NEW FLAGSHIP: Keller & Fann talk Naomi's pregnancy hiatus, WWE's ruthless aggression toward AEW, Jericho-WWE, Bayley, The Vision, more

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
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Speaker 2 (01:06):
Now PW Torch and Spreaker bring you the Wade Killer
Pro Wrestling Podcast. It's time for the weekly flagship talking
current events in pro wrestling.

Speaker 1 (01:21):
Well, last night was one of those unexpected well expected it,
but you know what I mean. Like in the big picture,
unexpected twists were real life intervened in wwbe's plans. Naomi
Trinity announcing that she and Jimmy Uso are expecting a baby.
That she is pregnant, and that explained why she was
scheduled for match last week, showed up at the building

(01:41):
and then left, as I reported, and I wasn't able
to participate, and then this week we know why. So
there's the two sides to this, Rich, There's the personal side, Yay,
they want to get pregnant, they're happy about it. It
was fun to see that announcement. And then the other
side is how it how well? Actually it's kind of
three sides this how doe we handled it on TV?

(02:01):
There's some pros and cons that people have brought up.
And then third and finally, how does it affect the
lay of the land. She happened to be champion at
that time, she was on a roll and now they're
down another top female talent in a pretty deep women's division.
But it certainly shakes things up. So Rich, take any
of those three to start with.

Speaker 3 (02:23):
Yeah, I think the first I'll start with is just
the joy for them in terms of I know Trinity
had done interviews before WrestleMania talking about at some point
similar to what Charlotte did in her Player's Tribune article
where she talked through the desire to have children, Trinity
had mentioned she wanted to at some point have a child,

(02:46):
and then after this with her interview with Stephanie, which
I guess will tie into the next part in terms
of how WWE handled it, talking about the fact that
she lost an ovary and had to have one removed,
she had to have fibroids removed from a U and
being thirty seven, this is what they would call it
geriatric pregnancy. So that's why she's taking it extra careful

(03:08):
because she doesn't want to miscarry. She doesn't want to
do anything that can risk losing the baby. I'm really
happy for her, and I'm astounded that WWEE was kind
of I in my family, I am known even though
I'm forty four years old, because thirties two years ago,

(03:30):
I opened everyone's Christmas presents on Christmas. I don't know
why I did it. I just did it. It was
a really weird thing. Never did it since, but everyone
remembers that, and that's a story of my family, and
that's what Stephanie did. It's like, Oh, Jimmy, do you
want to announce something? Oh wait, wait wait, I don't know,
Maybe you want to do it. Trinity. Oh, we'll go
to commercial and we'll find out what you're gonna know.

(03:52):
I was, you gotta be kidding me, Like, if it
was something at that point, you know what it is.
And it's I appreciate that. Even after they cut to
the clip, they cut back and they let Trinity be herself,
which was completely embarrassing. Adam Pearce being able to go

(04:13):
from tears to calling every woman in the back of
Heifer and declaring that even if she had the breastfeed
and whoop all of them, she'd do it like that.
This was a very like I thought that was the
most big cat Ernie Ladd promo I've heard in years,
but it was just so grandiose and so much bumbast.

(04:35):
I appreciated it immensely, and the last time she gave
it up, as she mentioned it was an injury that
forced her. At this point, she's already thinking, you know,
I'll be back in twenty six, probably twenty seven if
you think about like, you know, she says, she's seven
weeks a long doing the math. That's yeah, she's gonna

(04:57):
be back probably into twenty six, probably beginning of twenty seven.
And what is the landscape going to look like then?
I'm quite intrigued by that, let alone her coming back
into the mix. And as you say, you look at
the roster, and they're fairly they're fairly strong. If anything,
her out of the equation opens what had been a

(05:17):
ladder wrung for uh Stephanie Vicker, who had been kind
of pushed to the side a little bit from a
development standpoint and a featuring standpoint because of the fact
that Naomi did so well and she pushed the issue
and wound up, you know, shining as brightly as EO
and h Rhea Ripley did in that in the you know,

(05:39):
when she cashed in and then with the rematch. And
so I look at the roster. They have already those
four women I just mentioned. You have Oscar, You have Kyrie,
though I think Kyrie, given her post injuries second return
kind of gaffs in the ring, she might be more
for tag team than singles for a bit. You have

(06:01):
some of the other women in NXT. You have Raquel Rodriguez.
You have Roxanne, and then you also have the opportunity
to just let whatever that vignette was with Bailey where she,
I guess, is going to become an evil hugger whatever
she's got planned. But there's no one quite like what

(06:25):
Naomi brought to the table with this new character. And
so I'm really intrigued as to who gets to run
with the ball. I would presume it's Rhea or Eo.
But if they want to make it a heel or
they want to make someone, this might be the time
to give it to Stephanie and let her carry the
ball for a little bit, or even move and move

(06:46):
into NXT and grab one of the women that are
ready down there. I think Jordan Grace is ready. I
don't think right now Blake Monroe is. But that's more
along the lines of her trying to stay within the
lines of what WWE wants her to do more than
her wrestling acumen that I don't have a doubt about.

Speaker 1 (07:04):
Yeah, that's the possibility of it accelerating or changing course
to someone else's career is inevitable. I mean, someone's gonna
get the TV time that she was getting, and you know,
last night of the Post show, I was like this,
it's it's great news. I mean, what is happening is
most important, But the timing is not great. I mean
there's almost any other time in her career this would
have been better than now. And you know, when you

(07:25):
think about the fact that she's sort of had this
unexpected rise in TV time and being featured and a
distinct character that went, you know, just kind of feel
to glow and people were having fun with it, and
she seemed to be having a different kind of fun
than she had been prior to this, and now she's

(07:46):
got to take a you know, nine plus months as
she put it off, but as you say, probably closer
to well, who does you know, You just don't know.
You don't know what a pregnancy does to your body.
You don't know what it does when you're deep in
your thirties, and you don't know how you're gonna feel
afterwards mentally and physically. I mean, it is it is
not some people. It is not a consistent path that

(08:06):
women take. Theo's a whole range of possibilities. But when
she comes back, people are gonna remember this, whether it's
a nine months or eighteen months, or she chooses too
maybe she's like, I love being a mom. I'm good.
But you know, when she comes back, presumably, I don't
think they can get fans to boo her, can they.
I think everyone's gonna remember last night Rich.

Speaker 3 (08:23):
Yeah, They're gonna look at what she does. And she
has basically got herself made in the category of a
Randy Orton or a Paul Hayman, where you can say
whatever you want to incite the crowd, but they're gonna
cheer as well as boo you, just because they appreciate
who you are. I mean, even when she did what
she was doing, she she she was her usual self,

(08:45):
but the fans were with her. She you know, the
fact that she got to say that the baby was
the product of her in Big Jim Netflix and Chilling
too Much was just like everyone everyone just started cackling
like that. I was like, that is so perfect.

Speaker 2 (08:59):
Yep.

Speaker 3 (09:00):
And even her cursing at Pierce and telling them to
get out of her ring like that was again the
fact that she had that power in that moment. When
she comes back, she has to be similar to how
Riha is that really edgy on the line sort of

(09:20):
babyface that folks know may do what she wants, but
they respect her for who she is and what her
grid is.

Speaker 1 (09:28):
So you mentioned some possibilities, is from obviously with Bianca
Bella Air and Live Morgan and Nail Me. There's been
some openings and Ree Ripley's had some injuries. Is there
You mentioned some names, but is there a path that
you think they're most likely to take in terms of
what they do? Is is the care of just getting

(09:50):
a push more than expected and more TV time? Likely
it had been nice if there'd been a little bit
more consistency to her TV time to build up to it.
Is that the most likely path? Or do you think
NXT call up is or what.

Speaker 3 (10:04):
I think most likely? It's one of the big three
between EO Rhea and Stephanie as the person I would
win it.

Speaker 1 (10:11):
Yeah. By the way, since we're well, anything else on on,
like the three categories of discussion, the TV presentation, real life,
or the effect of the woman's fishing you want to
add before I pivot a little bit here, I.

Speaker 3 (10:26):
Would just say in terms of the podcast, I thought
the content was interesting and excellent. Stephanie as the Larry
King is interesting because she's kind of disarming in that
role in a way I did not expect she would be.
I thought it would be more about her, And it

(10:47):
really does seem like she does a good job in
the episodes I've seen of putting the onus of whoever
the guest is as opposed to just sucking all the
oxygen out of the room. So I want to give
her credit for that.

Speaker 1 (10:59):
Yeah, that's different than her in ring character. Yes, over
the years, so I get I get you feeling the
way people who are around her in real life like her,
you know, I mean, like they have an affection for her,
even if they even if they I mean, there was
a stretch of time where there's some people and when
she first got some you know, power overseeing the creative
team and stuff like that, and she'd probably look back

(11:20):
and you know, cringe a little bit at some of
the things she did. But there are people who just
swear by her as uh, you know, really engaging person
who's interested in other people and all that. So, I mean,
I don't think like it. It didn't shock me that
she wanted to go into the talk show host conversational,
let me interview and show interest in your life, and
do you know back and forth Q and A with you,

(11:41):
and that she'd be good at it. It would seem like
she's show showing genuine interest and that she wasn't making
it about her or seeming like it was performed, you know,
some sort of performative look at me as a host
or you know. So I'm not shocked by that. Was
there anything in the content of that interview Jimmy and
Trinity that that stood out as newsworthy or noteworthy?

Speaker 3 (12:04):
I think really the aforementioned health issues she's had and
so where she was at the point where she didn't
think she could even have a baby, she thought they
might have to adopt, and so this, you know, that
even added to like the hey I found out I'm pregnant.
We got to shut this down. Let's be safe. And
so I get the way she's treated this, and I
absolutely applaud the way that WWE gave her the privacy

(12:29):
she deserved in this moment.

Speaker 1 (12:31):
Did she express acknowledge because I didn't see the interview
or listening to the interview, did she acknowledge the timing
of it, like, oh, I was having so much fun
and then this happened? Obviously?

Speaker 3 (12:41):
Yes, Okay, it's one of those things where she framed
it as these are two of the greatest things to
happen in her life. They just happened to happen at
the same time.

Speaker 1 (12:51):
Yeah, yep.

Speaker 3 (12:52):
And so she was very positive about it. There wasn't
regret or anything. If anything, she cited all of those
health setbacks as the reason she's so grateful for this
opportunity to be a mother.

Speaker 1 (13:02):
Yeah good, All right, Well, let's pause and introduce ourselves,
and then I want to talk about that the Bailey situation.
Since we are talking on women's division and so obviously
let else cover. I'll talk about this potential well the
September twentieth, you know, the battle between AW and WW
and kind of talk about the history of the head
to head aggression that that's happening now and has has

(13:25):
happened in wrestling in wrestling history too. I put a
story up on pw torch dot com earlier today noting
some of the key points in history where there's been
this kind of head to head aggression. You can support
us on Patreon and get these shows with ads and
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(13:47):
with ads and plugs remove plus a few bonus VIP
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slash PW Torch VIP. That's Patreon dot com slash PW
TORCHVIP and you can also upgrade to other tiers and
receive even more benefits through Patreon. This is the Wade

(14:09):
Keller Pro Wrestling Podcast, the flagship edition for Tuesday, August nineteenth,
twenty twenty five. I'm Way Keller, host of the show, editor,
publisher and founder of the Pro Wrestling Torch weekly newsletter
and the website pew torch dot com. Also host a
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PW torch dot com slash go VIP. If you like

(14:31):
our approach to covering wrestling, then support us with the
membership PW torch dot com slash co VIP. A shout
out to our VIP members, thank you so much for
your support. And I also host the post shows after Rod,
dynamot and SmackDown. Those are free their day livestream on
our pw Torch YouTube channel and then they go out

(14:52):
on our way Keller Post show podcast, So if you're
not checking those out, be sure to check them out.
Real cool mix of co hosts and conversation and chatroom
interaction and callers and emails. It's just kind of a
fun community that gets together every Monday, Wednesday and Friday
to discuss the shows and uh yeah, and and interact
and every once in a while we just kind of
have related sidebars, Like last night we got into Paul

(15:14):
Hayman or Bobyhena and who's the greatest and and what's
the criteria pro and con for each of them being
the case? What's the best case for each of them
being the greatest manager ever? We also got into speculation
on the future of the women's division and more so,
what was the other what was the other thing? I'm
I'm blanking out. We had another sidebar topic that I

(15:36):
wanted to pluck, So I'm going to just screech the
show to a halt as I bring it up. Oh yeah,
the vision and the lack of chemistry between Hayman and Seth,
which am I kind of curious about your take on
rich there seemed to be a near consensus that people
were hoping by now to see a little bit more
of a fun dynamic between Seth and Paul than we've

(15:56):
seen so far. So that was a big part of
yesterday's post show. I so do VIP shows The Fix
with Todd Martin, way Keller Hotlines. I just did a
three part series interviewing or having a conversation with Guy Evans,
the author of the definite book on the ww Nitro
era called Nitro, and we focused on Hulk Coogan's role
during that time period. That was VIP exclusive. I'm part

(16:17):
of Post Paper b Roundtables and I also host Everything
with Rich and Wade usually on Tuesdays, and every three,
four or five weeks we simulcast it as the Flagship,
and that's what's happening here with today's flagship. Rich fan
person Torch columnist, Peter Torch, podcaster, welcome back to the
flagship co host chair. This doubles as this week's Everything.

(16:39):
How's it going? Rich?

Speaker 3 (16:40):
Pretty good? Pretty good? I can't complain and join a
decent weather here in Pittsburgh and looking forward to chat
and wrestling.

Speaker 1 (16:47):
When biking with my family, and we've been lamenting the
fact that the thunderstorm has been kind of missing us,
because it's kind of fun when you know there's a
thunder and win nothing, you know, deadly, but it's like
it's like it's just like the radar shows is coming
and it just misses us when like a shoot or
you sleep through it. And we just caught a bike
ride and there's like one giant rain cloud in the sky.
Otherwise it's mostly blue skies. It's USA Network Circle two

(17:08):
thousand and five and h and then all of a sudden,
it just starts raining on us, like and it's like, oh,
it was like eighty five degrees, so it's kind of nice.
We got kind of wet, and then we ended up
biking out outpacing the storm cloud or it moved the
opposite direction and we were largely dried off by the
time we finished up the bike ride. So that's that's

(17:28):
weather update here.

Speaker 3 (17:30):
That's interesting.

Speaker 4 (17:31):
I uh.

Speaker 3 (17:34):
Yeah, yeah, I'm not a lightning person or you guys.
You guys are at one with nature to a level
that I don't think I can I could ever achieve.

Speaker 1 (17:42):
It wasn't there was no thunder and lightning. It was
just a rain cloud and it was like, okay, you
got you got some rain. I'm just saying, like, of all,
it's sort of like the Trinity example. It's exactly like it.
Let me say that pregnancy, you know, career is just
like a bike ride in a rainstorm. No, but my
prain is is my point is is like missing the
thunderstorms and then we go on a bike ride and

(18:02):
that's when the rain cloud, you know, lands on us.
When when we aren't just sitting on the sitting on
the porch and enjoying the rain, we're actually getting you know,
drenched in it. But anyway, uh so let's uh, I's
gonna think if there's anthing else and you say no,
let's just get back to our conversation here. I brought
up Bailey. There seems to be some pushback on this,

(18:23):
but also some confusion on why there's pushback on it.
We have Bailey in these segments and it's like the
cinematic thing that they're doing, and so there's the intrigue
of where her character is going, and and that's a positive.
I'm curious where it's going. I want to talk about that,
But first, how can we hear the voices in her head?
Rich like wrestling is presented as a show where a
camera is aimed at people and there's a microphone and

(18:47):
a lens, and that's what we get to see. We
don't get to hear people's thoughts in their head. We
don't get to see through through walls with X ray vision.
We like, I mean, just like the narrative structure of
pro wrestling is it's a sporting event being filmed and
then there's these vignettes and you go, well, it's post produced. Well,
who's capturing the voices in Bailey's head in an audible

(19:09):
format and then post producing them in so that we
know what Bailey was hearing in her own head while
they were going on. It makes no sense and it's
totally stupid and it's just not typical for person to
go there and then people go, whoa, what about Papa Shango.
We hated that too, Just because something happened in the
past that was totally stupid and we're critical of it
doesn't mean well, now that it's been a few years

(19:30):
and it happened before, we should be okay with it.
Stuff like Undertaker. I mean, you can make a case
for a white Undertaker. There's a character who just they're
in their own realm and we just sort of accept it.
Bailey's not that like, that's not her character. It doesn't
make sense. It's like those multiple camera angle restaurant or table.
More like where they sit at a restaurant. You can

(19:51):
just see they're filming it three different times and spicing
it together because the camera's are all invisible, even though
clearly they'd be in view with the angles they take.
They just can't help themselves sometimes, or the Cody Roman
Reigns Georgia Tech Stadium thing, which is just over the top, overproduced.
So I think we talked about last night. There are
ways to make this work without it triggering this whole

(20:13):
break in immersion and the narrative structure. So that's my
little mini ran for those who didn't hear me yesterday,
Rich how you feeling about? And I actually rant I
said last week they couln't help themselves. They went too
far last week with like the little blurry, the little
waves on the screen and whatever they did. But this
is even worse. So where are you when it comes
to this type of thing?

Speaker 3 (20:33):
I think a lot of it is I liked the
chat a couple of weeks ago. Last week. I think
it was where she sat down and she was just
talking through everything. This one went a lot into the
Lea Fitting and Paulovek world of we are going for

(20:54):
an Emmy and this is how we get it. That
isn't helpful. I like the where the road's gonna take
her in terms of the old Bailey merging with the
ding dong, Hello Bailey, and becoming something new.

Speaker 1 (21:10):
Yep.

Speaker 3 (21:11):
I like that because I think for one of the
four horse women, Bailey's been the riskiest in terms of
making her evolutions because where she started with such a
safe place, and she had like in order to make
those changes, she had to go places the other three
didn't necessarily need to. Whereas you look at Becky Link

(21:31):
she as much as we talk about the uh the
example of oh she came out the first episode and
she did a jig and all that she was basically
a clean slate, and then she had a year where
they forgot they booked her to win every match, and
we had Becky taking that and running with it. Charlotte
and Sasha always had their positions known, Bailey was kind

(21:55):
of missing between. And so now with this role, bad
directing and all I think she kind of sets herself
up much like we just mentioned a few minutes ago,
with the fact that we're going to lose Trinity for
a little bit. This is a good chance for her
and so hopefully she can take the ball yet again
and run with it.

Speaker 1 (22:14):
Yeah. Yeah, Like I said, I mean, I'm intrigued with what,
you know, the hug reference at the end and the
inner voice we heard, and if this does kind of
reset or recalibrate her character in the way where she
finds something, because I felt her character has been a
little lost or just sort of derivative and not real focused,

(22:34):
not real compelling for a while now post COVID basically,
and so in post interest. So this I'm I'm I'm
on board for an adventure. Let's see where she can go.
So I think there's talent there and she's a good performer.
It just didn't seem like they had put a lot
of creative energy or found found a lane for her.
So stipulating to that, but this idea that there's people

(22:58):
likely fitting and Paula Beck and I don't know who
came up with the city. I mean, it's you know,
Jeremy borsh sometimes is near near these overproduced segments over
the years, and and you know, obviously we've seen you know,
TNA go down this road and whatever. I mean, this
isn't the only time, this isn't the first time. But sometimes,
like there's it's either a company struggling to kind of
make like fit in somewhere or grab people's attention, and

(23:23):
so they're trying to be different and break the rules,
or it's COVID you don't have fans and you're just
trying to innovate, and everyone goes, okay, we'll just set
aside the rules for now. But this is different. This
is a red hot company that has an established narrative structure,
and we shouldn't be being able to hear voices in
our head. I mean, it's just it's so stupid. And
whoever comes up with it, if it is somebody from
the outside, likely fitting he's like, oh, I have an idea.

(23:45):
All these decades, nobody thought to do this. It's like, yeah,
people think about it all the time, but people understand
that doesn't work in the way perors thing is presented,
so we don't do it. This feels like an outsider
having an idea that a bunch of people who understand,
grew up in the business, understand the tone, understand the
need to immerse people in something that feels grounded to
make up for all the other things that aren't. Doesn't

(24:06):
understand it's not that nobody thought of it, it's that
nobody everybody knew why they shouldn't do it. And that's
the part that bothers me about this. It's not going
to cost someone to not buy a ticket, but it
is symptomatic of a sloppiness, and really, I think a
lack of it's a surprising lack of cognizance of the
structure that's needed for properson to kind of work. And

(24:29):
you see that show up in other ways, like when
the announcers praise a heel for cheating. Oh, well, how
resourceful of that heel for cheating. No, the whole point
of heals cheating is to get heal heat, and if
the announcers are praising them for it, you're extinguishing the
whole point of doing it. So either don't do it,
or do it and condemn it, but don't do it
with the intent to get heal heat and then structurally

(24:50):
build in people extinguishing the heat that you're supposedly ostensibly
trying to get and so this comes across it's just
so fake that it just feels like it's patronizing to
the fan. So that's my second round, Rich.

Speaker 3 (25:06):
Yeah, Yeah, I get where you're coming from with it.
I always have the rule of cool, as my buddy
Matthew would put and so you know, if it's cool,
I'm gonna allow it. If not, I'm gonna just say,
you know, yes, it doesn't make sense to the logics
in this case. I thought I got what they were
going with because they're trying to show her in her conflict.

(25:27):
It wasn't as annoying to me as it was to you.
But that's also indicative of the WWE style in terms
of how they present things, and so I get what
you're talking about. For me, it's the more they can
get Bailey in a place where she is just a
solid character, I would disagree. I would say post pandemic,

(25:49):
the best thing she did was create damage control because
even though Dakota Kai is no longer went the company
that gave a voice and an aspect for EO that
was not necessarily shown at the time. And so when
you had her Kyrie and then OSCA after Kyrie left
again and Bailey, you had a really strong women's faction

(26:16):
that even now I'm confused because all of the arguments
they're having on that side of the ledger is because
that group broke up, as opposed to if they were
together it made sense. If they're outside with her. If
you're no longer in a stable and you say leave
me alone, I'm good and I don't come out to
help you, that that logic annoys me more than the
Bailey thing, because you told me that's like if my

(26:38):
wife tells me pick me up at seven point fifteen,
don't be late, and I show up at seven ten
and it's like you're too early. It's like, wait a minute,
you can't tell me not to be late, and I'm
five minutes early, and now you don't want me to
be here. It's not like I said anything. My car
is parked. This is not a real example. I'm getting
worked up over a hypothesis. But that's where you know,

(26:58):
I get Io rashing out and losing her mind where
it's like I can't win. And so when you look
at Bailey, that might be where she's at. Though I
would have probably said it would have been better and
he's not around anymore. If someone like a carrying cross
was there to be that voice as opposed to it

(27:19):
being an internal voice.

Speaker 1 (27:20):
Yeah, all right, well I look forward to on screen
thought bubbles when pretty deadly return.

Speaker 3 (27:26):
Oh that don't, don't, don't, don't threaten me with a
good time wead.

Speaker 1 (27:32):
I just say once once you uh, once you decide,
narrative structure doesn't count it. It can get really bad,
really fast.

Speaker 3 (27:40):
If they have a thought bubble that says yes, boy,
I will buy that thought bubble and have it in
my basement prominently.

Speaker 1 (27:46):
Oh you can. You'll have plenty of empty seats and
arenas that you can and you can buy cheap. If
if Dotoby goes down down that road of of slapstick nonsense,
that that that Bailey Skits instructure.

Speaker 5 (27:58):
Was need an extra dose of positivity in your wrestling podcasts.
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(28:20):
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Speaker 1 (29:06):
All right, let's let's shift to a more a more
serious story. Although I'm playing around with that, but I
do actually feel strongly about not not get too loose
and indiscriminate with how things are presented in a way
that that is structurally needed for everything to kind of
makes sense. But we have this ae W pay per

(29:29):
view coming up, and reports of have you seen it
confirmed yet? I mean, like everyone's rolling with it like
it's confirmed, and I mean I think it's like basically so,
but I mean W is not advertising it yet, I
don't think so. Yeah, is the is in Indianapolis September
twentieth W show head to head with AW confirmed?

Speaker 3 (29:49):
I believe. So let me hold on overard Chat and
I can check. I think it was finally up on
their end as far as it announced. Yeah, uh, let's see, Yeah,
Wressell Palooza.

Speaker 1 (30:06):
Okay, so they did, okay, yep, yeah, And did they
set out a press release on it?

Speaker 3 (30:11):
I do not think so, Yeah, but yeah they did.
They do have the pl for the twentieth in Indianapolis,
So it might not be Wressell Paloza, but that's definitely
that's definitely the uh the date that's happening. And you know,
depending on where your knowledge is varying because of they

(30:33):
basically if if what the reports have come out are true,
WW essentially Brock Lisonard, NBC Universal and got to their
dates because they doubled up on the summer Slam and
WrestleMania and things of that nature. So so that maybe
that's that's been the latest report. It's gonna be on
ESPN yep, right, So that would be the question like

(30:55):
how could you get out of your cousin, Like, well,
if you did all your dates and you did all
your your contract in that deal for X number of
shows before twenty twenty six, and you did them all
and so yeah, that counter programming on ESPN, which if true,
that would be the debut of WWE on ESPN. And
I know September twentieth from college football is gonna be

(31:18):
a decent ish week because that's me and Josh, Josh
Mustachio and I who do the mailbag for everything. There
are a couple of night games that are pretty good.
I'm looking right now to see if there's something that
stands out. We got Boise State Air Force what Yeah,

(31:41):
look at No, they actually might have picked a night
where everything's coming up Millhouse because I'm looking at the
college football schedule and there is not a competitive game
on that day at night. All the competitive games would
have been in the after or to be determined, which

(32:03):
is always a scary thing because there's some looking at
this here Florida Miami that would be really good. But yeah,
hopefully as long I mean, they'll be fine, but aw
might not be because now you're dealing with. If I
could take a step back, the biggest issue right now
is there's an economy of scale with WW and AW

(32:24):
that people do not want to acknowledge because it's more
comfortable to say I like this, so that means everyone
else likes it. And right now WWE, whether it's through
the stupid actions of leadership and their relationship with folks
in the current US government, the gas in terms of
logic and storytelling and some of the storylines as we

(32:47):
just talked through, or be if the Bailey I'm not
doing a broad brush for all of them. You know,
I will yeah, I'll die on the Bailey hill because
but yeah, and so they have a little bit of uphill.
You know, they're walking on a treadmill on like seven

(33:08):
elevation and aw's on a two. But WWE right now
is in an unprecedented level of money making, popularity, attendance,
and now notoriety. By way of being on ESPN, I
see a numerous I saw some folks mention that they
kind of quote unquote keep tricking these companies. They're not

(33:29):
tricking the companies. The companies are paying money to get
them to use that name to get subscriptions, and the
business is tricking itself. It's not like ww showing up
like a monorail salesman from The Simpsons and selling them
a bill of goods and then disappearing. ESPN knows, especially
because of the relationship between fitting Con and all the

(33:51):
execs there, what they're getting and they want it. Aw On,
Warner Brothers Discovery has a good deal with a great
partner for them. WWE has multiple partners, and it's like
a weird sister wive situation because they're trying to please Netflix,
they're trying to please Universal, they're trying to please now Disney.

(34:17):
And if you're trying to police the mouse like you're gonna,
you're in a good spot. They cannot complain about where
they are. So when you have these kind of programming situations,
it's still it rings even more because of that economy
is scale as well an opening for either a monopoly
or monopsony, a lawsuit, or just being jerks. And that's

(34:40):
where just because they're being jerks doesn't mean they're not
being successful.

Speaker 1 (34:45):
Yeah, I mean, there's a history of companies going headhead.
You know, pensic Man and Ran opposite the AWA in
nineteen eighty five Thanksgiving, Aba hed Autriction running out Thanksgiving
and w F Rana Show just about eight ten miles
away had to head. They built through fifteen thousand people
and Hulkgain headlined one and the Rotories and the free

(35:06):
Birds and a Battle Oil headline the other. And it
was a successful night, but it was also I won't
call it a tipping point, but it was sort of
the last time they seemed sort of. It was the
last phase of the AWA seeming competitive with the WF.
The hometown advantage started to wane when so many of
the top stars went went to the WF, and Pensic Man,

(35:28):
you know, was establishing himself. It's just a higher budget,
more forward leaning, growing production with the WrestleMania brand and
all that. So that happened, and then you had the
nineteen eighty seven situation where you had Stark Jim Crockett
Promotions was trying to get a foothold in pay per
view and they needed that revenue, and the w said,
let's do Survivisories on Thanksgiving head to head with Starcaid.

(35:51):
And by the way, a WA was running in front
of one hundred like a couple thousand people at the
Minneapolis Auditorium with a Greg gun your Kurt heading awas
title main event by that point, and it was not anywhere,
you know, after two, you know, just two three years
after being really strong, had a huge, huge drop off
unfortunately for them, But so Vincent Mannon then was going

(36:13):
after Jim Crockett promotion to the Top rival also on
national cable, and and they tied together. Cable companies didn't
have it. Most didn't have the ability to run two
live pay per view streams at once, so they had
to pick one or the other, and most markets chose
Survivor Series because if you wanted WrestleMania four after success
the Wrestlmentia three, you had to take, you had to
choose Survivor Series over over Star Kate eighty seven. And

(36:37):
then you had the royal Rumble free n USA network
going against the Bunkhouse Stampede just a couple months later
in January, and then ww or what would become w
w drinm Car Promotions fought back with a Class of
Champion special free on TBS opposite of WrestleMania, which was exciting.
I mean that all these had to ad battles and
then of course on Monday night, wore you know where

(36:57):
Vince lamented to me. Vincent Mann lamented to me that
Ted Turner and Erk Bischoft didn't need to go headhead
within those predatory and mean and they're being jerks, and
you know, I'm like, bits, come on, what'd you do
in eighty five and eighty seven and eighty eight. Let's
let's be real here. But he didn't like it because
he felt it was unfair. And his argument was Ted
Turner was using money from other divisions to subsidize what

(37:18):
was going on with WW so he would make a
point of differentiation there, whereas with Crockett and AWA's r
Gania and him, it was just wrestling promoters using wrestling
money to compete with each other. So anyway, all that
history is there, and we saw TNA, you know, try
to go headhead with Raw. We had NXT going aheadhead
with Dynamite initially. There's examples like that. Lately, it's been

(37:40):
b shows crowding the weekend, Senate, It's main event Evolution,
most prominently NXT specials kind of crowding aw's weekend to
ostensibly it seems to burn out fans with free content
on streaming services. So maybe people be like, well, I
don't want to spend the forty fifty dollars for a
pay per view. This feels the next step up, and
that's where this is all leading. This is the main

(38:03):
brand with a huge returning star against a retiring megastar,
and it's a made up ay per view, you know,
it's not part of the normal, normal routine, and I
won't call it pay per view, but a made up
major event that's not sort of part of the normal
calendar with main roster talent. And so this goes full circle.

(38:24):
Is there something different about this that does make them jerks?
Or is this simply Sam's Club opening a couple of
miles from a Costco or a Low's opening you know,
you know, two three blocks down the road from from
the nearest home depot. Is this just the way it
works and wrestling is no different and people shouldn't be

(38:45):
all up in arms about it.

Speaker 3 (38:47):
It's it's it's the or another of my favorite example
is here in Pittsburgh. We have a strip of road
here called McKnight Road that leads to like the malls.
They call it McKnight Americas. During Christmas time, it's just
long traffic. Well, you have a Starbucks, and across the
road you have another Starbucks. Yes, then up the road

(39:09):
you have another star You have five Starbucks counting a
target within like a mile of each other. And so
that means you can't have a Mamay Pop coffee shop
that opens because Starbucks doesn't mind as well if it's
cutting its own nose off, because the money's all going
to the same place. And I think with the advent
of NXT, the acquisition of Triple A and some of

(39:32):
the other moves they've made as far as TKO and
they're ties to either the Canelo boxing fights, things like that,
UFC and all that other stuff. This is a little
different because and that's where in one hand you can say, yeah, capitalism,
there's no ethical consumption, which I try to throw out
all the time, but in this case you have at

(39:53):
this point, and that's where I say the economy is scale.
WWE is a multi national entertainment brand that also happens
to have pro wrestling, and it's now so big it's
almost as if, you know, you think about the too
big to fail, they're almost too big to fail. And
AEW is a wrestling promotion that is trying to be

(40:15):
number two in North America and has alliances with a
group groups like CMLL New Japan, but those partners are
not in the case of New Japan, not in the
best creative world. They've been since the inception of the
partnership where they lost the larges of their main inventors,
not to WWE, but to their partner AW And then

(40:35):
CML is having a resurgence and a level of popularity
in Mexico where they can go toe to toe with
Triple A. But Triple A also has the promise of
folks like Dominic Mysterio, who the mysterial name is huge
in Triple A because of relationship with Conan and Ray
and Ray Senior. And you also have folks wanting to
be a part of this big circus. This is like

(40:59):
if not just the Larry David, because we've used the
idea like the Spikee the Spikes Store. This is if
Larry David decided to have a comic set during open
mic night.

Speaker 2 (41:09):
Hmmm.

Speaker 1 (41:10):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (41:11):
And I don't mean to say that to like Beep,
to mean AWSA they're amateurs. I just mean the level
of power and influence they're weighing in on in terms
of like against aw is absurd. This is like you're
dropping a nuke on a on a you know, a village. Yeah,

(41:33):
and it's it's just unnecessary. I think when you add
in TNA, and I think TNA if they get a
new television deal and they move to Wednesday nights and
they become the proxy of proxies where you could say,
hands in the air, we just helped our partner get
a big television deal. We don't own them, We didn't
do anything. We just tried to show we were playing

(41:53):
ball like everybody else. If that happens to bring your
ratings down before you have to get with a new leadership,
a group in place deals both with streaming, And that's
why I keep on everything hammering this because if you
don't follow, if you're a wrestling fan right now, listen
to me, you don't follow entertainment trades, and you don't
follow like what's going on in the world of television

(42:15):
and streaming, you're missing out not only on the way
things are working, but also the way things could work
for wrestling companies. So what I mean by that is
when the news first came out with AW and the
deal with Warner, I thought it was awesome. I also
do not trust David saslov as CEO because he's made

(42:35):
some really dumb moves. And ultimately it's very circular decisions like,
for instance, let's change HBO to HBO Max because we
want to be more accessible to the middle class, and
then the brand suffers and they bring it back to
HBO because they say we need to bring that classic
HBO verve back to the scene, you're just listening to

(42:56):
the first person that comes in the room to say
change something. And so with AW. Now Warner has split
up into two entities. One does streaming in movies, the
other does television and news. They are going to have
to negotiate two separate deals. And Nick Kahn, being the
former superagent that he is, knows that. And that's where
all this counter programming's coming in and all the attempts

(43:17):
to sign. They're telling a way that are running out
like a Jericho at the end of the year or
any of the other folks that are going to run
out with their contracts. They want to recap AW as
much as possible so that Tony doesn't have support from
a carrier to help his company, and he has to
pay out a pocket which is a billionaire. He can
do for a long time, but that then in turn

(43:39):
hurts the brand of aw and maybe they don't get
a better TV spot. Maybe now you're watching him at
ten o'clock instead eight o'clock. These little things better And
so I feel like this is unnecessary. You already make
big b close to Let's see, they're close to ten

(44:00):
I think in television rights, just ten billion dollars alone
before you get to their incomings as far as ticket
sales and merchandise. I mean, look at what they did
with Finn Balor. Finn Baler goes down to Mexico for
Triple A. He's having the time of his life. And
you could take a wrestler who's one of the best
wrestlers of the world and he's okay wrestling at like

(44:22):
three quarter speed and doing the silly stuff because you
pay them ob seeing them out the money. And now
you've seen the popularity of layesca from for mister Iguana,
and you give him his own version of the demon
doll that they sold for like between one hundred hundred
and fifty bucks, Like you could afford that and so

(44:46):
when you go to AEW in order to keep, retain
or gain talent, you're now paying at a premium that
is largely inflated because in the Walmart example, the big
box store decided they could afford to take the losses.

Speaker 1 (45:03):
Yeah, we're about to go to a commercial break. Why
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(45:23):
as four dollars in ninety nine cents to remove the
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nine dollars in ninety nine cents to treat yourself to
a streamlined, ad and plug free listening experience with a
VIP or Patreon membership. Into what does WWB have to
gain from doing this? Like? How different is their world?

(45:46):
If AW doesn't exist, AW is not going to be
able to hire all the wrestlers from WWE, even if
ww has a reputation for not paying well. So one
of the arguments would be, well, you know AW drives
up talent cost. Well, you know, sure, but they've got
a depmental system. They've got a deep roster. If AW

(46:08):
goes away, Honestly, how many people on the AW roster
is going to go? We want those people to come
in and displace our own people. I don't think it's
that many people, to be honest. I mean, there'll be
a few, but it's not likew's having not succeeding at
the level they could if only they had access to
aw's contracted wrestlers. They are sort of maxed out with

(46:28):
good talent, and the decisions that they make with the
talent I think they're happy with. So what is the
advantage if AW is driven out of business? I don't see.
Is it naiven me to say this, I don't really
see WWE being noticeably more successful if suddenly AW isn't

(46:50):
running monthly pay per views and running TV events in
front of three four five thousand people and putting on
shows on Wednesday nights. I mean, some people who would
be like, oh, I used to watch Dynamite, now I'm
watching nxtor or SmackDown. Sure, but like with the numbers
you're pointing out for these TV rights deals. I just
I don't really see it as like affecting them that much.

(47:11):
And that's where it does. It feels not like they're
protecting their the interest of their stockholders, or or their
best they're doing what's best for business. It does feel
more like we can, we can, so we're going to
it's fun, it's sport, it's personal, it's vindictive. We're gonna

(47:32):
teach that Tony Kahan who's boss, after some of the
things he said about us. I mean that that's that's
how it's coming across to me. And I'm I'm for competition,
and but but you know, some of the examples you
gave Rich show there's certain kinds of competition, there's other
categories of competition, and this just start is just starting
to feel predatory and personal and overly aggressive in a

(47:56):
way that I think is unbecoming. But I also don't know,
and this is kind of my question is does it
do they pay a price for it that does it
backfire on them in any way? Because I just don't
think you know, the fans when Jayusho comes out last
night on Raw, standing in the crowd and people are like,
oh my god, I'm saying that's to ju. So this
is so great. Those people aren't buying or not buying
a ticket based on w B being a little too
you know, being aggressive in counterprogramming. Aw. You know, I

(48:20):
just people are gonna either support w W or not
based on whether they're entertained and like the entertained by
the overall product and like the wrestlers. So I don't
know that woit Be really pays any kind of measurable
price for this.

Speaker 3 (48:32):
I'm glad you brought that up because I wasn't. I
thought about that and I marveled at it last night
and I instantly kind of memory hold it just because
of a day job in life.

Speaker 1 (48:42):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (48:43):
The fact that Jay has now evolved his promo style
and his fan interaction to allowing he trusts kids kids
to grab the mic and say yeat for him and
have the crowd say yeat for him is kind of
what you're not just what you're talking, but that's what

(49:04):
it is. It's WWE has their fan base. They're not
going anywhere. There's online, particularly social media particularly, there's a
belief that AEW fans are only AEW fans and they're
pure as the driven snow, and this is the wrestling
promotion of truth, justice and freedom. And there may be
some aspects to that, but WWA and AW have fans

(49:27):
that both like that, like both companies, and so to
present to pretend otherwise is foolish because the numbers bear
it out and have borne it out since the inception
of the company. WWE Essentially right now is a Gostis
group in Charlie and the chocolate factory. They want the
chocolate because they think all the chocolate belongs to them.

(49:48):
They don't care that AW isn't cutting into their stream
of revenue. They don't care that they couldn't use any
of the wrestlers that they're currently under contract. They care
that another company exists and not under their thumb.

Speaker 1 (50:01):
And Richard Anderack I used to feel that way, more
so about Vincic Mann. I feel like vinsack Mann felt,
this is my industry. I took chances in the mid eighties.
I succeeded, I defeated Ted Turner. I grew wrestling's popularity.
I added touches to it that helped explode it's its

(50:21):
marketability and acceptability in the mainstream. It's my industry and
it was personal. I just don't think Nick con should
feel that way. And Paul Aveck like he's he's more
anti McMahon than McMahon. Why I shouldn't say more? There
are aspects of him that are understandably anti vincick Mann,
and in terms of how he wants to approach things
and how he looks at how things were done. He

(50:42):
came up through WW he you know, he's he knew
the territory system. He's old enough to have caught the
tail end several years of that. I just don't it
doesn't come across to me like like there's a like
it's it's that it's about the prosessing industry as mine.
It just feels like whatever industry they were in, these
people running to KO would want to destroy the competition.

(51:04):
And it isn't about pro wrestling. It's about a ruthlessness,
you know, it's kind of ruthless aggression is It's kind
of what we're seeing on the business side right now
with this corporate team.

Speaker 3 (51:16):
Well, one of the things that folks, especially you know,
if you haven't listened to everything, one of the things
I try to focus on is highlighting the intersectionality like
I talked about before, between entertainment wrestling, like not sports entertainment,
but literal entertainment. Nick Cohn, before he joined WWE, was
working for them as part of CAAA Creative Artists Agency.

(51:38):
He was one of the foremost agents in Hollywood and
television and film. He was one of the scariest human
beings in terms of dealing with because he'll get you
a good deal if you were an age, if you
were a client, he would do well for you. But
if you were something or someone that felt he wronged them,
you're getting nuked for more of it. And so that's
what he's bringing to this role. Yeah, and I try

(52:01):
to highlight when you look at endeavor, endeavor is w
me endeavor William Morris. That was the CIA and William
Morris were two of the biggest agencies. They were the
competing the WCW and WWE of their day in terms
of representing talent. He's now worked for one as president
and now president of the other. He is like the

(52:24):
shark of sharks. If you're a football fan, you know
Drew Rosenhaus. Sharks don't sleep and sharks don't stop. They
keep moving. That's that's him. I mean, we talked about
this last week on everything in terms of him saying,
if I call you at two am, I expect you
to pick up yep. That is his most so if
he's doing that with his staff, if he sees you

(52:46):
as someone that is he doesn't have respect for you.
It's clear he doesn't respect Tony Kahan. He calls him kid,
he uses other pejoratives. When Tony was on TNA and
he was doing his Vince McMahon heel shtick and said
he's the best con in wrestling. When he went on

(53:07):
w when he went on the NFL network and said
that WWE is the not Epstein. What did he say?
They were the what's the other heinous gentleman? Oh?

Speaker 1 (53:20):
That movie?

Speaker 3 (53:21):
Yeah, he just fell out of my head. I was
doing so well toops every time. Yeah, he was the
Harvey Goldstein. They were the Harvey Weinstein, Harvey Weinstein of
professional wrestling. And they had to go to commercial because
this guy's talking about a partner. There is because they
sell the belts, the thirty one of the thirty two teams.

(53:43):
That stuff. While it seems like it's innocuous in terms
of the media landscape is a slap across his little nose,
and Nick won't countenance that. As a kid who grew
up dirt poor in Hawaii, I see, and I'm projecting.
I'm fully projecting here a lot of what he does
as a lot of kids like myself who grew up poor.
And once you make a little money, you never want

(54:04):
to not have money again. And so in his case,
he pushes himself to work hours that are unhealthy. He
pushes himself to destroy his competitors. It is not just
enough to have victory, it is to be total victory.
And I think that's what's happening here. I think this
is him more than Levek. I think Levec likes getting
under Tony Kahan's skin. But Nick Cohn wants to destroy

(54:28):
him and wants to destroy aw and not I'm an
evil man. He wants to do it because that's the
only way he thinks, Like, this is a guy who
if I'm going to get you a deal, that means
somebody else has to get fired. Great if you look
and again go back, look at Lee Fittings case, Look
at the gentleman they hired from Fox, anyone they have
under contract that has issues with sexual harassment and their

(54:50):
prior stop that he was an agent. Most of those
lawsuits will have parts that mention their representation doing things
to make sure it never became a legal issue. It
was barely a si A issue. That's Nick con.

Speaker 1 (55:03):
Yeah. So do you think fans notice and care in
whether it makes a difference in business or not? What's
what's your sense of fans noticing? Wait a second, there's
another weekend where I have to choose between all these things.
Why do they have to be why do they Why
does this have to be opposite? And I think this
is WW doing it. It's pretty obvious it's to be

(55:25):
doing it, not AW. So that's my first question. Then
second is does AW try to counter? Do you think
they have that it's in Tony Khan to push back
and go all right, well, we're we're gonna you know,
in how can he in the sense that people are
paying for ESPN, they're gonna get Wrestumania. He can't hurt
Wrestumania business in terms of pay per view buys? Is
wwe insulated from that? So do fans care? And can

(55:48):
Tony Khn strike back?

Speaker 3 (55:50):
I think folks haven't fans don't necessarily care. I know,
AW fans like it because WW more often than that
have failed. He's counter programmed Ontonge and so it kind
of blows up in their face. But they don't care
because again, much like the Russians in any Land war,
they got bodies to throw at the thing. And that's

(56:11):
what That's how they're treating this like, Hey, if DNA's
got to take a hit, we've helped build them up. Great.
If NXT's going to take a hit, great, we'll do
this special with John Cena versus brock Lessner, and people
were gonna want to watch it. The way in which
this is a checkmate, especially this counter program if it
does happen on ESPN on the twentieth, Tony can't talk

(56:33):
crap about ESPN. That's one of the NFL's business partners,
which means it's one of his family's business partners. You
can't say they made a bad choice. They made the
best choice they could from a branding standpoint. Oh yeah,
and so you just have to take the loss there.
But there are other ways you can push back. I mean,
if you wanted to explore a monopoly lawsuit or like
MLW did with court Bauer, I think you have to

(56:55):
be okay with And that's where you got to take
a step back where you think about Tony had You know,
Jason was really good at pointing this out Jason Power
fromprogresson dot net when they were doing the storyline with
the young Bucks and the young Bucks were running things
quote unquote and Aw, he kind of came to a
quick end because Tony couldn't countenance folks not knowing, Oh no, no,

(57:17):
actually I booked this stuff. Yeah, if he has to sue,
and con and Leveck are like, oh, well, you couldn't
take the heat. So he had to go to the
court room. They'll say stuff like that, are you okay
it with leaning into that or saying things like you
had to get your dad to pay for, you know,
a frivolous lawsuit while we're just being good businessman over here,

(57:38):
like are you okay with that? Is your dad is?
Is shotgun? Gonna be okay being brought into this stuff
As it stands now, Aw's currently in a lawsuit with
the twins and who is it Kevin Kelly and they're
fighting in court and they might have to remand it
from federal lawsuit to a local and to not list

(58:01):
all of the owners of the company h and that
some people are like seeing it as the smoking gun.
This means that Warner does have a pristake in AW
and they don't want to show it, or they don't
want to show the holding companies that the that shots
made so that the family can like own it without
legal indemnity. That's fine, but you can't. You can't run

(58:27):
from something like that. You just own it and move on,
or you take the loss. And I think if you could,
if they're still dragging their feet and try and try
and trying to hide ownership there. First thing WW is
gonna do or TTO is going to do is say, okay,
show us how you're being monopolized, show us who is
being harmed and who runs this company to say they're

(58:49):
being harmed. And that's you know, much like their ww's
running from Janelle Grant allegedly. You know, this stuff's getting delayed,
layed laid. AW doesn't want to be in a protracted
lawsuit just to prove WWE is this monster.

Speaker 1 (59:08):
Well, and that's where the best revenge for Tony Khan
is just running a really solid product that just makes money,
draws a good sustainable cable rating, draws attendance that doesn't drop,
but it starts to go up. And can you know,
have a really impressive stadium show once a year and
just do his thing. You know, like if Tony Kin's

(59:29):
going to define himself on is he is his TV
deal as good based on relatively comparable metrics, then w
B he's going to drive himself crazy. But if he's
got fans, we're really happy with the product, and he's
making money, and there's enough money being made that he
can hire the next generation of stars who want to
work for him in not WWA for any number of reasons,

(59:51):
or that W doesn't want that he knows how to
make work. Now, if W starts hoarding talent, you know,
they just hire overpay for aw names and then to
stash him and abuse them. But that hasn't happened. They've
they've gotten, you know, more out of Ethan than Ethan
Page then than Tony Khan did for instance. You know,
Sewn Spears is just Shawn Spears. You know, everybody learns

(01:00:12):
that Russav is Russa frankly you know, like not a
super serious person, but he's a you know, mid card
brawl or whatever. So you know, I don't know. I mean,
to me, the best privent for Tony Con is just
be like, especially publicly, just be like, you know what,
we were making good money and we're putting on wrestling
shows that I'm proud of, and we have a crew
of wrestlers who like who like showing up for work,

(01:00:35):
and we're just doing our thing and fortunately we're profitable
and there's a big media landscape. Just no, just stops no,
sell it, Like, I don't think him getting work. If
he gets worked up and loses his temper publicly, that's
gonna make it all worth it for Nick Con and
paula Vec and that whole crew who are just snickering
at Tony Khan being this quirky guy who's you know,
born into money. And I know that's the attitude in

(01:00:56):
w B. You know, who does this guy think he is.
He's just this silver overspoon privileged, you know, rest hardcore
wrestling fan from you know who's writing letters to personal
Toorge the newsletter that got published and on RSPW and
and all that. And it's like they just look they
look down at him because he's a wrestling fan first
before a businessman, and best thing Tony can do is

(01:01:17):
show he's a wrestling fan, but he's also a good businessman.
And also it's okay to be number two and not
in like the culture of what you describe of Nick Cohn.
Like the best way to counter that is to go
you know what, I'm proud and happy with what I'm doing.
I'm making money. That's all. That's all that matters. I'm
not worried about I'm not worried about whether I got
a bigger deal than you, or you took a few

(01:01:39):
you know, some some viewers away from my pay per
view and whatever. It's like whatever, I'm just having fun,
making money and putting out a product I love and
just you know, just don't don't give them the satisfaction.
That's my That would be my advice internally from Tony
Khan as far as that goes. And you know, but
if he gets all worked up at a press conference,
they're they're gonna snicker and be so happy with themselves
it'll all be worth it.

Speaker 6 (01:02:02):
Searching for more great pro wrestling talk, then join me
Jason Powell host him the three weekly Pro Wrestling Boom podcast.
Each week he'll hear the latest news and analysis for
me and my team at pro wrestling dot Net along
with other pro wrestling media members. Plus, the Pro Wrestling
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(01:02:24):
all your favorite secondary apps, or visit us directly at
PW boom dot com. Once again, that's PW boom dot com.

Speaker 3 (01:02:34):
Yeah, you gotta have almost like Notre Dame has played
like a champion today on the top of their locker room,
like the ceiling on the way out to the field,
comparison is a fief of joy. Just have that the
top of every sheet before he goes out to do
a press conference. Yeah, like, don't worry about it. Do
what he's been doing this year, aw is the best
it's been in years. This year aew is. Don't worry

(01:02:58):
about the other guy, don't worry about they should not exist,
you know, put my coaching hat on play like there's
double zeros on the board, and just go from there.
It doesn't matter. Your fans are going to be there.
You need to build more, bring a good product, continue
to bring a good product, and for the love of God,
let the folks who are typically live wires not be

(01:03:19):
as much live wires when it comes to chat, Like
MJF can cut it on some of the stuff he
says in terms of WWE and AW like that isn't necessary,
it's not helpful to the dialogue. If Jericho does in
fact go back to WWE, accept it, move on and
treat it like you know, when I work for the
State Department, Like when you leave, you have to hand

(01:03:40):
in your badge. They cut it so that they know
that you can't come back. Like you know that whatever
he has in his head from being your confidante is
now in Levec and CON's hands. Act accordingly. If there's
a conversation about something you're concerned with, if there's a
kind of protracted contract that you're working on, whatever the

(01:04:01):
last thing you needed advice from Jericho from, get its
handled because no, just like any you know, we think
about like when when Kirk Cousins is playing the Vikings,
he's gonna know the protections better than any other any
other defensive coordinator in the league. So as a quarterback,
he can tell you, hey, when they do this and this,

(01:04:21):
Kevin O'Connell would be you know it would be Malfeason's
if he was playing a Kirk Cousins team and not
adjust things because he's probably.

Speaker 1 (01:04:31):
Told them some right.

Speaker 3 (01:04:33):
And I think same thing with Tony, like just change up.
You know, there's certain things. You know they're gonna know.
It's fine, not the end of the world. But for me,
let aw rest on its level and don't be I've
said this for years. Lean into not being them. Yeah,
and so one of the things that you can't do.
And people will say it's good business, but I think
it's terrible. Someone like Dan Housen his contracts up and

(01:04:56):
you're tolling it over because of injury.

Speaker 1 (01:04:58):
Don't be like them. Just let him go.

Speaker 3 (01:05:00):
It's Dandhausen. But because he's tied with Punk and he's
cool with Punk, that that's that's his that's that's Tony's thing.
You gotta let the Punk stuff go. I know he
hurts you, but move on, man, it's cool, Like you're better.
The best the best revenge is living well. And you
have hang Man's in such a great spot. Yeah, you

(01:05:22):
have so many wrestlers in so many great spots. Lean
into that. Don't worry about winning the war online or
or you know what the sickos are are are are
trying to puff up and say because that's the other problem,
like the sickos need the chill.

Speaker 1 (01:05:38):
Yeah, it's definitely easier said than done to tell Tony
Khan not to engage in in social media drama and
in telling wrestlers wrestlers at all. So I do have
a concern in being too critical of Tony Khan for
not for for injury hiatuses being how someone runs out
their contract, because we saw in w W that can

(01:05:58):
lead to a lot of people having something that you
can't fully diagnose something, Oh I don't feel ready yet.
You know, they tell the doctor what they need to
tell them in order to say no, they're not cleared yet,
and you just run out your contract and then you
go somewhere like that. I hate it. It sucks because
that happened with the whole Lloyd's of London. You know
policy also on a bunch of wrestlers had back injuries

(01:06:19):
and they set out prime years of their careers making
money on not doing anything. I am I Every situation
can be different, but setting a precedent that you're just
gonna let people sit out with a long term injury
and then not extend their contracts for that amount of
time does come with a counter there is a downside
to that when you set that precedent where unfortunately there's

(01:06:41):
a history of that being abused, and so I don't
know if you do it for one and not for
the other, how that works legally. And so I just
want to I want to buffer a little bit Tony
being the bad guy and he shouldn't be doing it.

Speaker 3 (01:06:53):
Oh No, I don't think he's a bad guy, but
I do think when the asterisk is in the case
of say Dan Housen, he's getting told and he already
knows they're not going to extend him, Like so you're
just gonna so now it's to me, it's it's the
worst of both worlds. Yeah, because yes, you're you're rehabbing, Okay,
you've now healed. I'm not gonna use you. I'm not

(01:07:14):
gonna extend you, and then we're just gonna put you
on ice for this amount of time.

Speaker 1 (01:07:18):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:07:19):
Yeah, I think if it's the case you're talking about, Yeah,
I don't want it to be a situation where these people,
nor do I want him to release every single person
who gets their feelings or and says release me right.

Speaker 1 (01:07:30):
Yeah, And that's the thing why, that's why I specify
each case can be different. But in a broad brushstroke,
there are there's absolute times wrestlers have abused the system,
and there's more times the system has abused wrestlers, And
so just because it tilts one way doesn't mean there
should be one hundred percent brushstroke. We always just default
to believing that the wrestlers are in the right. I
think you have to look at each situation and and

(01:07:52):
the specifics that you just laid out in each case
and not have kind of a broad policy of condemnation
for something that that is different in different circumstances. As
you kind of detailed is going on here. You mentioned
MGFF and social media. What's what's MGFF engaging in social
media with w oh?

Speaker 3 (01:08:08):
I just his general stuff like whenever he brings anything
up like he'll you know, when he was on the
Happy Gilmore tour, Uh, he was on Busted Open and
he talked about what was it. I think he said
that Seth you know, you just talked about how sets

(01:08:28):
of freaking nature. He's gonna go down as one of
the greatest faces in the history of that company the
same way I'm gonna go down to one of the
biggest faces of the history of my company. So when
you think about these promotions, when you think of WWE,
you think Seth. When you think AW, think me. I
find him be extraordinarily talented. I feel horrible about his knee.
It sucks. So this is before the.

Speaker 1 (01:08:47):
It came out.

Speaker 3 (01:08:48):
Yeah, yeah, so that you know it's just we don't
or here's one w here's another one. You mean shows
that are running at the exact same time as us,
even though they claim we're not competition. How do I
feel about it? I think it's smart business practice. I'd
give jolly old Saint Nick and Trips a whole lot
of credit. At the end of the day, if you

(01:09:09):
stomp out your competition, you're only doing what's necessary. Lord
knows I would. Everyone's judging them for it. I think
it's silly. Don't judge them for it, but also don't
be stupid.

Speaker 1 (01:09:18):
So, so do you think that comes across as MGF
go and I get guaranteed money from Tony Kahan, but
now I'm gonna suck up to WWE. Or do you
think he's just giving most opinions, speaking freely, without without fear.

Speaker 3 (01:09:29):
I think, and it goes on to say, yeah, they're
not doing this by happenstance. The difference between me and
everyone else is, even though I know that, I'm not
gonna pretend it's not the truth, they're gonna stand here
and pretend it's not in the creilibat diligent thing to do.
I'd stomp on anyone's neck if it meant I would
get ahead. I've done it a million times. That's just
my thoughts. So, yeah, he's playing as he did before
his contract extension, quote unquote both sides. He's just a

(01:09:56):
Bill Alfonso. Hey, I'm a heel. No, this is this
actually you know what, let me back up. Wait, this
is this is the Brian Pillman calling Eric Bischoff on
the phone. Hey, I'm in character. I'm gonna talk about
how awesome it is because I'm a heel, and that's
what a heel would do. Also wink, I'm gonna give

(01:10:16):
them some credit because that's what a heel would do. Meanwhile,
this is really, Yes, this is a person I'm you know,
he's not under he's not up for contract. Like I'm
not saying this contract's gonna expire. But this is the
equivalent of a player that's saying, Hey, wherever I go,
I'll be happy. I appreciate you know, my time here,
but you know, maybe the future side elsewhere. So he's

(01:10:39):
keeping the door open. He's not trying to burn a
WW bridge before he's even crossed over.

Speaker 1 (01:10:44):
Yeah, you'd like to have him add And I don't
know in the total context if he did bring it
on because I believe in AW, I believe in our talent,
I believe in our roster, and you know, and then
you can, you know, do a little wink nod and
with me on a show. Really no one can compete,
you know, just like as a post to just yeah,
if they put us, if they put AW out of business,
you know, make it sound like Wontelton enough, they'll hire me.

(01:11:06):
W You'll hire me? Like you don't want to come
across like you're not loyal to the brand that you're
on at the moment. You don't have to be a
sick Evan, but you also don't have to just blankly
volunteer that you're in favor of them using the resources
stomp out the company that you work for and the
fans who love that brand.

Speaker 3 (01:11:24):
And it's interesting because the very movie he was promoting,
when ww had the commercial for Happy Gilmore Too, they
asked for MJF not to be in it. Yeah, and
so when you look at that raw episode, he's not
in it, even though he's a prominent character in the movie.

Speaker 1 (01:11:37):
And I understand that, if I'm to be honest.

Speaker 3 (01:11:40):
Yeah, yeah, But I also appreciate on the other side,
whenever they're on broadcast or cable television, AW will have
ads during SmackDown in NXT. Yeah, it's like get the
eyes get or you know, even with Amazon, you have
Amazon coming out with the American Gladiators, Miss is gonna
host and Ward and Camille are on there, and WWE

(01:12:04):
is trying like heck to make sure that none of
the promotional materials have them basically in the same room.
And that's that goes back to that Augustus Gloop analogy.
They want the chocolate, all the chocolate, doesn't matter if
this little crumb over here on the side isn't good enough.
I want that too, And so that's that sort of
a pathology is something that you you just got to

(01:12:26):
shake your head and ignore. Honestly, if I'm Tony.

Speaker 1 (01:12:28):
Kahan, you brought up Chris Jericho, where is his value
to WWE? I I I don't know that there's a
lot that Chris Jericho can share about trade seeker to
AW where like they should hire him just for that,
you know, the Kirk Cousins example of oh, I know
the offensive playbook. I mean, yeah, Jericho worked with Tony Kahan,

(01:12:49):
and he's you know, a political and engaged and smart
enough to have picked up on some things. But I
guess from a from a talent returning to ww B standpoint,
has it been gone long enough? Is he physically from
what we've seen, somebody who can contribute in a wrestling way,
or do you bring him in in a different context

(01:13:09):
to be the you know, the the talk show host
now or would like what what if if Jericha were
to go back to WWE, what value should w placed
on on that?

Speaker 3 (01:13:20):
Well, I think it's a package. So you're getting an
aw main eventor he has enough time and has had
enough time that by the end of the year, if
he is coming back to WWE, he'll get himself aesthetically
into a WWE body again right to speak, yep, exactly
and then he'll also do much like Cody has done

(01:13:44):
the media tour on all the major podcasts and markets,
talking about the difference since he's been there, up there
with Moxley in terms of the longest tenured AW quote
unquote original and so he can talk about, just like
when he was in AW for years and years, how
when he was in WWE he would turn his brain
off and sign those contracts. He'll have something similar on

(01:14:06):
talking Jericho. I'm sure he'll mention that will illustrate how
he learned quote unquote from his experience in AW. And
so that'll be helpful for them in terms of working.
They can always use nostal jacks and always use some
of those storylines they can fit in there in terms
of how that works. And again you can use to

(01:14:33):
their advantage AW storylines that never got brought to fruition
because of injury, suspensions, fights, things of that nature. Him
and Punk could have a good series. Him and Cody
could have another good series and bring out that history
like they've done with some other things in a way
where you are highlighting where they had this beef without

(01:14:55):
acknowledging that place exists.

Speaker 1 (01:15:00):
Yeah, I'd be curious where he would end up from
a wrestling main eventor's standpoint, I think they'd have to
assess his appearance, his physical capability, his mental state, where
his head was at as a fifty five year old
who doesn't have who has ring psychology in a way,
but like you know, he's how how old is AH

(01:15:21):
styles at this point? You know, and they're kind of
on on a you know, he's forty eight.

Speaker 3 (01:15:26):
So yeah, he's.

Speaker 1 (01:15:28):
Seven years older than AG styles and AJ is sort
of in everybody ages differently, you know, Kenny omeghan Well
asked for aging way differently because of their their style
and the choices that they've made that I've been sort
of critical of that you know, felt would catch up
with them. AJ wrestles an aggressive style. Jericho has to to
a degree, but he also has that, you know, the psychology,
the body language, you know, whatever, there's there's a ring

(01:15:52):
psychology that where it isn't he isn't dependent upon looking
like the old Chris Jericho athletically to still get by.
But I don't know if the Jericho we've seen the
last couple of years in a W and R wage
is of and I mean this could this could be
motivating words for him if if people are saying this,
but I don't. I don't know that Jericho has a
ton to offer in the ring anymore. As as a

(01:16:14):
top tier guy, I think would be very much, you know,
like a match with Pat McAfee, you know that kind
of thing, like just an agitator, you know, heel who's
just an older version of Grayson Waller and Ethan Page,
you know, as a nostal jack in w W. That's
kind of where I see him. I don't I don't
even think that's all that controversial, and I don't think it's shameful.
I just the idea of him like being in a

(01:16:36):
top level program because he's Chris Jericho, given what we've
seen the last couple of years, I think feels unlikely
to me.

Speaker 3 (01:16:42):
I would disagree because of the history of what they've
done with the main event. A w rest is coming
to the roster, I think if only for a short time,
he might dally with the main event. And I also
see him as a.

Speaker 1 (01:16:55):
Like a Seth Rollins match as a baby face, like
all take on, He'll Seth and a world title match.

Speaker 3 (01:17:00):
Yes exactly, Okay, Yeah, I think about Edge before he left,
where he would flirt with the main event, jump in
the mid card, jump around upper mid card, created the
judgment day, they turn on him and then he leaves
like something like that.

Speaker 1 (01:17:13):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:17:13):
I also think to your point, this isn't gonna be
the same Jericho we saw when he left or when
he leaves aw if he does leave, because one of
the things I do think we can count on is
hem reinventing himself in some way. That is something he's
taken pride in and has continued to do. And I think,
to be quite frank in aw towards the end here,
he's gotten a little bored, and I think that's a

(01:17:38):
reflection of his placement on the cards.

Speaker 1 (01:17:39):
Well, and I think he's anger at the fans for
rejecting him, for turning on him. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:17:43):
Yeah, And so he'll in a in WWE, he gets
the conquering hero return pop uh. If I'm being frank
his uh political views.

Speaker 1 (01:17:54):
Yeah, he gets yea handshake out yep.

Speaker 3 (01:17:57):
Or or he's in line with the company's upper tier folks.
So he can you know, skidada on that stuff. And
he'll be up there with Kennedy and company and just
asking questions on his podcast with all these folks who
don't ever have anything outside of what he agrees with
on But you know, that's in the topic for another day.
But yeah, I think this would be a perfect fit

(01:18:17):
for him if he were to come back. And then again,
like I said, the media of him talking about how
he's he was kind of like the mentor Papa Bear
to AW and now he's come back to kind of
do his grand finale in the biggest stage of them all.

Speaker 1 (01:18:34):
Anytime you're watching ww E Raw or SmackDown or AW
Dynamite in particular, send us an email if you've got
thoughts on the show or a topic you want us
to address or a question for us. Wade Keller Podcast
at pw toorch dot com. Wadkeller Podcast at petew toorch
dot com. If there's anything else going on in pro
wrestling that you want us to address on our main

(01:18:54):
podcast during our mailbank segments, that same email applies Wade
Keller Podcast at pw torch dot We invite that interaction.
Let us know what you think of what we're saying,
and let us know what you want us to talk
about and ask us specific questions. Wade Keller Podcast at
PW toorch dot com. Let's spend a little bit more

(01:19:15):
time on the TNA possibility of TNA Impact Wrestling moving
from Thursday to Wednesday, an E the CW. There's been
different networks that have been speculated upon and reported upon.
If they go ahead to head with Dynamoon on Wednesday,
not an overlap had to head two hours show and
they're live, what kind of dent does that make an

(01:19:35):
AW and what is that just n XT all over
again where there's enough people to go around? Or are
we in a different place now? Does the distribution method
matter if it's broadcast like the CW or a linear
cable legacy channel like A and E. Is that different
than being on HBO Max streaming along with a major

(01:19:59):
cable network like TBS and TNT. What's the lay of
the land in terms of how it might be different
than what we saw, you know, six plus years ago,
seven years ago with with the initial Wednesday battle.

Speaker 3 (01:20:10):
I think, as I said before, the big thing for
them is messing with aw's numbers, messing with their negotiations
with their new partner on the television side, getting them
to make the least amount of money possible to Edge
out whatever selfish goal. You know, Con and company have

(01:20:35):
to kind of prove this their yard.

Speaker 1 (01:20:37):
But that's a business I but like I'm thinking from
a fan standpoint, what does TNA. Does TNA have enough
to offer where you think they would knock thirty percent
off AW viewership or do they just bring a level
of excitement to Wednesday nights that actually ironically would give
a boost a w Well, how is a how is
TNA it's self positioned, and how is it different? And
then how is that different than NXT.

Speaker 3 (01:20:56):
Initially, I think Tommy Dreamer and his team do a
really good job of creating a pro wrestling product that's
easy to understand, no barriers to entry, no shoulder content
you have to pick up, and you get immersed in
the world. I think that is very helpful and that's
something that allows for healthy competition if they were to

(01:21:17):
come on Wednesday, because I do think right now, if
I had my brothers between the three companies, I like
the women's division and some of the moments in WWE,
the overall wrestling of AW when they don't go too
far and folks are you know, getting career ending injuries
like my guy Jay White. Thoughts in prayers to that

(01:21:39):
dude because he's gonna still be out a while. But
then when it comes to TNA, they have the mixture
of all three. They are like I have not had
you know, every now and again, even they said to
turn their pay per view like this is such a
DNA moment. I was like, don't say that. Most of
the time people said that pejoratively, TNA has solid storylines.
For the most part, they have really good wrestling, and

(01:22:00):
I think there's a mixture between entertainment in terms of
some of the silly and quality character work, and I
think that helps when you look at the system. They're
a different stable than the rascals. When you look at
what's going on with the Hearty's, folks who have followed
their career can understand veterans who feel like they've reached

(01:22:22):
the top of the mountain and maybe they can never
get back up there again. Those sorts of things. On
a Wednesday night, when you have an engaged audience and
they're getting pretty good production and they're having w W
wrestlers maybe pop in that are going to be like
floating folks. I think that's a really good combination for them.
The downside is what is the downstream effects of moving

(01:22:44):
from a tape format where you tape almost a month
of television depending on whether or not there's a paper
few weekend to live. Does that allow you to use
the roster the same way? Because right now they do
a great job of using their entire roster. It's almost
like a baseball lineup where you know the cleanup guy
gonna go after. You know, they have everything set up
so that by the time you're done with a month,
the entire roster's been used basically over that course of

(01:23:07):
that weekend tapings. When you look at some of the
other folks and some of the other things they're doing, it's,
you know, going live. If it's gonna be live every week,
do they have the infrastructure to make sure you maintain
all of those things, Because that's honestly one of the
issues we're talking about with w W and a W.
As they moved more and more live, you lose control

(01:23:28):
because as things happen, you might not have flown in
that wrestler that you want to use for this storyline.
Do you have hometown man? Do you have you know,
I would assume you're gonna grab someone like a Jake
something or a if you have right now the storyline
that's going on right now with Moose and how awesome
he's been doing. Do you have him available? Great, you're

(01:23:51):
gonna have him on every week, But are you gonna
have some of the other cast of characters that That's
the questions I think about when they if they were
to move live and is the juice worth to squeeze
in terms of making those changes making sure more money.
I think that's great for tenn and great for the restlers,
great for the company, but also how much is that

(01:24:12):
gonna push AW to do things differently because they either
listen to us and they ignore it or they cry
foul because WWE has created a proxy company, not created,
but they've used a proxy company to kind of like
stub Aw's toes going into one of the most crucial

(01:24:32):
years of the company's history.

Speaker 1 (01:24:35):
Very good. Let's turn to raw last night in the
vision I mentioned. We talked last night on the Post
Show about the chemistry with Paul Hayman and Seth Rollins,
or the lack thereof. It doesn't. It's not a negative.
It just isn't. It's not new. There's nothing new about Seth.
He just feels like there's there happened to be three
other people following behind him, but it's all about him.

(01:24:56):
He hasn't adjusted, he hasn't enhanced anything about his act,
and Hayman is just sort of doing a generic Hayman
manager gimmick a person. It's not really a gimmick. I mean,
it's a window into kind of who he is, with
you know, some embellishment in caricaturization, but largely it's reflection
we is. But it's not distinctly, it's not distinct from

(01:25:20):
what we saw before. It's sort of a generic version
still trying to find itself. And I was like, well,
let's give it some time. Have we given it enough time?
Do you think I'm overstating the lack of chemistry? Do
you think there's more there than I'm giving a credit for?
Kind of where are you on the state of the vision?
Because and I'll say this because we talked about this
on the Postal lesson, I think it is a means

(01:25:41):
to an ends, and I think that should be baked
in this. This whole thing is not Hey, Hayman and
Seth will be great together. That's not why this faction
was created, and so I think we have to understand
that in our in our evaluation of it, this is
created with the end goal being to give Bronton read
whoeverbody respects a prominent role as the fourth guy, a
forman group, but a good uh, a good place to

(01:26:04):
stand and be relevant. But mostly it's it's the it's
a means to an ends to get Brown Breaker into
a position as a Russulmanium made event, babyface or heel
wherever they're going with it. So I understand they're pushed back.
They go, well, lat chemistry course, soun. We didn't create
this because without there'd be chemistry, or because we wanted
Seth's reinvent himself or Hayman Avenue chapter. This is all
about broad and a path to get there. So I'm

(01:26:25):
loading up my question sort of with a with a
rebuttal already built in, which is, yeah, that's not necessary
for this to ultimately be worth doing. But I will
still say in the meantime, and Brandon Leclaire said, it's
less entertaining than we'd like it to be, And then
it probably could be if Seth changed a little and
Hayman changed a little and they interacted more. What's your

(01:26:45):
take on that at this point?

Speaker 3 (01:26:47):
Yeah, I agree, I think was it Brandon?

Speaker 1 (01:26:51):
Yeah, Brandon Leclair last night?

Speaker 3 (01:26:52):
Yeah, Brandon. I think Brandon had a great point there
because it's they're playing the hits. Okay, he's now the Oracle. Great,
what does that mean? What is the difference between the
wise Man and the Oracle in terms of the Vision
and how this goes? Does he just like all of
a sudden have strokes of genius? Allah the producers, you know,

(01:27:14):
he's just like looks at the sky and he's like, here,
here's my idea. Is that it? Or you know, I
don't see even the uh they try to have the
witty rep our tape between him and Seth, and it
just doesn't seem authentic. Whereas when he buddies up to Braun,
that seems like him and Broc all over again. It

(01:27:35):
just seems like a perfect match. And even Seth's relationship
with Braun, it's it's like each member of the Vision
has a better relationship with each other individually than the
collective unit. Because Seth in inciting Braun's rage by saying
that Jay meant all of these things by saying nothing

(01:27:58):
truly and and then Braun losing his mind's like, oh,
who wha, wha, wha, wha wha, we'll get him in
the ring. We'll get him in the.

Speaker 1 (01:28:04):
Ring, which felt like it sort of belittled his yes
intellect and their gimmick with him is he's not as
dumb as Scott, like, that's his gimmick. He's a smart.

Speaker 3 (01:28:11):
College guy if they need what they needed to do.
And I think that's where sometimes they're skipping a step
or they're missing something with him, and it's surprising they're
doing that, that the buddying up with him and then
Seth belittling him needs to come to a head at
some point. Yeah, I'm sure they're slow playing that and
that's probably why they're doing that. But him being foolish

(01:28:32):
enough to not hear that that man never said anything
remotely like that, and he's like, well, you know when
he looks at you like that, he means your family
doesn't matter. Your uncle's an idiot, your dad was a
terrible wrestler, your mama smelled like elderly, like all these
just horrible things. And it's like, no, man, don't don't

(01:28:53):
fall for this. Like you said, he's supposed to be
the bane, the genius with the uscles as opposed to
just Hulk running around smashing things. And I hope they
can calibrate it. Though I do like the tribal thief.
I'm very a very big fan of Bronson Reid stealing

(01:29:13):
Jordan's and wrapping him around his neck like they're hanging
from a phone pole in bedstide that that is a
very cool especially considering as he interviewed and talked through
the fact he's not going to have full range of
motion in his foot from that spot they talked through
where he dove through the table and broke his foot.
And I think, much like with a w like, was

(01:29:35):
that spot worth you losing full mote usage of your foot?
I guess he might say yes.

Speaker 1 (01:29:44):
I would hope not. But but I mean you sort
of you sort of have to defend the choices you
make or you don't have to. But I think a
lot of a lot of people do. Yeah, So any
anything more you want to say about what they are,
what they're setting up for with a four way match
at Clash in Paris, and and the role of Seth

(01:30:05):
as a heel up against three baby faces, and the
story that they're trying to tell there.

Speaker 3 (01:30:09):
Yeah, I think it's very interesting that it's set up
similar to what's going on with EO and the former
members of Damage Control, where you have Seeing Punk walking
around to the Baby Faces saying, Hey, we got to
make it to clash, and they're like, what do you mean,
we got to make it to clash? We got to
fight each other, And it's it's I get what Seeing
Punk's trying to do within the story in terms of

(01:30:31):
his strategy is the stronger we are as a unit,
the more likely one of us can beat Seth. But
it's coming across as him just kind of being Becky
Bebbie Downer. He's just showing up and like annoying them,
So I don't know where that's going.

Speaker 1 (01:30:49):
Yeah.

Speaker 7 (01:30:49):
Yeah, I'm Kelly Wells, host of p w T Talks
n XT, the longest running NXT podcast Anywhere. Join me
along with Nate Lindberg, Bruce Lee, Hazelwood, and special guests
live every Tuesday night, just minutes after NXT, where we
covered the good, the bad, and the ugly on the

(01:31:12):
way to becoming a star in WWE. Check us out
live on YouTube or stream later wherever you get your podcasts.

Speaker 1 (01:31:27):
Okay, we got an email here for the flag Ship
on Seth Rawlins, so we're near the range of we're
in the realm of talking about him. So let me
read this. This is from s who says hello, I
had this stot in question based on something Wade said
several months ago, maybe even a year or more ago.
Wade was comparing and contrasting Hangman Page and Seth Rawlins.

(01:31:49):
He observed that Seth was the more ambitious of the two,
but that Hangman Page probably had a more balanced to
overall life. For whatever reason, that stuck with me and
the two of them winning the title three weeks apart.
I've been thinking even more about it since Seth grew
up in a fairly nondescript Midwest town and started training
to be a wrestler pretty much immediately after finished high school.
And that's been six years on the and Ees, three
of which is primarily an Roh. Then he got signed

(01:32:09):
by Duba b and after two years in developmental, got
to the main roster. And since he's gotten to the
main roster, he's been featured a futured act essentially the
entire time. Conversely, as we learned during the Mexico Show.
Hangman grew up working on his family farm, and then
in the early years of his wresting career, he also
went to college at a large public university and was
a teacher for a couple of years. Seth has been
wrestling his entire adult life. He's married to a wrestler.
He probably did but during his adult life, I don't

(01:32:30):
know how he would have made any non wrestling friends
until he had a kid, and maybe since then he's
become friends with some of the kids friend's parents. Conversely,
Paige Hangman Page may have a huge bull of friends
who know who know little than nothing about wrestling. Friends
from college, friends from his time teaching, friends he knows
through his wife and who's not un wrestling, and like Seth,
may be friends with some of his kids friends parents.
That's a very long parable to what was the point

(01:32:50):
I want to make, which is I think not only
was Wade right, but that how each of them won
the title is a reflection of ways observation Hangman won
the title. In this year's long story of letting go
of anger, redemption and personal growth, Well, Seth won the
title and a nonsensical ruse of the century maybe this
is a really harsh, but I don't know if Seth
has the range as a wrestling actor in real lifeic
sperence to be able to pull off a Hangman page story.

(01:33:11):
And you have to be so wensconsed in the w
bubble to not just be able to make sense of
the sets story, but to look past the massive logical
to get to a point where you think that it
is a good idea. Do you think there's something to
this thought or is that a series of reaches based
on faulty premises? Thanks reading this, Rich, Yeah, I think
that's interesting. I had kind of forgotten I made that comment,
but it sounds like something I would say, so I'll

(01:33:31):
stand bio and.

Speaker 3 (01:33:35):
It is that.

Speaker 1 (01:33:35):
I mean, it's a very small sample size, it's two people,
but there's something about Seth being a wrestler in search
of an identity as a character that could be the
result of not having a discernible, distinctive, grounded foundation or

(01:33:56):
basis to build upon. Hangman has that in the This
email is framed and it's based on facts. It's not
the entirety of who Seth is or the entirety who
Hangmen is. But when you do look at their resume
and their life journeys. I think it's kind of interesting
because something to be said for maybe the range and
the connection that Hangmen has has established and forged, sometimes
purposefully and sometimes it's happened accidentally and against the storyline

(01:34:20):
with fans, there's a connection there and his delivery and
his vulnerability. I use the term emotionally accessible to say
that's why Roman Reigns wasn't connecting with fans. He wasn't
emotionally accessible. There was this wall that he had up
between him and the fans where he's just going through
the motions. Seth is this caricature, cartoonish, over the top,
flamboyant guy, and I don't know if fans feel they

(01:34:42):
have real moments with him or that there's a lot
more to dig into when it comes to who he
is based on what they see publicly. So, yeah, what
are your thoughts on that comparison of the two current
you know, two of the current top champs right now?

Speaker 3 (01:34:55):
Well, I mean that is a wonderful juxta busies too.
I will say one thing I would push back on
is because of the way Seth was trained and grew
up the fact that in his off time in addition
to hanging out with his wife and his daughter and
the friends, and he also runs a wrestling school, Black
and Brave, where he's hands in the dirt, not just

(01:35:19):
I'm the name on the the sign and I don't
show up, but he's in there training with them and
getting them right when he's not And because of the
fact they don't do as many house shows, he's able
to have training sessions Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Thursdays, and then they
do weekends for like going in independence and learning how
to work and learning how to market and get yourself

(01:35:41):
on the entry level up. So I think he is
a little more complicated then.

Speaker 1 (01:35:46):
That's a lot of resident though that almost you can
that backs his point, but I think it complicates him.

Speaker 3 (01:35:54):
So it isn't just me wrestler m good, but it
also is to his point. To ask his point he
leaves he lives breeds wrestling and Chicago Bears and how
much they torture him. So yeah, I definitely see Hangman.
And that's why when you look at Chicago's represent I

(01:36:16):
mean that would be a really cool like interest because
you look at him and Punk and you would think
Punk would identify more with Hangman. We clearly know that's
not the case. But those are two guys from Chicago
who have this wrestling bug and they're obsessed, but they

(01:36:36):
also have lives outside of it. Punk more so than
Ed Rollins pers his point. And then you see this
guy in Virginia who comes from sharecroppers and did tobacco farms,
and I think Page is a lot more grounded. I mean,
we saw that during the pandemic. During the pandemic, he
was the person, you know, just leaning into things and

(01:36:57):
saying it's okay to not be okay, and talking about
how he was dealing in the anxieties he had. Whereas
the ww wrestlers set in front of the line, we're
trying to be as business as usual because that's what
management said to do.

Speaker 1 (01:37:16):
Let's jump to another email here from Todd, who says,
I've listened to you talk about the DQ main event
finishes for a while. Full disclosure, I have to wake
up for Rick at four am, so staying up for
Ron it's entirety is tough for me to begin with. However,
the last two weeks after the opening show, promo over
the main event was set. I knew I did not
need to stay up to watch. I knew it was
going to happen in both instances. There was going to
be loads of interference in six to seven guys when

(01:37:36):
end up in the ring, and that's what happened. Surprisingly,
they actually had a finish last night, but only because
they had booked themselves into that corner. There was interference
in the tag match, the skybroadrigas match in the main event.
I stayed up to watch the Nailmi bit, which well,
which well well done, talk Twister. Had that been the
opening bit, maybe they could have explained later in the
show what they're doing about that title. Anyway, when Raw
first appeared on Netflix, I was excited. It was fun

(01:37:58):
to watch. It's quickly become the same old old week
in and week out. That didn't take long. Yeah. So
it was another theme of w B and Paul Beck's
booking this year as it I think our tone has
has become more skeptical that he's well, I know, skepticals
or just more negative about the choices he's making as booker.

(01:38:18):
Last night was three matches with similar sequences of I
think it was heels beating up baby faces after a
match and a baby Face coming out to make the
safe very much dropping that formulation. But in the main
event they had with the extreme rules, which made sense
that Philadelphia, you're guaranteed to finish, but it didn't really
mean a lot. They gave Jay a win, but it
was only because Roman reigned spared Braun And so you know,

(01:38:40):
how much does that really count for j It's better
than nothing, you know, it's a positive, but it wasn't
exactly like JB Braun and a no rules match one
on one by out no rules in him. He just
pinned a guy who got speared by Roman. It was
all within the rules, but it it to me, I

(01:39:01):
you know, I feel like Todd r here, who the
email is giving a little a little credit to w
for doing a finish, but like, of course there's gonna
be one because anything goes. So you can't do a DQ,
you can't do a cunt out, you can't throw the
match out. Where are you now on the on the finishes?
And did you notice that pattern with Raw last night
where it's like, wow, are they even comparing notes on

(01:39:21):
on one segment to the next.

Speaker 3 (01:39:24):
I think, man, it's annoying, especially when you know every
promotion like we just got out of it with AW
with the uh uh Death Riders. I just watched the
G one final where House the Torture's doing it and
then W's do it, So it's it's just it's it's

(01:39:46):
too much, and with WWE it's not only too much,
but then you add in we're supposed to invest our
time and energy and suspension of disbelief that this match
will come to a dramatic conclusion and instead we're treated

(01:40:07):
to bs compounds.

Speaker 1 (01:40:08):
Mm hmm. Yeah. You can imagine somebody who doesn't want
to stay up late going I I you know, I
think wrestling bookers often underestimate how much fans Ai don't
want to know who's going to win when the bell
rings ahead of time, and two want there to be
a winner with an outcome where it seems like somebody
actually deservedly beats somebody else, you know, they earned it,

(01:40:32):
or there's some heel heat for how they got the
pin that won't be brushed off by the announcers. It's
just resourcefulness and and and savvy, but rather shame for
winning it away with such with such disrespect to the
sport and a disregard for for actually being proud of
how you go about it, and those are just fundamentals
that you have to have. And I don't I don't

(01:40:53):
see le bec injecting that into the structure, the structure
of the booking outcomes, or how the outcomes are framed
afterwards by ANNs or other wrestlers. And that's and I
think it. I think they pay price for that.

Speaker 3 (01:41:05):
Yeah, and I know we talked about Borash, and we
talked about like how things are over the top and
this will never happen because that's not how Levec's brain works.
For some reason, they need to I need my today
in my life. I need I need someone And if

(01:41:26):
it's not Mike today, someone might today is chasing someone
that enjoys pro wrestling and isn't looking to actively be
a mau malcontent or be a misanthrope while on the mic,
because the WWE has gleaned into far too long the
banter era of announcing, and that takes away a lot

(01:41:49):
of what I enjoyed as a kid. Good wrestling matches
so great, Yeah, Gorilla Monsoon and Bobby the Brain. Okay,
but I also got when I was a teenager, Mike
Tay explaining it like nothing gave me more joy than
Mike Tay explaining the history of the Viano family.

Speaker 1 (01:42:08):
Well, and before that, Gordon solely was wrestling fans version
of a straight sports announcer who took it seriously. And
Lance Russell struck the tone just right. And Jim Ross
Mid South era, of course, yes, the attitude era, guy
who cared about the wrestling. And I think wrestling promoters

(01:42:29):
and bookers underestimate how valuable having a nerdy sports like
rule adhering baseline establishing straight man play by play announcer
is to the formula for it to work. That's where
that's where I do not that, that's where I pushed

(01:42:49):
back as strongly as I do against like Michael Cole
becoming a character. Yeah, it's fun, it's cute, it's honorable
people people are yucking it up with with Michael Gole.
That's our Michael Cole. And I know I hey, as
I enjoyed mean Gene Oakland team and with Hulk Hogan
against Mister Fuji and George the Animal Steel. But Gene
was outside of that, and part of it was and

(01:43:11):
I wrote this in my end notes commentary on Hulk
cokein a couple weeks ago on the Personal Torch, Jusleutter.
The reason the Gene Hogan thing made sense is Hulk
Cokin treated me and Jane. The Hul Cogan character treated
me and Jene with respect. He was the cool kid
who treated the frumpy, balding nerdy guy for lack of

(01:43:32):
better term, decently when everyone else wouldn't. All the heels
were mean, and that was part of establishing Hogan's character,
so that that worked. And Gene wasn't the play by
play guy. But I'm as an aside, I'm saying there
isn't place for that, but it shouldn't be the main
play by play guy. That's what was so like offensive
about Michael golbing a heel commentator for eighty percent of

(01:43:53):
the show, but then going hey, folks that you should
support w B and by the w network. In the
next segment, it's like, why should I listen to you?
You're a jerk, So that that there's a value in
having that that baseline, and I thought, I think Joe
Tesitor still is even if he's the top and chilly,
you know, and there's a.

Speaker 3 (01:44:13):
There.

Speaker 1 (01:44:13):
I think he's being encouraged to be over the top
by the same people who are ruining Adam Pierce by
having him yell and and lose his his top. Like,
the thing about Adam Pierce is that he was a
volcano who was bubbling but didn't explode. And now they said, hey,
want to be better if he explodes and he and
er erupts, and it's like, no, it was better when
it was all kept up inside. People relate to that.

(01:44:34):
But now that he's yelling and screaming at the top
as ung as anybody can yell and scream, that's that's
not that's not middle management.

Speaker 3 (01:44:40):
The whole of being middle management is you eat it
and they have to take it.

Speaker 1 (01:44:44):
It's like a complete lack of fundamental understanding what made
his character work. And when you have somebody who can
get over without yelling, let's take advantage of that. And
that's that's my issue with MGF, you know, thinking he
has to hit level eleven of yelling in his promo.
You know, out of four promos he gets into the
overmodulating the microphone thing. He's like, he's so good, he's
so talented, he doesn't need to do that. Leave that

(01:45:06):
to the average talkers who need to yell in order
to get people's attention. M Jeff doesn't need to do that.
He's more Jake or Roberts in that respect. And so anyway,
sidebar Joe Tessitur winding back to that tone it down
a little, but he's the guy who gets the notion
that you should be, that you are there to the

(01:45:28):
integrity of the sport that you're calling is important to you.
And I think wrestling promoters and wrestling bookers and wrestlers
sort of snicker at fans who feel that way about Oh,
I have Bride and prog wrestling. They see it as
a business or they see it as wait to get over,
But there is I think a big part of the
fan base that gets pulled into feeling like this is
important enough to stand for something, and we should stand

(01:45:50):
for when we get immersed in this world that we're
finding out who the best wrestler is. And there have
to be rules and there has to be condemnation of
breaking the rules for that whole system to work. I'm
not saying don't there should be people breaking the rules,
but there should be a foundational standard voice that is
condemning it when those rules are broken. That makes the
breaking of rules feel like a bigger deal than if

(01:46:14):
well there's it's like the whole that's It's one of
the reasons besides the lack of logic is the triple
thread in Fatal four Way not having any rules. It's
like you're sanctioning something that should be appalling to the
sanctioners that anything goes, you can interfere, you can use weapons,
like there should be a governing body at the top
of the wrestling promotion the way W and AW promote.

(01:46:35):
Who would find it abhorrent that we're settling who the
best wrestler is in a situation where there aren't guidelines
and rules. So yeah, thanks for downloading today's show. Take
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(01:46:57):
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(01:47:18):
bonus content and the ad free listening experience. Pwtorch dot
com slash go vip aren't email from JB from Detroit.
I don't really think that's saying Tommy Dreamer should be dead.
Is we're saying on a globally televised program. Regardless of
what Paul Hayman and Tommy Dreamer's pasting current relationship is.

(01:47:39):
It just isn't necessary and honestly isn't going to resonate
with ninety percent of your audience. Much like what Wade
says about Don Callison, aw it's about saying something shocking,
get a reaction from your buddies in the back, with
no real storyline payout in mind. I cringed at that
because there's so many wrestlers from MECW who are dead
and it's sad. It's a sad part of this, this

(01:48:03):
roster of of misfit toys that Paul Hayman instilled confidence
in and found a niche to amplify and gave them
a place. And you've got New Jack Johnny grunge, Flyboy,
rock O Rock, John Cronus, Ball's Mahoney, on and on,
like Mike Awesome, like these people who sacrificed their bodies,

(01:48:26):
their brains in terms of concussions and then had a
moment in their lives where they felt like they were
part of something. And then Paul Hayman had the parachute
landing and WWE while everyone else just crash landed into
oblivion because they didn't really be into society and Hayman
gave them something very special, but they didn't. A lot
of them didn't didn't react well when there wasn't a

(01:48:47):
place to go afterwards. They didn't have that land that
the soft landing, and so with the totality of that context,
I just and I'm not sure it ran through their head.
I don't think there was anything malicious about about that change.
I think it was just meant to be kind of
a funny line of you know, a little dig of Tommy,
maybe in a playful way, maybe not. But I didn't

(01:49:08):
like it because I just think he should tell you
such a track record of tragedy. I just think that's
sort of off limits for me to feel like we
can yuck it up over Tommy Dreamer somehow is live
after going through what so many other wrestlers didn't survive.

Speaker 3 (01:49:22):
Well, I disagree with the idea that Tommy Dreamer is alive. No, no, no, no, okay, okay,
I've seen him. I know he's alive. I've seen him.
But I disagree with the premise that in Philadelphia, in
that crowd, he's not known. If this is like that,
that's not my prom But that was the email, and

(01:49:44):
that was the beginning of the treatise. And then but
to your point, this hit a very This hit a
nerve with me in a way I didn't see coming
because of I, again, as always on everything you tell me,
assume no, no, I assume most people don't know the significance
of Tommy Dreamer, Paul Hayman, WrestleMania, and Jim Ross. I

(01:50:07):
don't even know. If I assume you know, Wade, I'm
sure you do. But Tommy Dreamer was in a very
dark place after E CW went down, and he did
an interview where he said he contemplated because WrestleMania was
in Houston the one year, or it was somewhere near
like it would it probably would even have been Dallas
the WrestleMania I went to where he contemplated bringing a

(01:50:27):
gun and hoping the rail and killing Paul Hayman in
himself because he felt like he got betrayed and he
was in a dark dark.

Speaker 1 (01:50:36):
And is a context of that. I think we talked
about this on the fixed mailback last week, if I
call right, somebody brought that up specifically, and I always
wondered if Tommy was saying I was so distraught. I
had this fantasy in my head, but of course I
wasn't gonna act on It. Wasn't like I was considering it,
but in my mind I imagined the release that I
would feel of or or was it No. I was

(01:50:56):
like kind of thinking, here's the steps I need to take.
Let me plan for it. But I stopped short of it,
and I don't what do you know the context?

Speaker 3 (01:51:02):
I have direct quotes from his interview. So at WrestleMania,
I was going to hop the rail and whack Paulie
in the back of the head, right on the announced table.
Then I was gonna whack myself, the ultimate martyr. I
was gonna hit my pose, crack boom, pull the trigger
because I was that insane. That's what I was thinking
about every day. I was like, I will go down
in history. Pop boom. He was so depressed and so

(01:51:24):
filled with rage. Uh. And he's thought that they wouldn't
think it was anything but an angle until he actually
shot him. Jim Ross actually called him and helped get
him the help he needed.

Speaker 1 (01:51:36):
Yeah. So so the that then, that says it wasn't
something Tommy fantasized about as a coping mechanism. You're saying
that the quotes, the context of that quotes, and then
what's known about Jim Ross indicates No, he was in
a dark place and he wasn't as far away from
actually executing that as we would all hope. Yes.

Speaker 3 (01:51:58):
Yeah, And and Paul Hayman fashion the guy who in
every cartoon, you know, he steps out of the way
and then someone else gets hit with the girder. He
can make a joke like he did about Dreamer and
not deal with any of the shrapnel from the people
whose lives he messed up by not paying them and

(01:52:19):
putting them in that position where like you said, they
were his soldiers, and the folks that were true believers
like Dreamer and I got just like any so you
come back home from a war and the people don't
appreciate the way you think they should.

Speaker 1 (01:52:34):
And I don't think Cayman had money to spend to
pay people. It's all like he was. You know, people say, oh,
you know there's wrestling promoters who hoarded their money and
kept too big of a share and did distributed to
the wrestler. There just wasn't money for him. And it's
just my issue is he had this this this soft
landing so to speak, with WWE, which was based on
networking and hit the recognition of his talent and what

(01:52:57):
he had to contribute and all that, but the issue
she was I think a greater I don't disregard is
too strong of a word, but he didn't take into
account how much his locker room speeches, which I witnessed
in ECW. I mean, I've been there for that, how
much that defined the self worth of some of the

(01:53:19):
wrestlers who sacrificed so much for him and saw it
as a cause. I think Tommy Dreamer was in that mindset,
and I know others were. So when it went under
and the way Hayman handled that crushed people. And Tommy
Dremer is a manifestation of that, but he wasn't alone.
And I think Paul underestimated the effect that his ability

(01:53:40):
to be a cult leader for this cult company, this
counterculture movement that was ECW. I don't think he gave
those speeches disingenuously to manipulate people into doing more than
he thought they should for the for the cause, but
I think he underestimated that when he did everything he

(01:54:00):
could to make that cause survive and he ran out
of the last lifeline, what it meant for him, what
it meant to people for him to be on television
with a soft landing moving on to the next chapter
when so many other people couldn't and they had nowhere
else to go. And I think that's the manifestation with
Tommy was saying, and why those thoughts went through his head.

Speaker 3 (01:54:24):
Yeah, And one of the things he mentioned was that
he had his own money, his parents' money in ECW
at the time it went down, and he turned down
deals where he could have gone the WWE or WCW,
and Paul's crying saying, hey, you got to stay with
me if you leave ECW, collepsed. Meanwhile, Paul's getting checks

(01:54:45):
from WWE, yep, So that that's where I with that stuff. Yeah,
I really bristle because I think that sucks. I think,
and I'm glad he's now in a great place mentally.
I'm glad he's you know, around and hasn't did you know,
didn't commit that act. He's around with his wife and
his kids, and he can do the creative at TNA.

(01:55:06):
To me, that is a very interesting like how how
do they interact now? I'm sure Tommy is like in
a better place, but Paul's like in many ways emotionally
and morally bankrupt in ways I don't is he's so
brazen with it that you don't forget that that's not
just the character it was.

Speaker 1 (01:55:24):
It was jarring that that felt like territory to go to.
And again, I I don't maybe I'm not even thinking.
It wasn't meant to be malicious or oh.

Speaker 3 (01:55:34):
No, it was meant to be a joke, but it's
Paul's version of a joke.

Speaker 1 (01:55:37):
But yeah, but it felt oblivious to or or you know,
disregarding the fact that, like there's a lot of dead
wrestlers who are part of that era, and I don't
think we should joke about it. Just to yuck it
up about you to have give Ron Breaker a funny linable.
Isn't he dead? You know? Or you know, like that
kind of thing. So yeah, yeah, all right. A couple
other things from JB here. I'm very much looking forward
to EO and Oscar and a tonnel match on the Rise,

(01:55:58):
and always thought that Oscar makes a better face and
Neil's obviously the quintessential face. We talked a lot about
the women's division at the top of the show. Rich
your thoughts on that.

Speaker 3 (01:56:07):
Yeah, I'm sorry, could you repeat that last part?

Speaker 1 (01:56:12):
Just EO is a better face and Oscar's a better
hell yes, and so how do you feel about that
being on the horizon?

Speaker 3 (01:56:17):
Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. And the two
of them together, I think that would just be wrestling magic.
Kyrie as the stressed out friend that doesn't know who
to side with also can lead to a little bit
of drama. But those are two of the best women
wrestlers in the world, two of the best wrestlers in
the world. Let me remove a qualifier of quote unquote
just being a woman like those are two of the

(01:56:38):
best wrestlers in the world. You get them together, it's
gonna be magic an Oscar post injury has been at
least in third gear, and I didn't think that was
gonna be possible with her knee being out as long
as she has and EO since she left for stardom
and her effort to kind of prove she still got it.
She has been on another level as a wrestler and
a character in WW as well. So I look forward

(01:57:00):
this immensely.

Speaker 1 (01:57:01):
I would like them to be producers and levec to
imagine if they had Judgment Day every time they were
backstage yelling at the top of their lungs and screeching
at each other, and how not entertaining it would be
compared to what we get out of the Judgment Day
with the nuanced personalities and the body language and the pauses.
I like to see a little bit more of that
with with THEO and Oskar and Kyrie, a little less
shrieking and yelling over each other. I feel like that's

(01:57:26):
I don't know, I mean, I know, you know, it's
not just a female thing, and it's not just a
quote foreigner thing, because.

Speaker 3 (01:57:32):
Yeah, some of their like natural language, and so that's
where like the argusaul like if you watch like a
lot of stardom or any of the Japanese wrestling like
that's them arguing, is like the voices being raised. Naturally,
it's not just let's do the foreigner. But I see
what you're saying. I think it would be helpful if
it was a little bit more measured and when they
kind of dole it out, just like you were saying
before with Peers.

Speaker 1 (01:57:53):
Yeah, it's just it's it's just too much. It just
escalates into oh my god, look at these crazy, hitysterical
women yelling at each other over each other. And I
think more can be accomplished if they apply more nuanced
to these personalities, because I think Oscar has Oscar and
Neo I think are very different, as JB points out,
in their demeanor and their kind of baseline personality, and

(01:58:14):
I'd like to see that explored, not just having them
yell over each other. JB says, a New Day mourning gimmick,
m you are an I G has way ill lifted
any simples of interest. I have the crowds agree, judging
by the reactions they're getting. Rich, how do you feel
about New Day? He'll turn they become essentially, you know,

(01:58:34):
just kind of mid card comedy figures. Are they rising
above that or are they settling into that? How do
you feel about or do you like it?

Speaker 3 (01:58:43):
I think I'm in the middle on it. I get
what they're trying to do. It's different than what they
had done. The humor and the ridiculousness of Exavivieer's hats
getting bigger and bigger every week is something that's very meme,
but like as a heel, like do you want that
or do you want to kind of go to that
next level? I do like Grayson Waller being the New

(01:59:09):
Day intern as they deal with Penta, and I guess
this is where they're at, and this is this is
the price you pay when you let brock Lesseners destroy
kofe Mania. This was like the small domino that leads
to this big domino falling of them being a mid
card act, because they in many ways that match that

(01:59:30):
what you would call a match, really cut off what
had been a brilliant run and an experiment to get
Kofee in that main event scene, and he got his
legs cut out from under him in a way that say,
you would never see jay Uzzo in that same position.
And so I'm nonplused by some of the stuff they're

(01:59:52):
doing on television now, but I also understand the position
and why they're there.

Speaker 1 (02:00:00):
JVLSA says, I think Becky doing her current tearing down
comedy routine heel is actually counterproductive to the stories being told.
She's treading dangerously close to cool lady heel, which is
going to inevitably make people want to cheer her, which
will in turn make it harder for opposing faces to
get over. Becky as a heel is all is a

(02:00:21):
polarizing It's polarizing like that she can be. And I
talk about this. I think of the week Helo Hotline
that night that like, had she just stayed babyfacing, been
the the centerpiece of the company and been cool Becky
and had a constitutionter character and just straight lined, people

(02:00:41):
can imagine her as a heel, it could have worked.
But I think she would have been a little more
bored by it. But when she goes heel and she
gets really creative and seems smart and witty, it can
do what you say, It can cut against getting her
booed and thus not serving her baby face opponents. So
that's that's kind of where JB is where are you

(02:01:03):
on this?

Speaker 3 (02:01:04):
Yeah, even when she had the comment about saying, yeah,
I laughed, but again, you don't want to you don't
want her to get you to laugh. How irresponsible it
was that Naomi got pregnant. She wasn't unfocused like she
should have been focused on being a champ, where Becky
had the same thing happened to her. And so that

(02:01:25):
sort of thing is where I'm like, Okay, I get it,
you're trying to be ironic, but it's more ha ha
instead of hey, you're a liar and you're being dishonest.

Speaker 1 (02:01:33):
She yeah, and she says preposterous things and then goes
on to rationalize I'm kind of in a dream McIntire,
you know, the spirit of Drew McIntyre, And you gotta
be you gotta be careful. You got to make sure
that the goal in the end isn't just to be
entertaining and clever, but that you don't lose sight of
what you want the crowd, what we want the emotions
to be of the audience when you're done, and if

(02:01:55):
it's oh, that was funny, that was enjoyable, that was entertaining,
that is not the ultimate goal of having a minute
or two or three of TV time, and I think
wrestler's loose sight of that. You're part of a larger
fabric of a story that is supposed to lead to
wrestler's getting cheered and wrestler's getting booed, and your job,
as heell, is to make sure that by the time

(02:02:17):
you're done talking, the fans want to see you get
beat up and lose, not cheer for you and buy
your merchandise. And yeah, I think Becky tries to do that,
But I also think she can't help herself because she
is really talented and charismatic and clever and smart, and
so that in portraying her character, I think the side

(02:02:39):
effect can sometimes undercut the ultimate goal, and I don't
think she's consistently found that balance.

Speaker 3 (02:02:48):
Yeah, I's going to take time.

Speaker 1 (02:02:50):
Yeah yeah.

Speaker 8 (02:02:55):
Are you a nostalgic wrestling fan. Do you want to
hear about shows you haven't seen ten, twenty, maybe even
thirty years. Well, I have the show for you. I'm
pwtortch dot Com contributor Frank petty Ani, and since December
of twenty twenty, I've hosted Pro Wrestling Then and Now
together with a rotating chair of co hosts. We go
back and review old shows from top to bottom, talk

(02:03:16):
about where the wrestlers were at the time and compare
what's taking place now to what took place.

Speaker 3 (02:03:21):
Then you can.

Speaker 8 (02:03:22):
Hear this so along with other shows as part of
your PW Toortch VIP membership with exclusive podcasts just for
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com slash go vip for details and sign up form.

Speaker 1 (02:03:41):
Uh okaybut a coach but Bailey, But we covered that
and deb I'll just read what he said. Though Bailey's
characters not basically a schizophrenic, a cheaper version of the
Randy ort and I hear voices in my head gimmick.
The videos are hokey, honestly, not even that well done.
She's one of wrestler I'd like to see venture outside
of wt ecosystem. I'd be curious to see how she
would do reinventing herself in a place like AW. Well,
that's a little different what we said. How do you

(02:04:02):
think Payley Wood would fit in an aw which she
rides to the top. Would you be a really good
veteran hand or would she not fit in and seem
like an interloper, veteran who's stopping other who's leap brogged
other people who in there, you know, who are aw originals.

Speaker 3 (02:04:18):
I think at this point it would be her coming in.
You have a veteran with the amount of talent she has.
She'd be trying to prove a point. You have, much
like Adam Copeland and Jay or Slash Christian the opportunity
to rekindle the tag team with Mercedes, and you'd also
have her trying to prove she can go outside of WWE.

(02:04:40):
I think that would be fun for her, But I
also think she is really comfortable in the WWE ecosystem
because she gets to be Miss San Jose. She gets
to do fun stuff and she gets the push and
be the veteran on the roster without having to deal
with stuff. Now, of course she could be you know.
I saw a recent interview with Mercedes where she meant
in the locker rooms night and day and AWWWE, but

(02:05:03):
then she also noted that, you know, I'm in there
sometimes because I have my own locker room. I was like, ah,
that part, That part I think Bailey could use. Honestly,
I think she I agree with JB's email she could
use leaving the ecosystem and seeing she's worth more than
they sometimes see her. But in order to do so,
you might go into an environment where you might outshine

(02:05:27):
some of the folks that are developmental because you are
so far ahead.

Speaker 1 (02:05:32):
And finally, JB says, well, Jimmy and Naomi host a
gender reveal party on wrong there is precedent pro wrestling.

Speaker 3 (02:05:39):
I think not. I think She's gonna go off and
try to, you know, take care of this baby and
pig jim is gonna be And that's the that's the
inherent and verit, you know, the the kind of deal
when you're a male wrestler versus a female wrestler. She
has to go and like take care of this baby
and jim gets to go be big him on TV

(02:06:00):
every week.

Speaker 1 (02:06:02):
I know, I know, what is the social media presence
of Jimmy and Trinity Naomi? Like how much are we
going to hear from them during the pregnancy is kind
of my because I don't know the context of how
much they're online.

Speaker 3 (02:06:16):
Jimmy, I don't know because like back in the day,
much like the Young Bucks, the usso's had one account
for both of them and then I got off of Twitter,
so I don't quite know. Now Naomi has fully leaned
into her social media is a way to broadcast her character.
And so when we had, you know, firings or things

(02:06:38):
like that, like for instance, when Ron Killings was fired,
she complained about whomever was she was feuding with at
the time not getting fired instead of him if they
really wanted to get rid of dead weight, like she
was going there with her character on social media. It
wasn't like as much as I love Drew who has

(02:07:00):
his like jokes like board at work loll. But then
the next tweet is or Instagram post is him setting
up a dramatic reenactment of coming home to his cat
after visiting a cat cafe and the cat not wanting
to talk to him because it's all betrayed.

Speaker 1 (02:07:18):
All right, thanks to emailer. So let's close with a
couple topics here that you had noted you wanted to
bring up. One oh, actually three because I didn't get
to this one. I don't know how bad this is,
but you talked about local fans versus international fans as
it relates to the Triple A Made event, the G
one finals and also what's coming up with Forbidden Door
and also Worlds collde.

Speaker 3 (02:07:40):
Yeah. So looking at what happened over this past weekend,
I'll try not to spoil because some people might still
be watching. But in the main event of the Triple
A show, you had Elvi Kingo with the local Triple
A fans being booed because anytime he wrestled Alberto L Patron,
El Patron pulled a kokin versus the Rock in Toronto

(02:08:03):
on him, and the fans saw Alberto as the true
champion and the Kingo as this kind of like tiny
dude who happened to beat him. And so now when
you see the matches and you see folks cheering for
dom and oh Grande Americano, you understand why it isn't
just ol wwe guy here they're good. It's also we

(02:08:26):
don't believe in you. And so sometimes ethnocentrically we try
to project what we see as a non native fans
into it to say, oh, well, they clearly don't understand
the situation. It's like, well, in Mexico, El Patron's over.
They don't care about the drugs, they don't care about
alleged drugs, they don't care about all the other allegations
against them. They just see him as a good wrestler

(02:08:50):
when you go to Japan. As much as I thought Kenoski,
Takeushta should be seen even though he's an next DDT
guy is a COAE W New Japan wrestlercause he has
contracts with both companies. In the main event, Evil the
leader of House of Torture whose run ins are so

(02:09:10):
frustrating all wrestlering fans of New Japan just cringe when
they hear it was cheered because they saw Evil as
the New Japan guy and Takeshta is the aw guy
who's just coming to visit. And I think there needs
to be whether it's in our coverage here in the

(02:09:31):
US of some of these things or just writ large
as fans that aren't in those countries and understanding of
what's going on there and not trying to project what
we want to be going on. As much as I
like to Qushta and Evil in that main event, there
was a faction of fans that were New Japan fans
that wanted one of the young lions that have earned
the right to move into a main event seem to

(02:09:52):
be there. And it isn't just well we brought our
guys in and so you deal with it, ha ha.
And so that just made me think about Forbidden Door,
where a lot of the like there is. There's nothing
forbidden anymore, Wade. There's there's no animus between Kenny Omega
and the President of New Japan. That president's gone. There's

(02:10:14):
no animus between CMLL and stardom. They tried that last
year and the announcer got suspended because he leaned too
much in the game kids gimmick of saying Tony Kainz
of Mark and all this other stuff he was saying.
And now when you look at the card, out of
the nine matches, seven of them are ae W AEW matches.
So where's the door And that's where you know you

(02:10:38):
have a Zach Saber Junior IWGP champion. And we've heard
this before, and so that's why I'm bringing this up
because this happened last Forbidden Door. He's taken on Nigel
McGinnis and they're in the UK, so that makes sense. However,
like I just said, we just had a g one.
We just had a month and a half long round

(02:10:59):
robin tournament that concluded with a single elimination tournament. To
determine the person who would be the contender for the
IWGP title at Wressell Kingdom, or the date they so choose,
which was now the established rule that Saber did last year,
or you could be on a collision four way and
get a title match exactly. Yeah, like that that can't

(02:11:20):
That to me is very and New Japan is in
such a week in state that they can allow that.
Last year, this time they weren't as weak, and the
wrestlers were complaining about it, like how are these folks
not even wrestling on our tours getting title shots? And
so that that's you know, that's where we got to
kind of be careful because I think a lot of
times when we think about the things we like versus

(02:11:42):
what is actually in existence in those companies, it's taking
away from the experience of the actual fans that are there.

Speaker 1 (02:11:50):
Yeah, all right, you mentioned Cody and Street Fighter.

Speaker 3 (02:11:56):
Yeah, there's going to be this week an announcement on
social media of his first image is Guile in the
Street Fighter movie. And if there's anyone that deserves to
be Guile from the Street Fighter video game, it's Cody.
After that American Nightmare tattoo, which I'm sure each and
every day as he gets more and more of these
roles he gets having.

Speaker 1 (02:12:14):
And weapons. What did it clean about?

Speaker 3 (02:12:18):
Yeah, so Weapons is a movie that came out stars
several A list actors, but it was directed and produced
by Zach Kraiger and it was bought out, much like
Warner is is doing Yeoman's work in terms of the
last few months, finding horror movies that are first run

(02:12:40):
original content that they're bidding for and they're doing well with.
And this in terms of pro wrestling, what it taught
me was sometimes it's better to go simple and get
creative in the simplicity of what you're doing. Because the storyline,
I'm not going to ruin it for anyone going to
see the movie is simple, but they make it complicated

(02:13:02):
because you see it through the lens of people who
are like, there's multiple protagonists in the movie. And so
that's when we talk about what we missed in terms
of issues in WWE or issues in aw or Nujaman.
There are gonna be plot holes, Like the director of
this movie is like, I can name four or five
plot holes in this movie, but you don't care because

(02:13:23):
I've tied it together where there's enough that you can
forgive me because everything else makes sense. And I think
that's the thing with progressing. It's not all going to
make sense, but it could work a lot harder to
make the little things make sense. They could believe a
medium thing, and if you make the medium things make sense,
you could forgive a big thing not making sense all

(02:13:43):
the way.

Speaker 9 (02:13:44):
Hello John Cena, our Rich, Thank you, fun conversation all
over the place we covered one might say everything yes,
and if you have any comments or any follow ups,
please Everything with Rich at gmail dot com. Myself of
my buddy Josh Fastachio do a mail bag I'd been
on well the last few weeks, so we're going to

(02:14:04):
get back to it probably by the end of the month,
but you could always replenish that.

Speaker 3 (02:14:07):
Everything with Rich at gmail dot com.

Speaker 1 (02:14:10):
Thank you Verlody for joining us PW Torch dot com
slash go VIP. If you're not a VIP members, you
can hear Rich and me discuss these topics in this
manner every week on the VIP podcast. Feed Weakekeller podcast
at gmail dot com is the email for feedback on
raw Dynavan and s backdown. Send it in as they're
airing if you want to be part of the show,
and you can also use that email to send questions

(02:14:32):
for the flagship when we record usually on Tuesday, so
you can send those emails anytime about any topic and
it might make the show all right. Thanks again, Rich
and thanks everybody.

Speaker 3 (02:14:41):
We'll talk you next time.

Speaker 1 (02:15:00):
Invite you to email the show with feedback or questions
or comments. That email address is Wadekeller Podcast at ptwtorch
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Speaker 6 (02:15:22):
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Speaker 5 (02:16:17):
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a classic bout that they were in attendance for We
love variety and you can expect lots of it at
the pro Rest Paradise. Detailed pw Torch VIPs of debscription

(02:17:00):
information on a list of all the VIP benefits is
available at pw Torch vipinfo dot com. And yes, all
VIP podcasts are compatible with popular podcast apps on iPhone
and Android devices, or you can stream them directly from
our ad free VIP mobile site, See you in the Paradise.

Speaker 1 (02:17:20):
One way that you can help us sustain our schedule
of putting out podcasts throughout the week is by giving
us a five star rating on Apple Podcasts. Just go
to Apple Podcasts and look for our Weightkeller Pressing Podcast
and Weightkeller Processing Post show and give us a five
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Speaker 10 (02:17:57):
In twenty twelve, NXT trends positioned into the developmental system
and ultimately the brand you see today. On the Torch
VIP podcast NXT Eight Years Back, we'll be taking a
weekly look at this page in NXT's early history.

Speaker 4 (02:18:13):
Join Kelly Wells and me Tom Stout from PWT Talks
NXT every Saturday as we go eight years back to
the day to track NXT's rising talents and why they
did or didn't work out, exclusively for PW Torch VIP members.

Speaker 1 (02:18:27):
PW Torch VIP membership doesn't just give you ad free
access to these shows and a ton of other VIP
exclusive podcasts throughout the week, but you also gain access
to our unmatched vast library of wrestling history, our contemporaneous
week to week coverage through our progressing Torch Weekly newsletters
dating back to the late nineteen eighties, along with streaming
and download access to hundreds of retro radio shows from
the nineteen nineties, including some of my interviews with wrestling's

(02:18:50):
top newsmakers in the nineties, and also our podcast library
dating back to the year two thousand and three. There's
no larger, longer spanning pro wrestling podcast library than that
comes with a PW Torch VIP membership. Now we're approaching
twenty years of podcasting. Go VIP and dive into our
post pay per view roundtables are covered with some of
your favorite eras of wrestling, top name long form interviews,

(02:19:13):
and special format podcasts that we've done throughout the years.
Pw torch dot com slash go VIP. We have a
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In one or two minutes from right now, you can
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