August 8, 2025 • 47 mins
Bryan has all the news and announcements of the big shows this weekend.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey, this is Brian Alvarez and this is today's edition
of the Wrestling Observer Daily podcast on the eight Side Network.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
Live from San Francisco. I'm a sports byline broadcasting network.
You are listening to Wrestling Observer Live with your hosts
Brian Alvarez and Mike sempervv.
Speaker 3 (00:23):
Right, you're ready, When you're ready.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
Let's get it off.
Speaker 1 (00:29):
How's it going, everybody? Bryan Alvarez here on Wrestling Observer Live.
We are here every day Monday through Friday, New Pacific
three Eastern Sundays, three Pacific six Eastern Saturday Mornings with
Jim Valley, Today Pacific one Eastern Sundays with andrews Arian
and Sursday here on the show. And you know that
means we got a lot to talk about today and
(00:49):
I'm going solo, so we're going to give you some
information later on how you can message the show, because
I mean, I can't imagine talking NonStop for an hour.
I guess I've done it before. But anyway, we'll get
into everything today because there's a lot of news. Tomorrow,
of course, is SmackDown. We got Collision this weekend. Got
(01:10):
a bunch of big shows coming up, including the teena
Emergence Show, Triple Mania, NXT, heat Wave and Forbidden Door.
You'll be stunned to hear heat Wave and Forbidden Door
going head to head. We got updates on Roman Reigns
and Carrion Cross and Buddy Matthews and more on this
ESPN deal, which if you listen to this podcast of
(01:31):
Observer Live yesterday, well you didn't hear any of that
because I just screwed everything up. It was one of
those days. But you know what, we barreled through and
we turned it around. If you didn't hear yesterday's After
Dark Radio, it was a great show. We talked about
dragons and dinosaurs, and an excellent guest will be returning
(01:54):
to the show. He wrote a great book, but we'll
get into that later as well. For the rest of
the news here, we got actually some things we didn't
get a chance to talk about the other day, and
of course the Dynamite Show MVP and talk more about
that and plenty more. If you'd like to text us
here today join the show. Why don't you join the show?
(02:14):
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Speaker 2 (06:00):
You were listening to Wrestling Observer Live with Brian Alvarez
and Mike simper Vivi on the Sports Byline Broadcasting Network.
Speaker 1 (06:09):
Of the show, Bryan Alvarez here Wrestling Observer Live. Brandon
here says, hope you are doing better today, Sir, I
appreciate that, Brandon. I am doing much better than than
I was yesterday when the show began, although we turned
it around to the end, I mean, for crying out loud.
The show ended with a dynamite lineup, can you imagine?
(06:31):
And then we already have three matches announced for Collision,
And we already have three matches announced or three segments
announced for next week's Dynamite z all a big improvement
Collision on Saturday as Hangman, Kevin Knight and Mike Bailey
(06:53):
against Rush Drollistico and the Beast Mortos, Kyle Fletcher against
a Shee for the TNT title, and Willow Nightingale, Queen
Amenada and ty Mello versus Tecla, Julie Hart and Skyblue.
So I guess we gotta talk about al MVP a
little more. You know, we mentioned this yesterday. There was
that story out and I don't know where to begin,
(07:18):
but I guess I'll just begin with the story. The
story was essentially that there were people that didn't like MVP,
and there were people MVP didn't like and YouTube feed
is down. What's going on? Do we have a YouTube feed?
Let me find out, everybody? Not that the YouTube the
(07:39):
feed is like a necessarily the best thing when it's
free sun cast. Do we have YouTube or no? We'll
see what he says anyway. You may just we're gonna
have another day like yesterday or what. So here's the deal, MVP. Well,
(08:04):
I don't even know where to start on this thing.
So everyone that Chad is is kind of talking about
how you know Fightful is wrong and this and that,
and I guess yesterday at uh yesterday on uh at
some point ever saying YouTube is up? What are you
guys doing to me here? Trying to screw this whole
thing up for me?
Speaker 3 (08:23):
Today?
Speaker 1 (08:24):
Apparently YouTube is working. I don't know what some people's
problem is here, but multiple reports that YouTube is working
just fine. So I don't know what to tell you.
All Right, here's what I'm gonna do. Let's just let's
just make this easy for everybody. Some of you might
have missed the show yesterday. I'll just go and read
the original story and then go from there. All right,
(08:49):
report aw roster member has rubbed a lot of people
the wrong way. It's being reported MVP has quote rubbed
a lot of people the wrong way backstage in a
w According to Fightful, this sentiment is been expressed by
a number of talents on the roster. The Hurt Syndicate
member has made it known he does not like Speedball
Mike Bailey and did not want Lashly and Shelton losing
(09:10):
to Bailey and Kevin Knight. It's not clear why MVP
dislikes Bailey or hurts indicate was ever actually planned to lose.
Report also states MVP turned down pitches for the Hurt
Syndicate to loose to FDR at all In and Forbidden Door.
MVP reportedly suggested they would rather lose to the Gates
of Agony Outrunners a private party three teams they've already
(09:31):
defeated this year. Said to be frustration within the aw
locker room. The faction beats everyone up high five as
of fans, does cool moves and they're supposed to be heels,
and most people have also expressed the environment the company's
best have been in years, and there's there's plenty more here.
So yesterday at the show, MVP and Speedball they did
(09:55):
kind of a little video together. MVP posted a video
was Instagram showing he, Bobby Lashley and Shelton Benjamin walking
backstage when they came upon Bailey, who was filming for
his vlog. MVP then said f you Speedball. Bailey said,
well fu two MVP. MVP then told Lashly and Benjamin
(10:16):
to tell him, but they stared at the floor and
said the same thing. A smiling Bailey says, well, f
you guys too, before he waved and MVP did the same. So, uh,
that was. That was on social media yesterday. So you know,
on the chat here everyone's oh, you know Sean Ross
(10:39):
Sap and fight ful blah blah blah, wrong this and that. Here.
Here's the thing, everybody, Okay, the story that came out
was when I read it, it was it was it
was the details were weird, Okay, Like I talked about yesterday, Listen,
there's there's all sorts of that have had issues in
(11:01):
aw and we've heard about them. And it's always a
situation where okay, whether you agree with one guy or
whether you agree with the other guy, or one woman
and another woman. At the end of the day, each
side has their side of the story about why they're upset. Okay.
A perfect example would be jungle Boy and cmpunk. Okay,
(11:25):
Jungle Boy was upset about a decision that cmpunk made.
He made a comment on television cmpunk didn't like the
comment that he made on television. They end up having
a what have you? Okay, so we know the thing happened.
We know why one side doesn't like the other. We
know why the other side doesn't like the other. Okay,
(11:46):
so at least we know everything. You can make your
decision about whose side you're on. Whatever. Okay, this one
was weird because it just came out of nowhere. It's
a very specific story. MVP doesn't like Mike Bailey. There's
no excep when they as to why he Everything about
it was weird. Okay. Now, before everybody gets on Fightful
(12:06):
and before everybody gets on on Sean and whoever else, listen,
don't think that there aren't people who is who MVP
has rubbed the wrong way. Okay, he has all right, Now,
MVP is a guy who's gonna speak his mind. He's
(12:28):
gonna say what's on his mind. I mean you can
even see it on television sometimes during this interview segments.
I mean, he's gonna say what's on his mind. He'll
do it on commentary, He'll he'll do it on on whatever. Okay, Yes,
he does rub people the wrong way sometimes, Okay, but
I mean, it's not like he's the only one that's
(12:48):
That's one of the other reasons the story is so bizarre.
It's like, you know, how many people rub people the
wrong way in every company. There's a lot of them.
But anyway, sure, sometimes it happens. I mean, the whole
situation with Speedball, Mike Bailey and Kevin Knight and the
Hurt Syndicate, Okay, Jet speed they were gonna get a
(13:10):
shot at the tag team titles, and if you watch
the TV, the build was they got beaten and beaten
and beaten and smashed and humiliated and made it look
like idiots. We talked about it. It's like, what is
this booking? Okay, don't think nobody else thought the exact
same thing. What is this Okay, We've talked about it before.
(13:33):
How are these guys heels? Like they go out there
and the people chant for them, and they cheer for
them to the point where people would argue with me
that they're actually babyfaces. Okay, they're not. They're supposed to
be heels. Don't think that That isn't something that people
talk about, Like why why do they destroy everybody and
(13:53):
beat everybody down and act cool and like the fans
cheer them and they bow the baby face. Don't act
like that's never happened. Okay, it has, all right, But
I don't. I don't think there's this serious issue between
MVP and Mike Bailey. Maybe maybe there's something there, but clearly,
(14:16):
I mean, everything's everything's good enough that they that they
did a segment backstage. Okay. My point is the fact
that they did that segment for social media doesn't mean
that the entire rest of the story is made up
whole cloth. Okay, it's not. Where there's smoke, there's fire.
There is some heat on MVP. There are some people
(14:37):
that don't like MVP. There's some people that don't like
how the hurt business is booked. I mean none, none
of this is new, is the other thing. It's like,
why did this all of a sudden come out this week?
Like we've been talking about it forever. So, I mean,
I I did you know the report here noted that?
What did it say here? Like basically he was talking
(15:02):
about like things things are better backstage than they've been
in a long time. That's true. I've heard the exact
same thing. Morale is better now backstage than it's been
in a long time. Okay. That doesn't mean that everybody
gets along, it doesn't mean that everything is perfect, okay,
but it does mean that morale is in general the
best it's been in a long time. And if you
(15:24):
watch the show compared to like a year ago, at
this time, it's like there has been a long, you know,
six seven month streak of a lot of improvements in
a lot of ways in aaw and a lot of
the wrestlers there, you know, they're they're feeling a lot
more bullish about things than they were a year ago.
So I don't know, the story was just weird, That's
(15:45):
what I can tell you. I asked around yesterday. You know,
there's a little bit to it, a little bit to
it that's maybe not what was written, but in general,
like a lot of that is is the way things are.
Back in the moment they were live.
Speaker 2 (16:08):
You were listening to Wrestling Observer Live with Brian Alvarez
and Mike semperviv on the Sports Byline Broadcasting Network.
Speaker 1 (16:17):
Back here on the show, Ryan Alvarez, You're Wrestling Observer Live.
To everyone in the chat, it was not a story
planted by WWE. I mean It's been something that people
have talked about for a long time in AW but
like it was never a big deal. It was just
a thing. It was a thing that people started talking about,
(16:38):
and it was weird because all of a sudden, like
if this would have come out right after like the
Hurt syndicates stomped down Jet Speed for about the third
straight time, if the next day the story had come
out had been like, okay, that makes sense. But the
weird thing was it just came out of nowhere on
a random day. And I mean it was just like,
(17:02):
it's not that big a deal, and I don't know why.
It was just like such a thing all of a sudden.
But no, it did not come from WWE. People in
AW been talking about it for a long time now
speaking of WWE, since we didn't even well some of
you heard about it. But here's a gist of the
(17:22):
ESPN deal and also some other notes. So it's a
one point six billion dollar a year over five years,
three hundred and twenty five million dollars a year. The
major ple is at this point ten ples, including the
two nights of WrestleMania and the two nights of SummerSlam
are all going to be on this new ESPN streaming service.
(17:45):
It's not ESPN Plus or whatever. It's a new service.
It is going to launch on August twenty first. It'll
be thirty dollars a month. Okay. Now, if you have
ESPN on your cable package at this point, maybe about
forty percent of you that have ESPN, depending on your provider,
(18:07):
you won't have to pay anything. This will be part
of your package. Okay. Now, the thing hasn't even launched
yet and they're still doing negotiations. So whatever is the
Whatever is the deal today, don't worry about it. Worry
about it as we get closer to WrestleMania if you
still don't have access to it, because for example, I
(18:28):
have YouTube TV, and right now, if I have YouTube TV,
even though it's got the ESPN packages, I will still
have to pay thirty dollars a month for this service today.
They could make a deal tomorrow. They can make a
deal next week. By the time WrestleMania rolls around, which
is when this thing is going to launch. Probably most
(18:53):
if you have the ESPN package, most of the cable services,
you will get this as part of your package. Right now,
It's not that way but I wouldn't panic about it yet.
So a couple of a couple of other notes. First off,
we don't know anything about the video library yet, we
don't know anything about NXT. They're obviously still shopping things around.
(19:18):
It's possible the library may end up on Peacock. Possible
nxt pls may also stream on Peacock. They may go
to Netflix. I mean, there's a lot of different options available.
They're going to go wherever the money is the highest,
which is should not come as a surprise to anybody.
Apparently in the negotiations, Peacock did make an offer, and
(19:43):
I guess the offer was allegedly in the neighborhood of
about two hundred and seventy five million a year, and
WWE wanted more, obviously, and they ended up getting the
three hundred twenty five million, and that's why they went
to ESPN over Peacock. Obviously, of Peacock at our for
four hundred million a year, they'd have stayed, but they didn't.
(20:04):
And and apparently they also we were potentially shopping around
WrestleMania as a separate deal, So for example, you know,
they might have been willing to stay with Peacock but
we're going to give ESPN WrestleMania for X amount per year.
That was something that was discussed, but they ended up
(20:24):
they ended up going all in with with ESPN. So
that's the gist of it, and where everything falls out
we shall learn as the months go on. I think
one of the biggest stories is that, you know, this
(20:47):
was a this is a one point six billion dollar deal,
one point six billion dollars. And yesterday when it came
out that they had moved from a one billion dollar
deal to a one point six billion dollar deal, apparently
the stock dropped because that wasn't a good enough increase
(21:10):
for investors one billion to one point six billion, And
so later in the day they actually said that the
Peacock deal, which had been i mean reported everywhere and
like in Financial Dog everything that they had claimed that
(21:32):
it was a billion dollar deal, and because investors were
not happy, they actually stated yesterday that it really wasn't
a billion dollars. It was only nine hundred million. Like,
I mean, this is supposed to be a publicly traded company,
the SEC is supposed to be involved in all of this.
(21:55):
How do you all of a sudden, years after the fact,
announced that we claimed a billion, but it was actually
only nine hundred million. How do you get away with this?
I mean, I guess just nobody cares. But anyway, it
turns out their Peacock deal was not as good as
(22:17):
they had claimed for years, which seems incredibly sketchy, but whatever,
that's what they said. So there you go. One other
note which kind of ties into this. So the last
match of John Cena at this point, the last John
(22:41):
Cena match is going to take place at a Saturday
Night's main event. Okay, so there had been a lot
of discussions about his final match being on a December
pl so at this point there isn't going to be
a December pl and granted, everything can change, but I
(23:04):
guess the the way that it works is they had
agreed to a certain number of ples with Peacock, and
because of the Evolution pay per view and also the
second night of SummerSlam, they pretty much they don't need
a December pl e. They've they've they've hit their quotas,
(23:28):
so to speak, and so as a result, it appears
that his final match will be on Saturday Night's main event,
which I mean probably will do significantly more viewers than
a pl would have done, and especially if you advertise
it on NBC as John Cena's final match. And so
(23:48):
that looks to be that looks to be the case.
And and there's another note, but I actually won't talk
about it because I don't know if it's actually the case,
but it ties into the three hours of SmackDown. So
they did do their earnings report, and they did mention
(24:12):
that their television revenue would be lower for the next
quarter because SmackDown was down to two hours. And that
means that, in fact, they were making more money for
SmackDown when it was three hours for the first half
of the year. It was a little more than half
of the year, and there was still no explanation as
(24:34):
to why. And a lot of people, you know, they
they've asked a question like, well, if we still don't
know why, and if they did make more money for it,
is it possible this will be like an annual thing,
so like, you know, the first half of the year
will be three hours and it will drop to two hours.
I don't think that's what's going to happen. And I
(24:55):
guess I will say I'm not reporting this is it
is one hundred percent speculation. But the speculation is that,
like with the ples, it might have been that there
were a certain number of episodes of SmackDown that WWE
was contracted to do and in order to meet that number,
(25:18):
they had to have had at an hour to the
show for seven months or whatever, and that's how they're
going to end up hitting the quota. So it could
be that, could be something else, but I don't think
that we're going to be doing like a fifty to fifty.
You know, half the year is going to be three hours,
half the year is going to be two hours. I
think it was kind of a one time deal and
thank god now it's over and we can move on.
(25:42):
So that's the update on that, the the ESPN deal
and everything else. Roman Reigns also has been confirmed for
more RAW appearances. He's going to be on the August
eighteenth Raw, August twenty fifth Raw. He will be most
(26:02):
likely on the Clash in Paris show on August thirty first,
So that's not one hundred percent, but Wrestle Votes believes
he's going to be there. So anyway, what that means
is is was not an injury angle. Apparently, you know
he's filming what is it Street Fighter, Mortal Kombat? What
(26:23):
is it? Anyway, he's filming a movie. It's the movie
that he's going to be part of. And Cody and
oh god, who was it from New Japan. It's just bizarre.
But anyway, the point is I don't believe that begins
filming until September, so there's really no reason to do
an injury angle in the middle of August to take
(26:45):
him off TV for August before he uh yeah, fifty
Cents in it. But there's who's the New Japan guy
in it? What like a completely random New Japan wrestler
is go to That's right, a rookie goat toes in
this movie with John Cena and Roman Reigns and fifty Cent,
I mean, and many others. It's gonna be. It's gonna be.
(27:09):
I think it's gonna be something to see. Anyway, somehow,
I have talked NonStop for forty minutes, So when we
come back from the break, I'll just jump right into
the Dynamite Report and Cody. That's right, Cody Roads as well.
All right back in the moment Observer Live.
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Speaker 2 (30:49):
You are listening to Wrestling Observer Live with Brian Alvarez
and Mike Sempervivi on the Sports Byline Broadcasting Network.
Speaker 1 (30:59):
I get the show Brain now Here Wrestling Observer Live.
Before I get to this Dynamite report, we got a
text message here versus. I have a question. May come
off as AW hate, but it's a legit question. I
was watching Dynamite on HBO Max last night and those
multiple times the audio glitched out. I know it's nothing
new for AW. When I look back at it, noticed
(31:19):
something the times the glitch has happened, and we're during
the callous Kyle promo, during the Bucks match, a couple
of times after as well. I knows during the Kyle
promo the crowd is booing him a lot, then the
glitch happens and you hear weird crowd chants. Okay, so listen,
this is the exact same thing that happens on WWE.
It's an attempt to remove profanity when the crowd is
(31:42):
chanting bad things. So don Kallus came out and there
were very very loud f don Kallus chants, which coincidentally,
by the way, I was watching on H on Max
and they didn't bleep them, and I was actually very surprised.
Normally they do, and I also normally Max so and
during the Bucks match, I mean, anytime there's crazy spots,
(32:05):
you'll hear profane chance, and I mean you have options,
like you can either try and cover it up with
different audio, which is what AW does, or like NXT,
they just mute the audio completely. So sometimes it's like,
you know, twenty seconds of complete dead air because they're
getting rid of these chants. On RAW, I think on
(32:26):
Raw they mute it, So it's just a different way
of doing it. Sometimes the decision is to mute it,
and sometimes the decision is to put a different audio
track over it. But it's not a production issue. It's
trying to cover up for the fans saying very bad
things during the show. All right, let's talk about Dynamite.
(32:51):
It's the lead to Forbidden Door, and it opened up
with got both my MJF doing a promo and he's
very upset hang Man for not giving him a title shot,
and he vowed to take it out on Mark Brisco
Tonight said Mark's luck is about to run out. So
(33:14):
then what an irony? The opening match is is John
Moxley versus Mike Bailey, MVP's most hated wrestler, Mike Bailey.
Clearly Moxley does not hate Mike Bailey because he gave
this guy a ton in this match, and it's kind
of where of those matches where he just beats this
(33:35):
guy unmercifully for the first half of the match, gets
a lot of heat, and then he starts giving this
guy a comeback, and like every time, the crowd just
they're going nuts by the end and they're trading these cradles,
and Wheeler tries to interfere, and Darby comes out and
kidnaps Wheeler, and then Moxley's distracted and speedball rolls him
(33:56):
out and this is like the closest to count you've
ever seen. And the crowd thought it was a three
and they're going wild, but it's a two. And finally
mox Le hits him with a death writer and pins him.
Smatcho's great. So afterwards, Moxley and Marina are heading outside.
They see Wheeler on the ground in a body bag.
Darby tries to run him over, but they save Wheeler's life.
(34:19):
They unzip the bag. Forbidden Door is staple to Wheeler's head,
so it looks like John Moxley and Darby's at Forbidden Door.
Mercedes showed up with the eight belts. Guys, aware that
(34:40):
we're all entitled to our opinion. Some of you aren't,
but it's true we all are. And in my opinion,
this eight belts thing is stupid. Okay, when when she
had like three belts and then she you won like
(35:00):
a fourth belt, it was like up until about four belts,
like it was it was pretty cool. You know, she's
a belt collector. She's winning all these and they're like
major belts from major promotions, and then like she shows
up on TV and she's got eight belts and they're
just draped all around her, and like, once you hit eight,
(35:23):
you know, I realize, you know, for a brief period
of time, Ultimo Dragon had that octople crown. But like
I was just watching on this show and it's like,
once you get to eight, now now it's it's it's
just it's goofy walking around with these belts and she's
trying to have you know, anyway, Alex Windsor Queen Aminadas, Skyblue,
(35:44):
Billy Starks four way qualifier for Forbidden Door, it's gonna
be a it's a four way qualifier for a four
way match, and Yetti Pop Pie. She's a heel is
not a defense for everything stupid, Okay, I know some
people that really like certain things. It's like that that's
your defense. She's a heel, okay, But there's a problem
(36:07):
like are you a heel that people are supposed to
take seriously or are you a heel that people aren't
supposed to take seriously? Because it is possible to be
a heel, and also you get too silly, and now
it's hard to take you seriously as a heel. We've
seen this with many heels over the years, and this
is not like good heel heed at this point. Now
(36:29):
it's silly, and I don't think the Mercedes character is
a heel is supposed to be silly. It's supposed to
be like a serious thing, and it's coming off not
serious here because it's now silly. So I know some
people like to defend everything, aw does It's okay that
some things are silly and like it could be better,
and this is one of them. It's ridiculous. Now where
(36:53):
were we? It's a four way for a four way
and Alex Windsor won, so we got two other women
that will be in the way at Forbidden Door for
Mercedes title. And then afterwards he did a big chebang
where Mercedes is out there and Alex Windsor's out there,
Tony's out there, Athena lays out Tony, and then Athena
(37:15):
and Mercedes have a stare down even though they're not
wrestling each other at the show, and we were told
they're on the same page, so maybe we'll get a tag.
Young Bucks gave a production guy a paper and said
that Justin Roberts needed to read this word for word.
We had the aforementioned Don kellis Kyle Fletcher promo. These
(37:39):
fans hated Don Kallas, just screaming at this guy at
the top of their lungs, and Kyle braggs about about
taking out dustin taking out coal. It's gonna be the
greatest T and T champion of all time. Don says,
I've got you a gift. It is another oil painting.
It is frickin' preposter. It's getting so much heat. And
(38:03):
this segment was great. So then we had another one
of those segments. I love these segments. Remember when Christian
came out last week and did that promo and I
said that promo sucked, His delivery sucked, and the whole
point of the promo sucked. Like eventually we're supposed to
(38:24):
want to like this guy and see him team with Copeland,
but like, this guy came out and he had no remorse,
he had no nothing, And what happened. Oh, it's great,
it's great, Brian, You're an idiot. Everything is great. In
aw It's a great promo, make great sense, it was perfect. Well,
here comes Copeland. They go, what do you think of
this promo? And he says literally the exact same thing
(38:47):
that I said. Kind of a promo was that Copeland
says he had no remorse, there was no apology, the
guys learned nothing, and he's still in a hole. I
was like, correct, that is absolutely correct. So Copeland and
I we both missed the brilliance of this promo to
(39:07):
eventually turn him babyface. So next week he's gonna be
facing Stokely. He has been allowed to match with Stokely.
FTR cannot come within fifty feet or two hundred feet
or whatever, and if they do, the restraining order is
null and void. This actually is great, and I'll talk
(39:30):
about why on the Brya Vitie Show tonight, and I
don't got time today. Young Bucks against Brodido. So the
Young Bucks had given a note to Justin Roberts. They
told the production guy, you tell him to read this verbatim,
and so of course the uh the letter Justin starts
to read. I didn't write it exactly down, but it
(39:51):
was to the effect of, hey, Justin, you idiot, when
we come out tonight, you better introduce us the right way.
We're not jobbers. And Justin just reads it exactly as
it's written. So of course the fans are going wild.
They're chanting jobbers at these guys. They're they're they're literally
announced as Max and Jeremy, which was the name they
(40:13):
used in about two thousand and eight and TNA when
they were shoot jobbers, And the fans are eating this up,
and uh, I mean, the good news is they can
still work. This match was awesome, Brodido Young Bucks. This
is awesome chance. They did the deal again where they're
(40:33):
going for the the uh EVP trigger but they're not EVPs.
So now they're in a big what should we call
it in the middle of the ring, which of course
is a distraction to allow the baby Faces to make
a comeback. They did some awesome spots during the comeback.
The baby Faces and h and finally Nick and Bandid
(40:54):
are on the guardrail. Bandido press slams them off the
barricade on the Matt. Bandido hits the X kne on
Matt twenty one plex. Nick breaks it up, they get
sent He gets sent outside. Bandido hits a top rope
Sos Moon Salt, and then they hit their monkey flip finish.
It's a monkey flip. That's their finish for the pin.
(41:14):
So it's FTR versus Brodido. The winners get Hurt Syndicate
at Forbidden Door. This smatch was awesome. Hurts Syndicate promo.
MVP walks in or MGF walks in. God if this
happens again. MVP says, you don't get it, dude, all
(41:37):
you think about is yourself. The Hurts Syndicate we we
are supposed to hurt people, not me, me, me. You
get the thumbs down and he warns him because Max
says it's not personal, it's just business. MVP says, no, no,
I hope you don't win that title because if you do,
(41:57):
Lashley's coming to get you, and it won't be business,
it'll be personal. This was a great segment. Stokely did
a promo but having a face Copeland, he's all worried.
This was a great segment as well. There were a
lot of great interview segments on this show. We had
Swerve come out for a promo, also a great promo.
(42:18):
He's gonna win the title from Okada and he's gonna
I guess every time he's been in London he's lost,
so He's going to redeem himself and win the Unified
title and make Don Callus cry in the corner. Queenaminada.
Oh god, I'm not gonna even review this thing. I
(42:40):
almost wanna what's happening with stat Lander and Willow? Are
they trying to beat the record of Waller and Theory?
Speaker 4 (42:54):
This is not a record.
Speaker 1 (42:55):
It needs to be broken. They broke up in May
of twenty twenty four. It is August of twenty twenty five.
It has been fifteen months, and I'm not sure we're
any closer to a resolution. MGF and Mark brisco This
(43:16):
was a good match, but because of that, I was disappointed.
It's MGF and Mark Briscoe. I expected this to be
so much better, and I think the big thing and
I know this this is from me, I don't know
by the rest of you, but my most hated spot
in wrestling is when a guy goes to the top
(43:37):
and the heel does the slow log roll out of
the way. There is no spot I hate more than
that in wrestling. I hate it. It just the action
just slows to a complete halt every time. It doesn't
even make any sense, like if it's fake and you're
trying to make the people mad. It makes sense, but
(43:58):
if it's real, it's like, okay, if you're in good
enough shape to like roll out of the way the move,
why don't you wait till the guy jumps so he
crashes in burds? Why don't you get your knee up
like it? It's such an infuriating spot to me. It
just kills the momentum of a match. They did it
five times and like Mark went for the froggy elbow,
(44:22):
and Max rolled out of the way five times. By
the fifth time, nobody cared and like he finally hit
it on the sixth time and it got like a monica,
I mean, and then I cheered and everything because they
like hit it. It was like, man, the rule of threes. Guys,
you broke it by two and then you did it
(44:45):
two more times after that, but you actually hit it.
So anyway, we'll get into the finished after the break
Observer Live.
Speaker 2 (44:51):
You were listening to wrestling Observer Live with Brian Alvarez
and Mike semperviv on the Sports Byline Broadcasting network.
Speaker 1 (45:01):
So the end of the match puts them through the
table or actually Mark goes Mark goes for the froggy
bow outside, crashed through the table, He's dead. Max gets
in the ring. Mark almost doesn't get it back, but
he gets back in. He's immediately hit with the heat seeker.
Max covers. Mark puts his foot on the ropes. Ref
(45:24):
doesn't see it. Max takes the wind pulls the foot
off the ropes. So Mark still has not gotten revenge
for MGF saying all of those horrible things about his
deceased brother. And not only does he lose, not only
does he not get his revenge on MGFMGF beats him
after death with the ring. Afterwards, hang man has to
(45:47):
come down to make the save. So, uh, I don't know,
I don't know. We'll see where this goes. Clearly mg
have a hangman are having a match, probably a Forbidden Door.
I mean, they could probably do something the second to
do Mark Brisco at Forbidden Door and Max it all out,
but at this point they beat this guy so bad.
(46:08):
I don't know, I don't know, but anyway, I'd say
overall it was a very good show. I mean, you
had two very very good matches the uh, the John
Moxley match and the Young Bucks match, so very very
good wrestling on the show and a lot of good
video packages and interviews. That's all I ask for, and
promotion of of future events. So that's good. Well, tonight
(46:33):
on the Brighton Video Show, we'll have more time ninety
minutes commercial free to talk AWNXT and I got a
lot to say that I didn't get to say here
about Dynamite and NXT. I didn't even do an NXT
report yet, so it's gonna be a lot of fun.
Check it out Wrestlingobserver dot com for w online dot com,
Slash Apple for w online dot com, Slash Spotify for
(46:54):
w online dot com, slash YouTube or fw on line
dot com and we'll see you next time for more
Wrestling Observer Live. You have been listening to the Wrestling
Observer Daily podcast on the eight Side Network.
Hey, this is Brian Alvarez and this is today's edition
of the Wrestling Observer Daily podcast on the eight Side Network.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
Live from San Francisco. I'm a sports byline broadcasting network.
You are listening to Wrestling Observer Live with your hosts
Brian Alvarez and Mike sempervv.
Speaker 3 (00:23):
Right, you're ready, When you're ready.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
Let's get it off.
Speaker 1 (00:29):
How's it going, everybody? Bryan Alvarez here on Wrestling Observer Live.
We are here every day Monday through Friday, New Pacific
three Eastern Sundays, three Pacific six Eastern Saturday Mornings with
Jim Valley, Today Pacific one Eastern Sundays with andrews Arian
and Sursday here on the show. And you know that
means we got a lot to talk about today and
(00:49):
I'm going solo, so we're going to give you some
information later on how you can message the show, because
I mean, I can't imagine talking NonStop for an hour.
I guess I've done it before. But anyway, we'll get
into everything today because there's a lot of news. Tomorrow,
of course, is SmackDown. We got Collision this weekend. Got
(01:10):
a bunch of big shows coming up, including the teena
Emergence Show, Triple Mania, NXT, heat Wave and Forbidden Door.
You'll be stunned to hear heat Wave and Forbidden Door
going head to head. We got updates on Roman Reigns
and Carrion Cross and Buddy Matthews and more on this
ESPN deal, which if you listen to this podcast of
(01:31):
Observer Live yesterday, well you didn't hear any of that
because I just screwed everything up. It was one of
those days. But you know what, we barreled through and
we turned it around. If you didn't hear yesterday's After
Dark Radio, it was a great show. We talked about
dragons and dinosaurs, and an excellent guest will be returning
(01:54):
to the show. He wrote a great book, but we'll
get into that later as well. For the rest of
the news here, we got actually some things we didn't
get a chance to talk about the other day, and
of course the Dynamite Show MVP and talk more about
that and plenty more. If you'd like to text us
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(02:14):
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Speaker 2 (06:00):
You were listening to Wrestling Observer Live with Brian Alvarez
and Mike simper Vivi on the Sports Byline Broadcasting Network.
Speaker 1 (06:09):
Of the show, Bryan Alvarez here Wrestling Observer Live. Brandon
here says, hope you are doing better today, Sir, I
appreciate that, Brandon. I am doing much better than than
I was yesterday when the show began, although we turned
it around to the end, I mean, for crying out loud.
The show ended with a dynamite lineup, can you imagine?
(06:31):
And then we already have three matches announced for Collision,
And we already have three matches announced or three segments
announced for next week's Dynamite z all a big improvement
Collision on Saturday as Hangman, Kevin Knight and Mike Bailey
(06:53):
against Rush Drollistico and the Beast Mortos, Kyle Fletcher against
a Shee for the TNT title, and Willow Nightingale, Queen
Amenada and ty Mello versus Tecla, Julie Hart and Skyblue.
So I guess we gotta talk about al MVP a
little more. You know, we mentioned this yesterday. There was
that story out and I don't know where to begin,
(07:18):
but I guess I'll just begin with the story. The
story was essentially that there were people that didn't like MVP,
and there were people MVP didn't like and YouTube feed
is down. What's going on? Do we have a YouTube feed?
Let me find out, everybody? Not that the YouTube the
(07:39):
feed is like a necessarily the best thing when it's
free sun cast. Do we have YouTube or no? We'll
see what he says anyway. You may just we're gonna
have another day like yesterday or what. So here's the deal, MVP. Well,
(08:04):
I don't even know where to start on this thing.
So everyone that Chad is is kind of talking about
how you know Fightful is wrong and this and that,
and I guess yesterday at uh yesterday on uh at
some point ever saying YouTube is up? What are you
guys doing to me here? Trying to screw this whole
thing up for me?
Speaker 3 (08:23):
Today?
Speaker 1 (08:24):
Apparently YouTube is working. I don't know what some people's
problem is here, but multiple reports that YouTube is working
just fine. So I don't know what to tell you.
All Right, here's what I'm gonna do. Let's just let's
just make this easy for everybody. Some of you might
have missed the show yesterday. I'll just go and read
the original story and then go from there. All right,
(08:49):
report aw roster member has rubbed a lot of people
the wrong way. It's being reported MVP has quote rubbed
a lot of people the wrong way backstage in a
w According to Fightful, this sentiment is been expressed by
a number of talents on the roster. The Hurt Syndicate
member has made it known he does not like Speedball
Mike Bailey and did not want Lashly and Shelton losing
(09:10):
to Bailey and Kevin Knight. It's not clear why MVP
dislikes Bailey or hurts indicate was ever actually planned to lose.
Report also states MVP turned down pitches for the Hurt
Syndicate to loose to FDR at all In and Forbidden Door.
MVP reportedly suggested they would rather lose to the Gates
of Agony Outrunners a private party three teams they've already
(09:31):
defeated this year. Said to be frustration within the aw
locker room. The faction beats everyone up high five as
of fans, does cool moves and they're supposed to be heels,
and most people have also expressed the environment the company's
best have been in years, and there's there's plenty more here.
So yesterday at the show, MVP and Speedball they did
(09:55):
kind of a little video together. MVP posted a video
was Instagram showing he, Bobby Lashley and Shelton Benjamin walking
backstage when they came upon Bailey, who was filming for
his vlog. MVP then said f you Speedball. Bailey said,
well fu two MVP. MVP then told Lashly and Benjamin
(10:16):
to tell him, but they stared at the floor and
said the same thing. A smiling Bailey says, well, f
you guys too, before he waved and MVP did the same. So, uh,
that was. That was on social media yesterday. So you know,
on the chat here everyone's oh, you know Sean Ross
(10:39):
Sap and fight ful blah blah blah, wrong this and that. Here.
Here's the thing, everybody, Okay, the story that came out
was when I read it, it was it was it
was the details were weird, Okay, Like I talked about yesterday, Listen,
there's there's all sorts of that have had issues in
(11:01):
aw and we've heard about them. And it's always a
situation where okay, whether you agree with one guy or
whether you agree with the other guy, or one woman
and another woman. At the end of the day, each
side has their side of the story about why they're upset. Okay.
A perfect example would be jungle Boy and cmpunk. Okay,
(11:25):
Jungle Boy was upset about a decision that cmpunk made.
He made a comment on television cmpunk didn't like the
comment that he made on television. They end up having
a what have you? Okay, so we know the thing happened.
We know why one side doesn't like the other. We
know why the other side doesn't like the other. Okay,
(11:46):
so at least we know everything. You can make your
decision about whose side you're on. Whatever. Okay, this one
was weird because it just came out of nowhere. It's
a very specific story. MVP doesn't like Mike Bailey. There's
no excep when they as to why he Everything about
it was weird. Okay. Now, before everybody gets on Fightful
(12:06):
and before everybody gets on on Sean and whoever else, listen,
don't think that there aren't people who is who MVP
has rubbed the wrong way. Okay, he has all right, Now,
MVP is a guy who's gonna speak his mind. He's
(12:28):
gonna say what's on his mind. I mean you can
even see it on television sometimes during this interview segments.
I mean, he's gonna say what's on his mind. He'll
do it on commentary, He'll he'll do it on on whatever. Okay, Yes,
he does rub people the wrong way sometimes, Okay, but
I mean, it's not like he's the only one that's
(12:48):
That's one of the other reasons the story is so bizarre.
It's like, you know, how many people rub people the
wrong way in every company. There's a lot of them.
But anyway, sure, sometimes it happens. I mean, the whole
situation with Speedball, Mike Bailey and Kevin Knight and the
Hurt Syndicate, Okay, Jet speed they were gonna get a
(13:10):
shot at the tag team titles, and if you watch
the TV, the build was they got beaten and beaten
and beaten and smashed and humiliated and made it look
like idiots. We talked about it. It's like, what is
this booking? Okay, don't think nobody else thought the exact
same thing. What is this Okay, We've talked about it before.
(13:33):
How are these guys heels? Like they go out there
and the people chant for them, and they cheer for
them to the point where people would argue with me
that they're actually babyfaces. Okay, they're not. They're supposed to
be heels. Don't think that That isn't something that people
talk about, Like why why do they destroy everybody and
(13:53):
beat everybody down and act cool and like the fans
cheer them and they bow the baby face. Don't act
like that's never happened. Okay, it has, all right, But
I don't. I don't think there's this serious issue between
MVP and Mike Bailey. Maybe maybe there's something there, but clearly,
(14:16):
I mean, everything's everything's good enough that they that they
did a segment backstage. Okay. My point is the fact
that they did that segment for social media doesn't mean
that the entire rest of the story is made up
whole cloth. Okay, it's not. Where there's smoke, there's fire.
There is some heat on MVP. There are some people
(14:37):
that don't like MVP. There's some people that don't like
how the hurt business is booked. I mean none, none
of this is new, is the other thing. It's like,
why did this all of a sudden come out this week?
Like we've been talking about it forever. So, I mean,
I I did you know the report here noted that?
What did it say here? Like basically he was talking
(15:02):
about like things things are better backstage than they've been
in a long time. That's true. I've heard the exact
same thing. Morale is better now backstage than it's been
in a long time. Okay. That doesn't mean that everybody
gets along, it doesn't mean that everything is perfect, okay,
but it does mean that morale is in general the
best it's been in a long time. And if you
(15:24):
watch the show compared to like a year ago, at
this time, it's like there has been a long, you know,
six seven month streak of a lot of improvements in
a lot of ways in aaw and a lot of
the wrestlers there, you know, they're they're feeling a lot
more bullish about things than they were a year ago.
So I don't know, the story was just weird, That's
(15:45):
what I can tell you. I asked around yesterday. You know,
there's a little bit to it, a little bit to
it that's maybe not what was written, but in general,
like a lot of that is is the way things are.
Back in the moment they were live.
Speaker 2 (16:08):
You were listening to Wrestling Observer Live with Brian Alvarez
and Mike semperviv on the Sports Byline Broadcasting Network.
Speaker 1 (16:17):
Back here on the show, Ryan Alvarez, You're Wrestling Observer Live.
To everyone in the chat, it was not a story
planted by WWE. I mean It's been something that people
have talked about for a long time in AW but
like it was never a big deal. It was just
a thing. It was a thing that people started talking about,
(16:38):
and it was weird because all of a sudden, like
if this would have come out right after like the
Hurt syndicates stomped down Jet Speed for about the third
straight time, if the next day the story had come
out had been like, okay, that makes sense. But the
weird thing was it just came out of nowhere on
a random day. And I mean it was just like,
(17:02):
it's not that big a deal, and I don't know why.
It was just like such a thing all of a sudden.
But no, it did not come from WWE. People in
AW been talking about it for a long time now
speaking of WWE, since we didn't even well some of
you heard about it. But here's a gist of the
(17:22):
ESPN deal and also some other notes. So it's a
one point six billion dollar a year over five years,
three hundred and twenty five million dollars a year. The
major ple is at this point ten ples, including the
two nights of WrestleMania and the two nights of SummerSlam
are all going to be on this new ESPN streaming service.
(17:45):
It's not ESPN Plus or whatever. It's a new service.
It is going to launch on August twenty first. It'll
be thirty dollars a month. Okay. Now, if you have
ESPN on your cable package at this point, maybe about
forty percent of you that have ESPN, depending on your provider,
(18:07):
you won't have to pay anything. This will be part
of your package. Okay. Now, the thing hasn't even launched
yet and they're still doing negotiations. So whatever is the
Whatever is the deal today, don't worry about it. Worry
about it as we get closer to WrestleMania if you
still don't have access to it, because for example, I
(18:28):
have YouTube TV, and right now, if I have YouTube TV,
even though it's got the ESPN packages, I will still
have to pay thirty dollars a month for this service today.
They could make a deal tomorrow. They can make a
deal next week. By the time WrestleMania rolls around, which
is when this thing is going to launch. Probably most
(18:53):
if you have the ESPN package, most of the cable services,
you will get this as part of your package. Right now,
It's not that way but I wouldn't panic about it yet.
So a couple of a couple of other notes. First off,
we don't know anything about the video library yet, we
don't know anything about NXT. They're obviously still shopping things around.
(19:18):
It's possible the library may end up on Peacock. Possible
nxt pls may also stream on Peacock. They may go
to Netflix. I mean, there's a lot of different options available.
They're going to go wherever the money is the highest,
which is should not come as a surprise to anybody.
Apparently in the negotiations, Peacock did make an offer, and
(19:43):
I guess the offer was allegedly in the neighborhood of
about two hundred and seventy five million a year, and
WWE wanted more, obviously, and they ended up getting the
three hundred twenty five million, and that's why they went
to ESPN over Peacock. Obviously, of Peacock at our for
four hundred million a year, they'd have stayed, but they didn't.
(20:04):
And and apparently they also we were potentially shopping around
WrestleMania as a separate deal, So for example, you know,
they might have been willing to stay with Peacock but
we're going to give ESPN WrestleMania for X amount per year.
That was something that was discussed, but they ended up
(20:24):
they ended up going all in with with ESPN. So
that's the gist of it, and where everything falls out
we shall learn as the months go on. I think
one of the biggest stories is that, you know, this
(20:47):
was a this is a one point six billion dollar deal,
one point six billion dollars. And yesterday when it came
out that they had moved from a one billion dollar
deal to a one point six billion dollar deal, apparently
the stock dropped because that wasn't a good enough increase
(21:10):
for investors one billion to one point six billion, And
so later in the day they actually said that the
Peacock deal, which had been i mean reported everywhere and
like in Financial Dog everything that they had claimed that
(21:32):
it was a billion dollar deal, and because investors were
not happy, they actually stated yesterday that it really wasn't
a billion dollars. It was only nine hundred million. Like,
I mean, this is supposed to be a publicly traded company,
the SEC is supposed to be involved in all of this.
(21:55):
How do you all of a sudden, years after the fact,
announced that we claimed a billion, but it was actually
only nine hundred million. How do you get away with this?
I mean, I guess just nobody cares. But anyway, it
turns out their Peacock deal was not as good as
(22:17):
they had claimed for years, which seems incredibly sketchy, but whatever,
that's what they said. So there you go. One other
note which kind of ties into this. So the last
match of John Cena at this point, the last John
(22:41):
Cena match is going to take place at a Saturday
Night's main event. Okay, so there had been a lot
of discussions about his final match being on a December
pl so at this point there isn't going to be
a December pl and granted, everything can change, but I
(23:04):
guess the the way that it works is they had
agreed to a certain number of ples with Peacock, and
because of the Evolution pay per view and also the
second night of SummerSlam, they pretty much they don't need
a December pl e. They've they've they've hit their quotas,
(23:28):
so to speak, and so as a result, it appears
that his final match will be on Saturday Night's main event,
which I mean probably will do significantly more viewers than
a pl would have done, and especially if you advertise
it on NBC as John Cena's final match. And so
(23:48):
that looks to be that looks to be the case.
And and there's another note, but I actually won't talk
about it because I don't know if it's actually the case,
but it ties into the three hours of SmackDown. So
they did do their earnings report, and they did mention
(24:12):
that their television revenue would be lower for the next
quarter because SmackDown was down to two hours. And that
means that, in fact, they were making more money for
SmackDown when it was three hours for the first half
of the year. It was a little more than half
of the year, and there was still no explanation as
(24:34):
to why. And a lot of people, you know, they
they've asked a question like, well, if we still don't
know why, and if they did make more money for it,
is it possible this will be like an annual thing,
so like, you know, the first half of the year
will be three hours and it will drop to two hours.
I don't think that's what's going to happen. And I
(24:55):
guess I will say I'm not reporting this is it
is one hundred percent speculation. But the speculation is that,
like with the ples, it might have been that there
were a certain number of episodes of SmackDown that WWE
was contracted to do and in order to meet that number,
(25:18):
they had to have had at an hour to the
show for seven months or whatever, and that's how they're
going to end up hitting the quota. So it could
be that, could be something else, but I don't think
that we're going to be doing like a fifty to fifty.
You know, half the year is going to be three hours,
half the year is going to be two hours. I
think it was kind of a one time deal and
thank god now it's over and we can move on.
(25:42):
So that's the update on that, the the ESPN deal
and everything else. Roman Reigns also has been confirmed for
more RAW appearances. He's going to be on the August
eighteenth Raw, August twenty fifth Raw. He will be most
(26:02):
likely on the Clash in Paris show on August thirty first,
So that's not one hundred percent, but Wrestle Votes believes
he's going to be there. So anyway, what that means
is is was not an injury angle. Apparently, you know
he's filming what is it Street Fighter, Mortal Kombat? What
(26:23):
is it? Anyway, he's filming a movie. It's the movie
that he's going to be part of. And Cody and
oh god, who was it from New Japan. It's just bizarre.
But anyway, the point is I don't believe that begins
filming until September, so there's really no reason to do
an injury angle in the middle of August to take
(26:45):
him off TV for August before he uh yeah, fifty
Cents in it. But there's who's the New Japan guy
in it? What like a completely random New Japan wrestler
is go to That's right, a rookie goat toes in
this movie with John Cena and Roman Reigns and fifty Cent,
I mean, and many others. It's gonna be. It's gonna be.
(27:09):
I think it's gonna be something to see. Anyway, somehow,
I have talked NonStop for forty minutes, So when we
come back from the break, I'll just jump right into
the Dynamite Report and Cody. That's right, Cody Roads as well.
All right back in the moment Observer Live.
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Speaker 2 (30:49):
You are listening to Wrestling Observer Live with Brian Alvarez
and Mike Sempervivi on the Sports Byline Broadcasting Network.
Speaker 1 (30:59):
I get the show Brain now Here Wrestling Observer Live.
Before I get to this Dynamite report, we got a
text message here versus. I have a question. May come
off as AW hate, but it's a legit question. I
was watching Dynamite on HBO Max last night and those
multiple times the audio glitched out. I know it's nothing
new for AW. When I look back at it, noticed
(31:19):
something the times the glitch has happened, and we're during
the callous Kyle promo, during the Bucks match, a couple
of times after as well. I knows during the Kyle
promo the crowd is booing him a lot, then the
glitch happens and you hear weird crowd chants. Okay, so listen,
this is the exact same thing that happens on WWE.
It's an attempt to remove profanity when the crowd is
(31:42):
chanting bad things. So don Kallus came out and there
were very very loud f don Kallus chants, which coincidentally,
by the way, I was watching on H on Max
and they didn't bleep them, and I was actually very surprised.
Normally they do, and I also normally Max so and
during the Bucks match, I mean, anytime there's crazy spots,
(32:05):
you'll hear profane chance, and I mean you have options,
like you can either try and cover it up with
different audio, which is what AW does, or like NXT,
they just mute the audio completely. So sometimes it's like,
you know, twenty seconds of complete dead air because they're
getting rid of these chants. On RAW, I think on
(32:26):
Raw they mute it, So it's just a different way
of doing it. Sometimes the decision is to mute it,
and sometimes the decision is to put a different audio
track over it. But it's not a production issue. It's
trying to cover up for the fans saying very bad
things during the show. All right, let's talk about Dynamite.
(32:51):
It's the lead to Forbidden Door, and it opened up
with got both my MJF doing a promo and he's
very upset hang Man for not giving him a title shot,
and he vowed to take it out on Mark Brisco
Tonight said Mark's luck is about to run out. So
(33:14):
then what an irony? The opening match is is John
Moxley versus Mike Bailey, MVP's most hated wrestler, Mike Bailey.
Clearly Moxley does not hate Mike Bailey because he gave
this guy a ton in this match, and it's kind
of where of those matches where he just beats this
(33:35):
guy unmercifully for the first half of the match, gets
a lot of heat, and then he starts giving this
guy a comeback, and like every time, the crowd just
they're going nuts by the end and they're trading these cradles,
and Wheeler tries to interfere, and Darby comes out and
kidnaps Wheeler, and then Moxley's distracted and speedball rolls him
(33:56):
out and this is like the closest to count you've
ever seen. And the crowd thought it was a three
and they're going wild, but it's a two. And finally
mox Le hits him with a death writer and pins him.
Smatcho's great. So afterwards, Moxley and Marina are heading outside.
They see Wheeler on the ground in a body bag.
Darby tries to run him over, but they save Wheeler's life.
(34:19):
They unzip the bag. Forbidden Door is staple to Wheeler's head,
so it looks like John Moxley and Darby's at Forbidden Door.
Mercedes showed up with the eight belts. Guys, aware that
(34:40):
we're all entitled to our opinion. Some of you aren't,
but it's true we all are. And in my opinion,
this eight belts thing is stupid. Okay, when when she
had like three belts and then she you won like
(35:00):
a fourth belt, it was like up until about four belts,
like it was it was pretty cool. You know, she's
a belt collector. She's winning all these and they're like
major belts from major promotions, and then like she shows
up on TV and she's got eight belts and they're
just draped all around her, and like, once you hit eight,
(35:23):
you know, I realize, you know, for a brief period
of time, Ultimo Dragon had that octople crown. But like
I was just watching on this show and it's like,
once you get to eight, now now it's it's it's
just it's goofy walking around with these belts and she's
trying to have you know, anyway, Alex Windsor Queen Aminadas, Skyblue,
(35:44):
Billy Starks four way qualifier for Forbidden Door, it's gonna
be a it's a four way qualifier for a four
way match, and Yetti Pop Pie. She's a heel is
not a defense for everything stupid, Okay, I know some
people that really like certain things. It's like that that's
your defense. She's a heel, okay, But there's a problem
(36:07):
like are you a heel that people are supposed to
take seriously or are you a heel that people aren't
supposed to take seriously? Because it is possible to be
a heel, and also you get too silly, and now
it's hard to take you seriously as a heel. We've
seen this with many heels over the years, and this
is not like good heel heed at this point. Now
(36:29):
it's silly, and I don't think the Mercedes character is
a heel is supposed to be silly. It's supposed to
be like a serious thing, and it's coming off not
serious here because it's now silly. So I know some
people like to defend everything, aw does It's okay that
some things are silly and like it could be better,
and this is one of them. It's ridiculous. Now where
(36:53):
were we? It's a four way for a four way
and Alex Windsor won, so we got two other women
that will be in the way at Forbidden Door for
Mercedes title. And then afterwards he did a big chebang
where Mercedes is out there and Alex Windsor's out there,
Tony's out there, Athena lays out Tony, and then Athena
(37:15):
and Mercedes have a stare down even though they're not
wrestling each other at the show, and we were told
they're on the same page, so maybe we'll get a tag.
Young Bucks gave a production guy a paper and said
that Justin Roberts needed to read this word for word.
We had the aforementioned Don kellis Kyle Fletcher promo. These
(37:39):
fans hated Don Kallas, just screaming at this guy at
the top of their lungs, and Kyle braggs about about
taking out dustin taking out coal. It's gonna be the
greatest T and T champion of all time. Don says,
I've got you a gift. It is another oil painting.
It is frickin' preposter. It's getting so much heat. And
(38:03):
this segment was great. So then we had another one
of those segments. I love these segments. Remember when Christian
came out last week and did that promo and I
said that promo sucked, His delivery sucked, and the whole
point of the promo sucked. Like eventually we're supposed to
(38:24):
want to like this guy and see him team with Copeland,
but like, this guy came out and he had no remorse,
he had no nothing, And what happened. Oh, it's great,
it's great, Brian, You're an idiot. Everything is great. In
aw It's a great promo, make great sense, it was perfect. Well,
here comes Copeland. They go, what do you think of
this promo? And he says literally the exact same thing
(38:47):
that I said. Kind of a promo was that Copeland
says he had no remorse, there was no apology, the
guys learned nothing, and he's still in a hole. I
was like, correct, that is absolutely correct. So Copeland and
I we both missed the brilliance of this promo to
(39:07):
eventually turn him babyface. So next week he's gonna be
facing Stokely. He has been allowed to match with Stokely.
FTR cannot come within fifty feet or two hundred feet
or whatever, and if they do, the restraining order is
null and void. This actually is great, and I'll talk
(39:30):
about why on the Brya Vitie Show tonight, and I
don't got time today. Young Bucks against Brodido. So the
Young Bucks had given a note to Justin Roberts. They
told the production guy, you tell him to read this verbatim,
and so of course the uh the letter Justin starts
to read. I didn't write it exactly down, but it
(39:51):
was to the effect of, hey, Justin, you idiot, when
we come out tonight, you better introduce us the right way.
We're not jobbers. And Justin just reads it exactly as
it's written. So of course the fans are going wild.
They're chanting jobbers at these guys. They're they're they're literally
announced as Max and Jeremy, which was the name they
(40:13):
used in about two thousand and eight and TNA when
they were shoot jobbers, And the fans are eating this up,
and uh, I mean, the good news is they can
still work. This match was awesome, Brodido Young Bucks. This
is awesome chance. They did the deal again where they're
(40:33):
going for the the uh EVP trigger but they're not EVPs.
So now they're in a big what should we call
it in the middle of the ring, which of course
is a distraction to allow the baby Faces to make
a comeback. They did some awesome spots during the comeback.
The baby Faces and h and finally Nick and Bandid
(40:54):
are on the guardrail. Bandido press slams them off the
barricade on the Matt. Bandido hits the X kne on
Matt twenty one plex. Nick breaks it up, they get
sent He gets sent outside. Bandido hits a top rope
Sos Moon Salt, and then they hit their monkey flip finish.
It's a monkey flip. That's their finish for the pin.
(41:14):
So it's FTR versus Brodido. The winners get Hurt Syndicate
at Forbidden Door. This smatch was awesome. Hurts Syndicate promo.
MVP walks in or MGF walks in. God if this
happens again. MVP says, you don't get it, dude, all
(41:37):
you think about is yourself. The Hurts Syndicate we we
are supposed to hurt people, not me, me, me. You
get the thumbs down and he warns him because Max
says it's not personal, it's just business. MVP says, no, no,
I hope you don't win that title because if you do,
(41:57):
Lashley's coming to get you, and it won't be business,
it'll be personal. This was a great segment. Stokely did
a promo but having a face Copeland, he's all worried.
This was a great segment as well. There were a
lot of great interview segments on this show. We had
Swerve come out for a promo, also a great promo.
(42:18):
He's gonna win the title from Okada and he's gonna
I guess every time he's been in London he's lost,
so He's going to redeem himself and win the Unified
title and make Don Callus cry in the corner. Queenaminada.
Oh god, I'm not gonna even review this thing. I
(42:40):
almost wanna what's happening with stat Lander and Willow? Are
they trying to beat the record of Waller and Theory?
Speaker 4 (42:54):
This is not a record.
Speaker 1 (42:55):
It needs to be broken. They broke up in May
of twenty twenty four. It is August of twenty twenty five.
It has been fifteen months, and I'm not sure we're
any closer to a resolution. MGF and Mark brisco This
(43:16):
was a good match, but because of that, I was disappointed.
It's MGF and Mark Briscoe. I expected this to be
so much better, and I think the big thing and
I know this this is from me, I don't know
by the rest of you, but my most hated spot
in wrestling is when a guy goes to the top
(43:37):
and the heel does the slow log roll out of
the way. There is no spot I hate more than
that in wrestling. I hate it. It just the action
just slows to a complete halt every time. It doesn't
even make any sense, like if it's fake and you're
trying to make the people mad. It makes sense, but
(43:58):
if it's real, it's like, okay, if you're in good
enough shape to like roll out of the way the move,
why don't you wait till the guy jumps so he
crashes in burds? Why don't you get your knee up
like it? It's such an infuriating spot to me. It
just kills the momentum of a match. They did it
five times and like Mark went for the froggy elbow,
(44:22):
and Max rolled out of the way five times. By
the fifth time, nobody cared and like he finally hit
it on the sixth time and it got like a monica,
I mean, and then I cheered and everything because they
like hit it. It was like, man, the rule of threes. Guys,
you broke it by two and then you did it
(44:45):
two more times after that, but you actually hit it.
So anyway, we'll get into the finished after the break
Observer Live.
Speaker 2 (44:51):
You were listening to wrestling Observer Live with Brian Alvarez
and Mike semperviv on the Sports Byline Broadcasting network.
Speaker 1 (45:01):
So the end of the match puts them through the
table or actually Mark goes Mark goes for the froggy
bow outside, crashed through the table, He's dead. Max gets
in the ring. Mark almost doesn't get it back, but
he gets back in. He's immediately hit with the heat seeker.
Max covers. Mark puts his foot on the ropes. Ref
(45:24):
doesn't see it. Max takes the wind pulls the foot
off the ropes. So Mark still has not gotten revenge
for MGF saying all of those horrible things about his
deceased brother. And not only does he lose, not only
does he not get his revenge on MGFMGF beats him
after death with the ring. Afterwards, hang man has to
(45:47):
come down to make the save. So, uh, I don't know,
I don't know. We'll see where this goes. Clearly mg
have a hangman are having a match, probably a Forbidden Door.
I mean, they could probably do something the second to
do Mark Brisco at Forbidden Door and Max it all out,
but at this point they beat this guy so bad.
(46:08):
I don't know, I don't know, but anyway, I'd say
overall it was a very good show. I mean, you
had two very very good matches the uh, the John
Moxley match and the Young Bucks match, so very very
good wrestling on the show and a lot of good
video packages and interviews. That's all I ask for, and
promotion of of future events. So that's good. Well, tonight
(46:33):
on the Brighton Video Show, we'll have more time ninety
minutes commercial free to talk AWNXT and I got a
lot to say that I didn't get to say here
about Dynamite and NXT. I didn't even do an NXT
report yet, so it's gonna be a lot of fun.
Check it out Wrestlingobserver dot com for w online dot com,
Slash Apple for w online dot com, Slash Spotify for
(46:54):
w online dot com, slash YouTube or fw on line
dot com and we'll see you next time for more
Wrestling Observer Live. You have been listening to the Wrestling
Observer Daily podcast on the eight Side Network.
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