Let's talk Monday Night Raw that aired May 5th, 2025. One that saw Paul Heyman cut another A+ promo, Rollins challenge Jey Uso for his World Championship, CM Punk return, Lyra Valkyria come to life, Iyo Sky vs Roxanne Perez and much more.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
This is WWE Superstar Drew McIntyre and you're listening to
the WWE podcast.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
Stop the show, the one that everybody wants.
Speaker 3 (00:17):
Me God, I'll stode sixteen, so just us your ass is.
Speaker 1 (00:28):
My Ron, You're gonna acknowledge me.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
Welcome everybody to the Raw review for Tuesday, May six five,
As we have a ple e in just a few days,
Backlash comes to us, and it's a shaping up to
be an interesting card. I know that it is a
coming off of so Mania. It's of course not usually
the most exciting pl If I was to choose any
(00:55):
pl out of the year to uh to watch or
to not watch, this may be one of them, outside
of any of the Saudi events. But this is shaping
up to be a good wrestling card, and not so
much an unpredictable outcome card, but more of again looking
at the quality of the wrestling and the matches and
(01:16):
potential storyline progression. That's where we should really, I think
aim our focus rather than are yo is anybody going
to drop the belt? Are we gonna have a new champion?
And while some of that is possible, it seems unlikely
as we go into Saturday, so we'll have our predictions
later this week for backlash that comes to a Saturday night.
(01:37):
I'm still loving the Saturday night pl e's. I do
appreciate it more than Sundays and it's just I think
it's a format here to stay. But beyond that, a
couple things. Number One, I want to give shout outs
to the new patrons of the show, Class Van Menser
and Chloe no Kardash. Thank you both, as well as
(01:59):
has Thank you for joining us at patreon dot com
slash ww podcast. If you want a shout out on
the show, head an over to Patreon, get yourself an
AD free experience, and I'll give you a shout out
on the show, as well as you getting priority placement
in the mail bag, meaning I read your emails up
front before any of the non patrons and a discord
(02:19):
server and other stuff. So check it out. But the
other important piece of news coming out of the wire
today not wrestling related, but certainly I think a certain
subset of my audience would be interested to hear. If
you didn't already, and I'm sure you did, the second
trailer for GTA six is out. I already has forty
million views. I mean it might be the fastest to
(02:40):
forty million out of any YouTube video ever released or
on x or. I think Rockstar released it all over
social media at the same time earlier this morning. And
we have GTA six trailer two. It's a half two
minutes three minutes long, and if you care about such things,
it is a hell of a trailer in terms of
what the game could offer. And the official release date
(03:05):
is a year from now. May twenty sixth, twenty twenty
six is the official date for the release of GTA six.
I wouldn't be surprised though, that that is the final
trailer before the GTA six releases. I know I've heard
rumors of oh, there's ten more to come, and I
don't believe it. The CEO of Rockstar recently came out
(03:27):
and said that this game doesn't need trailers, and which
is true, but also you may still be reaching people
that you otherwise may not have if you don't release trailers,
because trailers create a ton of buzz, and I would
still I would suspect, honestly, they'll probably release one more
prior to the release, maybe in you know, winter or
(03:50):
early spring of next year, to really get fans hyped.
How can they not because that's a year away. That's
and our attention spans today. That is re eternities long
of a time span. So it is an exciting day
if you're a GTA fan, although it's also depressing knowing
that you have to wait an entire year before you
(04:12):
get to hear and see GTA six in your hands. Also,
get ready to pay out your ass. You know, this
game isn't gonna go on sale. It's not gonna be
at a discount. You know, it's going to be probably
upwards of one hundred bucks to buy the game. I
would not be surprised. And the thing is people are
gonna pay it, that's my guess. We haven't heard about pricing,
(04:35):
but I mean, honestly, anywhere between eighty and one hundred bucks,
and that's just for the standard edition, not with all
the add ons and stuff. But they'll get away with
it and make four kajillion dollars on this thing. It
is the most expensive video game to ever be produced
in the history of mankind. And it also will be
a thirteen year gap between GTA five and GTA six.
(04:58):
That's insane. Thirteen years now they haven't been working on
it for thirteen years. But still that tells you the
longevity of this game, the popularity of this game, the
replayability of this game. I mean, it's incredible, and I
(05:19):
think people people have been burned out of GTA five
for like the last six years and waiting on GTA six,
but thirteen years between titles is insane. I mean, I
really my life. I don't think I'll get past GTA
eight or not, and maybe GTA nine then I'll be dead.
It's only a few more versions away based on this
(05:41):
pacing of their releases, so I'll, you know, maybe I
get to the PlayStation, PlayStation ten and then GTA six,
GTA nine will come out, and then I'll pass away
with my family surrounded in the hospital room while my
hands are on the controller playing GTA nine. All right, anyway,
(06:02):
moving on to wrestling. That's what you're here for. We're
not here to talk about GTA but we're here to
talk about wrestling, and let's do that as Backlash approaches
in just a couple of days. So let's talk about
Monett Raw and we'll start right at the top of
the show. All right, let's start right there and call
list at the attendants eleven five and we had Jay
(06:29):
us oblige by singling signaling for his music to play,
and he said he knew Logan Paul was in the
building and he said where are you at? However, a
different Paul said, ladies and gentlemen, I mean kind of
a surprising confrontation here with Paul Hayman. He comes out
(06:51):
and said he wanted to say something to Jay, who
responded by saying that Hayman had a lot of balls
for entering the ring with what he did to his family.
And Jay said he saw past Hayman since day one
and warned Roman Reigns and see him Punk about him.
Hayman said Jay should have warned him about Rains and Punk,
(07:14):
and then took to the crowd to keep their booze.
That told them to keep their booths to themselves. That's
when a CM Punk chant broke out as Haymon spoke
about him, and he mocked the chance and said fans
chant Punk's name because they don't know what's in his
dark heart. He said Punk put him in a position
that he knew would sabotage his relationship with Rains, and
(07:35):
then the fans responded with otc. Chance Hamon said to build,
he built the bloodline for five years and questioned if
Rains thought he was going to share all of his
secrets with Punk, why would I do that, asked Hayman.
And Hayman said he found a stray big dog on
the island of relevancy and turned him into the man
who had a record setting title reign. He said he
(07:57):
wasn't the one who lost the championship to Code Roads
at Wressell Maania forty. He said he spent sent spent
five years building up Roman reigns, and when he lost
the title, he disappeared and left him in the hands
of Solo Sokoa and the Tomatonga and Tonga Loa, the Tongans.
(08:18):
And Hayman said Rains came back, but only to get
his ulafalla. He said Rains couldn't handle the fact that
he wanted to help out his best friend. And Hayman
yelled how he always was always labeled the scumbag, and
he yelled, I'm right. Hayman yelled at Jay, I'm right,
and you blame me, Screw you, screech and every one
of you for booing in the crowd. It was just
(08:38):
you know all over Hayman and Jay said, are you okay?
And he asked what all this had to do with him.
Hamon said he owed Ja an apology. He said he
had nothing to do with Jay and he didn't come
out to talk about rains and punk. He basically said
that Rollins wants the championship and Hayman mentioned Breaker, said
(09:03):
mentioned bron Breaker and said that was just phase one
of their plan. Phase two is the World Heavyweight Championship,
and he said he was there to offer a favor.
He said he would let Jay pick the night when
he loses the World Championship, and he challenged raw On,
behalf of Rollins, challenged Jay to a World Championship match,
(09:24):
and that's when Jay said, let's do it tonight, so
we get a World Championship match on Monday Night Raw.
And I have to say it did feel like a
bigger deal than usual for a title match on Raw
because they haven't defended the world title on Raw in
a while. And it's amazing when you don't give away
(09:45):
free title opportunities on free TV, how much of a
difference it makes when you do offer something like that,
because it feels special and it also feels special enough
to know, subscribe to the network, subscribe to Peacock so
you can get the plest to see the title opportunity
to see the title matches. It's amazing when you don't
(10:08):
just constantly give away championship matches. How much they feel,
how different they feel, and last night felt different. And
you know, there was a lot of people, including myself,
who thought Seth Rollins has a shot.
Speaker 3 (10:23):
Here.
Speaker 2 (10:24):
He has a newly formed group with bron Breaker who's
a tank, Paul Hayman, who's one of the greatest of
all time. They're just getting on their feet. They got
a lot of momentum. Jay wasn't exactly, you know, a
absolute lock it in top champion that I think most
(10:45):
of the fans felt was the right guy to win
the rumble, and so there was some doubt. There was
some doubt that Jay was gonna lose the belt. And
obviously we saw the outcome of what happened and on
Monday night. But we'll get to that, and I will
say with Paul Hammy with how good he is. You know,
(11:08):
he is one of the greatest of all time, one
of the most legendary figures in all of professional wrestling,
and yet he's never had a single match. I know
some people have told me that he has had a
couple of matches, but for all intents and purposes, the
majority of fans don't look him as good. Look at
(11:28):
him as a wrestler, he's not. He's a manager. He
can be called an advocate, he'd be called a wise man. Whatever.
He's a manager. He is one of the greatest of
all time to do it. But imagine if Paul Haman
actually was able to have a wrestling career. If he's
this great as a mouthpiece on behalf of someone else,
(11:50):
imagine the kind of career he would have had if
he was able to actually compete in the ring and
be good at it. I mean, imagine, rivalries with John
Cena on the microphone right, would have been incredible. Think
(12:11):
about all the potential rivalries that Paul Hayman would have
had over the years. Now obviously he didn't, that's not
his stick. But I'm just saying it's incredible the level
that he's achieved in the eyes of fans with only
being able to speak, it's incredible. It shows you the
power of promos, which obviously Paul Hayman is a masterclass
(12:34):
at So all right, let's move on and we have
Penta versus j D McDonough and McDonough's entrance was not
televised here. The match did go eleven minutes with Penta
beating j D. The finish was Penta up top when
(12:56):
Chad Gable comes out and mess with him while the
ref he was focused on the ejections and Penta shook off.
Gable hit him with a flip dive and McDonagh hit
Penta with a whiplash and then Penta avoded a moon
salt Eddie hit the destroyer on McDonagh and got the victory.
So Penta continues the momentum. JD continues the losing a
(13:18):
nice kind of re establishing the momentum type of victory
for Penta here and then backstage we had Grayson Waller
talk with Adam Pierce about how he wasn't happy with
his singles match opponent, and Austin Theory shows up and
Waller claims he was there telling Pierce that Theory should
take his singles match and Pearce was rolling his eyes
(13:39):
and he agreed to switch after Theory said he wanted
the match, and it ended up being shamous versus Austin theory.
We'll get to that a second. But or Cole hyped
the WWE Money in the Bank event and the World's
Collide event being held on June in Los Angeles, so
(14:02):
that is the next real ple. I know we have
a Saturday Night main event at the end of May,
so that's something to consider to. I believe it is
rumored or nearly confirmed. I think that John ced is
actually going to be competing at a Saturday Night main event.
But the June seventh event in about a month is
(14:22):
the next real pl for WWE. So money in the
Bank guys, Yes, we have Saturday Night main event, but
that's kind of a hold me over. Look, I don't
really look at that as a true ple it's really not.
But money in the Bank is the next big one.
So we can start talking about who can win, you know,
who's in a position who could WWE look to the
(14:43):
future for heading into SummerSlam, heading into next year's WrestleMania,
So it's going to be a fun conversation after this weekend. Yes,
we'll look to the Saturday Night main event, but then
of course it's really the next big marker here is
money the bank and very much beloved pl So we
(15:03):
got Seamus taking on Austin theory. Always good to see Seamus.
He comes out of the woodwork, kind of out of nowhere,
and you know what kind of match you're gonna get
with him. He's just a solid ass worker and literally
and figuratively, the dude can work. He is a Yes,
(15:26):
I think he's a Hall of Famer. I think he
deserves to be in the Hall of Fame. Seamus definitely does.
He's never going to be the face of the company again.
He's a legacy star who still can go and there's
still I think some juice to squeeze out of Seamus
if they really want to have a semi significant run
with him again, even as Intercontinental Champion or US champion,
you could do it. Even competing for the World Championship
(15:49):
or w Championship. You can have him for a month
or so, be a fill in between opponents for the
for a champion, for a heel champion. So I think
that's something that we can consider a Shamus. While he's
you know, he's older now tons of miles, he's still
a hell of a worker, big name, but you know,
he's on the back side of his career, doesn't have
(16:09):
a lot of days left. I don't think I think
they could still do something significant with him if they
pace it out right, and if they maybe just give
him a little bit of a build, little bit of
a boost as they move forward, give Shamus some damn promos.
He can talk. I know, Seamus is a guy that
just is a constant who's there and you look at
him and go, wow, yeah, I forgot about him. Yeah cool,
(16:31):
I get to see Seamus. I think that's how a
lot of people feel. He's like, oh cool, yeah, Seamus,
you know that. I think that's how I feel. Anyway,
every time he comes out, I forget that he's there.
But then I'm glad he's there because he's a big
name that you don't mean to forget about it, but
you do, because he's not really used consistently on television.
(16:53):
So it was great to see him. So the match
was physical, as every Shamous matches. He sets up for
the ten beats, Theory clothesline him over the top, and
then when Theory rolled into the ring, Seamus hit him
with a knee strike and the match continues here. The
match went nine and a half minutes with ending with
(17:14):
a brogue kick and a victory for Seamus and it's
just good, you know, good to see him back. The
bro kicks fun. I don't know where they go from
here again with Seamus. As I said, you can do
some certain things with him on a limited basis, and
I think they should get everything out of him that
they can, honestly, so this is good. And the theory
(17:38):
Waller breakup continues to tease us if anyone's even interested
in that anymore. The Waller theory breakup is still on hold,
probably because they don't have anything in mind for the
breakup after it happens. While we know it's probably gonna happen,
it will happen. The idea of just having it happen
with no feet follow up is of course not a
(18:01):
good idea. So they don't know what's going to happen
after they break up, and that's really the most important part,
because you can do it and have that moment, But
then the question is a more important The question is okay, well,
why what did you do that?
Speaker 1 (18:13):
For?
Speaker 2 (18:13):
What is the what's the plan? That is more important
than the moment of having the breakup, because if the
breakup happens and then there's no plan. Well, then the
breakup wasn't worth it and the moment it gets devalued,
which we've seen things like that happen before. Okay, Dominic
Mysterio versus Penta for the IC Championship was announced by
(18:35):
Cole for Saturday's Backlash event. Again predictions coming this week
with a mailbag slash actual prediction show coming Friday, so
stay tuned for that. And let's see here, we had
a Dom telling the others in the room, and this
(18:56):
is backstage, that being a champion was hard than he realized.
He asked Balor if he would take care of styles
for him, and Balor got upset and asked if his
job was to take care of Dom's messes. Ballor flashed
a smile and said, of course he would do it. Again,
more teasing of this pair splitting up just like Waller
in theory, Dom and Dominant. I'm sorry Dom and Finn
(19:23):
that breakup has yet to happen too, but it's coming.
So backstage New Day an Xavier Cofin Xavier spoke with
Chad Gable, Kingston and Woods said it's time that American
may get some respect and Woods brought up the war Raiders,
wanting a shot at the tag titles. Woods set opportunities
(19:44):
like that need to come back to American Maid and
Gable loved it. Becky Lynch entered the picture and looked
at all three men. They wished her good luck and
Lynch walked past them while Cole hyped her match, and
he also hyped SummerSlam for August second and third.
Speaker 3 (20:00):
Third.
Speaker 2 (20:01):
There you go, We're getting a hype for the coming
months post Mania. They got to do that because coming
down off of WrestleMania, which really left the sour taste
in all of our mouths again with the Night two debacle,
they not only do they usually do this, but they
really extra need to do that this year to keep
fans like, hey, oh guys, guys, don't forget Yeah, we
got other Peli's coming up, you know, so stay tuned,
(20:24):
you know, forget about WrestleMania. And you also notice, I'm
just thinking about this now, WWE. At least maybe I've
missed it because I don't watch every single minute of Raw.
Have they and this is a genuine question, but I
don't think I've seen it. Have they been shoving WrestleMania
(20:46):
highlights down our throats for the past several weeks. I
don't think they have. I mean, yes, you had it
on the Monday night raw for WRESTLEMANI had the smack
down after WrestleMania. But I remember last year they would
not stop playing the WrestleMania highlights. I mean, I think
it went to SummerSlam. It was obnoxious about the biggest gate,
(21:09):
the biggest attendance. Ah, we took the most money from
the you know, the most fans ever, I mean literally
that's what they said. They said they had the largest gate,
which people are cheering for. Why you would announce in
gloat that you just made the most money or at
least gross made the most money from the people in
attendance is really arrogant and ballsy, and I think it
(21:30):
insults to fans intelligence. There's no need to talk about
the gate, like meaning, how much money you just made
from the people that are sitting there, how much money
you just you know, they they gave you from their wallets. Willingly,
you can talk about attendance, but they've brought up the
gate in the arena and fans are like, yay, and
then they all probably should be sitting there going wait
(21:52):
a second, right, No, I mean, but I wouldn't cheer
that anyway. Like last year, they were just so obsessed,
self obsessed with the WrestleMania production and everything that came
with it and all the pompt circumstance, and it went
forever This year with the WrestleMania forty one. Again, I
(22:16):
may have been missing it because I do I don't
go go through the commercials and all that stuff, and
some of the video packages I miss. I don't think
that they've been really hammering home WrestleMania forty one like
they did WrestleMania forty and I think a lot of
that has to do with the kind of silent admission
(22:36):
that the main event of Night two was a disaster,
and to be honest, Night one was not a lot
of fun outside of the main event, as we've all discussed,
So the highlights have not been really in our faces.
They've just kind of moved on, and I think that's
really the best case. Okay, So then we get a
(22:59):
really fun segment here, one that I did not expect
to enjoy as much as I did, and that was
Becky Lynch coming out and said she was upset with
the fans and that they were treating her like she
was the bad guy, and you know, I was saying
she's the victim and recalled fans crying tears of joy
when she returned to WrestleMania, and Lynch said nobody asked
(23:20):
where Bailey was and nobody cared because she's garbage. She
said people should be thankful when someone takes out the garbage,
and Lynch said the Women's Inner Continental Champion, Libra Valkyia
is less offensive than regular garbage, but she's still garbage
and said Valkyria wouldn't have a career or even a
fiance if it wasn't for her. That's when Lyra comes
(23:43):
out and said that Lynch is the queen of recycling
because she's been recycling the same moves and tired old
act for years. And Valkyria spoke as she walked to
the ring and said Lynch didn't make her. She said
that Lynch went on holiday and everyone got better. And
she continued and said Lynch went on holiday and she
(24:06):
made history. Valkyria held up her title belt and Valkyria
were called Lynch saying that the championship needs her and
that she was given rich given that she's defended the
title more than Lynch has shown up for work this year. Okay,
before I continue, Okay, the promo here, while I did
just pre compliment it, and it was still one of Lira's,
(24:29):
if not Libra's best to date, and it brought her
to life. So don't all this trash and recycling. I mean,
that's kind of a weird. I've never had that analogy
done before. I mean, it works, but it's also just
too cutesy sometimes, But I get it. And yeah, Becky
has been recycling a lot of her personality, so there
(24:50):
is some truth to that over the years. She hasn't
really changed a whole lot since WrestleMania thirty five. And
also again, United States doesn't go on holiday. That almost
sounds like a sentence that doesn't sound right because to us,
I think I've talked about this before. Like again, this
is for the United States. I don't speak for obviously
(25:13):
over in the UK, I know that they have holiday,
but to me, holiday is a singular day. You know,
you have a good holiday?
Speaker 3 (25:22):
Right?
Speaker 2 (25:23):
You hear that in stores because we're not allowed to
say or you know, frowned upon, don't say Merry Christmas.
You know, we all know that. But when you say, hell,
have a nice holiday, I hope your holiday is good.
When we hear that here, it's like, oh yeah, cool.
That means like have a great Thanksgiving, or have a
great Christmas or New Year's or you know, pick pick
(25:43):
your choice. Memorial Day whatever, fourth is July. That to
us is a singular day, like holiday to me is
a singular day. It is not a weeks long excursion,
you know. So when I hear that, it's just grammatically
doesn't sound right because to me, I know what holiday
(26:04):
means to us, Well, what it means to you know,
those overseas is vacation, So the synonym for us would
be vacation. So I don't mean to make a mountain
out of a mole hill here. But I've never heard
anyone in front of a United States crowd talk about
(26:25):
holiday like go on holiday, meaning okay, you should just
go on vacation. So it's just a difference of culture
and language. But it's you know, obviously you're in the
United States, so it's a bit of a I think
a miss there for most people, like huh, what do
you mean holiday? What holiday? Memorial Day? What are you
talking about? Right, So to us, it's vacation anyway, all right.
(26:49):
So this is where things get better for Lyra here.
Lynch said, it's true that everyone has had their best
year while she was away, but that's only because she
wasn't there. To be compared to Lynch, she's the greatest
to ever do it, and pointed to Sports Illustrated saying
the same. And Lyra then talked about Lynch's accomplishments and
wanted to and started to say that Lynch was the
(27:10):
first women's in her Continental champion and she said, oh wait,
that one was me. And she said, before holding up
the title that it bothers Lynch that she was the
first to win it and she should get used to
second place. And that's when Lynch went for a cheap
shot and it ended with a brawl, and you know,
we have Lynch yelling about disrespect and they kept brawling.
(27:34):
It ended with Lyra hitting a night wing finish on
Becky and holding up the championship. I know a lot
of people that are probably looking to Becky to win
the belt. Here I wouldn't do I wouldn't put the
car before the horse here. This there. If there were
(27:56):
plans to have Becky win it. This may be the
case against it, as Michael Cole even said she came
out of her shell. It's true. It felt like she
was hatched and it felt like she was poking through
the egg and she broke through like that dinosaur in
Jurassic Park. It's just like she hatched out of there,
the eggshells off of her. It's like it's like she
(28:19):
was born. She became a personality. Before she was just
kind of this this NXT star. Again, if you didn't
follow her an NXT, she was just kind of this,
you know, I mean, honestly generic NXT star, good in
the ring, not much of a personality, but can go
and you know, we just like her because she seems nice.
And now it's like, oh, we learned something about her here.
(28:40):
We understand a little bit more about your motivations, your personality,
which you're like on the MIC when you cut a
long form promo, when you're going toe to toe with
one of the best, how does she stack up? And
we saw that and it felt like she belonged. So
I think she took a big lyra did a big
step forward last night. And personality not in the ring,
(29:01):
there doesn't seem to ever be an issue with anyone
in the ring. Honestly, it was more personality and that
was a part that she really needed to work on,
and I think she came out shining. So that's why
I'm saying I would not bet against Lyra retaining at
Backlash for the Incontinental Championship. In fact, that's kind of
(29:22):
what I want is Lyra to retain, all right. We
then add EO Sky versus Rox San Perez and a
non title match. Cale noted that Ripley was in Australia
doing media for the shows in Perth, and Sky hit
Perez with an early suicide dive and rolled back inside
(29:43):
some early action here. The match went ten minutes, as
most matches do here on Monday Night, at least this episode.
Sky sold the knee injury. She went up top and
attempted her over the moon Salt finished, but rock Sand
moved and Sky sold the knee pain and landed on
her feet. Sky then stuffed a pop Rocks and threw
(30:04):
a kick, but Perez caught her leg and gave her
a dragon screw leg whip. They then took turns rolling
each other's pins and it reverses and reverses into pins.
Sky eventually gets the finish and gets the victory. After
the match, Perez offered a handshake. She seemed, you know,
happy and or at least respectful and accepted. Roxanne left
(30:26):
the ring, and then Julia attacked Sky from behind, and
that's when Roxanne laughed at ringside and joined Julia in
the ring to beat down Sky, and Cole reminded fans
that Rear Ripley was in Australia because you know, I'm
sure everyone at home was there going where's Ripley? We'll
make the save, make the save while she's in a
(30:48):
different country. So that's what Cole wanted us to be
aware of. So yeah, yeah, that was good. Was good.
I mean some people are mentioningly. I guess it was
funnily a word, funny enough comedically, you know, well, where's
Dakota Kai? You know that would have been a perfect
opportunity for Dakota to make a run in. Uh yeah
(31:11):
about that, right, I mean, with Dakota being released, that's
the joke not gonna happen. But boy, if there was
ever a time for Dakota to make the save, there's
not been a whole lot of opportunities for Dakota's to
be to be perfectly set up to make a big
time save. Of course, they have that set up the
week after they release her, so the universe gets the
(31:34):
last laugh. I guess, I don't know. I really do
wish the best for Dakota. I mean I was actually
as Dakota was getting more and more screen time, enjoying
her more and more, especially that turn on Bailey leading
up to last year's WrestleMania. I really enjoyed that version
of Dakota. I really loved it, and it's like, oh, okay,
(31:56):
there is something here, and it never really manifested into much,
or at least they didn't allow it to all. Right,
So then we have a tail of the tape with
the Russev versus Otis. Then we get the match. Predictably,
Russev beats Otis. He did it in eight and a
half minutes after he put him in the accolade and
got the submission. And after the match, Russive ignored the
(32:19):
ref and he eventually released the hole. Tazawa entered the
ring and wanted to fight Russev. He opted to leave
the ring instead and went to Zawa checked that Otis.
Russev came back and beat up both men and put
Otis in the accolade again, and a group of referees
and trainers ran out and eventually got Roussev to release, and.
Speaker 3 (32:39):
That was that was that.
Speaker 2 (32:43):
Otis did get a decent amount of offense here. It
wasn't a squash, but Otis has got size, and you
can't have Russev just trained through Otis. I know, on
the totem pole of stardom, Otis is not very high,
but he's still a big dude that the fans adore,
and they can't have Rusev just steamroll them. And they
didn't know there was a respectable amount of offense from Otis,
(33:07):
and I think that was important here, despite the fact that,
you know, Russev is gonna win for a multitude of reasons.
He just returned, he's a bigger star generally, you know,
those are really enough reasons for him to win. So yeah,
and they probably have plans for Russev where they don't
really have for Otis, So there's their third reason. So
(33:31):
that's when again, so it looks like it looks like
Russev is going to remain a heel. I know, and
the fans didn't really adore him as much in this
beatdown as they did last week with him beating down
Otis and Tizawa. The fans got on Roussov a little
bit more so. I think the once the the shine
wears off of his return and the fans decide, okay, cool, yeay,
(33:56):
it's great to have you back. But then Russev continues
to attack the people you like. I think that will
overtake the shininess and the love affair that fans have
with Russev of being excited to see him back. That'll
wear off quick. And I think you already saw some
of that last night. So keeping Russeva heels fine, I
(34:18):
don't have any issue with it. He's played both sides
and he's really good at both sides. So and he's
ultra athletic. I mean, he trimmed down. He looks good
in the ring, Russav just I mean, he's just looks
really good, all right, And especially that spinning heel kick
on Otis that was crazy. So then we get the
Gunther and Pat McAfee segment, and Gunther spoke about being
(34:41):
a professional this is in the ring. Then we had
McAfee pointing to Cole and called him a walking, talking goat,
and McAfee said Cole has only missed three weeks in
twenty eight years with WWE, and McAfee said Cole has
earned the right to have an opinion. McAfee played to
the Nebraska fans and the sports there, and McAfee mentioned
(35:05):
baseball in Nebraska and hosted Okay, so we started talking
about other stuff that just really gets the fans on
his side. McAfee said he and Gunther grew up with
the same dream of wanting to be in WWE. McAfee
said they both spent hours and hours watching pro wrestling
his children while thinking that that's what they were put
on the planet to do. And McAfee said Gunther has
(35:25):
been a champion for eighty percent of the time he's
been in WWE and said that Gunther's jaded and it's
become a job to him and McIntyre. I'm sorry, mactar.
McAfee said he gets jacked up when he walks into arenas.
He said Gunther got too comfortable and that he'll underestimate
him on Saturday and that he'll prove this version of
(35:47):
Gunther is soft. That's good I mean McAfee can talk.
Speaker 3 (35:53):
He can.
Speaker 2 (35:54):
It's too bad that he's, you know, not the most
muscular or athletic looking dude. I understand he's a punter.
I understand he's a former NFL. I understand all that
he's got, you know, the number one podcast in the world.
I get it. I get all that, But what does
that qualify him to be in the ring with Gunther?
And I understand, yeah, it's the underdog. I don't know
(36:18):
it's gonna be. I think one of those matches where
you know, McAfee has no business getting him out in
the amount offense that he's going to get in because
we saw what he did with Austin theory at WrestleMania
was at thirty eight, and yeah, he got a lot
of offense in an Austin theory, but Austin theory did
a lot of the work for him. He's one of
the best guys to have in the ring with somebody
(36:39):
that needs to look good and Gunther I think he's
not Austin theory in reality, I wouldn't have McAfee get
more than a couple of shots in before he gets
absolutely destroyed by Gunther. But they're not going to do
that in WW true WW fashion. They're gonna have and
I hope they don't do this, but I do believe
they probably will have Pat McAfee get a couple of
(37:02):
hope spots where you believe he can actually beat Gunther.
There is no world in which that should happen, but
they will have that happen because oh, it's entertainment, right,
They'll they'll use that's just the blanket deodorizer for everything
that they do. And I'm already hammering for something they
haven't done yet, but I can since it coming. But
(37:24):
a lot of times w W will do things and
that they know that's it's the wrong decision, but they
won't admit it, and they'll just deodorize it by saying, well,
it's entertainment.
Speaker 3 (37:34):
Enjoy it.
Speaker 2 (37:36):
Yeah, that's such a cop out corporate answer. What that
really means is we don't have the balls to take
accountability for the bad decisions we make, and so we're
going to now insult your intelligence by telling you it's
just entertainment. Calm down. At the same time they put
up scream you know, the decibel meter thing, which, by
(37:58):
the way, I think there's a bunch of garbage. That
thing has been pipulated top the bottom. I mean when
they put on the I forget what they call it,
some kind of some kind of meter. When they have
a big star come out and they show how many
decibels it is. It's all just completely phony. But they're
telling us of one breathy'll yell and scream and tell
us what you think. And then the same breath, They're like, well,
(38:20):
don't get too crazy if it's not nice. It's just
entertainment after all. Calm down, a boy. Anyway, Well, this
is what Gunther said on Saturday, that bell is going
to ring. I'm gonna beat you up. I'm gonna maul you.
I'm gonna grab you by the head and drive it
into the mat. I'm gonna choke you out until you
(38:40):
drop like a wet towel. And Gunther said McAfee is
untouchable due to his grace. And Gunther said that on Saturday,
only the grace of God will lift his arms off
of McAfee's throat, and Gunther shoved the mic into McAfee's
chest and stormed out of the ring.
Speaker 3 (38:55):
And then that was that.
Speaker 2 (38:58):
So I think that was good. It was a fine
promo for an announcer versus a wrestler, which I'm not
always a big fan of, but we're getting it. It
is as good of a build as you can have.
And you talk about Gunther's fall from grace. Here he
goes from an unbeatable ring general to tapping out instantly
(39:19):
to Jay Usso to now facing an announcer that he's
gonna have to sell for on Saturday. I hope this
is a breakdown to rebuild Gunther. No disrespect to Pat,
but look, you can't have Pat McAfee in any scenario.
Look like he could beat Gunther on Saturday. I know
they'll do it to get the fans excited. Oh my god,
(39:40):
it could be a moment, but ultimately you're still hurting Gunther.
Gunter will be more damaged coming out of this match.
There's just no scenario in which Gunther can't be more
damaged coming out of this match because he's gonna sell
for Pat. So it's a quote unquote entertaining match. But
he has also just in the first place, no business
(40:01):
in the ring with Pat McAfee. He is above that.
I thought he was above facing j at WrestleMania, and
now he's just down to beating up announcers. So I think,
and I hope this is just a way to break
Guntherro down to build him back up. All right, almost
(40:24):
threw raw. So next week in Louisville, you have aj
Styles versus Finn Balor, the war Raiders taking on American Made,
and Eo Sky and Rhea Ripley versus Rox Sane Perez
and Julia so fun. Yeah, I like that they do that.
That was a lot of stuff that they didn't do
during the Vince McMahon era. Although now there's a lot
of people who called Vince McMahon the devil incarnate just
(40:49):
a year or two ago who are now begging for
Vince to come back because of the things that are
going on with TKO and WWE and how TKO views
w and all that. And hey, lover hate Vince, And
I know a lot of people hate Vince. I understand
you're you're dislike for him, but you wouldn't be here.
(41:12):
You likely would not have the love for professional wrestling
that you do had it not been for Vince McMahon
and putting aside all of my personal feelings, all of
his personal faults, and he's got a lot. I don't
care about what he's done in his personal life. I
really don't. I mean, that's your own problem. All I
care about as a fan, and that's really all you
should care about as a fan, because none of us
know Vince personally. At least ninety nine point nine percent
(41:36):
of us listening to this don't know Vince personally, if not,
everyone that's listening to this doesn't. Everything he does in
his personal life does not affect you unless you need
it to for some personal vendetta. All the professional decisions
he made ultimately led to you being a fan. You
are here, I am here doing this because of Vince McMahon,
(42:01):
and there's just no two ways about it. He created
the most successful pro wrestling company of all time. No,
not sports entertainment, professional wrestling, because that's what is the entertainment,
is the wrestling. And now people that just absolutely excoriated
Vince McMahon a short time ago or wanting him to
(42:22):
come back, and that's not going to happen. But you
just see how fickle people are and how sometimes they
jump on the bandwagon, and you know, people are strying
to turn on Triple H, turn on TKO themselves, w
you know, the day they died was the day that
TKO bought the company. You're seeing it all now itself.
(42:44):
People are it's human nature. But okay, let's move on.
Main event, Jay us versus Seth Rollins for the World
Heavyweight Championship, and we got this match going for them
because the time stamp nearly twenty minutes. Wow, I didn't
know was that long. Didn't feel it really good match
(43:05):
as expected from two absolute professionals of the stomp that
Rollins gave Jay wasn't the best stomp in the world.
And I'm glad that both Cole and McAfee pointed out
that he didn't get all of it because it ended
up working out that that was a near fall. I
don't think he was supposed to sell it that way,
but it ended up working out perfectly because the kickout
(43:26):
was believable since he didn't quote unquote get all of it,
and so it was just kind of a perfect happenstance situation.
And Sammy comes out after of course Breaker interferes, and
Breaker walked towards the entrance and waited for him. Zayn
came out from the crowd, jumped the barricade onto Breaker,
(43:49):
got some revenge. Zayn had his ribs taped and that's
when Breaker recovered and speared Zaye, which, by the way,
I appreciate that Sammy at least had his ribs taped,
But if you really had your ribs taped and you
had broken ribs, you aren't moving like that. He had
(44:10):
the visual, but he didn't sell anything, you know, like okay,
I appreciate it, and I truly do appreciate it. At
least he had something one, but he was moving around
just as if it was another night. However, he got
spirited again by Breaker, and Jay left the ring to
check on Zane, and that's when Breaker spirit Jay while
Hayman distracted the ref and then Rollins hit Jay with
(44:33):
a stomp and it was about to pin him. That's
when Punk's music came out a hit and crowd popped huge.
He came out of the chair, Punk took out Breaker,
came in the ring. He tackled Rollins and slammed the
chair over his back while the referee could be seen
waving off the match at ringside, and Punk then hit
Rollins with a chair again and he came Rollins exited
(44:55):
the ring and stood with the Breaker and Hayman and
that was it.
Speaker 1 (44:59):
So this.
Speaker 2 (45:02):
Was a really good match. Now, the finish being kicked
out of not just the stomp, but the false finish
of Jay getting his spear and the USO splash also
was a fun false finish because you're thinking, Okay, wow,
Jay's gonna he's gonna retain and Seth kicks out and
you're like, uh oh, and then Seth gets his stomp
(45:24):
and Breaker gets his spear and you go, oh God,
here we go. If you're a Jay Uso fan, you're
in trouble. And so they had a lot of fun
ups and downs. They took us on a ride, did
they not. Yeah, they did really fun main event, really
fun main event here with Jay and Seth. They've worked
together throughout the years. Here now with the World Championship.
If you remember when the World Championship was reintroduced with
(45:48):
Seth Rollins becoming the first World heavyweight champion, again pretending
the lineage doesn't exist before that, and it did quite
a few years before that the World Heavyweight Championship, it did,
but when it was reintroduced a few years ago, Seth
was the first champion, and I remember attending a raw
in which Jay versus Seth while Seth was champion, was
(46:09):
the main event, and Jay came close to winning at
that point. Now fast forward a couple years later, now
Jay's the champion and Seth is the one in chase mode.
It's just kind of funny how things work. But it
was a good main event, really good main event. That's
a wrestling main event, and I think that that will
carry into Backlash and perhaps we get some kind of
(46:31):
multiman match with Seth and Jay and Punk for the
world championship. That seems to be what I'm tilting towards.
I wish I just didn't always have to resort to
the crutch of a triple threat. Whenever we see more
than one person involved in a world title, you just
kind of know instinctively that, oh, well, this person's here.
(46:51):
Out here comes the third person. Triple threat, Triple threats
in fatal four ways, in fatal five ways and all
that should not be as common as they are. But
I mean, that's just the landscape. It's the kind of
the culture of pro wrestling today. So I would think
that's probably where they're headed, but we'll find out in
the coming days. I would imagine or in the next
(47:13):
coming weeks because we don't have a World Championship match
right now. As I look at the card, it's Johnson
or Randy Ordan VI, then disputed w Championship, Lyra versus
Becky for the Women's Icy Belt, Jacob Fatu versus Knight
versus McIntyre versus Damian Priest for the US Championship, and
Dominic versus Penta versus No Dominic versus Penta. That's it
(47:37):
for the Icy Championship. Oh and Gunter versus McAfee. I
think that's probably it, unless there's some surprise match now'll
produce on SmackDown. I don't think there will be.
Speaker 1 (47:50):
This is it.
Speaker 2 (47:50):
This is your final card. So we've got five matches.
I think that's enough for this PLEE. And then that's
been kind of the staple of a triple H. Paul
of pl E has been five matches, longer matches, and
you know that that to me is a better, better pacing.
(48:11):
You know, the wrestlers were able to tell a story,
fans are able to digest it a little bit more.
You don't have to rocket through matches, and I think
it'll remain at five. See the only one that's not
a championship is McAfee versus Gunther. The rest are all
all four out of the five are four championships, so uh,
(48:33):
that's uh, that's good. And now we can look forward
to past backlash and whatever that's going to offer as
we head really towards Saturday, and it's made event quick
and then the money in the Bank event on June seventh.
So overall, solid episode of mondaet Raw and we have
a preview for next week, which is always a good
thing knowing what's coming for the following week and things
(48:56):
we get to look forward to. It also shows some
booking decisions ahead of time that they have a plan.
I think that's a big reason why they didn't announce
a lot of stuff to the Vince mcman era, is
that they didn't want to commit and then have to
back out if they had a better idea in the
coming week. But nope, if you announce it, they're sticking
to it. And that I do like that change from
(49:19):
the Vince mcman era. Not every change, not every change,
that's for sure. One of the biggest I think I
don't like is the advertising in the ring that's just
plastered all over the mad and all over the sides,
and it's just I'm watching, you know, wrestlers on a
billboard every single night, and I just every single Monday night,
and peey, I hate it. I hate it so much
(49:43):
with the you know, the advertised sponsors all over the ring.
And I know that that have to make money, and
I understand all that, but the trade off is the visual,
which is just horrendous. I can't get used to it.
I can't get used to Snickers or slim gym or
Prime or whatever the hell Fortnite is on the ring
(50:04):
Matt every single time Monday night raw or appeally happens.
I just I can't get used to it. It's just
it's so commercialized. I can't get just into it sometimes
because of that. But may it's my own problem. That's
a me problem. I think, all right, that'll do it.
If you guys want to join me on Patreon to
go ad free, it's a good place to go, Patreon,
(50:24):
dot com, slash w podcast. You can go to my website.
I guess you can still do that. I don't know.
Websites are kind of not the way to go anymore,
but W podcast dot com does still exist, or on
Apple or Spotify just check me out for the ad
free versions of the show. They're all there. Thank you
everybody for joining me here as we will go into
(50:46):
the week here and have a maybe another nostalgic show,
but NXT is coming, The After Dark show is coming
for the exclusive members of Patreon, and of course the
Mailbag slash preview and prediction show for Backlash is going
to come to you on Friday. So thanks everybody. Until then,
take care, Thanks.
Speaker 4 (51:08):
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 next time.
This is WWE Superstar Drew McIntyre and you're listening to
the WWE podcast.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
Stop the show, the one that everybody wants.
Speaker 3 (00:17):
Me God, I'll stode sixteen, so just us your ass is.
Speaker 1 (00:28):
My Ron, You're gonna acknowledge me.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
Welcome everybody to the Raw review for Tuesday, May six five,
As we have a ple e in just a few days,
Backlash comes to us, and it's a shaping up to
be an interesting card. I know that it is a
coming off of so Mania. It's of course not usually
the most exciting pl If I was to choose any
(00:55):
pl out of the year to uh to watch or
to not watch, this may be one of them, outside
of any of the Saudi events. But this is shaping
up to be a good wrestling card, and not so
much an unpredictable outcome card, but more of again looking
at the quality of the wrestling and the matches and
(01:16):
potential storyline progression. That's where we should really, I think
aim our focus rather than are yo is anybody going
to drop the belt? Are we gonna have a new champion?
And while some of that is possible, it seems unlikely
as we go into Saturday, so we'll have our predictions
later this week for backlash that comes to a Saturday night.
(01:37):
I'm still loving the Saturday night pl e's. I do
appreciate it more than Sundays and it's just I think
it's a format here to stay. But beyond that, a
couple things. Number One, I want to give shout outs
to the new patrons of the show, Class Van Menser
and Chloe no Kardash. Thank you both, as well as
(01:59):
has Thank you for joining us at patreon dot com
slash ww podcast. If you want a shout out on
the show, head an over to Patreon, get yourself an
AD free experience, and I'll give you a shout out
on the show, as well as you getting priority placement
in the mail bag, meaning I read your emails up
front before any of the non patrons and a discord
(02:19):
server and other stuff. So check it out. But the
other important piece of news coming out of the wire
today not wrestling related, but certainly I think a certain
subset of my audience would be interested to hear. If
you didn't already, and I'm sure you did, the second
trailer for GTA six is out. I already has forty
million views. I mean it might be the fastest to
(02:40):
forty million out of any YouTube video ever released or
on x or. I think Rockstar released it all over
social media at the same time earlier this morning. And
we have GTA six trailer two. It's a half two
minutes three minutes long, and if you care about such things,
it is a hell of a trailer in terms of
what the game could offer. And the official release date
(03:05):
is a year from now. May twenty sixth, twenty twenty
six is the official date for the release of GTA six.
I wouldn't be surprised though, that that is the final
trailer before the GTA six releases. I know I've heard
rumors of oh, there's ten more to come, and I
don't believe it. The CEO of Rockstar recently came out
(03:27):
and said that this game doesn't need trailers, and which
is true, but also you may still be reaching people
that you otherwise may not have if you don't release trailers,
because trailers create a ton of buzz, and I would
still I would suspect, honestly, they'll probably release one more
prior to the release, maybe in you know, winter or
(03:50):
early spring of next year, to really get fans hyped.
How can they not because that's a year away. That's
and our attention spans today. That is re eternities long
of a time span. So it is an exciting day
if you're a GTA fan, although it's also depressing knowing
that you have to wait an entire year before you
(04:12):
get to hear and see GTA six in your hands. Also,
get ready to pay out your ass. You know, this
game isn't gonna go on sale. It's not gonna be
at a discount. You know, it's going to be probably
upwards of one hundred bucks to buy the game. I
would not be surprised. And the thing is people are
gonna pay it, that's my guess. We haven't heard about pricing,
(04:35):
but I mean, honestly, anywhere between eighty and one hundred bucks,
and that's just for the standard edition, not with all
the add ons and stuff. But they'll get away with
it and make four kajillion dollars on this thing. It
is the most expensive video game to ever be produced
in the history of mankind. And it also will be
a thirteen year gap between GTA five and GTA six.
(04:58):
That's insane. Thirteen years now they haven't been working on
it for thirteen years. But still that tells you the
longevity of this game, the popularity of this game, the
replayability of this game. I mean, it's incredible, and I
(05:19):
think people people have been burned out of GTA five
for like the last six years and waiting on GTA six,
but thirteen years between titles is insane. I mean, I
really my life. I don't think I'll get past GTA
eight or not, and maybe GTA nine then I'll be dead.
It's only a few more versions away based on this
(05:41):
pacing of their releases, so I'll, you know, maybe I
get to the PlayStation, PlayStation ten and then GTA six,
GTA nine will come out, and then I'll pass away
with my family surrounded in the hospital room while my
hands are on the controller playing GTA nine. All right, anyway,
(06:02):
moving on to wrestling. That's what you're here for. We're
not here to talk about GTA but we're here to
talk about wrestling, and let's do that as Backlash approaches
in just a couple of days. So let's talk about
Monett Raw and we'll start right at the top of
the show. All right, let's start right there and call
list at the attendants eleven five and we had Jay
(06:29):
us oblige by singling signaling for his music to play,
and he said he knew Logan Paul was in the
building and he said where are you at? However, a
different Paul said, ladies and gentlemen, I mean kind of
a surprising confrontation here with Paul Hayman. He comes out
(06:51):
and said he wanted to say something to Jay, who
responded by saying that Hayman had a lot of balls
for entering the ring with what he did to his family.
And Jay said he saw past Hayman since day one
and warned Roman Reigns and see him Punk about him.
Hayman said Jay should have warned him about Rains and Punk,
(07:14):
and then took to the crowd to keep their booze.
That told them to keep their booths to themselves. That's
when a CM Punk chant broke out as Haymon spoke
about him, and he mocked the chance and said fans
chant Punk's name because they don't know what's in his
dark heart. He said Punk put him in a position
that he knew would sabotage his relationship with Rains, and
(07:35):
then the fans responded with otc. Chance Hamon said to build,
he built the bloodline for five years and questioned if
Rains thought he was going to share all of his
secrets with Punk, why would I do that, asked Hayman.
And Hayman said he found a stray big dog on
the island of relevancy and turned him into the man
who had a record setting title reign. He said he
(07:57):
wasn't the one who lost the championship to Code Roads
at Wressell Maania forty. He said he spent sent spent
five years building up Roman reigns, and when he lost
the title, he disappeared and left him in the hands
of Solo Sokoa and the Tomatonga and Tonga Loa, the Tongans.
(08:18):
And Hayman said Rains came back, but only to get
his ulafalla. He said Rains couldn't handle the fact that
he wanted to help out his best friend. And Hayman
yelled how he always was always labeled the scumbag, and
he yelled, I'm right. Hayman yelled at Jay, I'm right,
and you blame me, Screw you, screech and every one
of you for booing in the crowd. It was just
(08:38):
you know all over Hayman and Jay said, are you okay?
And he asked what all this had to do with him.
Hamon said he owed Ja an apology. He said he
had nothing to do with Jay and he didn't come
out to talk about rains and punk. He basically said
that Rollins wants the championship and Hayman mentioned Breaker, said
(09:03):
mentioned bron Breaker and said that was just phase one
of their plan. Phase two is the World Heavyweight Championship,
and he said he was there to offer a favor.
He said he would let Jay pick the night when
he loses the World Championship, and he challenged raw On,
behalf of Rollins, challenged Jay to a World Championship match,
(09:24):
and that's when Jay said, let's do it tonight, so
we get a World Championship match on Monday Night Raw.
And I have to say it did feel like a
bigger deal than usual for a title match on Raw
because they haven't defended the world title on Raw in
a while. And it's amazing when you don't give away
(09:45):
free title opportunities on free TV, how much of a
difference it makes when you do offer something like that,
because it feels special and it also feels special enough
to know, subscribe to the network, subscribe to Peacock so
you can get the plest to see the title opportunity
to see the title matches. It's amazing when you don't
(10:08):
just constantly give away championship matches. How much they feel,
how different they feel, and last night felt different. And
you know, there was a lot of people, including myself,
who thought Seth Rollins has a shot.
Speaker 3 (10:23):
Here.
Speaker 2 (10:24):
He has a newly formed group with bron Breaker who's
a tank, Paul Hayman, who's one of the greatest of
all time. They're just getting on their feet. They got
a lot of momentum. Jay wasn't exactly, you know, a
absolute lock it in top champion that I think most
(10:45):
of the fans felt was the right guy to win
the rumble, and so there was some doubt. There was
some doubt that Jay was gonna lose the belt. And
obviously we saw the outcome of what happened and on
Monday night. But we'll get to that, and I will
say with Paul Hammy with how good he is. You know,
(11:08):
he is one of the greatest of all time, one
of the most legendary figures in all of professional wrestling,
and yet he's never had a single match. I know
some people have told me that he has had a
couple of matches, but for all intents and purposes, the
majority of fans don't look him as good. Look at
(11:28):
him as a wrestler, he's not. He's a manager. He
can be called an advocate, he'd be called a wise man. Whatever.
He's a manager. He is one of the greatest of
all time to do it. But imagine if Paul Haman
actually was able to have a wrestling career. If he's
this great as a mouthpiece on behalf of someone else,
(11:50):
imagine the kind of career he would have had if
he was able to actually compete in the ring and
be good at it. I mean, imagine, rivalries with John
Cena on the microphone right, would have been incredible. Think
(12:11):
about all the potential rivalries that Paul Hayman would have
had over the years. Now obviously he didn't, that's not
his stick. But I'm just saying it's incredible the level
that he's achieved in the eyes of fans with only
being able to speak, it's incredible. It shows you the
power of promos, which obviously Paul Hayman is a masterclass
(12:34):
at So all right, let's move on and we have
Penta versus j D McDonough and McDonough's entrance was not
televised here. The match did go eleven minutes with Penta
beating j D. The finish was Penta up top when
(12:56):
Chad Gable comes out and mess with him while the
ref he was focused on the ejections and Penta shook off.
Gable hit him with a flip dive and McDonagh hit
Penta with a whiplash and then Penta avoded a moon
salt Eddie hit the destroyer on McDonagh and got the victory.
So Penta continues the momentum. JD continues the losing a
(13:18):
nice kind of re establishing the momentum type of victory
for Penta here and then backstage we had Grayson Waller
talk with Adam Pierce about how he wasn't happy with
his singles match opponent, and Austin Theory shows up and
Waller claims he was there telling Pierce that Theory should
take his singles match and Pearce was rolling his eyes
(13:39):
and he agreed to switch after Theory said he wanted
the match, and it ended up being shamous versus Austin theory.
We'll get to that a second. But or Cole hyped
the WWE Money in the Bank event and the World's
Collide event being held on June in Los Angeles, so
(14:02):
that is the next real ple. I know we have
a Saturday Night main event at the end of May,
so that's something to consider to. I believe it is
rumored or nearly confirmed. I think that John ced is
actually going to be competing at a Saturday Night main event.
But the June seventh event in about a month is
(14:22):
the next real pl for WWE. So money in the
Bank guys, Yes, we have Saturday Night main event, but
that's kind of a hold me over. Look, I don't
really look at that as a true ple it's really not.
But money in the Bank is the next big one.
So we can start talking about who can win, you know,
who's in a position who could WWE look to the
(14:43):
future for heading into SummerSlam, heading into next year's WrestleMania,
So it's going to be a fun conversation after this weekend. Yes,
we'll look to the Saturday Night main event, but then
of course it's really the next big marker here is
money the bank and very much beloved pl So we
(15:03):
got Seamus taking on Austin theory. Always good to see Seamus.
He comes out of the woodwork, kind of out of nowhere,
and you know what kind of match you're gonna get
with him. He's just a solid ass worker and literally
and figuratively, the dude can work. He is a Yes,
(15:26):
I think he's a Hall of Famer. I think he
deserves to be in the Hall of Fame. Seamus definitely does.
He's never going to be the face of the company again.
He's a legacy star who still can go and there's
still I think some juice to squeeze out of Seamus
if they really want to have a semi significant run
with him again, even as Intercontinental Champion or US champion,
you could do it. Even competing for the World Championship
(15:49):
or w Championship. You can have him for a month
or so, be a fill in between opponents for the
for a champion, for a heel champion. So I think
that's something that we can consider a Shamus. While he's
you know, he's older now tons of miles, he's still
a hell of a worker, big name, but you know,
he's on the back side of his career, doesn't have
(16:09):
a lot of days left. I don't think I think
they could still do something significant with him if they
pace it out right, and if they maybe just give
him a little bit of a build, little bit of
a boost as they move forward, give Shamus some damn promos.
He can talk. I know, Seamus is a guy that
just is a constant who's there and you look at
him and go, wow, yeah, I forgot about him. Yeah cool,
(16:31):
I get to see Seamus. I think that's how a
lot of people feel. He's like, oh cool, yeah, Seamus,
you know that. I think that's how I feel. Anyway,
every time he comes out, I forget that he's there.
But then I'm glad he's there because he's a big
name that you don't mean to forget about it, but
you do, because he's not really used consistently on television.
(16:53):
So it was great to see him. So the match
was physical, as every Shamous matches. He sets up for
the ten beats, Theory clothesline him over the top, and
then when Theory rolled into the ring, Seamus hit him
with a knee strike and the match continues here. The
match went nine and a half minutes with ending with
(17:14):
a brogue kick and a victory for Seamus and it's
just good, you know, good to see him back. The
bro kicks fun. I don't know where they go from
here again with Seamus. As I said, you can do
some certain things with him on a limited basis, and
I think they should get everything out of him that
they can, honestly, so this is good. And the theory
(17:38):
Waller breakup continues to tease us if anyone's even interested
in that anymore. The Waller theory breakup is still on hold,
probably because they don't have anything in mind for the
breakup after it happens. While we know it's probably gonna happen,
it will happen. The idea of just having it happen
with no feet follow up is of course not a
(18:01):
good idea. So they don't know what's going to happen
after they break up, and that's really the most important part,
because you can do it and have that moment, But
then the question is a more important The question is okay, well,
why what did you do that?
Speaker 1 (18:13):
For?
Speaker 2 (18:13):
What is the what's the plan? That is more important
than the moment of having the breakup, because if the
breakup happens and then there's no plan. Well, then the
breakup wasn't worth it and the moment it gets devalued,
which we've seen things like that happen before. Okay, Dominic
Mysterio versus Penta for the IC Championship was announced by
(18:35):
Cole for Saturday's Backlash event. Again predictions coming this week
with a mailbag slash actual prediction show coming Friday, so
stay tuned for that. And let's see here, we had
a Dom telling the others in the room, and this
(18:56):
is backstage, that being a champion was hard than he realized.
He asked Balor if he would take care of styles
for him, and Balor got upset and asked if his
job was to take care of Dom's messes. Ballor flashed
a smile and said, of course he would do it. Again,
more teasing of this pair splitting up just like Waller
in theory, Dom and Dominant. I'm sorry Dom and Finn
(19:23):
that breakup has yet to happen too, but it's coming.
So backstage New Day an Xavier Cofin Xavier spoke with
Chad Gable, Kingston and Woods said it's time that American
may get some respect and Woods brought up the war Raiders,
wanting a shot at the tag titles. Woods set opportunities
(19:44):
like that need to come back to American Maid and
Gable loved it. Becky Lynch entered the picture and looked
at all three men. They wished her good luck and
Lynch walked past them while Cole hyped her match, and
he also hyped SummerSlam for August second and third.
Speaker 3 (20:00):
Third.
Speaker 2 (20:01):
There you go, We're getting a hype for the coming
months post Mania. They got to do that because coming
down off of WrestleMania, which really left the sour taste
in all of our mouths again with the Night two debacle,
they not only do they usually do this, but they
really extra need to do that this year to keep
fans like, hey, oh guys, guys, don't forget Yeah, we
got other Peli's coming up, you know, so stay tuned,
(20:24):
you know, forget about WrestleMania. And you also notice, I'm
just thinking about this now, WWE. At least maybe I've
missed it because I don't watch every single minute of Raw.
Have they and this is a genuine question, but I
don't think I've seen it. Have they been shoving WrestleMania
(20:46):
highlights down our throats for the past several weeks. I
don't think they have. I mean, yes, you had it
on the Monday night raw for WRESTLEMANI had the smack
down after WrestleMania. But I remember last year they would
not stop playing the WrestleMania highlights. I mean, I think
it went to SummerSlam. It was obnoxious about the biggest gate,
(21:09):
the biggest attendance. Ah, we took the most money from
the you know, the most fans ever, I mean literally
that's what they said. They said they had the largest gate,
which people are cheering for. Why you would announce in
gloat that you just made the most money or at
least gross made the most money from the people in
attendance is really arrogant and ballsy, and I think it
(21:30):
insults to fans intelligence. There's no need to talk about
the gate, like meaning, how much money you just made
from the people that are sitting there, how much money
you just you know, they they gave you from their wallets. Willingly,
you can talk about attendance, but they've brought up the
gate in the arena and fans are like, yay, and
then they all probably should be sitting there going wait
(21:52):
a second, right, No, I mean, but I wouldn't cheer
that anyway. Like last year, they were just so obsessed,
self obsessed with the WrestleMania production and everything that came
with it and all the pompt circumstance, and it went
forever This year with the WrestleMania forty one. Again, I
(22:16):
may have been missing it because I do I don't
go go through the commercials and all that stuff, and
some of the video packages I miss. I don't think
that they've been really hammering home WrestleMania forty one like
they did WrestleMania forty and I think a lot of
that has to do with the kind of silent admission
(22:36):
that the main event of Night two was a disaster,
and to be honest, Night one was not a lot
of fun outside of the main event, as we've all discussed,
So the highlights have not been really in our faces.
They've just kind of moved on, and I think that's
really the best case. Okay, So then we get a
(22:59):
really fun segment here, one that I did not expect
to enjoy as much as I did, and that was
Becky Lynch coming out and said she was upset with
the fans and that they were treating her like she
was the bad guy, and you know, I was saying
she's the victim and recalled fans crying tears of joy
when she returned to WrestleMania, and Lynch said nobody asked
(23:20):
where Bailey was and nobody cared because she's garbage. She
said people should be thankful when someone takes out the garbage,
and Lynch said the Women's Inner Continental Champion, Libra Valkyia
is less offensive than regular garbage, but she's still garbage
and said Valkyria wouldn't have a career or even a
fiance if it wasn't for her. That's when Lyra comes
(23:43):
out and said that Lynch is the queen of recycling
because she's been recycling the same moves and tired old
act for years. And Valkyria spoke as she walked to
the ring and said Lynch didn't make her. She said
that Lynch went on holiday and everyone got better. And
she continued and said Lynch went on holiday and she
(24:06):
made history. Valkyria held up her title belt and Valkyria
were called Lynch saying that the championship needs her and
that she was given rich given that she's defended the
title more than Lynch has shown up for work this year. Okay,
before I continue, Okay, the promo here, while I did
just pre compliment it, and it was still one of Lira's,
(24:29):
if not Libra's best to date, and it brought her
to life. So don't all this trash and recycling. I mean,
that's kind of a weird. I've never had that analogy
done before. I mean, it works, but it's also just
too cutesy sometimes, But I get it. And yeah, Becky
has been recycling a lot of her personality, so there
(24:50):
is some truth to that over the years. She hasn't
really changed a whole lot since WrestleMania thirty five. And
also again, United States doesn't go on holiday. That almost
sounds like a sentence that doesn't sound right because to us,
I think I've talked about this before. Like again, this
is for the United States. I don't speak for obviously
(25:13):
over in the UK, I know that they have holiday,
but to me, holiday is a singular day. You know,
you have a good holiday?
Speaker 3 (25:22):
Right?
Speaker 2 (25:23):
You hear that in stores because we're not allowed to
say or you know, frowned upon, don't say Merry Christmas.
You know, we all know that. But when you say, hell,
have a nice holiday, I hope your holiday is good.
When we hear that here, it's like, oh yeah, cool.
That means like have a great Thanksgiving, or have a
great Christmas or New Year's or you know, pick pick
(25:43):
your choice. Memorial Day whatever, fourth is July. That to
us is a singular day, like holiday to me is
a singular day. It is not a weeks long excursion,
you know. So when I hear that, it's just grammatically
doesn't sound right because to me, I know what holiday
(26:04):
means to us, Well, what it means to you know,
those overseas is vacation, So the synonym for us would
be vacation. So I don't mean to make a mountain
out of a mole hill here. But I've never heard
anyone in front of a United States crowd talk about
(26:25):
holiday like go on holiday, meaning okay, you should just
go on vacation. So it's just a difference of culture
and language. But it's you know, obviously you're in the
United States, so it's a bit of a I think
a miss there for most people, like huh, what do
you mean holiday? What holiday? Memorial Day? What are you
talking about? Right, So to us, it's vacation anyway, all right.
(26:49):
So this is where things get better for Lyra here.
Lynch said, it's true that everyone has had their best
year while she was away, but that's only because she
wasn't there. To be compared to Lynch, she's the greatest
to ever do it, and pointed to Sports Illustrated saying
the same. And Lyra then talked about Lynch's accomplishments and
wanted to and started to say that Lynch was the
(27:10):
first women's in her Continental champion and she said, oh wait,
that one was me. And she said, before holding up
the title that it bothers Lynch that she was the
first to win it and she should get used to
second place. And that's when Lynch went for a cheap
shot and it ended with a brawl, and you know,
we have Lynch yelling about disrespect and they kept brawling.
(27:34):
It ended with Lyra hitting a night wing finish on
Becky and holding up the championship. I know a lot
of people that are probably looking to Becky to win
the belt. Here I wouldn't do I wouldn't put the
car before the horse here. This there. If there were
(27:56):
plans to have Becky win it. This may be the
case against it, as Michael Cole even said she came
out of her shell. It's true. It felt like she
was hatched and it felt like she was poking through
the egg and she broke through like that dinosaur in
Jurassic Park. It's just like she hatched out of there,
the eggshells off of her. It's like it's like she
(28:19):
was born. She became a personality. Before she was just
kind of this this NXT star. Again, if you didn't
follow her an NXT, she was just kind of this,
you know, I mean, honestly generic NXT star, good in
the ring, not much of a personality, but can go
and you know, we just like her because she seems nice.
And now it's like, oh, we learned something about her here.
(28:40):
We understand a little bit more about your motivations, your personality,
which you're like on the MIC when you cut a
long form promo, when you're going toe to toe with
one of the best, how does she stack up? And
we saw that and it felt like she belonged. So
I think she took a big lyra did a big
step forward last night. And personality not in the ring,
(29:01):
there doesn't seem to ever be an issue with anyone
in the ring. Honestly, it was more personality and that
was a part that she really needed to work on,
and I think she came out shining. So that's why
I'm saying I would not bet against Lyra retaining at
Backlash for the Incontinental Championship. In fact, that's kind of
(29:22):
what I want is Lyra to retain, all right. We
then add EO Sky versus Rox San Perez and a
non title match. Cale noted that Ripley was in Australia
doing media for the shows in Perth, and Sky hit
Perez with an early suicide dive and rolled back inside
(29:43):
some early action here. The match went ten minutes, as
most matches do here on Monday Night, at least this episode.
Sky sold the knee injury. She went up top and
attempted her over the moon Salt finished, but rock Sand
moved and Sky sold the knee pain and landed on
her feet. Sky then stuffed a pop Rocks and threw
(30:04):
a kick, but Perez caught her leg and gave her
a dragon screw leg whip. They then took turns rolling
each other's pins and it reverses and reverses into pins.
Sky eventually gets the finish and gets the victory. After
the match, Perez offered a handshake. She seemed, you know,
happy and or at least respectful and accepted. Roxanne left
(30:26):
the ring, and then Julia attacked Sky from behind, and
that's when Roxanne laughed at ringside and joined Julia in
the ring to beat down Sky, and Cole reminded fans
that Rear Ripley was in Australia because you know, I'm
sure everyone at home was there going where's Ripley? We'll
make the save, make the save while she's in a
(30:48):
different country. So that's what Cole wanted us to be
aware of. So yeah, yeah, that was good. Was good.
I mean some people are mentioningly. I guess it was
funnily a word, funny enough comedically, you know, well, where's
Dakota Kai? You know that would have been a perfect
opportunity for Dakota to make a run in. Uh yeah
(31:11):
about that, right, I mean, with Dakota being released, that's
the joke not gonna happen. But boy, if there was
ever a time for Dakota to make the save, there's
not been a whole lot of opportunities for Dakota's to
be to be perfectly set up to make a big
time save. Of course, they have that set up the
week after they release her, so the universe gets the
(31:34):
last laugh. I guess, I don't know. I really do
wish the best for Dakota. I mean I was actually
as Dakota was getting more and more screen time, enjoying
her more and more, especially that turn on Bailey leading
up to last year's WrestleMania. I really enjoyed that version
of Dakota. I really loved it, and it's like, oh, okay,
(31:56):
there is something here, and it never really manifested into much,
or at least they didn't allow it to all. Right,
So then we have a tail of the tape with
the Russev versus Otis. Then we get the match. Predictably,
Russev beats Otis. He did it in eight and a
half minutes after he put him in the accolade and
got the submission. And after the match, Russive ignored the
(32:19):
ref and he eventually released the hole. Tazawa entered the
ring and wanted to fight Russev. He opted to leave
the ring instead and went to Zawa checked that Otis.
Russev came back and beat up both men and put
Otis in the accolade again, and a group of referees
and trainers ran out and eventually got Roussev to release, and.
Speaker 3 (32:39):
That was that was that.
Speaker 2 (32:43):
Otis did get a decent amount of offense here. It
wasn't a squash, but Otis has got size, and you
can't have Russev just trained through Otis. I know, on
the totem pole of stardom, Otis is not very high,
but he's still a big dude that the fans adore,
and they can't have Rusev just steamroll them. And they
didn't know there was a respectable amount of offense from Otis,
(33:07):
and I think that was important here, despite the fact that,
you know, Russev is gonna win for a multitude of reasons.
He just returned, he's a bigger star generally, you know,
those are really enough reasons for him to win. So yeah,
and they probably have plans for Russev where they don't
really have for Otis, So there's their third reason. So
(33:31):
that's when again, so it looks like it looks like
Russev is going to remain a heel. I know, and
the fans didn't really adore him as much in this
beatdown as they did last week with him beating down
Otis and Tizawa. The fans got on Roussov a little
bit more so. I think the once the the shine
wears off of his return and the fans decide, okay, cool, yeay,
(33:56):
it's great to have you back. But then Russev continues
to attack the people you like. I think that will
overtake the shininess and the love affair that fans have
with Russev of being excited to see him back. That'll
wear off quick. And I think you already saw some
of that last night. So keeping Russeva heels fine, I
(34:18):
don't have any issue with it. He's played both sides
and he's really good at both sides. So and he's
ultra athletic. I mean, he trimmed down. He looks good
in the ring, Russav just I mean, he's just looks
really good, all right, And especially that spinning heel kick
on Otis that was crazy. So then we get the
Gunther and Pat McAfee segment, and Gunther spoke about being
(34:41):
a professional this is in the ring. Then we had
McAfee pointing to Cole and called him a walking, talking goat,
and McAfee said Cole has only missed three weeks in
twenty eight years with WWE, and McAfee said Cole has
earned the right to have an opinion. McAfee played to
the Nebraska fans and the sports there, and McAfee mentioned
(35:05):
baseball in Nebraska and hosted Okay, so we started talking
about other stuff that just really gets the fans on
his side. McAfee said he and Gunther grew up with
the same dream of wanting to be in WWE. McAfee
said they both spent hours and hours watching pro wrestling
his children while thinking that that's what they were put
on the planet to do. And McAfee said Gunther has
(35:25):
been a champion for eighty percent of the time he's
been in WWE and said that Gunther's jaded and it's
become a job to him and McIntyre. I'm sorry, mactar.
McAfee said he gets jacked up when he walks into arenas.
He said Gunther got too comfortable and that he'll underestimate
him on Saturday and that he'll prove this version of
(35:47):
Gunther is soft. That's good I mean McAfee can talk.
Speaker 3 (35:53):
He can.
Speaker 2 (35:54):
It's too bad that he's, you know, not the most
muscular or athletic looking dude. I understand he's a punter.
I understand he's a former NFL. I understand all that
he's got, you know, the number one podcast in the world.
I get it. I get all that, But what does
that qualify him to be in the ring with Gunther?
And I understand, yeah, it's the underdog. I don't know
(36:18):
it's gonna be. I think one of those matches where
you know, McAfee has no business getting him out in
the amount offense that he's going to get in because
we saw what he did with Austin theory at WrestleMania
was at thirty eight, and yeah, he got a lot
of offense in an Austin theory, but Austin theory did
a lot of the work for him. He's one of
the best guys to have in the ring with somebody
(36:39):
that needs to look good and Gunther I think he's
not Austin theory in reality, I wouldn't have McAfee get
more than a couple of shots in before he gets
absolutely destroyed by Gunther. But they're not going to do
that in WW true WW fashion. They're gonna have and
I hope they don't do this, but I do believe
they probably will have Pat McAfee get a couple of
(37:02):
hope spots where you believe he can actually beat Gunther.
There is no world in which that should happen, but
they will have that happen because oh, it's entertainment, right,
They'll they'll use that's just the blanket deodorizer for everything
that they do. And I'm already hammering for something they
haven't done yet, but I can since it coming. But
(37:24):
a lot of times w W will do things and
that they know that's it's the wrong decision, but they
won't admit it, and they'll just deodorize it by saying, well,
it's entertainment.
Speaker 3 (37:34):
Enjoy it.
Speaker 2 (37:36):
Yeah, that's such a cop out corporate answer. What that
really means is we don't have the balls to take
accountability for the bad decisions we make, and so we're
going to now insult your intelligence by telling you it's
just entertainment. Calm down. At the same time they put
up scream you know, the decibel meter thing, which, by
(37:58):
the way, I think there's a bunch of garbage. That
thing has been pipulated top the bottom. I mean when
they put on the I forget what they call it,
some kind of some kind of meter. When they have
a big star come out and they show how many
decibels it is. It's all just completely phony. But they're
telling us of one breathy'll yell and scream and tell
us what you think. And then the same breath, They're like, well,
(38:20):
don't get too crazy if it's not nice. It's just
entertainment after all. Calm down, a boy. Anyway, Well, this
is what Gunther said on Saturday, that bell is going
to ring. I'm gonna beat you up. I'm gonna maul you.
I'm gonna grab you by the head and drive it
into the mat. I'm gonna choke you out until you
(38:40):
drop like a wet towel. And Gunther said McAfee is
untouchable due to his grace. And Gunther said that on Saturday,
only the grace of God will lift his arms off
of McAfee's throat, and Gunther shoved the mic into McAfee's
chest and stormed out of the ring.
Speaker 3 (38:55):
And then that was that.
Speaker 2 (38:58):
So I think that was good. It was a fine
promo for an announcer versus a wrestler, which I'm not
always a big fan of, but we're getting it. It
is as good of a build as you can have.
And you talk about Gunther's fall from grace. Here he
goes from an unbeatable ring general to tapping out instantly
(39:19):
to Jay Usso to now facing an announcer that he's
gonna have to sell for on Saturday. I hope this
is a breakdown to rebuild Gunther. No disrespect to Pat,
but look, you can't have Pat McAfee in any scenario.
Look like he could beat Gunther on Saturday. I know
they'll do it to get the fans excited. Oh my god,
(39:40):
it could be a moment, but ultimately you're still hurting Gunther.
Gunter will be more damaged coming out of this match.
There's just no scenario in which Gunther can't be more
damaged coming out of this match because he's gonna sell
for Pat. So it's a quote unquote entertaining match. But
he has also just in the first place, no business
(40:01):
in the ring with Pat McAfee. He is above that.
I thought he was above facing j at WrestleMania, and
now he's just down to beating up announcers. So I think,
and I hope this is just a way to break
Guntherro down to build him back up. All right, almost
(40:24):
threw raw. So next week in Louisville, you have aj
Styles versus Finn Balor, the war Raiders taking on American Made,
and Eo Sky and Rhea Ripley versus Rox Sane Perez
and Julia so fun. Yeah, I like that they do that.
That was a lot of stuff that they didn't do
during the Vince McMahon era. Although now there's a lot
of people who called Vince McMahon the devil incarnate just
(40:49):
a year or two ago who are now begging for
Vince to come back because of the things that are
going on with TKO and WWE and how TKO views
w and all that. And hey, lover hate Vince, And
I know a lot of people hate Vince. I understand
you're you're dislike for him, but you wouldn't be here.
(41:12):
You likely would not have the love for professional wrestling
that you do had it not been for Vince McMahon
and putting aside all of my personal feelings, all of
his personal faults, and he's got a lot. I don't
care about what he's done in his personal life. I
really don't. I mean, that's your own problem. All I
care about as a fan, and that's really all you
should care about as a fan, because none of us
know Vince personally. At least ninety nine point nine percent
(41:36):
of us listening to this don't know Vince personally, if not,
everyone that's listening to this doesn't. Everything he does in
his personal life does not affect you unless you need
it to for some personal vendetta. All the professional decisions
he made ultimately led to you being a fan. You
are here, I am here doing this because of Vince McMahon,
(42:01):
and there's just no two ways about it. He created
the most successful pro wrestling company of all time. No,
not sports entertainment, professional wrestling, because that's what is the entertainment,
is the wrestling. And now people that just absolutely excoriated
Vince McMahon a short time ago or wanting him to
(42:22):
come back, and that's not going to happen. But you
just see how fickle people are and how sometimes they
jump on the bandwagon, and you know, people are strying
to turn on Triple H, turn on TKO themselves, w
you know, the day they died was the day that
TKO bought the company. You're seeing it all now itself.
(42:44):
People are it's human nature. But okay, let's move on.
Main event, Jay us versus Seth Rollins for the World
Heavyweight Championship, and we got this match going for them
because the time stamp nearly twenty minutes. Wow, I didn't
know was that long. Didn't feel it really good match
(43:05):
as expected from two absolute professionals of the stomp that
Rollins gave Jay wasn't the best stomp in the world.
And I'm glad that both Cole and McAfee pointed out
that he didn't get all of it because it ended
up working out that that was a near fall. I
don't think he was supposed to sell it that way,
but it ended up working out perfectly because the kickout
(43:26):
was believable since he didn't quote unquote get all of it,
and so it was just kind of a perfect happenstance situation.
And Sammy comes out after of course Breaker interferes, and
Breaker walked towards the entrance and waited for him. Zayn
came out from the crowd, jumped the barricade onto Breaker,
(43:49):
got some revenge. Zayn had his ribs taped and that's
when Breaker recovered and speared Zaye, which, by the way,
I appreciate that Sammy at least had his ribs taped,
But if you really had your ribs taped and you
had broken ribs, you aren't moving like that. He had
(44:10):
the visual, but he didn't sell anything, you know, like okay,
I appreciate it, and I truly do appreciate it. At
least he had something one, but he was moving around
just as if it was another night. However, he got
spirited again by Breaker, and Jay left the ring to
check on Zane, and that's when Breaker spirit Jay while
Hayman distracted the ref and then Rollins hit Jay with
(44:33):
a stomp and it was about to pin him. That's
when Punk's music came out a hit and crowd popped huge.
He came out of the chair, Punk took out Breaker,
came in the ring. He tackled Rollins and slammed the
chair over his back while the referee could be seen
waving off the match at ringside, and Punk then hit
Rollins with a chair again and he came Rollins exited
(44:55):
the ring and stood with the Breaker and Hayman and
that was it.
Speaker 1 (44:59):
So this.
Speaker 2 (45:02):
Was a really good match. Now, the finish being kicked
out of not just the stomp, but the false finish
of Jay getting his spear and the USO splash also
was a fun false finish because you're thinking, Okay, wow,
Jay's gonna he's gonna retain and Seth kicks out and
you're like, uh oh, and then Seth gets his stomp
(45:24):
and Breaker gets his spear and you go, oh God,
here we go. If you're a Jay Uso fan, you're
in trouble. And so they had a lot of fun
ups and downs. They took us on a ride, did
they not. Yeah, they did really fun main event, really
fun main event here with Jay and Seth. They've worked
together throughout the years. Here now with the World Championship.
If you remember when the World Championship was reintroduced with
(45:48):
Seth Rollins becoming the first World heavyweight champion, again pretending
the lineage doesn't exist before that, and it did quite
a few years before that the World Heavyweight Championship, it did,
but when it was reintroduced a few years ago, Seth
was the first champion, and I remember attending a raw
in which Jay versus Seth while Seth was champion, was
(46:09):
the main event, and Jay came close to winning at
that point. Now fast forward a couple years later, now
Jay's the champion and Seth is the one in chase mode.
It's just kind of funny how things work. But it
was a good main event, really good main event. That's
a wrestling main event, and I think that that will
carry into Backlash and perhaps we get some kind of
(46:31):
multiman match with Seth and Jay and Punk for the
world championship. That seems to be what I'm tilting towards.
I wish I just didn't always have to resort to
the crutch of a triple threat. Whenever we see more
than one person involved in a world title, you just
kind of know instinctively that, oh, well, this person's here.
(46:51):
Out here comes the third person. Triple threat, Triple threats
in fatal four ways, in fatal five ways and all
that should not be as common as they are. But
I mean, that's just the landscape. It's the kind of
the culture of pro wrestling today. So I would think
that's probably where they're headed, but we'll find out in
the coming days. I would imagine or in the next
(47:13):
coming weeks because we don't have a World Championship match
right now. As I look at the card, it's Johnson
or Randy Ordan VI, then disputed w Championship, Lyra versus
Becky for the Women's Icy Belt, Jacob Fatu versus Knight
versus McIntyre versus Damian Priest for the US Championship, and
Dominic versus Penta versus No Dominic versus Penta. That's it
(47:37):
for the Icy Championship. Oh and Gunter versus McAfee. I
think that's probably it, unless there's some surprise match now'll
produce on SmackDown. I don't think there will be.
Speaker 1 (47:50):
This is it.
Speaker 2 (47:50):
This is your final card. So we've got five matches.
I think that's enough for this PLEE. And then that's
been kind of the staple of a triple H. Paul
of pl E has been five matches, longer matches, and
you know that that to me is a better, better pacing.
(48:11):
You know, the wrestlers were able to tell a story,
fans are able to digest it a little bit more.
You don't have to rocket through matches, and I think
it'll remain at five. See the only one that's not
a championship is McAfee versus Gunther. The rest are all
all four out of the five are four championships, so uh,
(48:33):
that's uh, that's good. And now we can look forward
to past backlash and whatever that's going to offer as
we head really towards Saturday, and it's made event quick
and then the money in the Bank event on June seventh.
So overall, solid episode of mondaet Raw and we have
a preview for next week, which is always a good
thing knowing what's coming for the following week and things
(48:56):
we get to look forward to. It also shows some
booking decisions ahead of time that they have a plan.
I think that's a big reason why they didn't announce
a lot of stuff to the Vince mcman era, is
that they didn't want to commit and then have to
back out if they had a better idea in the
coming week. But nope, if you announce it, they're sticking
to it. And that I do like that change from
(49:19):
the Vince mcman era. Not every change, not every change,
that's for sure. One of the biggest I think I
don't like is the advertising in the ring that's just
plastered all over the mad and all over the sides,
and it's just I'm watching, you know, wrestlers on a
billboard every single night, and I just every single Monday night,
and peey, I hate it. I hate it so much
(49:43):
with the you know, the advertised sponsors all over the ring.
And I know that that have to make money, and
I understand all that, but the trade off is the visual,
which is just horrendous. I can't get used to it.
I can't get used to Snickers or slim gym or
Prime or whatever the hell Fortnite is on the ring
(50:04):
Matt every single time Monday night raw or appeally happens.
I just I can't get used to it. It's just
it's so commercialized. I can't get just into it sometimes
because of that. But may it's my own problem. That's
a me problem. I think, all right, that'll do it.
If you guys want to join me on Patreon to
go ad free, it's a good place to go, Patreon,
(50:24):
dot com, slash w podcast. You can go to my website.
I guess you can still do that. I don't know.
Websites are kind of not the way to go anymore,
but W podcast dot com does still exist, or on
Apple or Spotify just check me out for the ad
free versions of the show. They're all there. Thank you
everybody for joining me here as we will go into
(50:46):
the week here and have a maybe another nostalgic show,
but NXT is coming, The After Dark show is coming
for the exclusive members of Patreon, and of course the
Mailbag slash preview and prediction show for Backlash is going
to come to you on Friday. So thanks everybody. Until then,
take care, Thanks.
Speaker 4 (51:08):
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 next time.
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