449: John Cena's WWE Debut - SmackDown 06-27-02 Deep Dive - Straight Shooters Wrestling Podcast

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:13):
What is up everyone out there on internet land? And
welcome to episode four forty nine of the Straight Shooters
available wherever podcasts are found. My name is Vaughan Johnson
and I'm joined as always by my main man Pots
and Pans, Nick pecona Fox phl a Gambler and Crossing
Broad over there breaking news at Crossing Broad and we
have yet another fantastic show ahead of us here on

(00:37):
episode four forty nine. It is a deep dive. We
are diving deep into the June twenty seventh, two thousand
and two edition of SmackDown. And why is that SmackDown significant?
Because it is was the main roster debut of one
John Cena. And now that John Cena's career has been
putting put to rest, I guess you can say we

(00:57):
can we can speak about it in totality. We're gonna
talk about it throughout the deep dive and mentioned, of
course the last match that happened a little while ago
since we recorded, and man, there's a lot of discussions
coming out of that and so much more. But before
we get into that deep dive, I gotta do more
weekly check on my man Man Pots and Pants. Nick,

(01:18):
how are you on this Wednesday, Tuesday afternoon. My good brother,
this is what champions look like. Do you got that?
But you know what I mean, how would you people
know what champions look like? I mean you root for
the Lions.

Speaker 2 (01:38):
Let's be honest.

Speaker 1 (01:40):
The Lions wish they were as good as the Philadelphia Eagles?
Am I right?

Speaker 3 (01:45):
Yes?

Speaker 2 (01:46):
Niki Bella man oh Man w Hall of Famer Eagles
fan man, she got me hype man Eagles bills. I'm ready.
I'm ready today.

Speaker 1 (01:58):
The Eagles, of course, are you? Twenty twenty five NFC
East champions, second year in a row, the first team
to do that since the Eagles back in twenty oh
not twenty two.

Speaker 2 (02:09):
Thousand and four was in heist and four Oka.

Speaker 1 (02:13):
We were in high school.

Speaker 2 (02:14):
Yeah, thousand four h high school year prior, so ah,
just out of high school, which still a feel like
for some reason, I kept thinking two thousand and one,
but it's twenty one years so yes, two thousand and
four makes sense here, but still a very long time.
And the usual radio clips I do, uh you know,

(02:34):
I had the Maryland Mike sound of the back to
back NFC East champions, but I forgot to add East
to the tweet. So it's says back to back NFC
champions sign of the future.

Speaker 1 (02:48):
Jumping the gun a little bit.

Speaker 2 (02:50):
Huh, maybe a little bit, maybe a little bit, maybe got.

Speaker 1 (02:52):
Little ways to go to get there just yet. Can't
count the eggs before they hatch.

Speaker 2 (02:57):
But yeah, there's a White Division a little more than
a month away.

Speaker 1 (03:01):
I mean, that's that's the schedule. That is the schedule.
That is the schedule. But a little bit NFC East
Champions just division champions for now, which is I know
a lot of people were talking about how this team
is reminiscent to twenty twenty three, and you know that
you can say, oh, they're not twenty twenty three, they

(03:22):
are twenty twenty five and whatever that means. We'll have to.

Speaker 2 (03:26):
Find out what termined.

Speaker 1 (03:27):
Yeah, but this is a different situation because they have
won a division where they did not in twenty twenty three.
Man that collapse epic, unlike any in recent medal.

Speaker 2 (03:39):
Believe they came back from that, you know, last year.

Speaker 1 (03:41):
Honestly, Yeah, honestly, it's a it's a big deal that
they did that and won the super Bowl on top
of it. So, but I mean helps when we have
sakuon Barkley running for twenty five hundred yards over the
course of twenty one games. But but yes, Eagles, NFC's
champions back to back. Eagles fans happy until Sunday because

(04:02):
they got to play Josh Allen in the Buffalo Bills
and one of the final home games in the history
of Ralph Wilson Stadium. So it's gonna be it's gonna
be a little bit of an atmosphere up there in Buffalo,
so we'll see. But in the midst of the Eagles
clinching another NFC East title, we did get some wrestling
involved in that. This is a wrestling podcast. Wait, you're

(04:23):
not talking about wrestling, Yes we are, because we talk
about Coop Dejeen Cooper Dejen hitting a five knuckle shuffle
on one of his teammates after that pick he got
from Josh Johnson.

Speaker 2 (04:34):
That's wild he's.

Speaker 1 (04:36):
Doing doing his wrestling celebrations, don't him and Quinon They
always come up with something.

Speaker 2 (04:40):
They do they do so and I didn't. I didn't
catch it at first. I don't think it was on
the TV broadcast.

Speaker 1 (04:46):
Right, No, I saw boy John Clark posed to post
to I think a photo of it. So That's why
I went looking for the for the video, not the video,
the photo itselfing like Associated Press, and they had a
great photo. I'm on the way down of punching someone,
so you know exactly.

Speaker 2 (05:04):
What he's doing so he doesn't get ejected for punching.

Speaker 1 (05:10):
Oh my god, I don't know what happened. I haven't
really fully looked into that. I know that I saw
him punch the guy. I don't know what the guy
said or what's been claimed he said. I'm sure it's bad.
I don't know.

Speaker 2 (05:21):
But I was just talking about the commanders and.

Speaker 1 (05:26):
We're talking about that. I was, I was talking about
DK Metcalf.

Speaker 2 (05:29):
I figured it after you were talking.

Speaker 1 (05:30):
Yeah, I was like, no, I forgot about the fight
that happened after the two point conversion because oh we're
so angry. Commanders. We'll see them again in two weeks
and do what.

Speaker 2 (05:43):
The good season quicker than you know, you know anyone else.

Speaker 1 (05:46):
Probably booker trip to can Coon. That's you're gonna do
in two weeks, book a trip to Cowboy. I wish
I was doing the same thing. So you lucky. Good
for you, But like counters, not going to the playoffs.
That's what's not happening, and it's like a big robbery
game for a game that may or may not mean
anything to the Eagles.

Speaker 2 (06:05):
This is why I don't like putting divisional games, you know,
like heavy divisional games at the end of the year,
like putting them.

Speaker 1 (06:14):
So close together two or three weeks.

Speaker 2 (06:17):
Yes, I agree, like they should have played in November,
you know, like watching Washington's seasons like derailed pretty early,
but at the same time, like they still had a
sliver of hope to at least uh make the playoffs.
I'd say, you know, early November. But once Jada Daniels
got hurt, you know, kept getting hurt, you know, that

(06:40):
was kind of it. But just like, stop putting so
many games that close to the end of the schedule.
I just don't I don't like that. I was a
fan of the opener being against the Cowboys stuff like that,
Like I like the early divisional matchups week one and
week two. But yeah, I just I don't know why

(07:01):
they do that. I don't like it.

Speaker 1 (07:06):
It is an odd scheduling perk oh scheduling scheduling quirk,
not perk quirk. I should say to have and it's
the first time they played each other, and it's so
late in the season. I don't like they played each
other twice in three weeks, like in the middle of
the season, which would also be odd, but to not
play until a week was it sixteen? What was it? Yeah,
it was week sixteen, So that is kind of odd.

(07:26):
But we'll see what's in store for the Eagles.

Speaker 2 (07:30):
Eagle schedule general was pretty crappy. They had the fourth
toughest schedule of the season.

Speaker 1 (07:36):
It was a rough schedule, like it was a rough.

Speaker 2 (07:39):
Games, like how do they playing Washington and New York
which isn't terribly far, but it's still like, no back
to back home games. It's weird. First time, first Super
Bowl champion to ever have no back to back home
games next year.

Speaker 1 (07:53):
So I mean, maybe it's just seventeen games nonsense. That
messes up the scheduling in some way. I don't know.
But but they hey, look, oh yeah, don't worry about it, buddy,
eighteen games is on the way, all right. I think
I've been saying on the podcast, it's been done before.
Another league's don't get it twisted. They do it in

(08:16):
Canada right now every season. Everybody's cool with it. They
give them the you know, bi weeks and all that. Like,
no one back tony eighteen games.

Speaker 2 (08:24):
In Canada, you can win a game if you miss
a field goal.

Speaker 1 (08:28):
Well not anymore soon. They've changed the rules. They've changed
the rules to where that's not going to be the case.
So different deal now. But still, eighteen games is a
thing up there, and I'm sure people have pounded the table,
some rich people up in you know, owners or people
up in New York who are getting rich off of this.
Is like, yeah, they do it in Canada, so why

(08:49):
not here in the United States. So, yeah, eighteen games
is definitely happening at some point. And look it's even
at least an even amount of games is better. But yeah, yeah,
we don't know about the player safety aspect of that neither.

Speaker 2 (09:02):
But that, well they have two buys, is that also going.

Speaker 1 (09:05):
To be I would assume. So I feel like they
had an eighteen week schedule in the early nineties. I
think they tried it for one year, and I believe
over the course of those eighteen weeks they gave them
two buys.

Speaker 2 (09:17):
In early nineties.

Speaker 1 (09:18):
Yeah, it's like ninety three, I think you look it up,
but I think they did it one year, and I
guess everybody hated it. They went away from it and
went back to one by of seventeen weeks. But they
did have an eighteen week regular season one year in
the early nineties, if I remember correctly about that. Yeah,
but it's going to happen. I was just already a
eighteen week regular season.

Speaker 2 (09:38):
I no idea because I was.

Speaker 1 (09:39):
Oh, I know it was about the new generation time,
but maybe the early beginnings of it ninety three. You know,
there was no such thing as football at that time.
For you, it was only doing to clown Tatanka, mister
perfect in the whole gang.

Speaker 2 (09:52):
Oh yeah, the Lex Express, the Lex Express in the
ninety three oh Man all in through the country in
ninety three.

Speaker 1 (10:02):
But let's get to wrestling, right. We had some things
pop up over the last couple of weeks since we've
been going. Let's start off with TTNA got a TV
deal with AMC. How about the congrats to TNA. There
you go. It's been a long journey, boy, it's been.

Speaker 2 (10:20):
A longing, like talking about a TV deal for over
a year now for CNA.

Speaker 1 (10:24):
Just yes, in general, we've been talking about TNA just
being on death's door for a while too. Remember, like,
it wasn't that long ago when they felt like they
were when they were bouncing checks, and now they've been thriving. Obviously,
they had to partnership with WWE, which I'm sure has
helped them in a lot of ways, and the show
has helped ww in a lot of ways too. But

(10:44):
they've had some big crowds, and now they got a
TV deal with the same network that's aired Breaking Bad
and Walking Dead and Better Call Saw uh and other
really good show mad Men. Yeah, mad Men was on there,
and probably some other shows that I'm sure that's your
fad that that I forgot, but those are the shows
that I can remember at least that are the most
famous on AMC uh. So it's a network that's in

(11:07):
a lot of homes, a lot of people are familiar
with it. I don't know wrestling fans, you know, if
they like it. You know, wrestling fans will travel pretty
much anywhere to rotch watch wrestling, like especially TNA. They've
been on all kinds of networks. Okay, yeah, there's a
destination in America. There's a Pop Pop TV or something
like that. That's right, all kinds of stuff back in

(11:27):
the day, so they'll follow them to AMC and at
least it's a major network that's you know, on a
lot of major cable systems and a lot of homes.
And I don't know if it's a streaming only. I
haven't looked into it, honestly, I've been busy, but I know.

Speaker 2 (11:40):
I had heard that it would also be on AMC Plus,
but did not you know, I saw that that's all
like AMC and AMC Plus, but who knows.

Speaker 1 (11:52):
Yeah, so we'll see. But he it's a it's a
good deal for TNA to have a rights deal. It's
good to see other promotions outside of w W and
even AW get TV rights. Again, TNA is definitely benefited
from the relationship with WW. It'd be nice of other
promotions that could get the same type of deal without
the relationship with WW. But just so you know, you

(12:15):
have you know, other thriving promotions.

Speaker 2 (12:18):
Can they ring him on or somewhere or I don't
have a way to watch it?

Speaker 1 (12:22):
Well, that's up to Tony kNN apparently, and we'll see
about that if that ever comes to pass.

Speaker 2 (12:28):
Like I would like to see, even though I might
not watch every week and anymore like the smaller promotions.
It's still like a cool thing to have at your
disposal if you want to watch it, you know, like
I don't have to go through hoops to you know,
either pay or find it on a streaming service. I mean,
is cable making a comeback? I feel like more people

(12:49):
are talking about wanting to go back to the cable
nowadays with all the streaming. That's why things going on,
but maybe not too much.

Speaker 1 (12:58):
But I'm a cable I mean, I'm not saying and
it's impossible. I mean, who knows where we're going to
the cable guy.

Speaker 2 (13:03):
So I'm I'll always be we always probably have cable
in some capacity.

Speaker 1 (13:09):
I've stopped being a cable guy a long time ago,
so I don't I don't wish to go back. But
here we are. You're paying them there as much I
paid I pay. I got YouTube TV. That's damn in
a cable.

Speaker 2 (13:20):
So you got to deal with like the whole NFL thing,
and it's like, come on, people, just figure it out.
Rich people make it worse for us as a consumer
just we want to watch what we like and getting
more difficult, you know, when you have these stalemates of
rich people just being like, what was it a was

(13:42):
it the NFL like ESPN or something like that, having
like issues with YouTube TV recently, so it's like, why
why is this a thing? Why does it have to
be a thing. At least with cable, I didn't have
to worry about that. Well, I should say Exfinity.

Speaker 1 (13:56):
I mean you probably did it, just didn't know about it,
as we do.

Speaker 2 (14:00):
Seem to have these issues with these you know companies
knock on Wood.

Speaker 1 (14:07):
Yeah, that was a whole mess, that whole thing. Uh
but you know they they're they're they're cool now. Uh So,
I guess said everybody got paid the way they were
supposed to and here we are. But uh so, yeah,
it's good caddos of TNA uh getting a TV deal
with a MC uh. We have some revelations in w

(14:28):
W WE we now know who the mass Man is,
the mass Man who jumped into the kje At Survivor
series in the War Games match and hit the curb stomp.
Everybody thinking, for a second, is that seth rollins? It
never was. It was in fact Austin theory the entire time,
and now he's trying to be a part of the vision.
But uh, Bron Breaker and Bron Bronson Reid are a

(14:50):
little skeptical, so he's gonna have to earn his way
into the group seemingly over time. But Nick Austin theory,
being the mass man and being part of potentially the vision,
have any.

Speaker 2 (15:01):
Thoughts, Probably among the worst reveals that we've seen in
a long time, where he runs away, pulls the mask
off while he's standing in the crowd to no reaction.
I thought that was pretty bad. It's just why they

(15:21):
could have done the DDP thing right, or he's just
standing in the middle of the ring and just unmasks
and do it that way. That would have been a
lot better than how they did it this time. And
he looked like so he tried to look menacing, but
he looked like cornball man. I just I didn't buy it.
It wasn't because I don't buy Austin theory as a wrestler.

(15:43):
I just don't buy the vision anymore. Like we mentioned before,
once Seth got hurt, just Bron and Bronson. It'd be
great if it was just those two and like elevate them.
But why the need to start adding people? I guess
so Paul Hayman could talk for them. I don't know,
like Logan Paul doesn't need Paul Hayman, it's all for him.

(16:06):
I just don't know why we need so many more
people joining when I think bron and Bronson would have
been good just on their own. As you know, with Hayman,
I know we had war games, but you could just
be like, okay, like you can join us for one
night and then and then boom. We haven't seen Brock
since then. Right, It's not even like Drew's part of

(16:27):
that anymore. It's like you could have just done that
for one night. And same with Logan. Paul could have
had awesome theory in there, but I know they wanted
brought to have the moment. It's just everything's falling apart
for me in terms of the vision, where now I'm like,
I really hope Broadbreaker was the world heavyweight title for

(16:49):
Same Balk because that's the one thing that can like
kind of give them a jolt a little bit. Not
so much the vision, just like Monday Night in general,
and now with like reporters that Dombastereo might be hurt,
they definitely need some h people to like carry that program.
Just give them the ball, give them the ball. Give

(17:11):
Braun the ball. But yeah, I don't care about Alci
theory at all. The revealed is the guy. It's like, yep,
we we we knew what was gonna happen. The reveal
I still think was bad. But what am I gonna do?
I'm just gonna sit here and complain about it.

Speaker 1 (17:30):
I mean that's fair, uh there and complaining about it.
That's what we do on podcast.

Speaker 2 (17:34):
They say like, do you have a better idea? No,
I really don't because I'm not you know, like, I
don't need this big group of the Vision, Like again,
it should just be Braun and Bronson. That would have
been with Hayman. That would have been great. But you know,
now now we have like well the Vision Academy.

Speaker 1 (17:53):
Or something something not the Vision Academy. They involve Logan
Paul and Social Survivors because Seth Rollins is hurt, so
I guess they kind of keep him around and keep
him involved because of that. And then I think Austin
Theory is going to be involved the whole time, so
you can't just flush that down a toilet, I guess.
So the whole point of apparently the Vision is about

(18:14):
the future, and at one point Austin theory was for
you to ask the future and things then went off track.
I think it's at least worth a shot to see
if he can be something in the business. It's not.
I don't think they've really taken advantage of what he
could be yet or tried. And I know, and that's
saying that knowing that he beat John Cena at WrestleMania.

(18:37):
You know what I'm saying. And I still don't think
that they capitalize on what he could be. They haven't
really fully gone all in with Austin theory yet. Maybe
this is the beginning of it, and if it doesn't work,
then it doesn't work. But you got to at least
try with Austin theory, and I don't think they've really
tried that much yet. And again that's including a win
over John Cena, so we'll see. I I didn't think

(19:01):
the vision needed to be four deep, as it pretty
much is now if you include Austin theory. But I
also understand the vision no pun intendent of what the
point of the group is to build the future stars
of at least on the men's side of WWE, and

(19:22):
I think that's important. I think that's necessary I think
the problem, one of the major problems with WWE is
that they've had a lot of the same guys at
the top for a couple of years without a whole
lot of rotation amongst them. Like it's one thing to
have Cody stay at the top of the card, obviously,
but he can't just work with the same two or
three other people all year neither. You know what I'm saying.

(19:43):
There has to be a little variety there, and I
don't think there's been enough variety. And you know, they're
seemingly calling up people like Javon Evans when he on
RAW that you know, talked about all, let's talk about
your contract as you're a free agent now, which I'm like, well, damn,
he still got to win an NXT title. They're calling
them up to the I was biggering they're gonna give
him a run as an NXT champ and have him

(20:03):
be in the main event spot for a little while
to kind of feel that out. But Nope, if he's
coming up to the main roster, then he's coming up
to the main roster. He ain't gonna want to stay
in the next I would advise him to do that.
Make your money while you can. But to me, they
need some fresher faces, and I think the point of
the vision is to provide that. So Austin Theory would
be a guy that I would put in that position

(20:25):
if you ask me, if you looked at the whole
roster and be like, even though they're not they've done
nothing with them virtually outside of having them be John Cena,
which hasn't meant anything. Uh, they've done mostly nothing with him.
I'd put Austin Theory in that group. So it makes
sense to me.

Speaker 2 (20:42):
And you made a good point about Evans, but what
if they want not giving them that main event opportunity
in NXT, it almost makes me like skittish where it's like, okay,
he's gonna be a main roster without that experience. I
feel that is that you know a good thing or

(21:05):
a bad thing, and you know it's just we we
I don't think we've really seen many people go from
the mid card of NXT to the high upper level.
I mean, but like to maybe yeah, yeah, but it
took a while, right like he he was just kind

(21:26):
of there for for a long time as like a
henchman type figure. Before he I think was given an opportunity,
but obviously had to earn that. Like I'm sure Paul
Hayman helped him, Roman helped him, and the USO has
helped them. But that's just kind of I don't know,
maybe I'm not giving the machine enough credit. I guess

(21:50):
we will see, But I feel like, are you hampering
his ceiling by calling him up before he has the
chance to do that? At the level of NXT, you know,
maybe he's the you know, anomaly, it could be the anomaly.

Speaker 1 (22:06):
So I think that's a valid concern, and I think
that's something we've voiced about other people in the past.
Like I remember when Naya Jacks first got called up.
I was like, no, no, no, man. I think she can
use some more time. And but you know, eventually they'll
figure it out. The thing about Javon Evans that he's
also so young. He's only twenty one. Yeah, And I
don't know what it's like to be a wrestler and

(22:28):
to have that level of fame, but I could imagine
that it could be a lot at times. And you see,
you know, people getting a costed at airports and you're
constantly you know, if you're especially around a wrestling event
people recognize you, they're going to be asking for autographs
and everything else that comes with that. They don't travel
as much as they used to, so maybe you're not
you know, the temptation to live a fast life isn't

(22:51):
quite there. I don't know. I just know that when
people get called up really young, it could be a
struggle for them at first because you're just maturing into
an adult, really and now you're traveling everywhere on TV,
your national television, international television star. All of a sudden,
that could be a lot to handle.

Speaker 2 (23:06):
Yeah, So.

Speaker 1 (23:08):
I hope it works out. I'm sure they have people
around him. I would hope that people around him. I
could show on the ropes, And again, it's a different culture,
even from what it was when Vince was running the
show a couple of years ago, when they were doing
shows every weekend. They're spending way more time at home.
So is that a good thing? Maybe, you know, maybe
it's good that he can be at home. Maybe it's
bad that he has too much free time on his hands.
I don't know. I don't know, but I just hope

(23:31):
that he and I guess they're trusting him, that he's
mature enough and that he can handle the rigors of
being a main roster star, which could potentially make you
a mainstream level star. Potentially not everybody is, but potentially right,
and that comes with this pros and its cons, and
sometimes you need to be mature enough to handle that

(23:51):
and that comes with age, and it's just how it is.
You know, maybe he's mature beyond his ears and not
wish him the best, because again, I think he's super
talented it I think he's got a bright, bright, bright
future ahead of him, like straight to the top something
like make him the NXT champion because to me, if
you get him ready on the main event now, then
he can get ready for the main event in the future.

(24:12):
And I feel like that's he has that potential to
be ww A Ward Heavyweight Champion, whatever the situation is
at that point when he gets there. But you know,
just hope that everything's smooth for him.

Speaker 2 (24:23):
Maybe they realize they need du blood you know, right
away too. I mean, I'm sure that could help. I
know there's rumors of Trick Williams coming up too, h
So you know that might help on the main roster
seeing him every week on Raw or SmackDown, like I'd
rather see that than some of the people I see
on a weekly basis now. So even though he's been
around like flirting with the main roster and then NXT

(24:48):
like Trick Williams main roster, mainstay, I think could also
help just in general, like new faces every week.

Speaker 1 (24:58):
Well I don't know about every week, but you know,
a good amount for sure.

Speaker 2 (25:03):
I mean, give him a microphone, let them, let him
do a saying, have a good match. And then they
were like, Okay, I'm not tired of him.

Speaker 1 (25:12):
No, I get it, you gotta. I think that a
lot of people have kind of run their course, almost
not really run their course. But again, there needs to
be a shake up twenty twenty five in WW and
we're gonna talk about it next week on like our
twenty twenty five wrap up show. But twenty twenty five
did really they moved nothing forward in twenty twenty five,

(25:33):
where I think it felt like they were doing that
in twenty two and twenty three and twenty four and
twenty five, it felt like we were just in the
same spot we were all year and very little progressed,
like there's no main story, there's no main journey, And
I think those are important elements to what makes ww's
product hot. Like when it was hot a couple of

(25:54):
years ago, we had multiple journeys that we were taking
people on. They were taking people on that callminated eventually
in WrestleMania's thirty nine and forty. You know, if you're
talking about the Bloodline, you're talking about Cody Rhodes, Roman Rains,
Sammy Zin jay Uso. They all their individual journeys that
culminated over the course of those two shows, and we

(26:15):
just haven't had that, I mean, unless you count John Cena,
which was rough obviously, I guess we can kind of
transition into that. Oh MJF came back, we can mention
that real quick. But let's transition into John Cena. Okay,
let's start with Let's start with this because we're going
to talk about the first time he was on WW

(26:36):
television June twenty seven, two thousand and two, for his
magic as kurd Angle and his ruthless aggression. So we're
going to dive into that and have fun with that.
But his final in ring appearance at least for WW
took place December thirteenth, Saturday Night's main event against Gonther
and he lost but that is that really the story.

(27:00):
The story is that people hated it, hated it so
much that they were cussing out Triple H on live television. Now,
granted you probably won't see that again. I'm sure WW
is gonna edit that all the way out. Oh it's
been scrubbed, okay, scrubb or dub dub all right, Okay,

(27:23):
But we all saw it. We were all not there
in person, but there to watch it live, and we
heard those chants. Okay, you all heard them. Triple H
heard them too, Okay. So you have that kind of
overshadowed John Cena's supposed final moments in the ring, but

(27:44):
also the fact that he lost in the what I
would say is a very anti climactic way, Nick, how
did you feel about that finish in the aftermath of
John Cena's final match?

Speaker 2 (28:01):
To me, it I felt like I was seeing the
end of the match, but I was expecting, so like
wasn't as anti anticlomatic for me, because I was like, Okay,
this is it. He's going to just pass out. And
then I started seeing him smile a bit, and I'm like, no,
I don't, no, don't do this, don't do this, and.

Speaker 1 (28:21):
Then no no, no, no, no, no, no no.

Speaker 2 (28:26):
I mean I'm jay no, no, no no.

Speaker 1 (28:28):
Don't don't do it. Don't do it, don't don put
that turn that smile upside down, mag it a frown,
making a.

Speaker 2 (28:34):
Frown seeing him tap And it's funny because my uh,
the peacock I used through Expinity is like a little delayed,
I guess. So, like my sister is watching it with
like my nephews and everything, and I get a text
like at the same time, w t F, So I know,
like they're watching it, you know, at her house and
just not really getting it or understanding. I think they

(29:00):
thought seene it would win, but or if he would lose,
obviously he wouldn't tap out. So and I saw the reaction, Oh,
it's a perfect ending for his character, and I.

Speaker 1 (29:09):
Was like, is it is it really? Like? Is it perfect? Heed? It? Like?
It was very he explained, like in a very deep
cinematic way, and it just didn't come across that way.

Speaker 2 (29:22):
I'm sorry, bro, no, no, like, And I didn't watch
the whole interview with him of explaining it because I
just I don't want to not because I couldn't. But
it's like he knows it fell flat. So now he's
trying to like explain his way out of it, and
it's like, yeah, but that's that's not what we got

(29:44):
from it. It's you can easily tell the same story
without tapping, you know what I mean. Like, I just
I thought it was lame too for tapping, Like the smile.
You could have even like passed out while smiling. That's
where I thought it was going once the smiles. I
know now, but I was like, okay, like maybe he'll

(30:06):
pass out smiling, because why not even I would have taken.

Speaker 1 (30:10):
That he's at peace. Yeah he can he can die now.

Speaker 2 (30:13):
Like that's the better ending for this character, not giving up,
Like don't never give up until now you know it's the.

Speaker 1 (30:22):
End, until died, until you're retire.

Speaker 2 (30:26):
That's I just I I know why people like it,
like the wrestlings in art for him, right, Like people
watch it and like get to their own conclusions of
what they think is the story and what they like.
Not not for me, man, not for me.

Speaker 1 (30:46):
Yeah, I agree with you on that. Honestly, I understand
where people are coming from when they dislike it. I
didn't hate the fact that he lost. I know a
lot of people was mad that he lost.

Speaker 2 (30:55):
In general, yeah, I don't necessarily think he should have
won either, Like people like, oh, what's your last matches?
And I agree to an extent where like we're not
the seventies and eighties anymore, so like winning your last
match has been done before. It's not the worst thing
in the world. But go ahead and lose, you know,
just pass out. Like I was fine with that.

Speaker 1 (31:13):
That's cool, And I get that if people think that
you can buck tradition at times, I understand that. But again,
Sina is also apparently very willing to help people get over,
and it just makes sense to help going through not
only help them get over, but like put him on
a bigger level, put him on a higher level, I
should say, than what he was before. But I mean,

(31:35):
he's getting booed out the building so in a way
that he just wasn't before. So maybe, I mean, we'll
have to see when they come back on the road,
you know, these last couple of shows, I think we're
taped or something like that. I know this past Monday
was taped, so you know, we'll see when they go
in front of a live crowd again on January fifth.
But will they be in front of a live crowd
again on Monday. I don't know, but either way, I

(31:56):
know that's the biggest show that he got coming up
as January fifth. Either way, when he gets back in
front of more crowds again, we'll see what the reaction
is as we get further and further away from it.
How long will it last? But I think the intentions
are good. The execution was poor though. I think that's
the problem. It just the finish just fell flat. Even
if it's not his retirement match, the finish just fell flat. Period.

(32:21):
It just lying on the mat for a long period
of time and then just smiles and calmly taps out.
That's no. And I understand it's supposed to be poetic. Oh,
he's at peace with his career. I don't think people
really care that much in wrestling. I think it's a
nice visual for a movie, especially if you can shoot
it in a very cinematic way, But I don't know
how much you get that across in the movie even

(32:42):
I think even if a shot cinematically, you'd have people
go huh, that's how it goes out. But in a
live wrestling show it's even worse. This is not gonna
come across that well to me. To me, if he
passes out, even I won't even put a smile on
his face. He's fighting for his life. To me, he's

(33:03):
desperately trying to get out, and he's just like holding on,
holding on, holding on, and the arm goes limp and
he can't fight. He can't stands no more. Like he
gave everything he had. His shirt said, I gave everything
I had. He literally did it. He's held on as
long as he could and then he just passed out.
And it's like, damn, that's how you do it, bro.

(33:24):
He fought to the last second, went out in a
blaze of glory. He went out with a whimper.

Speaker 2 (33:31):
That maybe goosebumps man, like the way you said it.
That's John Cena, not the tapping out.

Speaker 1 (33:39):
I think I think Sena is full blown Hollywood at
this point. Now. He's into like the melodrama of it
all and like, you know, just like a peaceful, serene
he's at peace. And I think that's what he's really
trying to get across, Like he's at peace, he's happy
with his career. Is no, there's nothing to fight for.
I've done and everything to do. But it's like when

(34:02):
you said never, never means never, right, I guess you
never say never. That's why you shouldn't say it.

Speaker 2 (34:08):
Like I know you gave up and go forward or
at a lock, but you start to saying never give
up after that, right.

Speaker 1 (34:13):
Well, after that, bro, you you took on the mantra
of like I'm never giving up, right, So admitt something
to me? This means something to me, you know what
you mean? Ho cocad and eat his vitamins and say
his prayers you told me to do every night before

(34:34):
I went to bed. Miant something to me? Still real
to me. It's silly, it's it's nonsensical at times, but
it's also it makes for a cohesive story and a
character arc for Scena, Like after all these years, a
scene of overcoming seemingly insurmountable odds, that's it's like, damn,

(35:02):
that's it, okay, And again for that could probably work
for a movie. Some people would like that like kind
of not really ambiguous because it gave up, but like
there's quiet kind of ending and it's just like I
think that could come across maybe better in a movie,
but not in a live wrestling event in a live

(35:24):
setting on national television on a Saturday night, and everybody,
when you have a finish in wrestling, it's usually and
we've talked about this, it's like the end of a
rock concert where they just bang all this and it's like,
that's how it's supposed to be, supposed to be a
big bang, loud bangs over here, loud bangs over there,
and calamity, and then you had this climbactic ending one

(35:44):
two three, wha. That's usually when it happens. That's usually
when wrestling is great, right, Like people love that. So
I'm not an expert, but like people, I've seen that
a lot of times. That usually works for me. But
I like, you know what I'm saying. So the fact
that we just didn't get that climactic end to his

(36:05):
career his whole career apparently, well, we've had so many
climactic finishes in his career that scene is so good
at and he's been good at for twenty plus years,
and it's like, Okay, man, that's how you want to
do it. It don't make it good. It can still

(36:26):
be bad.

Speaker 3 (36:26):
Bro.

Speaker 1 (36:27):
It is yours, your it's your career. You can do
it if you want. But I don't mean it's good.
I'm sorry, and it could be a bad idea.

Speaker 2 (36:36):
That's the funny part where like I'm seeing people like, oh,
this is what Sina won in it, and it's like
that's fine, but it's again, it doesn't.

Speaker 1 (36:44):
Make it good, you know, like doesn't make it a
good idea.

Speaker 2 (36:48):
I can you know, go through my career and think like, Okay,
this is the way I want to end it, and
I'm entitled to that for you know, a great career, right,
But it also leaves the open to, you know, the
criticism where you know people aren't going to like that
you give up after you spent decades telling them not to.

(37:11):
Passing out is I think sends a stronger message too,
for whatever message you wanted to say, like it's okay,
I'm at peace now, I did my thing, I'm ready
to ready to move on. I think passing out tells
that in a stronger sense than just tapping out. Yeah,

(37:35):
and again, that's the art of wrestling, you know, like
the art of the finish. You know, we talked about
finishes a lot throughout the history of this podcast. You know,
the art of the finish and how how it means
so much that can during the course of a match,
you know, to tell a story, and then the finish
like makes everything makes sense right, And that's where I

(37:55):
think people will, including myself, like when we saw that finish,
it's like nothing made sense. And I think that's part
of the immediate reaction where it's like this didn't make sense,
what the hell? And then the more he goes like, Okay,
maybe he shouldn't have won. If people wanted him to win,
it's like, okay, maybe he shouldn't have won, but still
tapping out Man's that's the sticking point for me, and

(38:18):
I think a lot of other people that were fine
with him losing his last match. I didn't think he
was gonna win. I don't think it would have been
terrible for Gunther if if he did lose, But I
just I don't know where they with John Cena wanting
this to be like his last match, what he was stinking.

(38:39):
Everyone's like he loves pro wrestling, and I'm like, does
he really or like does he is this a movie
to him? You know? Like I know a lot of
the things are similar in wrestling and entertainment, but is
it like the best wrestling ending versus like you said,
like a Hollywood where he thinks he needs to tap

(39:01):
out to say, okay, I'm done with, Like what does
he want the free will to do that for his
character versus the free will to not do that where
he just gets choked out?

Speaker 1 (39:14):
You know.

Speaker 2 (39:14):
Like again, if we're talking about Hollywood, I still think
passing out is the better ending. I don't know where,
Like he's worked in Hollywood, I understand he probably knows
what people are saying there as a as a viewer
of these shows and movies throughout the years and TV shows,
I know what type of ending makes me feel the

(39:37):
most emotion. And it wasn't what happened a Saturday Night's
main event.

Speaker 1 (39:42):
There you have it. We're going to talk about the
beginning again of his main roster career in a sec.
But at the end let a little bit of desired unfortunately,
and I think people and honestly it's just a Michael
cosm of the year in total for John Cena as

(40:03):
we can now close the book on that too and
officially say that Johnson's retirement tour financially, I'm sure was
amazing for WW. I'm sure they sold a lot of shirts,
a lot of hats, a lot of towels, sold a
lot of tickets too, but creatively, dud ran out of gas,
ran out of gas. They barely filled it up with

(40:23):
good gas. Bro Remember the He'll turn that was in
the beginning of the year. We started out with a
half a tank.

Speaker 2 (40:32):
Is that the high point his heel turn because we
were it was okay, this is let's see where this goes.

Speaker 1 (40:38):
And it was definitely the most notable moment and probably
the high point. Definitely the high point of the heel
turn itself. But his match with Cody was pretty good
at SummerSlam. SummerSlam, the match up with Steampunk was okay, okay, yeah,
it's probably the high point omens.

Speaker 2 (41:01):
Yeah, couldn't matches. You know, I like the dom thing
as a little wrinkle, but it's not like the story
of the year, you know what I mean in terms
of like his tour. But I just remember after eliminates
the chamber, but we're like, okay, like let's go, Like
there were a few months there from like Survivor's series
to the Rumble, through the Rumble where we're like okay,

(41:21):
like okay, like look okay, like that's kind just what
we felt like and that felt like a kick that
like a kickstart. But dude, the follow up was brutal.

Speaker 1 (41:35):
Yeah, it was bad. It was. It was for the
most part bad. And I know some people think that, oh,
we should have never turned him here to begin with.

Speaker 2 (41:42):
I don't.

Speaker 1 (41:43):
I don't necessarily agree with that. I think you can
turn them here and you really could have had some
fun with it. They just decided not to, Like they
had to sell them shirts. Uh, And that's how that's
how it went. But despite all of that, at the
end of the day, the creative behind whatever they did
with Seees, he'll turn it. It was a bust. It

(42:05):
just it did not work, and that's a shame. I
feel like John Cena deserved better than this last year,
and whether he was all for it or not, it
sounds like he was, but I think it's still left
a lot to be desired. Unfortunately, he was so.

Speaker 2 (42:18):
Annoying hearing John Cena say I'll do whatever they want
and then like Triple A saying, oh that's whatever John wants.
It's like, is different, different freaking signals. The whole year
I didn't think helped. I don't think health at all.

Speaker 1 (42:32):
Stop passing the buck it's got to stop with somebody.

Speaker 2 (42:37):
Like John. John just like dictated it, and he's just like, oh,
I just do what I'm told. It's like, why don't
you just dictate it? At least we'll have one vision.

Speaker 1 (42:47):
If he had his his his way probably wouldn't been
that great because look at what happened. That's that nice
main event.

Speaker 2 (42:52):
True, True, wasn't that great? Unfortunately, So why wouldn't it
Why Why couldn't it have been the December twenty ninth
raw his last match? Why don't have to be a
Saturday night's main event? That wasn't even on NBC.

Speaker 1 (43:11):
Yeah, that was a Peacock exclusive, right.

Speaker 2 (43:13):
Yeah, And it's funny because it was on NBC and
I'm like, I don't think it is anymore.

Speaker 1 (43:18):
Yeah, it has to be, right, It's just you would
think that would have been, that would have been, that
would be a national TV affair for everybody to love
and everybody to view.

Speaker 2 (43:28):
Nope, that's frustrating because like it's just like, what is
going on? You know what I mean? Is it that
they're too worried about you know outside of WWE, you
know there, I know a lot of people in the
company are doing multiple tasks at the same time. Is
that a reason for the lack of structure and really

(43:50):
creative virtually the whole year? You know, like it is
it suffering because too many people are doing too many
things and this is what we're getting on TV. Just
you know that's a possibility.

Speaker 1 (44:08):
Maybe I don't know, man, But whatever the reason is,
it ain't it ain't good. Right now? We can talk
again more about that when we do our like year
in wrap up on episode four fifty to end the year.
But on four forty nine, we still have got a
deep dive to do, Nick, So you ready to dive deep?
Go back into time to June twenty seventh of two

(44:29):
thousand and two.

Speaker 2 (44:30):
I've got ruthless aggression.

Speaker 1 (44:35):
You sound like it's ain't it?

Speaker 2 (44:38):
But I should have.

Speaker 1 (44:40):
That is the sound that does the sound of a
ruthlessly aggressive man if I were to say so myself.
So let's go back to June twenty seven to two
thousand and two. SmackDown. Let's do it. The June twenty seventh,
two thousand and two edition of WWE s emanated from

(45:01):
the All State Arena and Rosemont, Illinois. If you ask
most wrestling fans Chicago even though it's rose My, Illinois,
technically a suburb of Chicago. I watched this before Saturday
Night's main event, but I watched it after, so we
have two different perspectives there. But you know, the fact

(45:24):
that John Cena's final year in pro wrestling was a
major storyline of WWE. Good or bad, Right, We've talked
about how bad it was, but just to begin with that,
the fact that he had that opportunity shows how far
he came since debuting in his very generic wrestling gear
back in two thousand and two. So in honor of

(45:46):
John Cena having wrestled his final match, we're going to
dive deep into the show when he of course debuted
on the main roster on the June twenty seventh edition
of SmackDown.

Speaker 2 (45:57):
I like that we're doing this show and not just
a match pick, because there were moments after the match
that you know, we can highlight as well. So I
like that we're doing the whole show.

Speaker 1 (46:07):
There's a lot to talk about on the whole show.
On our most recent deep dive, we did a show
later in the year, of course, the Survivor series from
two thousand and two, so that was November, so make
sure to go check that out. Our previous episode, which
was that was also a doozy back in the day
in two thousand and two, the first elimination chamber happening
at Survivor series in two thousand and two, and brock

(46:29):
Lesna dropping the title and Paul Hammond turning on him
is a whole complete mess. But while we know where
most of these characters are already headed, and I guess
that's the case where every deep dive for that matter,
this still serves up its own set of nostalgia because
I don't remember the last time I watched an episode
of WWETV from this time. Like I think we might

(46:52):
have done an episode of Raw from this time, right
or some I think we've done an episode.

Speaker 2 (46:58):
Of Raw to check our spreadsheets just so we can.

Speaker 1 (47:02):
But I know we haven't done a SmackDown we.

Speaker 2 (47:05):
Have, yeah, I don't think we have. Let's see, we've
got we've done raws I have it an alphabetic older
let's go, Okay, here we go. We've done two episodes
of two thousand and one Monday Night Raw and two
thousand and five, but nothing in O two for TV
and as far as Raw is concerned, Okay, this is

(47:26):
our first SmackDown Deep Dive.

Speaker 1 (47:29):
Yes, so very first SmackDown Deep Dive. So with that said,
it has been twenty three years since I have seen
the opening to SmackDown at this time, or actually the
original opener, the older let me rephrase that, the opener
of the show to begin with. Before the SmackDown opener,
you had the little water wrestling entertainment ye opener. I

(47:51):
don't know what you call that buffer or whatever. I
don't know either way. I just called the intro the intro,
the one that's always that's like the equivalent of for
fifty worldwide force like that one. But the two thousand
and two version of that. I haven't seen that since
two thousand and two, probably.

Speaker 2 (48:09):
Neither because I I using it. I did not pay
attention until the Like I just those are things I
never really paid attention to. After I grew up. I
was it was like the revolutionary force in sports entertainment,
and then they started getting like cute with it, and
I was just like, I don't care anymore. But they
had like all their shows in this intro, and I

(48:31):
took notes on it.

Speaker 1 (48:35):
Let's hear them.

Speaker 2 (48:36):
Oh okay, I thought you were gonna we were doing.

Speaker 1 (48:39):
If you notice any of them, I mean I saw
Velocity in there, I think, and heat, yeah, those WW properties.

Speaker 2 (48:47):
We also had w W bottom Line. You remember watching
w W bottom Line?

Speaker 1 (48:52):
What was bottom Line? I don't remember that.

Speaker 2 (48:54):
It replaced my favorite weekend Saturday morning show, Live Wire.

Speaker 3 (49:02):
Oh it was.

Speaker 2 (49:04):
I don't know if it was this if it was
on Saturday mornings, but uh, you know, I know they
switch some things around during this time period, but it would.
It aired from two thousand and two to two thousand
and five, so still broadcast international markets though. So yeah, dude,

(49:29):
this bottom Line program aired until twenty until this year.
And where the Philippines. Okay, that's crazy, which is wild?
Like we got Italy, South Africa like man bottom line?

Speaker 1 (49:46):
So is that like based off of Steve Austin's catchphrase?

Speaker 2 (49:49):
Absolutely?

Speaker 1 (49:51):
So the Rockets a main roster show. Steve Austin gets
to show that's not even like a like a b
recap show, so we get to recap show At.

Speaker 2 (49:59):
The bottom line.

Speaker 1 (50:01):
Was this theme song the theme music for the show.
We want to talk about some of the people he
wrestled with.

Speaker 2 (50:11):
I don't remember if I ever watched the show.

Speaker 1 (50:14):
Fair enough. I know, I've never heard of it until
right now.

Speaker 2 (50:17):
So so we had w W bottom line, so it
was w W What's funny here is that there was
also a show called w W E After Burne.

Speaker 1 (50:27):
I've heard. I do remember that that was another recap show.

Speaker 2 (50:31):
It was first SmackDown.

Speaker 1 (50:32):
Okay, so bottom line was for Raw and and after burn.

Speaker 2 (50:36):
I don't know if bottom line was well, yes, it
was for rall, yes, So bottom line was the recap
show for Raw. After Burne was the recap show for Spackdown.
The B program for Raw was Sunday Night He and
the B program for Spackdown was Velocity. So now we're
on the same page the w W after burn uh logo.

(50:56):
So where we're we're we already did the name change
and the logo change. It's WWE now, but they didn't
update the logo. There's a w WF after burn logo
in that open uh. And the only reason I noticed
it is because I think the phone rang or something
I was watching it, or something happened where I paused
the TV and I paused it right in the middle

(51:18):
of that of all those logos, and I was like, oh,
that's that's a good idea. I should do this more often.
I should pause it every you know, intro, just to
see what they have stuff I miss. But I saw
the they didn't change. They didn't update the w WF
after burn logo at this time, and we're already, you know,
a month and change into the name change, So I mean.

Speaker 1 (51:42):
Fun didn't realize yet. Maybe they did realize, because I'm
sure if they did, they would have immediately removed that logo.
So maybe they just snuck that one in and they
just didn't notice. But you better believe if the real
WWF found out, it would have been hell to pay. Okay,
I I don't.

Speaker 2 (52:00):
I should go back to Survivor series and watch the
intro to that see if they updated it by then.
But I wasn't paying attention to when we did the
Survivor series, So maybe I'll go back after this podcast.
There's also w experience.

Speaker 1 (52:14):
Yeah, what was that?

Speaker 2 (52:16):
Both raw and s backdown. I believe it took the
place of Confidential and We're confidential. It was on Saturday nights.

Speaker 1 (52:26):
I thought Confidential was so dope.

Speaker 2 (52:28):
It's like, oh, I love.

Speaker 1 (52:31):
Life.

Speaker 2 (52:32):
Yeah, what's funny is like I was in the middle
of my it wasn't even a sabbatical at this point.
But I was like very down on Like, even though
I liked the idea of a draft, I just I
wasn't feeling I guess it was I missed the Monday
Night war, you know, like I missed something else, and

(52:52):
it was just one thing, and I wasn't into it
as much in O two. So I didn't really if
the those types of shows, the proper respects, you know,
and Confidential, even though I liked the idea, I thought,
after like a few weeks, I was just well, it's
like a Saturday night, Like should I really tape? It's

(53:13):
like I don't really like I take a couple of them,
but not enough, you know. And but then like they
were talking about real life things and I would read
like recaps on the internet and I'm like, well, maybe
I should watch this, maybe I should tape it. But
I never really got into it, and it didn't last
very long. I don't think Confidential did.

Speaker 1 (53:33):
But I don't remember lasting very changed.

Speaker 2 (53:36):
Formats, you know, and I think this was the WW experience. Sorry, well,
I mean maybe Confidential ran longer than I thought, but
it more the insider type thing like Live Wire was
in the beginning. I think really I enjoyed that part
of it because it wasn't like they were airing matches either.
It was just like either a recap or like they

(53:58):
weren't airing new matches, and they were just like, hey, like,
you're not stupid as a viewer, so we're just going
to dive into this, and you're as a viewer like, yeah,
like treat me like I'm smart, you know, Like that's
what it felt like to me. And I'm still like
a teenager at the time, so I am smart, you know,
like I have the Internet. I know more about wrestling

(54:19):
than Jim ross Man. Come on, So you know this
show I didn't. I didn't watch Experience that much. But yeah,
ran only from May two thousand and four to September
two thousand and five in the US, but apparently continued
in international markets. And I think it's the final episode

(54:41):
aired in January twenty twenty, so it is officially not
going on anymore. Yes, So a lot of these shows
like because the international markets.

Speaker 1 (54:49):
Yeah, you got to go care of it.

Speaker 2 (54:50):
Yeah. In the US, like we just thought it was
over and done with.

Speaker 1 (54:55):
Apparently not, which is kind of wild. So this is
the stuff you come for on these deep dives is
talking about w W experience and after Burn. The only
thing I remember from those is after Burn. I remember
hearing about that, never really watched it, but yeah, bottom line,
I do remember Confidential, though, too Confidential. I feel like

(55:16):
this where they did the whole Steve Boston took his ball,
went home nonsense. It was on Confidential, which is wild.
He didn't even get buried on National TV. He got buried.

Speaker 2 (55:26):
Bro. Yeah, Jeff Rossberg and him too.

Speaker 1 (55:29):
Crazy didn't stab him right in the back. Boy, didn't
waste any time. Didn't waste any time. But it's also
been a while since I've heard the Beautiful People by
Marilyn Manson before a wrestling show. I probably heard it
in some other former fashion, but before a wrestling show.
It's been a while, I should say, But do you
recall uh this song at all? I guess you're taking

(55:50):
us to batical, so it's maybe more no sounding to
me because I didn't watch it every week.

Speaker 2 (55:54):
The I didn't really pay at this point when I
watched wrestling, I didn't really pay attention to the intros,
so the music like I didn't Uh yeah, I didn't
really pay attention to it.

Speaker 1 (56:07):
Oh man, you paid to the damn ropes though.

Speaker 2 (56:09):
I know, like even in ninety three, you know, like
like I got into those intros, but you know, as
a teenager, I was too cool to care about that.

Speaker 1 (56:19):
Apparently too cool for school. Not Scotty, too hotty Nick Kombe,
that's just too cool. Uh oh wow, I think that's
so funny. This is goofy. We're gonna look though, at
the stage for SmackDown, which is the SmackDown fist at
this time in two thousand and two, which goes without saying,

(56:41):
hell yeah, is an all timer, an all timer. Like
people still want WW to bring this back. I agree
with them, but you know they want a smaller stage now,
you know, so they can put more seats in there.

Speaker 2 (56:53):
But for the production, I'm sure it is.

Speaker 1 (56:57):
I'm sure you stead of hanging up panels of glass,
you know, and a fist in the arena, like yeah,
that's I'm sure that's easier. But like for the nostalgia purposes,
like I know they did, what did they do like
the twenty fifth anniversary SmackDown a couple of years ago.
I should have brought back the fist for that sh right. Hell,
I know they didn't. But if they for the thirtieth
Anniversity in a couple of years, bring back and I

(57:19):
know that wasn't even the original stage, bring back the
old stage, the old time, bring that back too. But
like I feel like they should lean in more into
those old stages, especially that that fist man with breaking
breaking through the glass. That was fire. That was hard.

Speaker 2 (57:33):
It's all times what I didn't appreciate it back then.
I really didn't.

Speaker 1 (57:37):
Man, No, I appreciated it back then. I appreciate you
SmackDown Fist stage just so you know, but no, that
was an all timer, man. That was classic. And it's
just it's just a cool idea with the fist breaking
through the glass. Like just creative stuff going on back
in those days. You just don't get no more in
these days and times we're living in. Besides John Cena

(57:59):
debuting on the show, what else do we have on
this edition of SmackDown, well, debut technically technically yeah, N
ring debut. We will talk about that. Uh, well, let's
talk about it now. We got, for one, we got
the main event is Chris Jericho going against Hulk Hogan,
but we got the N ring debut, also of Bud

(58:20):
Tista n ring main roster debut on the same show
that John Cena also makes.

Speaker 2 (58:29):
I didn't realize that, dude, my mind is blown.

Speaker 1 (58:33):
We just totally forget about that.

Speaker 2 (58:34):
Yep.

Speaker 1 (58:35):
Also, Randy Orton is also on this show, so you
get John Cena, Batista, and Randy Orton. In three years,
they're at the top of the card. Uh and their
main event in WrestleMania pretty much. I know it would
necessarily wasn't in the main event at WrestleMania twenty one,
but he's also went against the Undertake. At WrestleMania twenty one.
He went one on one with the Undertake, which is

(58:57):
a pretty pretty much a main event. So they all
funny enough, all three of them have faced Undertaker at WrestleMania,
even though seeing his match was like thirty seconds but
nothing to write home about. But it happened. Did happen?
But the show starts with Vince McMahon already in the ring.
We got Michael Cole and Taz on the call. Great

(59:18):
underrated team. I think in some people's eyes as far
as announcer teams, Michael Cole Tas had really good chemistry together.
They would really I think really worked really well together
as a team back in the day. But we got
Vince in the ring and he introduces Kurt Angle, who
is still wearing the wig and the headgear at this time.

(59:39):
Also something I did not know because usually the only
thing you see from this show is seen his debut,
and by that time Kurt Angle is, you know, rocking
the baldy. But when he first came out, he stood
the wig in the head gear. But he gets rid
of that, okay.

Speaker 2 (59:55):
And the funny part is this is what a week
after kicking the ring or like less than a week
after kicking the ring of that year where Kurt you know,
some of his matches that way comes off and he's like, ah,
just crambling to get it. So I yeah, I completely
over my head that this was the show that he

(01:00:15):
ditched that for good.

Speaker 1 (01:00:17):
Same same So we have our format for this week,
same format we've always had, you know, best match of
the night, worst match, best non wrestling happening, worst non
wrestling happening, hidden gems, best spot, worst spot, my dog spot,
random thoughts, the whole thing. But the order can change, right,
We don't have to have a rigid formula rigid format

(01:00:40):
where we follow the same exact path every time. Let's
change it up a little bit. Let's start with the
best non wrestling happening, because damn it, we know what
we're here for. It's John Cena's debut. But before John
Cena's debut, we got Kurt Angle, right, who's still again
wearing a wig in the headgear because he was shaved
bald by Edge at Judgment Day. We've done a deep

(01:01:01):
dive on that that's also hilarious. You can talk. You
can listen to that podcast and the archives as well
from my Judgment Day two thousand and two deep dive
where Edge is chasing Kurd Angle around the building trying
to cut his.

Speaker 2 (01:01:12):
Hair and he eventually got it episode ninety five.

Speaker 1 (01:01:16):
There you go, so go check that out. But as
a result, Edge eventually catches up with him, shaves him bald,
and now Kurt Angle is so embarrassed that he's bald
that instead of rocking the body, you know, just letting it,
you know, the skin out of his head, you know
what I'm saying, let it all hang out. Instead, he's
wearing the headgear with the wig, and it's an obvious wig.
It's terrible too, pay that he's got strapped down by

(01:01:38):
the wrestling.

Speaker 2 (01:01:39):
It doesn't even look like his original hair too, Like.

Speaker 1 (01:01:43):
It's so bad, but he still got it. But he
was wearing it at the King of the Ring when
he made Hank Hogan tap out.

Speaker 2 (01:01:51):
How about that?

Speaker 1 (01:01:53):
How how apropos that we're talking about Hogan tapping out
the same time that we're talking about Sea never giving
up right and he gave So I guess it's okay.
You know Hogian did it. I guess seeing they could
do it too. But kurd Angle says he is the
poster boy for ruthless aggression. About that, which is a
term that Vince McMahon coined pretty much after Steve Austin left,

(01:02:16):
I think, like, I need new guys, because he was right,
he needed new guys. Austin was gone, the Rocks was
in and out with Hollywood. So you got Brock and
Triple H and Undertake. You got some guys, but they
clearly needed some new guys. And this is pretty much
the show where we started seeing some new guys, which
is kind of wild again in hindsight. But because kurd

(01:02:38):
Angle made Hogan tap he's got his groove back. Y'all.
He filling himself and the confidence is through the roof,
and he's like, you know what, I don't even need
this wig no more and takes off the wig. He
snatches his own wig. Consider it snatched. It's that I'm
going bald. I'm going on at you out. As a
matter of fact, with my newfound confidence, I'm challenging anybody.

(01:02:59):
Anybody in the back, want to come try to wrestle me,
Come high at me. I'm standing right here. Everyone seems
shook apparently right.

Speaker 2 (01:03:08):
It's like a little bit, you know, long for this.
That's what happened.

Speaker 1 (01:03:12):
It took a while, okay. And also you can go
down the roster of all the people he could have
who could have answered the challenge, and everybody was like
mm hmm, I'm good.

Speaker 2 (01:03:22):
No worthless aggression here, No, not from them.

Speaker 1 (01:03:25):
But the one person that does come out after some anticipation,
it's John Cena who walks out. Well, you didn't know
it's John Cena. You just heard Marilond Manson's song The
Beautiful People again. That was Johnsena's first theme song. I
guess technically, and out walks John Cena in this generic wrestling.

Speaker 2 (01:03:42):
Gear and thank god they Michael Cole said John Cena,
because do you remember what his name was in OVW.

Speaker 1 (01:03:53):
The prototype.

Speaker 2 (01:03:54):
Yeah, yeah, if that was, if that carried over to
the main roster, he would not be He would not
have had the career he did.

Speaker 1 (01:04:04):
No, I don't think so. I don't think so. I
think yeah, I think he would have been. He would
have been in some trouble and me he kind of
was as John seen it got fired. That's how the
story goes till Stephane McMahon saved his job, but he
was on his way out, so he was in trouble regardless.

Speaker 2 (01:04:20):
But I guess he was the prototype.

Speaker 1 (01:04:23):
I guess. Michael Cole sounded like he's already familiar with
seeing his game, even though seeing it like created wrestler
number seven.

Speaker 2 (01:04:32):
In real life, and you know I'm watching I don't
remember if I watched this live, if I did tape it,
I think I ticked over it at some point, but
I was also not taping weekly anymore toward this time.
So again you said it like a career created wrestler

(01:04:54):
type thing, and it's just like, why am I supposed.

Speaker 1 (01:04:56):
To care about this guy?

Speaker 2 (01:04:59):
He's just didn't didn't hit me at all.

Speaker 1 (01:05:09):
Say that last part one time, Nick, I'm sorry I
miss it.

Speaker 2 (01:05:12):
Just didn't hit me at all, Like it didn't strike
me as something that was about to be as important
as it was.

Speaker 1 (01:05:19):
Yeah, I agree with you. First sight was like just
a guy, even though he's in tremendous shape, right, got
a strange haircut, but looks just like a guy. And
again he was in great shape, but like so many
other people were as well. It wasn't like he's the
only one with muscles back in two thousand and two.

Speaker 2 (01:05:39):
But I'd already seen brock lesnar By this one.

Speaker 1 (01:05:41):
It's like it's just massive.

Speaker 2 (01:05:43):
And I hated him at the time, so you know,
I didn't respect him, so I wasn't a brock lesnar respector.

Speaker 1 (01:05:50):
Back respector that's a new one for for the audience.
But yeah, no, doesn't seem like he had any bells
or whistles. Abottom didn't even have his own song. But
there he is in the ring with an Olympic gold
medalist and Kurt Angle's like, who the hell are you, sir,

(01:06:10):
which is a good question because I didn't know who
he was when I've watched this when I was a kid,
and who's this dude, like just a guy.

Speaker 2 (01:06:17):
I didn't even pay attention to developmental back then, Like.

Speaker 1 (01:06:21):
They didn't have it on TV, and there wasn't the
accesses wasn't there, like we.

Speaker 2 (01:06:25):
The only thing we had. I don't even know if
they had a website at the time for that specifically.
I would just hear pit some pieces on Message sports,
And I don't even remember if I heard about John Cena.

Speaker 1 (01:06:37):
I know, for me, at where I've been thirteen at
this time, ain't no way. I didn't even I probably
didn't even know what OVW was, Like I might have
heard of it here and there, but I didn't know
it was like developing talent down there, yeah, you know
for the next generation. I didn't know Batista was until
he came out as with as Deacon Batista. And I
didn't know Randy Orton until the Randy News Network. Okay,

(01:06:59):
and the same thing for mister Sena here had no idea,
just a guy and Kurt Angles graad and mopped the
floor with him, right well presumably presumably, but John Cena
says his name, So I'm John Cena, and I'm here
because I got you know, Vince coached him up to see.

Speaker 3 (01:07:21):
It that way.

Speaker 2 (01:07:23):
I want the footage of that Vince calling from the
chest ruthless and Sina doing it like eight times.

Speaker 1 (01:07:32):
Yeah, there you go. You got it. Now you're ready.
You gotta be champion one day because you follow my direction.

Speaker 2 (01:07:37):
Probably doing it right before he comes out to like
not even like before this show goes on the air.
It's like when Vince goes in the back and then
angles in the ring alone, and that's why they start
doing it.

Speaker 1 (01:07:48):
Look, and then he got out there and felt it
because he says the line and slaps the taste out
of Kurt Angle and off we go to now to
the match of the night, Yes, which I don't you
have a best Did you have another thing here for
best non wrestling happening?

Speaker 2 (01:08:03):
By the way, Uh, technically my best non wrestling happening
was after the batch with the Angle refusing to shake
his hand. I thought that was very funny, and then
after the commercial Undertaker backstage shaking his hand. So I
liked that juxtaposition, you know, is that the right word?

Speaker 1 (01:08:19):
I'm gonna have that? I had that as well as
like a continuation of least the backstage interaction. Yeah, we've
seen it. Necessarily the handshake or lack thereof.

Speaker 2 (01:08:28):
But the beginning was great with Kurt, you know, Dot
Ditch and the wig and everything, Like I thought the
prombo was real good. But yeah, and obviously my matchup
that I too, because it was a lot better than
I remember. I think I've watched this maybe like a
handful of times through the years. I don't think I
gave it the proper attention that I did for this podcast,

(01:08:51):
and a lot better that I thought that I remember
it being. Yeah, I mean just like crowd involvement even too,
like I just knowing you know what scene it became,
and then you could see like you know, bits and
pieces here and there of him putting it together, and

(01:09:12):
just like the quickness he had. I wrote in my notes,
this is the quickest John and seen it match I've
ever seen, just in terms of him moving.

Speaker 1 (01:09:19):
Around out You didn't kick out four or five times needed.

Speaker 2 (01:09:23):
Like yeah, like he's moving quick. You know. This is
what I loved about this era. It's like it's not
and this is what I dislike about today is like
everything is so slow a plotting where we don't need that,
you know, like the viewers not slow enough to process
like not able to process what you're trying to tell
in a match, Like you could work quicker, Like you

(01:09:45):
could tell stories a little bit quicker, like give us
more credit. And I felt like that, like this pace
was great, and it really it was up and down
the card this show, like all the matches seemed pretty
pretty fast paced, and I love that. I love that
because it doesn't look fake to me when it's fast paced,
So it doesn't look fake to me, you know, like

(01:10:06):
seeing it working that quick with Kurt Angle, I thought
it was like an eye opener a little bit that
I didn't I wasn't a respector back then.

Speaker 1 (01:10:15):
Not the respector again. It sounds like a job title.
But to your point, I feel like we've talked about
this before, and I don't know if a lot of
people are mentioning this just you know, around the diaspora source.
I don't know what you want to call it, the
cognizanity of pro wrestling in that I'm making up stuff now,

(01:10:40):
the just just the culture, let's say, the culture of
pro wrestling, and just how the people, you know, the pundits.
We don't really talk about how the pace has slowed
down quite a bit over the years. Uh, and you
look at two thousand and two and everybody's going boom boom, boom, fast, fast, fast,
and it's five minute match, and they get a lot
into these five minute matches, and look they don't have

(01:11:01):
I know, like you know, Raw was three hours for
many years and SmackDown is apparently going back to three hours. Boy,
but you still have the same amount of time today.
But like you said, the matches feel like they just
don't have the same pacing to them as they did
back in these days. But regarding Sina, you see why
he was a top prospect in WWE's developmental system. Like

(01:11:23):
he's in great shape, he's clearly got great stamina, he's athletic,
and he could keep up with Kurt Angle. This is
Kurt Angle bro in his prime. Granted he's you know,
probably a couple of neck surgeries in already, but like
this is Kurt Angle though, man, Like he's about to
be the world champ, He's about a main event WrestleMania
next year. So we're not talking about past prime, no,

(01:11:44):
you know, coming out of the prime. He's very much
still in his prime. And John Cena had a great
TV match with him, wasn't live, you know, in front
of everybody, but it was still on television and he
kept up. And I know people used to chant, you
can't wrestle at Sena, but that was never really the
case for him, Like that was never the case. He

(01:12:05):
always had it. It's just how he used it.

Speaker 2 (01:12:08):
Yeah, it was more like you won't wrestle, you know,
it's kind of how we figured it out, Like you
don't need to, you know, like Haul Coogan didn't need
to wrestle, you know what I mean. Uh, you know,
it's and it's funny where like I'm looking at the
Vest's bords and I'm reading this stuff and I'm like, yeah,
you know what, they're right, Like he he's doing all

(01:12:28):
these same the same stick and all that, and like
the moves look stupid. I don't like it. So I
don't like John Cena. And for years, you know, it
was like that. But like you you don't realize that
it's by design. It's not because you know, these wrestlers
can't do it. It's because they've been told not to
because it's either not necessary for the company's sake, or

(01:12:53):
you know, it's it's just not the story they want
to tell.

Speaker 1 (01:12:57):
Right, And in this match. See, it was supposed to
keep up with Olympic gold medalist, so he had to
wrestle in order to do that, and he did that
in spades on this match. And yeah, it was clear
from this match alone, looking man that John Cenese Kid's
gonna might be a star one day. I think he
might have something there, and that John Cena kid, he's
looking like a top prospect. And here we are, a

(01:13:19):
seventeen time world champion and WW is the greatest of
all time quote unquote. But I didn't think he was
watching the greatest of all time. But you can tell
like superstar in the making from day one.

Speaker 2 (01:13:33):
Yeah, I wish I looked at it that way then,
But for me, like we're coming out of the Attitude era,
no night tro so it's I'm in a lull where
nothing's really grabbing me and wrestling anymore, and I'm looking
at this and I'm just like, oh yeah, sure, like yeah,
he's gonna be the face of w in the future.

(01:13:54):
Yeah right, you know, like that's probably how I felt
deep down. I remember watching the these shows through the weeks,
like Raw and SmackDown and just not being interested in
any of it, and it wasn't really anything going on
in my personal life that may me not care about
wrestling or watching it. It was like, literally, none of
these are like the way it was either the Attitude era.

(01:14:17):
You know, I wasn't considering the wrestling I fell in
love with growing up. When I'm a teenager, I'm just like, oh,
it's not like the Attitude Era. So and more and
more people of my more and more of my peers
are just not watching anymore because it's the Attitude Era
coming to an end. The Rock is going to Hollywood,
stone Hold's gone. Like I don't have anyone to really

(01:14:40):
talk to it about. Not like I talked to a
bunch of people about it, but you know, people that
I liked interacting with were just not watching wrestling anymore.
So that was I think part of it as well,
where I'm like, Okay, what am I doing still watching it?
Like should I still be watching it? And I'm getting
into you know, the flyers and the sixers and the
goals more, you know, through that the course of high

(01:15:02):
school where I'm paying more attention to the sports in
Philly than i am pro wrestling in general, and so
a lot of a lot of why I looked at
it that way can be probably traced to that. And
so I'm seeing like John's seen at cardan Angle and
you know, the whole like, oh, like seeing the Undertaker

(01:15:23):
shake his hand I thought was so stupid back then.
I really did. I'm like, you're not gonna sell me
on some random dude that I don't know, Like, you're
not gonna sell me on it. Damn it.

Speaker 1 (01:15:33):
It's not gonna work, Vince. I don't care how many
people shake his hand, but it's clear. And this goes
back to the you know, continuation of the best non
wrestling happening that you know when they have after the match,
when Sina loses the match, what does he lose? No,
here's what happens. Kurd Angle says, I'm done with this, okay,
because Sina was giving Kurt Angle everything he could handle.

(01:15:53):
Kard Angles frustrated and he said enough and just grabs Scena,
throws him face person into the map, rolls him up
into a pen. So he just get the hell out
of there. He's like, you know what, I'm sure there's
nothing Sena could have actually done in real life about it. Neither,
Like if Kurdaninger wanted to be done with it. He's
going to be done. I'm pinning you right now. So

(01:16:14):
it looked kind of real.

Speaker 2 (01:16:14):
In that way. Nobody could have got out of that,
by the way, No, that's like that's.

Speaker 1 (01:16:19):
Kurt Angle, bro. He cooked you on that one. But
it was a good way of putting Sena over while
also beating him. And there's an art to that. He
gave Kurt Angler everything he could and Kurt Angle went
to desperate measures to finally get beat him and get
out of there. Right so, and Kurt Angle is an
Olympic gold medalist, so he's he's playing around the whole time.
But then he had to realize I got to stop

(01:16:40):
playing with him. I gotta beat him now and get out.
So put him over when you did that. So they
clearly had plans for John Cena because after the match,
you know everyone is giving him respect or Kishi for Ruke,
Billy Kidman. You know all these guys undertake the kipping there,

(01:17:01):
why Billy Kidmen here? But you know the Undertaker comes
up and he's the undisputed champion and he's a heel,
and it comes up to Sena, it sticks his hand down,
gives him a shakes his hand and gives him an
endorsement like, yeah, kid, good job. I'll be beating your
wrestling innion and you're twenty twenty eighteen. You don't know
it yet, but it's gonna happen, kid, And I'm already

(01:17:22):
gonna be done with my streak by then. You're not
gonna take my streak. It'll just be a nothing match.
See you in about sixteen years, kid. But when you
have people doing that, clearly they got plans for him,
and it was clear with Sina. So if anybody was
surprised that he became at least a main inventor, you

(01:17:44):
shouldn't have been, because on this night they were setting
the tone with like, yeah, we're gonna do some things
for him. Be on the lookout.

Speaker 2 (01:17:51):
It took a while, it did, and that's what I
was gonna say. They gave him three years to figure
it out, basically, like figure out how you're gonna become
the face of this.

Speaker 1 (01:18:00):
Look he was about to get fired too. Now it
wasn't like he was. They put him on a magic
carpet rodstick to the top. There's a story that you
know he was rapping and Stephan McMahon heard him, and
it was like, just do that on TV. And here
we are twenty some odd years later, the quote unquote
greatest of all time.

Speaker 2 (01:18:17):
You should have rapped while he was being choked out,
passed out, rapping.

Speaker 1 (01:18:22):
Stop rapping this load of game. He love a game.
He load of bars even while you're passing out from
gonther love a game, man, gotta love it. Let's move on.

Speaker 2 (01:18:36):
To by the way down in that match, like the
quick pins, you know, krdangle kick it out and then
Senia just pinning him again cardangle kick it out. Seen
it coming for the quick pin again. Uh, we don't
see that enough nowadays. We see it like once in
a while. But like that is also pro wrestling. That's
smart and logical and not someone kicking out and staring

(01:18:58):
at you staring at the camera for like minute shocked
like oh god. And people like criticize Shaw Michaels for
being the one to like kind of introduce that because
the whole the Rick Flair stuff. But I don't. It's
like a it's happening everywhere now, happens at aw every
other place. I don't know why it's so popular now,

(01:19:20):
but I hate it. Man, Go do the logical things,
like not every they do it in mid card matches.
It's like, we don't need that in a mid card
matches like main events. Like I guess I understand it
to build the drama, but you don't need it as
across every single match to like just today's wrestling. Man,
that's just one added thing that I don't like about

(01:19:41):
the way wrestling is today. It's like if someone kicks
out after you hit him with a big move, go
pin him again and see if they can kick out again,
and like use all that effort and just like be exhausted,
and then after three pen attempts, then you're exhausted because
you know, like they're kicking out and you're like, oh,
what do I have to do now? And like that
it makes more sense than just after one kickout looking

(01:20:03):
at the camera with his big shocked face like ah
it is.

Speaker 1 (01:20:07):
It has become or it has become a bit of
a bit formulaic when like you said, they kick out
and then look into the camera. When you can point
it out to that extent, and I, like you said,
it happens in every company, at least in AW and WWE.
It gets a little repetitive and You're right, it has
like that sense of urgency when you kind of a
little bit of desperate race when you're trying to do
it three consecutive times. Doesn't make sense though, I don't

(01:20:29):
know if it makes sense, like if you kicked out here,
it's probably gonna kick out again. But I do like
when you see people are urgent into the pen, yes,
and not like a drag themselves. Oh no, it's like, oh,
I'm trying to I'm trying to get this win as
soon as I possibly can.

Speaker 2 (01:20:45):
And it is explainable, you know, if you're like trying
to be like, okay, well you exert energy kick it out,
so you're gonna have to exert more kick it out
a second time, and stuff like that. So like, at
least in pro wrestling, lower it makes sense.

Speaker 1 (01:20:58):
Can make it make sense. And let's move on to
the worst match of the evening from June twenty seven
to two thousand and two or somewhere around there, because
of course this was not live, it was taped back then.
But Nick, what was your worst match of the night
from this episode of SmackDown.

Speaker 2 (01:21:15):
I hate to do with to him, but I did
not enjoy land Storm versus Mark Henry.

Speaker 1 (01:21:20):
I could not agree more.

Speaker 2 (01:21:23):
Brutal for Mark to lose that one. But this match
also included by top Spot of the night as well.

Speaker 1 (01:21:30):
Okay, so hold on, we got to acsect the table
for this because this is kind of wild and hindsight.
They it really has nothing to do with the match itself.
The match itself was fine, but they showed Mark Henry
being the strongest man in the world, in the entire world.

(01:21:52):
They sent Mark Henry to what was it? It was
like a body building like.

Speaker 2 (01:21:58):
Saddlebrook, New We're in New Jersey.

Speaker 1 (01:22:02):
Yeah, They cut to a video of him at an
event where he's trying to lift a one hundred and
seventy two pound dumb bell, a dumb bell that is
just compact with one hundred and seventy two pounds weight,
not a person, but a dumb bell, and he listed
up with one hand in Saddlebrook, New Jersey doing it

(01:22:26):
at a strong Man Barbell Association dinner, and they showed
him being the strongest person in the world. Bro just
for him to turn around and lose to Lance Storm.

Speaker 2 (01:22:40):
From like a drop kick? Was it a dropkick?

Speaker 1 (01:22:43):
I don't even it doesn't even matter it should it
should have been like a weapon. It should have been
a gun, bro, That's how That's the only way lance
Storm should lose to Mark Henry in a fight unless
lance Storm brought a gun to a fistfight. That's the
only way. What And they had people backing up marketing. Yo,
he's strong, like at the at the Dumbedelle Association. Then

(01:23:05):
the man, he's one of the strongest people I've nen't
seen in my life. Wow, I can't believe this awesome
feet I just witnessed in front of me. No one
can and has ever done this ever, he just made history.
He's the strongest man, not only now, but ever, no
one has ever been stronger than him. And then Landstorm

(01:23:25):
comes beats him with like a sidekick or something crazy,
just to get the Canadian guys over.

Speaker 2 (01:23:33):
Yes, because the same thing happened with like test right,
Like it's just like America sucks and it's just like
this is the I guess the birth of the Americans.

Speaker 3 (01:23:41):
I don't know if they were Americans, yes they were,
but well not say this time, no, this is the
formation of it this time. Yeah, so okay, like why
so later on in.

Speaker 1 (01:23:52):
The show we get Rikishi versus test, which was also
terrible and in its qualification. But people got a stink
face from so I guess they were happy about that.

Speaker 2 (01:24:03):
Yeah, I mean at.

Speaker 1 (01:24:04):
Face in two thousand and two. See the stink face
was worth a price of admission. Apparently, that's just how
we much we loved it. People still talk about the
stink face, by the way, who don't always watch wrestling,
and they were, oh, I remember Rakeshi. He give people
the stink face, like they still remember. That's why he's
in the Hall of Fame. Honestly should be in there,
were too cool, But he is in the Hall of

(01:24:24):
Fame because he's to give people to stink face. Bro,
he's a great wrestler. I think Rakeshi's a I think
Keshi is a fan. I'm a fan of his. I
think you know, he deserves the spot. I'm not trying
to take anything away from him, but this was the
run of his career.

Speaker 2 (01:24:37):
We all know he wasn't going to be inducted in
the Hall of Fame as making a difference Fatu or
headshrinker Fatu. He was just not. He's not in the
Hall of Fame part of the headshrinkers, just because the
wild Spots were inducted, but the head Strikers were like
tack team champions once, so maybe that would have got
been enough.

Speaker 1 (01:24:56):
But he's not in the he's inkishi bro.

Speaker 2 (01:24:59):
Yeah yeah, so no benefits out there.

Speaker 1 (01:25:05):
So people came to see the stink face. He made
a lot of money doing the stink face and it
look again, people still talking about it twenty some ody
years later. It left an impression on people and their faces.

Speaker 2 (01:25:16):
I won if like you're the usso's or like Roman
Reigns sat at home watching that as kids and be
like if I want to make it a wrestling and
I'm gonna have to do that, like like if that
if who even knows if they wanted to be wrestlers
back then, but like he.

Speaker 1 (01:25:30):
Was paying the bills, I guess. But yes, after that,
Christian and Landstorm help test and in the next segment
they all get together. They're all the Canadian guys together
and they formed the un Americans.

Speaker 2 (01:25:44):
Because Berica sucks.

Speaker 1 (01:25:47):
Yeah that's what that's what they believe. So yeah, there's that.
They did that in the wake of of course like
nine to eleven and very patriotic time in the history
of out country. So they apparently didn't want that heat.
I don't think Christian wanted to do that, right. I
think that's the story, is that he was opposed to that,
especially at this time.

Speaker 2 (01:26:07):
I think he lived in America. I think they.

Speaker 1 (01:26:13):
Maybe Lanstone still lived in Calgary. I don't know him.
I can't put that past them, But yeah, I don't know's.
It didn't last long, it didn't do well, it didn't
even make it to WrestleMania. So I don't think no,
because Christian was doing the whole DDP thing by WrestleMania. No,
this is this is already two thousand and two, So
no two thousand and three. I don't know what these
guys did at WrestleMania two thousand and three. I think

(01:26:35):
about it. Who the hell cares, I guess. But I
agree with you on that. But do we agree on
I have? Oh, I have other things as far as
best non wrestling happening as well. I can go back
to that.

Speaker 2 (01:26:55):
So in that match, by my top spot of the night, Oh,
I do have Mark Henry throwing Storm from the outside
of the ring to the inside. I thought was really
well well done. There's really no better. Maybe you can
find a spot and see it versus angle that other spots.
I liked just the spot of that happening. I was like, oh, Mark,

(01:27:15):
Henry is going to kill him and then he lost.

Speaker 1 (01:27:18):
Oh actually I did not have other spots. I think
I just kind of for four wins spots on this
one and just went to the matches. But I don't
I'll go with I agree with you. That was.

Speaker 2 (01:27:34):
Spots on TV shows are pretty hard to spin.

Speaker 1 (01:27:40):
I guess, yes, it's just a TV show and not
a pay per view, but I'll go I agree with
you on that. That was a pretty cool thing that
they did back in time.

Speaker 2 (01:27:49):
I just thought like Henry was going to kill Storm
at that point. I was like.

Speaker 1 (01:27:53):
Showcasing how strong he is. He can throw a human
being from floor level up in the air.

Speaker 2 (01:28:00):
Well, he might have hit the ropes, but still.

Speaker 1 (01:28:02):
Like then he can't pen this man to the mat one,
two three, he got.

Speaker 2 (01:28:07):
Beat mm hmmmm mmmmm.

Speaker 1 (01:28:12):
After they showed that video.

Speaker 2 (01:28:14):
Right, That's what I'm saying, Like, I was like, oh,
I forgot they pushed Mark Kennery as well, and I
was like, oh, wait, they didn't.

Speaker 1 (01:28:21):
They pushed him to go ahead and be strong, and.

Speaker 2 (01:28:27):
Then like a year later he's with Teddy Long on
a raw with Nathan Jones and everything like trash.

Speaker 1 (01:28:33):
I did not expect watching that videos like man, yeah,
Like I'm like, you're like, man, Mike Kenry about to
tell lancetorm Limb from Limb right because they showcase how
strong he is, one of the strongest people that ever lived.
Oh he lost. There's that and that's the end of that.
Uh it's terrible. Yep. I do have the best non

(01:28:58):
wrestling happening, Like I said, besides seen it was the
Undertaker's promo at one point where Kurt Angle comes out
and demands a championship match Undertaker. It's like, hey, man,
we could do this right now, because Kurt Angle wanted
to wanted to do it next week, but he had

(01:29:18):
a let's do this right now. Also, I should say
that until you announced that the Rock is coming back
July eleventh, so maybe you know in case you're interested.
But but right, why does he know that? Why does
he deliver that news? But Kurt Angle's like, hey, I
want to tie the match next week Undertakers. Hey, let's
let's do it right now. And it was like, well,

(01:29:40):
I just had a match, so I'm not ready. So
undertakers like, well, you just almost got beat by a rookie,
so whatever, I'll take your match. Angle asked is like,
hey man, can I kind of like touch the championship?
Can I put a hand on it just to just
to touch it? And this is like undertakers like, this
is close. You'll ever come to it? Ha ha. And

(01:30:02):
then Kurt Angle won it by the war rumble.

Speaker 2 (01:30:05):
But also him tossing it back to the Undertaker put
him in the alcolock. Maybe laugh there it is, that's
real funny. Slapped then for a second, yeah, real.

Speaker 1 (01:30:14):
Fast, because you can't have an Undertaker tapping out obviously,
Kerlingo's got to run away, scurry away.

Speaker 2 (01:30:23):
But let's move on to before the Undertaker puts his
title on the line against Jeff Hardy and a ladder
match on Raw, because remember we had we have a
traveling undisputed champion. Yeah, it's possible going from Raw to
spack Down. Do Raw to smack Down.

Speaker 1 (01:30:43):
Look, they got people appearing on both shows today. What's
the difference the champion had to do it. They're only
wrestling twice a week, yep, they don't do house shows.
I feel like it's more feasible now to have a
traveling champion than it was definitely in two thousand and
two when they're doing the house shows and everything else.
So I understand it then, but now, like you're telling me,

(01:31:03):
if you want a one champion, Cody can't appear on
Raw Intimact, that can't it go Monday and Friday on
his bus? Come on, man, come on, man, Now we
got two champions for what? For? What? For see? I'm punk,
I don't I don't know, man, But that was the

(01:31:24):
best non wrestling happenings. What about the worst nick.

Speaker 2 (01:31:31):
This bathing suit thing, yeah, Tory Wilson bikini showcase multiple times. Yeah,
and then the Stacey Keebler trying to steal her spotlight
and then Don Marie coming out. I was just like,
this is how they even though so I will say,
I look back on this era of wrestling, the ruthless

(01:31:54):
aggression era, I think I like a lot compared to uh,
you know, the attitude era and even the New generation.
I know, I know, it's crazy, right, I love this
era a lot. This was just like, couldn't they have
done something better with these women? And unfortunately they couldn't.

Speaker 1 (01:32:21):
They had no other ideas, but to trot them out
multiple times and look. Granted, Tory Wilson was looking good,
but like, come on, man, yeah, come on, that's all.
That's it. She looked good now, but she came out
multiple times just to look good. That's all she could offer.

Speaker 2 (01:32:37):
It's like the matches were they didn't put any effort
into like producing the matches either. It's like, I'm sure
the women wanted to go out have good matches when
they wrestled, but it was like they just weren't given
the opportunity.

Speaker 1 (01:32:49):
Yeah. Seeing hearing Tony Chimmel talk about Tory Wilson as
she's walking across the stage is like, ah, oh, I
don't want to hear him talk about her. Uh it
was wild out.

Speaker 2 (01:33:00):
Speaking of marine comes out, I have something on him
later on? Oh boy, nothing like crazy, just funny.

Speaker 1 (01:33:07):
How So Stacey Keebler comes out with the school girl
outfit remember when those were all the rage and they yeah,
probably still are and it's like why, yeah, tell me
why you like the school girl outfit there, sir, what
do you mean by that? Because that was hello popular

(01:33:28):
it was We lived through it the late nineties when
that became popular. Man, that said a lot.

Speaker 2 (01:33:35):
About us, spears man, it says a lot about.

Speaker 1 (01:33:40):
Us as a society. Boy, it's grown men too.

Speaker 2 (01:33:45):
School was saying like, like I remember eighth grade watching
the Britney Spears video, heard the school girl outfit, and
it's like, oh, like sure, but like when you're all
an old man, like a little weird.

Speaker 1 (01:34:00):
You know.

Speaker 2 (01:34:02):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:34:04):
But elsewhere in Terrible Land, Jamie Noble pimping out idiots
to Jerry go on, baby, give them my kids, give
them a taste.

Speaker 2 (01:34:16):
Wow, you do that so well, man, Like I heard
you and like I'm visualizing the scene in my head.
I was like, yeah, I can visualize it. As you said.

Speaker 1 (01:34:30):
That's what I'm here for. I'm here to paint a picture.
I'm here for the spirit of the thing, you know,
for the performance. A lot of game. Nick, I love
a game, all right, go and get them girl.

Speaker 2 (01:34:43):
That was my worst spot, by the way, it's just
uh DiDio given to Jerry her Gum, Yeah, that's I
guess that's that's awesome. That uh you know.

Speaker 1 (01:34:54):
Is a spot, right, I mean, yeah, we'll count it.
We'll count it.

Speaker 2 (01:34:57):
Bro.

Speaker 1 (01:34:58):
It's bad. It's a rough moment in wrestling history.

Speaker 2 (01:35:03):
And Niddy was so likable on tough Enough, like like
I have tough Enough one and two on tape, and
I remember really liking her in the show and then
like knowing, you know, okay, this is the character they're
giving her. I was just like, ah, I thought like
Nydia would be the start of taking the women's division

(01:35:25):
seriously and funny enough. You know that's what they got me.

Speaker 1 (01:35:31):
You thought, yeah, that Vince mcman was ready for that.

Speaker 2 (01:35:36):
Silly me.

Speaker 1 (01:35:38):
You thought wrong, brother, He was way too early for that.
Good thirteen years too early, at least at least a
decade too early for that. But I appreciate the sentiment,
but you know, mmm, nope. Also, speaking of Vince McMahon,

(01:35:58):
we got Hulk Hogan and you know he barges into
the office and just in between them, standing in the
post on the wall in between him is just Stacey Keepler,
a poster of Stacy Keepler and a butt. Yeah, just
like just to place some in between them, just like
it doesn't need to be there, not necessary. Uh. They
have different posters on the wall now and on WW

(01:36:19):
they have like old wrestling posters up now and they
don't do the bikini posters anymore because you know, you
gotta have taste, you know, some some level of the qorum,
like you know, Staky Keyboard was nice, don't get me wrong,
but come on. Also, Hogan said one day that he
was gonna whoop up on Vince and that day came

(01:36:42):
back next year's WrestleMania. Backsucker, better watch your back. I'm
gonna get you, and he got him, and he got
him hidden Gems in or out of the ring.

Speaker 2 (01:36:58):
And Hurricane again Snow and to Jerry it was a
good match, And uh yeah, I put Patissa and Devon
versus Frouk and Randy Orton, but I don't know, I mean,
would you agree with that? I don't know why I
put that. There's nothing that stands out other than Orton losing,

(01:37:18):
and like Patisa. I guess Patisa's first batch. You know,
maybe it was cool seeing him do these spinebusters and whatnot.

Speaker 1 (01:37:26):
But I forgot all about what was the Kidman match again,
because I didn't remember.

Speaker 2 (01:37:31):
That Kidman and the Hurricane versus Jamie Noble.

Speaker 1 (01:37:34):
And to Jerry that was fine. That would be an
honorable mention for me. As far as this category, I
would actually go with the World Tag Team title match
Billy and Chuck versus hardcore Holly and a big Valbowski.

Speaker 2 (01:37:47):
A big shot, big shot hardcore Holly and yeah, no,
I wish they now the big show, the big shots
looking for him. That's my favorite hard.

Speaker 1 (01:38:04):
Tell the big show, the big shot. He called himself
the big shot. I wonder why that didn't get over.
I'm the big shot. That's crazy. Not Valvenus doing this.

Speaker 2 (01:38:19):
No, he didn't have a shot here.

Speaker 1 (01:38:21):
No, not valve that's crazy.

Speaker 2 (01:38:25):
They why would you like? Is the ruthless aggression. Okay,
we're not the attitude alreadymore so we gotta change your name. Okay,
we're just going to use the nickname that we use
for you for the previous four years.

Speaker 1 (01:38:38):
Remember Big Lebowski.

Speaker 2 (01:38:39):
Yeah, yeah, so we'll go big.

Speaker 1 (01:38:42):
They called him Big Valvoski. But now that's going to
be his actual.

Speaker 2 (01:38:45):
Name, like it's on the chiron, like the Big valvos
I'm like, no, no, no, no, just.

Speaker 1 (01:38:52):
Just change his name. Put it with hardcore Holly. That'll
do the trick. You know what I'm saying. He'll finally
get over. You know what I'm saying. It will worked
for both of them, and he'll be the Big Valboski
with worst theme music and a worst name and a
worst haircut. It'll work. It'll work, trust me. Yeah he
was hot four years ago. He could still be that

(01:39:15):
big Valboski. We don't even know what that means.

Speaker 2 (01:39:22):
Why why the name change? I don't get it. It's
just nothing else, right, right, same character, you know. Yeah,
it's funny because it's the same character though, Like sometimes
we see like a name change. Okay, your character changes
a little bit. It's the same. It's Valvenus, Like, it's

(01:39:43):
not a different person, Valvenus.

Speaker 1 (01:39:46):
How did Valvenus and hardcore Holly even become a thing?

Speaker 2 (01:39:49):
Like, I don't know, Like we're remember they were they
had so it's June, right, So I guess they had
the tag team titles after us because after the brand split.
After the brand split, they waited a while to Raw
had the tag team titles and the women's title, and

(01:40:10):
then like SmackDown's gonna have the Cruise Away title but
no tag team titles, and so it's like, we probably
should have tag team titles here. So then that's when
they had like a tournament and when Kardagle and Chris
Benwa won him. So yeah, I guess this is before
that because I didn't have hair and they were Attack Team.
It's Rabbit series, So yeah, like I maybe they were

(01:40:31):
just put together for Attack Team tournament and this was
like I guess it didn't start by this point, but
maybe that was the reasoning or like I don't even
remember them as a tag team for a long time.
So but again, like after the brand split, they had
to like pair some people together because.

Speaker 1 (01:40:50):
They tag teams. Yeah, what about you keep the tag
teams together and you can keep Valvinus and Hardcore Holly
far apart and like you would put that would make
more sense to me.

Speaker 2 (01:41:00):
If you have the tag team titles on one show,
then a majority of the tag teams will be on
that show.

Speaker 1 (01:41:05):
In theory, having one show be the tag team show
and the other show be the cruise away show doesn't
sound like a horrible idea. I've probably heard better ones.
But that's not a terrible idea. Like it's a feature.
It's like, Hey, you want to watch good tag team wrestling,
you gotta watch Monday Night Raw. If you want to
watch the cruise Away, you gotta watch SmackDown. And that's
what you can say could make the shows feel distinct,
right if you want to really want to make them

(01:41:27):
feel distinct. You don't get tag team matches on SmackDown.
You don't get cruise away matches on Raw. You gotta
go to those shows to watch either one of those.
So in theory it sort of makes sense. But then
you got to put the tag teams on Raw instead.
They broke up the tag teams and the said, hold up,
we need tag teams, hardcore, Holly, Big Valboski, Europe, the
Big Shot, the Big Valboski, Let's go the big guys.

(01:41:53):
And then we got this match, which what again. I
put it as my hidden Jim because it was actually
a good match. They worked well together. I mean, yeah,
there were a couple of vistages of a previous era
still holding on, but you know, they worked well on
this night.

Speaker 2 (01:42:14):
It was good. It wasn't bad good, And I was
a billion Chuck fan. I thought that was a funny
tag team.

Speaker 1 (01:42:20):
It was.

Speaker 2 (01:42:21):
It was not, you know, I didn't dive into the
inn windows, but I thought it was like, you know,
same with gold Dusts. When when I you know, ninety six,
like the end of ninety five and ninety six, I'm like, oh,
he's just playing mind games. So he can like win,
you know, like he's just messing with people. And I
thought that actually made sense in wrestling because the whole

(01:42:44):
point is to win your matches. And I thought gold
Dusts did it great because it got to the Intercontinental
title and I was like, oh, like, you know, so
that's how I looked at it and wrestling, and even
as I got older of a billion chuck and everything,
I was like, oh, like they're doing it to win
matches and stuff like, not that I was against it
or anything. I was just like, that's funny, that's clever.
I thought it was clever. But again, like there are

(01:43:06):
other people that thought it was like exploitative and stuff,
and I can see that side of it now, you know.
As I got older, I was like, oh, you know what,
like I guess it could have been people just looked
at it differently than I did. But like I didn't
have a problem with that. I was like, yeah, like
makee people think you know certain things so you could
one up them, like why not, it's wrestling, why not

(01:43:28):
lots of them.

Speaker 1 (01:43:31):
I did think that theme music was pretty good.

Speaker 2 (01:43:33):
I liked it.

Speaker 1 (01:43:34):
Yeah, it was pretty good. Whoever was singing on that
song was sanging on that song. I don't know you
could sing whoever, it was good job to you. Yeah,
it sounded like some Backstreet Boy stuff from that time period.
I don't know if that's Jim Johnson production or what,
but it worked. It was a good song. Uh does

(01:43:56):
it sound like something you can listen to?

Speaker 2 (01:43:59):
Yeah? Yeah? Uh.

Speaker 1 (01:44:02):
Random thoughts. I don't know if you had any random
thoughts on this show. I have a few.

Speaker 2 (01:44:08):
Yeah. I went over the openings with the afterburn and
bottom line and experience. Those are part of it. Tests. Okay,
so the end of Tests of Rakish, you know, Test
takes out the ref because kesh she shoved them. The
refs not even like awake yet, and Tony Chimmell announces

(01:44:32):
that the by referees decision like you know this Rakeishi
wins from this qualification or something like that's liked the
ref is not even conscious. I just what if what
if the ref thought, you know, new Rakeshi shoved them
in and it was like, you know what, Test is
gonna win because Rakeshi is the one who calls that,

(01:44:53):
like you we don't know that because the referee is out,
you know, like unconscious, like come on, like that That's
the little, the subtle stuff that I noticed when I'm watching,
and I'm like, just say, like, you don't have to
add in the referees decision, you know, but the referee
has clearly not talked to you after he was taken out.

(01:45:15):
So that was annoying. Uh. We talked about the Hogan
backstage stuff. Uh so ruthless Aggression era, Dude, Like they
said it all the time on this show. I've heard it.
I heard it no less than like ten times, people
different people saying ruthless aggression.

Speaker 1 (01:45:34):
That this was like the unofficial launch of it somehow. Yeah, yeah,
this soft soft launch.

Speaker 2 (01:45:40):
I just say, yeah, the Vince thing must have been
like that week or something promo one raw, Like definitely,
you know in this timeframe obviously, so here in like
ruthless aggression all the time. I didn't even think, like
it didn't even dawn on me that it was like
a new era. Like even back then, it was like, okay,
attitude era, like people threw that around here and there,

(01:46:02):
but it didn't really become like an era until I
think went back to PG and like eight I think,
and then people started talking about the attitude hover the
attitude ever and I was like, oh, like I thought
this time period was part of that from like ninety
eight or even you could you could argue it was
like the end of ninety six really where a lot

(01:46:23):
of these baby faces started becoming like Dix, you know.
I was just like, how am I supposed to cheer
for Shawn Michaels when he's a jerk? And Brett Hart's like,
he sounds like a jerk. But they were like supposed
to be babyfaces, but they had like that edge to them,
And so I kind of view the end of ninety
six into ninety seven is like the official like Attitude
Hora launch, But a lot of people think of it

(01:46:45):
ninety eight onward from like Austin winning at maybe A
fourteen onwards, So I understand that, but to me, this
whole thing was like similar, But now you look back
and he'd be like, yeah, this is definitely different than
the Attitude era. Definitely different. I think it's honestly one
of the eras I like the most. And I haven't

(01:47:07):
even watched a lot of this era still to this day,
but the things I have watched are full of stuff
that made me fall in love with wrestling from the
early nineties. So even though they're trying to like navigate,
they don't want to be as pushy as the attitude error,
but they're still like the ruthless aggression are you had?
Like Katie Vick, we talked about it before. There's still

(01:47:29):
things that they tried to push the envelope a little
bit that did not work because they were trying to
move away from that. So when they tried to go back,
it was just like nobody wanted nobody was here for that.
So I think two to seven ish is an era
that I think is very, very underrated, and it's an

(01:47:49):
error that I love a lot, and I like, I
don't realize that sometimes, like when you know, I'm going
through just watching old stuff and I'm like, oh, don't
watch stuff much for that era. But what I do,
I think I underappreciated, and I think overall people underrated
as an era. So I like this time period in wrestling.

(01:48:14):
I mean I should say w W, not wrestling, because
they were the only wrestling in town at this point.
Came back the Westing at this point. Yeah, the WA
tn A had the weekly pay per views I think
starting in juneo two, So it was like at this time,
it was like WA TNA, just trying to start something new.
But for over a year now, WWE was the only thing.

(01:48:38):
In March two thousand and one to this point, it
was just w W.

Speaker 1 (01:48:44):
It was, it was, It was fine. It was fine
this time period.

Speaker 2 (01:48:48):
Not underrated.

Speaker 1 (01:48:49):
There was some I don't know if it's underrated. I
mean it done. They've done documentaries about it on WWE's
like platforms. I should say, Uh, so it's not that underrated.
It's known as the era of John Cena and Randy
Orton and Patista. So it's fine, It's okay. There was
some swings and misses, for sure, But I got some

(01:49:11):
random thoughts from random notes watching. I haven't watched an
episode of WWTV from this time period in a while.
It's been many, many years, obviously, but they I loved
the sponsored segments. They don't do these anymore. Yeah, the
Stacker two.

Speaker 2 (01:49:26):
Burn of the Night, and it was it wasn't even
like wrestling, right, it was just like someone on the bike.

Speaker 1 (01:49:33):
Yeah, wrestling or the Slam of the Week sponsored by
the eight Lega Freaks from Lux from Lux the Boot
of the Week. Speaking of eight Leaga Freaks, I saw
that movie maybe once back in the day. I don't
remember it very well, but we could deep dive it

(01:49:55):
because the star as former deb W Ward heavyweight champion
David Arquette. So just saying, just saying, we could do it.
You said the slam of the week. I've mentioned the
slam of the week already, but the slam of the
week was Jeff Hardy challenging the Undertaker for the title
and then and a light of match.

Speaker 2 (01:50:13):
How about that?

Speaker 1 (01:50:14):
That was a slam of the week on SmackDown. But yeah,
I missed those.

Speaker 2 (01:50:17):
Those were kind of fun there, Like I didn't appreciate
them enough, and they.

Speaker 1 (01:50:23):
Just don't do it anymore. They just give you a
commercial like we're not gonna sponsor a segment.

Speaker 2 (01:50:29):
It's like the JVC bo box, the boom of the week.

Speaker 1 (01:50:32):
Right, the boom, Yeah, something like that, The boom of
the week, the slam of the week, the burn of the.

Speaker 2 (01:50:37):
Night, Stacker two. Man. I remember being like, if I
grow up, I'm gonna take Stacker Twosane.

Speaker 1 (01:50:49):
Kids don't take Stacker two all right?

Speaker 2 (01:50:52):
Is it even still a thing?

Speaker 1 (01:50:54):
I doubt it because it's probably like outlawed because it's
not good for you.

Speaker 2 (01:50:58):
Okay, but the chancy and see, man, all those little
I took, I took like other stuff like throughout the years,
just thinking like supplements, Yeah it'll help me, and yeah,
I never you know, kept on it thankfully.

Speaker 1 (01:51:18):
Yeah, good thing you didn't get hooked on stack or two.

Speaker 2 (01:51:20):
While I remember taking a multi vitamin in my p
it was like neon yellow and I remember freaked out, Man,
freaked out. I'm like, I'm never taking a multiviody. But
again it was it was tough to swallow too, like
I have a small airway or something like like big pills, man,
like that can't you can't take?

Speaker 1 (01:51:39):
Man, We veer it off track on this deep dive.
Let's get back on track with Batista Race of the Night.
We have our debut of the Night. I guess as Batista,
who we mentioned earlier. We forgot that he made his

(01:52:00):
end ring debut on the show. But like Taz and
Michael Cole were taking aback by how massive, Batista was
a good huge That suit just hit his body's massive.
But he was an a tag team match with Reverend
Devon against the tag team of for Rooke and Bradshaw.

(01:52:21):
No for Rooke and Randy Orton.

Speaker 4 (01:52:25):
Oh team r k oh damn, that's crazy, that's insane.

Speaker 1 (01:52:39):
So yeah, Randy Orton is also on the show. Uh,
and I wrote my notes. Yeah, Harcoholy and Valvenus are cooked.

Speaker 4 (01:52:46):
Bro.

Speaker 1 (01:52:49):
Y'all done. Bro. They got new guys coming in and
they strapping the rocket to him. Bro, it's over with.

Speaker 2 (01:52:57):
And Randy was like so lanky, you know, like just
the way he walked around the ring, like, uh, tell
him for rook, he was gonna be the first one
in and everything. I was just like, he's man, he's
gonna get killed here, Like he's so small compared to
Patista and Sina.

Speaker 1 (01:53:12):
You know you don't but you might not belong here.
You sure you in the right place.

Speaker 2 (01:53:20):
Uh.

Speaker 1 (01:53:21):
The finish of Chris Jericho and Hulk Hogan was hilarious
to yes, yes, so hilarious. Yes. Uh. Hug Hogan holks up,
you know as he would do, hits the big boot
and after taking the big boot, Uh, Jericho immediately slides
out of the ring, grabs a steel chair and swats

(01:53:42):
Hogan's foot away before he can get hit with the
lake drop. Right, That's what happened, right. All I know
is that Jericho grabbed a chair.

Speaker 2 (01:53:54):
He hit him in the head with the chair.

Speaker 1 (01:53:55):
I know, okay, what is one of my notes? I
don't know why I wrote that down spatted his foot
away like even though wrought up, like what what show did?
I watched.

Speaker 2 (01:54:11):
He the big boot and Hogan's running the ropes as
Jericho goes out, gets the chair, comes back and for him,
and then Hogan gives him the leg drop it, Jeracho, listen.

Speaker 1 (01:54:25):
I was clearly distracted by what was happening there, okay,
But what did happen was Jericho slid out of the
ring as soon as he got the big boots, so
I'm done with this. And then he grabbed the steel
chair and then whacked Hogan over the head with it
because Jeredo had enough of that nonsense. And then he
grabbed the steel steps and laid holding on top of

(01:54:46):
him outside of the rings before he hits him in
the head with the steel chair. For the still steps,
I just say, and the steel chair. Uh, Jericho's music
goes off, like his countdown goes up and his pyro
goes off. I feel like, what's going on?

Speaker 2 (01:55:01):
Plenty of time to finish the job, by the way,
he could have. He just stopped.

Speaker 1 (01:55:05):
Is it me? What's going on? Stops before he murders
Hawk Hogan because he's about to drop still steps. Oh no,
he's about to hit him with his chair on the
top of the stee steps. Keep remembering he didn't pick

(01:55:25):
up the still steps. But no, it's not a Jericho
And like you, imitator or personator, it's Edge, who he
has been beefing with because they showed earlier than night.
I think it's one of those sponsored segments where Chris
Jericho injured Edge three weeks.

Speaker 2 (01:55:40):
Prior the kill of the Night.

Speaker 1 (01:55:44):
I have to kill the night. It's crazy, but he
was about to do Hawg Hogan dirty before Edge came down.
Hogan and Edge they team up to beat up Chris
Jericho and it wouldn't be the last time they team up,
as the very next week they would defeat Billy and
Chuck to win the tag team titles.

Speaker 2 (01:56:02):
Oh not Billion Chuck on July fourth, It's a good day.

Speaker 1 (01:56:10):
All of my random thoughts from the June twenty seventh,
twenty two thousand and two episode of SmackDown.

Speaker 2 (01:56:19):
What I wish is I don't have this on tape unfortunately,
but during Hall Cokin's entrance. There was no commentary at all,
and I know for a fact that nobody would have
been quiet during like any entrance really back then, like
everyone's talking all the time. So I want to know
what Michael Cole and Taz were saying during hall Cokin's entrance,

(01:56:40):
And maybe I don't have the tape.

Speaker 1 (01:56:42):
Maybe they kind of muted them because they blended in
with the music or something like that, because obviously it
was possible. Yeah, Jimi Hendrick's Voodoo Child for Hull Cogan's
theme song at this point, and Peacock does not have
the rights to that, and they won't have because they
won't have it because WWE and all this content is
leaving Peacocks. Yeah, so but on this night, he was

(01:57:05):
definitely using the Jimmy Hendrix song Voodoo Child and not
whatever song they put on Peacock that they don't have
the rights to. But but they do have the rights
of that, not Jimmy Hendrix obviously, but uh, maybe Taz
and Michael Cole were edited out because of that, even
though they've used commentary over that song before at least
I think, But now miss.

Speaker 2 (01:57:26):
It's like not some of them are and then others aren't.

Speaker 1 (01:57:30):
So maybe I just didn't notice before. I didn't notice
until you said something right now, honestly.

Speaker 2 (01:57:37):
Yeah, the speaking of Hogan, the crowd was still like
really behind him, you know, during this main event. You know,
they're they're reacted to everything. So maybe wonder we're we're
like over a month now from the Undertaker beating them
for the title, Like why did they take the title
off them? Like you know, he wanted that last you
know run, but maybe a month maybe it should have

(01:58:01):
been two months. I don't know, but maybe they're they
already were like, Okay, we're gonna get rock to beat rock,
and we gotta find a way to get the Rock
to title. Like I don't know what makes sense to me,
Like Hokan was still getting you know, that crowd hot,
So yeah, I did even just maybe think why take

(01:58:22):
the title off him? It wasn't like he was losing
momentum at all at that point.

Speaker 1 (01:58:29):
But in hindsight it was the best decision.

Speaker 2 (01:58:32):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:58:32):
Yeah, in hindsight, they probably shouldn't have put the title
back on him to begin with, especially after you beat
Triple H.

Speaker 2 (01:58:41):
Yeah, after his comeback from the Good Squad Terror, Like geez.

Speaker 1 (01:58:46):
He just came back, had this big baby face run.
Everybody's happy, and then he loses to Hogkkan the next month. WHOA,
that's a lot. But that's all I have from June
twenty seven to two thousand. Additional SmackDown. If you have
nothing else, I think we can wrap it up. We
can so three four take us out with some plugs please.

Speaker 2 (01:59:12):
You can follow me at Underscore pacone on Twitter, slash
x and Underscore pacone one on TikTok, also at pocone
on Blue Sky and at pocone nick on threads. You
check out by Philly sports content there along with maybe
some wrestling content you know Nikki Bella trashing allons fans

(01:59:32):
for like an alliance over the Eagles. You could find
videos like that on my platforms and read by writing
at crossingbroad dot com. Could follow this podcast at shooters
Radio on Twitter and x and Blue Sky, Instagram, Threads, Facebook, Patreon,

(01:59:52):
at shooters Radio, shooterspod dot com wherever we are available
on your pod favorite podcast platform playing like Apple Podcasts, Spotify,
iHeart Speaker, shoot In Radio, Amazon Music, and Pandora.

Speaker 1 (02:00:08):
You can find me on x at. Vaughan M. Johnson
can find me on Instagram at Vaughan Johnson one sixty six.
You can find me on Blue Sky Threads. All the
platforms out there you can find I'm on them. Generally.
You can find us on Patreon, Patreon, dot com, slash
shooters Radio. We can request a future deep dive just
like this. One does not have to be a pay

(02:00:28):
per view or a television show from WW or any
other wrestling promotion. It could be a movie like Jingle
All the Way. We're still waiting to do that. We
could do that before Christmas. We've got time. We can
also do the wrestler.

Speaker 2 (02:00:39):
We're gonna do two days, well, well less than two
days now we'll do We'll one year. We got next year, well,
we got less than twenty four hours.

Speaker 1 (02:00:47):
This is always next year.

Speaker 2 (02:00:50):
We can do it after Christmas.

Speaker 1 (02:00:52):
No, it's not the same wet but any type of
movie that involves wrestlers. Eight leggat Freaks just mentioned that
with David cat. If you want us to deep dive
into it, head on over Patreon, dot com, slash shooters Radio.
Put in your request and you can make a cameo
on the showers. I don't know, but I haven't watched

(02:01:12):
it yet. I've been kind of holding off on until
Stranger Things is done.

Speaker 2 (02:01:15):
You can talk about.

Speaker 1 (02:01:17):
We can talk about Stranger Things on the show too
once So I don't know if there's wrestling connection there.
They might show a wrestler or two or something. I
don't know. We can figure it out. I'll find it.

Speaker 2 (02:01:29):
Mcman.

Speaker 1 (02:01:30):
I mean, is that word on the street. I don't know.

Speaker 2 (02:01:33):
Start with me.

Speaker 1 (02:01:35):
That's enough for me either way. Again, if you want
us to do a deep dive, even if it's Stranger Things,
head on over patreon dot com Slash Shooters Radio. But
until next time for Nick pecone, I'm Von Johnson. Thanks
for listening to episode four forty nine of The Straight
Shooters and we'll catch you again after the holidays, and

(02:01:57):
for should say happy holidays one hope you all enjoy
time with your loved ones and have a good holiday season.
And we'll catch you again next week. Pease, thank gvage
wake up the show. No oh yeah, Jaggi

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449: John Cena's WWE Debut - SmackDown 06-27-02 Deep Dive

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}449: John Cena's WWE Debut - SmackDown 06-27-02 Deep Dive