WWE Raw Review: CM Punk & Roman Reigns Appearances, Lyra vs Roxanne Perez, Final Push for Crown Jewel

We review WWE Monday Night Raw that aired October 6th, 2025. The final Raw before Crown Jewel from Perth.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:02):
This is WWE Superstar Drew McIntyre and you're listening to
the WWE podcast show.

Speaker 2 (00:15):
The one that everybody wants me god st three sixteenths
with your ass is myn you can acknowledge me, all right, everybody.

Speaker 3 (00:35):
Welcome to the Monday Night Raw Review that is Tuesday,
October seventh, twenty twenty five. Welcome to Crown Jewel Week
as we crawl closer to the Perth event on Saturday.
And depending on where you are in the world will
depend on when that event starts for you, and that
may be good, maybe bad. I personally enjoy the much

(00:55):
earlier times that the show starts here on the East
Coast of the United States. But yeah, of course it
depends on where you are in the world. But it
should be a fun show. And WWE this past Monday
Night gave us their last real push and they have
a SmackDown two but from undern at raws. This was
the final push for Crown Jewel and I think they
did a nice job, really nice job in some respects,

(01:17):
particularly with Cody Rhodes and Seth Rawlins with that promo,
that prepackaged promo between them that was just it was
so it was so good. I mean, I've really got
nothing bad to say about it. We'll go over that
in a little bit. Paul Hayman, of course did his
part as he always does. It added a little more
sense of urgency and value to the outcome of that match.

(01:38):
And they continue to remind you about the undefeated record
that Cody holds against seth Rawlins in one on one competition.
So that's something that you can look forward to as well,
given the fact that there really is nothing on the
line other than the pride and the direction of the company,
the future of the company, all of course completely oversold
and unrealistic in terms of what the match means and

(02:00):
what the implications of who wins, what that means for
the company. Of course, it's all absurd, it means nothing,
but in the context of this particular match and these
two and who you want to win, they did a
really nice job in that package. And well, again we'll
go over that little more detail in a little bit.
I want to remind you as the show goes on, though,

(02:21):
that good time to join, because we have an ad
free version of the show that you can get for
free for a week, including the review for Crown Jewel
that'll be coming to you Sunday, most likely during the
Week in Review. It'll be a kind of combination episode
of the review and the Week in Review, and that'll
be coming to as I said, Sunday. But more importantly,

(02:43):
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Speaker 1 (02:57):
Now.

Speaker 3 (02:57):
One quick mention, because it is baseball playoff season for
those of you the hate baseball. Sorry, I promise this
will be brief, but since I'm a Yankees fan and
I have listeners that are Toronto Blue Jays fans, I'm
going to concede this series. I know that it's possible
to come back and win three in a row. We've

(03:18):
done it before. In fact, the Yankees in their history
have been down two in the Alds twice or i'm sorry,
four times and have come back twice. Not good odds, though,
when you look at the rest of the league, ninety
times a team has gone down oh two, only ten
of those ninety has the team down oh two come
back to win three in a row. So it's not good.

(03:39):
I'm not pretending that we're gonna win. We're not. We've
been embarrassed by Toronto or our hitting has gone silent,
as it does in every single postseason. Our pitching has
been horrendous in the first two games, and as I
speak right now, we're throwing out first pitch at Yankee Stadium.
So kind of a pre congratut relations to Toronto. Now,

(04:01):
you guys, as of this recording, you haven't won it yet,
but I have kind of conceded the series. Now if
we don't win tonight, or if we do win tonight,
of course we have to win two more in a row,
and including one at Rogers Center that we can't win
at all. I mean, Rogers Center is our kryptonite for
some reason. And we are one and I'm sorry, Yeah,

(04:24):
we're one and eight at Rogers Center this year, one win,
eight losses and it's not looking good no matter how
you slice it. So it kind of a pre congratulations
to Toronto. If we pull it off, it'll be a miracle.
But I'm a realist, So okay, let's back, get back
to wrestling. As I promised it'd be brief. We're gonna
go through mondaet Raw. We'll start right at the top

(04:47):
here as Bronson, I'm sorry, Roman Reigns comes out, and
he was being introduced by Lesia Taylor, and of course
Wade is on commentary with Joe Tessitore, and we had
Roman Reigns name being sung in an OTC champ breakout.
By the way, they're in Dallas, Texas. We're not overseas.

(05:10):
This singing of these the singing of the stars' names
that carried over from Europe is now here in the
United States, so that's quite impressive. I don't like it,
but the chants overseas have inspired I guess us boring
US fans to do something at these live events, right,

(05:31):
So we quickly had Bronson Reid interrupt Roman Reins, and
then Reid and Haymond walked onto the stage and Haymond said,
have read that Roman Reigns acknowledged the one man on
the face of the planet that you fear in your heart.
Haymond said Reins had never taken out on a stretcher

(05:52):
during his wrestling or football career until Red caused it,
and Bronson took the breath of the mic and said,
Romans uncle both had forty five years in the business
and were never stretchered out. Reid asked how they feel
looking down and seeing Rains get stretchered out. Rain said
Reed never knew his father or his uncle, but Hayman did,

(06:15):
and Roman asked Paul what his father would say, fight
him now. Rain said, so, let's do this now. Reed
was game, but Hayman grabbed his arm and told him
to do it on his terms and his schedule. Rain
said he'd been there before with Hayman. He said there
were no wise words, just wise, just words from a coward.

(06:38):
And Rain's told Reed that he's levels above him. Rains
indicated that he would face Reid whenever he wants the match,
and that's when we got Hayman talking about a Australian
street fight, and Roman just said, too easy. I accept.
Now I offer the question up to the w fans here,

(07:01):
anyone listening in the sound of my voice, please tell
me what the difference is between a no DQ match,
an Australian street fight, a Greenwich street fight, a regular
old street fight, a no holds barred match. Does anybody
know the difference? Yeah, there's not one. It's marketing. It's
just funny how many times they can rebrand the same

(07:25):
exact match. It's their job to brand and market. It's
getting to the point of just absurdity when they just
an Australian street fight, like, okay, it means no DQ,
that's it.

Speaker 2 (07:41):
But okay, So.

Speaker 3 (07:45):
We had Rains say that, Read and Hayman walk and
they walked in like tough guys, but we're leaving like
a couple of bees. And then Read headed to the
ring and ended up brawling with Rome and Reid ate
a superman punch and he sent Reid over the barricade.

(08:05):
Rains cleared the broadcast table, but security and producers came
out to stop him. Rains broke free through a few
punches at Reed, and Rains was moved away from Reed,
but he broke free again and hit Read with another
superman punch. So good here, I mean, the crowd was
hot for this, and it's most important here for Bronson Reid.

(08:25):
This is what this is for. This is not for
Roman Reigns, it's not for Paul him, and it's not
even for Seth Rollins or his Vision group. This is
simply for the benefit of Bronson Reid. That's the purpose
of this entire faction existing in the first place, as
you know, is to just help build new stars and
now more focused for Bronson. This match is for him.

(08:50):
This match is for Bronson. Read Roman Reigns gains nothing
by winning or losing, win, lose, draw, squash, disqualification. If
they're on it doesn't matter. Roman Rains cannot be touched
in a good or a bad way from this match.
This is one hundred percent for the benefit of Bronson Reid,

(09:12):
and I hope for him that the match is really
good because certainly Bronson Reid has a long way to
go in his career and this could be one of
those stepping stones, and I hope it is so all right,
we have the women's in are Cadital champion, Becky Lynch
take on Maxine Dupre in a non title match, and

(09:34):
the match went almost fourteen minutes with Maxine beating Becky
by count out. This was good, not just because of
the unexpected ending that we actually had the crowd cheer
for a count out. When's the last time that happened?
Number one? Number two you have Maxine Dupree get a

(09:59):
little momentum off of the count out by beating Becky Lynch,
and it puts Maxine, who has been kind of an afterthought,
never looked at as a serious threat for anyone in
the conversation for an intercontinental title match. Sounds crazy, but

(10:21):
Maxine could really kind of springboard her whatever run this
is from a disc qual of or I'm sorry, from
a count out finish. Think about that. When's last time
that happened? And perhaps Maxine is able to negotiate with
Adam Pierce. Hey, if Becky Lynch gets counted out, she

(10:44):
loses in her continental title, right, why not? That's how
you could kind of manipulate the next matchup that you
have with Becky. And you now own a victory over
Becky Lynch. You can use that to get the match
and then somehow negotiate that stipulation about Becky dropping her
belt if she gets count it out. So this is
fun and the match itself also, Number three was good,

(11:04):
surprisingly good. Becky Lynch's regarded as one of the best
women that WW has ever had, and I would agree
to that to that with some degree. But the match
was good. I think Maxine held her own not too
many botches, which is a good thing. The women have
been kind of on a botch streak lately hasn't been good.

(11:26):
But this was really just benefits to all here. It
brings number four a new person into the conversation. That's
what the Intercontinental title is for, for the men or
the women, but particularly for the women who need exposure.
You have that mid card belt with a megastar in

(11:47):
the women's division holding it that you could work with
to help build that person. So there's nothing negative that
I have to say about this, despite the fact that
it's a count out finish. Pretty wild, okay. Rowan Rains
then met Jimmy and Jay in a backstage area and

(12:09):
Jimmy tried to tell Rains that he had his back
at Crown Jewel, but Jay interrupted and said he had
Rains's back, and Rain said he was good and didn't
want any help, especially from Jay. Rains recalled telling Jay
that he should be hyper focused on his own opportunities
and he asked Jay who was talking at the top
of the hour, and Jay replied that it would be Ceampunk,

(12:31):
not you. Huh, Rains asked, and then Jay stormed off.
Rain's told Jimmy that he sees and hears everything. What's
the problem with him taking advice from me? Rain said,
and he stared at an uncomfortable time for Jimmy for
a moment and then walked away. Interesting tension here. I

(12:54):
don't see the need for any tension. I've said that before.
This is not getting any interest from the fans to
see these three doing anything but just working cohesively. There's
nothing to be gained by pretending that there could be
a turn or somebody gonna you know, is gonna go
back to the dark side, or that we could have

(13:16):
a rehash of Somebody versus Somebody and any of the three,
any of those three men. Nothing intrigues the fans about
this combination other than if you're going to keep them
as a unit. So hopefully this is just trying to
create interesting television. But I would argue it's kind of
the opposite because teasing something like that is a yawnfest

(13:40):
of fans because we've seen it. We saw it for
years in every variation that there could be. So all
right Lyra and Bailey then met at the gorilla position,
and Bailey said she would love to be in Lyra's
corner for her match. Lyra indicated that Bailey waited until
the last minute to ask and then said, what the
hell they couldn't click on their handshake, and then they

(14:03):
made their entrance. So we get Lyra taking on Roxanne Perez.
Bailey's at ringside and Raquel Rodriguez is in the corner
of Roxanne. The match went nine minutes and twenty seconds
with Roxanne beating Lyra. The finish was Lyra hitting Rodriguez
with a kick between the ropes. Perez dove through the

(14:24):
ropes and hit a DDT on Lyra that looked it
looked all right, and then back in the ring, Roxanne
hit pop rocks and got the victory. And after both
Roxanne and Roquel made their exit, Bailey grabbed Valkyria and
rushed her to the back, and it was in a
kind of a way of like dragging her by her hair,

(14:45):
like by her arms. It wasn't a very friendly type of,
you know, collaboration between Bailey and Lyra that continues to
be very uncomfortable to watch and not in a good
with Lyra being treated just so disrespectfully and she's willing
to put up with it. You know, it's hard to

(15:05):
have respect for somebody that doesn't have respect for themselves,
and that goes true. I think that that is true
in real life and in pro wrestling especially right, Like,
if you don't have respect for yourself, You're not gonna
stand up for yourself. I'm not going to stand up
for you or want to see you succeed because you're pathetic.
I mean sorry, I mean, if you don't have any

(15:26):
self respect, don't expect me to have any for you.
I can't have self respect on your behalf. That comes
from the self, and then people will respect you, right,
or at least there's a higher chance that someone will
respect you if you have a very clear respect for yourself.

Speaker 2 (15:46):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (15:46):
Again, that is kind of a life lesson, but also
a something that translates to pro wrestling all right. By
the way, next week's Raw will stream live at eight
eastern seven Central on Monday morning, Yes, Monday morning, not evening,

(16:09):
so twelve hours difference between the Star times twelve hours
earlier on Monday, which again isn't the worst thing if
you want to just get your wrestling out of the way,
if you're especially if you're a content creator, Hey, yeah,
you could get that done and post your reviews before
you go to bed, and you're ready to.

Speaker 2 (16:29):
Go, all right.

Speaker 3 (16:31):
So then we had to have backstage Jackie Redman interviewing
AJ Styles and asked how he's been preparing for his
match with Sena. That's when Judgment Day members Dom, Finn
and JD came in the picture. Dom asked Styles why
he thought he could beat Sena when he couldn't even
beat him, and Balor said a little Birdie told him
that Styles and Dragon Lee want to challenge him and

(16:55):
McDonagh for the world tag team titles. Styles said he'd
get to Lee, find a partner and talk to Adam
Pierce to get a six man tag match booked for
later in the show. Yes, Judgment Day is still sadly
a thing. I don't want it to be, You don't
want it to be, but it is. It still continues

(17:17):
to hang on by a thread. It's a walking corpse
at this point. But Seampunk was then shown walking through
the backstage area and he walked past russeb and Adam
Pierce while they were arguing. And then the continuation of
the AJ segment here we had AJ and Dragon Lee
approach Penta about being their partner, but there was some

(17:39):
commotion nearby, and that's when Lyra and Bailey were beating
up Roxanne and Raquel, and the referees and producers shut
up pull him apart. Of course, Adam Pierce does his
weekly blow a gasket and yell at everyone at the
top of his lungs and yeah, all right, so content

(18:00):
here seem. Punk comes out to cut a promo and
he said one of the reasons he hasn't been on
the show was that he was celebrating with his wife
after beating Seth Rollins and Becky Lynch at Russell Palooza.
Punk said he started to hear or started the year
beating Rollins on Netflix and he would end the year

(18:20):
by beating Rollins on Netflix. And Punk said he's better
than Rollins and everybody knows it. He said he would
become the new world heavyweight champion.

Speaker 1 (18:30):
L A.

Speaker 3 (18:31):
Knight comes out and he said Punk is known for
the pipe bomb, but lately he's been better known as husband.
And he said that wasn't a shot. He said everybody
needs love and it was a beautiful thing. Knight said
that for as as good of a husband that Punk
seems to be, he's a trash champion. Knight recalled Punk

(18:54):
being champion for roughly four minutes, and he asked Punk
if he knew whose shoulders wrong Dollins had never pinned.
Punk said he imagined it was a guy who had
never been world heavyweight champion, and the fans popped at that,
and Knight said he may not have been the world
heavyweight champion, but he will be the next one. Jay
Uso comes out and he told Knight that he was

(19:16):
finally thinking clearly. He said that he's the one he
never got a rematch when he lost the world championship,
and he's the one who's up next for a shot
at the title. And Knight said Jay had the title,
but he lost it because his time came and went,
and Knight said it's his time now, and he said

(19:38):
Jay isn't Roman and won't be Roman reigns. Knight said
that's okay, but Jay should focus on being a tag
team champion and added that after watching last week, Jay
sucked as a tag team wrestler. Jimmy comes out Jimmy
Uso and Jay ends up super kicking Night. Jimmy joined in.

(20:01):
Punk said he gets Jay's passion, but you have to
get behind him in line for a shot at the title.
This is probably the line of the night, though. Punk
told Jay that he loves Jay usso, but he doesn't
like quote Little Roman. That was nasty but kind of
true in some respects. Punk then dropped the mic and

(20:25):
started to leave, but it ends up with Jay and
Punk inning in a scuffle and Jimmy laying out Punk
with a super kick. So you know this, this is
an interesting kind of little trio of men here, quad quadruple, quadrette, quadrilette.

(20:51):
What do you what you call four people? I don't know.
It's an interesting group of guys here. How about that?
Because Jimmy USO is going to be up his brother
in anything he does, but will never have anything going
on of his own. It seems like we have La Knight,
who continues to attack the baby Faces, but doing it
in a way that's not heelish. Yet we have Punk,

(21:13):
who is seemingly back now in the world title picture,
but continues to get shoved out of it every time
he gets put in it. We have Jaus who you
know has probably got no chance of becoming world champion again,
but is easily a guy you could put in a
world title match to make it better. And it's interesting.

(21:37):
I mean, like, if you look at this honestly, if
the world title was up for grabs, you could argue
Ela Knight is actually the guy that is the favor
to win. I mean, Jimmy is a joke as far
as chances to win if you were going to put
them in some kind of you know, fail four way
or something. But Jay has no chance. He just dropped it.

(22:00):
Punk does have a chance, but you'd think they would
do it on a bigger stage against Seth Rollins and
La Knight is a guy that has never been champion.
Neither has Jimmy, but again, big difference in where they're
on the totem pole. Ella Knight is a guy that
you could really make a fun champion, even the heel champion.
I know La Knight is beloved, but there's an argument

(22:22):
to be made of turning Ella Knight heel. I mean,
he does have a record here of attacking the heels.
His issues with Jay Us are well documented, his shots
at Sam Punk last night. So I don't know where
they're going with this or if they're teasing a heel
turn or not, but Seth Rowlalds is the champion. So

(22:42):
is this going to be a situation where Seth has
put it in a fatal four way or a fatal
five way, or is it going to be a situation where, Hey,
after Crown Jewel, he and Cody have their exhibition match
that has nothing on the line. Does one of these
guys do one of these guys pull away from the
pack in some kind of mini tournament or a fatal
four way match to earn a shot at Seths title

(23:05):
at Survivors Series. Something to think about. But there's a
lot happening here. There's a lot of layers of things
happening with these men, with Jimmy j Punk Knight and Seth.

Speaker 2 (23:20):
All right, So.

Speaker 3 (23:23):
We then had a video package airing with EO telling
Osca that what's happened between them was Oscar's fault, not Rhea.
Ripley's sky said Oscar's jealousy and disrespect changed everything, and
EO said that Oscar was one of the reasons she
became champion. EO said that she didn't want to believe Ripley,

(23:45):
but she was right about Osca and said a real
family wouldn't do or wouldn't tell her who to be
friends with or who to take credit for what she's done.
We are not family anymore, and that's when EO Sky
comes out so effective. I thought it was an effective promo.
I really like when they give the women a chance

(24:06):
to speak. Well, I shouldn't say that any kind of
pandering way, particularly when somebody has a heavy accent, and
EO is more understandable than Oscar is. But I still
like when they just say screw it, we're gonna let
them talk. The fans can understand, and that's good. I

(24:28):
think EO still has more to show what she can
do on the mic, but for what we've seen and
every time she gets in the ring, it's like, oh man,
she could be champion at any moment.

Speaker 1 (24:38):
So I like this.

Speaker 3 (24:39):
It was concise to the point, and that's I think
good for the storyline's sake. So are EO and Kyrie
with Oscar at ringside, then had a match. The match
when ten and a half minutes, with Kyrie beating EO. Now,
of course, the finish was saying hesitated before going for

(25:00):
the insane elbow, but Sky puts her feet up and
Sky went up top for her own finish. But Oscar
climbed on the apron, and Sky roughed up Oscar until
Sane hit her from behind. Kyrie then pinned Sky while
Oscar held Sayin's hands for leverage. After the match, Oscar
attacks EO and Oscar held Sky, and a reluctant Saye

(25:22):
hit Sky with a what was it a back? A backfist?
And then we had Oscar hold Sky while Saye hit
Sky with an insane elbow, and Kyrie continued to act
like she was bothered by what he was she was
being told to do. Again, I guess Kyrie has just

(25:44):
no control of her own body, no say, no respect
for herself, once again, just doing whatever the master says
to do. How in the hell am I supposed to
get behind Kyle? I'm not supposed I guess I'm not
supposed to. But I also shouldn't lose. Was actual respect
for these performers, for these wrestlers, I don't know. I

(26:06):
just it's hard to believe too. It takes you out
of the moment because there's just no way, there's just
no way that this would actually ever be a real thing.
If this were to be believed, that it was a real,
you know, professional competitive sport, which really should be the
premise of pro wrestling, that you know these people are
treating each other like this, and that you could be

(26:28):
at this level and willingly accept the fact that you
are being humiliated a national television and having no respect
for yourself. I don't like these kinds of stories. This
is the same thing again with with Lyra and Bailey's
kind of the same dynamic as Kyrie and Oscar. Not
my favorite kind of dynamic on television, but okay, So backstage,

(26:50):
Becky Lynch laughed while pacing in front of Seth, who
looked at his watch, and Lynch complained about how fans
don't deserve her. She also complained about the reference and
then left the room. Rollins told Hayman they need to talk,
and Rollin said he has to win. Haymon said he would,
and Rollin's question, what would happen if he lost? And

(27:11):
Hayman as showed him that he would would win, and
Haymon's told Rollins or Hayman told Rollins that he would
lose the locker room breaker and read and Hamon said
Rollins would become nothing more than a de facto want
to be secondary champion? Do yourself a favor and don't lose,
said Haymen, and Hayman turned to walk away, but Rollins

(27:32):
grabbed his arm and Rollins said he noticed that Hamon
left himself out of the equation and asked him what
would happen if he lost, And Haymond said, he's Rollin's
secret weapon, and he demanded to get a straight answer,
and Haymond said that if Rollins loses to Cody, he
would have to ask himself why he picked Rollins and

(27:53):
why he picked Rollins over Roman Reigns. So it kind
of creates a little tension between Hayman and Rowins that
if Rowinds loses to Cody, perhaps Hayman decides, hey, I
chose wrong, I'm out now. He couldn't just go back
to Roman Reigns, because Roman Reigns would be a fool
to just accept him back blindly. But it does create

(28:14):
a little dynamic here and a little bit of an
incentive if Rowins wants to keep Hayman as his oracle
to certainly win the match, and kind of spoiler alert,
I think that Rollins will Rollins has to win this.
Cody has nothing to gain by winning. There's no tribe.
There's no actual title on the line, so there's no
real consequences. But when you're looking at the other effects

(28:37):
that this could have on Rollins, if he loses again
and goes down four to Cody, it wouldn't be a
good look, it wouldn't be a good feel. I think
it would stamp Rollins as a secondary champion. And in
the pantheon of w W championships, we all know that
Cody Worlds Championship is actually a superior championship when it
comes to lineage and how the company has treated the belt,

(28:58):
and that's the one Roman carried for four years, and
on and on and on. The World Championship was resurrected
in what twenty twentye, twenty twenty two, twenty twenty three,
whatever it was. When Seth Ronalds originally won it, they
pretended that it didn't exist beforehand, which I thought it
was a big mistake because it did and then they
brought it back. And all that being said, WWE still

(29:20):
treats that championship Cody Rose is holding as the superior
championship anyway, So even if Rollins wins, it's not going
to devalue that championship, but it can hurt his if
he doesn't win. If that makes sense, all right, So backstage,
we had Jay then grilling Jimmy about whose side he
was on, while Roman Reigns stood by and Jimmy set

(29:41):
he's on j side. As Jay left the room and
Jimmy told Rains he sees what's happening, and Jimmy sett
he's not like Rains and blah blah blah. Okay, I
mean I've had enough. I've had enough of this. I
mean watching this is just it's not interesting to me.
This is probably the one low light of Raw, despite
the fact that you have the og bloodline here, because
I don't need to see them in any kind of

(30:04):
any tension. There's nothing to be gained here. There's no
scenario in which I would want to see any of
these men fight anybody. I don't need anyone turning on anybody.
There's nothing interesting that can happen here. The only thing
you can do with them, as I said fifteen minutes ago,
is to keep them together and have them fight evil.
That's it. It's all you can do, because any other

(30:25):
option is one that the fans would be bored with
and annoyed at legitimately we've been through. I mean, there
was literally a match called Civil War. Was it a
whole pl you remember civil War? Or was that like
the slogan for a pl all centered around the inter
family or intra family rivalries going on within the og bloodline.

(30:50):
So I mean, I just I can't. I can't do
it anymore. I can't. I know that people now what
I'm reading here. According to this analyst here for this
particular segment, it said two strong segments. Rollins and Hayman
are doing their best to make Rowlins versus Rhads feel
like it matters because those gaudy Crown Deel Championship belts

(31:11):
and rings are not enough. Meanwhile, the issues between Rains,
Jay and Jimmy are compelling. Okay, I agree with the former,
not the latter here, because I would agree that Rowlins
and Rhodes are making their match feel important simply for
the fact that they know how to sell a match
even if there's nothing really on the line. But I
can't disagree more with the Jimmy j Rains dynamic. I

(31:33):
can't disagree more the idea that there's tension and who's who.
I just don't care. I just don't care, just because
this is not the role to put them in. We've
done that for years. Okay, moving on, It made my
point something out of AJ Styles, Penta and Dragonly taking

(31:53):
on Dominic, Finn and JD. The match went fourteen minutes
and ten seconds with AJ and his team win as
he should if he's going to take on John Cena.
I said that last week, but we had the finish
of Russev walking to ringside. Dom exited the ring, grabbed
his title belts belts and Russev grabbed dom Penta threw

(32:16):
a superkick that Dom avoided and it ended up taking
out Russev. In the ring, AJ hit McDonald with the
Styles Clash and got the victory. After the match, AJ
hopped on the broadcast table and said his match with
John Cena doesn't need a story because it rights itself.
Styles said they would have to leave it or they
would leave it all in the ring. It will kick ass,

(32:37):
is what he said, and dropped the mic and saluted
like John Cena does when he comes out.

Speaker 1 (32:43):
So what.

Speaker 3 (32:47):
I look, I have no problem with this match as
a concept of AJ Styles versus John Cena. They had
a hell of a rivalry. How many years ago won
that Open Summer Slam. They've had Match of the Year
candidates with them working together. Is it how I would
have ended John Cena's career? I mean, given the open

(33:07):
candidate pool candidate, I mean probably not. But I can't
complain about AJ and and John Cena given what I
know they're capable of and what the history of these
two is. I just don't like AJ's promo. And AJ
is not a great promo to begin with. He never
has been. He's been okay to good during his best

(33:29):
best ones. He trips over his words. He doesn't seem
he doesn't have a great wrestling promo. He he just
never has. What's made him so successful is his in
ring work, generally speaking. And this was just not good though,
because he's again breaking the fourth wall that I still
want to believe exists, saying, oh, we don't need a story,
saying like, we don't need the writers to come up

(33:51):
with something. You know, We're just gonna lay it all
in the ring. We're gonna have a good performance. Are
you kidding me? Yes, I'm still bringing this stuff up.
I know a lot of you don't care about this anymore,
which I think is part of the problem that a
lot of fans have just become very complacent and realizing
what makes wrestling magical at times, and that's believing that

(34:12):
what you're watching is a real competitive matchup. Otherwise, why
would you even care to watch? You're supposed to authentically
get involved emotionally in the match. And when I'm being
reminded every four seconds that when I'm watching isn't real,
it kind of is difficult to connect to what's happening.
And this was a terrible promo. I'm sorry, terrible from

(34:34):
the perspective of it could have easily been avoided, like
he could have said anything else, and instead he says again,
in so many words, the writers don't need to come
up with anything for us. We don't need an actual
story to tell. We'll just you know, we're gonna knock
the roof, or we're gonna you know, basically knock the
roof off the building, blow the roof off the building. No,

(34:57):
once again, you couldn't come up with just even those
basic the kind of tension to build here instead of
just yeah, this is an exhibition. We don't need a story,
are you kidding? I don't know, I hate that. I
hate that crap. It's just such a spit. Its spitting
in the face of what wrestling is. It doesn't need

(35:18):
to be redefined or reimagined. Wrestling is what it is.
It doesn't need to evolve into something else. People look
at evolution and progress as a net positive in and
of itself, like just for the fact that if you
progressing or evolving is proof positive that it's a good thing. Well,

(35:42):
things can progress that are bad because I know we
associate progress or progressing forward as a net positive. But
let's talk about like, oh, I don't know, something is
extreme and a little bit uh maybe off the rails,
but cancer progresses, that's not a good thing, you know,

(36:04):
So I don't know. I understand things evolve all the time,
but at a fundamental level, there are things that should
not be touched. There are things that you can as
an offshoot of those fundamental principles, you can evolve how
you present pro wrestling in terms of how the matches

(36:24):
are laid out, or the speed or cadence to the match,
or the types of matches. Do the fans want faster, slower?
Do they want more giants? Do they want weapons? Those
are offshoots of pro wrestling, but at a fundamental level,
it's getting emotionally involved in the damn match. It's trying
to show some respect for the fans, the intelligence of

(36:45):
the fans, and getting people emotionally invested. And you can't
do that if you are always reminding people, even during
the damn show. Now, what you're watching is not real.
So shut up about stories, Shut up about trying to
the match kicking ass? How about just trying to win?
Whatever happened to the goal of a wrestling promo being

(37:07):
what it would mean to you to win and what
it will do for you if you lose.

Speaker 2 (37:11):
What will you know?

Speaker 3 (37:12):
How will it hurt you if you lose, and how
will it benefit you if you win? And why are
you trying to win? What about winning? That ever cross
anybody's mind anymore? Instead, it's just we're gonna leave it
all in the ring. We're going to make history.

Speaker 1 (37:27):
Man.

Speaker 2 (37:28):
Shut up.

Speaker 3 (37:30):
Those are byproducts. Those are things that the fans can
talk about, the announcers can talk about, the documentaries after
the match and the coming years can talk about. You
don't talk about it in the moment, you fools.

Speaker 1 (37:43):
All right?

Speaker 3 (37:43):
Sorry? Aj I love you man. I love you, man,
I mean nothing but respect, but you are caught up
in twenty twenty five version of TKO's wwe not My
thing man. All right, So then we get the main event. Okay,
here we go, final segment. Here Ajor oh seeam punkin

(38:03):
Alley Night taking on Jimmy and Jay Usso the match went.
It was fairly quick. Nine and a half minutes was
Ceem punkin Alley Night beating Jimmy and Jay. The finish
was Jay going up top for an USO splash, but
he dropped off the ropes and to knock Knight off
the apron, Punk hit j with the GTS and he
fell back into his corner. Knight tagged himself in and

(38:26):
stole the pin. After the match, Knight exited the ring
and smiled the Punk while heading towards the back, and
Punk stared at Night and the credits rolled, which I
don't like the credits either, But Jay was still down
as the show concluded. So this continues to push the
narrative that Knight could be heading into the darkness.

Speaker 2 (38:49):
Could be.

Speaker 3 (38:51):
It adds more tension between Knight and Punk. I mean
the idea that Knight and Jay are allies. Has gone
by the ways, But that's okay. I don't need them
to be friends. I don't need all baby faces to
be friends simply because their baby faces. I don't need
all heels to be you know, to be allied just
because they are on the same side. I mean, you

(39:12):
can have inter rivalries here, and the one between Jay
and Ella Knight makes sense, but the one between Punk
and La Knight is the one that they're building towards here,
and I don't know exactly what that could mean for
Punker Knight moving forward. Doesn't mean that La and I
turns seal. That's simply what they're I mean, that's what
they're hinting at. But all one thing, I saw this

(39:37):
clip of the Unreal Show. I haven't watched a full
episode yet, but I mean I get the gist of it.
There was one segment in which the producers and Triple
H and everybody else in the conference room was talking
about the finish to WrestleMania and who should go over
in that triple threat match between Punk and Rains and

(40:02):
Rollins in that awesome May Night Night one main event,
and Triple H was you know, he was actually of
the belief that punc should go over right, which I
mean we obviously saw was not the case. But he
was saying, how on the show that once things become predictable,

(40:25):
you know the fans can see what's coming, that means
you got to change something. He actually said that, well, okay,
as a general rule, you don't want the fans to
see everything coming. I agree with the larger potential problem
of everything being predictable or there are too many predictable things.

(40:47):
I understand that. I agree that seeing things coming and
things being predictable a lot is not a good thing.
That said, the way Triple H phrased it, it was
as if if it's predictable, ever we need to change it.
Things can ever be predictable. I mean, if you guys

(41:08):
have been listening to for any length of time, you
know where I'm gonna say and where I'm going here.
Predictabibility and the right thing are often the same thing.
But it seems like Triple H values maybe doing a
screwy thing for the benefit of it being unpredictable, which

(41:29):
of course then leads into booking chaos because then you
have to explain why you did what you did and
hope that what you did for the benefit of being unpredictable,
doesn't screw things up for the long term. For the
next story you're trying to tell, there's a price to
pay for always wanting to be unpredictable, because the universe

(41:50):
will never allow you to always make the right thing
be the unpredictable thing. It's not possible because we live
in reality. So if Triple H wants to adopt that
principle in perpetuity, just that's what he always wants to do,
he's going to have a hell of a booking issue

(42:14):
moving forward, because sure things will be unpredictable. But then
you're gonna go, wait, okay, I didn't see that coming.
And then the scary question that they don't want you
to ask is well, wait, why did they do that again? Okay, cool,
it was unpredictable. I didn't expect that, And we all
go what And then we look at it and take
a step back, and after the shock wears off and

(42:36):
the initial kind of adrenaline, you're like, well, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait,
wait wait, why did they do that again? And if
you're looking for a really good example of this, and
you're like, ah, there's no example of that with triple
h oh. Really, I could think of one one that
really captured the w fans in a very negative way

(42:56):
at Elimination Chamber last year with the Rock and the
John Cena heel turn, where they did something that they
thought was unpredictable, and certainly it was. Was it the
right thing to do? Well? I think most people would agree,
probably not with John scene to turning heel. There are
some benefits to it. I've gone over that before. It's
not all bad, but there was no follow through. You

(43:21):
took the biggest star in the world that was the
catalyst for the whole thing immediately out of the story,
which was one of the biggest flubs I've ever seen
in w storytelling. So sure you did the unpredictable thing
their trips, but I would agree, or I'd ask you
why again? Or am I not allowed to ask that?
I guess I'm not allowed to ask that. I'm just

(43:42):
supposed to shut up you a good wrestling fan and
not ask questions. But I do wonder if he values
unpredictability over doing the right thing. It seems as if
he does. We'll see if he continues to push that
policy moving forward. But there are certainly examples none bigger

(44:03):
than that one of Triple H's philosophy. All right, well,
that'll do it for me on this Monday night ral review.
I'll be back Wednesday. No, well, I might be back
a little bit earlier this week because of the preview
and prediction show for Crown Jewel, So I will probably
do that a little bit earlier this week, maybe on
Wednesday or Thursday night. I'll push that out, maybe do

(44:24):
the mail bag a little bit earlier. I won't be
able to likely record. Well, I shouldn't say that. Friday
is an iffy day for me. Get your mailbag questions
in as soon as possible as a I'll say, because
if I end up doing the mail bag earlier, I
want to be able to answer your questions and get
them to me. Mailbag at ww podcast dot com if

(44:44):
you're interested. So and also combine that with a preview
and prediction show for Crown Jewel, and then of course
Sunday will be the review for Crown Jewels. So join
us at Patreon if you want to go add free
and get an get access to a Discord server that
you can chat with all the other wrestling fans during
the show. Patreon dot com slash wwepodcast. So that'll do

(45:05):
it for me. Everybody. Hope you enjoy your Tuesday or
your Wednesday or Thursday, whenever you're listening to this, We'll
talk soon.

Speaker 4 (45:13):
Thanks for listening to the WWE podcast. Don't forget to
subscribe on your favorite podcast app so you don't miss
a show, or head to wwepodcast dot com and for
all of these shows add free head over to Patreon
dot com slash WWE podcast. Until then, we'll see you

(45:34):
next time.