Latest / Solomonster Sounds Off / Sound Off 968 - BIG NAMES GONE From TNA And What It Means, Night Of Champions Predictions!

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Sound Off 968 - BIG NAMES GONE From TNA And What It Means, Night Of Champions Predictions! · Solomonster Sounds Off

0:01
Speaker 1: It's business time, baby. You are listening to Solo Monsters
0:05
Speaker 1: Sounds Off. I love your solo Mama monster dude, I
0:11
Speaker 1: want your souldier a woman.
0:13
Speaker 2: You got grown ass rustlers in the back going on Twitter.
0:16
Speaker 1: Come over here, hotday? Is that pet patison you have legs? Weekend?
0:22
Speaker 1: I was ninety nine percent positive it was just chessed up.
0:25
Speaker 2: Now I have been begging him for a job on
0:28
Speaker 2: every every platform I can, and I want to know
0:30
Speaker 2: the reason why you won't.
0:31
Speaker 1: Park. Welcome to episode nine sixty eight of The Solo
0:37
Speaker 1: Monster Sounds Off or Sunday, June twenty first, twenty twenty six,
0:42
Speaker 1: the first day of summer. You know, it's felt like
0:45
Speaker 1: summer for a month already, but now it's official. It
0:48
Speaker 1: was nice in Chicago too, you know, having been to
0:50
Speaker 1: Chicago in the winter a few times, it was a
0:53
Speaker 1: lot nicer to be there in June. But that's where
0:56
Speaker 1: I was on Friday for House of Glory, sold out
1:00
Speaker 1: yet again at Logan Square Auditorium. You think we've outgrown
1:04
Speaker 1: that venue. I think we have. We may have to
1:07
Speaker 1: do something about that soon. Well what a fun show,
1:10
Speaker 1: you know, really, I was talking to j D about
1:12
Speaker 1: it when the show is over, in my opinion, our
1:15
Speaker 1: best Chicago show to date. Nick Nemeth, who could very
1:19
Speaker 1: well walk out of slam Aversary next Sunday as the
1:22
Speaker 1: new TNA World Heavyweight Champion, falling to Charles Mason, he
1:26
Speaker 1: will not be walking in as the Hog champion. Mustafa
1:30
Speaker 1: Ali he defended his TNA International title against Rich Swan,
1:34
Speaker 1: probably the best match on the entire card. Shatzi with
1:38
Speaker 1: her broken arm, got her revenge on Steph Delander to
1:42
Speaker 1: hold onto her women's championship. I mean they were fighting
1:44
Speaker 1: all over the place. Raheem Royle, one of our more
1:48
Speaker 1: popular young stars, diving fifteen feet off the balcony right
1:52
Speaker 1: in front of us, down onto the pile and somehow
1:55
Speaker 1: stuck the landing, same thing he did in Las Vegas.
2:00
Speaker 1: That was insane. I'm doing commentary and I'm asking where
2:02
Speaker 1: the hell did Royal go? And I look to my
2:04
Speaker 1: right and there he is, crouching down, and at that
2:07
Speaker 1: point I knew it's like, oh shit, he's gonna jump,
2:11
Speaker 1: isn't he? He's gonna jump? Yep? He sure? Did you know?
2:16
Speaker 1: Leo Rush made a surprise appearance in that same Suicidal
2:20
Speaker 1: sixth Way and the pop that he got coming out.
2:24
Speaker 1: Holy shit. See this is why I say it's working.
2:27
Speaker 1: It's not for everyone, you know, the black Heart stuff
2:30
Speaker 1: that he's doing, but I enjoy the hell out of
2:32
Speaker 1: it whenever I see him on Dynamite because it's just
2:35
Speaker 1: so different than anything else that you would see on
2:37
Speaker 1: that show. And he's so committed to it. That's the thing.
2:41
Speaker 1: If you're gonna do something like this, you gotta be
2:42
Speaker 1: committed to it. That it's getting over a week by
2:46
Speaker 1: week is not a surprise to me. It is getting over.
2:48
Speaker 1: He's more over now than he ever was when he
2:50
Speaker 1: was just Leo Rush and he's the new Ring of
2:54
Speaker 1: Honor television champion as well. He had the belt with
2:57
Speaker 1: him and everything. People were going nuts with the guy,
3:00
Speaker 1: and for the first time ever, it did not disappoint
3:03
Speaker 1: Ricky Sosa picking up a win over Amazing Red, who,
3:07
Speaker 1: by the way, is returning to TNA next weekend for
3:11
Speaker 1: the first time in fifteen years, back to his roots,
3:16
Speaker 1: competing in an Ultimate X match, the man who pioneered
3:20
Speaker 1: the X division, and he and Ricky had a good one.
3:23
Speaker 1: Sosa is a big kid when you see him in person.
3:26
Speaker 1: WWE is gonna have stars in their eyes for that
3:29
Speaker 1: guy it's six foot four? Are you kidding me?
3:32
Speaker 2: So?
3:32
Speaker 1: Thank you Chicago and everybody I had the chance to meet.
3:36
Speaker 1: And that awesome chocolate chip cookie from Johnny and his family.
3:40
Speaker 1: That cookie was as big as my fist. I didn't
3:43
Speaker 1: think I would finish it, but I waxed the entire thing. See.
3:46
Speaker 1: If I live by one philosophy in life, it is
3:49
Speaker 1: the more carbs, the better. I cannot imagine a life
3:53
Speaker 1: worth living without them. Next time We're with you Live
3:57
Speaker 1: is going to be Friday night, August seventh, back in
3:59
Speaker 1: New York City for High Intensity. High Intensity is a
4:03
Speaker 1: special one for me because I first started with hog
4:06
Speaker 1: at High Intensity in twenty eighteen. The Harti's are going
4:10
Speaker 1: to be back, Ricky Sosa is coming back for his
4:13
Speaker 1: New York City debut, and the Mad King returns. Eddie
4:18
Speaker 1: Kingston will be there live. You know, he announced last
4:21
Speaker 1: year that this is his final indie run. He's only
4:24
Speaker 1: doing one or two indie shots a month until November
4:26
Speaker 1: and then he's finished, So this may very well be
4:29
Speaker 1: the last time that we get to see him in
4:31
Speaker 1: a House of Glory ring. We will not be streaming
4:34
Speaker 1: the event on Treiller TV. We made the announcement the
4:37
Speaker 1: other day. House of Glory will no longer be on
4:40
Speaker 1: Treiller going forward. We will have an announcement soon on
4:44
Speaker 1: where you'll be able to watch high intensity if you
4:46
Speaker 1: can't be there live. I know where we're headed and
4:50
Speaker 1: where we're not headed. All I will say is that
4:53
Speaker 1: this next show is going to be a lot more
4:54
Speaker 1: accessible to all of you than the shows usually are.
4:58
Speaker 1: So if ever, there was a show that you wanted
5:00
Speaker 1: to drop in and check out, this would be the one.
5:04
Speaker 1: We got a lot of TNA news to get into
5:06
Speaker 1: this week. There may be more TNA news here in
5:09
Speaker 1: this episode than I have ever had in a single
5:12
Speaker 1: episode in all the years, all the nineteen years nearly
5:16
Speaker 1: that I have been doing this podcast. There's a lot
5:18
Speaker 1: of it. But first, I would like to take this
5:21
Speaker 1: moment to announce that I too have left TNA. Yeah,
5:26
Speaker 1: it seems like everyone's leaving, doesn't it. There was a
5:29
Speaker 1: big talent name that chose to leave the company this week,
5:31
Speaker 1: and their head of creative is gone, among others. That
5:35
Speaker 1: may not be such a bad thing, actually, but that's later. Plus,
5:39
Speaker 1: the finals are set for the King of the Ring
5:41
Speaker 1: and Queen of the Ring tournaments, and I've got predictions
5:44
Speaker 1: for Night of Champions, which is coming up next weekend.
5:47
Speaker 1: I've even got thoughts on the new Toy Story movie,
5:50
Speaker 1: so a lot to get into. First though, I want
5:52
Speaker 1: to say thank you to everybody who supported this week,
5:54
Speaker 1: be it on YouTube or via PayPal. If you would
5:57
Speaker 1: like to do so, you can do so the Solo
5:59
Speaker 1: Monster dot com. You'll see the PayPal link at the
6:02
Speaker 1: top of the page. I want to say thank you
6:05
Speaker 1: to our PayPal producers for this week, including Rachel from
6:09
Speaker 1: the Badgers State. Thank you. She's hoping to have a
6:12
Speaker 1: celebration for the Brewers this fall, just like the Knicks did. Hey,
6:17
Speaker 1: you know what, keep hope alive. Anything's possible and may
6:22
Speaker 1: be unlikely, but anything's possible. The Portland pop Star Paul Hamilton,
6:27
Speaker 1: Big b Bryant, Bessera, The Diamond, Dallas A Dance Machine,
6:30
Speaker 1: Harrison Soapp, Velvet Revolver, Robert Murray, Big Time, Boris Weinman,
6:36
Speaker 1: Q The Destroyer, Tough Guy, Tim Gen Zephyr. It's good
6:41
Speaker 1: to hear from your brother. Badass Bernard Frederick. He says
6:46
Speaker 1: his favorite podcaster is number one Solo Monster. Well, I
6:49
Speaker 1: mean of course, number two Chris van Vliet and number
6:53
Speaker 1: three Dave Logreca. Hmm, would Logreca be considered to podcaster
7:01
Speaker 1: though he's a radio host. I don't know about podcaster.
7:06
Speaker 1: The Chicago Slayer Willie Chord, Hey, I missed you guys
7:09
Speaker 1: on Friday in Chicago. Rebel J. Leonard, thank you my friend,
7:16
Speaker 1: night Stalker, nif Al Safar and Killshot Keith Hart and
7:21
Speaker 1: I wanted to share this as well. I got a
7:22
Speaker 1: piece of feedback from someone who has become a fan
7:27
Speaker 1: of The Uncrowned Wrestling Show, which I do on Tuesdays
7:30
Speaker 1: for Ariel, and he just writes in he goes, hey, man,
7:34
Speaker 1: just wanted to just wanted to say I never heard
7:36
Speaker 1: of you before this show. Now I watch it every
7:39
Speaker 1: week and it's the only wrestling podcast I listened to.
7:42
Speaker 1: Says You're a great man, appreciate the content, telling it
7:44
Speaker 1: how it is. I quit watching weekly WWE TV last
7:48
Speaker 1: Summer Slam and only stuck to AW so your recaps
7:52
Speaker 1: are nice to listen to. WWE's not really for me anymore,
7:56
Speaker 1: but your show is great. Thanks again. That's funny, man.
8:00
Speaker 1: Sometimes all it takes is just like one message and
8:03
Speaker 1: a given day to really like put a smile on
8:05
Speaker 1: your face. And this was a very This is a
8:08
Speaker 1: very busy, very hectic week, especially heading into the show
8:12
Speaker 1: in Chicago and flying out to Chicago on Friday and
8:15
Speaker 1: trying to balance that with all the other shit that
8:16
Speaker 1: I'm doing. I just it was a tweet, actually a
8:19
Speaker 1: double tweet. When I saw that tweet, I said, man,
8:22
Speaker 1: you know, for all the shit that I have to
8:24
Speaker 1: sift through sometimes in the replies and stuff, you get
8:29
Speaker 1: a message like that. It makes it all worth it.
8:31
Speaker 1: So I love hearing it. If you're not checking out
8:33
Speaker 1: the Uncrowned Wrestling Show, please do so that drops each
8:37
Speaker 1: and every Tuesday. We now have a full card for
8:42
Speaker 1: Night of Champions this coming Saturday, and we know the
8:45
Speaker 1: four names in the finals of the King of the
8:47
Speaker 1: Ring and Queen of the Ring tournaments on Raw last Monday,
8:51
Speaker 1: or as I now call it, as the Bloodline turns.
8:55
Speaker 1: Roman Reigns presented Jacob fought with his own Ula Fallow. Jacob,
9:00
Speaker 1: he says, was always on the outside. Now he's on
9:02
Speaker 1: the inside. He's the inside man now. And the ussos
9:06
Speaker 1: did not seem to like that. Roman was showing so
9:10
Speaker 1: much love to Jacob Jacob is basically Roman's attack dog.
9:13
Speaker 1: Now it's like he's his first lieutenant. He beat up
9:17
Speaker 1: eric Andre on Monday, who was in the front row
9:19
Speaker 1: and is in the new Street Fighter movie with Roman
9:21
Speaker 1: that comes out later this year. Eric Andre is now
9:24
Speaker 1: threatening revenge on Roman reigns over what Jacob did to him.
9:30
Speaker 1: What's he gonna do? Send Jason Momoa after him. That'd
9:34
Speaker 1: be like putting me an Orange Cassidy in the ring together.
9:37
Speaker 1: You wouldn't be able to tell us apart. Even the
9:40
Speaker 1: bellas would be like, holy shit, do they look alike?
9:45
Speaker 1: So then on SmackDown, Jacob was back and he told
9:49
Speaker 1: Solo he was making a mistake not taking Roman up
9:51
Speaker 1: on his offer to rejoin the family, and Solo's answer
9:55
Speaker 1: was still no. I should point out that Tomatonga told
9:59
Speaker 1: So to stay in the back during their Tag Team
10:03
Speaker 1: Championship match with Damian Priest and Art Truth on Friday,
10:06
Speaker 1: since he's so preoccupied with his own family drama, and
10:10
Speaker 1: Solo did exactly what Tama told him not to do,
10:14
Speaker 1: which has come out during their match and it wound
10:16
Speaker 1: up costing them a win. Priest and Truth retained the titles,
10:20
Speaker 1: and all I could think watching this was maybe I
10:24
Speaker 1: have it all wrong. Maybe we're not headed for a
10:28
Speaker 1: bloodline civil war again. Maybe Solo does end up rejoining
10:31
Speaker 1: the family because they're disbanding the MFTs, which would be
10:36
Speaker 1: very bad news for Tomatanga and Taalatanga if that were
10:39
Speaker 1: to happen. I mean, if you catch my drift. But
10:41
Speaker 1: I'm starting to wonder if all of this pushback that
10:44
Speaker 1: we're getting from Solo like a tell Roman, you know, basically,
10:47
Speaker 1: I'm not joining fuck off, And you know, if he's
10:51
Speaker 1: he's going to keep coming after me, I'm going to
10:53
Speaker 1: come after him. All this bluster and bravado and all
10:56
Speaker 1: of this talk from Solo. Maybe in the end they
11:00
Speaker 1: do get the og family back together. I don't know,
11:04
Speaker 1: because again, as things currently stand, the MFTs are just
11:07
Speaker 1: they're not strong enough and it's not interesting enough in
11:11
Speaker 1: terms of doing group on group to see them build
11:14
Speaker 1: some kind of big match, whether it's wargames or anything else.
11:17
Speaker 1: I mean, sure they could always throw in a you know,
11:20
Speaker 1: Royce Keys or add a new member, but they're just
11:23
Speaker 1: they're not strong enough. It's a dead group, it's a
11:27
Speaker 1: dead faction. Maybe they realize that, maybe they know that,
11:30
Speaker 1: how could they not, maybe this is going in a
11:33
Speaker 1: different direction. Meanwhile, we had Jay Usso wrestling Javon Evans
11:37
Speaker 1: and the semi finals of The King of the Ring
11:39
Speaker 1: on Friday, and the match was perfectly solid. I actually
11:43
Speaker 1: thought it was probably the best thing on the show.
11:46
Speaker 1: I don't know what that says about the rest of
11:47
Speaker 1: the show. It was not a particularly egregious episode of SmackDown.
11:52
Speaker 1: I've seen worse. It wasn't great, but it wasn't bad.
11:57
Speaker 1: They used the rib injury that Evans sustained on Monday.
12:01
Speaker 1: Isn't out for him in losing. I thought he looked
12:03
Speaker 1: good even in defeat. But he was wrestling Austin Theory
12:06
Speaker 1: on Monday when he came off the top rope for
12:08
Speaker 1: an og cutter and bron Breaker absolutely destroyed him with
12:13
Speaker 1: a spear on the way down. So he came into
12:15
Speaker 1: this match with busted up ribs. You can tell that
12:19
Speaker 1: story and you can try to protect the kid, but
12:23
Speaker 1: to do it in back to back matches on Friday
12:26
Speaker 1: the way they did I just thought was overkill. You know,
12:29
Speaker 1: we went from the injured ribs with Javan to the
12:32
Speaker 1: injured knee with Charlotte Flair, which I'll get into. It's
12:35
Speaker 1: like they're so terrified to beat most of their big
12:39
Speaker 1: names without giving them some And I'm not saying Javon's
12:43
Speaker 1: a big name in the way that Charlotte or like
12:45
Speaker 1: the biggest stars are, but like Charlotte is an example
12:48
Speaker 1: of that, they're so terrified to beat these people they
12:53
Speaker 1: have to give them some sort of injury. Like it's
12:55
Speaker 1: no wonder that there's so many fans on social media
12:58
Speaker 1: who think anytime a wrestler lose this is a match,
13:01
Speaker 1: they're buried. Oh my god, I can't believe this guy
13:05
Speaker 1: lost a match on Monday. They're buried, right, instant burial,
13:09
Speaker 1: dead in the water. WWE is complicit in this. They
13:13
Speaker 1: have fostered an environment that allows the fans to think
13:16
Speaker 1: that way. Or baby faces, especially top baby faces, simply
13:20
Speaker 1: cannot lose clean with only rare exceptions, like it'll happen
13:24
Speaker 1: from time to time, but it's very rare, right. It's
13:27
Speaker 1: why I laugh when I hear someone like aj Styles,
13:31
Speaker 1: as he did last week, say wins and losses don't matter,
13:34
Speaker 1: and look, it's Aj Styles, Okay, one of the greatest
13:37
Speaker 1: wrestlers of his generation. His opinions on wrestling carry a
13:41
Speaker 1: lot of weight, more than mine, more than yours. But
13:43
Speaker 1: he also came into WWE as a top name who
13:47
Speaker 1: was already established. He was headlining pay per views with
13:50
Speaker 1: Roman Reigns, he was beating John Cena multiple times in fact,
13:55
Speaker 1: winning world championships. A loss for him, in his mind
13:59
Speaker 1: probably wasn't all that big of a deal. Ro Doug
14:02
Speaker 1: is another one on the wins and losses Now, wins
14:04
Speaker 1: and losses don't matter. Others like The Miz have come
14:08
Speaker 1: that and said wins and losses absolutely matter. Right, everyone
14:11
Speaker 1: has their opinion on it. We can debate this until
14:13
Speaker 1: we're all blue in the face. But for a company
14:16
Speaker 1: that had multiple people working there who believe wins and
14:19
Speaker 1: losses don't matter, nobody ever bothered to tell the writing
14:22
Speaker 1: team because the way they protect so many of these people.
14:25
Speaker 1: If wins and losses truly did not matter, they wouldn't
14:28
Speaker 1: take such great pains to protect them the way they do.
14:31
Speaker 1: And I never intended for this to be a soapbox
14:34
Speaker 1: rant here. It's just something I noticed that they did
14:36
Speaker 1: in back to back tournament matches on Friday, and it
14:38
Speaker 1: made me think of that, especially with the AJ comments
14:41
Speaker 1: last week. So yes, Jay USO is moving on to
14:44
Speaker 1: the finals and Night of Champions. He's gonna meet Oba Femei,
14:47
Speaker 1: who beat Dominic Mysterio on Raw. This was always going
14:51
Speaker 1: to be the end result once j won that four
14:53
Speaker 1: way match last week and also on Raw, Eo Sky
14:56
Speaker 1: beat Rakel Rodriguez to advance to the finals of the
14:59
Speaker 1: Queen the Ring tournament, which brings us back to SmackDown.
15:03
Speaker 1: I'm bouncing back and forth here your boy is bouncy.
15:06
Speaker 1: Charlotte Flair and liv Morgan they got to close the
15:09
Speaker 1: show on Friday night. I did not like this match.
15:12
Speaker 1: I did not like this match in a boat. I
15:14
Speaker 1: did not like this match with a goat. I did
15:16
Speaker 1: not like this match wearing my coat. I did not
15:19
Speaker 1: like this match. I just didn't think it was very good,
15:23
Speaker 1: and I think WWE kind of put it in that
15:26
Speaker 1: spot expecting the fans to see it as a much
15:28
Speaker 1: bigger deal than it felt like, especially with that reaction
15:31
Speaker 1: that it got. But Charlotte was attacked backstage beforehand by
15:34
Speaker 1: Jade Cargill, Meechen and BFAB. After Charlotte and Jade, they
15:38
Speaker 1: had a confrontation, and Charlotte basically after they were done
15:42
Speaker 1: talking Charlotte said, get out of my way, I gotta
15:44
Speaker 1: go to the ring, and as soon as she started
15:46
Speaker 1: walking towards Gorilla, they attacked her from behind. Jade went
15:49
Speaker 1: after Charlotte's knee, the previously surgically repaired knee. Nick all
15:56
Speaker 1: this begged her not to go out there. Charlotte insists,
16:00
Speaker 1: did the heroic baby face that she is. Now, I've
16:02
Speaker 1: got to I've got to go out there. And this
16:06
Speaker 1: all got very melodramatic with all this, and Alexa Bliss
16:09
Speaker 1: and the doctors rushed over to check on her later
16:12
Speaker 1: in the match when she was outside, you know, holding
16:15
Speaker 1: her knee, and they were ready to call it off,
16:18
Speaker 1: that the doctor was gonna go ahead and tell the
16:19
Speaker 1: timekeeper to call the match off. They kept telling her
16:22
Speaker 1: it's not worth it, and Charlotte told him it's worth
16:27
Speaker 1: it to me. And then one more single leg crab
16:31
Speaker 1: later and evidently it wasn't worth another knee operation because
16:34
Speaker 1: Charlotte finally tapped out. And that sends liv Morgan, the
16:37
Speaker 1: Women's World Champion, to the finals of the Queen of
16:41
Speaker 1: the Ring against Eo Sky next weekend, and then there
16:46
Speaker 1: is the WWE Championship for the second time this year.
16:51
Speaker 1: I missed a WWE title defense on SmackDown because I
16:54
Speaker 1: was working in Chicago, but I watched it when I
16:57
Speaker 1: got home, and as overbooked as was what they did,
17:02
Speaker 1: I didn't hate it. It caused some chaos on a
17:06
Speaker 1: show that could use a little bit of chaos because
17:08
Speaker 1: it's usually pretty lifeless and boring. Sammy' z ay was
17:12
Speaker 1: the special guest referee for this when Sammy had to
17:15
Speaker 1: at one point physically pulled Gunther off of Cody when
17:20
Speaker 1: he refused to release the sleeper hold after a rope break.
17:22
Speaker 1: Gunther was not pleased about this push, king to shove. Literally,
17:27
Speaker 1: Sammy slapped him, so Gunther power bombed him, which is
17:31
Speaker 1: not the smartest thing to be doing when you're trying
17:33
Speaker 1: to win the championship is to power bomb the referee.
17:36
Speaker 1: Another referee runs out, Gunther had the match one. A
17:39
Speaker 1: little while later, Sammy pulls the new referee out to
17:42
Speaker 1: the floor. He was well within his rights to disqualify
17:46
Speaker 1: gun there, but he opted not to do so. Instead,
17:48
Speaker 1: Gunther was holding onto the top rope on a sunset
17:50
Speaker 1: flip attempt by Cody. When Sammy got back in the ring,
17:54
Speaker 1: he kicked the hand free, Cody rolled him up. Sammy
17:57
Speaker 1: fast counted and he gave Cody the wind to retain
17:59
Speaker 1: the title. They really came into this week wanting you
18:04
Speaker 1: to believe that Sammy was going to screw over the
18:06
Speaker 1: Golden Boy. But he played it straight. He played it
18:09
Speaker 1: right down the middle until Gunther put his hands on him.
18:12
Speaker 1: Nick All, this was furious at Sammy. They were arguing
18:15
Speaker 1: at Gorilla. Gunther was there too Cody. Meanwhile, you can
18:19
Speaker 1: see Cody on the flat panel that was mounted on
18:22
Speaker 1: the wall of the Gorilla position, and Cody was still
18:24
Speaker 1: out in the ring and he had a mic and
18:27
Speaker 1: he was calling for a rematch. He was demanding a
18:30
Speaker 1: rematch even though he already won. So Gunther he takes
18:34
Speaker 1: out Sammy and then he looks over at nick All
18:36
Speaker 1: this and tells him to restart the match. All this
18:39
Speaker 1: is okay, and Gunther runs out to the ring. He's
18:43
Speaker 1: got a new impartial referee with him. So this was
18:46
Speaker 1: our third Cody and Gunther match, if you count clash
18:50
Speaker 1: in Italy fourth, if you want to go all the
18:52
Speaker 1: way back to Crown Jewel two years ago. If you
18:55
Speaker 1: do that means that Gunther is now zero for three
18:59
Speaker 1: in matches with Cody before this one here got started.
19:03
Speaker 1: So the match gets restarted all of three minutes before
19:06
Speaker 1: Sammy runs in. He catches Gunther with a halluva kick.
19:09
Speaker 1: Cody ducked out of the way because Gunther had him
19:12
Speaker 1: in a sleeper hole. He was kind of backed up
19:13
Speaker 1: in the corner. Here come Sammy and Cody ducks and
19:17
Speaker 1: guntherer ate the kick, which I presume means the match
19:20
Speaker 1: was just thrown away and it was not a disqualification
19:23
Speaker 1: win for gun Through. I mean they didn't care enough
19:24
Speaker 1: to announce it one way or the other. They never do.
19:27
Speaker 1: And later in the show, Cody went to all this
19:29
Speaker 1: to ask for a triple threat match at Night of
19:32
Speaker 1: Champions against Gunther and Sammy so he could put this
19:34
Speaker 1: thing to bed once and for all, and all this agreed.
19:37
Speaker 1: So we ended up with exactly the match that I
19:39
Speaker 1: figured we were going to be getting on that show.
19:40
Speaker 1: They just took the long way to get there. It's
19:43
Speaker 1: rare that we get a WWE title match on TV,
19:47
Speaker 1: let alone two of them back to back like that.
19:49
Speaker 1: The second match, I mean, the second match wasn't even
19:52
Speaker 1: a match as much as it was an angle. If
19:55
Speaker 1: they would have saved Cody against Gunther for Riodd with
19:58
Speaker 1: the same situation here Sammy is the referee, they did
20:01
Speaker 1: the same finish. That would have been amongst the worst
20:04
Speaker 1: title match finishes of the entire year. If they would
20:07
Speaker 1: have done that on the pl this would have been awful.
20:10
Speaker 1: So this was the place to do it. If you
20:11
Speaker 1: were going to do a finish like that, you do
20:13
Speaker 1: it on TV. You build to the bigger match on
20:15
Speaker 1: the bigger show. Now we have what should be a
20:18
Speaker 1: hell of a match when you consider who the three
20:21
Speaker 1: men are who were involved here, the match itself. To me,
20:24
Speaker 1: that's a main event. That's a worthy main event for
20:26
Speaker 1: a Night of Champions, Which brings us to Night of
20:29
Speaker 1: Champions with the first hours simulcasting live on ESPN at
20:34
Speaker 1: one pm Eastern, since they're in Saudi for this show,
20:37
Speaker 1: I'll be live on YouTube probably right after it ends.
20:41
Speaker 1: I'm inclined not to wait. I sometimes wait until maybe
20:44
Speaker 1: like eight pm or so and then go live. I'll
20:46
Speaker 1: probably just go live within half an hour of the
20:48
Speaker 1: show ending. We had six matches on the show last year.
20:52
Speaker 1: We have six matches on the show this year. Since
20:55
Speaker 1: two of them were tournament finals, and you've got to
20:58
Speaker 1: have more than two or three titles on a show
21:00
Speaker 1: called Night of Champions, you kind of had to have
21:03
Speaker 1: at least six matches, and these are the matches right now.
21:07
Speaker 1: Tiffany Stratton is going to be defending her Women's United
21:09
Speaker 1: States Championship against Jade Cargill. And the only reason this
21:14
Speaker 1: match is even happening here is because Rhea Ripley got hurt.
21:17
Speaker 1: Otherwise she would be defending her title in this spot.
21:19
Speaker 1: I do believe once they bumped Rhea off the poster
21:23
Speaker 1: for the show, they replaced her with Tiffany, so it
21:25
Speaker 1: became pretty clear Tiffany was going to be wrestling on
21:27
Speaker 1: this show. This is the fourth or fifth time now
21:30
Speaker 1: I've lost track that these two have squared off. None
21:34
Speaker 1: of those matches were particularly memorable, so I don't have
21:37
Speaker 1: I wouldn't say I have high hopes for this. It
21:40
Speaker 1: might be okay, but I don't have high hopes for this.
21:43
Speaker 1: Tiffany beat her at SummerSlam last year to retain the
21:46
Speaker 1: world championship. Jade then took it from her in November
21:50
Speaker 1: at Saturday Night's main event that kicked off her title run.
21:54
Speaker 1: You would you would, I mean, you would have to
21:56
Speaker 1: imagine after what happened to the end of the show
21:58
Speaker 1: on Friday. It was a direct result of an attack
22:02
Speaker 1: by Jade Cargill that Charlotte Flair failed to advance in
22:06
Speaker 1: the Queen of the Ring tournament, failed to make it
22:09
Speaker 1: to the finals of this tournament. Why would Charlotte not
22:13
Speaker 1: want to pay that back. That's what I'm expecting. I'm
22:17
Speaker 1: expecting Charlotte to be there in Riod and if she is,
22:19
Speaker 1: I'm expecting that she is going to play some kind
22:21
Speaker 1: of role in Jade Cargill not winning this match and
22:25
Speaker 1: not winning the championship. Tiffany will retain no matter what happens.
22:28
Speaker 1: Tiffany's going to retain because I don't see the point
22:30
Speaker 1: in putting the belt on Jade for what. Because they're
22:34
Speaker 1: going to do Jade and Charlotte at Summerslim and you
22:36
Speaker 1: want there to be a belt on the line, I
22:38
Speaker 1: don't think that's necessary. Although that is going to be
22:41
Speaker 1: the Summer Slim match, and that's been rumored for a while,
22:44
Speaker 1: but it's the one that makes the most sense. After
22:46
Speaker 1: what we saw on Friday, we know the match is
22:48
Speaker 1: taking place, Summerslim would be the best place for That'll
22:51
Speaker 1: be Charlotte and Jade. It will not be for the
22:52
Speaker 1: US title, though the Men's United States Championship will be
22:56
Speaker 1: on the line. Trick Williams is going to be defending
22:59
Speaker 1: against Ricky Say. Here's my question, do you think Lil
23:01
Speaker 1: Yati is making the trip to Saudi for this show?
23:04
Speaker 1: I don't know. I don't know, but Trick Williams is
23:07
Speaker 1: going to put his title on the line against Ricky says,
23:09
Speaker 1: who beat Carmelo Hayes on SmackDown to win the right
23:12
Speaker 1: to challenge for the title. I still think we're gonna
23:16
Speaker 1: end up getting a triple threat at some point, probably
23:19
Speaker 1: Summer Slim with Hayes included, although I wouldn't mind a
23:22
Speaker 1: straight singles match with Mellow and Trick. I just feel
23:25
Speaker 1: like we're probably gonna get that on SmackDown, or we're
23:28
Speaker 1: going to get that on Saturday Night's main event, and
23:31
Speaker 1: nin will end up getting the three way. So they'll
23:34
Speaker 1: have to figure out a way to make it all
23:35
Speaker 1: make sense, because if Trick goes in there on Saturday
23:38
Speaker 1: and just beats him, you know, he just beats Ricky,
23:41
Speaker 1: then that would seemingly finish Ricky off of the time being.
23:44
Speaker 1: As far as title contention goes. But I mean, they
23:46
Speaker 1: could always figure out a way where it makes sense
23:49
Speaker 1: to get all three of them in the ring together
23:51
Speaker 1: and do a triple threat. I don't think Trick is
23:53
Speaker 1: losing the championship here. He might at Summer Slam, but
23:55
Speaker 1: I don't think he's losing it here. Seth Rollins will
24:00
Speaker 1: go one on one. He will try to put this
24:02
Speaker 1: to rest once and for all, his feud, his bad blood,
24:06
Speaker 1: his issues with the Vision, his issues with bron Breaker.
24:09
Speaker 1: They are going to do it inside of a steel cage,
24:13
Speaker 1: and the question is really the bigger question is coming
24:16
Speaker 1: out of this match, what is the direction for Seth
24:19
Speaker 1: Rollins at Summerslim. Because to me, the only direction that
24:22
Speaker 1: really makes sense for Rollins on that show, and you
24:24
Speaker 1: got to imagine they're going to want him in a
24:26
Speaker 1: big match, is Roman Reigns. Now, that's what I was
24:31
Speaker 1: thinking right up until this week. Anyway, that was where
24:34
Speaker 1: my head was at Roman Reigns and Seth Rollins for
24:36
Speaker 1: the World Heavyweight Championship at Summerslim, and that may well
24:39
Speaker 1: be where we end up going. However, I have a
24:42
Speaker 1: different take on where they may be going. Where I
24:45
Speaker 1: kind of hope they're going with Roman. I'll get to
24:47
Speaker 1: that in a little bit. I still think Seth Rollins
24:50
Speaker 1: gets to the win here. I think at the end
24:52
Speaker 1: of all this, Rowlins is going to win the feud.
24:54
Speaker 1: Whatever plans they have for him are likely bigger than
24:57
Speaker 1: what bron Breaker will be doing at Summer Slim and
24:59
Speaker 1: so so I think it's if that's the case, if
25:02
Speaker 1: you're gonna have Rollins in a title match or some
25:04
Speaker 1: kind of big match on that show, it's probably more
25:06
Speaker 1: important for him to win this. I think Rollins wins
25:09
Speaker 1: the cage match. Now we have the Queen of the
25:13
Speaker 1: Ring Finals, where it will be the Women's World Champion,
25:16
Speaker 1: Live Morgan taking on EO Sky, two members of the
25:20
Speaker 1: raw roster. Live Morgan being in this tournament is ridiculous.
25:24
Speaker 1: We all agree on this. It's stupid. It's just dumb.
25:27
Speaker 1: And they try to have her go out there and
25:29
Speaker 1: explain why by saying, well, I want it all, I
25:32
Speaker 1: want it all. Why not, right, I want every championship. Okay, fine,
25:37
Speaker 1: it's fucking lame. She really was a waste of a
25:39
Speaker 1: spot in this tournament. And here's the other thing. The
25:43
Speaker 1: idea of the woman who won the World Championship at
25:47
Speaker 1: WrestleMania and has defended it exactly zero times since then.
25:52
Speaker 1: I don't give a shit what the excuse is. Oh, well,
25:55
Speaker 1: they thought Stephanie was going to be around, so she
25:57
Speaker 1: would have defended against Stephanie by the name. Okay, fine,
25:59
Speaker 1: but she didn't and they had no plan B. This
26:03
Speaker 1: has been the worst Women's Championship run in the history
26:05
Speaker 1: of that title. The woman who won the title at
26:08
Speaker 1: Mania and has defended it exactly zero times. The idea
26:12
Speaker 1: that we are supposed to, I guess, get somewhat excited
26:14
Speaker 1: about is that now there's the prospect of her winning
26:18
Speaker 1: this tournament and potentially unifying the two world titles at
26:24
Speaker 1: Summer Slam. Not only does that not get me interested
26:27
Speaker 1: in seeing that match at Summer Slam, it actively makes
26:31
Speaker 1: me not want to watch it because that just sounds
26:34
Speaker 1: fucking terrible. So we can't have any of this. So
26:38
Speaker 1: whoever's going to win here, whoever was going to be
26:40
Speaker 1: on the opposite side of live, was always going to
26:42
Speaker 1: be the presumptive winner. And I'm very happy that that
26:45
Speaker 1: person is EO Sky because she was my pick to
26:48
Speaker 1: win anyway. I wanted her to win. Queen EO is
26:51
Speaker 1: what we need. Queen EO is what I believe we
26:53
Speaker 1: are going to have on Saturday. Now. If Rhea Ripley
26:56
Speaker 1: is out for a while and this turns out to
26:58
Speaker 1: be a serious knee injury, that complicates things. Unless the
27:02
Speaker 1: plan is to just have EO win the tournament and
27:05
Speaker 1: then challenge liv Morgan to a rematch at SummerSlam. That's
27:10
Speaker 1: what I'm predicting ends up happening. We're gonna get Queen
27:13
Speaker 1: EO and then after the match, not during the match,
27:17
Speaker 1: after the match, maybe on Raw that Monday night. That's
27:20
Speaker 1: where we finally get the return of Stephanie Vicaire. I
27:24
Speaker 1: think the play here is to just do a straight match.
27:26
Speaker 1: I don't see her getting involved in the match, especially
27:29
Speaker 1: because they may be doing something similar in the men's side.
27:32
Speaker 1: I think to do that in the men's and the
27:33
Speaker 1: women's matches would be stupid. Stephanie coming back, EO choosing
27:38
Speaker 1: live That could then create a very interesting little triangle
27:41
Speaker 1: heading into Summer Slim. And remember Stephanie and EO they
27:44
Speaker 1: have history. It was EO who's Stephanie beat at Wresselled
27:48
Speaker 1: Palooza last year to win that championship. You know, does
27:52
Speaker 1: Live even make it to SummerSlam as the champion or
27:56
Speaker 1: is it gonna be Stephanie. Do we end up with
27:58
Speaker 1: a three way on that show? I'd be okay with that.
28:01
Speaker 1: EO might not be if she wins Queen of the
28:05
Speaker 1: Ring and ends up having to fight for it in
28:07
Speaker 1: a three way, but anything to get Stephanie and EO
28:10
Speaker 1: back in the ring together is fine with me. I
28:12
Speaker 1: love their first match, but I think Eosky is going
28:14
Speaker 1: to win the tournament. Then we have the King of
28:18
Speaker 1: the Ring tournament, and we have Obafemi taking on jay Uso.
28:22
Speaker 1: It comes down to what WWE has clearly staked as
28:26
Speaker 1: the future of this company, the man that they are
28:29
Speaker 1: building everything around against the yeat Man. When Raw ended
28:35
Speaker 1: on Monday and Obafemi stood in the middle of the
28:37
Speaker 1: ring again bringing up brock Lesner by name. This is
28:40
Speaker 1: after calling him a bitch, and this time he questioned
28:44
Speaker 1: his manhood. He expected him to show up on Monday
28:48
Speaker 1: and try to screw him out of a win, but
28:49
Speaker 1: he was a no show. Right, it could still happen
28:53
Speaker 1: as soon as tomorrow night, because the idea that I
28:56
Speaker 1: pitched a few weeks ago is still possible. There's still
29:00
Speaker 1: time for this to happen. To see Brock Lesnar's show
29:04
Speaker 1: up on Raw and take Obafemi out of the tournament
29:07
Speaker 1: before he even gets on the plane to fly to
29:11
Speaker 1: Riod And I'm sure those fans would be disappointed not
29:14
Speaker 1: to see him if he wasn't there. But hey, I mean,
29:16
Speaker 1: this is a sold show for WWE. They get their
29:19
Speaker 1: fifty million dollars guaranteed either way, they don't have to
29:22
Speaker 1: worry about selling tickets. Brock showing up tomorrow and taking
29:27
Speaker 1: him out of the tournament to then open up a
29:29
Speaker 1: wildcard spot for Night of Champions to be filled by
29:33
Speaker 1: someone like Cmpunk is still possible, but I will admit
29:38
Speaker 1: those hopes are dimming by the hour. I have to
29:42
Speaker 1: just look at what we have in front of us,
29:43
Speaker 1: and if it's Obafemi against jay Uso, I do not
29:47
Speaker 1: care to see Obafemi losing to jay Uso. I do
29:51
Speaker 1: not care to see jay Uso challenging for the championship
29:54
Speaker 1: at SummerSlam against any of those three in the main event, Cody,
29:57
Speaker 1: Gunther or Sammy's Ain, even with all of their history together,
30:01
Speaker 1: that is not a main event that appeals to me.
30:05
Speaker 1: If we get Oba against jay Uso. Obafemi needs to
30:08
Speaker 1: win that match. Brock Lesner can show up, he can
30:11
Speaker 1: attempt to screw Oba out of the crowd, but fail.
30:16
Speaker 1: Oba wins anyway. Brock is stunned, he can't believe it,
30:20
Speaker 1: and we get Oba and Brock on Night one in Minneapolis,
30:24
Speaker 1: and then Oba challenging Roman for the championship on night two.
30:28
Speaker 1: I talked about that. I think in the mailbag last week.
30:30
Speaker 1: It's not ideal. It would not have been the way
30:32
Speaker 1: that I would have laid everything out. I think burnout
30:34
Speaker 1: is a very real thing. If you do all of
30:36
Speaker 1: that in one weekend, and there's a good chance that
30:39
Speaker 1: Oba would win one and not the other. And by
30:41
Speaker 1: the way, that doesn't necessarily mean he beats Brock and
30:43
Speaker 1: loses to Roman. It could be the other way around,
30:47
Speaker 1: which would then set Lesner up for a title match
30:49
Speaker 1: coming out of SummerSlam, and then Oba could finally put
30:53
Speaker 1: him down once and for all. I'm not saying any
30:56
Speaker 1: of this is ideal. What I'm saying is that Obafemi
30:59
Speaker 1: should not be loose to jay Usso full stop, period,
31:03
Speaker 1: end of story. And if that's the match and there's
31:06
Speaker 1: no Chickanay and there's no big swerve, He'd better fucking win.
31:11
Speaker 1: I'm going with Oba to win the crown, and Cody
31:16
Speaker 1: Rhodes will defend the WWE Championship against Gunther and Sammy
31:21
Speaker 1: z Ain. Sammy z Ain has parlayed this whole last
31:25
Speaker 1: real good guy thing on SmackDown into what has been
31:28
Speaker 1: I think a pretty entertaining run for himself, probably the
31:31
Speaker 1: most entertaining thing on the entire show week to week
31:34
Speaker 1: at the moment. And Cody and Sammy, to me, is
31:38
Speaker 1: really where the issue is, and that's a match that
31:41
Speaker 1: I would like to see Gunther and I can't even
31:43
Speaker 1: believe I'm sitting here and saying this. You know, six
31:45
Speaker 1: months after he retired AJ Style, seven months after he
31:49
Speaker 1: retired John Cena, and there was all this buzz around
31:52
Speaker 1: Gunther in the career killer stuff, which was always going
31:55
Speaker 1: to have a short shelf life. You can only do
31:57
Speaker 1: that for so long. But they had done such a
32:01
Speaker 1: good job of really you know, keeping him strong and
32:05
Speaker 1: keeping him unbeaten for a period of time there, and
32:09
Speaker 1: it just feels like it was all for nothing. You know,
32:12
Speaker 1: I don't want to say I feel, you know, vindicated,
32:15
Speaker 1: sitting here, but here we sit now six months later,
32:17
Speaker 1: and having him be the one to beat John Cena
32:19
Speaker 1: in the way that he did, which some people anyway
32:22
Speaker 1: thought was going to be this big, massive thing. It
32:25
Speaker 1: turned out to me not a damn thing. Nothing. There's
32:28
Speaker 1: nothing right now about Gunther that feels like he is
32:32
Speaker 1: above everybody else, like he's in this rare space that
32:37
Speaker 1: only select people end up in, and now he's just
32:40
Speaker 1: looked at differently than everybody else. I might have said
32:42
Speaker 1: that months ago, but it doesn't feel that way now.
32:44
Speaker 1: Now he finally truly feels like just another guy on
32:48
Speaker 1: the show. And that's sad because it didn't have to
32:52
Speaker 1: be that way. But I feel like whatever aura was
32:54
Speaker 1: there coming out of all that has been squandered, and
32:58
Speaker 1: we are now looking at a situation where if he
33:01
Speaker 1: was to lose this match, he will have lost to
33:04
Speaker 1: Cody Rhoads in Italy, he will have lost to Cody
33:07
Speaker 1: Rhoads on Friday, and he will have lost to Cody
33:11
Speaker 1: Rhodes here at Night of Champions, not even saying anything
33:14
Speaker 1: about two years ago at Crown Jewel when he lost
33:16
Speaker 1: to Cody Roads there as well. Cody may just become
33:19
Speaker 1: the guy that Gunther can't figure out. Gunther may never
33:21
Speaker 1: beat him at this rate, so it's not ideal for
33:25
Speaker 1: Gunther to lose again here. But I'm looking at this
33:28
Speaker 1: and I'm going, solo Monster, I'm talking to myself, solom Monster,
33:32
Speaker 1: what is the outcome that you would like to see here?
33:35
Speaker 1: Like as a fan, I'm looking at this and I'm going, Okay,
33:37
Speaker 1: there should be a hell of a match. But who
33:39
Speaker 1: do I want to win? Who do I want to
33:40
Speaker 1: be the champion coming out of this match? Gunther winning
33:44
Speaker 1: the championship to me, you know right now, it doesn't
33:48
Speaker 1: do much for me. Cody retaining the title, that's boring.
33:53
Speaker 1: The person who should walk out of Riata as the champion,
33:55
Speaker 1: and what a reaction I'm sure he would get. Given
33:58
Speaker 1: where the show is being held, is Sammy's a I
34:01
Speaker 1: would like to see Sammy's ain win the WWE Championship
34:04
Speaker 1: on Saturday. Maybe it throws a monkey wrench into their
34:08
Speaker 1: plans for Summer Slam. Maybe Sammy doesn't hold it for
34:10
Speaker 1: very long. Maybe Samy holds it for a few weeks.
34:12
Speaker 1: I don't think that would be great. I would like
34:16
Speaker 1: to see him hold on to it for a little
34:17
Speaker 1: bit longer. I'm not saying give him a long super
34:20
Speaker 1: long title run or anything, but more than two or
34:23
Speaker 1: three weeks would be ideal. But still like, this could
34:26
Speaker 1: go any number of ways, but at the moment, Sammy's
34:29
Speaker 1: ain is the most compelling character on that show, right
34:33
Speaker 1: even if you don't think he's terribly compelling. Out of
34:35
Speaker 1: everything that is going on right now on SmackDown, he
34:38
Speaker 1: is the de facto most compelling character on SmackDown. He
34:42
Speaker 1: is the one where like, the stuff that he's interested
34:44
Speaker 1: into me is the best part of the show. I
34:46
Speaker 1: wouldn't have said that six months ago. Him winning the
34:50
Speaker 1: championship to me makes things a little more interesting on
34:54
Speaker 1: SmackDown then they would be if Gunther won the belter
34:56
Speaker 1: of Cody just retained again, Oh how exciting. So I
35:00
Speaker 1: would put the belt on Sammy and then you could
35:02
Speaker 1: build to a singles match at Summer Slim between Cody
35:05
Speaker 1: and Sammy for the WWE Championship. You can keep this
35:07
Speaker 1: issue between them going for a little bit longer because
35:10
Speaker 1: Cody Rhodes is not going to be left out of
35:13
Speaker 1: the Summer Slim main event. He will be in the
35:14
Speaker 1: main event on one of those two nights, him against
35:17
Speaker 1: Sammy's Ain. To me, you could absolutely headline one of
35:21
Speaker 1: those two nights with that match, more so than you
35:23
Speaker 1: could if it was sammy'sz Ain against jay Usso or
35:27
Speaker 1: Gunther against jay Usso. Give me a fucking break, nobody
35:31
Speaker 1: is asking for that. Cody against Sammy, I'd be okay
35:35
Speaker 1: with that. But if Sammy is coming in as the
35:38
Speaker 1: defending champion, or if maybe Cody was and Sammy won
35:41
Speaker 1: it from him there, I guess that would be okay too.
35:43
Speaker 1: But for this weekend, I'm focused on this match here.
35:46
Speaker 1: You're going to close the show with it, right, because
35:48
Speaker 1: we know Roman's not defending his title, He's not wrestling
35:51
Speaker 1: on that show. That's how you close out Night of Champions.
35:55
Speaker 1: The SmackDown this week is being taped on Tuesday and
35:59
Speaker 1: I believe on two Day in London to air on Friday,
36:01
Speaker 1: and it's normal time slot. That will be the final
36:05
Speaker 1: three hours SmackDown. The show is back to two hours
36:09
Speaker 1: as of July third. Get the party hats, everybody the
36:14
Speaker 1: party hats and the kazoos. We're going to have a celebration.
36:18
Speaker 1: It's going to be a fourth of July Bash that weekend.
36:21
Speaker 1: As we celebrate the return of two hour smackdowns. What
36:26
Speaker 1: a wild week for TNA, and not in the best
36:29
Speaker 1: of ways, although I guess time will tell creatively if
36:32
Speaker 1: it ends up being a net positive for them. TNA
36:35
Speaker 1: started the year with a brand new TV deal on
36:38
Speaker 1: AMC network. Right, it gave them their highest level of
36:41
Speaker 1: visibility since the Spike TV days on Access TV. They
36:45
Speaker 1: were in a death loop, right, they were never going
36:47
Speaker 1: to grow. But with the AMC deal and these unverified
36:51
Speaker 1: reports that it could be worth as much as thirty
36:54
Speaker 1: million dollars over three years or ten million dollars a year,
36:58
Speaker 1: there was reason to be optimistic that this be a
37:00
Speaker 1: positive step in the right direction for a company that
37:02
Speaker 1: has survived a lot of turmoil over the years, and frankly,
37:07
Speaker 1: a lot of self inflicted wounds that would have killed
37:09
Speaker 1: most other companies, and yet TNA finds a way to survive.
37:13
Speaker 1: If TNA was around when the dinosaurs roamed free and
37:16
Speaker 1: the meteor hit and wiped them all out, TNA would
37:18
Speaker 1: have survived. They would have found it tucked away under
37:20
Speaker 1: a rock or something, okay, narrowly escaping the impact. If
37:24
Speaker 1: nuclear winter blanketed the world, there would be TNA standing
37:27
Speaker 1: over there in a fucking hazmat su wandering around. This
37:30
Speaker 1: company will never die. It'll get sold at some point,
37:33
Speaker 1: and what happens then is anyone's guess. I guess it
37:36
Speaker 1: just depends on who buys it. If WWE buys it,
37:39
Speaker 1: unless they think they can maintain the AMC deal and
37:41
Speaker 1: make money that way, they really wouldn't have any reason
37:44
Speaker 1: to keep it alive anymore. Actually, on that note, Blake
37:48
Speaker 1: Avignon is the sports business reporter who first valued the
37:52
Speaker 1: AMC deal at thirty million, and was also the one
37:55
Speaker 1: who claimed that there was a sixty day termination clause
37:58
Speaker 1: in their deal with WWE that was activated with the
38:01
Speaker 1: announcement of the AMC deal, So take that for what
38:04
Speaker 1: it's worth. But this week he reported on his ex
38:07
Speaker 1: account that Len Asper of Anthem he has a floor
38:13
Speaker 1: for a potential TNA sale, so a value in which
38:16
Speaker 1: he will not go under if he is going to
38:17
Speaker 1: sell the company, and that floor is said to be
38:21
Speaker 1: in the forty to fifty million dollar range, which includes
38:24
Speaker 1: toxic debt on Anthem's books that any buyer would be
38:28
Speaker 1: expected to absorb. He said Scott Demore had offered around
38:32
Speaker 1: ten million to buy the company in twenty twenty four,
38:35
Speaker 1: including whatever debts TNA had, and that Anthem rejected the
38:39
Speaker 1: offer outright with no counter So if that report is
38:43
Speaker 1: to be believed, that's what Anthem would be looking for
38:45
Speaker 1: in any potential TNA sale for TKO or for Tony Kahn.
38:50
Speaker 1: They have the resources for that, But would it even
38:52
Speaker 1: be worth it to them? Like is TNA worth fifty
38:54
Speaker 1: million dollars? I mean it comes down to this, how
38:58
Speaker 1: much is that tape library work? Because that's the only
39:01
Speaker 1: real asset that you would be acquiring if you bought
39:04
Speaker 1: TNA right the IP like TNA Impact or Bound for
39:08
Speaker 1: Glory or slam Aiversary that doesn't hold any real value.
39:12
Speaker 1: So what are you really getting for that amount of money?
39:16
Speaker 1: Like at the end there, Vince McMahon was able to
39:18
Speaker 1: buy WCW for four point two million dollars right twenty
39:21
Speaker 1: five years ago. That was for everything, all in the IP,
39:25
Speaker 1: the tape library, some talent contracts, all of it. Four
39:28
Speaker 1: point two million dollars, even in its darkest days. If
39:32
Speaker 1: you set aside the money that they lost and just
39:34
Speaker 1: looked at the company and its assets, WCW was far
39:37
Speaker 1: more valuable that TNA has ever been in its twenty
39:41
Speaker 1: four years of existence, and so the idea of them
39:45
Speaker 1: getting fifty million dollars is laughable to me. But all
39:48
Speaker 1: that to say, they started the year off in a
39:50
Speaker 1: good place, with the chance to create an awareness around
39:55
Speaker 1: the product, to drive interest in their show, and they
39:58
Speaker 1: got off to a hurra And this start with that
40:01
Speaker 1: terrible AMC debut. I just remember I think the following week,
40:06
Speaker 1: what show was It might have been one of their
40:08
Speaker 1: pay per views, might have been Genesis. But Tom Hannifin
40:13
Speaker 1: had Carlos Silvett ringside, Who's gonna interview him? And Carlos
40:16
Speaker 1: was talking about his wonderful debut on AMC, and I
40:19
Speaker 1: think he was getting booed, and I'm like, oh, this
40:21
Speaker 1: is so bad, this, this is so terrible. After that,
40:25
Speaker 1: they were able to study the ship, they were able
40:27
Speaker 1: to overcome those growing pains. But in the time since then,
40:30
Speaker 1: I wouldn't say the ratings have shot up. They've gone up,
40:33
Speaker 1: they've gone back down recently, but they've done a very
40:36
Speaker 1: poor job of generating real interest in the product or
40:40
Speaker 1: doing anything to try to make themselves stand out from
40:42
Speaker 1: everybody else. There's already so much wrestling on TV. Just
40:47
Speaker 1: from the big two players that there's really nothing about
40:50
Speaker 1: the TNA product that feels like you have to go
40:52
Speaker 1: out of your way to see or that you don't
40:55
Speaker 1: already get from the other two. You know, part of
40:57
Speaker 1: the problem is that TNA has no brand idea, Y like,
41:01
Speaker 1: what do they stand for? What do they have to
41:04
Speaker 1: offer that nobody else does. I can't answer that. What
41:08
Speaker 1: we do know is, by virtue of this working relationship
41:11
Speaker 1: with WWE, they're going to have first DIBs on most
41:14
Speaker 1: of the TNA talents that they want to sign away
41:16
Speaker 1: from them. And as we saw with wrestlemany a week
41:19
Speaker 1: and that whole fiasco in Las Vegas, they have a
41:21
Speaker 1: new master that they now have to serve. Because I
41:24
Speaker 1: don't buy the excuse that Carlos Silva was peddling as
41:29
Speaker 1: to why they had to pull talents from certain shows,
41:31
Speaker 1: the idea that because AAW ran Collision on a Thursday
41:35
Speaker 1: night and one hour of the show overlapped with Impact
41:38
Speaker 1: on AMC, this was some sort of declaration of war,
41:42
Speaker 1: a decision minds you, that AAW had nothing to do
41:44
Speaker 1: with because they got preempted to a different night because
41:46
Speaker 1: of sports. Something that's happened many times before, but this
41:51
Speaker 1: is the excuse that was given and its horseshit. It
41:53
Speaker 1: is a complete lie. WWE does not want TNA talent
41:58
Speaker 1: working with AW talent, and or TNA does not want
42:01
Speaker 1: TNA talent working with AW Talent for fear that it
42:04
Speaker 1: may ruffle WWE's feathers. But either way, the common denominator
42:08
Speaker 1: here is WWE and it created this horrible backlash against
42:13
Speaker 1: TNA and specifically Carlos Silva, who took a lot of shit.
42:17
Speaker 1: I mean, this turned into a gigantic pr nightmare for them,
42:20
Speaker 1: and it gave Tony Con the chance to swoop in
42:23
Speaker 1: like the Knight in Shining Armor, so that these companies
42:25
Speaker 1: could use AW talent on their shows instead and look
42:28
Speaker 1: like the good guys. It was a complete misfire on
42:32
Speaker 1: TNA's part. But there's another issue, which is the number
42:36
Speaker 1: of talents that have chosen to leave TNA over the
42:39
Speaker 1: course of the last I don't know, twelve to eighteen months.
42:43
Speaker 1: It is a staggering number. Names like Joe Hendry and
42:47
Speaker 1: Jordan Grace. They seemed destined for WWE. It felt like
42:50
Speaker 1: they had done all they could do in TNA, and
42:53
Speaker 1: how much WWE was using them in NXT. I mean,
42:56
Speaker 1: those two felt inevitable. Especially with Joe Hennywe was able
43:01
Speaker 1: to negotiate him out of his TNA deal early to
43:04
Speaker 1: bring him in. And boy, they sure have done a
43:07
Speaker 1: whole lot with those two on the main roster, haven't they.
43:11
Speaker 1: Josh Alexander was another one who had an option year
43:14
Speaker 1: they rolled over, even though he didn't want them to.
43:17
Speaker 1: He wanted to test out free agency, so he stayed
43:20
Speaker 1: an extra year and he got the hell out of
43:22
Speaker 1: there as fast as he could. But just in the
43:25
Speaker 1: months since the AMC deal was announced, they've lost Steve Macklin,
43:29
Speaker 1: a former TNA world champion, all four rascals who went
43:33
Speaker 1: to AW until tray Meegell got fired before he could
43:36
Speaker 1: even debut, and then he went back to TNA. Tray Miegel,
43:39
Speaker 1: by the way, just re signed with the company this week.
43:42
Speaker 1: Just to be fair, There are people that have re
43:44
Speaker 1: signed or signed lately. Miguel is one of them. Ali
43:48
Speaker 1: is another one. Tasha steeles no word on how long
43:52
Speaker 1: any of these deals are for. They tend to be
43:54
Speaker 1: short term deals because TNA can't afford to pay people
43:57
Speaker 1: that or they don't care enough about TNA to make
43:59
Speaker 1: a law longer term commitment because they hoped to land
44:02
Speaker 1: somewhere else. I think Elena Black was another one. She
44:04
Speaker 1: may have signed for a year, maybe that was last year.
44:08
Speaker 1: But these constant short term deals are a killer because
44:11
Speaker 1: how can you ever invest in someone and build them
44:14
Speaker 1: for the future when they may have no future with
44:17
Speaker 1: your company, Like, you're not going to build around someone
44:20
Speaker 1: who signs a ninety day deal. But they lost most
44:24
Speaker 1: of the rascals. Jake Doyle is gone, Danny Luna wanted out,
44:28
Speaker 1: Mila Grace wanted out, The Inspiration opted not to re sign.
44:32
Speaker 1: This is to say nothing of names like Mike Santana,
44:35
Speaker 1: the reigning TNA World Heavyweight Champion, whose contract is said
44:38
Speaker 1: to be up next month. He's likely on his way
44:40
Speaker 1: to WWE Leon Slater. They held back from allowing him
44:45
Speaker 1: to break the record for the longest raining X Division
44:47
Speaker 1: champion ever because they probably figured there's a good chance
44:50
Speaker 1: he's gone in the next few months when his deal
44:52
Speaker 1: is up. You know, losing Santana and Slater would be
44:56
Speaker 1: a huge blow to that roster. Even losing one of
44:58
Speaker 1: them would be a big blow. Losing both of them
45:00
Speaker 1: would be a body blow, Like, what is going on
45:05
Speaker 1: in this company that this company cannot retain all of
45:08
Speaker 1: this talent. This company signed a supposedly multimillion dollar television
45:14
Speaker 1: deal and started on AMC this year. They have a
45:16
Speaker 1: partnership with the biggest wrestling company in the world, and
45:19
Speaker 1: they're actively choosing to leave and go elsewhere. They are
45:22
Speaker 1: bleeding talent, and it comes down to one thing. It
45:26
Speaker 1: comes down to money. At the end of the day,
45:30
Speaker 1: this is a business, and if they feel like they're
45:32
Speaker 1: not being paid what they're worth, they have no incentive
45:36
Speaker 1: to stick around. Follow the money. It's the old, tried
45:40
Speaker 1: and true phrase and it applies here to follow the money.
45:46
Speaker 1: They're following the money right out the door. There's some
45:50
Speaker 1: talented WWE names that are going to be free agents,
45:53
Speaker 1: you know, as their ninety day windows expire over the
45:56
Speaker 1: next month or so. It would benefit TNA to pick
45:58
Speaker 1: some of them up. But can they afford them, Will
46:02
Speaker 1: any of them want to go there? That's the question.
46:07
Speaker 1: But you can add another name to the list the
46:09
Speaker 1: voluntary departures now, as comes the news that former TNA
46:12
Speaker 1: World Champion and Knockouts Champion Tessa Blanchard is gone from
46:18
Speaker 1: the company. She appears to have been caught in the
46:21
Speaker 1: middle of a promotional war, as she is not only
46:24
Speaker 1: working for TNA for years, but for CMLL, the same
46:27
Speaker 1: CMLL that has a working relationship with AW and you
46:31
Speaker 1: add to that CML and Triple A, which is now
46:34
Speaker 1: partially owned by WWE. They have been at war with
46:37
Speaker 1: one another for decades, and it looks like things came
46:40
Speaker 1: to a head where, according to Tessa herself, TNA said
46:44
Speaker 1: that she could no longer work for both TNA and CML.
46:47
Speaker 1: She had to make a choice one or the other,
46:49
Speaker 1: and she chose CML, which books her more and pays
46:54
Speaker 1: her more than TNA does, so it was a no brainer. Gee,
46:58
Speaker 1: I wonder what should I do? Should I stay with
47:00
Speaker 1: the company that hasn't done anything with me over the
47:02
Speaker 1: past twelve months, that pays me less and hardly books me,
47:06
Speaker 1: or should I basically stick with the company that books
47:08
Speaker 1: me more and pays me more. G I wonder? She
47:12
Speaker 1: explained it a video on her YouTube channel that as
47:16
Speaker 1: time went on and business evolved, leadership change partnerships, change
47:20
Speaker 1: network deals changed, the direction of the company just shifted. Eventually,
47:24
Speaker 1: I was asked to make a decision to either continue
47:26
Speaker 1: with TNA or continue with CMLL. Now, she did say
47:30
Speaker 1: that TNA offered her or they made an offer to
47:33
Speaker 1: her to stay. Fitfel says that she was halfway through
47:36
Speaker 1: a three year deal and sources within TNA claimed that
47:39
Speaker 1: they were going to rework her deal to offer her
47:41
Speaker 1: more money due to CMLL paying her more, but she
47:45
Speaker 1: still chose to leave. I know she's also engaged to
47:50
Speaker 1: ask fiene Hay. I believe it is who wrestles for CMLL.
47:54
Speaker 1: She built a whole life for herself down there, even
47:56
Speaker 1: years ago when she was married to Daga. You know,
47:58
Speaker 1: I think she was living down in Mexico City, So
48:00
Speaker 1: it's not surprising to me that you know, she would,
48:04
Speaker 1: you know, gun to her head, she had to make
48:06
Speaker 1: a decision. TNA hasn't done jack shit with her over
48:09
Speaker 1: the past year that she would choose to leave, and
48:12
Speaker 1: maybe that's by design because it was very telling. For
48:16
Speaker 1: all of the TNA talents that WWE has used on
48:19
Speaker 1: NXT or NXT talents who have worked with TNA wrestlers
48:23
Speaker 1: on their shows, Tessa was never involved in any of that.
48:27
Speaker 1: They never used her a single time, which tells you
48:31
Speaker 1: about what interest WWE would have in using Tessa Blancher,
48:35
Speaker 1: probably even less interest from Tony Kahan in doing anything
48:38
Speaker 1: with her, and aw works with CMLL. But I don't
48:42
Speaker 1: think you're going to be seeing her on any of
48:44
Speaker 1: these forbidden door shows in the future. You know. The
48:47
Speaker 1: racism allegations have followed her around now for a year,
48:51
Speaker 1: the incident with La Rosa and Negra. It doesn't matter
48:54
Speaker 1: if they're cool with each other. Now, every now and
48:57
Speaker 1: then somebody will post a photo of them from like
48:59
Speaker 1: Wressel Connors some things, shaking hands and smiling and oh,
49:01
Speaker 1: everything's okay now. Like that did lasting damage to this
49:05
Speaker 1: woman's chances of ever rehabilitating her image, especially the way
49:09
Speaker 1: that she handled things in the aftermath of all of that,
49:13
Speaker 1: all the denials, no contrition, that only made things worse.
49:18
Speaker 1: If she had shown even the slightest bit of remorse
49:21
Speaker 1: after all of that, it would have done wonders for her.
49:24
Speaker 1: Things might have turned out differently for her. But she
49:26
Speaker 1: never did. Because here's the thing, whatever you think of
49:28
Speaker 1: all of this stuff, people have shown in the past
49:31
Speaker 1: that they are willing to be very forgiving when it
49:33
Speaker 1: comes to certain things. If there is the perception that
49:36
Speaker 1: the person is truly sorry for what they said or
49:39
Speaker 1: what they did, or they were making efforts or inroads
49:42
Speaker 1: to try to make amends for whatever it may have been.
49:46
Speaker 1: And that was never anything that Tessa attempted. She just
49:49
Speaker 1: denied everything, and she fought against it, and it was
49:53
Speaker 1: the worst thing that she possibly could have done. Like,
49:56
Speaker 1: just if you look at it from a pr perspective,
49:58
Speaker 1: it was the worst move that this woman could have made.
50:00
Speaker 1: Because now if all of a sudden she comes out
50:02
Speaker 1: and says all the right things, well years have gone
50:04
Speaker 1: by right now, she's just trying to rehab her image.
50:07
Speaker 1: So it's a no win situation for her. The bullying
50:10
Speaker 1: allegations from multiple other wrestlers, many of whom now work
50:13
Speaker 1: in that women's locker room by the way in WWE
50:16
Speaker 1: and probably would not want her there. Now, I'm not
50:19
Speaker 1: saying that they would have a mutiny on their hands.
50:22
Speaker 1: Everybody would fall in line like good little soldiers and
50:24
Speaker 1: they would be team players if they wanted them to
50:26
Speaker 1: work with her. But she pissed off a lot of people,
50:29
Speaker 1: right We're not just talking about one isolated incident where
50:32
Speaker 1: she spit on someone and uttered a racial slur, which
50:35
Speaker 1: is bad enough. She gained a reputation, and that's a
50:39
Speaker 1: hard thing to shake. Even the Wow Women of Wrestling
50:42
Speaker 1: Revival that was supposed to be like a rehabilitation project
50:45
Speaker 1: for her. She was going to be the face of it,
50:46
Speaker 1: she was going to be the star of it, and
50:49
Speaker 1: that went sideways. There was a time when she was
50:52
Speaker 1: a can't miss prospect for WWE. A future WrestleMania match
50:56
Speaker 1: was written in the stars with Charlotte Flair. She fumbled
50:59
Speaker 1: it all and I think when it became clear that
51:03
Speaker 1: WWE had no interest in bringing her in, that made
51:06
Speaker 1: it a lot easier for her to go back to
51:07
Speaker 1: TNA two years ago, who she did not leave on
51:11
Speaker 1: the best of terms in twenty twenty, but they brought
51:15
Speaker 1: her back anyway in the dark of night. I said
51:18
Speaker 1: it at the time, like you know someone is radioactive
51:20
Speaker 1: when the company sees fit to bring them back silently
51:23
Speaker 1: and they don't even tell anybody, even their own talent.
51:25
Speaker 1: Everybody was in the dark about this. They were smuggling
51:28
Speaker 1: contraband in over the border. That's how they brought Tessa
51:31
Speaker 1: Blanchard back to TNA. She went back to TNA because
51:35
Speaker 1: she had no better options and the closest that she
51:38
Speaker 1: may ever get to. Going to WWE would be in
51:40
Speaker 1: my opinion, if she ever were to leave CMLL, I
51:43
Speaker 1: could see them bringing her into Triple A. I could
51:46
Speaker 1: see Undertaker salivating over the prospect of booking her in
51:50
Speaker 1: Triple A as one of their top names, and that
51:52
Speaker 1: could be sort of a back doorway for her to
51:54
Speaker 1: work with main roster talents who they could bring down
51:56
Speaker 1: to wrestle her. Even that seems very unlikely because the
52:00
Speaker 1: loyalty that she has to CMLL. But there's really no
52:04
Speaker 1: need for WWE or for AW to bring her in
52:07
Speaker 1: because for all of the controversy that it would cause,
52:10
Speaker 1: and she's a racist chance that would ring out in
52:13
Speaker 1: some of these arenas, the value just is not in
52:16
Speaker 1: it for them to take that kind of risk. As
52:18
Speaker 1: talented as she is. This was a mess of her
52:21
Speaker 1: own making. And if she's built a life for herself
52:25
Speaker 1: in Mexico and she doesn't seem to have those same
52:27
Speaker 1: issues in CMLL right, which is coming off one of
52:31
Speaker 1: the biggest business years that company's ever had. I mean,
52:34
Speaker 1: CMLL was one of the hottest promotions anywhere in the world,
52:37
Speaker 1: then there's no reason for her to go anywhere else.
52:41
Speaker 1: But that was just Tuesday. That was on Tuesday in TNA.
52:45
Speaker 1: Then came Wednesday, and another name that you could add
52:49
Speaker 1: to the list of the departed from TNA is their
52:51
Speaker 1: head of creative Tommy Dreamer, who also happens to be
52:55
Speaker 1: one of tessa's biggest defenders. The same Tommy Dreamer who
52:59
Speaker 1: once told Hongaloa that he thought he would be a
53:01
Speaker 1: huge star for them and even reminded him of The Rock,
53:06
Speaker 1: Although to be fair, there was a time where I
53:08
Speaker 1: thought Sunny Siaki reminded me of The Rock and he
53:11
Speaker 1: was going to be a big star for them as well,
53:12
Speaker 1: and that didn't happen either. But on Wednesday, Dreamer revealed
53:16
Speaker 1: I'm Busted Open Radio that he and TNA president Carlos
53:19
Speaker 1: Silva had come to an agreement to mutually part ways. Now,
53:25
Speaker 1: if you listen to what Dreamer said, or if you
53:27
Speaker 1: watch the clip of him making the announcement, it sure
53:30
Speaker 1: don't sound like it was mutual. This guy was gutted
53:33
Speaker 1: over this. He looked like a man whose wife had
53:36
Speaker 1: just told him she wants a divorce and she already
53:38
Speaker 1: went and changed all the locks to the house and
53:40
Speaker 1: left his shit laying out all over the lawn. He said, yesterday,
53:45
Speaker 1: I had a great conversation with Carlos Silva and me
53:47
Speaker 1: and TNA are no longer in a relationship. Yes, yes, ladies,
53:53
Speaker 1: he is single and ready to mingle. We've mutually agreed
53:57
Speaker 1: to part ways. I've given so much of my life
54:00
Speaker 1: that company. I don't have any ill will or malice.
54:03
Speaker 1: I wanted to survive and I want it to be
54:05
Speaker 1: the best that can be. I love this business. It's
54:07
Speaker 1: hard because I'm not going to be able to see
54:09
Speaker 1: the people that I helped. I had a lot of
54:11
Speaker 1: people help me follow my dreams, and I love that
54:14
Speaker 1: part about the business of what I did. It was
54:16
Speaker 1: a twenty four hour job. I think I had it
54:18
Speaker 1: for close to ten years, off and on. I've been
54:21
Speaker 1: in and out of there, but I love going to work.
54:24
Speaker 1: But everything comes to an end. I'm not crying because
54:27
Speaker 1: I'm mad or I'm emotional, but I know I'll be okay,
54:30
Speaker 1: and I hope TNA will be okay. Fightful Select is
54:35
Speaker 1: reporting that road Dog Brian James has been discussed as
54:39
Speaker 1: Dreamer's potential replacement on the creative team. Oh Boy, here
54:43
Speaker 1: we go. Dave Meltzer says the company has been in
54:46
Speaker 1: contact with road Dog for weeks now, but it wasn't
54:48
Speaker 1: known that he would be replacing Dreamer, only that he
54:51
Speaker 1: might join Dreamer on the writing team and per pw Insider,
54:55
Speaker 1: the belief among those we've spoken with is that currently
54:58
Speaker 1: Delirious we'll head up TA Creative. There's always a chance
55:02
Speaker 1: there are more names brought onto the team with the
55:03
Speaker 1: departure of Tommy Dreamer, but we are told Delirious is
55:06
Speaker 1: the point person moving forward. You know, It's it's fascinating
55:11
Speaker 1: to me how it's always the same five or six
55:15
Speaker 1: guys in wrestling who get recycled for these positions, Like
55:19
Speaker 1: there's nobody else in the world that could do this,
55:22
Speaker 1: Like I know, wrestling is still a very niche thing,
55:24
Speaker 1: relatively speaking, and there's no off season. It's fifty two
55:28
Speaker 1: weeks a year. It's a very stressful job. There are
55:31
Speaker 1: there are injuries, people leave, there's visa issues. They fuck
55:35
Speaker 1: up even the best laid plans. Like I'm not saying
55:37
Speaker 1: it's easy, but why does it seem like there's only
55:40
Speaker 1: six people like Max who are qualified to book a
55:42
Speaker 1: major pro wrestling show in twenty twenty six, Like no
55:46
Speaker 1: wonder everything feels the same look. I can only speak
55:51
Speaker 1: to Dreamer's abilities as a booker so much. I can't
55:53
Speaker 1: say he's the worst. He's definitely not the best. I
55:57
Speaker 1: think Wrestle House was his idea during those pandemic era
56:01
Speaker 1: Impact shows. I did enjoy that, right, We got some
56:03
Speaker 1: fun character work there, so I'll give him that. But
56:07
Speaker 1: a creative change was probably needed in this company, to
56:09
Speaker 1: say the least. I don't know that Delirious is any better,
56:12
Speaker 1: But with Dreamer, I gotta be honest with you, it
56:15
Speaker 1: could just be that the dude was burned out. He
56:18
Speaker 1: still wrestles multiple weekends a month. He's got the busted
56:21
Speaker 1: open gig, he's got to watch all the current wrestling.
56:25
Speaker 1: He's doing the TNA stuff, you know. Whenever I see
56:27
Speaker 1: him in those awful segments that TNA does, Whenever they
56:29
Speaker 1: sign somebody new and Dreamer is there, he's always he
56:32
Speaker 1: always looks so bored and uninterested, to the point where
56:36
Speaker 1: I'm wondering, like, why is he even out there? Like
56:39
Speaker 1: when Fabian Eichner signed his contract, Eichner is smiling and
56:42
Speaker 1: Carlos Silva is smiling. He's got his t toa hat on,
56:45
Speaker 1: like he's going to camp, and there's a Dreamer with
56:48
Speaker 1: his arms crossed, looking like a kid with his eye
56:50
Speaker 1: on the clock, waiting for the belt rings that he
56:52
Speaker 1: can get out of class. Like, what the fuck is
56:54
Speaker 1: he even doing in these segments? Maybe he was burned out.
56:57
Speaker 1: I don't know. I don't think much of Dreamer after
56:59
Speaker 1: him comments on that Dark Side of the Ring episode
57:02
Speaker 1: on the plane Ride from Hell where he defended Rick
57:05
Speaker 1: Flair doing the helicopter with his dick, and he defended
57:08
Speaker 1: him against the evil female flight attendants who dared claim
57:12
Speaker 1: that Flair forced himself on them. It was what he
57:15
Speaker 1: said in the way he said it in that episode, like, oh,
57:18
Speaker 1: come on, it is all in good fun, and well,
57:21
Speaker 1: if that's how she felt, maybe she should have, you know,
57:23
Speaker 1: shouldn't have taken a payout, and she should have prosecuted thing,
57:26
Speaker 1: so the fullest extent of the law. And he's rolling
57:28
Speaker 1: his eyes as he's saying all this stuff, not realizing
57:31
Speaker 1: that the reason that the one flight attendant didn't press
57:34
Speaker 1: charges is because her husband pushed for a settlement to
57:36
Speaker 1: spare their kids the embarrassment of a trial, and the
57:40
Speaker 1: airline that she worked for pushed her to keep quiet.
57:43
Speaker 1: Because they handled flights for other sports teams and it
57:45
Speaker 1: would be bad for business if it turned into a
57:47
Speaker 1: whole public thing. None of this matters to Tommy Dreamer, though,
57:51
Speaker 1: It's just Rick being Rick. Come on, have a laugh,
57:53
Speaker 1: right this was said by a man with two daughters,
57:56
Speaker 1: mind you, right, fucking disgusting. I'm not shedding any tears
57:59
Speaker 1: over time. I dreamer of being gone from TNA. Neither
58:02
Speaker 1: are some other people in the business. Apparently. I saw
58:05
Speaker 1: the one referee, this guy Perch, who said that Dreamer
58:08
Speaker 1: pulled him aside one day at TNA to tell him
58:12
Speaker 1: that he was going to do everything in his power
58:14
Speaker 1: to make sure he didn't earn a job in the
58:15
Speaker 1: wrestling business. I have no idea what prompted that. I
58:19
Speaker 1: would love the context for that, or why Dreamer would
58:22
Speaker 1: have said that. But yet Carl Bravo of Shane Taylor
58:27
Speaker 1: Promotions and Ring of Honor, he came out on X
58:30
Speaker 1: He said Dreamer once told him years ago that he
58:32
Speaker 1: was talented, but he couldn't hire him because he didn't
58:36
Speaker 1: know if he can market a quote cocky black guy
58:38
Speaker 1: to the world. Amazing. I could think of a few
58:43
Speaker 1: cocky guys who Happened to be Black that have made
58:45
Speaker 1: plenty of money in wrestling. Some of them are even
58:48
Speaker 1: on television right now. This week's episode is sponsored by Wicks.
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1:00:02
Speaker 1: dot com slash Harmony. But Dreamer wasn't the only behind
1:00:06
Speaker 1: the scenes name to get the acts on Wednesday. Sammy
1:00:10
Speaker 1: Callahan is gone too. He retired from the ring last August.
1:00:14
Speaker 1: He worked as a producer for them backstage. He actually
1:00:17
Speaker 1: wore many hats behind the scenes. He also runs Wrestling Revolver,
1:00:21
Speaker 1: which is one of the more well known indie promotions
1:00:23
Speaker 1: out there. He tweeted this thought I was getting called
1:00:27
Speaker 1: today to be offered a position in creative Nope, I've
1:00:30
Speaker 1: parted ways with TNA. Oh well, onward to the next adventure.
1:00:34
Speaker 1: Check out my company, Wrestling Revolver. TNA issued a press
1:00:39
Speaker 1: release later that day build as an update from Anthem Sports,
1:00:42
Speaker 1: saying TNA Wrestling Today announced a workforce reduction designed to
1:00:46
Speaker 1: streamline operations and sharpened strategic focus and profitability. TNA's creative
1:00:52
Speaker 1: leadership team will see an immediate shift. Tommy Dreamer, who
1:00:55
Speaker 1: has worked in TNA's creative and talent relations departments, is
1:00:59
Speaker 1: leaving the company as TNA and Dreamer mutually agreed to
1:01:02
Speaker 1: part ways. Sure thing. TNA Wrestling also has come to
1:01:06
Speaker 1: terms on the release of Tessa Blanchard. We wish Tessa,
1:01:08
Speaker 1: Tommy and others the best in their future endeavors. Wow,
1:01:12
Speaker 1: look at that they and others. Sammy Callahan never even
1:01:17
Speaker 1: gave Callahan a mention. Now. He went on Busted Open
1:01:21
Speaker 1: Radio the next day to explain the sequence of events
1:01:24
Speaker 1: and how he didn't exactly go out quietly. There was
1:01:26
Speaker 1: a Zoom call where he got fired. When he found
1:01:30
Speaker 1: out that Dreamer had been let go. He thought he
1:01:31
Speaker 1: was going to be added to the creative team. He
1:01:33
Speaker 1: basically thought he was going to get Dreamer spot. And
1:01:36
Speaker 1: he says there were even talent in TNA who texted
1:01:38
Speaker 1: him that they wanted him in that role. And TNA
1:01:41
Speaker 1: informed him that there was going to be a conference
1:01:43
Speaker 1: call they wanted him on that afternoon. This is what
1:01:45
Speaker 1: he said. So I get on the Zoom and they
1:01:48
Speaker 1: start talking and I was like, in my mind, maybe
1:01:51
Speaker 1: this is still you know, maybe I'm getting added, and
1:01:53
Speaker 1: then it came to We're sorry, we're going to have
1:01:56
Speaker 1: to part ways, and I kind of went off. I
1:01:58
Speaker 1: am not one of the people that you usually goes
1:02:00
Speaker 1: off like this. I tried not to be very profanity laced,
1:02:04
Speaker 1: and I don't think it was a thing of screaming
1:02:05
Speaker 1: or yelling, but I stated my case. The people on
1:02:08
Speaker 1: that call were like, oh, well, this is this. I
1:02:11
Speaker 1: was like, well, you're going to listen to me now,
1:02:13
Speaker 1: Like I've given my life to that company. There have
1:02:16
Speaker 1: been multiple times where I could have left that company.
1:02:18
Speaker 1: I broke my leg for that company. I was world
1:02:20
Speaker 1: champion for that company. I love TNA. I didn't particularly
1:02:24
Speaker 1: want to go work for another company. TNA was my
1:02:27
Speaker 1: end all be all at the end of the day,
1:02:29
Speaker 1: and I had good relationships with everybody, and I stayed
1:02:32
Speaker 1: in my case. I was like, Hey, this is why
1:02:34
Speaker 1: I think you're making a terrible mistake. This is why
1:02:36
Speaker 1: I think this isn't happening right now. I am not
1:02:39
Speaker 1: the guy. And I was told as part of that
1:02:41
Speaker 1: Workplace Reduction Act, I like it. He makes it sound
1:02:47
Speaker 1: like it's some sort of like congressional Act. The Workplace
1:02:50
Speaker 1: Production Act was passed this week, but he says that
1:02:53
Speaker 1: should not be me. I was like, that's not me.
1:02:56
Speaker 1: I'm like, that's not me. That should not be me
1:02:58
Speaker 1: in a million years. After the call Callahan, he says
1:03:02
Speaker 1: he did send a text message to Carlos Silva admitting
1:03:05
Speaker 1: that he handled things poorly. He thought he was going
1:03:09
Speaker 1: to be a lifer in TNA, and he clarified that
1:03:12
Speaker 1: he wasn't just a producer for them. He helped run
1:03:14
Speaker 1: the merchandise division. He worked in the marketing department, he
1:03:17
Speaker 1: was an agent. He did all of these things. A
1:03:20
Speaker 1: tel Bust opened that he did feel a creative overhaul
1:03:24
Speaker 1: was needed. He thinks pro wrestling in general needs to
1:03:27
Speaker 1: be more willing to embrace ideas from the younger generation
1:03:30
Speaker 1: and that since Debuwing on AMC, TNA has played it
1:03:33
Speaker 1: safe creatively in a way that has been detrimental to
1:03:36
Speaker 1: the promotion. Now. Bully Ray was on with him and
1:03:39
Speaker 1: said that older generations have never been willing to give
1:03:42
Speaker 1: up their spots in pro wrestling, and Callahan said, why
1:03:45
Speaker 1: does pro wrestling have to be like that? Why can't
1:03:47
Speaker 1: it be synergy? Why can't one generation and it doesn't
1:03:51
Speaker 1: seem like this happens in wrestling instead of being like, oh,
1:03:53
Speaker 1: I'm taking the keys from you, Why isn't it Hey,
1:03:57
Speaker 1: I know pro wrestling from this generation. I'm extremely smart.
1:04:00
Speaker 1: I have all of these connects. But this younger generation,
1:04:03
Speaker 1: they understand the analytics, They understand what a younger fan
1:04:06
Speaker 1: base wants. Why can't that be meshed together into one
1:04:10
Speaker 1: perfect unit. By the way, Callahan calling out TNA for
1:04:15
Speaker 1: playing it safe on the same show where Bully Ray
1:04:19
Speaker 1: seems to agree with him, is so fucking funny to
1:04:21
Speaker 1: me when you remember that Bully has been doing Busted
1:04:24
Speaker 1: Open shows with Tommy Dreamer for months, all while Dreamer
1:04:28
Speaker 1: was heading up creative for that very company. That's just
1:04:31
Speaker 1: it's priceless, absolutely priceless. Now. Nick Nammoth, he wrestles for TNA.
1:04:37
Speaker 1: He was also on Busted Open because he co hosts
1:04:41
Speaker 1: on there, and on Thursday morning, he had this to
1:04:44
Speaker 1: say about Dreamer leaving the company. He admits that he's
1:04:46
Speaker 1: a little biased because he's friends with Dreamer. He said,
1:04:49
Speaker 1: I don't know what the situation is. I like that
1:04:51
Speaker 1: I don't have inside business stuff. I just happen to
1:04:54
Speaker 1: know everybody at work, so I think for the most part,
1:04:57
Speaker 1: I think morale building together to get that TV deal
1:05:00
Speaker 1: couldn't be any higher. And then as we move on,
1:05:02
Speaker 1: it's got to drop down just a little bit, and
1:05:05
Speaker 1: then it's like, oh, it was like, man, some people
1:05:07
Speaker 1: are leaving. What are we doing? I don't know exactly
1:05:10
Speaker 1: what's going on. Most importantly, I really think the locker
1:05:13
Speaker 1: room is such a huge aspect. That's what got me
1:05:15
Speaker 1: to sign on to TNA, and I thought we were
1:05:17
Speaker 1: in a really good place. But I think the last
1:05:19
Speaker 1: couple of months it's been a little weird. Backstage, it's
1:05:23
Speaker 1: been different and I don't exactly know why, and I
1:05:25
Speaker 1: can't put my finger on it. Mike Johnson says the
1:05:30
Speaker 1: production side at this workforce reduction was hit pretty hard.
1:05:34
Speaker 1: Also numerous exits. I saw that their digital producer, Luke
1:05:39
Speaker 1: Parrin I think his name is he was let go
1:05:41
Speaker 1: as well. He ran and edited all of the content
1:05:43
Speaker 1: for TNA Plus and YouTube for about five years. He
1:05:46
Speaker 1: shot all of their tiktoks and vertical shorts. At one
1:05:50
Speaker 1: point he led their photography team. He said in October
1:05:54
Speaker 1: he asked to be taken off the road to focus
1:05:57
Speaker 1: on directing work in Toronto and he would be editing
1:06:01
Speaker 1: TNA content from home, So it sounds like he had
1:06:03
Speaker 1: other interests anyway, or release he has something to fall
1:06:06
Speaker 1: back on, you know, for all the talk of them
1:06:09
Speaker 1: getting thirty million dollars out of this AMC deal or
1:06:13
Speaker 1: that it was worth thirty million, right because being worth something,
1:06:16
Speaker 1: and how much money they're actually being paid for it,
1:06:19
Speaker 1: if any that's a different story. I'm starting to wonder,
1:06:23
Speaker 1: and this is just me spitballing here, I'm starting to
1:06:26
Speaker 1: wonder if they're getting any money out of this deal
1:06:28
Speaker 1: at all. Like I'm not saying it's a time buy
1:06:30
Speaker 1: per se, but like, are they getting anything out of
1:06:34
Speaker 1: this deal? You would think that they would be, but
1:06:37
Speaker 1: this is TNA. I mean, stranger things have happened. If
1:06:39
Speaker 1: people think that they're making thirty million dollars off this deal, right,
1:06:43
Speaker 1: they have no incentive to come out and deny it
1:06:46
Speaker 1: because that only helps them. If people think, oh, they
1:06:49
Speaker 1: think we're making thirty million dollars off this deal, We're
1:06:52
Speaker 1: just going to keep our mouth shut and let them
1:06:53
Speaker 1: think that. But I'm just I'm thinking that they don't
1:06:56
Speaker 1: have the kind of money coming in that we were
1:06:58
Speaker 1: all led to believe, you know, lost in all of this,
1:07:01
Speaker 1: by the way, is the report from PW Insider. The
1:07:03
Speaker 1: TNA is working towards an agreement with Ohio Valley Wrestling
1:07:07
Speaker 1: that would see OVW effectively become a developmental system or
1:07:10
Speaker 1: a feeder system for TNA, much the same way TNA
1:07:13
Speaker 1: has become a feeder system for WWE. But they expect
1:07:17
Speaker 1: the agreement to be signed very soon. You know, with
1:07:20
Speaker 1: all the talent leaving, they're going to need OVW to
1:07:22
Speaker 1: fill out some of the open spots they're going to
1:07:24
Speaker 1: have on their television show. But it just makes you wonder,
1:07:28
Speaker 1: you know, what kind of money are they really getting
1:07:31
Speaker 1: out of this AMC deal with the need for them
1:07:33
Speaker 1: to be making cuts like this and not signing enough
1:07:36
Speaker 1: talents to longer term contracts. When you hear about the cuts, right,
1:07:41
Speaker 1: you can't not think about the possibility of a sale.
1:07:44
Speaker 1: It's what you do before one. You cut costs, you
1:07:47
Speaker 1: tidy up the books. That doesn't mean the TNA is
1:07:50
Speaker 1: prepping for a sale. I know Matt Hardy chimed in
1:07:52
Speaker 1: he doesn't think TNA is being sold, although he thinks
1:07:55
Speaker 1: in the next four to five years that could very
1:07:56
Speaker 1: well happen. But like if the right offer was made.
1:08:00
Speaker 1: Believe me, anything is for sale if the right offer
1:08:02
Speaker 1: comes along. Is this being done with an eye towards
1:08:06
Speaker 1: that in the future very possible. The long held rumors
1:08:10
Speaker 1: that WWE is part of its deal with TNA, has
1:08:13
Speaker 1: the option to buy the company and they have the
1:08:15
Speaker 1: right of first refusal if they wanted to sell, So
1:08:18
Speaker 1: if WWE didn't want it, then they could sell to
1:08:20
Speaker 1: somebody else. But my guess is that WWE would just
1:08:23
Speaker 1: buy it themselves and then strip it for parts. They
1:08:26
Speaker 1: wouldn't want it falling under someone else's control, not as
1:08:29
Speaker 1: long as Tony Kahan is around. If you're a fan
1:08:32
Speaker 1: of TNA, not just kind of sum it up like this.
1:08:35
Speaker 1: If you're a fan of TNA, you just hope for
1:08:38
Speaker 1: the best when it comes to Creative coming out of Slammiversary,
1:08:41
Speaker 1: because all of their TV is already taped heading into
1:08:44
Speaker 1: that pay per view coming out of it, it's the
1:08:47
Speaker 1: start of yet another new era for a company that
1:08:49
Speaker 1: has been through a lot of them over the years.
1:08:52
Speaker 1: This is now the post Dreamer era of TNA, and
1:08:56
Speaker 1: whether it's Delirious or road Dog or whoever, for the
1:09:00
Speaker 1: sake of the talent who worked there, you hope they
1:09:03
Speaker 1: can get their shit together and they could come up
1:09:05
Speaker 1: with a plan to help elevate the right people and
1:09:08
Speaker 1: make the shows as entertaining as they can. This company
1:09:12
Speaker 1: is not defined by one person. There are many that
1:09:15
Speaker 1: have come and gone there. You just hope that the
1:09:17
Speaker 1: next one can do a better job than the one
1:09:19
Speaker 1: who came before them. Some quick aw notes. First, on
1:09:24
Speaker 1: Jim Ross, who showed up at Double or Nothing last month.
1:09:28
Speaker 1: We hadn't heard from him in a while. He did
1:09:29
Speaker 1: commentary for the John Mox League Kylo O'Reilly match for
1:09:33
Speaker 1: the Continental title. I know after the fact he talked
1:09:36
Speaker 1: about on his podcast wishing that he had been able
1:09:39
Speaker 1: to call more matches. If he would have known that
1:09:42
Speaker 1: that's all Tony was going to have him doing, he
1:09:43
Speaker 1: would have had a conversation with him about it. He
1:09:46
Speaker 1: just loves doing commentary, He loves being a part of it.
1:09:49
Speaker 1: I feel like he's at his age and he's had
1:09:52
Speaker 1: a lot of health issues, and obviously he lost his
1:09:54
Speaker 1: wife many years ago. I feel like for him in
1:09:57
Speaker 1: his mind, it's almost therapeutic to be able to go
1:10:01
Speaker 1: out there on those occasions when he can and do
1:10:03
Speaker 1: commentary for a match here and there. He wants to
1:10:07
Speaker 1: be part of something, and I can understand that. The
1:10:10
Speaker 1: problem is that over the last few years he has
1:10:12
Speaker 1: fallen so many times, like multiple times. And he actually
1:10:17
Speaker 1: talked about it on that trip to New York for
1:10:18
Speaker 1: Double or Nothing. On his podcast, he talked about falling
1:10:23
Speaker 1: and he suffered a back injury just before that trip,
1:10:26
Speaker 1: and he just was feeling awful and he was planning
1:10:29
Speaker 1: on seeing a doctor to try to figure out what's
1:10:33
Speaker 1: been going on with his legs. Whire his legs so,
1:10:36
Speaker 1: you know, unsteady. But he also mentioned that doctors were
1:10:39
Speaker 1: doing tests to see if he was suffering from dementia
1:10:44
Speaker 1: or Alzheimer's. And I don't know what the update is
1:10:47
Speaker 1: on that. I haven't heard him comment on that, but
1:10:50
Speaker 1: he popped up on X the other day to talk
1:10:54
Speaker 1: about the fact that he has been hospitalized for over
1:10:57
Speaker 1: three weeks. I mean, it seems like come out of
1:11:00
Speaker 1: Double or Nothing, he probably went right into the hospital,
1:11:02
Speaker 1: he said, day twenty two in the hospital in Norman,
1:11:06
Speaker 1: watching Omaha with my sooners. Thanks for everyone's kind thoughts
1:11:11
Speaker 1: and prayers. Don't count me out just yet. I'm still fighting.
1:11:16
Speaker 1: And Mike Johnson, a PW Insiders, said that Jr. Is
1:11:18
Speaker 1: believed to have suffered a fall after returning home from
1:11:22
Speaker 1: double or nothing, and so that's yet another fall. And
1:11:27
Speaker 1: you keep hearing these stories and look as therapeutic as
1:11:32
Speaker 1: it may be for him to travel still and go
1:11:35
Speaker 1: out there and work, it just sounds to me like
1:11:37
Speaker 1: that's just a very bad idea. The problem is that
1:11:40
Speaker 1: even at home he's still falling. He really needs somebody
1:11:43
Speaker 1: who can be there with him twenty four hours a day,
1:11:46
Speaker 1: like round the clock, like a nurse's aid or so,
1:11:48
Speaker 1: or at least maybe not twenty four hours. But I
1:11:51
Speaker 1: don't get the sense that he has anybody kind of
1:11:52
Speaker 1: looking after him, which he could definitely use. He's had
1:11:56
Speaker 1: a lot of health issues and challenges that he's had
1:11:58
Speaker 1: to overcome. Is going to continue happening, though, until one
1:12:02
Speaker 1: day he falls his phone's not there, and then what's
1:12:04
Speaker 1: he going to do? Right, That's already happened a few
1:12:06
Speaker 1: times where he's fallen and his phone wasn't on him
1:12:08
Speaker 1: and he laid there for hours, and you just, yeah,
1:12:12
Speaker 1: you hate to think about somebody walking in on him
1:12:14
Speaker 1: and finding him one day, and you know it turns
1:12:17
Speaker 1: into a tragic situation. So I don't know what he's
1:12:20
Speaker 1: in the hospital for specifically this time. Hopefully he's getting
1:12:23
Speaker 1: whatever care he needs. Hopefully those other tests come back negative,
1:12:27
Speaker 1: because that would be awful if he tested positive for
1:12:29
Speaker 1: some sort of dementia. But clearly he's having issues with
1:12:33
Speaker 1: his legs and keeping his balance and this is just
1:12:35
Speaker 1: going to keep happening. He really should not be traveling.
1:12:39
Speaker 1: FTR is taking a break from aaw for the first
1:12:44
Speaker 1: time in over a decade. Dax Harwood took to Instagram
1:12:48
Speaker 1: the other day to post this. He says, since the
1:12:49
Speaker 1: summer of twenty fourteen, the revival FTR, Dawson and Dash,
1:12:54
Speaker 1: Dax in Cash, whatever you want to call us, we've
1:12:57
Speaker 1: had the pedal to the metal. Aside from my bicep
1:13:00
Speaker 1: tear in twenty seventeen, we've taken no time away from
1:13:03
Speaker 1: the job we've dreamed of having. Physically and mentally. We
1:13:05
Speaker 1: both became exhausted. We were two of the very bests
1:13:09
Speaker 1: or two of the very few. Sure it is my
1:13:12
Speaker 1: best talents that traveled and worked on both Collision and Dynamite.
1:13:16
Speaker 1: I have fought through three hematomas on my lower back,
1:13:18
Speaker 1: another bicep tear that I decided not to have surgery
1:13:21
Speaker 1: on a laborum tear from my groin to my hip,
1:13:24
Speaker 1: a shoulder that needs replacement, and probably a laundry list
1:13:27
Speaker 1: of other things. I'm too afraid to get checked out.
1:13:30
Speaker 1: For the first time in twelve years, we've decided to
1:13:32
Speaker 1: step away and take some time for ourselves and our families.
1:13:36
Speaker 1: I'm not sure when we will be back, what we
1:13:38
Speaker 1: are going to do, how much longer we have, or
1:13:41
Speaker 1: if we even need to prove anything at all anymore,
1:13:45
Speaker 1: although he did say they were going to be working
1:13:46
Speaker 1: two dates later this summer. There's going to be a
1:13:48
Speaker 1: match against the Good Brothers in Kentucky on August twenty second,
1:13:53
Speaker 1: and a date for rev Pro on August twenty ninth. Now,
1:13:57
Speaker 1: if you remember, about a month ago now, bodyslam dot
1:14:00
Speaker 1: net had a report that FTR was approaching their option
1:14:04
Speaker 1: year in AAW. They had signed four year deals back
1:14:07
Speaker 1: in twenty twenty three, and they reported at the time.
1:14:11
Speaker 1: Sources close to the situation describe FTR as believing their
1:14:15
Speaker 1: value and consistency over the last several years should place
1:14:19
Speaker 1: them among aw's top tier acts financially. There has also
1:14:24
Speaker 1: reportedly been at least preliminary interest from WWE communicated through
1:14:28
Speaker 1: mutual contexts as the situation continues to draw attention internally,
1:14:34
Speaker 1: and like I remember reading that report and thinking, boy,
1:14:37
Speaker 1: it sounds like this is it's a very strategic report,
1:14:41
Speaker 1: Like somebody definitely wants to get the word out there
1:14:44
Speaker 1: so Tony Kahn will see it that you know, they
1:14:46
Speaker 1: feel like they should be among the highest paid. They
1:14:48
Speaker 1: are getting interest in WWE potentially, you know, basically like
1:14:54
Speaker 1: re sign us for more money and we'll stay. Was
1:14:57
Speaker 1: kind of the message out of that. I'm taking this
1:14:59
Speaker 1: at phase value, you that they really are just taking
1:15:01
Speaker 1: a break to heal up and be with their families
1:15:03
Speaker 1: for a while. Maybe there's nothing creatively for them to do.
1:15:07
Speaker 1: But how much of this is going to play into
1:15:09
Speaker 1: the fact that they apparently have an option year coming
1:15:11
Speaker 1: up and they're probably looking for a better deal. Right again,
1:15:14
Speaker 1: I said it earlier when I was talking about the
1:15:16
Speaker 1: TNA stuff. It is a business. Follow the money. If
1:15:20
Speaker 1: they feel like they can make more money somewhere else,
1:15:22
Speaker 1: or if they feel like they're not being compensated in
1:15:24
Speaker 1: the way that they should be, or they other people
1:15:26
Speaker 1: on the roster are making more than us, and look
1:15:28
Speaker 1: at all the you know, the great matches we've had
1:15:31
Speaker 1: and the injuries and everything. Then you know they're going
1:15:35
Speaker 1: to make whatever decision they have to make based upon that.
1:15:38
Speaker 1: I cannot imagine them going back to WWE, though, even
1:15:41
Speaker 1: for more money and being happy there. So I still
1:15:44
Speaker 1: think AW is their best option unless they just want
1:15:46
Speaker 1: to go fully independent. It's not like they're going to
1:15:49
Speaker 1: be hurting for work on the independent scene. They can
1:15:52
Speaker 1: go overseas, they can make a lot of money. But
1:15:54
Speaker 1: if they go to WWE, WWE does not value tag
1:15:57
Speaker 1: team wrestling. FTR is all about tag ta wrestling. Like
1:16:02
Speaker 1: the two don't jive. It's like oil and water. They
1:16:04
Speaker 1: don't go together. They're going to be miserable there. I
1:16:06
Speaker 1: can't imagine them wanting to leave and go to WWI.
1:16:11
Speaker 1: Now Forbidden Door is next Sunday. We're a week away
1:16:15
Speaker 1: from how many Forbidden Doors is this? Now? First one
1:16:17
Speaker 1: was what in twenty twenty two? Right? This would be
1:16:20
Speaker 1: the fourth or fifth one. Now they're in San Jose
1:16:24
Speaker 1: and the card. I don't want to say the card
1:16:26
Speaker 1: is complete. The card is never complete. When you still
1:16:29
Speaker 1: have the go home shows on AW television, there's always
1:16:32
Speaker 1: going to be more matches added here, but we had
1:16:33
Speaker 1: a bunch of new ones that were added. I'm just
1:16:35
Speaker 1: going to read the card here. I don't even know
1:16:38
Speaker 1: that I'm going to do predictions yet for everything. I
1:16:41
Speaker 1: may save that for the Uncrowned Wrestling show on Tuesday.
1:16:44
Speaker 1: But there was a report from Fightful Select that noted
1:16:48
Speaker 1: multiple talents across the different promotions involved here were still
1:16:52
Speaker 1: unaware of their plans for the show. Talents that Fightful
1:16:55
Speaker 1: spoke with shared that some of them have not been
1:16:58
Speaker 1: told about their plans, although some talents claim that this
1:17:02
Speaker 1: was not out of the ordinary and they would find
1:17:04
Speaker 1: out about their matches on the week of the event.
1:17:07
Speaker 1: And that is the nature of a lot of these
1:17:09
Speaker 1: forbidden door shows, isn't it. There are matches on the
1:17:11
Speaker 1: card that just feel very thrown together at the last minute,
1:17:14
Speaker 1: and so not surprising that some of the talents themselves
1:17:17
Speaker 1: would not even know what the hell they're doing or
1:17:18
Speaker 1: if they're even on the show. But this is the
1:17:21
Speaker 1: lineup as it currently stands. We have let me let
1:17:24
Speaker 1: me start from the bottom here because on the Bay
1:17:26
Speaker 1: in pre show, they've announced the women's tag team champions
1:17:29
Speaker 1: Divine Dominion, Meghan Bain and Lena Cross are going to
1:17:33
Speaker 1: be defending against Thunder Rosa and Olympia from CMLL. The
1:17:38
Speaker 1: Young Bucks are going to be taking on El Sky
1:17:41
Speaker 1: Team Mystico and Mascarriderata and Unbound Company Shingo Takagi and Titan.
1:17:47
Speaker 1: It's going to be a three way tag team match,
1:17:50
Speaker 1: a little bit of that forbidden door flavor in there.
1:17:53
Speaker 1: Showta Umino, the new IWGP Global Champion, is going to
1:17:57
Speaker 1: be defending against Pack Omega one on one with Zach
1:18:02
Speaker 1: Saber Junior, Adam Copeland and Christian Cage defend their AW
1:18:06
Speaker 1: Tag team titles against the Dogs David Finley and Clark Connors.
1:18:11
Speaker 1: We got John Moxley defending the Continental Championship against Bandido.
1:18:15
Speaker 1: Tecla is going to put her AW Women's World Championship
1:18:19
Speaker 1: on the line against Starlight Kid, who was very good.
1:18:23
Speaker 1: See that. To me, that's a forbidden door match right there.
1:18:26
Speaker 1: Tekla has been doing everything she can to really push
1:18:29
Speaker 1: this hole, like her versus Stardom few. She's literally spat
1:18:33
Speaker 1: on the logo, She's beaten up the president. She appeared
1:18:37
Speaker 1: at the Stardom Show in Japan the other night again
1:18:39
Speaker 1: tormenting their president, Taro Okada, she attacked him, she tried
1:18:43
Speaker 1: to shave his head. So they've done a good job
1:18:46
Speaker 1: with this. This really does feel like there's bad blood there,
1:18:49
Speaker 1: and so that's gonna be the aw Women's championship match. Now.
1:18:53
Speaker 1: Also on this show, we have the finals of the
1:18:56
Speaker 1: men's and women's owen Hart Foundation tournaments, and on the
1:19:00
Speaker 1: women's side, the question was who would Mercedes Monet be
1:19:03
Speaker 1: wrestling on that show. Now, it seemed pretty clear that
1:19:05
Speaker 1: the big match to do would be Mercedes against the Athena.
1:19:09
Speaker 1: We haven't seen that match in a very long time,
1:19:11
Speaker 1: right well over a year, and Mercedes won that one.
1:19:14
Speaker 1: And now the big tournament final, the winner goes on
1:19:16
Speaker 1: to Wembley Stadium to wrestle for the World Championship, and
1:19:20
Speaker 1: this could be Athenis chance to get a win over
1:19:22
Speaker 1: Mercedes and then maybe Mercedes could win the belt at Redemption,
1:19:26
Speaker 1: we can get a title match. There's yeah, you're going
1:19:29
Speaker 1: through all these different ideas in your mind. Meanwhile, we
1:19:33
Speaker 1: have the wrong person involved because Athena is not even
1:19:36
Speaker 1: going to the finals of this tournament because she wrestled
1:19:38
Speaker 1: Maya World on collision in Maya World Shock the World
1:19:42
Speaker 1: for the second time in this tournament, although this was
1:19:44
Speaker 1: a much bigger surprise than her beating sky Blue. But
1:19:48
Speaker 1: back up a little bit here. So this was supposed
1:19:50
Speaker 1: to be Serree's spot. Serie had a neck injury. She
1:19:54
Speaker 1: announced it she was taking a month off. Tony Kahan
1:19:56
Speaker 1: announced her anyway for the owen Hart Tournament, and she
1:19:59
Speaker 1: fle and she had to be cleared first by the
1:20:02
Speaker 1: aw medical doctors and she wasn't, and so Maya World
1:20:06
Speaker 1: was a substitute force Toree Maya World. Also, earlier that
1:20:11
Speaker 1: week she had lost her brother in a terrible accident,
1:20:15
Speaker 1: only twenty five years old. She was grieving. Tony Kahm
1:20:18
Speaker 1: was like, be home with your family. She said, no,
1:20:20
Speaker 1: I need to be here. So she got a win
1:20:23
Speaker 1: and it was a feel good win. And the match
1:20:24
Speaker 1: with sky Blue was you know, it was a fine match.
1:20:28
Speaker 1: But I didn't really give a second thought to the
1:20:30
Speaker 1: idea that she would make it beyond the semi finals.
1:20:32
Speaker 1: I said, yeah, she beat sky Blue, that's fine, but
1:20:35
Speaker 1: she's not gonna beat Athena. I mean, come on now,
1:20:38
Speaker 1: she's the forever Ring of Honor Women's Champion, and yeah,
1:20:41
Speaker 1: this is forbidden door. You want to do the biggest
1:20:43
Speaker 1: possible match on that show. They have their match on
1:20:46
Speaker 1: Collision and she beats Athena, and Athena had a look
1:20:50
Speaker 1: on her face. I think Athena actually posted the meme.
1:20:53
Speaker 1: It was like her shocked face next to Pikachu's shocked face.
1:20:57
Speaker 1: She was stunned, She couldn't believe it, and she was
1:21:01
Speaker 1: making like, you know, she was paying respect to her.
1:21:04
Speaker 1: When it was over and Mercedes came out, they ended
1:21:06
Speaker 1: up putting a beating on Maya World. So Mercedes and
1:21:08
Speaker 1: Athena are working together, and Maya World is now going
1:21:12
Speaker 1: to go to Forbidden Door next weekend and challenge Mercedes Monae,
1:21:16
Speaker 1: a match that she has in the past. Set is
1:21:18
Speaker 1: her all time dream match for her. It's a dream
1:21:21
Speaker 1: come true to be in there with Mercedes, and I
1:21:24
Speaker 1: have no doubt knowing that and knowing Mercedes her track
1:21:28
Speaker 1: record on these pay per views, they're going to go
1:21:30
Speaker 1: out there and they're going to have a killer match.
1:21:34
Speaker 1: So that's great. I'm still expecting them to have a
1:21:36
Speaker 1: killer match. I look at this though, we were robbed
1:21:41
Speaker 1: of an Athena Mercedes final, which is very upsetting to me,
1:21:45
Speaker 1: but at the same time it makes me wonder, by
1:21:47
Speaker 1: the way, if Willow Nightingale was supposed to go to
1:21:49
Speaker 1: the finals against Athena or Serie, if that was the
1:21:52
Speaker 1: plan here, because there have been a lot of changes
1:21:54
Speaker 1: in this tournament. You know, Willow got replaced by Mercedes,
1:21:59
Speaker 1: and it's a legit hitimate injury that Willow has. So
1:22:01
Speaker 1: Mercedes was, as far as we know, not even supposed
1:22:04
Speaker 1: to be in this tournament unless you would have been
1:22:06
Speaker 1: slotted in somewhere else at the last minute. So she
1:22:08
Speaker 1: gets put in there when she wasn't even supposed to
1:22:11
Speaker 1: be in there, and Siri had an injury she couldn't go,
1:22:15
Speaker 1: Maya World gets the spot. Now she's going to the finals.
1:22:18
Speaker 1: Look at the people that we have in the finals
1:22:20
Speaker 1: of this tournament. Both women that are in the finals
1:22:24
Speaker 1: of the Owen Heart Tournament were not even announced for
1:22:26
Speaker 1: the tournament when the bracket was initially announced. Like Mercedes
1:22:30
Speaker 1: wasn't even in the tournament, Maya World wasn't in the tournament,
1:22:33
Speaker 1: and now they're wrestling in the final. If like it'd
1:22:34
Speaker 1: be one thing if there was one person in the
1:22:36
Speaker 1: finals who wasn't originally in the bracket. To have both
1:22:39
Speaker 1: of them, though, like that is very strange the way
1:22:43
Speaker 1: it all worked out. Now, I had Mercedes losing to
1:22:47
Speaker 1: Athena in the finals, and I can't help but think
1:22:52
Speaker 1: the end result here is still going to be the same.
1:22:55
Speaker 1: I feel like Tony Kahan has decided to go all
1:22:58
Speaker 1: the way here with my world because whether it would
1:23:03
Speaker 1: have been Athena or now Maya Mercedes. She still has
1:23:07
Speaker 1: one belt. She's still walking around with that owen Hart belt.
1:23:10
Speaker 1: Now I know she doesn't defend it well, she kind
1:23:12
Speaker 1: of is defending it in this tournament. She still has
1:23:15
Speaker 1: one belt left. She lost all of her other championship.
1:23:18
Speaker 1: She was the belt collector, thirteen belts Monette. One by
1:23:22
Speaker 1: one by one, she lost all of those belts. She
1:23:24
Speaker 1: still has one left. She's got to lose that belt.
1:23:28
Speaker 1: Someone has to take it from her. And I think
1:23:32
Speaker 1: now it's going to be Maya World. I think Maya
1:23:34
Speaker 1: World is going to go to all in and challenge
1:23:38
Speaker 1: for the championship. I feel like Tony Khan has made
1:23:40
Speaker 1: that decision. Now, maybe Mercedes wins and then she'll wrestle Tekla.
1:23:46
Speaker 1: It's very possible, and I'm sure Mercedes and Techla would
1:23:48
Speaker 1: have a hell of a match, right unless Techla loses
1:23:50
Speaker 1: the belt to somebody else before then. But all of
1:23:53
Speaker 1: this just seems to be setting up a Maya World
1:23:57
Speaker 1: feel good win in the Owen Heart Tour. And I
1:24:01
Speaker 1: can understand Tony looking at this and going, Okay, we
1:24:03
Speaker 1: have to we have to strike. We have to strike
1:24:06
Speaker 1: right now. Right, There's a lot of emotion around Maya
1:24:09
Speaker 1: and there's this great story to follow of her having
1:24:12
Speaker 1: all this unexpected success. She wasn't even supposed to be
1:24:15
Speaker 1: in the tournament. Let's just go all the way with her.
1:24:18
Speaker 1: But you know, is that is that the match that
1:24:22
Speaker 1: you know people are are going to want to see
1:24:25
Speaker 1: at Wembley Stadium? Yeah, I don't know, But you know what,
1:24:28
Speaker 1: look at it a different way. This is an opportunity
1:24:31
Speaker 1: here for Tony to make a new star, right we
1:24:34
Speaker 1: talk about that, We talk about like what new stars
1:24:36
Speaker 1: are being made here. If coming out of this tournament,
1:24:40
Speaker 1: Maya World becomes a real player in the women's division,
1:24:44
Speaker 1: then credit to them. They will have made a new
1:24:47
Speaker 1: star out of it. So let's see. Maybe maybe at
1:24:50
Speaker 1: the end of the day, it'll all be worth it
1:24:52
Speaker 1: for that reason alone, because I just feel like with
1:24:55
Speaker 1: that one belt left, it would actually make more sense
1:24:58
Speaker 1: for her to lose it, and in order for her
1:25:00
Speaker 1: to lose the owen hart belshe has to lose the tournament.
1:25:03
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1:26:22
Speaker 1: Now on the men's side, we have swerved Strickland taking
1:26:24
Speaker 1: on will Ospray that right there could easily be the
1:26:27
Speaker 1: main event of this show. It will not be the
1:26:30
Speaker 1: main event of this show. It'll be my main event.
1:26:33
Speaker 1: They had a great match two years ago for the
1:26:35
Speaker 1: championship on this very same pay per view. I have
1:26:37
Speaker 1: no doubt that this match is gonna go out there
1:26:40
Speaker 1: and steal the show, and it's going to be a
1:26:42
Speaker 1: hell of a fucking match. But there's no way will
1:26:44
Speaker 1: Osprey is not winning this match. Will Osprey is going
1:26:47
Speaker 1: to Wembley Stadium. He will be challenging for the championship.
1:26:51
Speaker 1: This can go no other way, and the main event
1:26:55
Speaker 1: as it currently stands is the twelve man six on
1:26:58
Speaker 1: six steel cage match MJF, Kevin Knight, Kyle Fletcher, Jake
1:27:03
Speaker 1: Doyle and Andrade l Edelo representing the don Kallis family
1:27:08
Speaker 1: taking on Mark Briscoe, Kyle O'Reilly, Orange, Cassidy Roderick Strong,
1:27:14
Speaker 1: Darby Allen and Kenoski Takeshta. They all had a big
1:27:19
Speaker 1: twelve man tag by the way on Dynamite on Wednesday
1:27:22
Speaker 1: that the Heels won. Of course, the Heels won because
1:27:24
Speaker 1: the Heels are fucking losing on the pay per view
1:27:26
Speaker 1: because Mark Briscoe has to win to get his championship match.
1:27:31
Speaker 1: That's how that's gonna go. But MJF is also nursing
1:27:35
Speaker 1: a hyper extended knee. His knee was all wrapped up
1:27:37
Speaker 1: on Wednesday. I mean, it's not like he's going to
1:27:40
Speaker 1: be cowering in the corner for thirty minutes, but this
1:27:43
Speaker 1: is a way to at least protect him in so
1:27:44
Speaker 1: much as he won't have to do as much as
1:27:46
Speaker 1: he would if it was a singles match. And that's
1:27:49
Speaker 1: the way the card looks so far. I mean, on paper,
1:27:52
Speaker 1: there's plenty of matches that could end up being a
1:27:54
Speaker 1: show stealer. It's just again this whole forbidden door concept.
1:27:57
Speaker 1: As I've been saying, the bloom for me and was
1:28:00
Speaker 1: off the Rows a couple of years ago. You know,
1:28:03
Speaker 1: most of these matches when you look at them, these
1:28:06
Speaker 1: are ADW matches. Now they've tried in the last several days,
1:28:10
Speaker 1: they have added a bunch of matches that have that
1:28:12
Speaker 1: forbidden door flavored to them that we're kind of thrown
1:28:15
Speaker 1: together at the last minute here. So it's going to
1:28:18
Speaker 1: be a good show. I just I can't get excited
1:28:20
Speaker 1: for it in the way that I used to Jericho
1:28:22
Speaker 1: and Champa. By the way which I thought might happen
1:28:24
Speaker 1: on this show is not happening a forbidden door. They
1:28:27
Speaker 1: had a segment on Collision where they made it official
1:28:29
Speaker 1: for the Beach Break episode of Dynamite, which is coming
1:28:32
Speaker 1: up on July eighth from Clearwater, Florida. That's that location.
1:28:36
Speaker 1: They're going to be running by the beach. It's outdoors visually,
1:28:39
Speaker 1: it's probably going to look great. So that's where that
1:28:42
Speaker 1: match is going to be taking place. And the Duke
1:28:46
Speaker 1: of Dorchester, Duke Dougherty real name Pete Doherty, passed away
1:28:51
Speaker 1: on Tuesday, the age of eighty five. The Cauliflower Alley
1:28:55
Speaker 1: Club made the announcement. They said, as per his friend
1:28:58
Speaker 1: Danny Davis, the CA is saddened to hear the unforgettable
1:29:02
Speaker 1: Pete Doherty has passed away the age of eighty five,
1:29:05
Speaker 1: known to fans everywhere as the Duke of Dorchester, a
1:29:08
Speaker 1: true character in professional wrestling who brought charisma along with
1:29:12
Speaker 1: a larger than life personality to every arena he stepped into.
1:29:16
Speaker 1: We send our condolences to his family and friends. He
1:29:21
Speaker 1: was generally used as an enhancement talent in the Northeast
1:29:25
Speaker 1: throughout the seventies and eighties, although he did challenge for
1:29:28
Speaker 1: all the WWF titles at different points, including an intercontinental
1:29:33
Speaker 1: title match against Tito Santana. He had a WWF title
1:29:36
Speaker 1: match against Bob Backland, and he was from Dorchester, Massachusetts,
1:29:40
Speaker 1: which is where the whole Duke of Dorchester nickname comes from.
1:29:43
Speaker 1: Some notable matches for him he lost to the Junkyard
1:29:47
Speaker 1: Dog on the very first Saturday Nights main event, and
1:29:50
Speaker 1: he wrestled in the last non televised King of the
1:29:52
Speaker 1: Ring tournament in nineteen ninety one as a replacement for
1:29:55
Speaker 1: Kerry von Erik. He lost to the eventual winner, Breught
1:29:58
Speaker 1: the Hitman Heart only took about thirty seconds in the
1:30:02
Speaker 1: opening round, and he wrestled his last match in nineteen
1:30:05
Speaker 1: ninety two against the Latin Fury better known as Conan.
1:30:10
Speaker 1: I can't vouch for the Duke when it comes to
1:30:13
Speaker 1: in the ring. I only saw some very scattershot matches
1:30:17
Speaker 1: of his. I'm sure he was a perfectly capable worker
1:30:21
Speaker 1: of that era. What I knew of him was his
1:30:24
Speaker 1: commentary on some of those WWP shows that aired on Nessen,
1:30:28
Speaker 1: probably from the Boston Garden. I assume he would do
1:30:31
Speaker 1: color commentary for those shows, and I thought he was
1:30:35
Speaker 1: fucking terrible. Like I'm sorry, I don't mean to speak
1:30:38
Speaker 1: ill of the dead. I just have to be I
1:30:40
Speaker 1: don't know when I'm going to be able to talk
1:30:42
Speaker 1: about the Duke of Dorchester again, so I'm just going
1:30:45
Speaker 1: to say what's on my mind here. I just got
1:30:47
Speaker 1: to be honest. I mean, his voice on those shows
1:30:49
Speaker 1: was like nails on a fucking chalkboard. I know he
1:30:52
Speaker 1: was a heel and he was playing up the heel shtick,
1:30:56
Speaker 1: but like whenever there was a match on Primetime wrestling
1:30:59
Speaker 1: or maybe an old coliseum video and I heard his
1:31:01
Speaker 1: voice on there, it would just ruin the entire match
1:31:04
Speaker 1: for me, like I did not want to watch the match.
1:31:07
Speaker 1: God that I hate his commentary. He had one of
1:31:09
Speaker 1: those voices that was just it was unmistakable, I'll say
1:31:12
Speaker 1: that much. He had one of those voices that when
1:31:16
Speaker 1: you heard it, you do exactly who it was. It
1:31:18
Speaker 1: was definitely a sound that was unique to him. I'm
1:31:22
Speaker 1: sorry he passed away though, But this comes after the
1:31:25
Speaker 1: death of Eddie Andandlman on Monday, another famous name out
1:31:28
Speaker 1: of New England. I talked about him on the Uncrowned
1:31:30
Speaker 1: Wrestling show on Tuesday. Andlman was a Hall of Fame
1:31:33
Speaker 1: sports radio host out of Boston who created the King
1:31:36
Speaker 1: of the Ring. Never worked in the wrestling business, but
1:31:39
Speaker 1: he was friendly with the McMahon's. He came up with
1:31:41
Speaker 1: the idea for them to do a tournament as a
1:31:43
Speaker 1: charity event to help raise money for various children's nonprofits.
1:31:48
Speaker 1: This would be the first King of the Ring tournament
1:31:51
Speaker 1: that was ever held in nineteen eighty five. In those days,
1:31:54
Speaker 1: it was a non televised deal on the house shows
1:31:56
Speaker 1: for many years. He was on the Lapse Fan podcast
1:31:59
Speaker 1: a few year years ago. He claimed that first event
1:32:01
Speaker 1: raised more than one hundred thousand dollars. They did King
1:32:05
Speaker 1: of the Ring tournaments every year until the first one
1:32:07
Speaker 1: on pay per view every year except for nineteen ninety
1:32:10
Speaker 1: and nineteen ninety two for some reason. But then in
1:32:13
Speaker 1: ninety three they brought it to pay per view and
1:32:15
Speaker 1: Brett Hart won his second one because he had won
1:32:18
Speaker 1: the one prior to that in nineteen ninety one. All Right,
1:32:22
Speaker 1: mailbag questions, we got a lot of them. You could
1:32:24
Speaker 1: email me the Solomn Monster at gmail dot com. Please
1:32:27
Speaker 1: include your name and where you are from when you
1:32:29
Speaker 1: write in. You want to have a chance of hearing
1:32:33
Speaker 1: your question read here on this global podcast. It goes
1:32:37
Speaker 1: all over the world. I have been led to believe.
1:32:40
Speaker 1: In fact, I can't prove this, but I have been
1:32:42
Speaker 1: led to believe that the signal here from this show
1:32:44
Speaker 1: is even beamed out to the other planets in the
1:32:47
Speaker 1: Solar System. There could be beings on Jupiter right now,
1:32:51
Speaker 1: on Saturn in Uranus that are listening. Yes, there there
1:32:55
Speaker 1: could very well be aliens in Uranus that are listening
1:32:58
Speaker 1: to this podcast right now. Doug from Santa Barbara, California.
1:33:04
Speaker 1: I wanted to get your thoughts on WWE making Cindy
1:33:06
Speaker 1: Lauper their San Diego Comic Con twenty twenty six exclusive
1:33:10
Speaker 1: action figure. It's a pretty cool set, but my first
1:33:13
Speaker 1: thought when I heard about this was she must have
1:33:15
Speaker 1: signed some sort of WWE deal for them to produce
1:33:18
Speaker 1: her figure. You've been harping for years wondering why she
1:33:21
Speaker 1: has never been inducted into the Hall of Fame when
1:33:24
Speaker 1: she was so integral in WrestleMania. Just wanted to get
1:33:27
Speaker 1: your thoughts on her getting her recognition and maybe a
1:33:29
Speaker 1: Legends deal was signed and this is the first step
1:33:32
Speaker 1: to an induction. I did see it, and I saw
1:33:36
Speaker 1: the video of her reaction to the set and taking
1:33:39
Speaker 1: the toys out and playing with them, and that was
1:33:41
Speaker 1: kind of cool. That does not mean, though, that she
1:33:44
Speaker 1: necessarily signed a deal with WWE. She may have been
1:33:46
Speaker 1: approached directly by Mattel and maybe they have to get
1:33:50
Speaker 1: WWE's blessing for it. But you know, she may have
1:33:53
Speaker 1: been approached by the toy company specifically and made the
1:33:57
Speaker 1: deal directly with Mattel, So it doesn't mean that she
1:34:00
Speaker 1: signed a Legends deal or anything like that. She absolutely
1:34:03
Speaker 1: deserves to be recognized in their Hall of Fame. But
1:34:06
Speaker 1: I don't think that this makes that any more or
1:34:08
Speaker 1: less likely than it was before. Like, I definitely don't
1:34:11
Speaker 1: see it happening next year with Mania being held in
1:34:14
Speaker 1: Saudi Arabia. But it's still a mystery to me. You
1:34:17
Speaker 1: know why it hasn't happened already when she's been open
1:34:20
Speaker 1: about never being offered a spot. There was this rumor
1:34:22
Speaker 1: for years about like, oh, she turned them down once,
1:34:26
Speaker 1: and then it was on Twitter she was responding maybe
1:34:29
Speaker 1: to something land Storm said, and she said no, that
1:34:32
Speaker 1: never happened. The offer was never made. You know, mister
1:34:37
Speaker 1: T is in there, but not her. Very weird. Both
1:34:40
Speaker 1: of them were equally important to the success of that
1:34:42
Speaker 1: first wrestle Media, maybe Lawper even more so than mister T,
1:34:46
Speaker 1: because through Lauper's involvement, we got the rock and wrestling
1:34:49
Speaker 1: stuff on MTV and everything that came from that, which
1:34:53
Speaker 1: then led into the first WrestleMania. So I think there's
1:34:55
Speaker 1: an argument to be made that if they're not equally
1:34:57
Speaker 1: as important, she may be more important than even he was.
1:35:00
Speaker 1: Was Anton from London. With Jay getting into the final
1:35:04
Speaker 1: of the King of the Ring, I had a thought
1:35:06
Speaker 1: around if the match ended up being Jay versus Cody
1:35:08
Speaker 1: for the WWE Championship. Could you see the Rock returning
1:35:13
Speaker 1: and costing Cody the title? There's the obvious storyline ties,
1:35:16
Speaker 1: But with WrestleMania being in Saudi next year, I don't
1:35:19
Speaker 1: think it's be too much of a stretch for them
1:35:21
Speaker 1: to want Rock there. Could they plant the seeds for
1:35:24
Speaker 1: a Rock versus Cody match there? If Rock is going
1:35:28
Speaker 1: to make an appearance in Saudi next year, we'll have
1:35:31
Speaker 1: nothing to do with anything that happens at Summerslim. Rock
1:35:34
Speaker 1: is not going to be appearing at Summer Slim. The
1:35:36
Speaker 1: answer is no. Chris from Manteca, California, I have a
1:35:40
Speaker 1: question or an idea for Forbidden Door. I do agree
1:35:44
Speaker 1: with you that it's lost its luster and just isn't
1:35:46
Speaker 1: what it was a few years ago. With that being said,
1:35:48
Speaker 1: what if Tony updates it by making it similar to
1:35:51
Speaker 1: a Survivor series type show. You could fill the card
1:35:54
Speaker 1: with some elimination type matches in regular matches, but I
1:35:57
Speaker 1: think it would be more effective than the current format.
1:35:59
Speaker 1: They could so move the pay per view to a
1:36:02
Speaker 1: slower time in the year for all of the promotions
1:36:05
Speaker 1: so they have time to do a proper build. I
1:36:07
Speaker 1: know on Tuesday on The Uncrowned Wrestling Show, you made
1:36:10
Speaker 1: the point that New Japan has lost a lot of
1:36:12
Speaker 1: their big names. It was something I originally didn't think about,
1:36:15
Speaker 1: but maybe they could use this to showcase some of
1:36:17
Speaker 1: the younger guys in aw instead of some of the
1:36:20
Speaker 1: top stars. Curious what your thoughts would be if you
1:36:23
Speaker 1: take the top stars out of it and nobody's gonna care, Like,
1:36:27
Speaker 1: that's the whole point. The top stars have to be involved.
1:36:29
Speaker 1: The closest thing to a real forbidden door match that
1:36:31
Speaker 1: we have on that pay per view next Sunday is
1:36:33
Speaker 1: Kenny Omega against Zach Saber Junior, precisely because it's two
1:36:38
Speaker 1: of the biggest names in either company facing off and
1:36:42
Speaker 1: going one on one. So no, if you use it
1:36:45
Speaker 1: as an exhibition exclusively for younger talent, I'm not saying
1:36:48
Speaker 1: that that's not cool at all, but you're not going
1:36:49
Speaker 1: to build an entire pay per view around that. It's
1:36:51
Speaker 1: going to fail. It's just not going to work. As
1:36:54
Speaker 1: far as having some sort of Survivor Series style matchup. Yeah,
1:36:59
Speaker 1: I mean, look, if you wanted to take like the
1:37:00
Speaker 1: Blooding Guts concept and take that and use that on
1:37:04
Speaker 1: the Forbidden Door show where you take five or six
1:37:07
Speaker 1: people from AAW and then five or six from New
1:37:09
Speaker 1: Japan and maybe one year it's five or six from
1:37:12
Speaker 1: AW and then five or six from CML. Or I
1:37:15
Speaker 1: guess you could always do like a three a three
1:37:17
Speaker 1: way thing where you could have five AAW, five New Japan,
1:37:22
Speaker 1: five CML. Only problem there is if you're going to
1:37:25
Speaker 1: do a whole pay per view call Forbidden Door and
1:37:28
Speaker 1: you're taking fifteen of the biggest of the biggest names
1:37:31
Speaker 1: and putting him in one match. But I mean, it's
1:37:34
Speaker 1: not like they don't have talent to make other matches
1:37:37
Speaker 1: on the undercard work. Yes, I actually think that would
1:37:40
Speaker 1: be more in line with sort of an US versus them,
1:37:44
Speaker 1: you know, kind of of thing. But that's not really
1:37:47
Speaker 1: really what Tony. I don't know, he doesn't really portray
1:37:50
Speaker 1: it that way, so I don't know if that's even
1:37:53
Speaker 1: something they would want to do. But look, if he's
1:37:56
Speaker 1: going to keep the concept around, I'm all for trying
1:37:59
Speaker 1: to come up with new ways to freshen it up.
1:38:01
Speaker 1: That could be one way of doing it. But yes,
1:38:03
Speaker 1: part of the problem is New Japan has lost a
1:38:05
Speaker 1: lot of its big names. So like you think of
1:38:08
Speaker 1: like the five names that New Japan would pick, Let's say,
1:38:11
Speaker 1: to go up against five, but the very best that
1:38:13
Speaker 1: AAW has to offer. Who would those five names from
1:38:16
Speaker 1: New Japan be? Right? You would think a Shota Umiino
1:38:19
Speaker 1: because he's kind of the new guy they're building around
1:38:21
Speaker 1: as their champion. Callum Newman just held the championship for
1:38:26
Speaker 1: a few months, Shingo Takagi, Zach Saber Junior, and then
1:38:31
Speaker 1: I don't know who did you round out that team with.
1:38:35
Speaker 1: It doesn't hit quite the same way as it would
1:38:37
Speaker 1: have a few years ago, does it. You know, when
1:38:40
Speaker 1: they when they still had Tanahashi and Nito and some
1:38:44
Speaker 1: people that are in AW right now who are still
1:38:46
Speaker 1: working in New Japan. It just doesn't hit the same way.
1:38:50
Speaker 1: I just question how much of a real draw that
1:38:53
Speaker 1: would be. Derek from Arkansas. With all the talk about
1:38:58
Speaker 1: tournaments lately, what did you think of the Survivor series
1:39:01
Speaker 1: Deadly Game. This is one of the first pay per
1:39:03
Speaker 1: views I had on VHS as a kid, and still
1:39:05
Speaker 1: to this day, one of my favorite pay per views
1:39:08
Speaker 1: that WWE has ever done. With the Austin stuff Taker
1:39:12
Speaker 1: versus Caine getting a first round by and the Rock
1:39:15
Speaker 1: turning heel at the end. I thought it was great
1:39:17
Speaker 1: storytelling throughout the tournament. It was even a fun triple
1:39:20
Speaker 1: threat tag team title match with the Outlaws, the Headbangers
1:39:24
Speaker 1: and Mark Henry and d Lo Brown. I thought it
1:39:28
Speaker 1: was cool at the time. It's not the sort of
1:39:31
Speaker 1: thing that I really cared to go back and rewatch
1:39:35
Speaker 1: from start to finish. It's a lot of short matches,
1:39:37
Speaker 1: so you're right about the storytelling aspect. It was definitely
1:39:40
Speaker 1: a tournament that was more about telling the Austin story
1:39:45
Speaker 1: and the Rock story. Austin was trying to win and
1:39:48
Speaker 1: get a title shot. He got screwed in the middle
1:39:50
Speaker 1: when Shane McMahon turned heel and then with Rock. It's
1:39:54
Speaker 1: so weird, you know, coming out of SummerSlam that year,
1:39:56
Speaker 1: the fans just turned in babyface. He lost that ladder
1:40:00
Speaker 1: match of Madison Square Garden to Triple h and he
1:40:03
Speaker 1: didn't do anything different. The fans just gravitated to him
1:40:06
Speaker 1: because he was fucking cool. And for about two months there,
1:40:10
Speaker 1: two or three months, he and Austin were basically a
1:40:13
Speaker 1: one and a two as far as the top babyfaces
1:40:16
Speaker 1: in the company. But when you have an A one
1:40:19
Speaker 1: as strong as Austin, right, It's having an A two
1:40:23
Speaker 1: babyface like that is less important than having an A
1:40:26
Speaker 1: one heel. So it was the right move to make
1:40:29
Speaker 1: because Rock is the corporate champion. As the heel, he
1:40:32
Speaker 1: was just so great and he got to work with
1:40:34
Speaker 1: Austin and so we got a lot of great stuff
1:40:36
Speaker 1: out of it. So yeah, I mean, I'll give you
1:40:38
Speaker 1: that the storytelling aspect was there, but I mean in
1:40:41
Speaker 1: terms of I don't know, I mean, in terms of
1:40:42
Speaker 1: what people look for in a tournament. Are you looking
1:40:44
Speaker 1: for great wrestling matches? Are you looking for big angles
1:40:49
Speaker 1: and swerves and surprises? I would like to have a
1:40:53
Speaker 1: nice mix of both. To be honest with you, we
1:40:55
Speaker 1: didn't really get a lot of great wrestling in that tournament.
1:40:57
Speaker 1: But at the time I thought it was cool. I
1:41:00
Speaker 1: wasn't really I wasn't really a fan of not having
1:41:03
Speaker 1: any traditional Survivor Series elimination matches because they did the
1:41:06
Speaker 1: whole tournament in one night, so you didn't have time
1:41:08
Speaker 1: for anything else. So I mean, it's not my favorite show.
1:41:13
Speaker 1: Jamie from Los Angeles. With the recent reports of boso
1:41:18
Speaker 1: Enzo and cas, I don't know, why, I said, Boso Boso,
1:41:22
Speaker 1: I did it again, Enzo and Enzo and Cass potentially
1:41:26
Speaker 1: coming back. I'm gonna leave that in. I'm not even
1:41:29
Speaker 1: gonna edit that out. Do you think rather than bring
1:41:32
Speaker 1: them back as a tag team, it should be a
1:41:35
Speaker 1: manager wrestler duo. I honestly thought Enzo would have been
1:41:38
Speaker 1: better in that role back in twenty seventeen instead of
1:41:41
Speaker 1: going to two zero five Live and getting betrayed by Cass. Rather,
1:41:44
Speaker 1: I thought he should have managed Cass and potentially formed
1:41:47
Speaker 1: his own faction like Bobby Heenan and manage other wrestlers.
1:41:51
Speaker 1: Could you see Enzo as a manager? One hundred percent?
1:41:55
Speaker 1: One hundred percent. We were just having a conversation about that,
1:42:00
Speaker 1: JD and Jesse and me after the House of Glory show.
1:42:03
Speaker 1: He went out to a bar for a drink after
1:42:07
Speaker 1: and I don't even know how he got on this subject.
1:42:09
Speaker 1: I think Jesse maybe brought up Enzo and I said
1:42:12
Speaker 1: Enzo was miscast. Enzo really should have been a manager.
1:42:17
Speaker 1: I think that would have been a role he would
1:42:18
Speaker 1: have thrived in. And so I agree, And you know,
1:42:21
Speaker 1: Big we don't know where Big Bill's gonna go. Big
1:42:24
Speaker 1: Bill's contracts supposedly was up at the end of May,
1:42:27
Speaker 1: and here we are now June twenty. First, I haven't
1:42:29
Speaker 1: heard anything about Big Bills, so I don't know what's
1:42:31
Speaker 1: going on with him. But let's say he becomes a
1:42:33
Speaker 1: free agent and wwe wanted to bring him in. I'd
1:42:37
Speaker 1: like to see him get a singles run instead of
1:42:39
Speaker 1: him doing that, because again, the tag team division is dead.
1:42:43
Speaker 1: This is the problem. Bringing in one new team or
1:42:48
Speaker 1: two new teams is not going to work. Like they
1:42:52
Speaker 1: would have to have five or six, maybe not even
1:42:54
Speaker 1: five or six, like four or five new teams, real
1:42:58
Speaker 1: tag teams that they can bring up or bring in
1:43:02
Speaker 1: if they wanted to really inject some life into their
1:43:05
Speaker 1: tag team division. They don't have that. So let's say
1:43:09
Speaker 1: they put Enzo and cast back together right after the
1:43:11
Speaker 1: first few weeks, who do they have to work with? Like,
1:43:14
Speaker 1: by putting them in the tag team division, you have
1:43:16
Speaker 1: already set the ceiling on those two so incredibly low
1:43:19
Speaker 1: that it's unfair to the two of them. I think
1:43:22
Speaker 1: a Big Bill push with Enzo is his mouthpiece, would
1:43:25
Speaker 1: actually be a great idea. Que the Destroyer from Chicago.
1:43:30
Speaker 1: Do you think when fans say they only boo him
1:43:33
Speaker 1: or her because they think it's cool. It's a cop
1:43:36
Speaker 1: out defense for a babyface when a crowd is starting
1:43:39
Speaker 1: to sour on them or not fully get behind them.
1:43:42
Speaker 1: As a kid, I had to watch John Cena beat
1:43:44
Speaker 1: all of my favorites and I hated it, so I
1:43:46
Speaker 1: started booing him ever since. It wasn't because it was
1:43:48
Speaker 1: the trendy thing to do. It was because I thought
1:43:50
Speaker 1: he sucked and usually found the heel to be the
1:43:53
Speaker 1: more interesting character. BOYQ, he hasn't minced his words here.
1:43:57
Speaker 1: It feels like not having a babyface, especially now, get
1:44:00
Speaker 1: you or not liking a babyface, get you labeled as
1:44:03
Speaker 1: some kind of mark or kill joy when you're really
1:44:06
Speaker 1: just reacting to the product as you see it. Yeah,
1:44:09
Speaker 1: it's definitely a cop out sometime. I mean there are
1:44:12
Speaker 1: times where fans I feel like are just trying to
1:44:14
Speaker 1: be too cool for school and they will go against
1:44:16
Speaker 1: the grain just to be contrarian. I think that happens also,
1:44:20
Speaker 1: But yeah, I mean, look, the fans are going to
1:44:22
Speaker 1: react to the people they like, and they're going to
1:44:24
Speaker 1: react a different way to the people they don't like.
1:44:27
Speaker 1: And so if they don't react to somebody the way
1:44:29
Speaker 1: that you want them to automatically. Ah, the fans are
1:44:33
Speaker 1: just you know, they're being marks right. Yes, absolutely, that happens,
1:44:37
Speaker 1: one hundred percent. Kevin from Sycamore, Illinois. You've mentioned in
1:44:43
Speaker 1: the past in ninety four that you could have given
1:44:45
Speaker 1: Owen Hart a title run, even if it was a
1:44:47
Speaker 1: short one. At what time could a Razor Ramone title
1:44:50
Speaker 1: win have possibly worked? So, yes, I have said that.
1:44:54
Speaker 1: I have said that there was a period in between
1:44:56
Speaker 1: King of the Ring and SummerSlam where you could have
1:44:59
Speaker 1: given the belt to Owen and had Owen go into
1:45:01
Speaker 1: the cage match at Summer Slam defending against Brett and
1:45:04
Speaker 1: had Brett win the belt back there, and so Owen
1:45:06
Speaker 1: would have had I don't know, a month or six
1:45:08
Speaker 1: weeks or something. You absolutely could have done that. But
1:45:13
Speaker 1: that's the thing about Razor Ramone. I don't think there
1:45:16
Speaker 1: was a good time to put the belt on Razor. Yeah,
1:45:20
Speaker 1: when he first came in as a heel, he wasn't
1:45:22
Speaker 1: world championship material. He was still a relative unknown. He
1:45:27
Speaker 1: was too new, and he went babyface pretty quick after that.
1:45:30
Speaker 1: I mean he came in it was like the fall
1:45:32
Speaker 1: of ninety two. I want to say late summer, early fall,
1:45:36
Speaker 1: and by the middle of ninety three, not even a
1:45:38
Speaker 1: year later, he was already a baby face. So I
1:45:42
Speaker 1: don't think that there was a good time for him
1:45:46
Speaker 1: to be champion from ninety two to ninety six. Now,
1:45:48
Speaker 1: had he stuck around and Knock gone to WCW, maybe
1:45:52
Speaker 1: he goes heel again, at some point, drops some of
1:45:55
Speaker 1: the Razor stick, gets a short heel run his champion.
1:45:59
Speaker 1: Maybe maybe Hall takes the belt off sewn at Survivor
1:46:04
Speaker 1: Series instead of Sid Right, that could have worked, maybe
1:46:07
Speaker 1: for a short run. Anything more than that. By that point,
1:46:11
Speaker 1: you know, his addiction problems were getting worse. And would
1:46:14
Speaker 1: they have trusted him with it. I mean they trusted
1:46:16
Speaker 1: Shawn Michaels and he was all fucked up. But Scott Hall,
1:46:19
Speaker 1: you know, great as he was, he was not Shawn Michaels. Right,
1:46:23
Speaker 1: very few people would be able to say that. So
1:46:26
Speaker 1: I don't think there was a good time for him
1:46:28
Speaker 1: to be the world champion while he was still there.
1:46:30
Speaker 1: You know, Vince put the belt on Diesel because he
1:46:33
Speaker 1: was big and he saw his next big star. Well
1:46:37
Speaker 1: he could have given the belt to Razor then, right.
1:46:39
Speaker 1: People might say that, Well, sure, but Razor wasn't someone
1:46:42
Speaker 1: that you were going to build your company around. You
1:46:44
Speaker 1: weren't going to make him your top guy. That's what
1:46:47
Speaker 1: Vince was looking to do. He tried to make Lex
1:46:49
Speaker 1: Luger the next Hulkgan. It didn't work. Brett Hart was
1:46:53
Speaker 1: popular with the fans, but I don't think Vince ever
1:46:56
Speaker 1: truly saw him as being that guy either, Right. I'm
1:46:59
Speaker 1: just it's being practical here and just looking at it
1:47:01
Speaker 1: through the lens of how I think Vince McMahon would
1:47:03
Speaker 1: have seen him at the time. But if you wanted
1:47:06
Speaker 1: to include him on your list of guys you never
1:47:08
Speaker 1: won a world title but should have. You know, I
1:47:10
Speaker 1: won't argue with you if you have Scott Hall somewhere
1:47:12
Speaker 1: on there. But you just have to keep in mind
1:47:14
Speaker 1: that at least part of the reason he was probably
1:47:16
Speaker 1: never considered for such a spot had to do with
1:47:18
Speaker 1: his own reputation. Molly from Toronto. There is that old
1:47:24
Speaker 1: phrase in wrestling, the man makes the title and not
1:47:27
Speaker 1: the title makes the man. Is there ever a time
1:47:30
Speaker 1: when it was the opposite, when the title did make
1:47:33
Speaker 1: the man or woman? This is my best David Schultz impression.
1:47:39
Speaker 1: There ps a little side story. The other day, I
1:47:43
Speaker 1: was babysitting my three year old niece and was watching
1:47:45
Speaker 1: your podcast. She asked, who's that. I told her he's
1:47:48
Speaker 1: the guy behind Heardy the Horse book that I got
1:47:51
Speaker 1: you for Christmas. She thought I was on a zoom
1:47:53
Speaker 1: call with you and was trying to say thank you
1:47:54
Speaker 1: and didn't understand why you weren't replying back. So I'll
1:47:58
Speaker 1: say it again, thank you. She loved it. See that's adorable.
1:48:02
Speaker 1: Tell her I said, you're welcome. I love hearing that.
1:48:07
Speaker 1: I believe it's true that it's more than It's more
1:48:10
Speaker 1: the man makes the title. It's not the other way around.
1:48:12
Speaker 1: John Cena, for example, with the US title in twenty fifteen,
1:48:15
Speaker 1: I think that's a good example of that. Gunther with
1:48:18
Speaker 1: the Intercontinental title in twenty twenty two. I mean, that
1:48:21
Speaker 1: thing had fallen off a cliff until they put it
1:48:24
Speaker 1: on him, and he helped bring a level of prestige
1:48:27
Speaker 1: to that title that had been missing for a very
1:48:29
Speaker 1: long time. Cody with the TNT title right Roman reigns
1:48:35
Speaker 1: right now with the World Heavyweight Championship because now that
1:48:38
Speaker 1: he's got that belt, you know, that makes it the
1:48:41
Speaker 1: top title in the company. First time that title gets
1:48:44
Speaker 1: the WrestleMania Night two main event is because Roman Reigns
1:48:47
Speaker 1: was winning it. I think that says it all, But
1:48:50
Speaker 1: I mean there are exceptions. I think. I mean, I
1:48:53
Speaker 1: think Triple H is probably the best one I could
1:48:54
Speaker 1: think of in two thousand, like ninety nine two thousand,
1:48:58
Speaker 1: where the title helped make the man that and mcfoley
1:49:02
Speaker 1: the title and mcfoley helped make Triple H. And if
1:49:07
Speaker 1: I don't if I had to throw one more in,
1:49:10
Speaker 1: uh you know, maybe Diesel title makes the men. I
1:49:14
Speaker 1: think that could be applicable to Diesel in ninety five,
1:49:18
Speaker 1: really cementing him as a main eventor Malik from Queens,
1:49:24
Speaker 1: New York. I was thinking what if King of the
1:49:26
Speaker 1: Ring had stuck around after two thousand and two? So
1:49:30
Speaker 1: I decided to list the wrestlers that I thought would
1:49:32
Speaker 1: win two thousand and three. John CENAH four, Randy Orton
1:49:36
Speaker 1: OH five, Chris Jericho O seven, Bobby Lashley OH nine,
1:49:41
Speaker 1: Jeff Hardy twenty eleven, CM Punk twenty twelve, Alberto Del
1:49:46
Speaker 1: Dipshit twenty thirteen, Daniel Bryan twenty fourteen, Dolph Ziggler twenty sixteen,
1:49:52
Speaker 1: Finn Balor twenty seventeen, Shinsky Nakamora twenty eighteen, Samoa Joe
1:49:58
Speaker 1: twenty twenty, Rollins twenty twenty two, Kevin Owens and twenty
1:50:03
Speaker 1: twenty three La Night. That's funny. Sure, I'd be cool
1:50:10
Speaker 1: with those all, But maybe Jericho in five. I think
1:50:17
Speaker 1: Mohammed Hassan would have made for a better choice, just
1:50:20
Speaker 1: given the push that he was getting at the time.
1:50:22
Speaker 1: I think he would have gotten great heat for becoming king,
1:50:26
Speaker 1: and Jericho didn't need it to get that match that
1:50:28
Speaker 1: he had with John Cen at SummerSlam that year. But
1:50:32
Speaker 1: then if you do here's the thing though, if you
1:50:34
Speaker 1: do that right, if you do the Hassan angle in July,
1:50:38
Speaker 1: the terrorist angle, boy, they would have been in a
1:50:40
Speaker 1: real pickle if he was the King of the ring.
1:50:42
Speaker 1: I don't know how they would have gotten out of that.
1:50:46
Speaker 1: Patrick from London just wondered what happened to George the
1:50:50
Speaker 1: security guard who worked at Madison Square Garden. Did you
1:50:53
Speaker 1: see him after the phone incident in late two thousand
1:50:56
Speaker 1: and nine when you accidentally passed up being seated right
1:50:59
Speaker 1: now to the Orton Kofe table spot. Also, are you
1:51:03
Speaker 1: ever in the UK? Your British fans would love to
1:51:05
Speaker 1: meet you, and I would love to meet my British fans.
1:51:09
Speaker 1: But I've not been to London, I've not been to Europe.
1:51:12
Speaker 1: I'm gonna have to change that at some point. Are
1:51:15
Speaker 1: you sure it was George by the way, and not Frank.
1:51:19
Speaker 1: I thought it was Frank who tried calling me or
1:51:22
Speaker 1: texting me, and I didn't see it until later on. Yeah,
1:51:26
Speaker 1: because he worked in Madison Square Guard. He didn't just
1:51:28
Speaker 1: work in Madison Square Garden. He worked other events as
1:51:30
Speaker 1: well at that time. That's really where I knew him
1:51:35
Speaker 1: from were those other events, and we became very friendly.
1:51:39
Speaker 1: I don't know about the Garden, I mean, but as
1:51:41
Speaker 1: far as I know, he is still working those other events,
1:51:45
Speaker 1: although he's up there in Age now. I really should
1:51:48
Speaker 1: check in and see how he's doing. But yeah, man,
1:51:51
Speaker 1: I was. I was kicking myself for that one. I
1:51:54
Speaker 1: could have been right there for the big Boom drop spot.
1:51:57
Speaker 1: I could have been literally right there though late two
1:52:00
Speaker 1: thousand and nine. You're one of the ogs, aren't you. Man,
1:52:03
Speaker 1: Patrick's been listening for a long time. I talked about
1:52:06
Speaker 1: that on the SoundOff Freaking Lifetime ago. Lee from Thorn
1:52:11
Speaker 1: Gumbald uk Man. You guys in the UK have some
1:52:16
Speaker 1: funny Would that be a city? I don't even know
1:52:19
Speaker 1: what that would be. I know in Canada their provinces
1:52:22
Speaker 1: Thorn Gumbald. Would that be a town? Would that be
1:52:26
Speaker 1: the city? I don't know. Been listening twelve years and
1:52:29
Speaker 1: by far my favorite podcast question is about the World
1:52:32
Speaker 1: Cup or football in general. Are you watching it and
1:52:34
Speaker 1: have you been caught up in any buzz about it
1:52:36
Speaker 1: with it being held over your side of the water.
1:52:40
Speaker 1: I myself hope England does well, but I think the
1:52:42
Speaker 1: heat will prove difficult. Well, I know they got a
1:52:46
Speaker 1: big win over Croatia the other day. I don't have
1:52:49
Speaker 1: like a favorite team. I don't follow it really. I
1:52:53
Speaker 1: feel kind of left out because everyone's so excited about
1:52:55
Speaker 1: the World Cup, and I feel like I should, I
1:52:57
Speaker 1: should try to get into it. I feel like I
1:52:59
Speaker 1: would have fun with it, but I just I'm not
1:53:02
Speaker 1: really I'm not really familiar with any of the key
1:53:05
Speaker 1: play I mean, I know Messy obviously, but I'm not
1:53:07
Speaker 1: really familiar with any of the key players or who
1:53:10
Speaker 1: the favorites are. I don't even know who the favorite
1:53:12
Speaker 1: is this year. I mean, I think England is probably
1:53:15
Speaker 1: up there right, probably in the top five maybe, But no,
1:53:18
Speaker 1: I haven't been following it as closely as I probably should.
1:53:22
Speaker 1: But I think it's really cool how like into it
1:53:25
Speaker 1: everybody gets for their team and their country. I think
1:53:28
Speaker 1: that's cool. Zach from Liberty, Kentucky. I just wanted to
1:53:32
Speaker 1: say I'm enjoying your movie reviews. I'm always or it's
1:53:36
Speaker 1: always good to take a break from just the wrestling
1:53:39
Speaker 1: stuff and talk about something else that you love doing,
1:53:42
Speaker 1: and that is watching movies. I'm thinking about seeing the
1:53:45
Speaker 1: new Supergirl movie in a couple of weeks, and I'm
1:53:47
Speaker 1: definitely seeing Clay Face when it comes out. I'm also
1:53:50
Speaker 1: a huge Batman fan, so my question is by Rent
1:53:53
Speaker 1: and sell on these iconic Batman villains, the Joker, the Penguin,
1:53:58
Speaker 1: and the Riddler. Well, the answer is Joker, Riddler, and
1:54:03
Speaker 1: then Penguin in that order, although I still have to
1:54:08
Speaker 1: watch the Penguin series on HBO Max. You know, they
1:54:10
Speaker 1: just announced that they're not bringing it back. They're not
1:54:12
Speaker 1: renewing it for a second season, so I don't know
1:54:15
Speaker 1: if that's a bad thing or if the first one
1:54:17
Speaker 1: is better off on its own as like a mini series.
1:54:20
Speaker 1: I'm gonna watch it anyway soon. But yes, I am
1:54:25
Speaker 1: a movie fan. I am a movie fan. And on
1:54:28
Speaker 1: that note, we have a question from Sufi from Malaysia.
1:54:32
Speaker 1: Now that you're catching up on films, I'm curious your
1:54:35
Speaker 1: thoughts on Iron Lung. Like Obsession in back Rooms. It's
1:54:39
Speaker 1: made by a YouTuber named Marketplier and it's independently made
1:54:43
Speaker 1: with self funding, self acting, writing, and directing. It's based
1:54:46
Speaker 1: on the indie horror game of the same name, and
1:54:48
Speaker 1: market Plier was a fan of it, so that's why
1:54:51
Speaker 1: he wanted to make a film out of it. Also,
1:54:53
Speaker 1: is there a horror genre or subgenre that you are
1:54:56
Speaker 1: not a fan of or doesn't click with you. I
1:54:58
Speaker 1: have not seen Iron Lung. This is the first I'm
1:55:01
Speaker 1: actually hearing of it. I will I will look into it.
1:55:05
Speaker 1: As far as subgenres, I would say splatterpunk is not
1:55:11
Speaker 1: really my thing, or a torture porn if you will.
1:55:16
Speaker 1: That's that's not what SAUW was at the beginning, but
1:55:18
Speaker 1: it's sort of degenerated into that over time. Although I
1:55:21
Speaker 1: never watched Saw X and people say that was one
1:55:24
Speaker 1: of the better sequels, but like I saw, Hostile wasn't
1:55:29
Speaker 1: really a fan terrifier, Like I'm just I'm not super
1:55:33
Speaker 1: into the hyper gory stuff where it just feels like
1:55:37
Speaker 1: it's hyper gory for the sake of shocking you. So
1:55:40
Speaker 1: that's one subgenre that doesn't really click with me. And
1:55:43
Speaker 1: I would say folk horror is another one, like, you know,
1:55:47
Speaker 1: the stuff that's tied into like ancient settings and ancient rituals,
1:55:51
Speaker 1: you know that sort of thing. Not really big on
1:55:53
Speaker 1: that either, But I am a fan of most everything else.
1:55:55
Speaker 1: You know, slashers, sci fi horror, body horror like Playface
1:56:00
Speaker 1: is a body horror movie. I can't wait to see
1:56:02
Speaker 1: that one. It comes out in October. I still haven't
1:56:04
Speaker 1: seen The Substance, though I have that on my watch list.
1:56:08
Speaker 1: But on the subject of movies, I did mention that
1:56:10
Speaker 1: I saw Toy Story five the other day. I have
1:56:13
Speaker 1: seen all the previous ones. I saw Toy Story four
1:56:17
Speaker 1: in theaters and my god, people were just they were
1:56:19
Speaker 1: they were in tears as I looked around the theater.
1:56:21
Speaker 1: I'd be lying if I said that I didn't have
1:56:23
Speaker 1: a couple streaming down my own face, even though I
1:56:25
Speaker 1: thought going into it that do we really need a
1:56:28
Speaker 1: Toy Story four? And then everyone's fucking bawling their eyes out.
1:56:32
Speaker 1: So of course I was going to see the new
1:56:33
Speaker 1: Toy Story movie. It has been three hundred and sixty
1:56:38
Speaker 1: three episodes since I have reviewed a Toy Story movie
1:56:42
Speaker 1: on this podcast, seven years, which is probably the average
1:56:48
Speaker 1: age of the people who should be seeing these movies.
1:56:52
Speaker 1: But they've been cranking them out since nineteen ninety five,
1:56:55
Speaker 1: So of course the people who saw them in nineteen
1:56:56
Speaker 1: ninety five are going to want to go see these also,
1:56:59
Speaker 1: and they're thirty years older now, probably seeing it with
1:57:02
Speaker 1: their own kids, which is really cool. I don't have
1:57:05
Speaker 1: that luxury, but I still go and see them. Here's
1:57:09
Speaker 1: the thing about the last movie. I feel like the
1:57:10
Speaker 1: last movie. I mean, look, the last movie gets a
1:57:12
Speaker 1: lot of love, but there are a lot of people
1:57:14
Speaker 1: who think, oh, it's you know, it wasn't as good
1:57:16
Speaker 1: as the other ones. And they debuted Fourky in that movie, right,
1:57:22
Speaker 1: Fourky was the new character in the fourth movie or Sporky. No,
1:57:27
Speaker 1: it was foky. Fourky was a spork that's what it was.
1:57:30
Speaker 1: The new character in this or one of them. And
1:57:32
Speaker 1: this movie is smarty Pants. And when you see the
1:57:36
Speaker 1: movie and you hear the voice you'll probably be able
1:57:38
Speaker 1: to figure out who does the voice over for it.
1:57:41
Speaker 1: And so I thought that this movie is very similar
1:57:44
Speaker 1: to the other Toy Story movies and that it has
1:57:46
Speaker 1: its emotional moments. It has its emotional moments. They know
1:57:51
Speaker 1: how to get you right in the fields, right when
1:57:53
Speaker 1: the time is right. It doesn't seem to matter how
1:57:57
Speaker 1: many years go by and how much old are I
1:57:59
Speaker 1: might get. I just I will always go and see
1:58:02
Speaker 1: a new Toy Story movie. If they do Toy Story six,
1:58:04
Speaker 1: which I'm sure they will, I'll be there to see it.
1:58:08
Speaker 1: And really, they could continue to do these movies infinitely,
1:58:11
Speaker 1: or at least until you know, we don't have Tom
1:58:14
Speaker 1: Hanks and Tim Allen anymore, because once you lose those two,
1:58:17
Speaker 1: you can't really do Toy Story anymore. But you know,
1:58:20
Speaker 1: the thing about Toy Story is the reason it works.
1:58:23
Speaker 1: And I said this in my review on my letterbox,
1:58:25
Speaker 1: like they have heart at its core. Like these movies
1:58:29
Speaker 1: they have heart. They make you care about these characters,
1:58:32
Speaker 1: even though it's an animated movie and there are a
1:58:35
Speaker 1: bunch of fucking toys, right, They make you care about
1:58:37
Speaker 1: these characters. And whether they make you laugh, they make
1:58:41
Speaker 1: you cry, whatever it may be, and I will say
1:58:45
Speaker 1: that for me, this Toy Story is the weakest of
1:58:48
Speaker 1: all five movies, because the first one, to me is
1:58:52
Speaker 1: and will forever be, the best out of all of them.
1:58:55
Speaker 1: But this was still an excellent movie, and I think
1:58:58
Speaker 1: I ranked it four stars. Look, it's the weakest of
1:59:01
Speaker 1: the five, and I still gave it four stars. So
1:59:03
Speaker 1: I mean, what does that tell you. I was curious,
1:59:05
Speaker 1: like I actually looked up the ratings for each of
1:59:07
Speaker 1: them on Rotten Tomatoes, and it's amazing. Like it's got
1:59:10
Speaker 1: to be the only movie franchise that has gone five
1:59:12
Speaker 1: films and every film is at least like ninety four
1:59:16
Speaker 1: ninety five percent fresh like it. It's crazy, but it
1:59:19
Speaker 1: speaks to the quality of these movies. And so I
1:59:23
Speaker 1: will simply leave you with this. I'm going to repeat
1:59:25
Speaker 1: something I said on that episode of the sound Off
1:59:28
Speaker 1: when I reviewed the fourth one, because I think the
1:59:31
Speaker 1: same thing applies here. This is a movie that did
1:59:34
Speaker 1: not need to be made, but I'm very happy it was.
1:59:40
Speaker 1: That's the best endorsement I can give. If you want
1:59:42
Speaker 1: to follow me on Letterbox, by the way, I'm on
1:59:44
Speaker 1: there at the Solemn Monster. I've been enjoying it. People
1:59:47
Speaker 1: told me you got to get on there, so I
1:59:49
Speaker 1: created this account. Now I'm like addicted to it now,
1:59:52
Speaker 1: I mean like chiming in on stuff. I'm watching stuff
1:59:55
Speaker 1: that isn't even necessarily new. I finally saw the movie
1:59:58
Speaker 1: Contagion the other day, which came out in twenty eleven.
2:00:01
Speaker 1: And my god, if you saw a Contagion, I look,
2:00:04
Speaker 1: it came out in twenty eleven. I didn't see it
2:00:06
Speaker 1: until now. Okay, we're talking like after COVID. Holy shit,
2:00:10
Speaker 1: did they not predict that or what in that movie?
2:00:13
Speaker 1: And that ending threw me for a loop. So I
2:00:16
Speaker 1: saw that. I saw Invasion of the Body Snatchers, which
2:00:19
Speaker 1: somehow I hadn't seen until just now, and you know,
2:00:22
Speaker 1: with with Donald Sutherland, and I enjoyed that. So as
2:00:27
Speaker 1: I watch more of these, I'll make sure I rate
2:00:30
Speaker 1: and review them. Anyway, keep emailing me the Solo Monster
2:00:34
Speaker 1: at gmail dot com, and I will be back with you.
2:00:37
Speaker 1: Next Sunday will be a brand new episode. That'll be
2:00:41
Speaker 1: nine sixty nine. It's it's actually gonna be a very
2:00:44
Speaker 1: busy day next Sunday. I'm gonna do the sound off
2:00:47
Speaker 1: as normal. But Slammiversary is airing at four pm Eastern.
2:00:52
Speaker 1: I think it's a three pm pre show, but at
2:00:55
Speaker 1: four pm Eastern. Next Sunday Slammiversary and then that night
2:00:59
Speaker 1: and has the Great American Bash airing on the CW
2:01:03
Speaker 1: Network for free, competing with aw Forbidden Door, and that's
2:01:08
Speaker 1: on pay per view, although I think that pre show
2:01:10
Speaker 1: starts at seven. Great American Bash starts at seven, and
2:01:14
Speaker 1: the main card for Forbidden Door starts at eight. I'm
2:01:18
Speaker 1: not planning on being live after Forbidden Door, just so
2:01:20
Speaker 1: you know. I will be live though after Night of
2:01:23
Speaker 1: Champions on Saturday. That's a little more manageable. That's at
2:01:27
Speaker 1: one o'clock Eastern. As soon as Night of Champions is
2:01:29
Speaker 1: over next Saturday, come on by the YouTube channel. I'll
2:01:33
Speaker 1: be live for the review, so you're getting a double
2:01:35
Speaker 1: podcast from the next weekend. But otherwise I think everything
2:01:38
Speaker 1: is pretty much normal. We got the RAW post show
2:01:40
Speaker 1: on YouTube on Monday night. Actually, no, that's not true.
2:01:44
Speaker 1: Raw is in London tomorrow. I forgot about that. Yes,
2:01:47
Speaker 1: there at the two. So Raw is going to be
2:01:50
Speaker 1: airing at two pm Eastern on Netflix, which means I
2:01:53
Speaker 1: will go live probably immediately after Raw. So figure five
2:01:57
Speaker 1: o'clock Eastern time. Tomorrow we'll do an earlier raw stream.
2:02:00
Speaker 1: I almost forgot about that brand new episode of The
2:02:03
Speaker 1: un Crowned Wrestling Show on Tuesday. You know where to
2:02:06
Speaker 1: find that, the Ariel Helwani show feed or the dedicated
2:02:09
Speaker 1: feed that we have now for the un Crowned Wrestling Show.
2:02:12
Speaker 1: Tuesday night will be a brand new installment of TNT
2:02:15
Speaker 1: with JD Tuesday Night Titans. Wednesday is the Dynamite Post show,
2:02:20
Speaker 1: and then Friday, even though it's a tape show, we
2:02:23
Speaker 1: will go live for what is going to be the
2:02:26
Speaker 1: final three hours SmackDown. Maybe you know they had a
2:02:29
Speaker 1: funeral for the gingerbread Men a few weeks ago, maybe
2:02:32
Speaker 1: we should host a funeral for three hour Smackdowns on Friday.
2:02:36
Speaker 1: So everybody wear your best attire, bust out the black suits,
2:02:41
Speaker 1: and if you have anything you'd like to say, if
2:02:43
Speaker 1: you have a speech that you want to prepare, super
2:02:46
Speaker 1: chats will be open. So I will see you all
2:02:49
Speaker 1: there to pay your respects and then back here next
2:02:52
Speaker 1: Sunday for a brand new sound up. So until then,
2:02:54
Speaker 1: be well, stay safe, haby still have's a great week
2:02:58
Speaker 1: and I will see you back here for more next
2:03:00
Speaker 1: time on the sound off until then, Take care, guys.
2:03:04
Speaker 1: The Soln Monster sounds off. Duffs Vid says, why shouldn't
2:03:07
Speaker 1: you play poker with a plumber? Because it did? Flush?
2:03:10
Speaker 1: Beats a full house every time, and I give you
2:03:14
Speaker 1: a food, said flushed. I had to give you a flush, Ashley,
2:03:18
Speaker 1: kind of what I'm dealing with right now. Actually, I
2:03:19
Speaker 1: have a toilet here that will not stop flushing. It's
2:03:24
Speaker 1: just going and going and going and going and going,
2:03:27
Speaker 1: and it will not stop. And I go, what the
2:03:28
Speaker 1: fuck am I supposed to do? So I turn the
2:03:30
Speaker 1: water off. I know how to do that, and I'm
2:03:33
Speaker 1: waiting for this plumber to return, and I have no
2:03:35
Speaker 1: idea and I try to put the water back on
2:03:37
Speaker 1: and the flushing just continues. That's kind of annoying. Where's T.
2:03:40
Speaker 1: L Hopper when you need it?
2:03:42
Speaker 2: The Solo Monster sounds off bringing you the good, the bad,
2:03:46
Speaker 2: and the ugly. Check out the weekly live streams bonus
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Speaker 2: content for subscribers, and follow The Solo Monster on Facebook, Instagram,
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Speaker 2: and X The Soln Monster.
2:03:56
Speaker 1: I love you so long,