07/30 Pro Wrestling Boom Podcast with Jason Powell (Episode 269): Powell and John Moore review the NXT Great American Bash

The Pro Wrestling Boom Podcast with Jason Powell and guest John Moore reviewing the NXT Great American premium live event featuring Carmelo Hayes vs. Ilja Dragunov for the NXT Title, Dominik Mysterio vs. Wes Lee vs. Mustafa Ali for the NA Title, Tiffany Stratton vs. Thea Hail in a submission match for the NXT Women's Title, Gable Steveson vs. Baron Corbin, and more...

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Welcome to Jason Powell's Pro Wrestling Boompodcast. Hey, production of Pro Wrestling
dot Net. Get ready for thelatest news, analysis and interviews featuring big
names from the world of pro wrestling. Here comes the Boom. Thank you

(00:36):
Paul Allen Radio boys of the MinnesotaVikings. Check out Paul Sports Talk radio
show at KPAN dot com. Well. The NXT Great American Bash event took
place on a Sunday night, Julythirty, twenty three and streamed on Peacock
from at Cedar Park, Texas atthe HEB Center. This was a premium

(00:56):
live event and here to help mecover this show wanted only John Moore,
who covers NXT on a weekly basison Tuesday nights at Pro Wrestling dot Net.
So who better to have here?John is always before we get into
anything spoilerly related, give me yourletter grade for this show, and if
somebody is short on time, givethem two three matches to check out.

(01:19):
Sure, as far as letter gradeis concern, right now, I'm hovering
around A B plus N A minus. This. You know, we're not
ranking nxc pls like you know,on the same curve, like a higher
curve that we used to and whenback in the Black and Gold days.
But I thought this show had agood variety of matches. Each match offers

(01:42):
something different. The one you knowdownside with a lot of matches in NXT
since the two point o days isyou do have a lot of inexperienced talent
and you do get a flub heirentthere, but that's where you give them
the benefit of the doubt. They'regetting better. And yes, I thought
this show had matches that all hadsomething different. As far as recommendations are

(02:04):
concerned, definitely go out of theway to see the Iliad dragonof versus Carmelo
Hayes match on paper that looked likethe match that would steal the show.
That can be a match of theYear candidate, and it lived up to
the hype. Another match see thesecond match is actually pretty tough because a
lot of these matches you you havelike their own merit. I would say

(02:24):
the the Perez versus a Wait coustwas Yeah, and maybe Gable steveson just
for the whole if the seeing GableStevens since Stepson's first match in WWE,
heck, I thought the And forhonorable mention, I thought the pre show

(02:47):
match exceeded expectations only because I hadserial expectations going in. So those are
my recommendations. Now, I canI hear what you're saying about the Steveson
just the novelty of it being hisfirst match. Um, it didn't make
I cut, but I would totallyunderstand if somebody really wanted to see that
match because it is the first timeever I went. So I'm giving the

(03:09):
show. I'm in the C plusB minus range, and I am comparing
it to all other shows at thispoint now that they're kind of out of
that two point zero phase and intokind of regular NXT, and they're bringing
in more main roster talent as wesaw with the Dominic with Sterio being featured
in a match, I'm kind ofback into Yeah, you know what's to

(03:30):
make it easier on the listeners andthe readers. I'm gonna take that approach
to it. If you want tostick with yours, you can. If
you want to change it based onthat, you can. But as far
as the three matches, I willgo with the main events, and also
the davenporton Perez match, and I'llgo with the dom match. I enjoyed

(03:51):
that, and yeah, again,I can't. I don't think you can
go wrong if you just want tocheck out Stevenson's debut because it's his debut
match. But John, yeah,if you I guess, let me ask
you, if you were just straightup compared to w w E main roster,
aw everybody else, what would youraid this show? It would have
change at all compared to what yougave us, no id like some What

(04:14):
really like kept me in like afavorable to this show was the Ilia versus
Mellow match. That that was yourblack and Gold classic. Hey, if
you don't want to watch anything else, watch that and maybe watch DUM because
it's don spun like, like,why can't you not watch the dominic monsire?
He's a draw now. He definitelyis well with that Shet, we

(04:36):
will dive into the spoiler portional andgive you guys a bit of a buffer.
Again. You can check out John'sreports Tuesday nights. He also does
the NXT Audio Reviews Same Night AudioReviews for the members of the n XT
show, and we have a tonof that. Raw aw Collision is either
same night or next night with WillPrue and Jake Burnett is handling the SmackDown

(04:58):
audio reviews kind of same approach there, I handle Raw and aw Dynamite.
Those are the same night and tomorrowwill be my Q and a audio show.
Jake and I co host a dotand weekly audio show, and we
have audio reviews of other shows includingImpact Wrestling, MLW, Ring of Honor
and so yeah, there's a tonof audio content. If you're interested in
membership, it is all add freeif you go to PW Membership dot net.

(05:24):
And for that matter, you canalso become a patron of our Patreon
page that is Patreon dot com slashPro Wrestling dt NT. And we will
be by later on this week witha SummerSlam preview edition that is the plan
and then or the Boom and thennext Monday, a week from Monday is

(05:44):
going to be the return of ProWrestling Boom Love coming out of SummerSlam,
and that will be at one Centralto Eastern at PW audio dot net I'll
Love. All the details are alableat Pro Wrestling dot Net. As we
get closer to that show, JohnnyFairplay will join me, and hopefully Sean,
who fills in for Johnny from timeto time, is gonna be able
to call us as well. Whatcalls are certainly welcome during that show.

(06:05):
With that buffer, let's get intothis. Let's actually start with the Well,
there was a title change. Ishould mention that we do have new
tag team champions. Tony D'Angelo andStax ended up winning those titles. That
was the notable title change for theshow. But I think you kind of

(06:26):
touched on it the let's start withGabel steveson. I wasn't very impressed,
but I wasn't horrified either. I'veseen really mixed reactions to this when it
comes to people that thought he wasokay, too good and other for our
first match, and others who thought, oh my god, you know,

(06:46):
just to throw in the towel onthis guy. Where do you sit on
that? How do you think Gabeldid in his first match against Baron Corbin?
Same as you? I thought hedid okay, and we didn't get
to see him over expose himself oranything, because they did cut the match
off at a certain point to protecthim, to protect Corbin and everyone involved.

(07:08):
I was fine with it only mostlybecause we've seen a lot of wrestlers
in n XT recently since the twopoint oh era that have just like fumbled
and bumbled, just like remember themthrowing lash Legend out there every week before
she was ready. A few otherwrestlers we've seen worse. So he can

(07:28):
throw some good supplexes and he didn'ttrip over himself. So I would say
that's a success where you know likewhere it's always you know where, just
because they're related, and you haveto make the comparison. His brother is
Bobby Steveson. Damon Camp is wayahead in terms of development than him.
So Damon Kemp almost sets like abarometer that Gabel Steven Seatson has to get

(07:54):
to. We know Gabel is horribleon Mike, but hopefully he's putting time
behind the scenes to get better.His brother's really good on the mic,
and he said it could have beenworse. There were like no expectations other
than the fact that they want theguy to be the next card angle.
Yeah, that stood out and I'mnot a fan of that approach, and

(08:16):
we'll certainly do a full rundown aswe get to that match, as we
work our way through. Yeah,I'm just kind of in the okay category
for a debut. It didn't leaveme wanting to see more. I guess
would be the disappointing part of this, but some of it was the presentation.
The crowd turned on him, notall, but a good vocal portion
of the crowd, which we'll talkabout. And I can tell you that,

(08:39):
you know, I know somebody thatis involved in amateur wrestling at a
coaching level in the Twin Cities area, and so not that he's like tight
with the Stevesons or anything like that, but he certainly has familiarity there.
And he was telling me that hewasn't surprised. He's not a big pro
wrestling fan, but he wasn't surprisedthat Damon is doing well from a verbal

(09:01):
standpoint and Gable is struggling. Hejust said that, you know, Damon
Bobby is the guy that has thepersonality in the family, and so it
may not be well, you know, it's just a matter of Gable needing
more reps. He may not havethat as part of his arsenal. Maybe
something that has to really work on. And I felt like watching him for

(09:24):
a guy that is so dominant anamateur wrestling and and you know, gold
medalists and many people feel like hehas a great chance if he goes back
to win another gold medal. There'sjust something about him, and maybe it
was being in there with someone thesize of Corbin. You're not your eye
isn't just drawn to him. Hedoesn't have the same intimidation factor that a

(09:46):
brock Lesner does and few people do. But still, being an NCUBA and
a champion and a gold medalist heavyweightdivision, you'd think there'd be a little
bit more. Now, if youran into Gable Stevenson on the street,
I'm sure you would held that.But just on television, Yeah, there's
just something that's not there. Andyeah, I mean again, we'll talk

(10:07):
more about that, but I didn'twant to kind of touch on that just
before we kind of run through theshow because that was a major part of
this. He didn't embarrass himself oranything like that, but yeah, I
guess it just didn't leave me wantingmore. So let's start with the pre
show. I know you touched ona new review John, your thoughts on
them, deciding Hey, let's goback to an hour for the Kickhoff Show.

(10:31):
Why did they need an hour all? Because all that does is just
make their meaningless conversations slightly longer.It's it's the same approach to every match
it's before it was McKenzie, butnow McKenzie on site, so that he's
making morants. It's just Megan introducinga match to cutting to a video package.

(10:52):
All three people give their predictions andSam robertecks like a heel. Every
once in a while, A waycalled and yes, and it cut to
McKenzie. Mitchell interviewed Rins and repeats, Yeah, I don't get it.
The match that they had on theshow was only ten minutes, but then
you can just tear through the highpackages and the useless banter between the panel.

(11:16):
I know this is going to beunpopular with the match driven crowd.
Give me this yawn fest that wasthe kickoff show over the zero hour approach
it they use for the Ring ofHonor shows where they're cramming four matches in,
because I just think it takes itstoll on the crowd to have that
many matches, and it's not duringthe one hour show at where the crowd

(11:39):
starts to feel it. It's laterin the show, so at least there's
still there's just one match in thekickoff show, which is something they added
because for a while there it wasthirty minutes no match and I actually like
that because it gave you permission asif you were to go. All right,
if I want to see this,I can. If I don't,
it's all good. I'm not missinga match or anything. And down on

(12:00):
this, you know. It's justthere's so much wrestling on. They're providing
so much of that content. Justbe respectful of people's time. And no,
it's not like they're forcing you towatch. But I just know more
people are going to check it outif there's an actual match there, and
to start it instead of going thirtyminutes to start, go to the full
hour. It is too much.I just I don't and I'm with you.

(12:22):
They didn't do anything different. Theydid have some backstage interviews whatever,
but and showed Gable Steveson arriving lookinglike an idiot. I'm sorry, John,
Why in God's name do they havehim walking around with his gold medal
around his neck as he's arriving atthe building because they want him to be

(12:43):
the next Kurt Angle. That's whatKurt Angle did, right. I don't
like it. I just think it'sfoolish. It makes him look like a
dope. It just wouldn't happen ifhe's a UFC. Is he really going
to show up to the building withthe gold medal around his neck? Does
he go to the supermarket with thegold medal Rane? Does he go to
the club? What the gold medalRane is? Maybe he does, he

(13:05):
knows, Maybe that's who he is. I don't know. I'm kidding.
Anyhow, Let's get to the onematch they had on mis pre show you
liked it. It was the teamof Nathan Fraser, Dragon Lely, Ulyssia
Leone and Valentino for Roy's. Ialways want to say for Ros, but
I think they're calling it to forRoys. They defeated the Metaphor no him
Dar or A Mensa Lash Legend andJacara Jackson. I will say it was

(13:31):
better than I thought. They wentover in ten fifty one Lee pinning Metsa
or Mensha after the after a Dostino, which I didn't even make their connection.
Did they call it Herdstino? No, No, they don't. But
what's his name? Naida was likethe only guy to use it, so
it kind of stands out as likeit's his move, so yeah, yeah,
and then they have the Los Angeleanablesconnection, so I assume that's why

(13:56):
he uses it now. I guessthe things I liked about this match,
Most of it was the men carryingthings. But when Leone, yeah you,
Lisa Leone and Ferroys were performing somehigh spots, they had the crowd
with them, and they were smartto limit what they had lash Legend do.

(14:18):
She's improved, but I still thinkthey're smart too not ask her to
do a whole lot in the ring. And I mean, it was fine.
It was better than I anticipated,and I was kind of surprised though
to see the baby Faces win.I know, it's a pre show match.
Usually get the night off to usa positive start that way, but
they just put this metaphor group togetherand they're already having them lose John.

(14:41):
They are having oral Mensa be theone that takes to all the losses.
Though. Yeah, so it lookslike they're protecting no Emdar in that case.
One thing I don't like was nowthey're doing this whole weird storyline.
We're there like two heritage cups,and it began they did that so he
they can wake no Emdar out ofhis coma. I would have liked it
if they went the approached us forcomedy's sake if they'd had this match and

(15:05):
they were just Weekend of Bernie,you know, like they did the one
week the Weekend of Bernie's with noemDar's dead body flopping around. I would
have liked that. But they wantto go with like two Heritage Cups for
like god knows why. They're likereplicas too, Like give Impact Wrestling one
of one of those to replace thatparticipation trophy that they had Bully Ray run
around with. Oh, the callyour Shot trophy that, Yeah, it

(15:28):
looks like it was well, probablysomewhere in Windsor like the local trophy shop,
and it was bought off the cheaprack, not even like an expensive
one that they bought for that thing. But yeah, I have really been
down on not that it was afactor here, but the way they've introduced
a Heritage Cup. And I likethe format of the matches and all,

(15:48):
but they haven't even like shown usa good one. They started having clunky
finishes. Now you have two cups. Doris, he's really I get a
kickup. I think he's very funny, but he's also a comedy guy.
At the same time, you're tryingto get this Heritage Cup thing over.
I don't know that I can thinkof the worst way to introduce this whole.
This whole I don't know if it'sa division what you'd call it,

(16:11):
John, but just a Heritage Cup. Yeah. I think the big problem
around that is a lot of theirHeritage Cup build was built around No One
Dar sort of sports entertainment type ofcharacter. He's a really good like comedy
wrestler. He was like that backwhen he was Oliver the main roster with
Alicia Fox. It's just, youknow, they're also at the same time

(16:33):
trying to introduce almost like their theirversion of a pure type of title.
Like it's just the philosophies are clashing. Maybe what they could do is sort
of this pivot No One Dar awayfrom the Heritage Cup division, then move
him into the North American title.Pictures a little tough now that you have
a Hee old dom as champion,but maybe bring in someone like Axiom so

(16:57):
we can get like Axiom Ragon,Lee, Nathan Fraser, those cyper wrestlers
wrestling Heritage Cup matches. Maybe you'llbring in Tyler Bait how much Harley Dempsey.
Yeah, they sort of us havehim eating a lot of losses and
when no real development right now,I have a bad feeling and it's just
overcompensated. Well, he's the sonof William Rigo. We want to make

(17:19):
sure that we don't make it looklike their's favorite guys. Push it a
guy Jesus. But the broadcast team, I should point out was VIC Joseph
Booker t and Alicia Taylor was thering announcer. And so it was not
long after that opening match that wewent to the main card and they opened
with a Cody Rhodes video package thathe narrated, and they showed him on

(17:42):
camera and there was footage of hisfather, who of course created the Great
American Bash, and he welcomed everybodyto the Great American Bash. And then
we went to the broadcast team checkingin and then entrances for the opening match.
As you noted in your review,there was an army of CGI rats
on Tony d'angelo's introduction graphic he andStacks and we have new champions. It

(18:07):
was the team of Tony D'Angelo andChanning Stack Lorenzo defeating Gallus, Smart Coffee
and Wolfgang who had Joe Coffee withthem. They win the tag titles in
eight forty three and I noted thison Twitter. John it was very interesting.
From the pre show, Mommy saidthat she's always on top, and
then later the Gallus guy said thatthey're always on top. Like, boy,

(18:30):
there's a lot of people on topand NXD and we got a dom
too in Dominique. But yeah,I know, hey reminding if they if
they want to like get a wholebads M division, bring an alien.
Die Jack remembered out weird phase theywere having. Yeah, yeah, but
yeah, no, I noted Ididn't pick up on that. So the

(18:53):
outcome of the I mean, itwas a pretty good match. They did
have to incorporate the stupid crowbar Stacksended up taking out some of the Gallus
members with the Flip Dime, TonyD'Angelo and Staxon Hit Wolfgang with Urope,
Double Belly, Tobac Suplex and Tonyd not to win, So we have
new tag team champions. Look,I'm sorry, it just wasn't working with

(19:15):
Gallus. I can't say that I'mexcited about D'Angelo and Lorenzo as champions,
but I gotta say the crowd seemedto like them, you know, And
it's not now that we're out ofthe performance Center for this show. It's
not as well. The fans inFlorida liked them. You can see why
when they take the show on theroad, the fans are into this act.
Yes, and add to note well, part of another thing that added

(19:36):
to my positive scoring of the payper view rating at the pay per view
was the crowd tonight. They drewa really good crowd for this show where
they were very energetic. There didn'tseem to be of any buffer period in
between. And if it seemed likeit was going to be a buffer period,
the crowd started like going to businessfor themselves with like fun, unique

(19:56):
and innovative champs that didn't necessarily likeinterfere with the flow of the show.
It did interrupt the gas Gable steepsin match, which we'll get into a
little bit. But yeah, Ithought the crowd was really good. Here
h say what you want about TonyD. Like the moment he showed he
was like on the first episode ofU n XC two point zero and you

(20:18):
saw that they were going to introducelike this want to be Robert de Niro
and every other Mafia stereotype rip off, but Tony D took that character.
He doesn't seem like he's embarrassed.He's going all in, has a lot
comes and the crowd can see thathe takes something that like shouldn't work and
it's andy. It's always the bookingthat actually Messing misses them up, like

(20:41):
them having a wrestling match for torelease someone from jail whatever. But Tony
d does like say, he doesn'tseem embarrassed by that, and he just
he's the guy who's making this characterwork. And yeah, now we have
the Belts on a sort of fanfavorite. They're not is like big,
you know, like as big aslike they chase you, but people get

(21:03):
into them they do. I thinkit's things like, well, we're going
to do jailhouse videos and we're gonnadump it down, but we're gonna show
you from one side outside the jailpart, but oh then we're gonna cut
inside where the camera's in there withlike, just come on, this is
so corny. At least try tomake it believable, and they just don't.
That's the stuff I know. SeanMichaels talked about he likes to have

(21:26):
it kind of the variety show approachto what they're doing in NXT. And
you can do some of that,but not make it as idiotic as some
of these things come off. Andthey just clearly it's a choice, you
know, I don't think it's like, oh, we never thought of that.
I wish they'd make a different choice. Match two. Roxanne Perez defeated
Blair Davenport in a Weapons Wild matchin eleven forty nine, and this one

(21:49):
had Roxanne's family in the crowd,her mom, her sister, I think
it was maybe her stepfather, Idon't know who all was there, and
so she stopped eat them. Theywere right by the entrance aisle in the
front row, and as she's greetingthem, she stopped to take a photo
with a guy wearing a lucha mask. I think it was when all of
a sudden there was a hooded personwearing a hood next to him who attacked

(22:12):
her. And of course that wasBlair Davenport. And you know, when
I hear weapons Wild, I kindof rolled my eyes, like, okay,
weapons matches. I thought these twoproduced a hell of a match.
They when they would use the weapons, it wasn't corny. I thought they
brought a real intensity to this.That they started at a fast pace and

(22:33):
they didn't really slow down, AndI mean that as a positive in this
case. There's times where it's like, man, slow down a little bit.
But I really felt like they broughtit from bell to bell and it
was a big assist to the familythat Perez just her family. Her sister
seemed legitimately emotional when she would getbeaten up. Her mom looked like she

(22:56):
was legitimately concerned. And you seethis sometimes times with families, like do
you want them to have that reaction? But they're not actors and they know
what this is, and so therearen't times where you hit the family trying
to act and it doesn't come offwill they tried too hard. There's other
times where they just don't get investedin what's happening. You know, they
know what it is and they're justgoing to kind of shit there and yeah

(23:18):
whatever, and you're like, ohGod, these people were great and really
added to this match. John,Yeah, kudos to Roxanne's sister for crying
at will, for that like thatstretch of time when she was getting beat
up at ring when Roxanne was gettingbeat up at ringside. Yeah, I
know we've seen it in wrestling before. I mean, we do get good
performances, like say Missus Dad orJosh Alexander's son when he stole his belt.

(23:45):
But and but yeah, in alot of cases you had them trying
to act and it just looks veryunconvincing. They might have, you know,
they might have practiced this backstage.But if they did, good for
them. And yes, of themom looked really concerned, and yeah,
added to the sister for crying outwealth and I will who knows, this
might just be how they are duringher matches. I've seen some of that

(24:07):
at the indie level, and you'dthink by now maybe they'd be over it.
But who knows how much wrestling theywatch. And yeah, I just
I've seen it where there's friends andfamily, and especially like the mothers will
get a little too emotional during thematch, like worrying about their son or
daughter. And so maybe, justmaybe, I don't know how much of
this was acting, if it wasgood for them. Either way, they
added to it, which drove menuts after the match. He'll get to

(24:32):
that in a second. As faras the finish is concerned, Perez put
Davenport on a table and splash aheadat top ropes, splashed through it,
and then hit her with a kickin the gut and hit pop Rocks to
get to win on a pile ofchairs. As you wrote, now here's
the part that drove me nuts.We have this great family thing. They
brawled in front of them to startthe match and everything else, and the

(24:53):
cameras kept cutting to them. Whatdoes roxand do after the match? Hop
they make sure that she looks atbook r t she never went to the
family, John, No, that'sthat's true. I'm there. That's they
sort of have Roxanne and Booker tiedto the hip just because of how,
you know, the whole reality ofwrestling thing you can do. But yeah,
it wouldn't But but it wouldn't youknow, they could have. It

(25:15):
would have made more of sense forher to roll to the family and console
them that she's okay, especially withthe good performance that they put in.
But it's just their thing. Theydo it every week. Wear a stress
that Booker t as her mentor,and Booker treats are like a daughter.
How important was this match for Roxannefor us? You know, they've been
clearly trying to toughen up the imagea little bit after you get a little

(25:37):
too sugary sweet and I'm wearing ribbonsin my hair for you little girls.
It was just too much, andit feels like they've recognized that and they're
trying to just make a little bitof a change here with her. Yes,
this whole feud, uh so,the first part of the feud was
to put that import over strong,but it looked like the part of the
feud that let up to this matchwas us to toughen up Roxanne Perez.

(26:02):
They they it seems like they knowthey did know that it was a mistake
to have her sort of be thelike play a little girl character, to
the point where they have Davenport Lambchaining that in her promos, saying that,
yes, so NXT is for agrown asque woman and not little girls
like you. So what I likeis the we have We've seen several promos

(26:23):
of Roxanne Lyddy leading into this.The whole Bodega fight on this past Tuesday
wasn't that great, but it didhelp the you know it was it looked
better in the high package. Thewhole goal of the feud, and I
thought she looked good in this matchis they are toughening her up hopefully they
don't double back, like if theyever consider bring her to the main roster.

(26:45):
I don't think they should push RoxamPerez as like a Bailey type,
but yeah, I think this hasgiven her a little bit of an edge.
Let's see how they go. Theymight end up having a rubber match
between these two because they are onewhin piece, and I hope they put
Blair import over Strong in that onelike they did in their first encounter roxand

(27:07):
really needed to win here, andso I'm all for that just because of
everything we just talked about. Howmuch does this do a lot of damage
to Blair Davenport in your mind?I don't think so. Because of the
weapons stipulation, Yeah, you canjust say yeah, yeah or not home
damn home state, home state weapons. They were building this towards a Roxanne

(27:29):
Perez win. Uh, they canalways screw it up, you know.
If Blair takes another loss cleanly toPerez, I think that would hurt.
But right now they can go withthe rubber match, and I think,
yeah, that's the you know,you now you have a series. Now
you said you wouldn't ring here,you know, the cater to Kidd's Bailey
type of character the main roster,and I'm with you one other thing I'll
add to that, having now seenher primarily in Ring of Honor and NXT,

(27:56):
I would not rush a championship ontoher. Bothy has made that mistake,
and I think it's you know,by the time she didn't get a
long rain and Ring of Honor becausethe company was changing hands and fold was
on the verge of folding anyway,and she may have been leaving before that.
I don't recall. I don't know. I think I think they don't
think her contract came up in WWwas able to scoop her up because of

(28:18):
them letting everyone out of their deals. I could be off on that,
but yeah, Ring of Honor rushedthe title on to her, and I
get it, Hey, she's ateenager and maybe we can really the youngest
champion in all of this. Andthen NXT, I think they wanted to
take a similar approach. But I'veseen it in both companies where that's the
peak and then what and the fansstart to turn on her because of that,

(28:41):
and so yeah, if she goesto the main roster, I would
not rush to that peak moment.I would take my time building to it.
Do you remember the circumstances there,John was it? The company let
everybody out of their deals and that'show she became a free agent, I
believe. So that was during thewhole Honor No More Stuff and Impact and
without you know, everyone got released. They did the on or no More

(29:02):
stuff there and they had her droppedthe belt to Dianna Prrazzo. And then
because and I think the word wasout at the time that she was WWE
bound. Yeah, and and Ithink Booker also acted accidentally, might have
let the cat out of the bagon his radio show too, his podcasts.
I would not have her stand nextto book or ever again. That

(29:25):
shot they had of the two ofthem recently, she looked like she came
up to his waist. I mean, you can't help it. She's shortened,
he's whole, But you can avoidhaving them on camera like that.
The shots of them when she's atthe broadcast table or something and he's sitting
down. That's all right, Yeah, it's noticeable. I because you know,
you like, nope, you've neverhad really had that like like visual

(29:47):
until they showed it there and Iwas like, oh, shoot, that's
twice her size John is pop Rockstoo kid of a name If you're trying
to toughen jumping up this character,it kind of is. That's why,
that's why I kind of always putCode Red and excellent, So yeah,
pop Rocks. But that again,I think I think it's probably her decision

(30:07):
to call it that because Roxy plusthe kid thing. But yes, you
can get a little bit too cutewith names. Maybe you can. I
wouldn't mind them this going with likeCode Red or Code Roxy or something.
I don't know. Yeah, whenyou first hear it, and you know
you're first getting familiar with her,whether it was Entering of Honor before that
or NXT whatever, it was,oh okay, that's kind of clever.

(30:30):
But then yeah, it's just there'ssomething too little girlish about her and that
isn't helping. It's not like ina make or breaker if you she sticks
with that finishing name. But itmight be something I'd consider tweaking. But
I really enjoyed the match. Ithought both women came through with strong performances
and work well together. And againa big assist to Perezi's family for their

(30:52):
role in this. And then wegot a little bit of chase you video,
but it wasn't time for them yet. It was time for Baron Corban
to make his entrance. And younoted that he had a weird pirate ship
motif in his video wall, andhe also had new ring gear that what
did it say? Burn on ithis new catchphrases, burned all the ships.

(31:18):
So that's why he did. That'swhy I don't because he burned all
his old gimmicks. That was that. And then he and then somehow I'd
produced a clone of him, hatedclone Baron Corbyn. Okaddy, Okay,
he looked a lot better. Idon't I'm looking at the burn on his
leg and he was like a tributeto Michael Kelso I don't know, I
don't know. That's the rascals nevermind. Uh yeah, said he looked

(31:42):
a lot better. And if there'san I don't know how much interest there's
going to be. And from likeyour espns of Gable Stevenson's first wrestling match,
let's show this but later, ifthere is any I'd rather Corbyn look
like he did here than when hewas wearing the gym shorts on regular time
television all the time. Yeah,it was a weird and yeah, where

(32:02):
he looked like he was he waswearing Pat McAfee's ring gear where it works
for him, Yeah, because likehe's very casual stuff. But it looked
like Corbyn couldn't find his Like,yeah, he was like coming off his
gym gear. Am I wrong?You know he said he didn't want to
be the lone wolf character. Maybethere's more to this, but it feels
like he's the lone Wolf. It'sjust without being called the lone Wolf.

(32:25):
And I don't think that's a negative. It's the best gimmick the guy's ever
had. Yeah, it does feellike the lone Wolf, but I guess
they wanted to introduce the fact thathe burned all his old crappy gimmicks and
the name the lone Wolf was justa casualty of it. But it does
look like he's just lone wolf barnCarbon, which we saw against Carmelo Hayes

(32:47):
recently, just without them calling hima lone wolf wolf like say, he's
burned all the ships, Baron Carbonnow burn all the ships. Yes,
it makes sense to him. Soin this match, it was Gable,
Steve and finding Baron Corban to adouble count out in six thirty two.
So here's my interpretation of what Isaw from Stevenson. He can stuff moves

(33:10):
because he's an amateur wrestler. Hecan throw a lot of punches, he
can throw a lot of sup plexus. His selling wasn't terrible, It really
wasn't there. There was a spotearly where it looked like Corbin was expecting
him to do something different in thecorner than what he did. And I
mean it, Corbyn's a pro.It was a smart move to put Steveson

(33:32):
in there with a guy like Corbynwho has been there and done that veteran
and I don't care if the fansdon't like him whatever, but he's been
around the block and so it wassmart to have him been there with him
to kind of keep him under control. They brawled and then there was ring
posts and things and it just Idon't it was and oh yes, the
ankle lock John is you've been mentioningthey want to make him curt Angle.

(33:57):
Come on, that's just ridiculous thatwe're doing this. She's not going to
be the next curd Angle. Heneeds to be the first gable Steve Sheon.
Oh yeah, no, exact,it's gonna pigeonhole him with or not,
it's gonna set expectations too high andwhen he doesn't if he if he
doesn't meet them, then he's goingto be a disappointment. That's where his
brother actually benefits, where people haveno expectations from and he's killing it.

(34:21):
Uh. And that was that's thisthe whole That was the whole bill towards
this match. Yar like, wegot the next curt Angle and we're gonna
see how good he is. Soeveryone's expecting curt Angle, who is one
of the greatest pro wrestlers of allthe time. And so I said he
this match wasn't bad, but theexpectations are high. They did also have

(34:44):
Baron Corbyn mentioned it. I thinkit was in the pre show too,
where he said he remember Baron corbyanretired curd Angle, so he's going to
retire a second Olympic gold medalist.He this won't stop talking about it.
And this was similar to what NathanFrasier when they first brought him a board
and they kept saying this is thisis stef Rawlins Guy, stef Rawins Guy.
And things got better when they movedaway from that with Gable Steveson.

(35:07):
It's a little tough now because theyare laying it on so thick, but
they can always pivot and hopefully givethis guy his own identity. The crowd
did not like him, at leastI would say the vocal majority were against
him, and on social media inour comment session, it led to some

(35:29):
assuming that it's because of the sexualmisconduct allegations against him. To go back
he was amateur wrestling days. Ican't speak for everyone who's booing John.
I'm skeptical that that's why everyone wasbooing. I think that a lot of
it was that he came off asthis second rate guy, the second rate
Kurt Angle, and you know he'splaced promo on television. Setting this up

(35:53):
was really bad and there's nothing rightnow to cheer if you're not. Look,
we've seen, like if the crossoverbetween amateur wrestling and pro wrestling fans.
I'm not saying there's none, butI don't think there's a lot.
It's just two different worlds. Andyes, you get a lot of people
from amateur wrestling, but I justdon't think the average pro wrestling fan is

(36:16):
all that excited when they hear thisguy won this medal and he's done this.
It's like, okay, cool.I look forward to seeing him.
But it's not just instant Oh,this guy's great. I can't wait to
see him. It's like, let'ssee what he's got. I think that's
I hope he's good. It's something. But it's not just instant success,
because this guy's been a successful amateurwrestler. Yeah, and well, we

(36:37):
talked about it before we went torecording, you know, the we I
saw it on social media to wherea few paper were talking about the allegations
that which never really went anywhere.And the reason I bring that up to
is you have Austin theory who hashad similar allegation. You had Kevin Owen's

(36:58):
point out to JD don't make don'tmake google my name with that joke of
that almost alluded to it. Soyou have other and of course the owner
of the company, Yeah, thethe private CEO of the company out there
under endeavor I forget. But yeah, no, there's a lot of like
other people who fall under the sameboat in h WWE. Yes. I

(37:22):
think it's like there's like it's sprinkledthroughout the crowd. There's a few people
that know, a lot of peopleknow that he is a celebrity, a
gold medalist, but I think itwas like so surreal because they were like
really popping for Baron Corbyn. Idon't remember the last time I've seen Baron
Corban gets such a huge baby facevation. I mean the happy Corborde stuff

(37:44):
people had fun with. Oh andbum ass that was that. That was
fun. But yes, I think, yeah, the bable Stepson does come
off as a like a discount curtangle and it's like entitlement. So there's
that. It's like a combination thefactors, and you know, with all
the build up and all the hype, some of it by the company,

(38:05):
some of it just expectations because ofhis amateur wrestling credentials, and you know,
he's kind of been this myth forthe longest time you've been hearing about
him. I signed him and enteredescedmcmani and all this, and then he
just kind of disappears and pops upon NXT. I do think that people
wanted to be really impressed by whateverthis guy did when they first saw him,
and that promo got him off tosuch a bad start, and like

(38:28):
the stuff that he did in thecorner working against his brother was weird,
but it was okay. I stillthink right now at my guest with him,
he's not going to be as badof a talker even initially as he
was in that initial promo. Isay that because like when he was talking
with Eddie Thorpe, it was better. It wasn't good, but it was

(38:50):
better than when he had to lookinto the Cameron delivered a promo. I
don't he's not ready for that.They need to be really protective of him,
and I think they need to goback and watch this and one or
some less said, yeah, wecan't just have this guy do sue plexes
in the ankle lock and think thateveryone's gonna love him because they remember Kurt
Angle. That's foolish. And John, what are the odds that within the

(39:10):
next two years this guy's not inWWA, that he's working in UFC instead,
now that they'll be under the same, you know, the same umbrella.
Basically, I actually think that's totallypossible because it could almost be a
career pivot if this pro wrestling thingis a little bit too much for him,
and it seems like that there there'sa chance that that could be.

(39:32):
And what I'm gonna bring up is, yeah, you just know, we
talked about the bad promo from thispast Tuesday, and even during this match,
he so he was doing all themannerisms. It seemed like he expected
the baby paste reaction and so thatwhen the crowd turn on him, he
was taking a back a little bit. That's what it seemed like at points.

(39:53):
Oh for sure. Yeah, Solike I said, he like it.
You know, he never give up. Like one person I go who
really turned things around from night today was like Bobby Lashley when they gave
him the huge push and he waslike never really camera and microphone ready for
years and all of a sudden,he like put a cap over his eyes

(40:15):
and now he's a really good promo. Underrated these days, we see what
a lot of people wear. Theyit takes time for him, I think
because it's a little tough because itseems like they want to treat him like
he's a big, big time,top tier celebrity, which he is in

(40:36):
the sense that he got the Olympicgold medal and does have that accolade that
a lot of people don't have.But where that's hurting them is and we
see the converse with Damon Kemp beingtoo able to travel the circuits. Is
they're really protecting Gable Steves and notexposing him as like a developmental wrestler,
having him created like everyone else anddevelopmental. They need to find a way

(41:00):
to get him to wrestle in frontof live crowds and learn how to interact
with live crowds, which his brotherhas taken a badge of. They even
sent him to Europe because that wouldhave been a good thing if they still
had n X TUK like they weredoing and said in experience out on excursions.
Maybe they can do that once theyget NXT Europe up and running.
But they need to get Gable infront of live crowds and have him learn

(41:22):
how to interact with live crowds.Like you mentioned, he was good on
the pretape, he didn't know howto interact with the crowd on Tuesday and
he had a hard time knowing howto react to the heel crowd. We've
seen other wrestlers like lean into it, like see him punk when he with
his last couple of matches where crowdsare back and forth on him. So

(41:45):
yeah, for Gable, I thinkthey need to find a way to at
least take away this entitlement that they'regiving him and have put him in front
of crowds so he can practice andget reps. Yeah, boy, I
do think that you mentioned Bobby Lashlythat if we're ready man, maybe there's
even an argument to be made thathe'll get more reps. I he's on
the man roster, this group thatBobby Lashly putting together. Let's say we're

(42:07):
just lastly at the Street prophets andsteveson. Well, he'd looked the part
in the suit, you wouldn't haveto have him, say a whole lot,
because you have three guys who cantalk and he can learn as he
goes. That might be something toconsider. But I don't know that they're
in a rush to put him therebecause I don't know if they know what

(42:27):
his future is. I think heyou know, they made this like,
oh, he's made his decision,and it sure doesn't seem like he's made
his decision. I think it comesdown to whether or not they let him
go back and wrestle for a goldmedal. And we'll only time will tell
what they do, because I meanthere's been talk of him on it a
transfer to Iowa from the UFM andgo back allegiately and then go for the
world, go for the gold andall of this, and just the wording

(42:51):
they use, they never said thisis over. One of his coaches at
the UM came out and said,well, just because he's wrestling doesn't mean
his eligibility is over. If peopleremember Kurt Angel deep into his pro wrestling
career, talked about going back tothe Olympics, so it can be done.
It's not the disqualifier that it oncewas, and so I won't be

(43:13):
surprised at all if that's what happens, is he ends up going back to
amateur wrestling for a while and theygot this out of him, maybe there's
going to be more. I wouldthink with the finish of this match being
what it was, they want todo more with him. In Corban.
You mentioned the crowd turning on himand him not knowing how to react.
I wouldn't be at all surprised ifthis match was laid out step by step

(43:35):
and something they rehearsed at the performancecenter and they weren't anticipating the crowd reaction
reacting the way it did, andhe's not at a point in his career
obviously where he's going to be ableto even be coached through changing on the
fly by Corban, So you know, those things will come. I didn't
watch this match and think I neverwant to see this guy again, but
I also didn't watch it. No, man, I can't wait to see

(43:57):
what's next. But John, Idid think for a heavily hyped anticipated not
hyped so much, but I havevery eagerly anticipated debut. What a ship
finish? Yeah, yeah, I'mso. I understand the reasoning behind the
finish, and I was clean tohoping they did something like that, because

(44:17):
so they like they did the wholeBaron carbon burned the ship's thing where he
like meets his clone in the forestwith the tiki torches. I actually thought
they did a good job like reyou know, like rebuilding Baron Corbin to
the point where I didn't want tosee them feed him to the celebrity in
his first match out. So Isee that this this finish was made to

(44:38):
protect Baron Corbin while you know,and of course Gable stepson celebrity has all
the plot armor, so it's thewhole heavier Kike and eat it too.
I liked it more from Baron Corbinand but yeah, and the crowd gave
their displeasure to the match, andunderstandably so. And look, if this
is going to continue, like ifSteveson's going to be around ound, you

(45:00):
know he's gonna beat Corbon eventually,I just would have gotten it out of
the way here, like, Okay, Corbyn was overwhelmed by this guy and
didn't see it coming, and youmove on in a different direction. But
I think they want to extend itbecause they liked the idea of the veteran
working with him and maybe this,you know, they do the match on
TV again and said, you know, on NXT television rather than on a

(45:22):
plee. We'll see a lot ofquestions here regarding Steveson, for sure,
and the Crow was not happy withthe finishes, you know, to the
chanted bullshit. They were pulled apartand Steveson ended up sending Corbin through a
ringside barricade that broke something you've seena million times and doesn't come off all
that impressive. And then he wasa standing call and acting like he really

(45:43):
accomplished something, which I don't thinkreally worked on his detractors at all.
From there we had Mackenzie Mitchell interviewLyraville Curia and she talked about her match
with Ria Ripley and then was attackedby J C. Jane and they brawled
and re ripple and Dom showed upafterward, and Ripley praised Lyra for showing
fire. I didn't like this brawlonly because I felt like I'd seen similar

(46:07):
brawls with Roxanne Perez and Blair Davenport. They had the one of the bodeg
as you mentioned, they showed anotherone of them from I think it was
the Dream Convention, and it justwas a little too similar, like these
quick brawls that don't really go anywhere, And so yeah, I don't know.
Maybe I don't know if you hadthe same feeling watching this, or
if you liked this more than Idid. No, I had that same

(46:28):
feeling because we also had one withthe Baron Corbyn and Gable steveson postmatch where
it is security guards ran out.I did that also. I feel like
we were getting a lot of secularsecurity pull aparts. The next match was
Dominic Materia with Ria in his corner, defeating Leslie and Mustafolie in twelve oh
five to retain the NXT North AmericanChampionship. It was the only finish that

(46:52):
would make any damn sense to me, John dom you mentioned it, dom
and Ria bringing the ratings. Whywould you stop here? I think the
important thing was that he didn't makethe others look too bad, and they
didn't. I felt like, youknow, Allie is what it is,
but Lee is the important one tothe NXT brand. I have no idea
how long all He's going to bethere. And even though he ended up

(47:14):
taking the pin, he was alsomade to look very resilient, kicking out
of some things that you wouldn't expecthim to down the stretch before Rha ended
up pulling Allie off of the pinof Wes, and then Dominic hit West
with a frog splash and that endedup sealing his face. So yeah,
it might sound crazy to those whodidn't see the show, but even though

(47:34):
Lee took the took the pin,I really felt like they did a good
job of making him look resilient.Yeah. I think they told a good
story throughout this match and everyone wasprotected and a lot of people got you
know, boosted from this match,including Riah Ripley, who gave Wesley a
riptide through the table at one point, But yeah, no, I thought

(47:55):
everyone was protected and would Dominic mysterio. They're due a good job building him
up as a vulnerable pest heel wherehe can lose it any time, but
he has all these uh you know, the heaters behind him helping him win
matches, and he's one of thetop heels in pro wrestling in terms of

(48:16):
getting that reaction, so I thoughtthey protected him him here. Eventually we
want I would want to see aWesley versus Mustafa. That was the match
that they were going to go withbefore they pivoted towards dom But because eventually
you can see Wes Lee and MustafaAli just you know, give him like
fifteen to twenty minutes minutes and totear the house down. We didn't get

(48:39):
that like in Ring Classic here,but I thought the story was good at
everyone benefited coming out definitely. Thenwe went to the Women's championship match,
thea hail ran through the chase youmanner, and then Tiffany Stratton was in
Barbie gear. You said, howboy, I'm sorry, cal girl Barbie

(49:01):
of course, and they had theBarbie looking entrance for her and everything else,
and certainly a timely entrance and sheI mean seriously, John, had
you taken her and put her onthe big stage at WrestleMania, she would
not look out of place. I'mnot saying from her in ring standpoint,
but I'm just saying from the cosmeticwalk to the ring and the entrance and
all that. In the gear itlooked top notch. Yes, and we

(49:23):
were saying that ever since she startedreally getting her feet wetted ad XC.
She has that future WWE Women's Championtype of look to her and confidence and
if he gets better in the ringevery time, the only thing she does
is a little clunky on is makingthat character feel genuine. But she did

(49:45):
look a big league. She endedup retaining her championship. You had to
know what the finish was going tobe when you saw the red towel around
the neck of Andre Chase. Sureenough, he ended up throwing it in.
They worked in a back injury forhal that Tiffany was exploiting. Someone
in the comments section Tonight mentioned it, and I remember thinking the same thing.

(50:07):
I don't remember the move, butthere was something that Tiffany took where
she came up and she looked alittle woozy, and it was fairly early
in the match and she was ableto continue. They didn't have to stop
it, and they didn't check onher anything like that, and you know,
it was very quick and it couldhave just been schelling. But I
do remember wondering like, oh,did she did get her bell rung?

(50:29):
So to speak? It did shesuffered some concussion or something, And there
was nothing totally noticeable the rest ofthe way, like, oh, she's
out under feet. It wasn't likethat. But I do wonder if there
were some potential issues, some lingeringissues throughout this match. I didn't think
it was put I guess the bestway I can describe this, Joan is

(50:49):
it was hard for me to getinvested in this match as I'm watching it,
because I spent a lot of timewhenever Tiffany would perform big moves wondering
if she could really execute them.And I was kind of fearful at times
for thea Hale. I don't knowif it's Stratton is kind of trying to
do something she's not ready to do, and she were credit for the most
preto things ended up coming off fine. There were some close moments from like

(51:12):
oh boy, I don't like thisor don't like this, and I think
she is a hell of a talentand bright future, but I can see
why she's still in developmental. Yes, and I believe she's said that in
interviews where she understands why she's indevelopmental and totally accepts that. So Dad,
you know she can get better.Because a lot of people were saying
that, oh, she's ready forthe call up at the WWE draft,

(51:35):
but it's good to see that she'saware of her weaknesses and is willing to
tighten those up. I did pointout in my thoughts that, yeah,
I noticed she tends to fumble,but when she tries to get a little
bit too creative, when you don'tlike you just don't have to do something
that looks innovative or unique. Andif you're gonna do something like that,

(51:55):
do what, like say, maybelike soul Ruka does, and maybe try
to things out outside of television andonce you get those time off, then
you can use it. I didnotice that points too, that yeah,
she was her timing was off.Don't remember if it looked like Boble came
from a like getting her bell rung, but yes with her at least the

(52:17):
one positive of this match, though, I did like that they made her
look strong indie end, and that'sbeen a problem in her recent matches where
she's sort of just you know,gone off by the skin of her TV
and yeah, so yeah there foranyone going out. No, she's ready.
There was a triple threat match thatthey had on NXT television because I

(52:39):
would certainly think like, wow,she got to look, she's got everything
else, it's time. Yeah,here it is. It was the one
with it it's been a while AndyHartwell and Roxanne Peress. That was really
rough and I'm just like, okay, um, Actually there's their spring break
in episode and I just remember thinkinglike, oh, yeah, she needs
more time. She's not ready,and there's going to be those moments where

(53:01):
at this point in her development,she's gonna look ready and then the next
match you see here, you're gonnago, oh, maybe not quite yet.
So I think they're playing this smartway. The finish again felt predictable
to me, but what I likedis that it did make Stratton look a
little more ruthless because one of theissues I've had with their character is she
just comes off as phony, andnot in a phony heel arrogant way,

(53:23):
but in a just this isn't areal person way. And also, she's
a new champion, and they've neverreally made her look like a dominant wrestler
where you don't feel like this woman'sthe champion. You kind of look at
her and she has the belt,and so the more they can establish her
as an in ring force, thebetter, And I think this helped in

(53:43):
that regard. Yes, and I'mhappy they're not giving up on her because
I can totally have saw the Haillwinning here if they just felt like Tiffany's
not ready to be their top champion. We saw a similar problem with Mandy
Rose earlier in her run. Andeventually they start racking up those credible winds.
So hopefully we get to the pointwhere Tiffany's friend can dominate wrestlers.

(54:06):
The finish here protects the A hailand they can they can even put the
belt on the A Hail down sometimedown the road, if you know,
if they want to, because thehall was protected here, and yeah,
no, I'd like that. Itmade her look a little bit more credible.
Now, Duke Kutzon did not lookpleased that Andre Chaster and the towel
So, I mean, we've beenkind of waiting for this split since they

(54:30):
joined forces, and do you thinkthey're finally doing it or is this just
more of another tease. Basically they'llbe fine. I think it's another teas
In the end, they'll be fine. I like how they treat Duke Utzon,
where you know, he was comingoff being like a heel in several
programs, and while he still actslike a scumbag, it's sort of like,
you know, he's like a scumbagpeople like now, yeah, I'd

(54:52):
like because I let you know,that's that's what we see you with heels
and baby feace all the time,where like all of a sudden, you're
a baby face now, so nowyou follow the rule and you're a completely
different person. I like that hischaracter is still the same scumbag that he
was when he was playing poker,except he's sort of bought into the honor
chaset kool aid. From there,we went to a backstage segment. It

(55:12):
was the Baby Faced team from theKickoff show match celebrating and dragged Lely ended
up kind of strang away from thegroup. And he ran into Dominic Masterio
and rear Ripley and Ripley I calledhim a wannabe Ray Masterio and he ended
up saying that he's honored to becompared to Ray and then they just kind
of went back and forth for alittle bit and a long story short,

(55:36):
it looks like we'll be seeing DragonLee against dom Masterio. Another excellent opportunity
for Dom to learn and have agood match. But yeah, they just
they haven't got it right with DragonLee yet. I don't know if this
is the key is I mean,if he has a full on feud with
Dom, I think it's going tobe a lot of fun. But man,

(55:57):
I don't know, John I justkind of already comes in and Harry
hitch Coup filed out of place there. They just I expected I expected dragon
Ly to make a bigger splash.Yeah, and it looks like they're protecting
him a little bit more because theygiving him wins. But he sort of
got sucked into a lot of thebecause he's like sucked into everyone else's orbit

(56:19):
where instead of making his own characterwhere he's like, uh it sucked into
no one Dar's madness. And nowthey have him show up on Nathan Fraser's
John Oliver Show because like he's wrestlingJohn Oliver for some reason. Um.
I did get a kick out ofthis though, because Dragon Lee says,
you will know who I am andit create riha Ripley from behind goes Batman.

(56:42):
That was like like that that wasI that was if that was like
impromptu, that was that was great. But yeah, this will be interesting
because I don't think they should putthe belt on Dragon Lee and they shouldn't
take the belt off of dom Uh. They might be able to get a
story out of it because Dragon Leesays he wants to be in the next

(57:04):
Raymisterio, so they can go backto a variant of the dead Bee Dad
thing. But we'll see. Yeah, Dragon I hated when he said that.
I remember when they signed him,and it was it came out as
part of the story when they signedhim that he wants to be the next
Raymisteria. I'm like, do youknow how many guys they've tried they brought
in with the intention of making thatguy the next Raymisteria, Like Dragon Lee
something special, don't say that justagain be the first Dragon Lee And and

(57:30):
that's okay. I don't think there'sever going to be another Ramisterio, just
a little thing that drives me nuts. Whendn't they So yeah, go ahead,
No, so I was gonna sayso. I actually talked to Dragon
Ly at a press conference that backthe New Japan show. Okay it was
it was the unfortunate one where itwas coming right off. He that Dragon
Driver Dad took Horoma Takachi out fora long time. But at the time,

(57:54):
like I had asked him, becauseI don't think I knew that he
was brothers with Ruche, And eventuallyI did bring up something with Loop and
knovelists, and he did talk aboutat the time to reason so Ruche wanted
to bring him in as a fullon like maskless heel into Los Angle knoblists.
But the reason he always refused atthe time was he wants to be

(58:15):
his own man in the first DragonLee So I knew he had that thought
back then. Eventually he didn't endup joining his brother and stuff, and
now he wants to be next forRemisterre. But I do remember him talking
about how he always wanted to belike his own lutador. I hope,
yeah, I hope he has thatmindset, I mean, and maybe they
coach him to say that I wantto be the next ray because the guy

(58:35):
is incredibly talented, and I dothink that he has an opportunity to be
the next lucristensation for WW if thingsgo well for him. But it's just,
you know, Ray Masterio is sospecial and I just wouldn't make that
comparison if I were him or thecompany. Let others start to make it
first. So the next show thatthey're doing, pe wise is No Mercy
in September and John that is inyour well ballpark neck of the woods and

(59:00):
Shamsick. You may just be goingto that show. You're not sure yet.
I'm not sure yet. It's solike if it was in La,
I would definitely go because there's likea lot of fun things to do in
La so I can turn into likea Vaca chance. My hometown Bakersfield is
like stuck in that like middle ofnowhere farmland and it's just really hot out

(59:20):
there. And also there's a moreconvenient to reach San Jose show a couple
of days later on my birthday.That's my birthday weekend, and yeah,
I might be going. It's Icover NXT I would like to see how
Eddie's the NXT Live experience is withtheir current format of p L E.
So I've talked about this lately.I don't know if you've actually had a

(59:42):
chance to hear John, but Ido think I have to confront you about
this. So you know, Jake'sbirthday was on Friday, and Will's birthday
was on Saturday. My birthday iscoming up on next Saturday. And in
fact, new dot net shaffer SamRobinson's birthday as on August second. Hayden
Leading no longer writes for the sitewas August third. It's you and Colin

(01:00:05):
mcglire. You two have the audacityto have your birthdays away from ours.
We had this great thing going andyou two just have to ruin it.
I'm sorry I was born in Octoberanyway. I guess I just wanted to
work in Does that so? Doesthat put y'all in the same DIAC sign?
I'm assuming I don't think so.Um, that's a good question.

(01:00:27):
I'll look that up. Oh yeah, well we're moved forward here because I'm
not even sure I'm a LEO,but I think I'm like close to the
cut off. I don't I don'tknow, maybe maybe we are. Is
this schisum thing the dumbest storyline andall of wrestling right now? It's it
seems like like every company like thishas a dumb this is like this is
exactly like the Design storyline and ImpactWrestling now to the point where we had

(01:00:51):
the Creeds infiltrating the mid card coldthat they could have just got rid of
if they if they won that match. Yeah, this is a stupid And
here's the thing. I liked itbecause Joe Gacy delivers in the material Saint
like we said the sayning about Deaner, but Joe Gacy delivers the material.
Well, it's just when you havean ineffective mid card call, what's the
menacing about them? They just likefumble and bumble and lose and uh yeah,

(01:01:15):
I don't like it. They're goingto do an interrogation to the mask
of the developmental wrestlers, like they'rethe only people on earth who are not
thinking that this is the Creeds.Are these characters and probably the broadcast team
no followers set no Followers said it'sdumb, and then everyone's like no,
they're gone, Like what yeah,so like three of them are idiots.

(01:01:37):
There's just no other way around it. And even if it's like, well
they're going to serve us and they'vegot somebody else that's going to be on
masked, No, they're still idiotsfor not thinking it could be that it's
just who the one tall and onewide cult member that looks like the Creeds.
You know, I did watch itwas it the James Gang back in
the day. It was Dusty Rhodesand magnum Ta and as watching the Midnight

(01:02:00):
Express fight who everybody thought was themand now was younger. So maybe it
was pretty obvious and I just wasn'tpaying close enough attention. But then all
of a sudden, Dusty Roads andmagnum Ta walked out during the match,
and the unmaster these guys is acouple of enhancement wrestlers that everyone had thought
was Dusty and magnum So maybe they'lldo something like that, John. It

(01:02:21):
still doesn't make this any better.Oh yeah, And they because they have
like a hundred developmental you know,all their security guards and everything, where
we just the velment wrestlers off thatare security guards. They can find like
a wide and a tall big manlike one of those like two, not
two college linebackers. That's there.You go. Well, they have all

(01:02:42):
those security guards and yet none ofthem are in the parking lot. Oh
that's true, the most dangerous placein a NXC in the world. Up.
Oh, yeah, that's true.Did we find out that Blair Davenport
is the one responsible for beating upKNTO that one time? I don't know.
That's a good question. But toyour earlier question, yes, we
are all Leo's July twenty third throughAugust twenty second. There you go.

(01:03:06):
I'm sorry for being a libra.Shame on you and Colin McGuire, just
how dare you two? Then itwas time for the main event and we
had Alicia Taylor handled the in ringintroductions for the title match, which I
always loved. And this was thematch I think everybody expected in terms of
quality. Carmelo Hayes, which TrickWilliams in his corner, defeats Eliot Dragonoff

(01:03:28):
to retain the NXT Championship in twentyfour oh seven, using nothing but net
but just a good back and forthbattle from start to finish. Kind of
a slow paced start, but oncethey got going, terrific. Yes,
I thought this was a different positionfor Eliot Dragonoff. Usually he's the small

(01:03:49):
underdog wrestler who's getting beat up bylike some giant monster and flopping all over
the place. But here he wasin the position where he is the one.
It's again the downside would Mellow thateveryone's afraid of when he makes the
main roster is he is a bitundersized. But I thought the pacing was
good. You had to know fromthe beginning when they were starting out with

(01:04:12):
all the like methodical sort of chainwrestling and headlocks and stuff, that we
were in for one of those uhlike Black and Gold type of main events
where it starts out slow, butat some point you almost feel conditioned from
the back end Gold days to knowthat you know, even though it's slow,
now it's gonna you know, it'sreally gonna pick up and be great

(01:04:36):
by the end. But yes,it was just this an absolute war.
Elliot was dominant both you know,this very stiff strikes as you would expect,
and it looked up to the hype. Am I often thinking that they're
teasing us. Now they're starting toplant the seeds for the turn of Trick
Williams, because hey, later onreally thick with the friend talk. I

(01:04:57):
think it was maybe a pre showproma that he did. And then even
during the main event, even thoughhe was yelling encouragement to Carmelo, he
had an NXT title belt in hishands and it made sense that he would,
but there was like, I thinkthey want us to be thinking,
are you gonna hit him with it? It just kind of and then we
had that moment where he kind ofblew off Trick Williams should get the dragon
off on television recently. I don'tknow that the turn is coming immediately or

(01:05:21):
anything, but I feel like we'removing closer or at least they're planning the
seeds. Yeah, we've seen becausehe's always the one who takes the bullet
for Mellow. What's interesting is thenyou can have him say we're like,
why don't you take the bullet fromme? And he does on occasion,
but you know he'll logic right hereand where I can see them having Mellow

(01:05:44):
take exception was the finish of thematch. So the finish of the match
here was I think, remember,so Trick Williams gets the title belt uses
it to try to encourage Mellow oftotal baby face stuff at a certain point,
Elia tried to hit Mellow with thetorpedo Moscow. Trick takes the bullet
and this was clever because like becauseit helped it. Like Vic Joseph didn't

(01:06:08):
know what was going on and whyElia lost so easily because after this it
took was Melo tossing Elia back inthe ring and hit in nothing buttonette.
What I liked was the post matchwas off the replay Vic notnis that it
looked like Alia hit his head onthe title the Trick was holding, so
I can see like Trick of coursehas the benefit of the doubt excuse,

(01:06:30):
but I can see Carmelo sort ofnot wanting to, you know, have
a tarnish win and eventually leading tolike, you know, a Trick maybe
doing like you know, like youshould be winning by no all means,
you know, by any means necessary. And what's interesting though, is I
can see that happening if they wantto call Carmelo up by himself because Trick

(01:06:57):
Williamson needs more seasoning and NX,which doesn't heard. He's looked better recently,
but he is still very green downthe road. Once there's enough time,
then they can put Trick and Mellowback together. But yes, I
see them planning seeds of a possibledissension between the two. Would Trick being
the heel? That was it?No mercy? Is that the next one

(01:07:17):
they're doing? Yeah? Which Crimela'smatch? They might They might go with
Ilia again because of the title,because of the title shot to the head?
Who else? And NXC is hotenough? I mean if they like
if, then maybe they pivot FinnBalor over. Yeah, there is still

(01:07:39):
unfinished business there, that's right,and by then we'll be through his PAS
program with Seth. You would think, yes, unless un Let's say they
put the at the WWE title,the World Heavyweight title on Balor and I
could throw things out of wack,but they did planting the seeds there where.
Balor has two wins over Mellow already, one from the raw episode and

(01:08:01):
one from the tag match. Yeah, that's they could definitely follow up on
that. And then what the hell'sup with bron Breaker? I don't know.
He beat up bon Wagner last week, and my guess is they're going
to have him randomly beat up Peopil. They they've done this before, where
like Samoa Joe was randomly beating uppeople and Riham Riego had to like hire

(01:08:25):
someone to take care of Samoa Joe. Carry On Cross was beating up random
people. Riem Riego had to hireSamoa Joe to take care of carry On
Cross. My guess is maybe thatlike Sean Michaels has to bring in a
heater and that leads to uh bronBreakers eventual call up because he seems to
be spinning his wheels. He's doinggreat work as a heel, but he's

(01:08:47):
like taking a lot of losses nowand uh sort of with like nothing to
do, and they're keeping him thehell away from the title picture for good
reason. He did everything there wasto do in the title pictures. It's
like, now, what the mostimportant question I can ask you all night.
Ilia's contact lenses year now. Itend to flip flop on them.

(01:09:10):
It looked like when I first sawthem back in the day, it didn't
look a little goofy. But that'skind of Ilia for you, where you
first see it a guy and heit like it's like what the hell is
this? Where he's like this movingall over it up, doing the maniac
things and the red eyes, butyou find out that it's just him he
can do what he wants. Hehas a he has a go tee now

(01:09:30):
too. He's like Evil Ilia.Maybe he's a clone. I vote.
I'm not a big fan of thecontacts. They don't do much for me
in wrestling. That was just kindof look silly, and I have a
feeling that they're really uncomfortable for thepeople that are wearing them. It's like,
is it worth it? In mostcases? No, I don't think
it is ray Masteria. They kindof work for there. I mean,
it's it's just somebody else may feelcompletely different. So I'm not gonna sit

(01:09:51):
here hard. But it too muchfinal. It's time for the final grade.
I will bump mine up to officiallya B minus. Was kind of
torn between C plus and B minusand what is your settle in at I
settled in at a B plus,As I said, what really, so
I probably would have been at aB B minus. But I think that

(01:10:13):
a great crowd can take a wrestlingshow up a level. And I think
one of the MVPs of making thisa good PLI was that very hyperactive crowd
who seemed to be well informed ofNXC two because they they like, seemed
to know what all the stories Lionswere into. They got chase you,
they booed Gable Steveson out of thebuilding, and it was unique in a

(01:10:39):
way. So yeah, I thinkthe crowd bumped it up a little bit
for me very early in the votingforty five percent giving it a Bason Boy
forty four percent giving it an asforeigner pull. And then also for the
best match, no surprise here Hayesand Ilia with what looks like sixty six
percent. The only other match,well, there was a twelve percent for

(01:11:03):
second place right now, Rock samPerez and Blair Davenport, and then ten
percent each for the Triple Threat match. And this one's surprised me. I
don't think this is gonna fair,this is gonna end with it. I
don't think it's gonna finish this highin the voting, But we'll see.
Tiffany Stratton and THEA Hale. Iwould not have had that anywhere near my

(01:11:26):
best match vote about you, yeah, because I thought of you know,
what it did for Tiffany Stratton wasway more important than the actual match quality
because there worth a few missteps.But I guess people just both like Tiffany
and Leftia Hales I mean that's justa benefit of the weight that they're building

(01:11:46):
both women. Any issue with themnot putting the belt on Thia? We
had somebody in the comment section waspretty worked up that they didn't know networked
up but disappointed. Yeah, nah, I don't think that they have to.
We said the same thing with RocksPress. You don't have to rush
to get that superlative. Uh.The it's it's interesting that they don't mention
the person who currently has the record. Uh it's a page Sorayah who wanted

(01:12:12):
at twenty years old. So yeah, I have of the one suprised.
I'm not I'm not surprised, butyou know, because they remember they were
doing the same thing with west Lee, And I understand why you don't mention
that record when west Lee broke allthose North American championship records because they were
all held by velveteen dream right.Yeah, I understand they didn't have to

(01:12:39):
give via Hail the accolade of youngestwomen's champion. Well, gang, that
is going to do it for us. If you enjoy this audio, I
know that we do these for allof the plas and pay per view events,
all the major shows. I dowant to tell you to follow John
on Twitter. I will not saythat other thing yet. It's a Boker
kept Booker kept pushing X on thisshow. Yeah, well it's Booker.

(01:13:04):
He's is he trying to be cuttingh? No, he says, being
Booker. It's on x VIC,It's on H Whatever I did, I
gave them credit. I mean,as silly as I think the name change
is that night WW we'd already updatedall their graphics. True, and they
had already tonight too. And wherecan people find you on a Z or

(01:13:27):
T or whatever he's going with thebird so that you can find me on
Twitter, I'll say it at atLittle John M. That's l I l
j O h n M on Twitterand Twitter. Perfect and you can certainly
fallow along with John's live reviews ofn XT on Tuesday nights, he does
the auto reviews for members, andhe also does the Impact Wrestling reviews that

(01:13:47):
are available on Fridays for everybody.Thank you, John, and thank you
everybody for listening. I'll talk toyou again this week with a Summer Slam
preview and again progressing. Boom Livereturns on next Monday, the Monday coming
out of Summers slam Johnny Fair PlanI will be taking your calls. Thank
you ready for listening, and we'lltalk to you soon. Take care,