
Speaker 1: not been in many years. I would argue it hadn't
Speaker 1: been there since Miz had that run back in twenty seventeen,
Speaker 1: and before that. I couldn't even fucking tell you the
Speaker 1: last time the Intercomminental Championship meant a damn thing. Shinsky Nakamora.
Speaker 1: He won the US title from La Night. He spends
Speaker 1: most of his time now stalking people backstage like Japanese
Speaker 1: Jason Vorhees right, I mean Lyra beat Dakota to win
Speaker 1: the title on January thirteenth. It took them an entire
Speaker 1: month to get her a match, and when they did,
Speaker 1: what happened. She lost non title. It was a qualifying match,
Speaker 1: but she lost in the same week that their other champion,
Speaker 1: Chelsea Green, also lost. Yet Ivy Nile is talking about
Speaker 1: challenging Lyra for her title and then she goes out
Speaker 1: there and loses to Dakota on Monday, So Dakota is
Speaker 1: challenging for the title tomorrow night. But forget that. What
Speaker 1: have they done with Ivy Nile on TV to warrant
Speaker 1: her getting a championship match or to get people to
Speaker 1: really invest in her? When Ivy is out there, people
Speaker 1: are silent because they haven't taken the time to let
Speaker 1: people know who she is or care about her interviews,
Speaker 1: backstage segment, I mean the backstage segment that she's in.
Speaker 1: They're useless. Backstage segments, interviews, video packages, matches, whatever. You
Speaker 1: can't just give her a token segment here and there
Speaker 1: and expect people to care. So she's going to continue
Speaker 1: to wrestle to crickets and then she'll be cast aside
Speaker 1: for the next challenger and they won't do anything with
Speaker 1: her because, oh, she's not over. Gee, I wonder why
Speaker 1: that is. I understand the talent. They have to get
Speaker 1: themselves over, Yes, that is true, but they need to
Speaker 1: be put in a position to succeed. In order for
Speaker 1: that to happen, they need the support. And if they
Speaker 1: fall flat on their face, then they fall flat on
Speaker 1: their face and you move on to the next but
Speaker 1: they're not being given anything in a lot of cases.
Speaker 1: Zelina Vegas, she got a video package on Friday Night
Speaker 1: on SmackDown. Good. That's a step in the right direction.
Speaker 1: But what else are they going to do to get
Speaker 1: people to care about her challenging Chelsea for the US
Speaker 1: title when that day comes? They point to the ladies
Speaker 1: on NXT and how they're being used as a point
Speaker 1: of frustration. Why they're not doing something like that with
Speaker 1: them on the main roster. The NXT women's division right
Speaker 1: now is stacked with talent, right you hear that word
Speaker 1: thrown around a lot man. Look how stacked the division is, right,
Speaker 1: guess what so is the main roster. People don't talk
Speaker 1: about that so much, but look at the main roster.
Speaker 1: I know people love to rave about Julia and Stephanie
Speaker 1: Vicaire and Jordan Grace now is there and oh my god,
Speaker 1: soul Ruka, she's such an athlete, She's going to be
Speaker 1: such a big star. Zaria is great. Yes, so are
Speaker 1: Eo Sky and Rhea Ripley and Tiffany Stratton and Bianca
Speaker 1: bell Air and on and on and on. They've got
Speaker 1: plenty of great talent too. But look at what Sean
Speaker 1: Michaels is doing with them on NXT, and look at
Speaker 1: what Triple H is doing. Yeah, I went because I
Speaker 1: watched the show this week, and I went back and
Speaker 1: I counted it out. This week's episode of NXT featured
Speaker 1: thirteen different women in matches on a two hour show.
Speaker 1: You're lucky to get half that on Raw or smack
Speaker 1: Down any given week. NXT is the closest thing, honestly
Speaker 1: to an all women show that WWE has ever had.
Speaker 1: The first two matches this week were women's matches, and
Speaker 1: they shot an angle with Julia, Stephanie, and Jordan making
Speaker 1: the save for Carmen Petrovic and fighting off fatal influence
Speaker 1: that set up the six women tag that we had
Speaker 1: in the main event of the show. And evidently the
Speaker 1: ratings for the women's segments generally do well on Tuesdays.
Speaker 1: I'm not saying that it has to be even Stephen
Speaker 1: do on the main roster exactly what they're doing in NXT,
Speaker 1: but they can learn from what NXT is doing. Right.
Speaker 1: They do a better job of fleshing out their characters.
Speaker 1: It's not always good. I'll tune in sometimes and I'll
Speaker 1: see these backstage segments that belong on fucking public access TV,
Speaker 1: not the CW network. But they take the time to
Speaker 1: develop their characters, not just at the top level, up
Speaker 1: and down the show. Some of the stories I just
Speaker 1: can't get into, but at least they're taking that's what
Speaker 1: developmental should be for. They're taking the time to develop them.
Speaker 1: There are lessons to be learned from what Shawn Michaels
Speaker 1: is doing down there. But if these anonymous women are
Speaker 1: worried about a lack of equity when it comes to
Speaker 1: TV time, or if they're worried about the company focusing
Speaker 1: on the same ones over and over and over again, boy,
Speaker 1: it ain't going to get any better for them. Once
Speaker 1: Becky comes back, and when Julia eventually gets called up
Speaker 1: and Stephanie gets called up and Jordan gets called up.
Speaker 1: I'm looking forward to it. I think it's going to
Speaker 1: be great to see those women mixing it up with
Speaker 1: all the big names on Ron's backdown, But I don't
Speaker 1: see it getting any better for the women underneath. Now.
Speaker 1: Speaking of NXT, I did catch the episode this week.
Speaker 1: I'm not going to do a full review, but I
Speaker 1: wanted to especially see the contracts signing with Ricky Stocks
Speaker 1: who came into this show with no name this week,
Speaker 1: but he was signing his contract. But there were a
Speaker 1: lot of things that happened on this show. They had
Speaker 1: Oba Feme coming off of his win over Waller in
Speaker 1: Theory at Vengeance Day, the NXT champion. He comes out
Speaker 1: for a promo and he said, those four fools who
Speaker 1: attacked him after his match, that was the new Retribution
Speaker 1: group whatever they're going to be calling themselves. I hope
Speaker 1: it works out a lot better for them than that did.
Speaker 1: But he said, those four fools who attacked him after
Speaker 1: his match made one very big mistake. They didn't finish
Speaker 1: the job. And he told them, get your ass out
Speaker 1: to the ring and finish what you started. And the
Speaker 1: lights went out, and who should show up? It wasn't
Speaker 1: you know Retribution two point zero. It was Moose from TNA,
Speaker 1: and the place went nuts once they recognize who it was.
Speaker 1: This was his debut and they circle each other in
Speaker 1: the ring. That had a big stare down and Moose
Speaker 1: said that he just burst Oba's bubble because he was
Speaker 1: the one man that Oba could not rule over. And
Speaker 1: Oba said that that place where you're the man that's
Speaker 1: your bubble here. I'm inevitable and Moose said that this
Speaker 1: had to happen Oba Femi against Moose, and Oba said,
Speaker 1: don't worry it will. I love the idea, by the way,
Speaker 1: that like that place where you're the man completely ignoring
Speaker 1: who the raining TAA World Heavyweight Champion is. I understand
Speaker 1: that Moose, I guess, you know, ex division champion, but
Speaker 1: it's you would watch this segment and really think that
Speaker 1: Moose was the like, he's their world champion, He's their
Speaker 1: top guy. Oba's enxt's top guy. Poor Joe Hendry. I mean,
Speaker 1: he's just relegated to concerts on Thursday and he's not part.
Speaker 1: He's not part of what's going on here. He's still
Speaker 1: busy challenging John Cena to a match that may or
Speaker 1: may not happen. So this was interesting. This was a
Speaker 1: nice surprise. The fans reacted well to it. Later in
Speaker 1: the show, we found out there was a backstage segment.
Speaker 1: It was actually the way it was done was kind
Speaker 1: of very underwhelming, but they had the no quarter catch
Speaker 1: crew backstage and in the middle of this promo segment,
Speaker 1: they turned to the camera because they have a challenge.
Speaker 1: They want to issue and it's Miles Bourne and Tavian
Speaker 1: Heights and they issue a challenge to Matt and Jeff Hardy,
Speaker 1: who are currently the TNA World Tag Team Champions. So
Speaker 1: then later in the show we have a promo that
Speaker 1: was inserted into the show because we have a response
Speaker 1: from Matt and Jeff and they accepted their challenge. And
Speaker 1: on Matt's pot cast, he said that video that aired
Speaker 1: on NXT that was a last minute thing. It was
Speaker 1: not even made until like an hour or so before
Speaker 1: it was posted. So now we got the hearties are
Speaker 1: on NXT. But also on this show, we had the
Speaker 1: contract signing and Ava was in the ring for Ricky
Speaker 1: Starks still not identified the man with no name. She
Speaker 1: said that she was in the ring with the hottest
Speaker 1: free agent in wrestling. Ricky said that there were some
Speaker 1: things he wanted to get off his chest. He wanted
Speaker 1: to main event every NXT pl e and become the
Speaker 1: NXT champion. I'm the man here. He said he was
Speaker 1: going to do what he always did, which would show
Speaker 1: up and show out because the revolution was beginning, and
Speaker 1: he was interrupted by Ethan Page and so Ethan was basically,
Speaker 1: you know, cutting a heel promo here and let me
Speaker 1: guess you're in here to sign your new deal. And
Speaker 1: in that d it says that your first match you're
Speaker 1: going to be challenging for a championship. And he says,
Speaker 1: you're a genius. You're following the Ethan Page playbook to
Speaker 1: a t. But I want to tell you as a friend,
Speaker 1: there's only one Ethan Page. And Ricky told him you're
Speaker 1: wearing your insecurity as tight as you have that jacket
Speaker 1: on right now. And you should know that I walked
Speaker 1: the walk and I talked to talk and I'm here
Speaker 1: to take this place to a different level. And Page
Speaker 1: said that you'll never reach the bar that I set.
Speaker 1: And Ricky said, let's not do this right now. Let's celebrate.
Speaker 1: I'm signing with NXT. You just beat Javon Evans a
Speaker 1: vengeance day. But remember people like Javon, they always come
Speaker 1: back around to whip that ass. And wouldn't you know,
Speaker 1: Javon Evans suddenly hit the ring, he brawled with Ethan
Speaker 1: into the crowd. Ricky was finally about to sign the
Speaker 1: contract and then he was interrupted by Wesley Now in
Speaker 1: the back. There was a segment earlier where Wesley was
Speaker 1: being interviewed, and when the interviewer spotted Ricky walking by,
Speaker 1: she basically said, Okay, I'm done with you. I want
Speaker 1: to go talk to Ricky. So I guess this offended Wesley.
Speaker 1: He says, look, I know who you are, but you're
Speaker 1: new around here, and there are rules, and the number
Speaker 1: one rule is you don't disrespect Wesley Ava If he
Speaker 1: signs that contract, I want to show him the ropes
Speaker 1: and I want to be the one to welcome him
Speaker 1: to NXT. And Ricky said, why is everybody so angry
Speaker 1: all the time? Said next week, you and I in
Speaker 1: the ring. No problem. So he goes to sign the contract.
Speaker 1: West tried to take a shot at him. Ricky clotheslined
Speaker 1: him out of the ring. He finally signs the contract,
Speaker 1: he strikes a pose and the cameraman then zooms in
Speaker 1: on the on the contract which is sitting on the table,
Speaker 1: and the name and giant letters on the contract it
Speaker 1: ain't Ricky Starks, It's Ricky Saints, And finally the announcers
Speaker 1: acknowledged Ricky Saint says, come to NXT now. Ricky went
Speaker 1: on Busted Open Radio after the show went off the air,
Speaker 1: and he talked to the new name. This is what
Speaker 1: he said. He said, it's as close as you're going
Speaker 1: to get to Starks. I like the name. I know
Speaker 1: a lot of people are going to be, Oh, it's
Speaker 1: going to take time for them to get used to it.
Speaker 1: I respect that they care so deeply about me that
Speaker 1: they rebel against any name change. But at the same time,
Speaker 1: I am a product of New Orleans first and foremost,
Speaker 1: and I want to pay respect to that as well.
Speaker 1: I think this is the best of both worlds, and
Speaker 1: that means a lot to me. Obviously. I think it's
Speaker 1: cool to have a piece of home with me and
Speaker 1: the person doesn't change. I'm still that guy, and so
Speaker 1: it is what it is. And I thought that last
Speaker 1: it is what it is line was maybe the most
Speaker 1: telling of the entire thing, because there is some people,
Speaker 1: I think, who just assumed that this whole thing was
Speaker 1: his idea, Like they were going to let him keep
Speaker 1: the name, or he could have kept the name, but
Speaker 1: he was like, you know what, I want to change
Speaker 1: my name. I don't think that's what's going on here.
Speaker 1: You know, bron Breaker opted to change his name because
Speaker 1: he wanted to blaze his own path without the Steiner
Speaker 1: name Brian Pillman Junior. He went with Lexus King to
Speaker 1: do the same thing and get away from his dad's name.
Speaker 1: I don't think Ricky Stark sat at home for a
Speaker 1: year waiting to come to WWE, thinking, first thing I'm
Speaker 1: gonna do, I'm going to change my name when I
Speaker 1: get there. So I don't know what the reason is.
Speaker 1: I assume he just didn't want to surrender the rights
Speaker 1: to his name because he's one of the very few
Speaker 1: that had to change it. There's been so many people
Speaker 1: that have come in from other places, including aw and
Speaker 1: they're they're using the same name that they were using before.
Speaker 1: So he chose to come up with a name that
Speaker 1: sounded similar as similar as possible to Ricky Starks, same initials,
Speaker 1: but just incorporate a little piece of himself into it.
Speaker 1: What do I think of the name. It's fine, It's
Speaker 1: not a bad name. I mean again, I've seen some
Speaker 1: of these fucking names they've been trademarking left and right recently.
Speaker 1: Some of them are not that terrible. Some of them
Speaker 1: are fucking awful. It could have been a lot worse,
Speaker 1: especially if they came to him and said, hey, we
Speaker 1: have a name, we want you to use. At least
Speaker 1: he had input into it. It's not dramatically different from
Speaker 1: the name he was using before. Ricky, you know, thank god.
Speaker 1: I mean it could have been worse. He could have
Speaker 1: been born in Tampa Bay. Okay, Ricky Buccaneers doesn't have
Speaker 1: quite the same ring to it. So Ricky Saints is fine.
Speaker 1: Bully ray On busted up and then gave him the
Speaker 1: floor to talk a little bit about his departure from
Speaker 1: AAW So he talked about that. He said, I don't
Speaker 1: know the specifics of what it was. Some people you
Speaker 1: asked the internet it was because you were at the
Speaker 1: Royal Rumble. Screw you. The footage got leaked from me
Speaker 1: being at the Rumble. I wasn't backstage. I left after
Speaker 1: the first match. Some could say, well, you were at
Speaker 1: WrestleMania last year in a suite and you got on
Speaker 1: camera you were cheering. Screw you. You're an idiot with
Speaker 1: no friends and no passion in life. If you think
Speaker 1: the damnedest thing that I've done is cheering somebody on
Speaker 1: in another company. My boss was okay with it. I
Speaker 1: can't tell you exactly what the moment was. You could
Speaker 1: say it was punk leaving and things kind of fell apart. Absolutely,
Speaker 1: I probably agree with you on that, all right. Or
Speaker 1: you could say that Ricky didn't play the politics well enough,
Speaker 1: all right, for sure. There's so many things you can say.
Speaker 1: What I can say for myself is that when I
Speaker 1: got hurt in March, that was it. I never came back,
Speaker 1: and even then I wasn't hurt. It was a precautionary
Speaker 1: thing where I got scared because I had a stinger.
Speaker 1: Then I was fine after that, no dice, no communication,
Speaker 1: no nothing. And that's okay because I ended up here
Speaker 1: and it's fine. Everything worked out. I don't know explicitly
Speaker 1: where it went wrong. I can't point to one thing.
Speaker 1: I can say. It was a storm of things. Probably
Speaker 1: did I do something that may have, you know, tipped
Speaker 1: them off, Sure, asking for my release whenever, this past whatever,
Speaker 1: that could have been it. But never once was I
Speaker 1: not willing to do something. Never once was I sabotaging anything.
Speaker 1: And Bully asked him if he felt that it was
Speaker 1: a personal or a professional reason for the release, and
Speaker 1: Start said that it was probably personal, because if it
Speaker 1: was professional, his departure would would not have happened. This way,
Speaker 1: he says, I'll say this. There are some people who
Speaker 1: stuck their nose in my creative business that should not
Speaker 1: have happened veterans, and that's it. I'll leave it at that.
Speaker 1: And if they got a problem with me, they got
Speaker 1: my number, they could text me about it. I think
Speaker 1: what it was is that if it didn't work for
Speaker 1: their creative then someone had to get the boot. That's
Speaker 1: how I see it. But I'm not trying to be
Speaker 1: negative in my thought process. If you want to step
Speaker 1: on me to get ahead in your illustrious career, everyone
Speaker 1: has an illustrious career. Everyone should have an illustrious career.
Speaker 1: That's perfectly fine. But at the same time, I'm not
Speaker 1: wet behind my ears. So that was a lot to
Speaker 1: say that. At the end of the day, he doesn't
Speaker 1: know exactly what it was. As far as why Tony
Speaker 1: Khan wouldn't bring him back and wouldn't have him back
Speaker 1: on TV working, It could be as simple as Tony
Speaker 1: Khan really did just think he's going to WWE and
Speaker 1: it doesn't matter what we do with him, so fuck him.
Speaker 1: I don't want him on my television show. Could have
Speaker 1: been as simple as that could have been backstage politics.
Speaker 1: We don't know because we were in backstage with politicking,
Speaker 1: So who knows. I know a lot of people have
Speaker 1: been floating the segment from Collision. I think it was
Speaker 1: not long after Adam Copeland joined the company and there
Speaker 1: was a promo segment and Ricky got some shots in
Speaker 1: and then clearly he rattled Copeland, and honestly, in that segment,
Speaker 1: Copeland did not come off well at all. Some people
Speaker 1: are like, oh, Ricky got cooked. No he didn't. Adam
Speaker 1: Copeland looked very insecure and very kind of knocked off
Speaker 1: his game. In that segment. He went to the old
Speaker 1: vanilla midget thing, which is fucking low hanging fruit. It's like, really, dude,
Speaker 1: that's the best you can come up with. So he
Speaker 1: clearly was not happy with Ricky. Did he say something
Speaker 1: backstage to Tony Kahn? Did he say something that would
Speaker 1: have negatively impacted Ricky's push? Yeah, because Ricky was still
Speaker 1: on TV after that for a few more months. I
Speaker 1: don't know. I don't know. People are throwing names around
Speaker 1: Ricky or not Ricky, you know, Copeland and Jericho, who knows?
Speaker 1: Who knows? All that matters is that he's gone. He
Speaker 1: wanted out of there. He got out of there and
Speaker 1: now he's where he has always wanted to be, and
Speaker 1: hopefully he will have a great run down there that
Speaker 1: isn't too long, and then eventually he'll end up on
Speaker 1: Raw or SmackDown, and you know, as popular as he
Speaker 1: is right now, I see Ricky really shining when he
Speaker 1: has a good heel run. I think when the heel
Speaker 1: run comes, that's where he'll really shine. But we have
Speaker 1: coming up on NXT this week. They announced a bunch
Speaker 1: of matches. Stephanie Vequier will defend her Women's North American
Speaker 1: championship against Carmen Petrovic. Moose, the TNA X Division champion,
Speaker 1: we'll defend his title against Lexus King. The Hardys are
Speaker 1: going to defend Actually I don't think they are defending.
Speaker 1: I don't think they said it's a title match, but
Speaker 1: they are the TNA Tag Team champions. They're going to
Speaker 1: be facing the note Quoder Catch Crew. Ricky Say will
Speaker 1: have his first match tagging with Javon Evans against Wesley
Speaker 1: and Ethan Page, and they're gonna be in Cincinnati on Tuesday.
Speaker 1: They're gonna beat the same music venue where AW did
Speaker 1: a show last month. That was the night that John
Speaker 1: Moxley defended the aw title against Powerhouse Hobbs. I love
Speaker 1: the look of that place, so I'm assuming it'll be
Speaker 1: set up more or less the same way. I think
Speaker 1: that's gonna be a great venue for that show. TNA.
Speaker 1: They had back to back shows this week from Full
Speaker 1: Sale University. They actually had a live show there on
Speaker 1: Thursday and then tapings on Friday, and Obafemi, the NXT Champion,
Speaker 1: made a surprise appearance on Thursday's Live Impact alongside Matt
Speaker 1: and Jeff Hardy came to the aid of Leon Slater
Speaker 1: from a beatdown at the hands of Moose and his
Speaker 1: faction the System, Brian Myers and Eddie Edwards, and they
Speaker 1: made a six man tag team match. It's gonna be Oba,
Speaker 1: Femi and the Hardy's taking on Moose, Myers and Edwards
Speaker 1: on Impact this coming Thursday, which has already been taped,
Speaker 1: so there's spoilers that are out on that already. Just
Speaker 1: be aware of that. Also, the date and place of
Speaker 1: the match with Oba and Moose has been set, so
Speaker 1: for any Impact watchers who don't want to know, I'm
Speaker 1: not going to mention it. It's not hard to find
Speaker 1: if you want to look it up. But they all
Speaker 1: but said that they're going to have a match, right.
Speaker 1: They said that on Tuesday, So that's not really a surprise,
Speaker 1: but as far as the win and where that is
Speaker 1: floating around out there, to just be aware. Speaking of TNA,
Speaker 1: one quick note here. TNA star Jake Something launched a
Speaker 1: GoFundMe this week to help with his medical expenses after
Speaker 1: undergoing surgery recently for a torn biceps, and he said,
Speaker 1: being uninsured, the medical bills are crippling. Add to that,
Speaker 1: his dog Leah had to get surgery the same day
Speaker 1: that he did, so he's got bills from that as well.
Speaker 1: And I know recently he had to vacate a couple
Speaker 1: of independent titles that he held, and he specifically thanked
Speaker 1: I think it was Deadlock Pro for their help when
Speaker 1: he first made the announcement. He really put them over.
Speaker 1: So I'm not sure if he got hurt in their
Speaker 1: ring or not. His last three matches were all in
Speaker 1: a TNA ring, his last match coming against Joe Hendry
Speaker 1: on the January twenty fourth episode of Impact. It's possible
Speaker 1: he wrestled those matches he was already hurt. Maybe he
Speaker 1: wrapped it up. He did the matches and then he
Speaker 1: went off to have surgery. If he was hurt on
Speaker 1: TNA's watch in their ring, then I don't understand why
Speaker 1: they're not covering his medical expenses. I know they've taken
Speaker 1: good care of Chris Bay after he got hurt in
Speaker 1: their ring. They should be taking care of Jake two.
Speaker 1: Unless he got hurt in someone else's ring, then I
Speaker 1: can understand it. Still shitty, but I can understand it. Hey,
Speaker 1: it's Chris van Fleet.
Speaker 2: Big thank you to Sola Monster for letting me hop
Speaker 2: in here for a minute, since you clearly like great
Speaker 2: wrestling podcasts.
Speaker 1: When this one's done, go check out mine. It's called
Speaker 1: Insight with Chris Van Fleet.
Speaker 2: All of my interviews that you may have seen clips
Speaker 2: of on social media or on YouTube, they're all available
Speaker 2: in podcast form. Ludwig Kaiser just did his first podcast
Speaker 2: interview that's on the show. Some other recent interviews are
Speaker 2: seth Rawlins, Jordan Grace, Kurt Angle, Otis, Chad Gable, Baron Corbyn,
Speaker 2: and lots more. Go check out Insight with Chris Van
Speaker 2: Vleet on Spotify or Apple or wherever you're listening to
Speaker 2: this right now, or look for those interviews on YouTube,
Speaker 2: as well.
Speaker 1: Some other news and notes. Carmela is no longer with WWE.
Speaker 1: Masked j of pw Nexus on Twitter and Sean Ross
Speaker 1: Sappa Fightful both reported that her contract recently expired and
Speaker 1: she is no longer with the company. She was also
Speaker 1: moved to the alumni section on WWE dot Com. She's
Speaker 1: been out for a while. You know, we talked about
Speaker 1: Alexa Bliss coming back at the Royal Rumbles. She was
Speaker 1: out for two years, and Carmela has also been out
Speaker 1: for two years. She's been out since early twenty twenty three.
Speaker 1: She had her first child with Corey Graves later that year,
Speaker 1: but she ended up suffering from drop foot, which is
Speaker 1: a nerve condition that could be caused by childbirth, basically
Speaker 1: nerve damage. It can paralyze the foot or part of
Speaker 1: the foot, which can make it hard to lift the
Speaker 1: front part of the foot. Scott Steiners had drop foot
Speaker 1: for over twenty years. You know, he can barely stand
Speaker 1: watching any of his WWE stuff back when he came
Speaker 1: back to the company in two thousand and two because
Speaker 1: of it, because he had some really bad matches. The
Speaker 1: only reason he was able to work with it is
Speaker 1: because he would tape it up. It was almost like
Speaker 1: a cast, and he would just hope that he didn't
Speaker 1: fall or get hurt. He was unbusted open just recently
Speaker 1: and said that he stumbles at least twice a day,
Speaker 1: you know, like he won't fall, but like he'll trip
Speaker 1: because his foot doesn't come all the way up. But
Speaker 1: she said she wrestled for eleven years and outside of
Speaker 1: some concussions, she never had a major injury until she
Speaker 1: delivered her son, and then she had her first major injury.
Speaker 1: And it wasn't a case where she got hurt in
Speaker 1: the ring and they released her like they did Carl Anderson,
Speaker 1: but they just let her contract expire. They did the
Speaker 1: same thing with Sonya Deville. Her deal runs out at
Speaker 1: the end of the month. I don't know if she's
Speaker 1: ever going to wrestle again. It sounds like she wants to,
Speaker 1: so I hope she can somewhere. But if she never
Speaker 1: works another match for WWE again, she had a respectable run.
Speaker 1: I would say, SmackDown Women's Champion, tag Team Champion, first
Speaker 1: ever Women's Money in the Bank winner. You know she'll
Speaker 1: be getting that Hall of Fame induction one day. It
Speaker 1: looks like Goulberg, will not be haunting wrestle Mania this year.
Speaker 1: On his weekly car Cast podcast, Bill Goldberg said that
Speaker 1: he expects to be back in the ring for his
Speaker 1: retirement match sometime this summer. Says, I don't know exactly
Speaker 1: when it is, but I know it's coming up, and
Speaker 1: I know, at fifty eight years old, I have to
Speaker 1: be in my underwear in front of everybody, and I
Speaker 1: hold a very high standard for myself. I do too,
Speaker 1: by the way. You know, I'll look at myself in
Speaker 1: the mirror in my own to where sometimes and my
Speaker 1: standards are very low. But he says, I need to
Speaker 1: get to work yesterday, But the long term benefit and
Speaker 1: the benefit for me in the ring will be much
Speaker 1: more if I just calmed my ass down. So this
Speaker 1: all came up as part of a discussion about stem
Speaker 1: cell therapy injections, which he recently received in Columbia, where
Speaker 1: a lot of wrestlers have gone to get similar treatment.
Speaker 1: Kevin Nash is always talking about that bio accelerator. He
Speaker 1: swears by them. He goes down there maybe a couple
Speaker 1: of times a year, because they only last for so
Speaker 1: long and you have to constantly go back, not every month,
Speaker 1: but you have to go back and get more injections.
Speaker 1: But he swears by it, you know, raymisterio, He's gotten
Speaker 1: it for his knees especially. It's probably added years to
Speaker 1: his career if you look at it, Ray fifty years
Speaker 1: old and wondering how the fuck is this guy still
Speaker 1: flying around the ring and doing what he does when
Speaker 1: I mean, my god, like legitimately, like twelve or thirteen
Speaker 1: years ago, I thought he was washed. I thought he
Speaker 1: was done. Yeah, it was like every other month we
Speaker 1: were hearing about n injuries with him, and so he
Speaker 1: had all of this time basically that he added onto
Speaker 1: his career. And I'm sure the stem cell therapy is
Speaker 1: a big part of why. So Goldberg apparently is going
Speaker 1: the same route. So a summertime match could be Summer Slam,
Speaker 1: not necessarily Summer Slam, although they've added the extra night,
Speaker 1: so it's gonna be a big one this year. They're
Speaker 1: gonna be back to back nights in MetLife Stadium, so
Speaker 1: they're gonna have some tickets to sell for that one.
Speaker 1: That would be an attraction. I guess that they could
Speaker 1: add to that, but it could just as easily be
Speaker 1: their next Saudi Arabia show, which is said to be
Speaker 1: taking place sometime in June, so long as he doesn't
Speaker 1: headbut his locker again and knock himself silly. And Michael
Speaker 1: Cole appeared on Logan Paul's Impulsive Podcasts for an hour
Speaker 1: long interview. I watched the entire thing. I thought it
Speaker 1: was very good. You could tell he's having a lot
Speaker 1: more fun with his job now that he did in
Speaker 1: his first twenty five years there. I know that he
Speaker 1: re signed with the company last year, but he revealed
Speaker 1: that his new contract will take him to retirement age.
Speaker 1: He's fifty eight now, and later in the interview he
Speaker 1: clarified that he's got eight years left on his deal.
Speaker 1: He said, the company really made me feel for the
Speaker 1: first time like I was really important to this place. So,
Speaker 1: you know, from contemplating retirement to signing a new contract
Speaker 1: for ten years. I assume it was around ten years
Speaker 1: when he signed it. If he's got eight left, it
Speaker 1: would be weird to sign a fucking nine year deal.
Speaker 1: But yes, he was thinking about quitting when Vince was
Speaker 1: still in charge. To go from that to like, yeah,
Speaker 1: I'll sign a new freaking decade long contract. Sure, So
Speaker 1: he was asked what about the deal made him feel
Speaker 1: that way, and he said, the paycheck is part of it,
Speaker 1: but the new regime had a lot to do with it.
Speaker 1: When I went to sign the new deal, I sat
Speaker 1: down with my wife and I'm fifty eight years old now,
Speaker 1: and I'm like, they want to get me to retirement age.
Speaker 1: And this is because we had talked about me getting
Speaker 1: off this out of this for a long time now
Speaker 1: because of the travel and everything else. Yeah, I think
Speaker 1: it's the everything else that's the key here. And she
Speaker 1: was like, you gotta do it. This is your legacy.
Speaker 1: Like you're going to be miserable if you don't finish
Speaker 1: this up the way that you want to finish it up.
Speaker 1: And she was great about it. So she was one
Speaker 1: hundred percent on board with it, and so I'm here
Speaker 1: for a while. He was asked about the Corey Grave
Speaker 1: situation and had this to say about it. I still
Speaker 1: don't understand all the dynamics of it. I know that
Speaker 1: he sent something out on social media that was pretty
Speaker 1: critical of the company. He tried to explain to everyone
Speaker 1: that he was trying to generate some interest in maybe
Speaker 1: a type of storyline. I don't think the company saw
Speaker 1: it that way. I think he and the company are
Speaker 1: working that out. I love Corey to death. He's an
Speaker 1: unbelievable commentator. Besides McAfee, he's probably the best partner I've
Speaker 1: ever had. Oh. I think there was some very real
Speaker 1: frustration behind that tweet that he deleted, and I think
Speaker 1: it's very telling that they did not call on Corey
Speaker 1: to fill in for Joe testeditour a couple of weeks
Speaker 1: ago when he missed SmackDown. They called on Vic Joseph,
Speaker 1: as they did last week when Jackie Redman missed Row
Speaker 1: for the NHL Nations game. They had Vic Joseph doing
Speaker 1: interviews with the wrestlers up on the concourse throughout the
Speaker 1: entire show. It may have just been during the ad breaks,
Speaker 1: but Vic filling in for Joe and not Corey, I
Speaker 1: think was very telling. He also spoke about Vince McMahon
Speaker 1: and how things in the company have been since his departure,
Speaker 1: and he also admitted that he was a puppet for
Speaker 1: Vince for many years and that's how the fans looked
Speaker 1: at him. But he said, listen, I will never ever
Speaker 1: disparage Vince McMahon. He's got his personal issues and what not.
Speaker 1: From a professional standpoint, I will never disparage the man.
Speaker 1: I would not be where I am today without Vince.
Speaker 1: He gave me everything. I'll never disparage the man. But
Speaker 1: Vince was very heavy handed. It was his company, his sandbox,
Speaker 1: whatever he wanted, so I was never really able to
Speaker 1: break out and be myself, with the exception of a
Speaker 1: little bit of a heel run that I had over
Speaker 1: a decade ago. But when Vince left and Paul came
Speaker 1: in and was in charge Triple H, he really changed things.
Speaker 1: Then we brought in Lee Fitting, who came from ESPN.
Speaker 1: Lee coming from ESPN where the talent is the announcer,
Speaker 1: he came here and said, I don't understand why our
Speaker 1: guys at the desk are not bigger and have bigger
Speaker 1: personas and are as respected as the people in the ring.
Speaker 1: What Lee and Paul have allowed us to do is
Speaker 1: bring our personalities out, and you're seeing the real Michael
Speaker 1: Cole now. Professionally, sure, Vince did a lot for him,
Speaker 1: so I'm not surprised by his answer, but he went
Speaker 1: out of his way to make sure that he said professionally,
Speaker 1: I will never disparage Vince McMahon and here's why, and
Speaker 1: this is why things are different now. You know, his
Speaker 1: way of saying that Vince micro managed everything was saying
Speaker 1: that he was very heavy handed, which we already knew, right.
Speaker 1: People have said that, people that have done commentary have
Speaker 1: said that. I mean, there's videos. I don't know where
Speaker 1: they are now, but like over the years, I'm going
Speaker 1: back to like small down in two thousand and three,
Speaker 1: for example, and you would get these satellite videos that
Speaker 1: would pop up from the satellite feed didn't err on TV,
Speaker 1: and you would hear you couldn't hear Vince, you couldn't
Speaker 1: hear who was in his ear, but you would hear
Speaker 1: Cole on commentary. And I can't remember what the circumstances were.
Speaker 1: There was one video Vince was lacing into him about
Speaker 1: something and JBL has been filling in for Bruce Pritchard
Speaker 1: on his podcast now for several months, and there was
Speaker 1: a clip going around recently where he was talking about
Speaker 1: Cole and how Vince McMahon went off on him one
Speaker 1: like there's so many stories about that, and it's amazing
Speaker 1: he lasted as long as he did, either because he
Speaker 1: didn't get run off or that Vince didn't get tired
Speaker 1: of him. I mean, the turnover with so many people
Speaker 1: in this company, announcers, writers, is astronomical over the years.
Speaker 1: How Michael Cole survived in that spot for so long
Speaker 1: is a credit to him. Obviously, Vince saw something in
Speaker 1: him that he didn't with other people, and he survived
Speaker 1: a hell of a lot longer than people I think
Speaker 1: thought he would when he first came into the company.
Speaker 1: But he also talked about the evolution of WWE and
Speaker 1: he said something that and I take issue with this,
Speaker 1: and this just made me shake my head. He's not
Speaker 1: wrong in a lot of what he's saying here, but
Speaker 1: there's one part in particular that really got on my nerves.
Speaker 1: He said, we're a storytelling entity. First, we're not professional
Speaker 1: wrestling anymore, we haven't been for many years. We are
Speaker 1: an entertainment product, and we need stories so our fans
Speaker 1: can emotionally invest in our characters. They also said, you know,
Speaker 1: Jim Ross came to WWE already a wrestling guy, and
Speaker 1: I think me, being new and fresh and not a
Speaker 1: wrestling guy, Vince was able to mold me how he
Speaker 1: wanted me to be an announcer. I think people are
Speaker 1: beginning to understand now that, yeah, you know what, you
Speaker 1: don't have to call every single move in a wrestling match.
Speaker 1: You make sure you call the big spots, the big moments.
Speaker 1: But it's more important for me to explain to our
Speaker 1: audience who you guys are first. Let me just say
Speaker 1: a lot of what he said there is one hundred
Speaker 1: percent true. They are a storytelling entity, and you absolutely
Speaker 1: need to tell those stories to get people to emotionally
Speaker 1: invest in your characters. Oka story is so important, and
Speaker 1: you don't have to call the name of every single move.
Speaker 1: Jim Ross said at once, like it's not radio, it's TV.
Speaker 1: People can see what's going on. It's a little bit
Speaker 1: different if you're a radio announcer, right, you have to
Speaker 1: give these details. People can't see what's going on on television.
Speaker 1: It's different. You don't have to go all in on that.
Speaker 1: But Michael Cole is clearly still Vince pilled Vince McMahon.
Speaker 1: For as much as he grew up around the wrestling business,
Speaker 1: and he will go down as the most successful pro
Speaker 1: wrestling promoter of all time. It has to aggravate the
Speaker 1: shit out of him that people would still call him
Speaker 1: that a professional wrestling promoter. Right. I'm sure he just
Speaker 1: must hate that because he has spent his entire adult
Speaker 1: life outside of trying to fuck anything in his s art,
Speaker 1: he has spent his entire adult life trying to differentiate
Speaker 1: his product from everyone else's because he didn't think pro
Speaker 1: wrestling would sell tickets to the masses, right, and pay
Speaker 1: per views and sell merchandise. It's like wrestling became a
Speaker 1: dirty word to him, even though it was in the
Speaker 1: name of the company. Still they shied away from it
Speaker 1: so much. And I'm not even saying he's totally wrong, Like,
Speaker 1: if you wanted to bring wrestling more into the mainstream, right,
Speaker 1: you focus more on some stuff, you focus less on
Speaker 1: other stuff. Play stuff up, play stuff down. Where I
Speaker 1: take issue with this is that pro wrestling we don't
Speaker 1: do pro wrestling anymore. We're not a pro wrestling company anymore.
Speaker 1: Pro wrestling has always been about the personalities and the stories.
Speaker 1: You could take it all the way back to the
Speaker 1: advent of TV and Gorgeous George right, that man was
Speaker 1: ahead of his time. Go to the seventies, Dusty Rhodes
Speaker 1: and Superstar Billy Graham, other territories into the eighties outside
Speaker 1: of his own, the Road Warriors, the Four Horsemen staying,
Speaker 1: the evil Russians right, the stories they were doing in
Speaker 1: Mid South, Jyd being blinded and not being able to
Speaker 1: see his baby girl, you know, the Freebirds and the
Speaker 1: von Eerics. Like, I hate this idea that we're not
Speaker 1: professional wrestling anymore. We're a storytelling company, as if they
Speaker 1: were never a storytelling company, as if they weren't telling
Speaker 1: stories on their shows twenty five years ago, thirty years ago.
Speaker 1: Like this is some kind of new era that they
Speaker 1: ushered in with the Bloodline. I mean, they may be
Speaker 1: more cinematic in the way they present things, but they are,
Speaker 1: and always have been, and always will be, first and
Speaker 1: foremost above all else, a professional wrestling company. But Vince
Speaker 1: was so worried about the stigma around that word that
Speaker 1: he managed to convince these people that everyone looks at
Speaker 1: wrestling the same way, and so you know, what we're
Speaker 1: going to do was something innovative and completely different from
Speaker 1: what is anyone else is doing. It's not it's really
Speaker 1: not like it's not that deep. You're a pro wrestling company, dude,
Speaker 1: Like no father is telling their son, hey, let's go
Speaker 1: to the entertaining show. Tonight, Hey Winston, they're telling stories
Speaker 1: tonight at the Barclay Center. Want to go? You don't
Speaker 1: want to do matches just for the sake of doing
Speaker 1: matches with no story? I agree with that, right, unless
Speaker 1: there's squash matches, right, you're just trying to get somebody
Speaker 1: new over, that's fine. But this idea that like we
Speaker 1: tell stories and other companies don't like it's something trademarked
Speaker 1: and patented by WWE. It's just so fucking laughable to me.
Speaker 1: Pro wrestling is storytelling. It has been for a lot
Speaker 1: longer than Michael Cole has been around. It's the story
Speaker 1: of good versus evil, right with larger than life personalities.
Speaker 1: That's what pro wrestling is. That's what WWE is. You
Speaker 1: are a pro wrestling company. Over on the aew C
Speaker 1: per pw Insider Max will be adding AW pay per
Speaker 1: views from twenty twenty, twenty one, twenty two, twenty three,
Speaker 1: and twenty four to their streaming service on March first.
Speaker 1: They already have all the big events from twenty nineteen.
Speaker 1: Once those are added, Max would have every pay per
Speaker 1: view and special event in AW history available for their subscribers,
Speaker 1: so just be aware of that. According to Programming Insider,
Speaker 1: this week's edition of NXT drew six hundred and eighty
Speaker 1: nine thousand viewers, which is a big drop from the
Speaker 1: eight hundred and one thousand that it did the week before.
Speaker 1: The eighteen to forty nine demo also dropped from point
Speaker 1: one eight to point one seven, and that's coming out
Speaker 1: of Vengeance Day and they had a Ricky Starks contract signing. Meanwhile,
Speaker 1: per Wressel, namiks Aw Dynamite drew five hundred and sixty
Speaker 1: three thousand viewers on TBS, which is a decrease from
Speaker 1: last week's five hundred and seventy nine thousand, but eighteen
Speaker 1: to forty one nine improved slightly. It was up a
Speaker 1: little bit from point one six to point one seven,
Speaker 1: tying what NXT did this week. And this doesn't account
Speaker 1: for whatever audience now watches the show on Max. I
Speaker 1: happen to be one of those people, and no, I
Speaker 1: don't think it's anywhere near the number they do on TV.
Speaker 1: I see people online they're like sometimes they're like, they
Speaker 1: could have a million more viewers watching on Max. You
Speaker 1: don't know, Like, yeah, sure they could, they could. And
Speaker 1: if my aunt had balls, should be my uncle that's
Speaker 1: possible too. As far as I know, my aunt doesn't
Speaker 1: have any balls. That would be news to all of
Speaker 1: us if that was the case. I don't think that's
Speaker 1: the case, but one can't ever really fully be sure.
Speaker 1: I guess, but I don't even get into the ratings
Speaker 1: discourse anymore really on these shows, because especially once they
Speaker 1: started simulcasting on Max, because without having access to those numbers,
Speaker 1: it's all kind of pointless. But the usual bad faith
Speaker 1: merchants on social media, they were tripping over themselves this
Speaker 1: week to point out that Dynamite dropped coming out of
Speaker 1: Grand Slam. Oh, look at the drop. You know they
Speaker 1: dropped for Hangman at MJF. That's their big storyline. So
Speaker 1: I thought it was only fair to point out that
Speaker 1: NXT also dropped, even though they had more viewers and
Speaker 1: even steeper drop coming out of Vengeance Day. So it
Speaker 1: wasn't really a good week for either show in that regard,
Speaker 1: and to twist it any other way really exposes you.
Speaker 1: So don't be one of those people. While speaking on
Speaker 1: the Coach and Bro Show, which is typically hosted by
Speaker 1: Jonathan Coachman and Vince Russo, Bro the Bro was out
Speaker 1: this week, I saw that JD was co hosting the
Speaker 1: show with Coach on Thursday. But Coachman mentioned how people
Speaker 1: started talking when that picture was floating around last year
Speaker 1: of Shane McMahon and Tony Kahan meeting at the airport
Speaker 1: in Arlington. They had rumors about Shane possibly joining AW
Speaker 1: and then all of that talk, all of a sudden
Speaker 1: stopped and there's been no indication that any progress was
Speaker 1: made between the two sides. And if you remember, Shane
Speaker 1: even put a statement out in the days after the
Speaker 1: meeting that the statement said Tony and I were connected
Speaker 1: through a mutual friend and we had a great meeting.
Speaker 1: We talked about many things, but mostly about our shared
Speaker 1: love for the business and the rewards and challenges of
Speaker 1: working with family. I congratulated him on the five year
Speaker 1: anniversary of AAW and I look forward to how he
Speaker 1: evolved the business going forward. And that was that well.
Speaker 1: According to coach Shane asked for a significant deal, including
Speaker 1: equity in the company and control over the entire show.
Speaker 1: Tony Kahan ultimately ghosted Shane, not the other way around.
Speaker 1: This is what Coach said. I remember the picture that
Speaker 1: surface with Shane and Tony in their meeting and there
Speaker 1: was all this speculation that he wanted to come into AAW.
Speaker 1: Then all of a sudden that talk disappeared. Well, I
Speaker 1: have it on good authority that Shane McMahon asked for
Speaker 1: the world. He wanted equity in the company. He wanted
Speaker 1: to come in and run the entire show. And honestly,
Speaker 1: it was probably the first time that I said to myself,
Speaker 1: I actually agree with Tony Kahn ghosting it. Because Tony
Speaker 1: ghosted Shane. It wasn't the other way around. So fightful
Speaker 1: Select followed up on this and reported that a source
Speaker 1: close to Shane confirmed that Tony Khan made no effort
Speaker 1: to continue discussions after their private meeting near Arlington Airport.
Speaker 1: While rumors swirled that McMahon had asked for equity in
Speaker 1: the company, the source could not confirm that, but did
Speaker 1: acknowledge that Shane wanted to run things. It seemed like
Speaker 1: KHN almost thought Shane was joking when he mentioned the
Speaker 1: possibility of running everything, the source said. Despite AAW's lack
Speaker 1: of respond Shane apparently didn't take it personally and understood
Speaker 1: that nothing was going to come from the talks from
Speaker 1: AAW side. Sources stated that Tony Kahan never talked much
Speaker 1: about the meeting, only mentioning that the two sides had
Speaker 1: met and that nothing was in the works. Those we've
Speaker 1: spoken to and AAW say that Tony hadn't spoken about
Speaker 1: it extensively outside of noting that the two met and
Speaker 1: are not working together. The source close to McMahon that
Speaker 1: we talked to claimed that they would not rule out
Speaker 1: a cameo appearance, but did not think that they would
Speaker 1: extensively do business together at this stage, to which I say, yeah,
Speaker 1: no shit. I would have done the same thing that
Speaker 1: Tony did. Somebody walked in and said, I want everything.
Speaker 1: I want to run everything, I want equity, I want this,
Speaker 1: I want that. I would have said, you know what,
Speaker 1: it's nice meeting you. We'll talk soon. And I would
Speaker 1: have ghosted him too. I don't blame Tony for that.
Speaker 1: Why would Tony Kahan surrender basically control of his company
Speaker 1: to a McMahon. That sounds like a very bad idea.
Speaker 1: You know, at least when Paul Hayman met with Dixie
Speaker 1: Carter and told her what it would take to bring
Speaker 1: him into TNA. Hayman, you know, he had a track
Speaker 1: record creatively where you could say We could really use
Speaker 1: a guy like this, right, we could use his brain.
Speaker 1: Maybe I handle the business end of things, but we'll
Speaker 1: let him run wild with Creative. Right, this could be
Speaker 1: exactly what we need to turn this company around with Shane.
Speaker 1: This is what I said when this story first came out.
Speaker 1: Where is the track record? There is no track record.
Speaker 1: You're bringing a McMahon into your company and giving him
Speaker 1: full control to do what he wants with it. Why
Speaker 1: what warrants that outside of the name, Why would you
Speaker 1: do that? If somebody said to me, you know, when
Speaker 1: Scott Demore got fired from TNA last year, and obviously
Speaker 1: he was under a non compete and so he couldn't
Speaker 1: do anything. Now he's running his own company. But let's
Speaker 1: say none of that existed, right, they like WWE is
Speaker 1: doing now. They let his contract lapse. Right now, Scott
Speaker 1: de Moore is a free agent. If you would have
Speaker 1: said to me, Scott de moorehead a meeting with Tony
Speaker 1: kan and said, look, if you want to bring me
Speaker 1: in like as far as working together, or bring me
Speaker 1: in in some kind of a role, I want full
Speaker 1: control over Creative. I want you to let me. You know,
Speaker 1: you let me run this the way that I want
Speaker 1: to run this. I don't want meddling or anything like that.
Speaker 1: I don't want to be co writer with anybody. Even then,
Speaker 1: I can understand Tony being hesitant, but at least with
Speaker 1: Scott de Moore, like, Okay, you could point to his
Speaker 1: record and say it's it's a great record or it's
Speaker 1: spotty record. He has success doing this or maybe you know,
Speaker 1: not doing that. You have a record to draw from,
Speaker 1: And frankly, I think Scott Demore would have actually brought
Speaker 1: a lot to the table in that company. What Shane
Speaker 1: McMahon you don't have that? People were so in love
Speaker 1: with the idea. Oh my god, Shane. He's like the
Speaker 1: one McMahon that I like, yeah, or he's like the
Speaker 1: one McMahon that didn't get on my nerves or was overexposed. Right,
Speaker 1: let's bring in sh Shane seems like a nice guy.
Speaker 1: He's got a good head on his shoulders. We heard
Speaker 1: stories about him helping out behind the scenes. I'm sure
Speaker 1: he could do this stuff. Yeah, let's just give Shane
Speaker 1: control of the show. That would be fucking dumb bringing
Speaker 1: a McMahon into your company and giving him full control
Speaker 1: to do what he wants with it. I don't blame
Speaker 1: Tony for being reluctant to do that. And I was
Speaker 1: reminded as I was talking about, like Paul Hayman and
Speaker 1: the stuff from all those years ago. I want to
Speaker 1: say it was two thousand and ten, twenty eleven. I
Speaker 1: don't remember what year that would have been. Maybe oh nine,
Speaker 1: maybe it was like oh nine, twenty ten it was.
Speaker 1: It was probably before Hogan came in. But that was
Speaker 1: a real thing that happened. But I was reminded that
Speaker 1: Billy Corgan, he did an interview on Kurt Angle's podcast
Speaker 1: back in twenty twenty three. So I went to go
Speaker 1: find the exact quote. This is what he said about
Speaker 1: that whole situation because he I think he had equity
Speaker 1: in the company. This is before he had his whole
Speaker 1: big falling out with Dixie. And this is what he
Speaker 1: said about that whole situation because he tried, he tried
Speaker 1: to convince her give it to him whatever Hayman wants,
Speaker 1: give it to him. He said, I'm sitting at a
Speaker 1: table and she says, if you were me, would you
Speaker 1: hire Paul Hayman? And I said, give him whatever he wants.
Speaker 1: She told me what he wanted. He was a big
Speaker 1: pile of money, and he wanted absolute total control. He
Speaker 1: gave one interview Hayman did where he later said after
Speaker 1: the whole thing didn't happen and he was back with WWE.
Speaker 1: He said what he would have done, and he said
Speaker 1: that he would have cleaned everybody at every veteran out
Speaker 1: except for one that being Kurt Angle. He would have
Speaker 1: kept Kurt. He would have gone younger, and he would
Speaker 1: have went more Mma shooter style. He says, it was
Speaker 1: very interesting. I said, please give him whatever he wants. Well,
Speaker 1: he wants this, and he wants that. He wants total
Speaker 1: control of my company. And I said, please give it
Speaker 1: to him. Number one, your ratings will double overnight. Number two,
Speaker 1: you'll get all the smart marks off your back instantly.
Speaker 1: Number three, they'll hail you as a genius for bringing
Speaker 1: in Hayman. Number four, the company will be on fire
Speaker 1: within six months. I guarantee it. Just do it. And
Speaker 1: she said, well, what about giving up control? I said,
Speaker 1: I don't care. Just give it to him. I begged her.
Speaker 1: Imagine what that company would have been with that roster
Speaker 1: or whoever he would have brought in. It would have
Speaker 1: been hot fire. I think she was very reluctant to
Speaker 1: give up control, he says this, but also in the interview,
Speaker 1: he then admits, he concedes that as somebody who now
Speaker 1: runs the NWA, he would have to think long and
Speaker 1: hard if he was faced with a similar proposition. And
Speaker 1: that's really the key, right, Unless you're in that position,
Speaker 1: it's easy to sit here and say, oh my god,
Speaker 1: just give of course, Paul Hayman creative genius, right, just
Speaker 1: give it all to him, whatever he wants. Just give
Speaker 1: it to him, give him a blank check and give
Speaker 1: him a contract, and that's it. Let him have at it.
Speaker 1: But if you're Dixie Carter, or if you're Tony Kahn,
Speaker 1: or if you're Billy Corgan and you're running the show,
Speaker 1: it's your baby, it's your company, right, you're the head
Speaker 1: han show, right, you control everything. It's a lot easier
Speaker 1: for somebody on the outside to say give all that up,
Speaker 1: but not if you are that person in that position
Speaker 1: at that moment, the idea that I'm going to give
Speaker 1: all of this up. Why this is my company, And
Speaker 1: if you think you're doing a good job, you're certainly
Speaker 1: not gonna want to give it up. I can remember
Speaker 1: that period though TNA definitely could have used somebody like Hayman.
Speaker 1: It's one of those what if things. How would things
Speaker 1: have turned out? Who the hell knows. I think it
Speaker 1: would have been a big help to them. Years later
Speaker 1: there was a similar story. So actually the Hayman thing
Speaker 1: probably was like nine because I think it was like
Speaker 1: twenty thirteen. Jeff Jarrett was going to buy the company.
Speaker 1: I think it was going to be Jeff Jarrett and
Speaker 1: Toby Keith, and they had plans to buy the company
Speaker 1: away from Dixie, and it all came down to Bob Carter,
Speaker 1: Dixie's father, I guess, the head guy Panda Energy, insisted
Speaker 1: that his daughter would maintain either a role or even
Speaker 1: just like an executive title, you know that she would
Speaker 1: still have that I guess to save face. And Toby
Speaker 1: Keith said no, like he wouldn't agree to it, and
Speaker 1: that caused the entire deal to collapse. That was like
Speaker 1: the one deciding factor in this. He's like, fuck this,
Speaker 1: I'm not going to like. This is either mine or
Speaker 1: it's not, and so he walked away from the entire deal.
Speaker 1: So there have been multiple instances where t Anda could
Speaker 1: have ended up looking very different than it did, had
Speaker 1: Dixie just you know, surrendered control or had they sold
Speaker 1: the company. But yeah, I can understand, like, when you're
Speaker 1: in that situation, you don't want to give that up.
Speaker 1: It's that power. This notion that people are Tony Khan
Speaker 1: sucks and he should just give the company up to
Speaker 1: somebody else, let them run it, like that will never
Speaker 1: ever happen. I don't know why there are some people
Speaker 1: who still talk like that, like it will never happen.
Speaker 1: Vince McMahon, he would still be in the same position
Speaker 1: he was in if all that stuff didn't happen. He
Speaker 1: would still be there because it's all he's ever known
Speaker 1: and it's his baby, it's his company. He built it
Speaker 1: to what it's become. Right, He took it from his father.
Speaker 1: He didn't really build it from the ground up, but
Speaker 1: he took it from his father and built it into
Speaker 1: what it is today. And so Dixie, I'm sure had
Speaker 1: some of that. And Tony Khan feels that way too.
Speaker 1: He built this from the ground up, he bankrolled it,
Speaker 1: he's still bankrolling it. This is his company. Why would
Speaker 1: he give that up? So I would have done the
Speaker 1: same thing, honestly, if I were him, I don't care
Speaker 1: what your opinion is about Tony and his creative abilities.
Speaker 1: And yeah, I know they're on a bit of a
Speaker 1: hot streak recently with some of their shows. Whatever you
Speaker 1: think about that is irrelevant. Like if I'm in his position, yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm not giving everything up. Like why the hell would
Speaker 1: he do that? Doesn't make any sense? And maybe Shane
Speaker 1: didn't really think he would accept the offer. Maybe Shane
Speaker 1: is like, you know what, I'm just gonna shoot my shot.
Speaker 1: He'll probably say no, but fuck it, maybe he'll say yes.
Speaker 1: Maybe he didn't really expect an answer out of him.
Speaker 1: I don't know, but I would have done the exact
Speaker 1: same thing if I were Tony for being honest. And
Speaker 1: this notion about him bringing Shane in in some kind
Speaker 1: of creative role. Who knows, maybe one day Shane does
Speaker 1: end up in that company in some kind of role.
Speaker 1: But again, even just like giving him creative I don't
Speaker 1: know where people were getting this from or what they're
Speaker 1: basing that decision on, Like why would he do that?
Speaker 1: What is the track record? I would love to see
Speaker 1: what his track record is that people think Shane McMahon
Speaker 1: could have been the creative force to turn things around.
Speaker 1: A AAW in a way that Tony Khan couldn't. It
Speaker 1: was all just so ridiculous to me. The card for
Speaker 1: AW Revolution is stacking up pretty nicely. John Moxley, of course,
Speaker 1: is going to defend the AW World Championship against Adam Copeland.
Speaker 1: We have MJF against Hangman. Adam Page is Official or Revolution.
Speaker 1: They had a face to face segment on Dynamite Wednesday
Speaker 1: night that I thought was excellent and I loved how
Speaker 1: they tied it back to the start of the company
Speaker 1: in their match from twenty nineteen, the only match they
Speaker 1: ever had. Yeah, you got two men here who have
Speaker 1: gone on to become world champion, but they took very
Speaker 1: different paths to get there. And I look at Revolution
Speaker 1: as step one or chapter one of their story because
Speaker 1: there's still a lot of time between now and all
Speaker 1: in when they go to that stadium in Texas, which
Speaker 1: I think is where Hangmen. You know, if I had
Speaker 1: the pen where Hangman would win the AW World Championship,
Speaker 1: But there's plenty of time before we get there. You
Speaker 1: can have MJF win the first match of Revolution, you
Speaker 1: get a second match out of it. And I said
Speaker 1: this on Wednesday, and it could even pay it off
Speaker 1: with a third match in the finals of the Owen
Speaker 1: Hart Tournament, which I assume is going to happen in
Speaker 1: June this year since All Out We're All In rather
Speaker 1: is in July. But that would make a lot of sense,
Speaker 1: all right, the rubber matches in the finals of the
Speaker 1: Owen you get another great match between those two with
Speaker 1: real stakes on the line. I like that idea. We
Speaker 1: have Kenoski Takeshta defending the aw International Championship against either
Speaker 1: Kenny Omega or Orange Cassidy. We'll have to wait and see.
Speaker 1: Because Orange Cassidy beat Roderick Strong on Wednesday, he is
Speaker 1: now going to challenge Takesha for the title this Wednesday
Speaker 1: on Dynamite. The winner of that match, whoever the champion is,
Speaker 1: will then defend against Kenny Omega. This entire thing is
Speaker 1: completely asked backwards because we had Kenny Omega in Australia
Speaker 1: last weekend cut a promo and you know, challenge Takeshta
Speaker 1: to an international title match. But it wasn't just about
Speaker 1: the championship. It was about the fact that Takeshta holds
Speaker 1: two wins over Kenny that were never avenged because Kenny
Speaker 1: got hurt and was out for a very long time.
Speaker 1: But there was a six man tag team win where
Speaker 1: he pinned Omega, and there was a singles match. It
Speaker 1: all out a couple of years ago, and so Kenny
Speaker 1: was like, I dare you to do it for a
Speaker 1: third time. So it's not even just about the international title.
Speaker 1: It's about the history between these two men. And so
Speaker 1: then they go ahead and they announce this basically number
Speaker 1: one contenders match that could completely turn everything upside down.
Speaker 1: Now it won't. We're still going to get Omega into Keshti,
Speaker 1: I'm sure, but the idea that it's like these two
Speaker 1: were fighting for the right to wrestle Kenny Omega, that's
Speaker 1: basically what this is. At this point. The whole thing
Speaker 1: is is just completely ass backwards. But the match is
Speaker 1: going to be great. So we'll find out this week
Speaker 1: that it will be Takeshta defending against Kenny Omega. We
Speaker 1: have Tony Storm putting her brand new AW Women's World
Speaker 1: Championship on the line against the former champion, Mariah May.
Speaker 1: They did an angle on Collision last night where Mariah
Speaker 1: ambushed Tony in the back as they were showing people
Speaker 1: arriving at the building. They were showing Harley Cameron arriving,
Speaker 1: and then there's Mariah made an ambush. Tony dragged her
Speaker 1: out by her hair out on stage the top of
Speaker 1: the ramp, demanded that there'd be a spotlight shown on
Speaker 1: the two of them, and she's cradling Tony's head in
Speaker 1: her arms and she's crying and issuing a challenge for Revolution,
Speaker 1: which was made official later on. But she said, you know,
Speaker 1: let's have a Hollywood ending, very appropriate with them being
Speaker 1: in Los Angeles for that pay per view, and so
Speaker 1: they didn't announce a proper stipulation. Even in the match
Speaker 1: graphic it says the Hollywood ending, So we don't know
Speaker 1: what that means. But I'll tell you what you know.
Speaker 1: I wouldn't mind a cinematic Hollywood backlock brawl type of
Speaker 1: match between these two, you know, similar similar to the
Speaker 1: one that Piper and gold Dust had at WrestleMania, but
Speaker 1: you know, cinematic and they can make it their own
Speaker 1: and they can go all over the place. Since we're
Speaker 1: talking about Hollywood and cinematic and Hollywood endings and everything,
Speaker 1: because I was thinking, yay, they could do a last
Speaker 1: woman standing, or they could do a first Blood or
Speaker 1: lights Out, but I would dig a stipulation like that, honestly.
Speaker 1: Will Osprey against Kyle Fletcher is now official. Are going
Speaker 1: to have a steel cage match. Mercedes Monet not confirmed
Speaker 1: yet but very likely defending her TBS title against Momo
Speaker 1: Watanabe on that show. And Big Boom Aj of the
Speaker 1: Costco guys is coming back. AW hasn't said a word
Speaker 1: about it, but last month they told I say, ay,
Speaker 1: I don't know if it was Aj or his son,
Speaker 1: Big Justice, but they told cult to Halick that Aj
Speaker 1: would be recovered from his broken foot by then. They
Speaker 1: were in conversations with AW and it sounded like he
Speaker 1: was going to have another match of Revolution. So zero
Speaker 1: hour would be my guess. That's their pre show. Say
Speaker 1: what she wants to about the Costco crap. But he
Speaker 1: had a fun match with q T Marshall on the
Speaker 1: pre show last time. You know. I was going to
Speaker 1: say he could answer Max Caster's open challenge, but that
Speaker 1: open challenge gimmicks should be building to Anthony Bowen's accepting
Speaker 1: the challenge, not Big Boom Aj. So I'll hold off
Speaker 1: until we get a little bit closer to do predictions.
Speaker 1: I'm sure the card will be fleshed out a little
Speaker 1: bit more, but it's looking like a very strong card
Speaker 1: so far. And finally here. While speaking on TBS's Meal
Speaker 1: and a Match, which is on YouTube. It's co hosted
Speaker 1: by Renee Piquette and RJ City, Mercedes, Monet talked about
Speaker 1: what she loves about Japanese wrestling, saying that it's not
Speaker 1: just about fighting or strength, but entertaining, and she mentioned
Speaker 1: a conversation that she had recently with Rocky Romero about
Speaker 1: doing something fun outside the ring, and she revealed her
Speaker 1: interest in having a match throughout the entire city of
Speaker 1: Tokyo and not just limited to a wrestling ring. She said,
Speaker 1: I think that's the greatest thing about Japanese wrestling. It's
Speaker 1: not just about fighting or the strength. They're so entertaining
Speaker 1: and funny. Yeah. I was just talking to Rocky Romero
Speaker 1: the other day about doing something fun outside the ring,
Speaker 1: and I think having a match throughout the entire city
Speaker 1: of Tokyo would be fun. Doesn't even have to be
Speaker 1: in a wrestling ring. Just get me in a real
Speaker 1: street fight on a train, then get me off of
Speaker 1: it into a taxi and then let's just go all
Speaker 1: around Tokyo. I endorse this idea. I think that would
Speaker 1: be a lot of fun if we can see Minora
Speaker 1: Suzuki wrestling on bullet trains and we can have Mercedes
Speaker 1: having a match all over the city of Tokyo. Let's
Speaker 1: take some mailbag questions, shall we? You can email me
Speaker 1: to Solo Monster at gmail dot com. Please include your
Speaker 1: name of where you are from when you write in.
Speaker 1: Stefan from Washington who is celebrating a birthday today, Happy birthday, dude.
Speaker 1: The Rock made it seem like there may not be
Speaker 1: a match with him in and it was more about
Speaker 1: the story. It feels like we could be seeing someone
Speaker 1: else take the deal and become the corporate champ. What
Speaker 1: if it's Punk. In their last promo together, Punk asked
Speaker 1: Cody if he was all right that all of this
Speaker 1: looked like it was starting to take its toll on him.
Speaker 1: He mentioned how it was about this time in his
Speaker 1: title run that he gave into the pressure and he
Speaker 1: became a bad person. Cody is now faced with a
Speaker 1: deal with the Devil, much like Punk with Hayman, and
Speaker 1: it is likely Cody will turn that deal down and
Speaker 1: show that he is better than that. Punk and then
Speaker 1: take the deal, stab Cody in the front like he
Speaker 1: said he would, and sell his soul to the devil
Speaker 1: to achieve his dream. Once Seena's best rival becomes the
Speaker 1: new scene is Foil feels like great story potential and
Speaker 1: naturally sets up matches for Punk against Roman as well
Speaker 1: as Sina later this year. What say you, Yeah, I
Speaker 1: mean I could get behind it. That's what I talked
Speaker 1: about earlier. I think going back and forth between whether
Speaker 1: or not Sena or Punk would be best in that role.
Speaker 1: I think both of them could be very entertaining and
Speaker 1: they both intrigue me, but I would go at Punk.
Speaker 1: Give me that choice. I think Punk just make between
Speaker 1: the two of them. I think you can make more
Speaker 1: sense of Punk in that role, and I think Punk
Speaker 1: would take it, and I think he would knock it
Speaker 1: out of the park because I think it would be
Speaker 1: right up his alley if he can play the heel
Speaker 1: role again and just a matter of telling the right
Speaker 1: story and getting there. So yes, I think that that
Speaker 1: could work. Chris from Phoenix, Arizona. In recent podcasts and streams,
Speaker 1: you've politely turned down fantasy bookings from people for the
Speaker 1: Death Riders because they are lame finishes to the story,
Speaker 1: But isn't that what this story really deserves? Just pull
Speaker 1: the plug. At Revolution we get another lame interference finish.
Speaker 1: Moxley wins big scrum, Christian cash is in the team
Speaker 1: implodes because who cares. Then we get Edge against Christian
Speaker 1: in a singles feud that runs the AW Championship through
Speaker 1: Dynasty and onto MJF or Hangman, et cetera. Heading into
Speaker 1: all in see you mentioned MJF said that right there
Speaker 1: that intrigues me. Edge against Christian. I mean, yes, you
Speaker 1: could do Edge and Christian on a short term basis,
Speaker 1: Edge versus Christian being your top Like AW Championship feud
Speaker 1: is not the answer, but as a means to get
Speaker 1: the title onto the person that it should be on,
Speaker 1: and if it means the death of the Death Riders,
Speaker 1: I'm on board. But you mentioned MJF. You mentioned Dynasty.
Speaker 1: Dynasty is their next pay per view after Revolution, So Dynasty,
Speaker 1: I think is on April sixth. I want to say,
Speaker 1: and the idea that MJF beats Hangman to the punch
Speaker 1: and that MJF would win the title because it still
Speaker 1: fits with what I just talked about as far as
Speaker 1: Hangman really should be the one to go to Texas
Speaker 1: in July and win the championship. So if you're going
Speaker 1: to do this first match with MJF and Hangman, I
Speaker 1: said MJF should win the first match. What if MJF
Speaker 1: wins that match ends up winning the aw world title
Speaker 1: of Dynasty the following month, holds onto it until we
Speaker 1: get to all In and we get the rematch. So
Speaker 1: maybe they don't do three of them, but they do
Speaker 1: the rematch, it all in circle back around to MJF
Speaker 1: and Hangman. That's where Hangman gets to win. I like that.
Speaker 1: I'd be on board with that, especially if it kills
Speaker 1: off the death Riders Like you got my attention as
Speaker 1: soon as I saw that, But now that I'm thinking
Speaker 1: about how this might play out, I actually like that.
Speaker 1: Kevin from Chicago, I wanted to get your opinion on
Speaker 1: if you think it's possible the Jade car Gills attacker
Speaker 1: could potentially be NXT's Lash Legend and Shakara Jackson at
Speaker 1: the behest of Naomi, which would lead to them forming
Speaker 1: a stable between the three women. The reason I think
Speaker 1: it could be the case is because they've been building
Speaker 1: Jade to be this monster. So I can't imagine one
Speaker 1: person being responsible for taking her out for months and combined, well,
Speaker 1: I mean, it doesn't take a whole hell of a lot.
Speaker 1: I mean you could take freakin' Raymistereo and have him
Speaker 1: shove Jade off of I mean, if she got shoved
Speaker 1: off a platform of a certain height, fell through a
Speaker 1: car windshield, I mean, it could have been a fucking
Speaker 1: cat that scared her and she fell off. You're falling
Speaker 1: off someplace through a car windshield. I don't know that
Speaker 1: it really matters if it's one person or three, but anyway,
Speaker 1: I can't imagine one person being responsible for taking her
Speaker 1: out for months, and combined with the fact that they're
Speaker 1: already trying to sell us on a tag team being responsible,
Speaker 1: So I think you could easily swap out them for
Speaker 1: two more women who have a similar stature to make
Speaker 1: it work. Naomi could also justify her actions by claiming
Speaker 1: she did it for Bianca, believing Jade was holding her back,
Speaker 1: and this could all be setting up a potential six
Speaker 1: women tag match of Lash, Jakara, and Naomi against Jade
Speaker 1: and Bianca, with bel Air having to go recruit the
Speaker 1: woman that she doesn't trust. Bailey to even the odds
Speaker 1: at WrestleMania. Yeah, I mean that could work. I mean
Speaker 1: they already did the war Games match though, where Bailey
Speaker 1: and Bianca they had to coexist. I know Bianca wasn't
Speaker 1: happy about being her partner, but it all worked out
Speaker 1: and they even started working together in that match. So
Speaker 1: to now go back to Bianca like, oh, I don't
Speaker 1: trust this woman, I mean, you could do it. You
Speaker 1: could do it. I think them already being partners kind
Speaker 1: of softened it a little bit. But yeah, I mean
Speaker 1: you can make it work. I just I kind of
Speaker 1: don't want to see Beyonca relegated to a six woman
Speaker 1: tag match at WrestleMania. But I haven't really been able
Speaker 1: to figure out what to do with Bailey if she's
Speaker 1: not going to be wrestling Roxanne. I mean, there are
Speaker 1: some people who think she'll win the Chamber and she'll Wrestleria,
Speaker 1: which I really I don't see the appeal in that
Speaker 1: match personally. I mean nothing against Bailey, but there's just
Speaker 1: more interesting opponents for me that I would like to
Speaker 1: see in the ring with wherea Ripley at WrestleMania, She's
Speaker 1: not one of them. So outside of a match with Roxanne.
Speaker 1: I don't know what else you would do with Bailey,
Speaker 1: so maybe some variation of this is what ends up happening.
Speaker 1: I don't know. Alvin Fromteville, North Carolina. I was recently
Speaker 1: watching some old WCW matches with Alex Wright. I thought
Speaker 1: this guy had a good look. He say worker had well,
Speaker 1: he was a worker. You didn't say he was a
Speaker 1: good worker. He just said he was a worker. He
Speaker 1: certainly was. He was in the ring. Eddie had charisma.
Speaker 1: When WWE brought he means bought WCW, I was surprised
Speaker 1: they did not bring over Alex Wright. Do you know
Speaker 1: the backstory to why he never came over to WWE.
Speaker 1: He still had a few years left on his contract
Speaker 1: with Turner after w CW close, and I remember him
Speaker 1: saying he didn't like the offer that WWE gave him.
Speaker 1: I guess to buy him out. There were a lot
Speaker 1: of guys who are like, now I'm just gonna sit
Speaker 1: at home and collect my guaranteed money. You know, it
Speaker 1: really was only Booker, T and DDP who gave up
Speaker 1: free money to take a deal for less money with WWE, figuring,
Speaker 1: oh well, I'll come out well on the other end,
Speaker 1: I'll be a bigger star for Booker. It worked out
Speaker 1: well for DDP, not so much as far as him
Speaker 1: being a big deal in WWE. I think Ddp's doing
Speaker 1: stuff now that's far more important than he would have
Speaker 1: done in WWE. So yeah, he was like I guess
Speaker 1: they just in his mind, low balled him on an offer,
Speaker 1: and he just didn't want to take the offer. But
Speaker 1: he also said that he was just very burned out.
Speaker 1: I see interviews with him that pop up on my
Speaker 1: YouTube timeline every now and then. He's talked about how
Speaker 1: with WCW sometimes he would wrestle up to seven matches
Speaker 1: a day, which I know that sounds hogan esque, but
Speaker 1: you got to remember, like those tapings they did at
Speaker 1: Universal for their syndicated shows, like you would have guys
Speaker 1: coming out multiple times in his single taping. I don't
Speaker 1: know about seven times, but it's at least conceivable that
Speaker 1: he did. So he was burned out in the backstage politics.
Speaker 1: I know he didn't like that, so he retired and
Speaker 1: he opened a wrestling school, which I believe he still
Speaker 1: runs to this day. It's crazy to me how he
Speaker 1: never ended up being bigger than he was he was
Speaker 1: only twenty five years old when WCW shut down. I
Speaker 1: never understood when they had him shave his head and
Speaker 1: he did the Berlin gimmick, unless that was his idea. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he did have a look to him and then he
Speaker 1: shaved his head, and it's like, I don't know what
Speaker 1: these fucking people are doing. But he was still only
Speaker 1: twenty five when WCW got sold to WWE, Like he
Speaker 1: could have been a much bigger star for sure, but
Speaker 1: it just sounded like he was sick of it all.
Speaker 1: Aaron from Tulsa, Oklahoma. This year marks fifteen years since
Speaker 1: NXT's debut. Well, kind, I mean he puts it in quotes,
Speaker 1: I assume because you realize NXT as a show started
Speaker 1: in twenty ten, but that was a very different NXT
Speaker 1: than what we ended up getting on the network when
Speaker 1: it debuted. There. What, in your opinion is NXT's best
Speaker 1: matches moments and who were the biggest success stories coming
Speaker 1: out of NXT to the main roster? Oh, I mean
Speaker 1: when you say that Charlotte Flair, Bianca Belair, I think
Speaker 1: you can put Alexa Bliss on that list. Ria Ripley
Speaker 1: to an extent, But I mean not really, because she
Speaker 1: wrestled on the indie scene in Australia before coming to
Speaker 1: the States, but she started to really find herself in NXT.
Speaker 1: You know. That's the thing. You know, lots of names
Speaker 1: were a part of NXT, but they just kind of
Speaker 1: passed through, you know, guys like Kevin Owens and sammy's
Speaker 1: Ain and Finn balor Seth Rollins. Roman Reigns was more
Speaker 1: a product of FCW, which was under Steve Kern. So
Speaker 1: I don't think it's fair to really call Rome and
Speaker 1: It like as big of a star as he became
Speaker 1: later like the greatest NXT export or a success story
Speaker 1: of all time. Like he doesn't really have a genuine
Speaker 1: connection to the brand, unlike Seth Rollins, who was the
Speaker 1: first ever NXT champion. Like you could definitely make more
Speaker 1: of a case I think for Rollins as the greatest
Speaker 1: NXT success story over Roman Reigns, even though Rains is,
Speaker 1: you know, Rains is definitely the bigger star of the two.
Speaker 1: Bray Wyatt started in FCW also, but when they rebranded
Speaker 1: as NXT, that's when we got bray Wyatt, like the
Speaker 1: bray Wyatt character, but like more recent names, I think
Speaker 1: could end up being their greatest success story. Bron Breaker,
Speaker 1: Tiffany Stratton, Oba Femei. Right, it's still too early to know,
Speaker 1: but I'm looking at those names like five years from now,
Speaker 1: we're going to be talking about, if not all of them,
Speaker 1: some of them I think as the great success story
Speaker 1: in NXT. The best matches, There's too many to name,
Speaker 1: but Sasha Banks against Bailey and Brooklyn that's one of
Speaker 1: the most important matches in NXT history, especially for the women.
Speaker 1: Sammy Zane's underdog rise to the NXT Championship. That was
Speaker 1: a great story. Kevin Owens turning on him that same
Speaker 1: night that he debuted, That's a pretty memorable moment. Shinsky
Speaker 1: Nakamora's debut for the brand coming Over is this huge
Speaker 1: star from New Japan and he ends up in NXT.
Speaker 1: That was a big deal. Oscar's run. Oscar's run is
Speaker 1: the NXT Women's champion. That undefeated run that she went on,
Speaker 1: you know, that was a legendary run. Nathan from Wisconsin.
Speaker 1: I'm getting into the year twenty ten of TNA and
Speaker 1: the outrage fans had going from a six sided ring
Speaker 1: to a four sided one. Yes, it does make them
Speaker 1: traditional but it also does take away the original feel
Speaker 1: that TNA had because no other company used that ring. Well,
Speaker 1: I don't think that's true. Triple A uses this excited ring.
Speaker 1: I don't know if they use it all the time,
Speaker 1: but I know Triple A was and I think still
Speaker 1: does use this excited ring. Add to the fact that
Speaker 1: they brought in Sean Morley, I thought that said Sean Mooney.
Speaker 1: I was like, what did I miss? They brought in
Speaker 1: Sean Morley who beat Daniels and then basically left. Despite
Speaker 1: the CMLL fallout, the Nasty Boys who brought nothing, and
Speaker 1: Bubba the Love Sponge, TNA definitely started losing momentum because
Speaker 1: of bad ideas like this. Other than moving to Mondays
Speaker 1: for that brief period, what do you think was the
Speaker 1: worst decision TNA made that really hurt them as a company. Well,
Speaker 1: especially if we're talking about that period, I got two
Speaker 1: names for you, hul Cogan and Eric Bischoff. There you go.
Speaker 1: I'd say that hurt them pretty good. They made a
Speaker 1: lot of dumb decisions over the years. We'll be here
Speaker 1: all day if I talk about all the stupid shit
Speaker 1: that TNA did over the years. But since you brought
Speaker 1: up that period specifically, and people like the Nasty Boys
Speaker 1: and Morley coming in and the switch from the six
Speaker 1: sided ring. That was all Hogan and Bischoff. Hogan got
Speaker 1: his buddy some jobs. Hogan had his ideas for how
Speaker 1: things should go. That was definitely something that when you
Speaker 1: look at where TNA was before he came in, and
Speaker 1: then where they were at the tail end of it,
Speaker 1: and when he literally on television walked out on Dixie
Speaker 1: Carter and she was hanging on to his leg like
Speaker 1: a little child, I don't see how you can look
Speaker 1: at that and say that TNA was in a much
Speaker 1: better position at the end than they were at the beginning.
Speaker 1: And Christopher from East London says, I am binging all
Speaker 1: of the in your house pay per views on Netflix.
Speaker 1: All of this is before my time. And I found
Speaker 1: Sewn Michael's celebration after defeating Diesel very interesting. He kind
Speaker 1: of mocked Hulk Hogan there hitting his pose and whatnot.
Speaker 1: Was this the case? Was he trying to say that
Speaker 1: he was the number one wrestler in the world or
Speaker 1: was it deeper than that. No, I don't think it
Speaker 1: was any deeper than Hogan was the top star in
Speaker 1: the other promotion. You know, Diesel was on his way
Speaker 1: out to that same company and he was mocking the
Speaker 1: old guy in that other place. You know, Sean had
Speaker 1: just won the title at WrestleMania the month before. I
Speaker 1: don't know if Hogan was champion in April of ninety six.
Speaker 1: It was it was either Hogan or Savage or Flair.
Speaker 1: I'm sure it was one of those three. Maybe the Giant.
Speaker 1: I don't know. The Giant won the title around that
Speaker 1: time too, But you know, Hogan was the guy over there.
Speaker 1: He used to be their guy, but now he was
Speaker 1: w CW's guy. Shawn had just won the title. I'm
Speaker 1: sure there were some people in his mind who you know,
Speaker 1: didn't see him in that role, and that was just
Speaker 1: him taking some shots, you know, with the other guy
Speaker 1: in the other promotion. So no, I don't think he
Speaker 1: needs to look at it any deeper than that. They
Speaker 1: were not fully getting their asses kicked yet by w
Speaker 1: CW because the nWo angle hadn't started up for another
Speaker 1: few months. But that's really all it was. Wait, wait
Speaker 1: until you get to nineteen ninety seven, like you're going
Speaker 1: through all the in your house shows, Wait until you
Speaker 1: get to ninety seven. You should really do a watch
Speaker 1: through of that entire year, at least in WWE, just
Speaker 1: because ninety seven ninety seven is when they had their
Speaker 1: backs against the wall and it ended up being one
Speaker 1: of their best years creatively. But he says, also, who
Speaker 1: would you deem as mister in your House? Ugh? Uh, dude,
Speaker 1: that's a tough one. That's a tough one. It's really
Speaker 1: between two people though, either Brett Hart or Shawn Michaels.
Speaker 1: It's one of those two. But that's tough, you know,
Speaker 1: with Brett. The in your House matches that stand out
Speaker 1: to me with Brett are the Hakushi match, which was
Speaker 1: from the very first one. Later that year, I know,
Speaker 1: he had a match with Pierre when he was doing
Speaker 1: the Pirate Gimmick. They had a very good match. The Hershey,
Speaker 1: Pennsylvania match with the British Bulldog was a great match
Speaker 1: that was better than their Summer Slim match at Wembley
Speaker 1: a lot bloodier too. The final four match for the
Speaker 1: vacant title, which literally just I just watched this on
Speaker 1: their Vault channel yesterday. They posted it several days ago.
Speaker 1: I watched it yesterday. They talked about bloody poor Vader
Speaker 1: he gets his eye busted open five minutes into a
Speaker 1: thirty minute match off a chair shot by the Undertaker,
Speaker 1: and he's got the mask on and like all throughout
Speaker 1: the match he's like repositioning it and stuff. I'm like, dude,
Speaker 1: take it off. And then finally, it was like two
Speaker 1: minutes before he gets eliminated from the match, he finally
Speaker 1: takes the fucking mask off. I'm like, why'd you wait
Speaker 1: so long? He looked like he could barely see. But
Speaker 1: that was a great match, and the ten man tag
Speaker 1: a Canadian stampede. It's a legendary match, one of the
Speaker 1: greatest matches in the history of that company. With Sean,
Speaker 1: first thing I think of is him beating Jeff Jarrett
Speaker 1: in Nashville for the Intercontinental title. He had a really
Speaker 1: good match with Owen Hart. I forget which show. That
Speaker 1: was the match with Diesel that you just mentioned. Good friends,
Speaker 1: Better enemies. That's the best match that Kevin Nash ever had.
Speaker 1: Mind Games against Mankind is an excellent match, even with
Speaker 1: the shitty finish, and the Undertaker matches their ground zero
Speaker 1: match and their Helen is Cell match the following month.
Speaker 1: It's pretty incredible. You know, three of the best matches
Speaker 1: in WWE history all took place in the same year.
Speaker 1: Brett Hart and Steve Austin, Wrestlemani at thirteen Canadian Stampede,
Speaker 1: ten Mantag, and the first Helen of Cell. And really
Speaker 1: it's between Wrestlemanti at thirteen and Helena Cell. If you
Speaker 1: made the argument that either of those two matches were
Speaker 1: the greatest match in company history, I wouldn't argue with you.
Speaker 1: But all of that happened in nineteen ninety seven. See
Speaker 1: that's why I say, make sure you go through all
Speaker 1: the ninety seven stuff. So honestly, it's pretty even between
Speaker 1: the two. I have to go Seawan Michaels, though I
Speaker 1: think Sean Michaels is mister in your house. The mind
Speaker 1: Games match and the Hell in a Cell match, that's
Speaker 1: really what puts it over the top for me. But
Speaker 1: good stuff. Keep emailing me the solom Monster at gmail
Speaker 1: dot com. Make sure you follow me on x That's
Speaker 1: where I'm most active when I am active at solo
Speaker 1: Monster on there. But if you go to the solo
Speaker 1: monster dot com, all of the socials are there. I
Speaker 1: have links to a whole bunch of different the pro
Speaker 1: wrestling tea store. I put a link up to Hardy
Speaker 1: the Horse, my mother's children's books. Sometimes people ask me
Speaker 1: about that. I got the Amazon link up there on
Speaker 1: the bottom of the page as well, so you can
Speaker 1: get all that information there. I will be live on
Speaker 1: YouTube this week coming up as I am every week,
Speaker 1: Live on Monday for the Raw Post Show, live on
Speaker 1: Wednesday after Dynamite, and live on Friday after SmackDown, and
Speaker 1: of course Tuesday night will be another episode of Tuesday
Speaker 1: Night Titans with JD. We've been crushing it with the shows,
Speaker 1: so you could find me over on his channel on Tuesday.
Speaker 1: A lot of good stuff coming up, and of course
Speaker 1: next Sunday that will be episode nine three of this
Speaker 1: very show. Solom Monster sounds off. So thank you for
Speaker 1: all the support, thank you for the questions. Leave a
Speaker 1: comment on Spotify or Apple Podcasts or wherever they accept
Speaker 1: comments and reviews, and I will see you back here
Speaker 1: for a brand new podcast next weekend. Until then, take care, guys.
Speaker 1: The Solom Monster sounds off. Not only did Powerhouse Hogs
Speaker 1: not win the aw World Championship tonight, which is no surprise,
Speaker 1: but they actually destroyed his leg and right after they
Speaker 1: stomped on the fucking share you think you know me?
Speaker 1: And here comes Adam Copeland and FTR who were standing
Speaker 1: there that't the go position, just waiting for their cue, watching,
Speaker 1: I'm sure on a monitor as this man was maimed
Speaker 1: by the death go out there without my music. I'll
Speaker 1: leave my music right now. Come on, as soon as
Speaker 1: they hit the music out they can see now if
Speaker 1: I'm Powerhouse Hobbs when I come back from this in,
Speaker 1: I'm going after Cope and Bald and Hair for not
Speaker 1: coming out and saving me here in this spot, for
Speaker 1: being a couple of selfish, spineless asshole where's the fucking music.
Speaker 1: You can't go anywhere until the music hits, So let's
Speaker 1: let this poor fucker get his leg destroyed first and
Speaker 1: then we'll run out. Please, for the love of fucking God,
Speaker 1: put the music on. That's who Hobbs ought to go after,
Speaker 1: very very stupid. The Solo Monsters Sounds off bringing you
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Speaker 1: I love you so young,