Speaker 1: It's business time, baby. You are listening to Solo Monster
Speaker 1: Sounds all. I love you so mama monster, dude, I
Speaker 1: want your soul a woman.
Speaker 2: You got grown ass rustlers in the back going on Twitter.
Speaker 1: Come over here is that Pet Patterson? You have legs?
Speaker 1: I was ninety nine percent positive it was just chessed up.
Speaker 1: Now congratulations. Who hasn't beat Daniel Barcia. This is episode
Speaker 1: nine thirty eight of The Solemn Monsters Sounds up for Sunday,
Speaker 1: November sixteenth, twenty twenty five. I am the Solo Monster.
Speaker 1: Legendary NWA announcer Bob Caudle passed away this morning. News
Speaker 1: of his passing was revealed by his son Mike, who
Speaker 1: noted that he died in his sleep overnight. He was
Speaker 1: ninety five years old. God bless him. We should all
Speaker 1: be so lucky to live that long. Cardle just lost
Speaker 1: his wife in April, not long after the couple celebrated
Speaker 1: their seventy sixth wedding anniversary, and they leave behind three children,
Speaker 1: seven grandchildren, and twelve great grandchildren. It is quite the
Speaker 1: family there. You know, as someone who grew up watching
Speaker 1: WWF television in the Northeast as a young fan. I
Speaker 1: really had no exposure at all to Bob Caudle and
Speaker 1: only became familiar with him, you know, later on as
Speaker 1: I went back and watched old NWA and WCW stuff,
Speaker 1: And he was a very straight lace, kind of like
Speaker 1: broadcast journalist type. You know. He wasn't over the top.
Speaker 1: He wasn't like a heel commentator or anything like that,
Speaker 1: didn't make himself, you know, the center of attention. He
Speaker 1: was that guy with credibility that you would tune in
Speaker 1: every single week. Oh it's Bob Caudle. Probably the way
Speaker 1: that people who were watching WWF would look at, you know,
Speaker 1: like a Gorilla Monsoon or someone like that, and he
Speaker 1: wasn't even like gorilla, and that gorilla could be over
Speaker 1: the top sometimes. So yeah, there were a lot of
Speaker 1: fans who grew up for years and years and they
Speaker 1: would tune in and watch their wrestling in the morning
Speaker 1: mid Atlantic or whatever it might have been, and Bob
Speaker 1: Caudle was the voice, you know, of their childhood. And
Speaker 1: it's very sad to hear that he's passed away. His
Speaker 1: go to line on all those old the mid Atlantic
Speaker 1: Championship Wrestling shows at the very end, his sign off
Speaker 1: was so long for now, so I will say that
Speaker 1: about Bob Caudle. So long for now. I've got news
Speaker 1: to get into on the location for Elimination Chamber, why
Speaker 1: it's a big deal SmackDown moving back to three hours
Speaker 1: that sounds you Here is my soul dying on the inside.
Speaker 1: Got news on John Cena's final raw match tomorrow and
Speaker 1: last match ever next month. With this tournament, the lineups
Speaker 1: for war games have mostly been completed, not total, but
Speaker 1: we're just about there lol. TNA lives, blooding, guts, thoughts,
Speaker 1: full gear predictions, including thoughts on MVP's latest comments about
Speaker 1: one Paul Leveck. Well he really does not like that man.
Speaker 1: And p WI just dropped its list of the top
Speaker 1: two hundred and fifty women's wrestlers in the world, and
Speaker 1: I've got thoughts to share on the top ten. That'll
Speaker 1: be part of the mail bag a little bit later on.
Speaker 1: If you would like to support the podcast, now running
Speaker 1: eighteen years strong, you may do so on the Solomonster
Speaker 1: dot com. You'll see the PayPal link at the top
Speaker 1: of the page. Ten dollars and more. We'll get you
Speaker 1: a nickname and a special shout out here on this show.
Speaker 1: I want to say thank you to Big B Bryant Becea,
Speaker 1: the Portland pop Star, Paul Hamilton, Diamond Dallas Dance Machine himself,
Speaker 1: Harrison Soap, Velvet Revolver, Robert Murray, the Cape Cod Crusader,
Speaker 1: Chris Setterland, Josh Bad Medicine, Medina Tough Guy, Temjin Zephyr,
Speaker 1: the Chicago Slayer, Willie Iicherd. Maybe I'll see you and
Speaker 1: Mama Ikered on Friday. I Hope the Wichita Workhorse, Clayton
Speaker 1: Nettleton yeeha. Indeed, Russell the Mussel, thank you, He's been
Speaker 1: here with me since day one. Night Stalker and if
Speaker 1: Alsafar killshot, Keith Hart, Jason the Boner Ventura, that is
Speaker 1: his name. And also I want to give a shout
Speaker 1: out to the Boner's girlfriend, Queen Mallory Twinter. They have
Speaker 1: been dating for four years now and she has supported
Speaker 1: him through a lot over those four years, So congrats
Speaker 1: to the two of them. Jason does a monthly reading
Speaker 1: at the local daycare near his library, and typically he
Speaker 1: says he reads Marvel or Disney stuff, but he tested
Speaker 1: out my mom's children's book, The Adventure of Hardy the
Speaker 1: Horse which you can buy right now on Amazon cheap plug.
Speaker 1: He's done six readings so far and the book has
Speaker 1: been a big hit apparently, so I love hearing that.
Speaker 1: It's like I told him, I started doing readings myself
Speaker 1: to kids right before COVID shut everything down, and I
Speaker 1: really wish I could have done more. So this is
Speaker 1: very cool to see. This Tuesday, Brett Hart's book, which
Speaker 1: has been out for a number of years and is
Speaker 1: probably the best, certainly one of the best wrestling books
Speaker 1: ever written, one of the biggest ones, is coming to Audible. Officially,
Speaker 1: it's been available for pre order. It still is available
Speaker 1: for pre order right now as we speak, but the
Speaker 1: audiobook drops on Tuesday, with twenty five hours worth of
Speaker 1: narration from the Hitman himself. You can wait if you
Speaker 1: want to until Tuesday and use our Audible link here
Speaker 1: to buy the book, or you can pre order the
Speaker 1: book right now for free when you use the link
Speaker 1: audibletrial dot com slash Solo Monster. So whether it's today, tomorrow, Tuesday,
Speaker 1: make sure you jump on that deal it may not
Speaker 1: always be there, and get yourself a free audio version
Speaker 1: of arguably the best wrestling book ever written. And don't
Speaker 1: sleep on that Natty book either n Italia's Memoirs out.
Speaker 1: The audio version is also on Audible, So if you're
Speaker 1: an Amazon Prime customer, use my link and you can
Speaker 1: get two free books instead of just one. And if
Speaker 1: you can get two instead of one, I don't know
Speaker 1: why you wouldn't take advantage of that. So audibletrial dot
Speaker 1: Com slash Solo Monster. Last night, House of Glory presented
Speaker 1: its super Clash show from Brentwood, New York, in conjunction
Speaker 1: and collaboration with the Big Event Expo for the first
Speaker 1: time ever. The Big Event is the biggest autograph expo
Speaker 1: to hit New York each year, usually twice a year,
Speaker 1: and this is our first time partnering with them. It
Speaker 1: was a huge success. We had a sold out event
Speaker 1: last night, well over one thousand fans. I met many
Speaker 1: of you there who either were at the event or
Speaker 1: at least the convention, so that was very cool. Great
Speaker 1: to catch up in person with Chris van Vliet as well,
Speaker 1: so that was nice. Now I arrived pretty early in
Speaker 1: the day, but the convention itself started at ten, so
Speaker 1: the convention went from ten to four, then they cleared
Speaker 1: everybody out and then hour events started officially at eight
Speaker 1: and I got there probably midway, a little past the
Speaker 1: midway point of the convention, so I did not bear
Speaker 1: witness to any of this, but I know that Bill
Speaker 1: Goldberg was there. Brett Hart was supposed to be there,
Speaker 1: but he had to pull out of some East Coast
Speaker 1: conventions a few weeks ago. This was one of them
Speaker 1: that would have been very interesting. But you know, Sting
Speaker 1: was there, Great Muda was there. This is probably one
Speaker 1: of the last conventions Sting will be doing in the
Speaker 1: face paint because he said he's going to stop doing
Speaker 1: that at the end of the year. But Bill Goldberg
Speaker 1: was there and K and S wrestle Fest shared on
Speaker 1: social media. Now they have since taken this Facebook post down,
Speaker 1: but they did post on social media that Goldberg did
Speaker 1: not participate in a previously scheduled private autographs signing that
Speaker 1: they had agreed to and that they had set up
Speaker 1: for him. This is what they said. Unfortunately, Goldberg private
Speaker 1: signing did not happen. We had all of our items
Speaker 1: laid out ready to sign as Goldberg was doing another
Speaker 1: private for another vendor. After he was done, he got
Speaker 1: up and said he was done. He walked out right
Speaker 1: past our stuff and he left. We were all super
Speaker 1: disappointed and frustrated. My apologies to all. And he was
Speaker 1: apparently he was at the Big event as far as
Speaker 1: you know, the pictures of him chatting, would sting and
Speaker 1: signing autographs and taking pictures. But evidently this other private signing,
Speaker 1: he just walked right past these guys and right out
Speaker 1: the door. So there you go. That was the Goldberg
Speaker 1: controversy coming out of the Big Event. But as for
Speaker 1: the event itself, a lot of great matches in the card,
Speaker 1: of course, the one that got the most attention and
Speaker 1: actually had hog trending on social media number two behind UFC.
Speaker 1: It was Mercedes Monette challenging for title number thirteen in
Speaker 1: the main event against nor Phoenix Diana out of Malaysia.
Speaker 1: She has been the APAC Wrestling Women's Champion for well
Speaker 1: or had been now for over seven hundred days. She
Speaker 1: had made it very clear it was a dream of
Speaker 1: hers to get a match with Mercedes. Mercedes as the
Speaker 1: one many years ago, ten years ago who inspired her
Speaker 1: to take a shot at wrestling in the first place,
Speaker 1: so this was a big match for her and she
Speaker 1: traveled all the way to the States. This was only
Speaker 1: the second time that she has defended that title on
Speaker 1: US soil, and Mercedes Monette goes from Mercedes twelve belts
Speaker 1: to now Mercedes thirteen belts. She is victorious. It's thirteen
Speaker 1: her unlucky number. Or does she make it number fourteen
Speaker 1: next weekend against Chris Statlander. We shall see, but it
Speaker 1: was very cool to be on the call for that one.
Speaker 1: You could probably hear it in my voice right now.
Speaker 1: We're not done yet, because House of Glory is coming
Speaker 1: right back this Friday with our return to the Windy
Speaker 1: City November twenty. First, we are already sold out in Chicago,
Speaker 1: so this is going to be back to back sold
Speaker 1: out shows for US in less than a week, which
Speaker 1: is the first time we've done that. Amazing Red Battles
Speaker 1: Tyler Breeze for the first time ever the Rascals Desmond
Speaker 1: Xavier and Zachary Wentz. They're going to be taking on
Speaker 1: Jay Lion and Midas Black of main event, with the
Speaker 1: winners getting a shot at Matt and Jeff Hardy next
Speaker 1: month back here in New York for the hog Tag
Speaker 1: team titles. We've got Mustafa a Lee of course, he
Speaker 1: a Chicago native, taking on Marcus Mathers, Indie Heartwell Defenser
Speaker 1: HG Women's Championship again, Shatzi, who tagged with Scarlett Bordeaux
Speaker 1: last night, Charles Mason defends his Hog World championship on
Speaker 1: the show as well, and more yet to be announced.
Speaker 1: I will be on the call yet again on Triller
Speaker 1: TV plus if my voice holds out, hopefully it will.
Speaker 1: We'll see, but hopefully I will get to see some
Speaker 1: of you in Chicago. It's always a fun time there,
Speaker 1: especially when we're packed in and sold out at Logan
Speaker 1: Square Auditorium. So given that that is where I'm going
Speaker 1: to be on Friday, you could surmise from that that
Speaker 1: there will be no SmackDown live stream, so just be
Speaker 1: aware of that. Let's get into the news of the
Speaker 1: week here, and we'll start with this. WWE announced that
Speaker 1: next year's Elimination Chamber, while they still have an Elimination
Speaker 1: Chamber until Mark Shapiro decides to kill it, will be
Speaker 1: held at the United Center in Chicago. There you go, Chicago, man,
Speaker 1: I'm telling you, Chicago's a big hub for wrestling. Chicago.
Speaker 1: And I say this as a as a native New
Speaker 1: Yorker my entire life. I can sit here and say
Speaker 1: that I do believe Chicago. If you had to pick
Speaker 1: one city that has the best wrestling crowds, it would
Speaker 1: be Chicago. Right. New York is great, there are cities
Speaker 1: in Canada like Toronto that are great in the UK,
Speaker 1: but Chicago has got to be number one. So they
Speaker 1: are going to bring the Elimination Chamber to Chicago, the
Speaker 1: home of the Chicago Bulls and the Chicago Blackhawks, on Saturday,
Speaker 1: February twenty eighth. That's big because WWE has not run
Speaker 1: a show of any kind at the United Center in
Speaker 1: nearly eight years, and they have not run a major
Speaker 1: show there since SummerSlam in nineteen ninety four. That was
Speaker 1: the very first event that that arena ever hosted. And
Speaker 1: I especially like this. This is a Today in Chicago
Speaker 1: History item that I found from the Chicago Tribune site
Speaker 1: from just a few months ago. Breaking the seal on
Speaker 1: this dulled up barn was not the Rolling Stones as
Speaker 1: originally rumored, but rather the sophisticated artistry of the World
Speaker 1: Wrestling Federation's SummerSlam ninety four and with the three tenors
Speaker 1: already booked through the upcoming millennium, Brett Hitman, Heart Lex
Speaker 1: Luger and the Undertakers seem like the next logical lineup.
Speaker 1: And in the steel cage match, Hart defeated Owen Hart
Speaker 1: and the Undertaker defeated himself. I don't know why that
Speaker 1: made me laugh so much when I read that for
Speaker 1: the first time. It just sounds so ridiculous, but I
Speaker 1: mean it's classier I guess to say that the Undertaker
Speaker 1: defeated himself than to say the Undertaker beat himself. But
Speaker 1: what better way to break in the new arena than
Speaker 1: having the Undertaker beat himself in the main event. I oh, man,
Speaker 1: I'm five years old. You know the bigger story here
Speaker 1: from the original newspaper article is this. This is legitimately
Speaker 1: from an article that was done after this original Furst
Speaker 1: Ever event at the United Center. Other Virgin customers who
Speaker 1: dared to venture out of their seats meander throughout the
Speaker 1: boundless confines, trying to find restrooms, exits, and mustard. It
Speaker 1: took me almost fifteen minutes to get two Italian sausages,
Speaker 1: said a visibly distressed Audrey Doneldson. Then they told me
Speaker 1: they have no mustard. You expect the high prices, but
Speaker 1: not bad service. Her son Brandon chimed in tell them
Speaker 1: to get mustard packets so you can fix your food
Speaker 1: at your seat before it gets cold. You know, it's
Speaker 1: been thirty years. Hopefully they've addressed the mustard situation by now.
Speaker 1: But that's one of my favorite matches of all time
Speaker 1: from that Summer Slam show, the brett Owen Cage match.
Speaker 1: I don't know that anything on this Elimination Chamber show
Speaker 1: could possibly top it, but they'll have their chance now.
Speaker 1: I said that it was the first event of any
Speaker 1: kind there in several years. In twenty eighteen, they ran
Speaker 1: a house show there because the All State Arena where
Speaker 1: they usually run was already booked, and that show had
Speaker 1: a main event of Roman Reigns beating John Cena. That's
Speaker 1: actually the reason they're running the United Center this time
Speaker 1: instead of the All State Arena, because they already have
Speaker 1: a Monster Jam Freestyle event booked that day. The United
Speaker 1: Center is the largest indoor arena in the United States
Speaker 1: for concerts. It has a capacity of over twenty three thousand.
Speaker 1: This is going to be less than that if you
Speaker 1: account for the staging. But you know, the way that
Speaker 1: TKO has been doing things over the last couple of years,
Speaker 1: and if they run a very minimalist stage, they could probably
Speaker 1: fit pretty close to twenty k in that building. And
Speaker 1: as you would imagine, CM Punk is front and center
Speaker 1: in the graphic for the show. If he is not
Speaker 1: defending his World Heavyweight title on that show, he will
Speaker 1: surely be in the elimination chamber. I could see him
Speaker 1: winning the elimination Chamber. I don't see him winning the Rumble,
Speaker 1: but if he was to lose the championship between now
Speaker 1: and then, I much better chance I see him winning
Speaker 1: the chamber. Punk has a very unique connection to that
Speaker 1: arena because it is the place where he returned to
Speaker 1: wrestling in twenty twenty one and made his aw debut,
Speaker 1: which is still one of the loudest reactions that I
Speaker 1: have ever heard on a wrestling show. And that is
Speaker 1: I mean from someone who lived through all of those
Speaker 1: Austin reactions during the Attitude era. Okay, that Punk return
Speaker 1: in twenty twenty one was up there in that category.
Speaker 1: And I have sometimes gotten questions over the years about
Speaker 1: why WWE always runs All State and they never run
Speaker 1: the United Center. Now, I think it has mostly to
Speaker 1: do with costs. One of the reasons they don't run
Speaker 1: Madison Square Garden as often as they used to, and
Speaker 1: they tend to run the Barclay Center in Brooklyn. You know,
Speaker 1: it's very expensive to run the United Center relative to
Speaker 1: whatever the deal is they have with the All State Arena.
Speaker 1: But also they don't have conflicts with All State to
Speaker 1: worry about like they do with the United Center. They
Speaker 1: don't have to compete with Bulls games, they don't have
Speaker 1: to compete with Blackhawks games, and whatever the schedule is.
Speaker 1: And then there's another aspect to this, and this is
Speaker 1: from what I've been told by some of my Chicago listeners,
Speaker 1: which is that All State is a lot closer to
Speaker 1: the major airport there than the United Center is. It's
Speaker 1: only like three miles away, So it's just the more
Speaker 1: convenient options. So if you've ever wondered how come they
Speaker 1: don't run the United Center anymore, I think it's a
Speaker 1: combination of those three things, and when you think about it,
Speaker 1: it makes a lot of sense. But then came this
Speaker 1: piece of tragic news from wrestle Votes on Friday. I'll
Speaker 1: be sitting shiva for the rest of the week because
Speaker 1: SmackDown is moving from two hours back to three hours again.
Speaker 1: Starting with the January second episode from Buffalo, New York, Buffalo,
Speaker 1: New York. I wonder if a West Side Gun will
Speaker 1: try to attend. They said that this was a joint
Speaker 1: decision between WWE and USA Network. And this comes after
Speaker 1: I threw a party on July fourth when they finally
Speaker 1: moved the show back to two hours. We celebrated our
Speaker 1: nation's independence and our independence from three hour smackdowns. I
Speaker 1: just don't believe it. At a time when the show
Speaker 1: has not been this bad in years, their answer is
Speaker 1: to expand it, make it longer. It's to give us
Speaker 1: another hour. And of course the defenders are out there
Speaker 1: in full force. Who will defend anything this company does
Speaker 1: to their dying breath. They're already out with the excuses, well,
Speaker 1: you know, Solemn Monster. Now they'll have more time for
Speaker 1: women like Julia and some of the undercard people, and
Speaker 1: more time for the Tag Team Division, and at Tag
Speaker 1: Team Division, by the way, that's gone from hot to cold,
Speaker 1: not because they're not featured enough, but because it's the
Speaker 1: same teams every week on TV and they have nothing
Speaker 1: interesting for them to do. Three hours is going to
Speaker 1: do nothing to solve this in and of itself. But
Speaker 1: evidently they think three hours is going to be the
Speaker 1: magic pill that this show needs. You do realize that
Speaker 1: this means that it will be an extra hour for
Speaker 1: them to squeeze in another match with the MFTs each week.
Speaker 1: You do realize it's another hour for them to squeeze
Speaker 1: in a whole bunch of commercials. The problem with SmackDown
Speaker 1: is not that the matches are too short, although some
Speaker 1: of them are, the problem with that the show is
Speaker 1: just as an interesting The problem with SmackDown is that
Speaker 1: they haven't even bothered to truly shake up the roster
Speaker 1: in over a year. The problem with SmackDown is that
Speaker 1: certain top names vanish for months on end. So you
Speaker 1: tell me, how does adding a third hour to this
Speaker 1: show do anything to solve any of those problems that
Speaker 1: I just mentioned. It doesn't. But if they insist on
Speaker 1: expanding the show back to three hours, and I stand
Speaker 1: firm in my belief that there is no weekly wrestling
Speaker 1: show that needs to be three hours long, I don't
Speaker 1: give a shit what company it is. I don't care
Speaker 1: how good the show is. I don't care how bad
Speaker 1: the show is. You feel it more when the show sucks.
Speaker 1: But I absolutely hate this belief that some fans have,
Speaker 1: and probably because it's what they grew up with as
Speaker 1: a wrestling fan, that the shows need to be three
Speaker 1: hours long. This is the norm. It has to be
Speaker 1: three hours long so you can get everybody on the
Speaker 1: show every single week and you can tell stories the
Speaker 1: right way. Motherfucker. If you can't write a good, compelling
Speaker 1: television show in two hours and you feel the need
Speaker 1: to have three hours in order to do that, then
Speaker 1: you are doing it wrong. Because last night checked they
Speaker 1: had a brand split, so their giant roster is split
Speaker 1: in half between Mondays and Fridays, and I know there's
Speaker 1: a lot of overlap and they ignore their own rules,
Speaker 1: but still there is a brand split in place, and
Speaker 1: two hours should be plenty of time to feature all
Speaker 1: of the people that you need to feature, even if
Speaker 1: that means not everybody can be on the show every
Speaker 1: single week, that's okay. It's okay if you skip a
Speaker 1: week here and there. Not everybody has to be on
Speaker 1: the show every single week. But I watched wrestling for
Speaker 1: years and years, and I saw lots of good wrestling
Speaker 1: shows that were a hell of a lot less than
Speaker 1: three hours long. The length of time is not the
Speaker 1: I mean, it is an issue when it's too long,
Speaker 1: but the length of time is not the issue here.
Speaker 1: The issue is with the writing of these shows and
Speaker 1: the booking of the talent on these shows, the way
Speaker 1: they utilize some of the talent on these shows. Let's
Speaker 1: just say it isn't always up to par. Adding another
Speaker 1: hour to the show does not make the show better.
Speaker 1: All you're doing is adding another hour of shit. But
Speaker 1: if they insist on doing this, there are moves that
Speaker 1: are gonna have to be made. Now. I'm sure that
Speaker 1: they are doing this for WrestleMania season right now. TC
Speaker 1: from wrestle Votes says the move to three hours is
Speaker 1: at least through June. So it's not gonna go, you know,
Speaker 1: three months, four months and then go back to the
Speaker 1: way it was. It's gonna go beyond WrestleMania. That's what
Speaker 1: happened this year. It didn't go back to two hours
Speaker 1: until the beginning of July. But I'm sure Mania season
Speaker 1: is the impetus for this, right that, and they love
Speaker 1: torturing me, but there are serious changes that are gonna
Speaker 1: have to be made to that show, whether it goes
Speaker 1: three hours or they keep it at two hours. So
Speaker 1: now we're getting into a discussion here about SmackDown in general.
Speaker 1: This actually doesn't even necessarily have anything to do with
Speaker 1: three hours. There are serious changes that need to be
Speaker 1: made to this show. Getting Jacob fought Too back will help.
Speaker 1: Getting Bianca bell airback eventually will help. And Randy Orton.
Speaker 1: But they need to swap certain people out and swap
Speaker 1: other people in. And they need to make some roster moves.
Speaker 1: That's number one. Number two, they need to continue calling
Speaker 1: up new faces from NXT lash legend is not enough.
Speaker 1: Number three. If they continue with this MFT stuff, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna need a reason to care about these men right now.
Speaker 1: I have none. And you want to know what would
Speaker 1: get the MFTs over. You know, I watched Ray Phoenix
Speaker 1: splat on the ground outside on Friday. When he did
Speaker 1: that corkscrew dive out onto the floor onto the MFTs,
Speaker 1: nobody caught him. Tongala was standing right there, he didn't
Speaker 1: catch them. We have seen Solo Socoa acting goofy. Sometimes
Speaker 1: he's a funny guy. He's got personality. Sometimes he shows it.
Speaker 1: Sometimes they force him to try to be serious and
Speaker 1: it just doesn't work. I just want it to be entertaining.
Speaker 1: I have nothing against any of these men personally. It's
Speaker 1: their presentation and the characters and the way that they
Speaker 1: are utilized and presented on television. It is not entertaining.
Speaker 1: I just want it to be entertaining. I will never
Speaker 1: take these guys seriously in there current incarnation. I cannot
Speaker 1: do it. But if they lean into them as the
Speaker 1: gang that can't shoot straight, if they lean into them
Speaker 1: like like a bunch of tryhards, but they fall flat
Speaker 1: on their faces each time, and Solo has a meltdown, right,
Speaker 1: that would be funny. That would be entertaining, and they
Speaker 1: would still be heels. But if you do that for
Speaker 1: a few months, and you inject some humor into it
Speaker 1: and give us more interactions between the members. Or maybe
Speaker 1: it's Tangala who always screws things up and they clown
Speaker 1: on him for it. Tamatanga, though acts all protective since
Speaker 1: it's his brother. Talatanga becomes the giant with a big heart,
Speaker 1: you know, who can't control his temper and just smashes
Speaker 1: people and sticks up for his family. Like they each
Speaker 1: develop a personality of their own. I guarantee you, if
Speaker 1: you play this right, within a few months, they are
Speaker 1: going to be super over as babyfaces, I promise you,
Speaker 1: And it sounds counterintuitive, but I think to get people
Speaker 1: to take these guys more seriously and invest in them,
Speaker 1: you have to go all the way and turn them
Speaker 1: into a complete joke. If you play it right, I
Speaker 1: think it pays off with an act that's actually over
Speaker 1: and you'll get more out of them on the back
Speaker 1: end as fan favorites than you will as heels. But
Speaker 1: use that extra time to really develop some of these characters,
Speaker 1: and not just the MFTs. I mean this applies to
Speaker 1: everybody on the roster, top to bottom. You'll learn from
Speaker 1: what made SmackDown the a show there a few years ago.
Speaker 1: Kicking the can down the road and giving us more
Speaker 1: of the same is not the answer. They're lucky they
Speaker 1: have the Royal Rumble and WrestleMania coming up, because that
Speaker 1: tends to get people more excited. It's the most exciting
Speaker 1: time of year for the WWE product, although the build
Speaker 1: to WrestleMania this year tells us that's not always a
Speaker 1: good thing. But SmackDown has been low effort, boring television
Speaker 1: and that needs to change, especially if you're gonna give
Speaker 1: us more of it. Three hours of the show in
Speaker 1: its current state benefits no one, No one except USA Network,
Speaker 1: which gets an extra hour of content. It benefits no
Speaker 1: one else. Changes aren't made, and really what they're getting
Speaker 1: is an extra thirty minutes or so, because the rest
Speaker 1: of it is going to be commercials. But take those
Speaker 1: extra thirty minutes and make the most of it. John
Speaker 1: Cena got his Boston farewell on Raw Monday Night with
Speaker 1: a match against Dominic Mysterio, who interrupted the opening segment
Speaker 1: and talked his way right into what he did not want,
Speaker 1: which was an Intercontinental title match. And they had a
Speaker 1: very basic match, but it was exactly what it needed
Speaker 1: to be. They didn't have to do much. They had
Speaker 1: that crowd eating up everything they did, and it was
Speaker 1: a huge spot for dom to be and even in
Speaker 1: the promo, like he just looked cool as a cucumber,
Speaker 1: like he knew he belonged in that spot. And then
Speaker 1: he got to wrestle John Cena in one of his
Speaker 1: last matches and he lost, and that's okay. I think
Speaker 1: some people are making too big of a deal about
Speaker 1: the fact that he lost this match. It was about
Speaker 1: the moment, you know, people wanted to see John Cena
Speaker 1: win the Grand Slam. The Intercontinental title was the only
Speaker 1: one that he'd did not have and now he does,
Speaker 1: and so John Cena is the new Intercontinental Champion. He
Speaker 1: also announced that one request that he made, and he
Speaker 1: doesn't usually make requests, but he requested that they host
Speaker 1: a series of WWE versus NXT exhibitions as he called them,
Speaker 1: as part of his final night on Saturday Night's main event.
Speaker 1: This was legitimately a John Cena call. It's something that
Speaker 1: he wanted on his final show. He wanted to do,
Speaker 1: you know something where the show would double as a
Speaker 1: showcase for NXT talent because he's paid a few visits
Speaker 1: recently to the performance Center and he was very impressed
Speaker 1: by what he saw. He was also spotted visiting the
Speaker 1: Dungeon with Natty and TJ Wilson and all of their students.
Speaker 1: The guy wants to give back and this is his
Speaker 1: way of doing so. I don't know what the matches
Speaker 1: are going to be, but I think you want to
Speaker 1: showcase your best names from that brand. You know, we
Speaker 1: know Oba Femi is not going to be in this
Speaker 1: Last Time Is Now tournament unless he ends up as
Speaker 1: the mystery entrant on Raw tomorrow. Night, which I don't
Speaker 1: think he will be. Let's assume he's not going to
Speaker 1: be in this tournament. He also just returned at the
Speaker 1: very end of Tuesday's NXT episode, so he is not
Speaker 1: done with Ricky Saints yet. Obafemi should absolutely get a
Speaker 1: match or spotlight of some kind on that show. He's
Speaker 1: going to be a major player for them in twenty
Speaker 1: twenty six on the main roster. Ricky Saints is the
Speaker 1: NXT champion. He needs to have a match on that show,
Speaker 1: and hell, why not Cody Rhodes Champion against champion. They're
Speaker 1: good friends. I'm sure Cody would love to work with Ricky.
Speaker 1: He would give him a lot. Ricky loses that fight, absolutely,
Speaker 1: but losing to the top guy in the company is
Speaker 1: not a bad thing if you go out there and
Speaker 1: have a competitive match with him or Cmpunk, Right, Ricky
Speaker 1: is tight with both those guys. Either one of those
Speaker 1: matches would be a good option. Trick Williams, Javon Evans,
Speaker 1: Blake Monroe, Kendall Gray. Kendall Gray is the Evolved Women's Champion,
Speaker 1: but they're said to be very high on her potential.
Speaker 1: Why not show her in a spot on that show? Now?
Speaker 1: As far as the tournament is concerned, and seen his
Speaker 1: final opponent, Gunther still looks to be the favorite. They
Speaker 1: announced that he will be back on Raw Tomorrow night
Speaker 1: from Madison Square Garden against Javon Evans. And that is
Speaker 1: the thing that I am most looking forward to about
Speaker 1: any of the shows this week. That is the match
Speaker 1: that I pitched as the final of this tournament a
Speaker 1: few weeks ago, and we're getting it in the opening
Speaker 1: round instead, And that's okay. I'm just happy that we're
Speaker 1: getting it at all, because I think that match is
Speaker 1: gonna kick ass. Now. If they want to book the
Speaker 1: biggest upset since Razor and the Kid back in ninety three,
Speaker 1: it's right there, but I don't think they have the
Speaker 1: guts to do it. Rusev, Seamus, jay Usso, La Night,
Speaker 1: they have all advanced to the next round, although without
Speaker 1: a bracket we still don't know who who's facing who
Speaker 1: yet Russev against Seamus and La Night against jay Usso.
Speaker 1: It would all make sense, but we've already seen those matches.
Speaker 1: We're not done yet, though, because Tomorrow night, in addition
Speaker 1: to Gunther against Javon Evans, Solo's Sokoa faces a mystery opponent,
Speaker 1: and on SmackDown this Friday, it's Carmelo Hayes against Big
Speaker 1: Bronson Reed and Finn Balor takes some penta and that's it.
Speaker 1: That's the entire first round. La Night beat Zach Ryder
Speaker 1: on Friday Night under that name. He was Matt Cardona
Speaker 1: on NXT a few weeks ago, but here he's back
Speaker 1: to Zack Ryder, even though he has said in the
Speaker 1: past Zach Ryder is dead and if it were up
Speaker 1: to him and he went back to WWE, he would
Speaker 1: be Matt Cardona. Evidently it was not up to him,
Speaker 1: and I guess they wanted him back to Zack Ryder
Speaker 1: because Zach Ryder is the one who has history with
Speaker 1: John Cena. But it's still silly to go from one
Speaker 1: name and one gimmick on your television show to a
Speaker 1: completely different one a few weeks later. But you know what,
Speaker 1: good for him. Cardona has been killing it on the
Speaker 1: indies for years. I know that he has been waiting
Speaker 1: for that phone call to go back there. This does
Speaker 1: not mean that he is back full time. This does
Speaker 1: not mean he has signed a contract with them. For now,
Speaker 1: it is just a one off appearance now they do
Speaker 1: have Zach Ryder merchandise back up on WWE shop, and
Speaker 1: Fightful is saying that's because he signed a merch deal
Speaker 1: with them, but that's the only thing that he has signed.
Speaker 1: Under no circumstance though, should he have been beating La
Speaker 1: Knight in this tournament. So that was the right call,
Speaker 1: and it's sad that we've gotten to a point where
Speaker 1: when La Knight wins a match like this, I'm actually
Speaker 1: pleasantly surprised. That's sad. And the final surprise will come
Speaker 1: at MSG tomorrow and it is very likely going to
Speaker 1: be Joe Hendry. Joe Hendry is officially a WWE superstar
Speaker 1: per Fightful Select. He has reportedly signed a full time
Speaker 1: contract with the company, which I think most people predicted
Speaker 1: was going to be the case. But this is even
Speaker 1: though his TNA deal was not set to expire for
Speaker 1: a little bit. PW insiders said the end of December
Speaker 1: he used representation to move forward with WWE. Now, if
Speaker 1: I'm TNA, I know we have this partnership with the company.
Speaker 1: It really it's more of an NXT partnership than anything else.
Speaker 1: But you know, we saw Joe Hendry and the rumble
Speaker 1: we saw Joe Hendry get that spot against Randy Orton
Speaker 1: at WrestleMania when Kevin Owens had to be pulled because
Speaker 1: of the neck injury. If i'm TNA, I'm asking for
Speaker 1: one thing in return for allowing you to sign this
Speaker 1: man early, even though he was still under contract to
Speaker 1: our company, and I am requesting an aj Styles match
Speaker 1: in return for letting Joe out of his deal. I
Speaker 1: think it's only fair. Styles doesn't seem to think another
Speaker 1: match in TNA is going to happen. He said that
Speaker 1: this week. But that's what I would have asked for. Right,
Speaker 1: we'll let you have him early. Just commit to letting
Speaker 1: us use Styles for one match at some point next year.
Speaker 1: I don't think that's too much to ask, Or maybe
Speaker 1: they didn't they were rejected, but that's what I would
Speaker 1: have asked for. Henry has been trying to manifest a
Speaker 1: match with John Cena all year. He said he spoke
Speaker 1: to Sena about it back at the Royal Rumble and
Speaker 1: Seena's answer to him was very simple. He said, if
Speaker 1: you can manifest it and make it happen, then do it.
Speaker 1: I would love it, but Sina wasn't going to lobby
Speaker 1: for it or anything like that, And then the last
Speaker 1: few months, no one was really talking about it. You know,
Speaker 1: it kind of felt like that idea had had grown cold.
Speaker 1: But now if he ends up in this tournament, he
Speaker 1: at least has a shot. I cannot see him in
Speaker 1: a tournament that has Gunther in it and Joe Hendry
Speaker 1: winning over Gunther. I just I don't see that. I
Speaker 1: actually think he's got a much better shot at getting
Speaker 1: a match with John Cena, and this is my idea
Speaker 1: for how they could go with it. He's gonna be
Speaker 1: on the NXT roster from what we are reading, So
Speaker 1: this may be pie in the sky. But John Cena
Speaker 1: has confirmed that he will be wrestling tomorrow night. That's
Speaker 1: gonna be his last Raw match ever, five hundred and
Speaker 1: forty four matches on Raw, the most in history. He says,
Speaker 1: I'm not so sure that that is entirely accurate. Randy
Speaker 1: or teased him about it on X. It may be
Speaker 1: Randy Orton, I don't know. Randy Orton, by the way,
Speaker 1: is being advertised for the December fifth episode of SmackDown
Speaker 1: in Austin, Texas, so he is finally on his way
Speaker 1: back soon. But it is not that hard to envision
Speaker 1: John Sena coming out tomorrow night and saying, you know,
Speaker 1: in the spirit of the open challenges that I started
Speaker 1: when I was the United States Champion ten years ago,
Speaker 1: I would like to do the same with the Intercontinental
Speaker 1: title with the limited time that I have left. Because
Speaker 1: he's all about opportunity, right, That's all he talks about is,
Speaker 1: you know, paying it forward and giving opportunities to the
Speaker 1: next generation. So in his final match of Madison Square Garden,
Speaker 1: We're going to have the Intercontinental Championship Open Challenge, and
Speaker 1: that's when they hit the music and outcomes Joe Hendry
Speaker 1: making his MSG debut to challenge John Cena for the title.
Speaker 1: And if he wins it, what a debut for him,
Speaker 1: and you start him on the main roster. If he
Speaker 1: doesn't win it, still what a debut for him, and
Speaker 1: then you can keep him in NXT. He's actually wrestling
Speaker 1: the following night at the theater at Madison Square Garden
Speaker 1: on the NXT Gold Rush Show. He's teaming with Thea
Speaker 1: Hale against Ethan Page and Chelsea Green for the Triple
Speaker 1: A Mixtag Team titles. But if Gunther is winning that tournament,
Speaker 1: then John Cena does not need to be the champion
Speaker 1: heading into December thirteenth. If he does not drop it tomorrow,
Speaker 1: let him do another open challenge at Survivor Series and
Speaker 1: drop it to somebody in San Diego. Right, But Sena
Speaker 1: just won this title, right, and we know he's wrestling
Speaker 1: on the show tomorrow. An open challenge would make sense
Speaker 1: unless they just have Dominic come out to accept the
Speaker 1: open challenge and he wins the belt back, which you know,
Speaker 1: I mean that works too, you know, and dom gets
Speaker 1: his win back, he gets his belt back, and the
Speaker 1: only reason they did what they did this week with
Speaker 1: John Cena was to give the fans in Boston a
Speaker 1: big moment and to give him the Grand Slam, and
Speaker 1: then the belt goes right back to dom I kind
Speaker 1: of feel like in his final Raw match, though, that
Speaker 1: would be a little underwhelming, especially when you know that,
Speaker 1: you know, he's not gonna win the belt back without
Speaker 1: the judgment day or El Grande Americano getting involved in
Speaker 1: helping him with some bullshit like that. But that's tomorrow night.
Speaker 1: For Friday, let me talk about this real quick. You know,
Speaker 1: people are gonna laugh at the idea of Carmelo Hayes
Speaker 1: beating Bronson Reid. I actually think he's got a really
Speaker 1: good chance of advancing in this tournament, just because of
Speaker 1: the way the show ended. On Friday, they had a
Speaker 1: WWE Championship match between Cody Roads and Bronson Reid. Paul
Speaker 1: Haman set the trap earlier in the show. Cody took
Speaker 1: the bait and he convinced him to make it a
Speaker 1: title match, and for some reason, Paul Hayman didn't seem
Speaker 1: to be too bothered when bron Breaker and Logan Paul
Speaker 1: ran in to cause the disqualification and ruin their chances
Speaker 1: of winning the WWE Championship that he asked for. He's
Speaker 1: the one who pitched the idea of Hey, why don't
Speaker 1: you make this a title match? And Cody was like,
Speaker 1: WOOKI that's a great idea, Nick, make the match, and
Speaker 1: that's how we ended up with a w W Championship match.
Speaker 1: Paul him it didn't seem too bothered by it. Bronson
Speaker 1: Reid didn't seem too bothered by it either. None of
Speaker 1: that made any sense, but what happened at the end
Speaker 1: of the show was Reid squash Cody with a tsunami splash.
Speaker 1: So I think it's very likely that Bronson Reid is
Speaker 1: going to get bounced. He's going to get his come
Speaker 1: up and and that may be the big upset of
Speaker 1: the tournament. You gotta have at least one. You have
Speaker 1: to have at least one upset. If Javon Evans is
Speaker 1: not upsetting Gunther tomorrow night, then I think you have
Speaker 1: Carmelo Hayes eke out a win over Bronson Reed. Now
Speaker 1: he's not gonna look very strong at all if Bronson
Speaker 1: Reed just dominates him for ten minutes and then he
Speaker 1: only wins the match because Cody gets involved. But a
Speaker 1: win is a win, and he would advance to the
Speaker 1: next round. And then with Balor and Penta, there's a
Speaker 1: reason that I call him pin Balor. I don't see
Speaker 1: why this would be any different. I think that should
Speaker 1: be a win for Penta. We had a lot of
Speaker 1: developments this week on the war games front for the
Speaker 1: men's and women's teams. It will be five on five.
Speaker 1: In case anybody was wondering if they might shoot for
Speaker 1: four on four this year, the answer is no. Cody
Speaker 1: Rhodes will be in wargames. And if Cody is in
Speaker 1: war games, then it only makes sense that Drew McIntyre
Speaker 1: is in War Games as well. Right now, it is Cmpunk,
Speaker 1: Cody Rhodes and the ussos. They are all official. On
Speaker 1: the baby face side, Roman Reigns said that he did
Speaker 1: not want to see his cousins until Christmas. But I
Speaker 1: think he's showing up in Madison Square Garden tomorrow. And
Speaker 1: you know, I was talking to Noah Mark, our old
Speaker 1: pal Noah, and he pointed out that Roman had a
Speaker 1: total of six matches last year and he has had
Speaker 1: a total of six matches so far this year. And
Speaker 1: him telling the USOS that he doesn't want to see
Speaker 1: them until Christmas. You know, he was and that maybe
Speaker 1: he's contracted to a specific number of matches each year, right,
Speaker 1: as is the case I'm sure with brock lesnar probably
Speaker 1: so he won't be at Survivor Series and we won't
Speaker 1: see him in the ring again probably until the Royal Rumble.
Speaker 1: And it's an interesting theory. So I can't say that
Speaker 1: it would be impossible to conceive that Roman is contracted
Speaker 1: to a specific number of matches each year. Maybe he
Speaker 1: has hit his quota and that's it for him in
Speaker 1: twenty twenty five, I still say he shows up tomorrow night.
Speaker 1: But it's an interesting theory. Now if it is not Roman,
Speaker 1: it could still be John Cena or someone else like
Speaker 1: La Knight. And then they do the idea that I
Speaker 1: pitched a few weeks ago where Jimmy or or La
Speaker 1: Knight gets taken out the week before it's like, oh
Speaker 1: my god, who's going to be the fifth man, and
Speaker 1: that it ends up being John Cena as a surprise.
Speaker 1: Because we know Sina will be at Survivor's series, we
Speaker 1: just don't know what he's doing yet. Sena being in
Speaker 1: there actually kind of makes sense if Brock Lesner is
Speaker 1: going to round out the heel side. The only thing
Speaker 1: with that idea is that if they're right now, they're
Speaker 1: doing the exact same angle with the women after Charlotte
Speaker 1: Flair refused to team with Rhea Ripley and she walked
Speaker 1: out of SmackDown on Friday, so I don't know about
Speaker 1: running the same angle in both matches. The heel side
Speaker 1: now has bron Breaker, Bronson, Reid Logan, Paul and Drew McIntyre,
Speaker 1: with one spot left open that should be the Brock spot.
Speaker 1: McIntyre returned on Friday night. Nick Aldis was not happy
Speaker 1: about this the reason he was back one week after
Speaker 1: being suspended by All. This was because in the Wargames contract,
Speaker 1: Paul Hayman pointed out earlier in the show, I could
Speaker 1: sign anyone from any brand to join our team, even
Speaker 1: a SmackDown Star. That SmackDown star turned out to be
Speaker 1: Drew McIntyre. So that's their way of circumventing the suspension,
Speaker 1: which honestly, you would think would resume after Wargames. I mean,
Speaker 1: why would Nick All does not continue the suspension, suspension
Speaker 1: of disbelief. That's why they want you to check your
Speaker 1: brain at the door with this stuff. The Kabooki Warriors,
Speaker 1: they won the women's tag team titles from Charlotte Flair
Speaker 1: and Alexa Bliss on Monday Night. Then Rhea Ripley and
Speaker 1: Eosky came out to make the save after the match.
Speaker 1: So it looked to be Ria EO, Charlotte, Alexa and
Speaker 1: a fifth woman on the babyface side until they all
Speaker 1: got in the ring together on Friday and Charlotte said,
Speaker 1: I can't do this anymore. He said, Ria, I don't
Speaker 1: like you, I don't trust you. You're a snake. I
Speaker 1: can't forget the history that we have together and she said, Alexi,
Speaker 1: you can do this if you want, but I'm out
Speaker 1: and she left. So they're building drama because now the
Speaker 1: Babyfaces are two women short, right, what are they going
Speaker 1: to do? The heels have Oscar Kyrie, Naya Jack Slash Legend.
Speaker 1: My guess is Becky Lynch rounds out the five and
Speaker 1: on the other side, Charlotte eventually has a change of
Speaker 1: heart and rejoins them, and the fifth spot goes to
Speaker 1: aj Lee, who I think shows up to Madison Square
Speaker 1: Garden tomorrow night. We know AJ's in New York because
Speaker 1: she was at the Big Event yesterday. Boy, she had
Speaker 1: the longest line of anybody at the Big Event. Long
Speaker 1: after the event was supposed to be over, there was
Speaker 1: still a long ass line for aj Lee. So I
Speaker 1: don't know if she flew right back to Chicago or not,
Speaker 1: but at least as of yesterday, we know she's in
Speaker 1: New York. I'm just saying that makes it a little
Speaker 1: easier to believe that she may be at Madison Square
Speaker 1: Garden tomorrow. But Becky on that show tomorrow is defending
Speaker 1: her Intercontinental title against Maxine Duprix. Having Maxine in the
Speaker 1: Wargames match, you know it doesn't pack quite the same
Speaker 1: punch as aj being in there. I don't think any
Speaker 1: of this is leading to a Charlotte heel turn, by
Speaker 1: the way, just because they need Charlotte as a baby
Speaker 1: face to work with Jade Cargill like Jade needs challengers,
Speaker 1: Alexa Bliss and Charlotte Flair are two people for her
Speaker 1: to work with, especially now they don't have those tag
Speaker 1: team titles anymore. You have to keep them baby face
Speaker 1: at least for a few more months. Bailey and Lyra
Speaker 1: they drew the short stick here because they've had their
Speaker 1: issues with Oscar and Kyrie and they have no spot
Speaker 1: in war games unless Charlotte really is out, and then
Speaker 1: the last two spots go to Bailey and Lyra. But
Speaker 1: if Becky is joining the heel side, it really has
Speaker 1: to be someone on the opposing side that she's been
Speaker 1: beefing with recently, and her feud with Bailey and Lyra
Speaker 1: that's months old at this point. But we're actually getting
Speaker 1: a traditional Survivor Series elimination style match this year. We
Speaker 1: haven't had one in a while. We have the MFTs
Speaker 1: against Sammy Zain, Ray Phoenix, Shinsky, Nakhamora and the MotorCity
Speaker 1: machine Guns on SmackDown. Yes, the night before Survivor Series.
Speaker 1: We are getting a traditional Survivor Series elimination match. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I can't be too upset that they're doing it on
Speaker 1: TV instead of on the pl because it's the MFTs,
Speaker 1: so I'm not going to be sad they're not on
Speaker 1: the big show. But at least we're getting an elimination
Speaker 1: match this year. I think they should shoot to do
Speaker 1: one every year. The only thing is we are going
Speaker 1: to have to deal with three or four commercial breaks
Speaker 1: during the match. That's the thing that sucks about it
Speaker 1: being on TV, unless, of course, you're using your Express
Speaker 1: VPN like this guy here, then you don't have to
Speaker 1: worry about that. Now. On the TNA front, we had
Speaker 1: another example this week of lol TNA, which has lived
Speaker 1: on really for the entire eighteen years that I've been
Speaker 1: doing this podcast. You can find plenty of LOLTNA moments
Speaker 1: over the years, and as TNA has evolved and changed
Speaker 1: and come under new ownership, and they've even created some
Speaker 1: buzz around the product in recent months. We're still waiting
Speaker 1: for word on what this new TV deal is going
Speaker 1: to be. It's almost December already, Carlos Silva said that
Speaker 1: it was going to have to be a deal that
Speaker 1: kicked off at the beginning of twenty twenty six, so
Speaker 1: we're still waiting on that. But for all of that,
Speaker 1: one thing remains consistent, one thing we'll live on forever,
Speaker 1: and that is LOLTNA. Because this week, Mike Santana, who
Speaker 1: just had his big crowning moment at Bound for Glory
Speaker 1: right less than a month ago and became the TNA
Speaker 1: World Heavyweight Champion after a struggle that lasted most of
Speaker 1: this year, Mike Santana is no longer the TNA World
Speaker 1: Heavyweight Champion because Frankie Kazarian during Thursday night's Live Impact
Speaker 1: episode defeated Santana by cashing in his Call Your Shot
Speaker 1: Gauntlet trophy that he won actually co won with Nicknameth.
Speaker 1: At Bound for Glory, Santana made his one and only
Speaker 1: defense of the TNA World Championship on Thursday's episode. He
Speaker 1: beat Ryan Nemeth. It was some kind of I don't know,
Speaker 1: no contest or DQ whatever it was when a group
Speaker 1: of NXT stars and I used that word loosely, ran
Speaker 1: in and attacked Santana during the match and they went
Speaker 1: after the arm, and after the ring cleared, Kazarian cashed
Speaker 1: in his trophy and became the sixth Grand Slam champion
Speaker 1: in TNA history. Boy, we had a lot of Grand
Speaker 1: Slam history made this week, didn't we? In wrestling? So
Speaker 1: they took a month off. TNA had no shows, okay,
Speaker 1: for an entire month, and they came back with this
Speaker 1: TV taping They actually taped at Full Sale University on Thursday.
Speaker 1: And you have Lexus King, and you have Charlie Dempsey
Speaker 1: and Robert Stone, and you have Stacks and Brooks Jensen
Speaker 1: from nxt the NXT B team run into attack Mike
Speaker 1: Santana and injure him. This this was LOLTNA in every
Speaker 1: way because even the way he lost, Santana lost the
Speaker 1: championship in the worst possible way. After the company takes
Speaker 1: a month off, the first night he defends that championship,
Speaker 1: he gets attacked by these guys. They stomp on the arm,
Speaker 1: Kazarian cashes in. Santana go in the second match here
Speaker 1: after you know, Kazarian kesht and Santana's going for the
Speaker 1: spin the block lariat, but he stops. He gets a
Speaker 1: cramp in his arm and he gets rolled up. That
Speaker 1: is how he lost the title. And you can call
Speaker 1: it well it was arm pain. I'm gonna call it
Speaker 1: a cramp. He lost his championship on account of a
Speaker 1: cramp and Mike Santana's rain. Think about this as TNA
Speaker 1: World Champion, his first reign ends with his only other
Speaker 1: television appearance being a match with Cedric Alexander a few
Speaker 1: weeks ago, where he did not even bring the belt
Speaker 1: out with him to the ring because the match was
Speaker 1: taped the month before he won the belt. And now
Speaker 1: they're trying to build drama around this, and this is
Speaker 1: only making the situation worse because per pw Insider on Friday,
Speaker 1: this was quite the drama over the course of the
Speaker 1: day because they said, as of two pm Eastern this afternoon,
Speaker 1: Mike Santana has not arrived at tonight's TNA Turning Point
Speaker 1: pay per view. Call time for Talent was one pm Eastern. Santana,
Speaker 1: who dropped the title last night to Frankie Kazarian, did
Speaker 1: not appear for his scheduled meet and greet after the taping.
Speaker 1: The word making the way around Talent says that Santana
Speaker 1: has not returned the company's phone calls or texts. TNA
Speaker 1: officials did not return a request for comment, and they
Speaker 1: said Santana is slated to work tonight's pay per view
Speaker 1: main event, teaming with Steve Macklin against Kazarian and Nick Nemath,
Speaker 1: and then later in the day on Friday, PW Insider
Speaker 1: follows up and says Santana's current TNA deal is up
Speaker 1: at the end of the year. The belief is that
Speaker 1: he has an offer on the table from TNA for
Speaker 1: an extension. There has been WWE interest in Santana dating
Speaker 1: back months, but obviously the two sides work together, and
Speaker 1: it's entirely conceivable that they will work together as they
Speaker 1: did with Joe Hendry. There has been an assumption from
Speaker 1: some that last night's angle with Santana losing the title
Speaker 1: was to facilitate him leaving for NXT, but no one
Speaker 1: on the WWE SCA side has confirmed that that was
Speaker 1: the case. Then came Seawn ross Sap later on, who tweeted,
Speaker 1: the Santana thing is a work. Don't know how else
Speaker 1: to put it. TNA should have probably just posted that
Speaker 1: on their Twitter instead of feeding it to media like
Speaker 1: it was real. That's a no go for me. First
Speaker 1: time an official in any company has done that with us.
Speaker 1: So they tried to pass this thing off as a
Speaker 1: shoot where oh, he's been unreachable and he's ignoring the
Speaker 1: company's phone calls and texts and Santana is angry and
Speaker 1: this is all very very dumb. If this is all
Speaker 1: some angle, this is all some kind of work, This
Speaker 1: is so stupid. So like in storyline, why would Mike
Speaker 1: Santana be mad at TNA management and ghost them because
Speaker 1: they let Kazarian cash in on him after he was
Speaker 1: attacked by the B team. That's what the call your
Speaker 1: shot trophy is for. It's their version of money in
Speaker 1: the bank right played out as it is. Why would
Speaker 1: he be mad at them for that? Like everything about
Speaker 1: this is just so fucking dumb. And I'll tell you what, Like,
Speaker 1: my guess is that Santana is probably gonna stick around
Speaker 1: for a while longer with TNA. You know, he knows.
Speaker 1: I'm sure that he can appear on NXT if they
Speaker 1: call upon him. It's good they have that partnership. Mike
Speaker 1: Santana absolutely belongs in NXT. If NXT is the kind
Speaker 1: of the first you know, entry point for him to
Speaker 1: eventually get to the main roster. He is more than
Speaker 1: ready to be on Raar SmackDown, But Mike Santana belongs
Speaker 1: in NXT. You know, he should be in there wrestling
Speaker 1: guys like Ricky Saints and Oba Femi in a regular basis.
Speaker 1: If he wants to stay with TNA, that's that's his
Speaker 1: decision to make. But I just think ending his first
Speaker 1: championship run and he'll likely win it back and everybody
Speaker 1: will be like, oh see, you know he won it back. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's not the point though. For him to go in
Speaker 1: there after all these months and win the championship and
Speaker 1: to take it from him in the most anti climactic,
Speaker 1: just like Bush League way possible, is just incredibly stupid,
Speaker 1: where they're trying to work some kind of weird workshoot
Speaker 1: angle that really is not entertaining and it's not going
Speaker 1: to generate any new interest in the product or bring
Speaker 1: in any new fans. It's just going to piss off
Speaker 1: and alienate the people who already watched the product or cover.
Speaker 1: The product. Doesn't do anything for Mike Santana, doesn't do
Speaker 1: anything for Frankie Kazari, and it doesn't do anything for TNA.
Speaker 1: Just stupid.
Speaker 3: Who are these mystery opponents in the last time is
Speaker 3: now John Cena Tournament. Hey, it's Chris fan Fleet and
Speaker 3: I'm breaking that down on my podcast Insight.
Speaker 1: With Chris fan Fleet this week.
Speaker 3: I also just had one of my favorite interviews of
Speaker 3: the year with the legend himself, Mick Foley. Some other
Speaker 3: recent guests include EO Sky, Stephanie Vicaire, Joe Hendry, Shawn Michaels,
Speaker 3: Rhea Ripley, Samoa Joe, and many others. You can find
Speaker 3: Insight with Chris van Fleet on Spotify or Apple or
Speaker 3: wherever you're listening to this right now, or just search
Speaker 3: for Chris.
Speaker 1: Fan Fleet on YouTube. Again. It was good to see
Speaker 1: Chris at the Big event yesterday. And yeah, you see
Speaker 1: a lot of his content on YouTube, a lot of
Speaker 1: the full video interviews and the clips, but some people
Speaker 1: don't realize that the audio versions are available as well.
Speaker 1: He's got audio shows, so definitely go ahead and give
Speaker 1: those a listen and drop them a note, drop them
Speaker 1: a tweet, and let him know that you heard about
Speaker 1: the shows here on the SoundOff. On his recent episode
Speaker 1: of Talk Is Jericho, Chris Jericho made a comment that
Speaker 1: got a lot of people talking, and he had an
Speaker 1: episode with the Hardy's and the Dudleys discussing their match
Speaker 1: from TNA Bound for Glory this year, and Jericho is
Speaker 1: praising the match and the presentation really of the entire
Speaker 1: pay per view, saying that TNA looked like the second
Speaker 1: biggest company in the world that night. Yes said, I
Speaker 1: don't think I've watched an Impact sorry, a TNA match
Speaker 1: in ages, if not this decade at all. I was
Speaker 1: so impressed. Jericho said, Well, first of all, you guys
Speaker 1: had a match. Yeah, no, shit, I didn't even It
Speaker 1: wasn't even the match. It was the beginning part, before
Speaker 1: you guys even locked up. It was the end part
Speaker 1: after it happened like that. I'm getting a little goosebumps.
Speaker 1: That's pro wrestling in its ultimate form. That's all that matters,
Speaker 1: is that emotion and that reaction. That was one thing too.
Speaker 1: That fucking crowd looked huge. It looked huge. It was
Speaker 1: like a WWE level crowd. The place was packed. I
Speaker 1: was watching this and not saying anything out of school here,
Speaker 1: but comparing it to watching Dynamite when they were at
Speaker 1: the ECW Arena, which looked like a Tony Condello taping.
Speaker 1: Sorry it did. TNA looked like the second biggest company
Speaker 1: in the world, and that was amazing and the presentation
Speaker 1: was amazing. Yeah, he's gone, I mean we are. I
Speaker 1: think most people probably assumed he was gone anyway. I
Speaker 1: don't think that he's taken most of this year off, right,
Speaker 1: he's I mean off television since what April. I don't
Speaker 1: think he's taken most of this year off just to
Speaker 1: go right back to aaw But if you didn't believe
Speaker 1: it before, you can believe it now. That Chris Jericho
Speaker 1: is just preparing for that Royal Rumble return, I am sure,
Speaker 1: but I expect him back in WWE in the next
Speaker 1: few months. AJ Styles was on a podcast, not Chris
Speaker 1: Jericho's podcast, although he may well be wrestling him at
Speaker 1: some point next year. But AJ Styles was on a podcast,
Speaker 1: the No Contest Wrestling Podcast, talking about the lack of
Speaker 1: quality selling in wrestling today. He said he would like
Speaker 1: to see the industry return to way less is more
Speaker 1: type of approach. He said, I can tell you one
Speaker 1: thing that's missing, and I still to this day. I
Speaker 1: will go over to my buddy's house before we work
Speaker 1: out and we'll watch old school wrestling. It's what we do.
Speaker 1: That's kind of our thing. And the one thing I
Speaker 1: think is missing the most is selling. When he was
Speaker 1: asked to respond to name one thing that is missing
Speaker 1: in the modern wrestling era, he said, the way they
Speaker 1: used to sell back in the day, Man, they really
Speaker 1: made you believe that this hurt, that this guy's in pain.
Speaker 1: And I just feel like we've gotten away from that.
Speaker 1: And I'm just as guilty as anybody. But if we
Speaker 1: could take it back and make it a less as
Speaker 1: more kind of thing, I think that would be best
Speaker 1: for everybody. And naturally, he's going to say that the
Speaker 1: man is forty eight years old who wrestled a very
Speaker 1: high risk aerial style for a large swath of his career,
Speaker 1: and I'm sure he's feeling pretty beat up, and I'm
Speaker 1: sure he recognizes that as you get older as someone
Speaker 1: who is, you know, the crusty old veteran now in
Speaker 1: the wrestling business, that you know what, maybe it's not
Speaker 1: always the smartest thing to go out there, balls to
Speaker 1: the wall and do all of this risky, crazy, dangerous stuff.
Speaker 1: Maybe sometimes you could just slow things down a little bit.
Speaker 1: You do a little bit less, but you get more
Speaker 1: out of it, and that probably is something that comes
Speaker 1: with just experience and time, because when you're young, like
Speaker 1: some of these guys in NXT, you know you're a
Speaker 1: Leon Slater and TNA or a Javon Evans going out
Speaker 1: there twenty years old, twenty one years old. You use
Speaker 1: the tools that you have, right, Javon Evans is not
Speaker 1: a big guy. He's not gonna go out there and
Speaker 1: work a big man match. He's a lightweight, right, He's
Speaker 1: not exactly muscled up or anything like that. So he's
Speaker 1: going to use that to his advantage. He's gonna fly,
Speaker 1: he's gonna do things that dazzle you and make you go,
Speaker 1: holy shit, I can't believe you just did that. That's
Speaker 1: what made the match with him and Leon Slaters so
Speaker 1: much fun to watch because their styles so similar, their
Speaker 1: body types are so similar, and two of the best
Speaker 1: in the world of what they do right now. So
Speaker 1: they went out there and had this great match. But
Speaker 1: you do all of these moves and these dives, and
Speaker 1: you take these incredible risks, and at what point do
Speaker 1: you just go how do you top this? Like, where
Speaker 1: do you go from here? It's just the natural question
Speaker 1: to ask, and this has been the age old question
Speaker 1: of wrestling. This is not like a new phenomenon here.
Speaker 1: I'm just using them as an example. But I one
Speaker 1: hundred percent as a fan watching the shows, I one
Speaker 1: hundred percent of agree with AJ styles. Although I will say,
Speaker 1: you watch SmackDown each week, You've got Ilia Dragonov out
Speaker 1: there every week selling his ass off like he's on
Speaker 1: the verge of death in every match. Sometimes he may
Speaker 1: go a little over the top with it, but I
Speaker 1: appreciate the way that he sells in his matches. Dragonov
Speaker 1: is one of the few, honestly in wrestling today who
Speaker 1: can still sell in a way that is similar to
Speaker 1: a Brett Hart. And to me, Brett Hart will always
Speaker 1: be the master at it. There's a reason why Guerrilla
Speaker 1: Mond soon started calling him the excellence of execution. Brett
Speaker 1: Hart was the best when it came to selling a
Speaker 1: beating in a wrestling match and making it look as
Speaker 1: realistic as possible. When he was in there and he
Speaker 1: was down on the mat, thrown into the turnbuckles, taking
Speaker 1: that chest bump in the corner when the heel was
Speaker 1: working him over, you felt like this was a battle,
Speaker 1: This was a struggle for him. He was fighting for
Speaker 1: his life in there, and that type of selling is
Speaker 1: virtually non existent in wrestling these days. And I'll throw
Speaker 1: one more thing in there. And AJ didn't mention this,
Speaker 1: but I've brought this up before. I don't understand why
Speaker 1: we don't have that many wrestlers in wrestling today. It
Speaker 1: just feels like to me, who know how to throw
Speaker 1: a punch like those guys did back in the day.
Speaker 1: I can list off of and Brett's one of those guys,
Speaker 1: but Steve Austin and Scott Hall and Jeff Jarrett and
Speaker 1: Jerry Lawler. There are certain people who when they would
Speaker 1: throw like a closed fist and they would throw a
Speaker 1: work punch in a wrestling match, it looked devastating. It
Speaker 1: looked like they were really punching the guy in the
Speaker 1: fucking face. And I just feel like we don't have
Speaker 1: as much of that in wrestling now. And part of
Speaker 1: it is the fact that a lot of guys will
Speaker 1: throw forearms, which I think is something that I first
Speaker 1: started noticing that watching New Japan. I think it's a
Speaker 1: Japanese thing, you know, a strong style. I guess the
Speaker 1: logic behind it is, well, you don't want to break
Speaker 1: your hand so you throw a forearms so you can
Speaker 1: you could explain it in that fashion, but there's a
Speaker 1: lot of wrestlers who will do that. Now we have
Speaker 1: these forearm battles and these chop battles, yay boo, all
Speaker 1: this stuff, But just throwing a simple punch I think
Speaker 1: is a lost art. It really is. But the art
Speaker 1: of selling is so important in the course of a
Speaker 1: wrestling match. That's how you tell a story. You tell
Speaker 1: a story through the way that you are selling in
Speaker 1: the course of the match. And if you're going to
Speaker 1: make a big heroic comeback, that's part of the story
Speaker 1: that you're telling. So AJ is one hundred percent bang
Speaker 1: on in that. I think part of it. I don't
Speaker 1: want to excuse the talent, you know, the talent is
Speaker 1: guilty of it. AJ himself said, I'm guilty of it.
Speaker 1: But also it's I think just the nature of wrestling
Speaker 1: television now where everything is just there's this sense of
Speaker 1: urgency and the pace has been picked up so much
Speaker 1: and you've got to go from one to the other
Speaker 1: to the other, and the way these matches are constructed,
Speaker 1: and I see it a lot watching aw where it's
Speaker 1: just spot spots, spotspot spot, Right, we got to go
Speaker 1: from one big spot to the next thing. You don't
Speaker 1: leave any time for selling, and it's not just an
Speaker 1: aw thing, but I notice it a lot watching Dynamite
Speaker 1: week to week or the pay per views, and you
Speaker 1: just do this big spot. But I'll tell you what.
Speaker 1: I'll give you a WWE example, and I'll use Ilia
Speaker 1: Dragonov and the match that he just had with Axiom.
Speaker 1: So they just had this United States Championship Open Challenge
Speaker 1: on Friday, and Axiom did this great move where he
Speaker 1: did a backflip off the ropes while he was holding
Speaker 1: Dragonov's arm, and he caught Dragonov on the way down
Speaker 1: with this spike DDT and it looked fantastic, right, this
Speaker 1: great fucking move, And of course you know he didn't
Speaker 1: win the match with it, but shortly thereafter we had
Speaker 1: a top rope Spanish fly spot an Axiom hit a
Speaker 1: top rope Spanish fly and went Immediately after that, he
Speaker 1: went to go set it for his finisher, which was
Speaker 1: the Golden Ratio, and Dragonov caught him with a torpedo
Speaker 1: moscow coming out of the corner and head butted him
Speaker 1: right in the fucking face or chest or whatever it was,
Speaker 1: and it looked great. It was a great closing sequence
Speaker 1: and it got the fans into it. But you know what,
Speaker 1: I'm watching this and I said this on Friday, I'm like, boy,
Speaker 1: the top rope Spanish fly really doesn't mean what it
Speaker 1: used to. That's just one example of these big moves
Speaker 1: that these guys do, and it just it's a setup
Speaker 1: move or it sets up a near fall and the
Speaker 1: match just keeps going. That's why I love how Penta
Speaker 1: when he left AW and came to WWE, they at
Speaker 1: least have really taken great pains to make the destroyer
Speaker 1: a finishing move. It is no longer just a setup move.
Speaker 1: It's not just another move. It's a move he actually
Speaker 1: wins matches with. And I appreciate that, but it just
Speaker 1: goes to this problem that I've noticed in wrestling today.
Speaker 1: And maybe if you're a newer fan, you don't see
Speaker 1: it as a problem because you have no concept of
Speaker 1: what wrestling used to be like. To you, this is
Speaker 1: what wrestling is. It's balls to the wall, NonStop, boom boom, boom,
Speaker 1: spotspot spot, and anything else is boring. All this guy,
Speaker 1: he's why is he on the mat? He's just laying there,
Speaker 1: he's making faces. Fucking boring. Some people don't like that,
Speaker 1: but I'm with aj on this one. I think it's
Speaker 1: It's definitely something that has become a lost art because
Speaker 1: I feel like wrestlers are too afraid to slow the
Speaker 1: pace of the match down. I think they're too afraid
Speaker 1: to slow the pace of the match in. I think
Speaker 1: there are definitely absolutely some wrestlers out there who pay
Speaker 1: too much attention to social media and social media comments
Speaker 1: and they don't want to log on and scroll through
Speaker 1: their timeline and see all this match sucked. This match
Speaker 1: was boring, This match was slow, This match was dull,
Speaker 1: And there are matches that are just a little too
Speaker 1: slow paced, right. You just got to find that happy medium.
Speaker 1: But I think that's part of the problem. And there's
Speaker 1: just just this constant need to Okay, we got to
Speaker 1: keep things moving here, We got to do another big
Speaker 1: move because we don't want to lose the crowd and
Speaker 1: we want to get those chants. We don't want them
Speaker 1: to lose interest in what we're doing here. And it's
Speaker 1: just a different way of doing things, you know, than
Speaker 1: it was back in the day. You can borrow from
Speaker 1: the old school on certain things. Not everything has to
Speaker 1: be old school. Things change, things evolve, but there is
Speaker 1: a lot from the old school that I think if
Speaker 1: you were to educate and condition the current audience that
Speaker 1: this is the way it should be, they would buy
Speaker 1: into it, and I think it would really help the
Speaker 1: product a lot. Today's episode is sponsored by Better Help.
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Speaker 1: dot com slash solom Monster. That's better h elp dot
Speaker 1: com slash solo Monster. Wednesday night was aw's big Blooding
Speaker 1: Gut show from Greensboro, which shot up to six hundred
Speaker 1: thousand viewers on TBS. That's up almost twenty one percent
Speaker 1: from the previous week. It's the first time they've touched
Speaker 1: six hundred k since September, and that was under the
Speaker 1: old Nielsen system. The numbers for wrestling across the board
Speaker 1: have been down under the new methodology, so there was
Speaker 1: definitely interest in this show. Ricky the Dragon Steamboat made
Speaker 1: a cameo on the show with his history in Greensboro,
Speaker 1: and he shot an angle with FTR where they roughed
Speaker 1: him up a little bit until Brodido came out to
Speaker 1: make the save and Ricky tagged them with a few
Speaker 1: shots of his own. Not bad for seventy two. Rick Flair,
Speaker 1: on the other hand, did not make it on to
Speaker 1: TV even though he was there. Tony Kahan brought him
Speaker 1: out before the show to address the live crowd, but
Speaker 1: he left right after as he was said to be
Speaker 1: in a ton of pain from a rotator cuff. Tear
Speaker 1: I said watching that segment this feels like Flair was
Speaker 1: supposed to be out there. It felt like it was
Speaker 1: planned for both of them. So it was strange that,
Speaker 1: you know, he didn't make an appearance. I mean, I
Speaker 1: not that I needed him on the show, but it
Speaker 1: just felt like this show was, this segment was designed
Speaker 1: for him to be there, and then all of a
Speaker 1: sudden he wasn't. You know, if you wanted blood, you
Speaker 1: got plenty of blood on the show. One thing you
Speaker 1: cannot say is that when AW does this stipulation, they
Speaker 1: don't go far enough, right. Why don't they go all
Speaker 1: the way with it? Why don't they take full advantage
Speaker 1: of it. When you have a blood and gut show,
Speaker 1: AW will give you more than enough blood. So you
Speaker 1: definitely got that, But there was a lot. My biggest
Speaker 1: criticism honestly, of these matches, if I had to boil
Speaker 1: it down to one, and it was more of an
Speaker 1: issue in the men's match. But my issue is that
Speaker 1: you have this cage that is covering these two rings,
Speaker 1: and the idea of blood and Guts is that you're
Speaker 1: trapped inside the cage and you just go in there
Speaker 1: and kill each other. And you know, and we've seen
Speaker 1: it in past Blood and Guts matches and you know
Speaker 1: other maybe war games matches sometimes where people will end
Speaker 1: up brawling outside the cage. But this was just out
Speaker 1: of control on Wednesday. Now, there was so much shit
Speaker 1: going on outside the cage that it was just it
Speaker 1: was very dumb. I think they overdid it on all
Speaker 1: of the action that took place outside the actual cage,
Speaker 1: which to me defeats the entire purpose of what Blood
Speaker 1: and Guts is supposed to be, So that would be
Speaker 1: my biggest criticism of it. But otherwise, I think the
Speaker 1: two matches delivered exactly what you were looking for. If
Speaker 1: this was something that you were looking forward to seeing.
Speaker 1: If you were looking forward to Blood and Guts and
Speaker 1: you wanted hardcore violence and weapons and all kinds of
Speaker 1: crazy insanity, you got it. You know you got it.
Speaker 1: On the show, we had the first ever women's Blood
Speaker 1: and Guts match. They went forty five minutes, and they
Speaker 1: clearly went out there with something to prove. Every woman,
Speaker 1: I thought, at one point or another in this match
Speaker 1: had a chance to shine. They had some kind of
Speaker 1: moment or spot or something, you know, to try to
Speaker 1: let them stand out. You had a lot of blood,
Speaker 1: you had a lot of broken glass, which is really
Speaker 1: just another Wednesday in aw Sky Blue was in there first.
Speaker 1: She was one of the first people in the match,
Speaker 1: and in the first probably four minutes of the match,
Speaker 1: if that she was bleeding. When I say she was bleeding,
Speaker 1: she was bleeding, like the blood was gushing out of
Speaker 1: the top of her head. And what happened to cause
Speaker 1: that was just so lame. I mean she I think
Speaker 1: it was Willow, but she had her up in a
Speaker 1: power bomb position and basically kind of threw her backwards,
Speaker 1: face first into the steel. And look, I'm not saying
Speaker 1: that it's fun to have your face thrown into a
Speaker 1: chain link fence, but of all the things that these
Speaker 1: women did to each other in this match, that that's
Speaker 1: simple spot would cause that type of blood loss. And
Speaker 1: in the first five minutes of the match it was like, okay,
Speaker 1: I think we went from zero to one hundred a
Speaker 1: little too quick here. That was a little ridiculous. So
Speaker 1: she stood out for that though, because by the she
Speaker 1: was in there for so long bleeding that by the
Speaker 1: time the match was over, a lot of the blood
Speaker 1: was gone and dried up. But for a good portion
Speaker 1: of the match she was just covered in blood and
Speaker 1: then caked in blood. So Sky Blue stood out for
Speaker 1: that reason. To me, though, the real standouts in this
Speaker 1: match honestly were Megan Bain and Marina Shaffir. Those are
Speaker 1: the two women who stood out the most to me.
Speaker 1: I like the way they did the finish that closing sequence.
Speaker 1: It made sense. They had Tony Storm was in there
Speaker 1: and Mina Shirakawa was in there as well, and their
Speaker 1: tag team partners in this women's tag team title tournament,
Speaker 1: and they're like best friends now, and you had the Heels,
Speaker 1: you had the triangle of madness holding down Tony Storms.
Speaker 1: So all she could do was watch as Marina Shaffir
Speaker 1: locked in this choke on Mina and Megan Bain was
Speaker 1: just brutalizing her with it might have been Mercedes TBS Championship,
Speaker 1: but she had one of the championship belts, and she's
Speaker 1: whipping her hard right across the back, over and over
Speaker 1: and over and over again, and right in front of
Speaker 1: Tony Storm, and all she could do is watch, and
Speaker 1: then finally she surrenders to save her friend and to
Speaker 1: save her partner, and the Heels win blood and guts,
Speaker 1: and it made sense in terms of the storytelling, because
Speaker 1: it's pretty clear that it's not official yet, but Tony
Speaker 1: and Mina they're gonna wrestle Megan Bane and Marina Shafir
Speaker 1: in the next round. So this really of that tag
Speaker 1: team title tournament. So this really puts some heat on
Speaker 1: a match that otherwise wouldn't have had any you know
Speaker 1: going into it. That's the story they told with that finish,
Speaker 1: it will play into this tournament. And can I also
Speaker 1: just say, like, what a beast Megan Bain is? Like?
Speaker 1: This woman shows up in Japan to work the Goddesses
Speaker 1: of Stardom Tag Team League tournament on Friday, the Tag
Speaker 1: League that would have been on the seventh, right, November seventh.
Speaker 1: Three straight nights she worked, then she flew back to
Speaker 1: the United States for blooding guts of all matches, right
Speaker 1: bleeding with tax sticking out of her body. Then she
Speaker 1: flew right back to Japan to continue in the tournament.
Speaker 1: Then she flies back to the States for Full Gear
Speaker 1: just coming up next weekend. For whatever they may have
Speaker 1: her doing on that show. At least I think that
Speaker 1: was the plan for her to be a part of
Speaker 1: Full Gear in some way, only to then fly right
Speaker 1: back to Japan to finish the tournament, back and forth
Speaker 1: multiple times in the span of three weeks. You talk
Speaker 1: about jet lag. She's gonna end up topping Hogan's record
Speaker 1: of wrestling four hundred days in a year with that
Speaker 1: time zone difference. Then we had the men's blooding guts match.
Speaker 1: The women's one went forty five minutes. This one went
Speaker 1: almost an hour. This one went fifty four minutes, which
Speaker 1: it did not need to go fifty four minutes. And
Speaker 1: again you had people freely going in and out of
Speaker 1: the cage throughout the match. I gotta tell you, I
Speaker 1: was pretty bored through the first half of this match.
Speaker 1: There's not a lot of heat. It was a lot
Speaker 1: of the same rinse repeat stuff we had already seen
Speaker 1: in the opening match. It picked up nicely though in
Speaker 1: the closing stretch. There was nothing crazy off the top
Speaker 1: of the cage. Mark Briscoe, who they did this angle
Speaker 1: where Briscoe was taken out in the back by the
Speaker 1: don Kallis family. So now the conglomeration in Darby Allen,
Speaker 1: they're a man down. Oh my god, what are they
Speaker 1: going to do? And of course Mark Briscow ends up
Speaker 1: coming out anyway, so he did wrestle in the match,
Speaker 1: he ended up on top of the cage with Wheeler Dah.
Speaker 1: He actually gave Wheelerda Jade railler on top of the cage,
Speaker 1: but then they climbed down, so there was no big
Speaker 1: crazy stunt bump off the top of the cage this year,
Speaker 1: which is fine. The big crazy spot belonged to Darby
Speaker 1: Allen surprise, surprise, and because there was so much fighting
Speaker 1: and brawling happening outside the cage, they ended up on
Speaker 1: top of one of the entrance tunnels. Gabe Kidd had
Speaker 1: run out to also assist the Death Riders, even though
Speaker 1: he wasn't supposed to be in the match, but they
Speaker 1: had tables set up next to the stage next to
Speaker 1: one of the tunnels, and on top of the tunnel
Speaker 1: pack Gorilla presses Darby over his head and he dumps
Speaker 1: them all the way down. After Gabe Kids set those
Speaker 1: tables down below a blaze and Darby crashes through the
Speaker 1: tables and he is engulfed in flames. He's like a
Speaker 1: ball of flames, and you could even see where his
Speaker 1: back was on fire for a few seconds even after
Speaker 1: he took the bump, like the flames didn't extinguish right away,
Speaker 1: and because when he rolled over you could see that
Speaker 1: there were spots on his back where he was on fire.
Speaker 1: And that was the last we saw of Darby Allen
Speaker 1: in this match, and that led into the finish, which
Speaker 1: I thought was great. Kyle O'Reilly was also everyone was bleeding,
Speaker 1: but Kyle O'Reilly is just bleeding profusely. They gave the
Speaker 1: win to Kyle O'Reilly. He was the MVP. He won
Speaker 1: it for the Conglomeration. It was the biggest win of
Speaker 1: his aw career by far. But it made sense because
Speaker 1: they had a couple of matches recently on TV where
Speaker 1: Moxley was doing everything in his power to avoid being
Speaker 1: trapped in a submission and tapping out, which is what
Speaker 1: he did against Darby at Wrestle Dream when he was
Speaker 1: locked in the Scorpion deathlock. He did not want to
Speaker 1: go through that again, so he did everything in those
Speaker 1: matches to avoid tapping out. Only here in blood and
Speaker 1: Guts to finally tap out and the crowd went crazy
Speaker 1: for the finish. So I liked the storytelling here. I
Speaker 1: like the storytelling at the end of the women's match.
Speaker 1: I like the storytelling at the end of the men's match.
Speaker 1: Me personally, I'm not a huge fan of some of
Speaker 1: the excess violence and stunt bumps and all the blood
Speaker 1: is fine, but then you just kind of go overboard
Speaker 1: with it, so that's that's not my thing necessarily. But
Speaker 1: I love the finishes of the matches. I was a
Speaker 1: fan of that and so much for this leading to
Speaker 1: anything with Moxley and the Death Riders. This was the
Speaker 1: finish that I pitched, and I was happy they did it.
Speaker 1: I said, it has to be Moxley. Moxley has to
Speaker 1: be the one who surrenders in this match, and that
Speaker 1: could be the beginning of the end of the Death Riders.
Speaker 1: I wasn't necessarily expecting them to gang up on him
Speaker 1: on Wednesday and beat the shit out of him. Maybe
Speaker 1: this coming Wednesday. But then, you know, I caught up
Speaker 1: with what I needed to catch up with this morning
Speaker 1: from Collision last night, and I see that the Death
Speaker 1: Riders were on the show, and I see that John
Speaker 1: Moxley was on commentary for the opening match on the show,
Speaker 1: and he's brushing off their loss in blood and guts.
Speaker 1: He's preaching about I just want to bring positivity into
Speaker 1: this world, which was fucking hilarious. So I don't know
Speaker 1: if the idea is that he is just completely you know,
Speaker 1: out to lunch and he is completely delusional about all
Speaker 1: these losses that he has incurred for his crew, because
Speaker 1: this is now the third big loss since all in
Speaker 1: that John Moxley has suffered to embarrass the Death Riders,
Speaker 1: including losing the championship to Hangman Page. But there was
Speaker 1: no hint. There was no indication of anything with Moxley
Speaker 1: and the Death Riders or him being on the outs
Speaker 1: or anything like that. And maybe it'll happen, but if
Speaker 1: it is, there was no fucking sign of it on
Speaker 1: Collision last night, which I think is ridiculous. Now AW
Speaker 1: presents its Full Gear pay per view this coming Saturday
Speaker 1: from the Prudential Center in Newark, New Jersey, with a
Speaker 1: seven o'clock start time for their Tailgate Brawl pre show
Speaker 1: eight pm start time for the main card. They're doing
Speaker 1: a tag team match on the pre show with Big
Speaker 1: Boom aj of the Costco guys teaming up with Q T. Marshall. Yes,
Speaker 1: they're on the same side now. They set this up
Speaker 1: on Ring of Honor Television. They share an I'm an
Speaker 1: enemy in the don Kallis Family. They take on Trent
Speaker 1: Burretta and Rocky Romero. You know, keeping the Costco guys
Speaker 1: stuff to the pre show is where it belongs. I
Speaker 1: can't believe the Costco guy stuff is still going on here,
Speaker 1: but keep it to the pre show. Fine. He has
Speaker 1: no business being on the main card when they already
Speaker 1: have a ton of matches on their main cards, So
Speaker 1: keep it on the pre show. That's fine. If I'm
Speaker 1: aj I'd be watching some old sting Rick Flair Horseman
Speaker 1: tapes to prepare myself for what's probably about to happen
Speaker 1: to him. Also, they've added a two hundred thousand dollars
Speaker 1: tag team match. Boy Tony Khan has a little too
Speaker 1: much money to throw around two hundred thousand dollars with
Speaker 1: the Acclaimed who don't want to have anything to do
Speaker 1: with each other, but they're being forced back together slowly
Speaker 1: week by week. The Bang Bang Gang, Big Bill and
Speaker 1: Brian Keith and the Outrunners winner gets two hundred thousand dollars.
Speaker 1: It would be more entertaining to see the Outrunners win
Speaker 1: the fake money, but they don't do anything with the Outrunners,
Speaker 1: so it'll probably be Castor and Bowen's winning the money.
Speaker 1: On the main card, They're gonna crown the first ever
Speaker 1: aw National champion with a casino gauntlet match. I already
Speaker 1: talked about the national title last week, which is completely unnecessary.
Speaker 1: All we know so far is that Bobby Lashley, Shelton,
Speaker 1: Benjamin Ricochet, the Gates of Agony, and Jet Speed have
Speaker 1: all declared for the match, and without knowing who else
Speaker 1: is in the damn thing, it's hard to predict a
Speaker 1: new champion, but I'll toss one name out there and
Speaker 1: say that we get the return of Switchblade Jay White.
Speaker 1: Jay White walks out as the new national champion. I
Speaker 1: still think adding this title is completely unnecessary and dilutes
Speaker 1: their other belts. MVP's boys are in he is not,
Speaker 1: but I do have some news on MVP. He spoke
Speaker 1: with the website Adventuregamers dot Com and he revealed that
Speaker 1: he just signed a contract extension with aw saying I'll
Speaker 1: be with AWE for quite a while in my current
Speaker 1: capacity and hopefully beyond in a managerial capacity and to
Speaker 1: whatever extent, possibly behind the scenes. But he talked about
Speaker 1: other stuff too, and in comparing Tony Khan to Paul
Speaker 1: Levek and Vince McMahon. He said, it's very different because
Speaker 1: Tony Khan is a completely different human being with a
Speaker 1: completely different personality. He's just a nice guy and a
Speaker 1: good person. I've never had any kind of relationship with
Speaker 1: Triple H Vince. I was able to work with and
Speaker 1: with Vince. Vince knows exactly what he wants, how he
Speaker 1: wants to do it, and if you can present something
Speaker 1: that is better, sometimes Vince will listen. But when Vince
Speaker 1: has a vision, that's it. You go with it. There's
Speaker 1: no second guessing it. Tony Khan is a lot more
Speaker 1: interactive and he will take in a lot more ideas.
Speaker 1: He's more willing to be pliable when it comes to
Speaker 1: his vision and how he wants to present it and
Speaker 1: what he's willing to do or add or change it.
Speaker 1: He's just a nice guy. It's funny like his energy level.
Speaker 1: He's always happy and I've never seen him be mean
Speaker 1: to somebody. It's a much different environment where WWE was
Speaker 1: very corporate, very tight laced for some people, even uncomfortable,
Speaker 1: and they're made to feel like they're walking on eggshells
Speaker 1: and people are scared of getting fired. That environment doesn't
Speaker 1: exist in aw, it's way more relaxed. No one's walking
Speaker 1: on eggshells. The boss has time for everybody and it's
Speaker 1: super fun. No stress on Bret Hart and others who
Speaker 1: have criticized Paul Levec, who he is no fan of.
Speaker 1: He's made that very clear. MVP was very blunt, he said,
Speaker 1: I've said before, I call him a coward and a liar.
Speaker 1: Let's put it like this. If you really want to,
Speaker 1: you can go to YouTube and you can look up
Speaker 1: the interviews of various wrestlers through the years of what
Speaker 1: their opinion is of the man, interviews of guys that
Speaker 1: were his friends, what they had to say about the guy.
Speaker 1: I can think of more guys that dislike him than
Speaker 1: I can think of ones that do like him, and
Speaker 1: people say MVP's salty or he's bitter like no. I
Speaker 1: have personal issues with the dudes, stemming from professional stuff,
Speaker 1: but just the things that he does, how he carries himself.
Speaker 1: I just don't have respect for the guy. The newer
Speaker 1: generation they don't know that guy yet. So the ones
Speaker 1: that came up underneath him in NXT, they think he's
Speaker 1: brilliant and a lot of them should. For the hand
Speaker 1: that he's had in their career. But the guys that
Speaker 1: had to work with him back in the day will
Speaker 1: tell you a different story, almost overwhelmingly. And so it's
Speaker 1: not just me saying it. It's Sports Illustrated saying it.
Speaker 1: It's the Bleacher Report. Oh no, I'm sorry. I just
Speaker 1: I'm thinking of a different promo here, he said. So
Speaker 1: it's not just me saying it. There's guys who are
Speaker 1: way up the totem pole than me that are telling
Speaker 1: you that this guy's no bueno. I don't know where
Speaker 1: the heat stems from. I mean, it stems from the
Speaker 1: MVP side at the very least, but what caused it,
Speaker 1: we don't know. He's never pointed, to my knowledge, he's
Speaker 1: never pointed to any one specific incident, although supposedly it
Speaker 1: may go back to when he was first on SmackDown
Speaker 1: years ago as a wrestler. So now we're going back
Speaker 1: to like the mid to late two thousands. So this
Speaker 1: is not just a recent thing, because he knew Triple
Speaker 1: H from the days you know of him as an
Speaker 1: inn ring performer, when Triple H cared about Triple H
Speaker 1: and nothing else, right, not the Papa H crap that
Speaker 1: people talk about now, which is creepy as hell, by
Speaker 1: the way, when people call him that, So I can't
Speaker 1: speak to his personal experiences with the man. Clearly, something
Speaker 1: he said or the way he carried himself when dealing
Speaker 1: with him rubbed MVP the wrong way and it gave
Speaker 1: him an impression of Triple H that really made him
Speaker 1: lose all respect for the man. The stories about Triple
Speaker 1: H have been out there for years, right going back
Speaker 1: over twenty years, about how self absorbed he was, you know,
Speaker 1: trying to protect his spot, making comment which, by the way,
Speaker 1: a lot of top guys have done in wrestling over
Speaker 1: the decades, but most, if not all, of those top
Speaker 1: guys did not have the power and position that Triple
Speaker 1: H found himself in in WWE. Not all of them
Speaker 1: can be part of that inner circle and those production
Speaker 1: meetings and the way the Triple H was when he
Speaker 1: was still a performer. That's the big difference here. But
Speaker 1: he's very protective of his spot. He would make comments
Speaker 1: about guys behind their back that you know, may well
Speaker 1: have affected their career in some cases, depending on what
Speaker 1: he's saying in these meetings to a Vince McMahon or
Speaker 1: a Bruce Pritchard or a Pat Patterson or whoever would
Speaker 1: have had some level of power and influence at the time,
Speaker 1: like oh, hey, this guy doesn't have it, or hey,
Speaker 1: this guy did this, or hey this guy did that,
Speaker 1: or he's too small, you know, whatever the comments were
Speaker 1: that could have a profound effect on someone's career. Now,
Speaker 1: are we to believe that, as he's gotten older and
Speaker 1: his priorities and his responsibilities have changed to where it's
Speaker 1: not all about him anymore, that he's a change man? Right?
Speaker 1: I'm not around him. I don't work for him. I
Speaker 1: can't say for sure. And also keep in mind that,
Speaker 1: you know, Triple H almost died a few years ago,
Speaker 1: so that could change your worldview real quick. As of viewer,
Speaker 1: what I see on TV and what I see from
Speaker 1: all of the interviews and podcasts and Ted Talks and
Speaker 1: whatever else this guy's been doing is that he still
Speaker 1: has a very, very healthy ego and he likes to
Speaker 1: make things about himself. That hasn't changed. I don't think
Speaker 1: that part of Triple Ah has changed, And I joked
Speaker 1: about it when I saw him in the ring on
Speaker 1: Monday in Boston. The first person we saw on the
Speaker 1: show on what should have been a segment all about
Speaker 1: John Cena. He had to be there front and center,
Speaker 1: knowing the house was sold out, to make sure that
Speaker 1: he was involved when he really was not needed right,
Speaker 1: not when raw was already they already have a general
Speaker 1: manager on the show. Yet there he was, right the
Speaker 1: credits at the end of the shows, which we never
Speaker 1: had before, all of a sudden the last couple of years.
Speaker 1: Now we do to make sure that Paul Levec is
Speaker 1: the first name that we see at the end of
Speaker 1: every show WrestleMania in Vegas next year. When the first
Speaker 1: commercial dropped a few weeks ago, who was the first
Speaker 1: face that we saw in the ad? Paulovec the signature
Speaker 1: that opens every show. He made sure to add his
Speaker 1: voice to it, so it's the first thing we hear
Speaker 1: on every show. He is enjoying his new position. That
Speaker 1: much is clear. The ego is still there. Beyond that,
Speaker 1: when it comes to the way he treats people, MVP
Speaker 1: would know better than I would. But it is an
Speaker 1: interesting point that he makes about how different the perspective
Speaker 1: might be for someone coming up in that system in
Speaker 1: the last decade. Let's say, who would have worked with
Speaker 1: him in NXT and now on the main roster. They're
Speaker 1: working with him there too, as compared to the people
Speaker 1: who worked with him fifteen years ago, twenty years ago,
Speaker 1: and they saw a very different side of Triple H.
Speaker 1: You look at Shawn Michaels, he's mister NXT right now
Speaker 1: and people glow about Shawn Michaels. That wasn't the case
Speaker 1: thirty years ago. But how much of that was also
Speaker 1: him being hopped up on god knows what. He may
Speaker 1: have been an asshole anyway, but I'm sure that that
Speaker 1: didn't help. Every now and then a story will leak
Speaker 1: out about an interaction that someone had with him after
Speaker 1: he came back to the company and he became born again.
Speaker 1: That doesn't really paint him in the best light, right.
Speaker 1: Shane Helms had one of those stories many years ago,
Speaker 1: Dax Harwood, Stevie Richards. Just to remind you that the
Speaker 1: old Shawn Michaels is still there, like buried beneath the surface.
Speaker 1: But I bring him up because by and large, people
Speaker 1: are very complimentary of him today, and how much you
Speaker 1: know he is a pleasure to work with and how
Speaker 1: great of a boss he is to work for. People
Speaker 1: can change. I'm not so sure that's the case with
Speaker 1: Triple h but people can change, but back to full gear.
Speaker 1: In the first ever million dollar trios match, More Money,
Speaker 1: Kenny Omega and Jurassic Express they take on Josh Alexander
Speaker 1: and the Young Bucks. I'm going with Josh Alexander and
Speaker 1: the Young Bucks for the win. Mark Briscoe challenges Kyle
Speaker 1: Fletcher for the TNT Championship no disqualification, and if Briscoe loses,
Speaker 1: he must join the don Kallis family. Because if there's
Speaker 1: one thing we need, actually two things, if there's two
Speaker 1: things we need in this company, it's more belts and
Speaker 1: more members of the don Kallis Family. Mark Briscoe failed
Speaker 1: in his first attempt. I think he wins the title. Here.
Speaker 1: We have a new TNT champion, Brody King and Bendido.
Speaker 1: They defend their aw World Tag Team titles against the
Speaker 1: former champions FTR Dax in Cash. I think they're taking
Speaker 1: the titles here to set up for the eventual return
Speaker 1: of Adam Copeland and the inevitable Cope and Christian tag
Speaker 1: team match. They've added the Bastard Pack against Darby Allen.
Speaker 1: After Pack preslam Darby through a flaming table and blood
Speaker 1: and guts still with Darby and the Death Riders, we
Speaker 1: are continuing this. This should be a win for Darby,
Speaker 1: the reigning TBS champion now Mercedes thirteen. Else after last
Speaker 1: night's House of Glory show, You're a new Apak Wrestling
Speaker 1: Women's Champion, Mercedes Monette is looking for title number fourteen
Speaker 1: when she challenges Chris Statlander for the aw Women's World Championship.
Speaker 1: A year ago at Full Gear, Monette beat Statlander to
Speaker 1: retain the TBS title, and then she beat her again
Speaker 1: at World's End. Two great matches but two losses. For Statlander.
Speaker 1: She got a measure of revenge in Blood and Guts,
Speaker 1: where she put Mercedes through a table outside the cage
Speaker 1: with a Samoan drop, even though her team did go
Speaker 1: on to lose. This needs to be a Statlander win.
Speaker 1: I think it will be a Chris Statlander win, and
Speaker 1: she will retain her title, not only because she has
Speaker 1: already lost twice to this woman, but because the story
Speaker 1: should be Mercedes cannot win the world championship. This is
Speaker 1: now her second bite at the Apple. The one blemish
Speaker 1: on her record came against Tony Storm at all In
Speaker 1: she didn't get the job done. That will be the
Speaker 1: result here as well. No matter how many belts she
Speaker 1: collects to make herself feel better, she cannot win the
Speaker 1: big one, and maybe thirteen ends up being her unlucky number.
Speaker 1: So she fails again here, and then she starts to
Speaker 1: drop each one of those belts one by one until
Speaker 1: she is left with nothing. And then and only then
Speaker 1: does she finally win the world title. That's the story
Speaker 1: they tell with this, and that's the one that makes
Speaker 1: sense here, because to put your world title on someone
Speaker 1: only for her to then go out and start losing
Speaker 1: a bunch of different independent belts doesn't really make a
Speaker 1: whole lot of sense. You have her do that first,
Speaker 1: then you put the world championship on her. But before
Speaker 1: this match, Mercedes is wrestling Red Velvet in a title
Speaker 1: unification on Dynamite for the Ring of Honor Women's Television title.
Speaker 1: Mercedes has the interim title, Velvet's been out with an
Speaker 1: injury since June. She has the actual belt. I don't
Speaker 1: think this would count as number fourteen because she already
Speaker 1: has the interim version. It would just go from interim
Speaker 1: to official and Hangman Adam Page defends the aw World
Speaker 1: Championship in a steel cage match against Samoa Joe. This
Speaker 1: is to keep Powerhouse Hobbs and Katiori Shabada out of
Speaker 1: the match, and we all know how well these cages
Speaker 1: were to prevent that from happening. By the way, we're
Speaker 1: also coming off two blood and Guts matches and now
Speaker 1: we're getting a standalone cage match, which is just ridiculous.
Speaker 1: Of course, Hangman is retaining, he's not losing the title,
Speaker 1: and I believe we get the return of MJF after
Speaker 1: the match is over. That's the big cliffhanger they go
Speaker 1: off the air with, which leads to him cashing in
Speaker 1: his Casino Gauntlet contract for a championship match at World's end,
Speaker 1: and at that point, I think you're looking at the
Speaker 1: brand new aw World Champion. Now it doesn't look like
Speaker 1: we're going to get the finals of the women's tag
Speaker 1: team title tournament on this show on Dynamite Wednesday, we
Speaker 1: have two quarterfinal round matches. It's Tony Storm and Mina
Speaker 1: Shirakawa taking on Riho and Alex Windsor, and then Taj
Speaker 1: takes on Megan Bain and Marina Shafears. So just time wise,
Speaker 1: I don't think there's any time left to do the
Speaker 1: finals on the pay per view, but that's coming up
Speaker 1: on Wednesday, which, by the way, is a three hour show.
Speaker 1: It is a combined dynamite and collision show three hours.
Speaker 1: The two most evil words in my vocabulary all week.
Speaker 1: It won't be a three hour mail bag. I'll promise
Speaker 1: you that. Let's go through these questions here. You can
Speaker 1: email me the Soolom Monster at gmail dot com. Please
Speaker 1: include your name and where you are from when you
Speaker 1: write in. Dane from Saint Louis did want to mention
Speaker 1: he got notified that Eric Bischoff's book Grateful by Eric
Speaker 1: Bischoff and Guy Evans is either out or coming out
Speaker 1: in the next few weeks on Audible. So again I
Speaker 1: mentioned the Audible link earlier, the Brett book, the Natty Book.
Speaker 1: If you're interested, there's also going to be in a
Speaker 1: new Eric Bischoff book. You could probably pre order it
Speaker 1: right now using our links, So just be aware of that.
Speaker 1: Dak from Saint Paul, Minnesota. The PWI Women's List has
Speaker 1: come out and Mercedes Monet was ranked number one. Naturally,
Speaker 1: people online are losing their minds about this, and it
Speaker 1: still baffles me that it seems so many don't understand
Speaker 1: it's a k FABE list, just wanted to see what
Speaker 1: your thoughts on the women's list were. Overall, it is
Speaker 1: a k fabe list mostly so yes. PWI released its
Speaker 1: list of the top two hundred and fifty women's wrestlers
Speaker 1: of the year, and again it relies heavily on kfabe.
Speaker 1: They consider win loss records and championships, and your influence
Speaker 1: within your chosen company or the industry as a whole,
Speaker 1: among other criteria. The evaluation period for this ran from
Speaker 1: October first of last year through September thirtieth of this year,
Speaker 1: and so with that in mind, Mercedes Monette topped the
Speaker 1: list in number one for the first time in her career.
Speaker 1: She came in second back in twenty sixteen, and she
Speaker 1: didn't rank at all last year because she didn't have
Speaker 1: enough matches and it's well deserved. She had one loss
Speaker 1: all year that was to Tony Storm, who ranked right
Speaker 1: behind her at number two. She was number one in
Speaker 1: last year's rankings, so she went almost undefeated for the
Speaker 1: entire year. She's held onto the TBS Championship for the
Speaker 1: entire evaluation period, and she has won ten or eleven
Speaker 1: other titles in the meantime, some of which she has
Speaker 1: gone back and defended right, and that cannot be understated
Speaker 1: the influence that that has on these independent promotions, the
Speaker 1: tickets that she helped sell for those shows, the exposure
Speaker 1: that she has given to some of these women that
Speaker 1: she's worked with, even if it just gets them on
Speaker 1: WWE's radar or aw's radar, right, then you factor in
Speaker 1: the quality of her matches. Mercedes at number one is
Speaker 1: really a no brainer. And if not number one, then
Speaker 1: number two for sure. So there's really nothing to lose
Speaker 1: your mind over unless you're someone who just doesn't like her,
Speaker 1: or if you're not a fan of her winning all
Speaker 1: these championship, which is fine, and that's perfectly that. It's
Speaker 1: perfectly fine to not be a fan of it and
Speaker 1: think it's too much. But to say, well, well, you know,
Speaker 1: I can't believe she's number one, Like what like, why
Speaker 1: wouldn't she be number one? Why wouldn't she be number
Speaker 1: Just look at the criteria they based the list though,
Speaker 1: of course she's going to be number one. There's nothing
Speaker 1: to argue here. They went with Tony Storm at number two,
Speaker 1: which again I can't argue with that. If I had
Speaker 1: one gripe with the list, Eosky was ranked too low.
Speaker 1: They had her at number six. Eo is one of
Speaker 1: the best in ring performers in the world right now.
Speaker 1: But that period after WrestleMania where she did nothing, I
Speaker 1: think really hurt her. You know, she was the champion,
Speaker 1: but like, can you tell me, can you name me,
Speaker 1: off the top of your head, anything memorable about Eosky's
Speaker 1: run and what she did from post WrestleMania until that
Speaker 1: Evolution match with Rhea Ripley, because I can't think of
Speaker 1: a fucking thing, you know, And I think that really
Speaker 1: hurt her, or else she would have been ranked higher.
Speaker 1: So I guess it's less of a gripe with their
Speaker 1: rankings and just more of a gripe with how she
Speaker 1: was used in that period between WrestleMania and Evolution. But
Speaker 1: she had that great match with Rio Ripley. Saya Katani,
Speaker 1: the reigning New Japan Strong Women's Champion and Stardom Champion,
Speaker 1: ranked number three. I can't speak to her because I
Speaker 1: haven't seen any of the matches that she's had this year.
Speaker 1: I probably should, but she ranked number eighty nine last year.
Speaker 1: She jumped all the way to number three. Number four
Speaker 1: was Tiffany Stratton, who spent most of the year undefeated
Speaker 1: as the women's champion. Stephanie Vaquier was number five. This
Speaker 1: would have included her winner take all win over Julia
Speaker 1: in NXT back in March and winning the Women's World
Speaker 1: Championship at Wressell Palooza, but not her Crown Jewel win
Speaker 1: since that came after the deadline. Number six, as I mentioned,
Speaker 1: was Eo Sky. Number seven was Athena with her one
Speaker 1: thousand plus days as Ring of Honor Women's World Champion,
Speaker 1: but her influence is only going to extend so far
Speaker 1: so long as she's stuck in Ring of Honor. Hell,
Speaker 1: she does own a women's promotion of her own down
Speaker 1: in Texas, so she has influence in that regard. Number
Speaker 1: eight was Surrey. Number nine was Naomi who had a
Speaker 1: breakout year. It's too bad it ended right as she
Speaker 1: was really starting to truly break out. And number ten
Speaker 1: was Rhea Ripley, who ranked number three last year this
Speaker 1: year was down to tenth. That's a pretty damn good list.
Speaker 1: Becky Lynch did not make the list. You need a
Speaker 1: minimum of ten singles matches or six matches in the
Speaker 1: course of six separate months within the review period. Becky
Speaker 1: had nine non tag team matches during the period and
Speaker 1: only wrestled in four different months, so she did not qualify.
Speaker 1: It's the same reason Roman Reigns didn't make the PWI
Speaker 1: Top five hundred last year. He only wrestles six matches
Speaker 1: all year. Adrian from Dallas. Do you see John Cena
Speaker 1: having an open challenge for the Intercontinental title and Shamus
Speaker 1: coming out and saying something to the effect of, I'm
Speaker 1: not waiting for December thirteenth, I want to match tonight
Speaker 1: and having Seamus beat Sena for the championship. This would
Speaker 1: be poetic as how Shamus beat Sena for his first
Speaker 1: WWE championship or seeing is how he beat him for
Speaker 1: his first title and now he beats him for the
Speaker 1: one title that Seamus is seeking. No, I don't see
Speaker 1: that happening, and honestly, it just doesn't feel it doesn't
Speaker 1: feel like the right time for it, because again, Seamus
Speaker 1: is in the tournament, so it would be kind of
Speaker 1: weird for him to be like, well, I'm in the
Speaker 1: middle of this tournament that I just qualified for to
Speaker 1: move on to the next round, but you know, what.
Speaker 1: I don't want to wait, So why don't we just
Speaker 1: wrestle right now? Like, why don't you just tell people
Speaker 1: this Shamus is not winning the tournament. Yeah, it doesn't work.
Speaker 1: If he wasn't in the tournament, I'm totally open to it,
Speaker 1: but now it's just not gonna happen. Curtis from Toronto.
Speaker 1: This week, WWE announced a brand new partnership with Maple
Speaker 1: Leaf Sports and Entertainment centered around a Monday night raw
Speaker 1: show on January twenty sixth of twenty twenty six. This
Speaker 1: partnership will see the show air from the city, with
Speaker 1: NHL players appearing on the air and vice versa, WWE
Speaker 1: stars appearing at the Leafs game later that week. MLSE
Speaker 1: operates Scotiabank Arena, where many of the WWE pay per
Speaker 1: views are held, as well as TV tapings, but also
Speaker 1: the home to a lot of AW events vice versa.
Speaker 1: The Coca Cola Coliseum, where WWE runs house shows and
Speaker 1: AW often run their TV tapings, is under the MLSE
Speaker 1: banner until twenty thirty five and potentially twenty forty five.
Speaker 1: Based on the city's offer for an extension on their agreement.
Speaker 1: Is WWE essentially locking AW out of Toronto and the
Speaker 1: biggest Canadian market. And then bonus question, TNA do their
Speaker 1: TV tapings at Rebel Entertainment Complex in Toronto, which is
Speaker 1: smaller but has spectacular audio video. Do you think that
Speaker 1: space would be a fit for AW. Yeah, I think
Speaker 1: it would be a space for AW, especially if it's
Speaker 1: a smaller venue then they can pack it in and
Speaker 1: make it look good. This new agreement with MLSE, by
Speaker 1: the way, that you asked about in your main question,
Speaker 1: it will not preclude AW from running there because they
Speaker 1: were asked about this and a spokesperson told a reporter
Speaker 1: for TSN that the new agreement with WWE does not
Speaker 1: prevent other events in our venues. So I know there
Speaker 1: was some hey made about this this week and is
Speaker 1: WWE shutting them out of the market. They are not
Speaker 1: shutting them out of the market, and that is straight
Speaker 1: from an MLSE spokesperson. So the answer is no. Chuck
Speaker 1: from the Joker's Voice channel on YouTube, first time emailing
Speaker 1: love your podcast and your channel. You and JD are
Speaker 1: huge inspirations from my own channel. Well, thank you, brother,
Speaker 1: I love hearing that. Again, it's the Joker's Voice channel
Speaker 1: on YouTube. But he says question, you guys talked about
Speaker 1: Julia and the quote unquote burial she got on SmackDown
Speaker 1: against Chelsea Green, saying that she is damaged goods. As
Speaker 1: far as SmackDown goes, would you be opposed to moving
Speaker 1: Julia to raw and grouping her with OSCA and Kyrie
Speaker 1: and using the freebird rule for the tag team Championship.
Speaker 1: My reasoning is that OSCA wanted EO to adhere to
Speaker 1: a master and student relationship. This didn't happen, so OSCA
Speaker 1: is still looking for another student to take under her wing.
Speaker 1: Julia fits that role. Also, Julia being associated with OSCA
Speaker 1: helps rebuild her credibility, as OSCA is pretty much the
Speaker 1: standard of excellence. This way, Julia can also have the
Speaker 1: leash taken off and tap into her more aggressive, ruthless
Speaker 1: in ring style. You could do it, You could do it.
Speaker 1: I think Julia has to It probably has to be
Speaker 1: moved from SmackDown. And I hate saying that because SmackDown.
Speaker 1: The last thing SmackDown needs right now is fewer women
Speaker 1: on the rock. I'm not a proponent of, you know,
Speaker 1: cutting women from that roster. They need more women on
Speaker 1: that roster, but they have done such a horrific job
Speaker 1: with Julia this year that I just think moving her
Speaker 1: to RAW or moving her back to NXT for a
Speaker 1: period of time to rebuild hers is probably the best
Speaker 1: course of action here. You want to move her to
Speaker 1: raw and pair her up with the Kabuki Warriors. I
Speaker 1: mean some people may look at that and go, of course,
Speaker 1: WWE taking all the Japanese girls, taking all as a
Speaker 1: Bill Goldberg would say, taking all the Japanese girls and
Speaker 1: bunching them up, right, let's put all the Joshi wrestlers together.
Speaker 1: But you know what, it may be the best thing
Speaker 1: for Julia. That's what it takes, then, so be it.
Speaker 1: Because the Kabuki Warriors are getting a bit of a
Speaker 1: push right They're on TV, they're featured every single week.
Speaker 1: They just won the women's tag team titles. I'd be
Speaker 1: okay with that. Sean from Byron Illinois been a listener
Speaker 1: for twelve years. Like you, I was a huge fan
Speaker 1: of the black and Gold era of NXT under Triple H.
Speaker 1: I was really excited when he took over WWE. Creative
Speaker 1: fels like the honeymoon phase has worn off, probably starting
Speaker 1: around Elimination Chamber this year with the Rocks involvement. I
Speaker 1: understand that running NXT against Ron Smackdan is a completely
Speaker 1: different challenge, but I often find myself scratching my head
Speaker 1: at some of the creative choices on the main roster.
Speaker 1: Triple H did such an amazing job with guys like
Speaker 1: Tamaso Champa, Johnny Gargano Andrade and others in NXT, yet
Speaker 1: it feels like he hasn't really tried to elevate his
Speaker 1: former NXT talent on the main roster, even to mid
Speaker 1: card title contention, what do you make of the apparent
Speaker 1: downgrade in Triple H's creative direction compared to his NXT
Speaker 1: days in the initial period where he first took over
Speaker 1: creative Also, does Triple H truly have full creative control
Speaker 1: or is it more of a collaborative process where he
Speaker 1: drafts ideas and higher ups like Nick Cohn or Mark
Speaker 1: Shapiro need to approve them. I'm not entirely sure how
Speaker 1: the TKO hierarchy works. Well. I am not in the
Speaker 1: TKO hierarchy, but I would be shocked if Nick Kahn
Speaker 1: and Mark Shapiro had any sort of say or needed
Speaker 1: approval on day to day creative ideas. If it's a
Speaker 1: creative idea relative to someone like the Rock or a
Speaker 1: celebrity that they're going to bring in like Travis Scott
Speaker 1: Been Been Been. Then yes, I'm sure Nick Cohn is involved.
Speaker 1: Maybe Ari Emmanuel has some say in the matter, but no,
Speaker 1: I cannot imagine that on the day to day, week
Speaker 1: to week raw and smack down creative ideas. You know,
Speaker 1: we're going into wargames. Now what wargames teams do we want?
Speaker 1: And stuff like that. You know, Mark Shapiro doesn't give
Speaker 1: a shit. You know, Nick con doesn't have any saying that.
Speaker 1: That's Triple H and the people that work underneath him
Speaker 1: as part of the creative team. It's Triple H. It's
Speaker 1: Bruce Pritchard, it's Michael Hayes, it's Road Dug, and it's
Speaker 1: all those people you saw in the writer's room when
Speaker 1: you watch WWE Unreal. So there is a collaboration there,
Speaker 1: but Triple H is the chief content officer. He has
Speaker 1: final say in everything, even if it's not his idea.
Speaker 1: He may say, Okay, it's a great idea, I'll go
Speaker 1: with that, and maybe some of it is his idea.
Speaker 1: And the other thing to consider also is, you know,
Speaker 1: when he was running n XT, Triple H was not
Speaker 1: writing the shows. Like Triple H did not have a
Speaker 1: pen and paper and sit there and write out TV
Speaker 1: each week. He had writers working for him, and I
Speaker 1: think Ryan Katz, and maybe I'm getting the name wrong.
Speaker 1: I think it was Ryan Katz though who I don't
Speaker 1: want to say he was really the one who was
Speaker 1: coming up with all the stories in NXT. But like
Speaker 1: Triple H had his writers and he had his right
Speaker 1: hand men or right hand men down there, but he
Speaker 1: got credit as the face of NXT. We don't know
Speaker 1: how many of those great ideas and great match combinations
Speaker 1: that we saw on those takeovers shows, Like how much
Speaker 1: of that was Triple H's idea, how much of that
Speaker 1: was a Ryan Katz idea or someone else's idea. I
Speaker 1: don't know if William Regal at the time had any
Speaker 1: input into the creative process. So, you know, I think
Speaker 1: it's one of those things where we got to be
Speaker 1: careful not to give him all the credit or all
Speaker 1: the blame, because there's a lot of moving parts here.
Speaker 1: There's a lot of team members. People talk about SmackDown
Speaker 1: right now, road Dog, fire road Dog, Well, you know, yeah,
Speaker 1: road Dog may not be the best there, but it's
Speaker 1: still Triple H' show. And if nothing else, if the
Speaker 1: ideas aren't his, he's putting his stamp of approval on them,
Speaker 1: and that's what we're seeing on television. Main Roster and
Speaker 1: NXT are two totally different beasts. NXT is a much
Speaker 1: smaller roster. NXT is also a very different roster. It's
Speaker 1: a less experienced roster. Ron SmackDown even just in terms
Speaker 1: of the formatting of the shows, you know, is different
Speaker 1: from NXT, and there are other obligations and responsibilities as
Speaker 1: far as things to promote on the shows that goes
Speaker 1: to the formatting of the shows. You have a much
Speaker 1: bigger roster to work with. You have a roster that
Speaker 1: has a lot of older talent on it as compared
Speaker 1: to NXT. I mean, just look at the main events
Speaker 1: scene right now in WWE. Not a lot of what
Speaker 1: I would call young guys in the main event picture.
Speaker 1: So it's two totally different beasts. He's deal with certain
Speaker 1: egos maybe and veteran talents that you know, he wasn't
Speaker 1: necessarily working with in NXT. They were his kids, and
Speaker 1: he was working with a lot of younger talents and
Speaker 1: older talents too. He did bring in some veteran talents
Speaker 1: from the independence scene when he basically rated the independent scene,
Speaker 1: so you know there was a mix. But yeah, of
Speaker 1: course there's a big difference between the two rosters. But
Speaker 1: at the end of the day, creative is creative. You
Speaker 1: either have it or you don't. You either have good
Speaker 1: ideas or you have terrible ideas that are not going
Speaker 1: to hit. And I don't know that there's any one
Speaker 1: explanation for why. Yes, there's a honeymoon period at the beginning.
Speaker 1: I think a lot of it, frankly also is just
Speaker 1: it's not Vince. That's what a lot of it was.
Speaker 1: It's not Vince. Now, there are things that he shares
Speaker 1: in common with Vince McMahon, I think in terms of
Speaker 1: his just overall philosophy, things he learned from his father
Speaker 1: in law over the years. But I think a lot
Speaker 1: of people were just happy, like knowing it's not Vince. Wow,
Speaker 1: And then you hear from talents, you say, wow, we
Speaker 1: have more input now and to creative and the handcuffs
Speaker 1: aren't on and the way they used to be, and
Speaker 1: that's great. There's a lot of positives that came out
Speaker 1: of Vince McMahon no longer being there and no longer
Speaker 1: being the head of creative. However, that doesn't mean that
Speaker 1: there are no issues. That doesn't mean that all of
Speaker 1: a sudden, Creative is great and everything's great and all
Speaker 1: the stories are great. Clearly that's not what it means.
Speaker 1: But I do think the way that they probably operate, like,
Speaker 1: if you're a talent there and you worked under Vince
Speaker 1: McMahon and now you work under Triple H in this
Speaker 1: current regime, probably you're going to look at that and go, yeah,
Speaker 1: it's better now. It's a lot easier to navigate now.
Speaker 1: You know, I feel like I have more of a
Speaker 1: voice in the process, or if I have an idea,
Speaker 1: maybe it's you know, they're more open to allowing me
Speaker 1: to go out there and do something, or go out
Speaker 1: there and maybe not stick to a script. That's all
Speaker 1: a plus, that's all a massive positive if that's the case.
Speaker 1: But creative is creative. You either have great ideas or
Speaker 1: you don't. Right now, there's not a whole lot of
Speaker 1: ideas on WWE television. I think that are really hitting
Speaker 1: in the way that you would want them to. And
Speaker 1: that does fall on Triple h because you get all
Speaker 1: the credit when things are great, but when things are
Speaker 1: not great, you can't deflect other people. You get all
Speaker 1: the credit, you get all the blame. That's how it works.
Speaker 1: Bender from Milwaukee. Two questions about Chris Jericho's potential WWE return,
Speaker 1: One should it happen at the Rumble? And two? Will
Speaker 1: he be Judas theme Jericho or Y two J Jericho.
Speaker 1: I do think that he will probably be back at
Speaker 1: the Rumble. I think that initial return appearance for the
Speaker 1: sake of all the WWE fans who maybe don't watch
Speaker 1: aw and just remember Y two J and oh my god,
Speaker 1: where's he been for six years? It's going to be
Speaker 1: to the Y two J music if you want to.
Speaker 1: If you want an example, just look to what we
Speaker 1: saw on Friday Night with you know, Matt Cardona on
Speaker 1: Smack Dad. He came out not as Matt Cardona, he
Speaker 1: came out as Zach Ryder. I think he comes out
Speaker 1: initially to the Y two I would like to see
Speaker 1: him going forward, though, use the Judas music for his
Speaker 1: last run because I like Judas and I think hearing
Speaker 1: it in WWE would be something different that would be
Speaker 1: kind of cool. I think we're looking at a Rumble return,
Speaker 1: and I think we're looking at a WrestleMania feud in
Speaker 1: match with La Knight justin from Chicago. I know there's
Speaker 1: a lot of speculation about Jay Usso turning heel, but
Speaker 1: what if both USO's turn heel at Survivor Series, Roman
Speaker 1: and Jimmy end up rounding out Team Punk for war
Speaker 1: Games and towards the end of the match, Roman has
Speaker 1: bron Breaker lined up for a spear as he charges him,
Speaker 1: Jimmy hits Roman with a superkick. A stunned Jay and
Speaker 1: CM Punk confront Jimmy, only for Jimmy and Jada lock
Speaker 1: eyes and smile and hit double super kicks on CM Punk.
Speaker 1: Breaker then hits Roman with a spear to win the match,
Speaker 1: further serving as a catalyst for a potential WrestleMania match
Speaker 1: on Raw. The Usso's simply acknowledge it as a business decision,
Speaker 1: citing that brock Lesner and Punk and Roman reigns all
Speaker 1: saw their careers peak under the guidance of Paul Hayman,
Speaker 1: and they also note that they had the longest reign
Speaker 1: in WWE history as champions. While Hayman was the wise
Speaker 1: man for the Bloodline. This could take Jay out of
Speaker 1: the main event scene as a single while also providing
Speaker 1: raws tag team scene with a much needed shot in
Speaker 1: the arm. Maybe you could even get a short program
Speaker 1: with the USO's and an eventual Babyface New Day one
Speaker 1: last time. What are your thoughts. I think that having
Speaker 1: the USOS back in the tag team division to give
Speaker 1: that division a shot in the arm makes sense. And
Speaker 1: I would be fine with Jay being out of the
Speaker 1: main event picture for a while and having him do
Speaker 1: something different, even going hell, even if he stayed single,
Speaker 1: but you know, went heal just again. The fact that
Speaker 1: everything has to revolve around the Bloodline is just I'm
Speaker 1: over it at this point. Another War Games and we're
Speaker 1: gonna have the USSOS turn on Roman and the family
Speaker 1: drama continues. It's been years of this shit, Like, I
Speaker 1: don't know, it's to me, it's just played out. The
Speaker 1: story peaked a couple of years ago, and they're just
Speaker 1: milking it for all it's worth and it just doesn't
Speaker 1: do anything for me at this point. But I mean,
Speaker 1: if you got to do something with these guys that
Speaker 1: I could think of worse ideas. I'm not opposed to
Speaker 1: the idea. One thing I do like, not necessarily this
Speaker 1: idea no offense, but I think the idea that you
Speaker 1: mentioned of bron Breaker being the one to get the
Speaker 1: win if the Heels win and he beats Roman, that
Speaker 1: could be the catalyst to an eventual WrestleMania match in Vegas.
Speaker 1: That idea, I like Daniel from Houston. I don't see
Speaker 1: many people talking about the idea of Dominick turning face, really,
Speaker 1: because that's all people seem to be talking about. You
Speaker 1: could have Ray versus Dominic for the Triple A, Mega Title,
Speaker 1: or just a singles match. At Survivor Series. You saw
Speaker 1: how Dom was upset with the Judgment Day not being
Speaker 1: there for him during his match with John Cena. So
Speaker 1: what if the Judgment Day promised to be in Dom's
Speaker 1: corner for his match, and yet again Dom loses to Ray,
Speaker 1: the Judgment Day turn on Dom after the match. You
Speaker 1: could have Ray at the ramp looking conflicted on what
Speaker 1: to do. They'll be in San Diego, so you can
Speaker 1: imagine just how big of a pop it would be
Speaker 1: for Way to go back into the ring and help
Speaker 1: his son. This then leads to Ray and Dom teaming
Speaker 1: up against Finn and JD McDonough not a bad way
Speaker 1: to do it. The only problem I have with it
Speaker 1: is that I still think it's too soon, especially Live
Speaker 1: Morgan hasn't even come back yet. You can't turn don
Speaker 1: babyface before Live Morgan comes back and rejoins the judgment
Speaker 1: day or we know what she's going to be doing
Speaker 1: when she comes back. So next year maybe, but I
Speaker 1: think it's too soon to turn down now. The fans
Speaker 1: can continue to cheer for him, but I think the
Speaker 1: actual turn I would not be doing it right now.
Speaker 1: Aaron from Indiana. With it being a month away from
Speaker 1: John Cena's retirement match, I was wondering where he would
Speaker 1: fall on your greatest of all time list. This could
Speaker 1: include things like impact on the industry, ticket and merch sales,
Speaker 1: et cetera. So if we're talking about WWE goats, because
Speaker 1: wrestling is more than just WWE, I mean, if you
Speaker 1: were to make a list of all time greats, John
Speaker 1: Cena would not even be in the top ten all right,
Speaker 1: Like wrestling is more than just the United States. You'd
Speaker 1: have El Santo, you'd have Enoki and so on. But
Speaker 1: in terms of WWE, he's not even in my top five.
Speaker 1: Like that's reserved for hul Cogan. And this is in
Speaker 1: no particular order, but Hulk Hogan, Randy Savage, Steve Austin,
Speaker 1: Brett Hart, and Shawn Michaels, Kurt Angle is right there
Speaker 1: with him. And honestly, Savage and Angle are both like
Speaker 1: the complete pro wrestler to me, they had it all,
Speaker 1: they could do anything. So it's tough for me to
Speaker 1: leave Kurt out of the top five. But I'm thinking
Speaker 1: for me, that's my top five. Then you get into
Speaker 1: the Rock and Undertaker and Broccoli. I'm not sure exactly
Speaker 1: where Triple H or John Cena would rank for me.
Speaker 1: Seen him might be top ten, you know. Casting him
Speaker 1: as the generic top babyface for so long it hurt
Speaker 1: him with me when I know there was this great
Speaker 1: heel run in him during that period, And maybe I'd
Speaker 1: feel differently had Vince not been so scared to turn him.
Speaker 1: But he didn't want to give up that sweet merch money,
Speaker 1: you know, when you factor in other things like merch
Speaker 1: sales and his role as an ambassador for the company
Speaker 1: all to make a wish stuff. He was a great
Speaker 1: representative for that company. I would have loved to have
Speaker 1: had Johnson as my top guy because he was probably
Speaker 1: very agreeable to whatever they wanted him to do, and
Speaker 1: you knew that you could rely on him and not
Speaker 1: get him. Yeah, he's not going to get himself into
Speaker 1: any trouble. Of all the names that I mentioned, he
Speaker 1: was probably the one who gave them the least amount
Speaker 1: of headaches. And he just seems like a genuinely good
Speaker 1: human being. I can't always say that for a lot
Speaker 1: of the people I have in my top five, unfortunately.
Speaker 1: But this is not a list of the top five
Speaker 1: greatest human beings in wrestling history. This is my list
Speaker 1: of the top five goats, at least in WWE. My
Speaker 1: list will be different than your list. I don't give
Speaker 1: a shit, right I mean, And again, those guys, I
Speaker 1: may love them as performers, but clearly they all come
Speaker 1: with baggage of varying degrees. But we all have our favorites,
Speaker 1: you know, for one reason or another. But even weighing
Speaker 1: their impact on the company and on the industry, Hogan's
Speaker 1: impact is undeniable. So many people would not be wrestling
Speaker 1: fans today, myself included, very likely were it not for
Speaker 1: hul Cogan, Brett Hart and Shawn Michaels have probably influenced
Speaker 1: more talent on the roster right now than most right
Speaker 1: inspired them to want to become a pro wrestler or
Speaker 1: influence them in some way in there in ring style.
Speaker 1: John Cena is one of the elite talkers in the
Speaker 1: history of the company when he wasn't playing the role
Speaker 1: of narrator on the shows each week for everybody else's storyline.
Speaker 1: You know, he's had more classic matches than some people
Speaker 1: will give him credit for. I defended him on that
Speaker 1: even back then, back in the day on this show.
Speaker 1: You know, he didn't have to be the best wrestler
Speaker 1: to go out there and have great matches. His matches
Speaker 1: with Edge and CM Punk and Sean Michaels and aj
Speaker 1: Styles and brock Lesnar are like. He had tons of
Speaker 1: great matches. Scene is great. Was he over pushed there
Speaker 1: for a while? You bet you're ass he was. He
Speaker 1: was Vince's boy, so was Hogan. Doesn't take away from
Speaker 1: his body of work. He's one of the greatest in
Speaker 1: WWE history, but he's not the greatest. He's not my greatest.
Speaker 1: But you can let me know who you think is
Speaker 1: your greatest. Send in any other questions, or comments you
Speaker 1: have for the mail bag the soolom Monster at gmail
Speaker 1: dot com, follow me on x at solo Monster, and
Speaker 1: of course subscribe on YouTube where I am live multiple
Speaker 1: times throughout the week and you get some bonus content
Speaker 1: as well. Just search for solom Monster Sounds off. We
Speaker 1: just passed eighty nine thousand subscribers, which means the March
Speaker 1: to ninety k has begun, so you can help get
Speaker 1: me there. The next time I am live will be
Speaker 1: on YouTube. It will be Tomorrow night. It's gonna be
Speaker 1: a big raw show. John Cen is final Raw from
Speaker 1: Madison Square Gardens, so join me live for the post
Speaker 1: show as soon as Raw is done. I will be
Speaker 1: live on Tuesday night over on JD's channel for Tuesday
Speaker 1: Night Titans, and then Wednesday for the Go Home three
Speaker 1: hour Dynamite before Full Gear, and then Friday night for
Speaker 1: Actually no, I will not be live Friday night for
Speaker 1: SmackDown because on Friday I will be in Chicago for
Speaker 1: House of Glory. That's where I will be and so
Speaker 1: if you are not watching SmackDown live, I will be
Speaker 1: broadcasting on Triller TV Plus and then back here next
Speaker 1: Sunday for episode nine thirty nine of The Solemn Monster
Speaker 1: Sounds Off. So until then, be well, stay safe, have
Speaker 1: yourselves a great rest of your week. I will see
Speaker 1: some of you in Chicago on Friday and back here
Speaker 1: for more sound Off next Sunday. Until then, take care, guys.
Speaker 1: The Solemn Monster sounds off. So you got Moxley on
Speaker 1: one side, you get Darby on the other. Moxley said, look,
Speaker 1: I did what I could for Danielson, but this is
Speaker 1: a war for the future of the sport and for
Speaker 1: their crazy you know they're running. What is it with
Speaker 1: these Shield guys. You know here on this show, you've
Speaker 1: got John Moxley forming his own faction, coming out every
Speaker 1: week and talking about the future of the industry, the
Speaker 1: future of the company, the future of the sports. You
Speaker 1: got Seth Rollins on the other show, forming his own
Speaker 1: faction and coming out and basically doing the same thing.
Speaker 1: I'm fighting for the future, right everything is so epic,
Speaker 1: like this match that you and I are about to have, Cody,
Speaker 1: It's a fight for the future of this company. Like
Speaker 1: fuck aw, what is this nonsense? I don't recall like
Speaker 1: Stone Cold or The Rock or the Undertaker coming out
Speaker 1: on television every week for John Cito or Randy Orton,
Speaker 1: even if you want to use a different era as
Speaker 1: an exam. Coming out on television and cutting these fucking
Speaker 1: boring promos on television every single week, over and over
Speaker 1: and over again about the same fucking shit. We gotta
Speaker 1: save the future of the company. How about you worry
Speaker 1: about yourself? How about worrying about the here and now
Speaker 1: and not fucking five or ten years from now? What
Speaker 1: is it with these Shield guys? At least Roman Reigns
Speaker 1: doesn't give a fuck about the future he comes out.
Speaker 1: He just cares about himself. I respect that. Fuck everybody else.
Speaker 2: The Solo Monster sounds off bringing you the good, the bad,
Speaker 2: and the ugly. Check out the weekly live streams bonus
Speaker 2: content for subscribers, and follow The Solo Monster on Facebook, Instagram,
Speaker 2: and X The Solo Monster.
Speaker 1: I love you so long.