NEW FLAGSHIP: Keller & Fann talk ESPN-WWE, Netflix-WBD-AEW, Vaquer, Mickie James HOF, Cody-Seth, Lesnar, 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):
All right, Rich, we're hearing that there are options for
wbd's purchaser. That go beyond what we were thinking was
the case. Last week, Netflix in the game. Netflix has
a deal with WWE. Netflix might buy WBD. There are reports,

(01:41):
I think fight full among them, saying that AW does
have freedom to shop around and look at other distributors.
You know, last resort would be the home of AW
Dark YouTube if they had to bridge a gap.

Speaker 3 (01:54):
We've seen TNA over the years have.

Speaker 1 (01:57):
Having to bridge gaps between TV partners over at different times,
media landscape changing do By has a partnerships with a
lot of different places. It seems like that would likely
preclude bringing AW into the fold, although it.

Speaker 3 (02:10):
Wouldn't necessarily have to be the case.

Speaker 1 (02:14):
Tell me what you think is the top takeaway concern
or perhaps bright side of Netflix now being in the
game to buy Warner brother Discovery. Certainly that bring an
incredible library of content and merge two of the biggest
streaming apps.

Speaker 4 (02:29):
Yeah, it makes sense.

Speaker 5 (02:30):
We talked about it a few months ago, actually almost
maybe a year ago, when the idea of some of
the Warner Brothers streaming services and all the fun stuff
of aw's new contract came out. AW under Warner Brothers
good deal, Warner Brothers under Warner Brothers not so good.

(02:53):
What I mean by that is a lot of the
money Warner Brothers Discovery made, outside of say your Barbies
or your Superman's or things like that, was renting out
their library of shows like Sex and the City, all
their premier content that you would see on HBO to Netflix.
And so for Netflix, this is a very easy decision

(03:17):
to make, especially since they've been so venture capitalists with
the money they pump into movies that might not necessarily
do as well for them. They just want the large
s and they want the idea of we have Oscar
nominated movies or we have Emmy nominated television shows on Netflix.
Just cut the middleman out by Warner and you have HBO,
you have T and T, you have TBS, CNN, you

(03:38):
have all of these accessible items that can then be
added into your conglomeration of streaming and also aw if
you know.

Speaker 4 (03:49):
That doesn't run into any deals they made with WWE.

Speaker 3 (03:56):
Yeah, I mean it. Part of me is just in
the realm of this.

Speaker 1 (04:00):
There's so many moving parts right now, there's so many
big players talking. I don't want to spend a ton
of time. I almost spend a little time, but not
a ton of time getting too deep into would this
be good or bad, because I think there's just so
many variations.

Speaker 3 (04:11):
In terms of whether it could be good or bad.

Speaker 1 (04:13):
Right now, it's good in the sense that AW has
a home there the exclusive Prossing property. It is a
brand name with proissing history, and if it stayed independent
and on its own, it seems like you could be
a home for AW four a while that would pay
them a sustainable amount of rights fees. Anything beyond that
could be better. But it also, I mean stating the obvious,

(04:34):
could be worse, and it could be really bad. But
there's so many possibilities and we're not far enough down
the road where I think you look and you go, well,
one seems much more likely than the other. So I'm
just not quite sure how much analysis to give it.
But I think it's worth flagging at the top of
the show that the changing media landscape with cable and

(04:55):
streaming and everything we're seeing with that would be with
ESPN and having with so many different places, AW has
options out there, you know, Amazon Prime, whatever, you know,
like there's other places that they could shop. But I
don't know if the current lay of the land. I

(05:16):
think is good for aw and change comes with risk,
and I think more downside than upside. Do you agree
with that framing?

Speaker 5 (05:24):
Rich? Yeah, And I also would say, as just everyone
taking a step back five hundred fort view, all of
this is great for Warner Brothers Discovery because the stock's
going up with the idea, just the mere idea. Nothing's
been confirmed that there are multiple suitors for the company,
and that makes as Love and Company very happy. And
so to have that stuff this leak out right now.
From a residence standpoint, sure, it's great to talk about.

(05:46):
From a business and television standpoint, this helps them build
a brand and kind of keep the lights on a
little longer with what they need in terms of money,
because as much as they've knocked down the debt, the
debt's there.

Speaker 1 (06:01):
Yeah, all right, looking at the debut on ESPN, we'll
kind of stay in the media landscape realm. Here, give
me a big picture perspective on how and we'll talk
about the details rescilues of the specifics of these show
for fans. But from a dynamic between ESPN and WWE,
who gained who didn't, who looked good, who overdid it?

(06:24):
In terms of ESPN putting w B on their shows
in WWE, building up the brand of ESPN and the personalities.

Speaker 5 (06:31):
Well, I talked about this last week when I was
on Pro Wrestling Boom with Jason. I think the it
was a good job for ww to try to sanitize
itself as you deal with the lawsuits, as you deal
with the bad publicity, dealing with Hey, we're having wrestlemanting
in Saudi Arabia.

Speaker 4 (06:51):
Oops.

Speaker 5 (06:52):
And so I thought looking at it, they had, you know,
the big friends of Nick Con come in Stephen Smith's
first takes, everyone talking about their favorite wrestlers. But then
when you get to the actual wrestle palooza, there's no
real wrestling and ESPN presence. There were some Indiana Pacers,

(07:15):
there were some colts things like that.

Speaker 4 (07:17):
You know obviously Pat McAfee.

Speaker 5 (07:19):
But that was it, and only quin Uniclete pat McAfee
because he is one of the biggest stars at ESPN.
But I figured if McAfee would be there, and that
is where you have to think about the politics of ESPN.
Stephen A. Smith and McAfee do not get along, and
so I did not expect stephen A. Smith to be

(07:41):
doing anything wwe related in terms of there at the
show if McAfee's there, because if steven A is going
to be there, he wants to be the star.

Speaker 4 (07:49):
And mcafe's already proven himself in this circle.

Speaker 3 (07:52):
What's the backstory there? By the way, there was just.

Speaker 5 (07:56):
A couple of things show wise where steven A and
McAfee just they've been kind of like, I'm gonna give
you a direct quote because I like this, because it's
one of those dammon.

Speaker 4 (08:10):
With faint praise. Let's see.

Speaker 5 (08:16):
So it started with stephen A. Smith being conciliatory and
also petty to congratulate a Lebron James interview that McAfee
got okay, And so here's what he says. Congratulations to
Pat McAfee. First of all, anybody who would have gotten
that interview. I take no issue with the job that

(08:37):
Pat McAfee did have Lebron James on his show. Anybody
would have done that. The questions that he asked was
more than appropriate. Outstanding job by him and his team,
no doubt about that.

Speaker 3 (08:48):
So loaded compliments, loaded.

Speaker 5 (08:52):
Compliments, And this interview happened after stephen A. Smith and
Lebron James got into an altercation during la Overtime went
over the Knicks. While Smith had been critical of Brownie James,
and James said something to him in between a play
and steven A spend the entire week saying I wish

(09:15):
I would have just punched him and shown them where
I came from, or something like that, where it was
one of those things where it's the guy who goes
to the wrestling show and the wrestler, you know, does
the heel stick and he's like, well, you know, he's
just like at and hopping that ring and break his arm.

Speaker 4 (09:29):
M Only steven A.

Speaker 5 (09:31):
Smith has millions of listeners, and so they had an
upcoming project and so McAfee was supposed to have Tuesday
appearances on First Take.

Speaker 4 (09:43):
Stephen A.

Speaker 5 (09:43):
Smith banned him from the show. They resolved it allegedly,
and you know they have the all everything's amicable, but
they don't show up on each other's shows.

Speaker 3 (09:54):
Yeah, yeah, all right.

Speaker 1 (09:58):
What do you expect to see going from here on
with WWE a ESPN in terms of.

Speaker 3 (10:07):
Is Dobe Be going to stay.

Speaker 1 (10:08):
As enamored but with with the ESPN brand and promoting
the history and the validation that they see it or
giving them, or do you think we kind of got that,
we got that they got out of their system, and
now they're going to act like, you know, they belong
together and it's not like, you know, this huge deal.

Speaker 3 (10:24):
Just let it speak for itself.

Speaker 1 (10:25):
And from ESPN standpoint, any do you have any sense
of Okay, this is the big beginning, but they're going
to bring it way down. There's going to be opposing
forces going enough is enough? Or do you think there'll
be more? Because they just were kind of happy with
everything and how it went.

Speaker 4 (10:40):
I think it's going to be somewhere in between right
now there, you know. And this leads to.

Speaker 5 (10:47):
Kind of from a media standpoint, there's been a bit
of a bruhaha online that has always got tribal because
when someone there's a wrestled uh to Loza grade Andreas had,
who I know, he's done MMA, he's ESPN's.

Speaker 4 (11:04):
One of their lead reporters.

Speaker 5 (11:07):
And so he grated the show and Andreas gave Russell
Palooza a C and he said the excellent Vicaire and
sky Matt saved this show from being truly average. It
was a phenomenal display inside the square circle. Everything else
was either underwhelming, the short roads McIntire match, or it
set up for a future match Lesner dominating Sena for
a cart that promised to have epic moments. It fell

(11:28):
short of expectations. I think that's a fair evaluation of
the show. This turned into man If ae W would
have gotten this from Bleacher Report as a review, people
would have said, aw's in the mud. It's like, well,
and that's where the nuance of this comes in. Andreas

(11:49):
isn't someone I would personally say, knowing him, would just
write an article because WWE told him to an ESPN
made him do it. The fact that he has that
job is because he's a pretty straightforward guy and he
as a journalist in sports.

Speaker 4 (12:03):
He doesn't es ye.

Speaker 3 (12:05):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (12:06):
On the other hand, what you're asking is for the
folks who are like, bang at this and saying, wow,
you know.

Speaker 4 (12:13):
Their partner didn't even cover up for him. I thought
we wanted this.

Speaker 5 (12:16):
I want if ESPN is covering a WW match and
it sucks to say a Matt sucked, not to just
cover up and pretend like it was great just because
it was, you know, their partner. I think about the
Chiefs and the Giants on Sunday. That was a terrible
game unless you were a fan of one of those teams.

(12:38):
Mike Turrico by the end of it, almost hated his
existence as he's calling the game.

Speaker 4 (12:44):
That's fine.

Speaker 5 (12:46):
If you're going to pretend like just because you know
a team was in the super Bowl last year, they're
having good games of the year after, that's not really accurate.
Like they're the Chiefs are kind of in a bad
spot right now and they're trying to figure themselves out.
It's okay to say that, same thing with WWE. This
was an okay show. It doesn't need that. You don't
need to kind of blow up the grade or put
it on a curve just because you're you're you're friendly

(13:08):
and same thing I would hope and Bleacher Report back
when they you know, Doc Miller and Phil Lindsay and
some of the other folks that covered it there. I
would never want them to be seen as kind of
gotten to in order to make sure something was good.
And so from I'm going to use a sports analogy
that makes a lot of sense for this.

Speaker 4 (13:29):
I need WWE to act like they've been there before exactly.
This isn't their first touchdown.

Speaker 5 (13:34):
You have right now made more money as a professional
wrestling company than any company in the history of the world.
It is fine for you to be happy that you
made yet another deal, which what it shouldn't be fine
is for Shapiro to brag about how you're gouging people
and how you're just going to keep doing it.

Speaker 4 (13:53):
What shouldn't be fine is finding ways to.

Speaker 5 (13:59):
Ingratiate yourself with a foreign entity that has no limits
to the things that'll do in the name of legitimizing itself.

Speaker 4 (14:09):
And what you.

Speaker 5 (14:10):
Should feel bad about is tying everything you've done into
a look at what my wife did at the end
of this show, like they did with Stephanie's quote unquote
surprise Hall of Fame announcement.

Speaker 6 (14:24):
Mm hmm.

Speaker 5 (14:25):
Like that stuff you should be worried about, not Oh yay,
we're on ESPN and everyone respects us. Now, that's kind
of a little silly to me.

Speaker 3 (14:35):
Yeah, yep, agreed.

Speaker 1 (14:37):
All right, Well, let's pause and introduce ourselves and then
get onto some other topics. I want to go into
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Pro Wrestling Podcast, our Tuesday Flagship edition for September twenty third,

(15:20):
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(15:43):
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Speaker 4 (16:44):
Thanks great Brian here, looking forward to chatting some more
about wrestling and lord knows what else.

Speaker 3 (16:49):
Yes, we do have an email.

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You can always email the show Weadkeller Podcast at gmail
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Speaker 4 (16:55):
Just want to.

Speaker 1 (16:56):
Throw that out there. Wad Keller Podcast at gmail dot com.
You can send questions for the flag Ship, feedback topics
after Wrought Dynamite and SmackDown and whatever. Use use email
to say nice things about if you enjoy the show
and send in suggestions or whatever. Art Rich, So Wrestle Bluesy.
You talked about how ESPN and House gave it an

(17:16):
average grade. I don't disagree with that. I also think
it's fine to have average shows. I think Drew and
Cody was a straightforward match on a show that was
running a little long due to a lot of filler
and commercials.

Speaker 3 (17:34):
But it was straightforward. You know, Cody got a.

Speaker 1 (17:36):
Clean win and there wasn't a big angle, and it
to me, you want to condition your audience to think
a world title defense with your top central babyface the
last few years, full time guy Cody Wroates defending its
former champ who's taken down Lessner and is a big
star and has been doing great work in the Ringing
on the microphone, Drew macintar felt like a big match.

Speaker 3 (17:57):
It was a good main event. Cody won.

Speaker 1 (18:00):
That's how most shows should end, like this idea that
there has to be a viral moment or a controversy,
you know, just sit back and enjoy it, just like
sometimes a football game, usually hockey, basketball, baseball, whatever you
see there's a fight, it's for a prize and you
get to see it happen, and in the end there's
a winner and a loser, and then we get to
look forward to them reacting to winning and losing. That
should be the expectation. And I thought it was a

(18:22):
good match. You know, every move they did counted. It
wasn't super dazzling, but that would be doesn't sell themselves
on that being a requirement. So I thought it was
a fine main event. I think it was match of
the year, but I thought it was a good main event. However,
I'll give that compliment out because I think that's one
of the things people like, oh that just not have
happened there overall, five matches over three plus hours with

(18:44):
a lot of commercials, when a lot of people antied
up thirty dollars or spent a lot of time trying
to figure out how to get the damn app or.

Speaker 3 (18:49):
We're confused about how to watch it or authorize it.

Speaker 1 (18:53):
There's part of me that things they should have done
something a little I don't want I'm qualifying my words.
I think that would be should have done something to
make the show a little more special than that really
good women's match. The mixtag was what people were most
looking forward to. Certainly brought lesser against John Cen On
paper feels like a big deal, and that got the
majority of the hype. The tag match just sort of

(19:14):
felt like Eah. But I think having something else special
or something else more exciting would have felt like a
better use of people's three plus hours than what they delivered.
And I think because it was overall average, it was fine.
It was a fine show, But to sit through that

(19:35):
many promotional videos and plugs and commercial breaks and filler,
I think that's part of why people left feeling a
little empty, like this is the start of at ESPN
and it just feels like a stretched out, dragged out
peacock off brand plee.

Speaker 3 (19:49):
At the end of the day, how did you feel?

Speaker 4 (19:52):
Well?

Speaker 5 (19:52):
Okay, before I tell you how I feel, I want
to give you someone else's opinion that kind of falls
into yours. But then he makes a hard left and
goes on only where he could go, and that's Booker T.
Booker T on his podcast talked about actually the grading
system and he didn't like the fact it was given
a C. And he said, exactly what you just said.

(20:13):
There were five matches on the show. Not one was bad.
Tour Stellar Women's match was the Crown Jewel. That's very ironic,
saying that Cody and Drew had a hell of a
time and the mixtag might have been the best of
it's kind of scene. So how to give the show
like that a sea It's a crazy, crazy take.

Speaker 4 (20:27):
But then he.

Speaker 5 (20:28):
Jumps down and he says, when I look at professional wrestling,
I look at the whole story, it's not easy to
knock it out of the park.

Speaker 4 (20:34):
Every time.

Speaker 5 (20:35):
We have to layer and build stories to reach the
bigger picture. We don't even know whether scene of Brock's
Lessner story might go. So when people rest to judgment,
Johnny Cochran might say, I always say sit back, watch
and wait because the best is yet to come. This
show was a transition show to the best coming like that.
What he's talking about is what the show did. So
it's okay that it's a C.

Speaker 4 (20:56):
For him. However, letter grades, it's like star ratings.

Speaker 5 (21:03):
It's frustrating to him because he says, I don't know
when wrestling became about letter grades. We went from star
ratings to A A plus maybe an A plus plus. For me,
it was simply darn good match releading to whatever comes next.
Could it have been better?

Speaker 4 (21:15):
Sure? Could have been worse. Absolutely? Was it a classic fight?
I think so that's a C. Could have been better, yeah,
could it have been worse?

Speaker 1 (21:24):
I don't understand, like C means average, an average show
that people said was fine. It was fine, not super
excited about it. But I don't have a lot of
complaints either, you know, a little complaint here something that
I you know, I liked it, but their aspects that
I wish were better. I mean that's gonna happen. I
think the key is is with all the with all
the hight for ESPN, wwe gave. I mean, if I'm ESPN,

(21:46):
I'm thinking, like the corporate I'm like, can you give
us something more special than this? But WWU see it
with their TV shows. They do the same thing. They're like,
what what can we give this paying audience that they
can look at and and kind of latch onto and
say this is I was there when and I got
to see this, and so is it the Is it

(22:09):
a brock Lesner appearance? Is it a John Cena appearance?
Is it a Cody Rhodes appearance? Is it a cmpunk
promo that really stands out? Is it someone wrestling who
doesn't wrestle very often? They try to give you one
or two things in every show, but they don't give
you everything, and that can ultimately hurt you. I think
it's hurt aw that they had so many top stars
for six plus years.

Speaker 3 (22:26):
People would pay to go to.

Speaker 1 (22:27):
A Dynamite and you didn't know what you were going
to get, you know, and then you know a lot
of guys were part time, the Bucks off and on, Kenny.

Speaker 3 (22:33):
Off and on.

Speaker 1 (22:34):
Even the regulars who were there most weeks weren't always
there and you didn't always know. With WWE and pl
e's or even we're on Smackdonne do w's brand is
you're not going to see everybody every time, and that's
we're not going to load up every show with every star.
So to me, WWE fan should know that is what
they're getting into when they buy a ticket or when

(22:56):
they watch a pl e. However, the ESPN debut felt
special only because they spent so much time telling you
how special it was. But in the end, it wasn't,
you know, like it was. It was just it was
a fine show. You got to see brock Lessner Russell
for the first time in a while. But it wasn't
a classic. It was just a beatdown with a short
little comeback and then another beatdown. It was more of
an angle than a match. I'm fine with that almost

(23:18):
anytime other than the premiere on ESPN, and you would
just think, we're gonna make people when we're done with this,
We're gonna show them that this is special and not
basically tell them. For a lot of people, you're paying
thirty instead of ten roughly, but you're getting a peacock
off brand show. And so it sounds like Bookert went
through the same thing, you know what I mean. It's like,

(23:40):
how dare you say it's average? But it's okay to
be average, And it was, and that's really what it was.
I just don't think for the premiere on ESPN they
should have settled for that. I think they needed one
more match, especially if they were going to do what
they did with Sena and Brock, which is just kind
of a beatdown in an angle. And if I mean,
I think they thought the women's match is you know,
going to be like a classic in a lot of

(24:00):
ways than it was. But even Cody Drew like it
didn't feel epic. It should have it with the right
build up, but Cody had an off TV. It was
kind of it felt a little rushed, and I don't know,
yeah as O, I don't know. I think it's I
think it's clear. I think most people would think, yeah,
average show, and then if you expected more, are going
to be disappointed. You might even be angry if you
just kind of know what that would be delivers and

(24:20):
the ESPN thing didn't phase you, then you're like, Okay,
it's fine. It's not a musty show, but there's some
good stuff on it. The issue too, it's just a
are the commercials going to get to people?

Speaker 4 (24:30):
You know?

Speaker 1 (24:31):
Is that gonna because I mean PL's are basically just
a weekend TV show now, you know, I mean like
it used to be pay per view, meant oh no,
commercials just sit down and be immersed in it, which
is what aw does, and you know, pl is a
different takes on a different connotation now and they're trying
to double dip. You know, they want you to pay
for it, but they also want to get a bunch
of sponsorship money. And Barrios and Wilson back in the

(24:54):
day would talk about that though, like we're not we're
not making any promises. We might add advertising during the
w to be network days, and certainly that's the way
they're monetizing. But man, they're reaching in every pocket you have,
and every bank account you have, and in your mad
money jar and the drawer where you hide the envelope
with an extra cash if you need to make it
a quick escape. Like they are going everywhere, and we're

(25:15):
seeing it now with fan signs. It's sort of a trend.
I mentioned this in my raw report. Almost every out
of the event has somebody holding up a sign talking
about I can't afford college because I came here, or
you know, like I've worked overtime for a year to
be able to afford this, or my kid can't have
a Curstoness gifts.

Speaker 3 (25:33):
Because I'm here.

Speaker 1 (25:33):
Like people are like talking about how it's breaking the bank.
And that's a point of sort of fun ironic I
don't find right, sure, but fun pride for a while.
But you better make sure you're over delivering, not just
sort of arrogant Arrogan's too strong a word, but kind
of feeling like you're self satisfied. People love us who
will give them just enough but nothing extra, and for

(25:54):
the prices they're paying that can ultimately backfire rich or
wear people out.

Speaker 4 (25:59):
Yeah, and that's where I felt.

Speaker 5 (26:01):
I for me personally, as I put in the round
table reviewing, as I said on the roundtable audio, I
thought it was an okay show.

Speaker 4 (26:09):
I thought.

Speaker 5 (26:09):
I think I gave it like a seventy five out
of one hundred and seventy seven and a half. And
for me, I liked the women's match a little bit
more than you did. And I really liked the mixed tag.
I do agree with Booker t that was the and
I said that during the roundtable that was the most
logical man on woman wrestling violence WWE's done since China,

(26:30):
And that was really cool that aj Lee was the
person that got to be the person that brought that
into the kind of the zeitgeist.

Speaker 3 (26:38):
Which mens, which mench do you say liked more than me?

Speaker 5 (26:40):
I just missed that the AJ Lee got CM Punk
mixed tag with Seth and Becky.

Speaker 4 (26:46):
I think that was.

Speaker 5 (26:47):
Oh I'm sorry, I said I like the women's title
match more than you did.

Speaker 3 (26:50):
Oh oh, I liked it a lot though, So.

Speaker 5 (26:52):
Okay, there you go again. We're picking it. It's like
one of those things, the mixed tag.

Speaker 1 (26:57):
My my issue with it is it got a little
too cute with like double t he moves and when
I it got even when I say too cute, it
got quite cute. It's in the eye that beholder for
it got too cute, but it would just sort of
broke down into let's see something you know, little offbeat
and choreographed that'll get that'll pop the crowd. But it

(27:17):
in the end you've got you know, Punk and aj
skipping around, and you got Becky and Seth kind of
doing more slapsticky stuff than something that feels serious. It
didn't feel like it had gravity. It felt like it
was just a crowd pleasing WWE Styles show that had
a lot of fun spots in it, and I enjoyed
the match, but in the end, as like it didn't

(27:38):
feel serious, you know, it just felt like playful a
playful grudge being played out in really creative ways. And
I wasn't quite sure that was a wrong tone, but
it wasn't for me the best tone. Given that, I
think that the after effect, which is is punk as
serious wrestler is aj Lee here to skip around and

(27:58):
kind of make faces, and andre is Becky going to
keep doing this bit, which I enjoy. It's entertaining, but
it doesn't feel like top tier centerpiece threat to a
world title. And then Seth kind of is all over
the place as a character. Although this is he's doing
less dancing, but he's also playing off of Becky now
in a way that again kind of feels a little
little slapsticky versus vicious. But I think that's why design,

(28:23):
and I think it works for some people. It just
I kind of wave a little yellow caution flag. It
felt maybe a little self indulgent. Maybe it's the word
I'm looking forward to.

Speaker 5 (28:30):
Yeah, And I think given the four of them, self
indulgent would be a very fair word to use because
they I mean that that as much as Sean Michaels
is verboten to see him punk from back in the
days in avowed Brett Hart guy that Sharpshooter spot is
like as much a hug around Brett Hart's neck as

(28:52):
some of the Triple h and se Michael spots were
later by both aj Lee.

Speaker 4 (28:58):
And Becky and Seth.

Speaker 5 (28:59):
So it's it's I think, yes, I would actually, you know,
use the phrase, uh, now I won't because.

Speaker 4 (29:07):
This is the flagship, so I will be.

Speaker 5 (29:09):
But there's typically a phrase I would use with Zach
Saber Junior when he takes things too far, and I
think this would fall into that where it's just self
self congratulation.

Speaker 4 (29:18):
I'll say in.

Speaker 1 (29:18):
That there a guy and I know, and I didn't
know where you're going, and now I do. Yep, absolutely yep.
And And the thing is, I mean, like that match,
if we look at that, the crowd ate it up,
so it but but it also the self indulgent aspect.
I also think it could have just trimmed like four
minutes off of it, added four minutes to scene to

(29:38):
Cody and Drew, you know, just trade four, five, six minutes,
so that the world title felt a little more epic,
and that take match felt a little less self indulgent
and a little less stretched out. I think I would
have liked the show overall better if those if they
just traded roughly five four five six minutes between those
two matches.

Speaker 4 (29:55):
Yeah, that's fair.

Speaker 7 (29:58):
Me an extra dose of positivity in your wrestling podcasts.
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(30:19):
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Speaker 1 (31:05):
Talk about the women's match a little bit more and
what is this a historically significant match? I don't know
if passing of the torch is the reason, but certainly
you know it isn't just the care winning It is
the way they framed her coming out at the beginning
of the match during commentary. Afterwards, she gets a solo
promo on Raw No Angle, just a chance for her
to be in the spotlight, introduce herself to an audience

(31:27):
a little bit more who hadn't seen a lot of her,
and the announcers just saying she is the future. This
felt like a crowning moment where do By is signaling
and flagging to everybody she is special and settle in
and get used to it because she's going to be around.

Speaker 5 (31:41):
It's funny because as always in my life, there's always
these weird intersections, and so late late tonight before I
go to bed, I gotta do a podcast with the
Sam Kennison of a pro wrestling wh park who's guest
hosted like I think two times here over at the Torch.
Of times it was like, wait, he's not way and

(32:02):
he's not wearing a nice smoking jacket and you know,
blowing bubbles.

Speaker 4 (32:06):
He's just setting fire to the whole torch tower here.

Speaker 5 (32:09):
But we're going to talk about Toshiaki Kuwata and Kennikobashi
from January nineteen, nineteen ninety five. That was a Kuwata's
first title defense of the Triple Crown, and it's very
much similar to this because you have.

Speaker 4 (32:23):
A woman who is being positive as the new hero
in the promotion.

Speaker 5 (32:27):
She's the new champion and in order to beat Eo,
it wasn't as I thought it would be Oscar being
a jerk and a bad friend. Instead, she just beats
her legit. And what I loved about the match was
the usage of the knee pads of Eo taking them
off and going to hit her moves like shatted wizards

(32:48):
and moon salts, all this stuff with the knee and
it seems so silly, right, like, oh my god, she
took her knee pads off. But that's something that's very
much in the zeitgeist of particularly Japanese for wrestling, in
terms of you're taking off the protection. Now I'm hitting
you with a real lariat, or I'm gonna hit you
with a real shining wizard and she was basically hoisted
by her own petard by landing on those knees had

(33:11):
already been injured. And then Stephanie not doing a roll
up where it's like I'm just gonna absorb this and
take the win. She locked her down almost like a
shoot pen, to make sure like I'm winning this. And
so from beginning to end, Stephanie was set up as
a woman who wanted to out wrestle one of the
best wrestlers in the world, and she did it for

(33:32):
this one night.

Speaker 4 (33:33):
That Monday night.

Speaker 5 (33:34):
Raw Promo cemented it because, like you said so many times,
particularly where folks aren't native English speakers, we would have
the champion's first speech interrupted by an English speaking jerk
to not give that person an opportunity to slip up
on whatever pre arranged speech they had been given in
the back. I feel like Stephanie is that next person

(33:56):
up there with Rhea EO and obviously when healthy.

Speaker 4 (34:03):
The eest.

Speaker 5 (34:04):
I think Bianca, those four are going to be the
future of the sport. I mean, the fact that Bianca
was there for the Saudi Arabia press conference tells you
all they need to know in terms of where they
value her and how much they value her and her
husband in terms of being faces to crowds that might
not necessarily be as receptive to the folks they want
to throw up there.

Speaker 1 (34:26):
Where does the care fit in in the big scheme
of things with the other assets that they have, both
the legacy stars, the Bailey's and Becky's, but also and Charlotte,
And then you've got the other new, you know, shiny
slightly less new toys in Tiffany and Jade and Julia

(34:47):
for that matter. And then you also have the NXT
crop that is ready, and then kind of the next generation,
the next way that will replace them. There's a very
deep women's division right now in a lot of different categories.
Where is she ultimately going to fit in? Is she
going to displace someone who's maybe near the end of
her career or gonna want to have more of a

(35:07):
part time schedule. Is she going to leap frog Tiffany
and Jade? Is she vulnerable because of promo her communication
style that somebody from nx's going to step up and
kind of steal her thunder talk about the big picture
in where she fits in with all of those factors
at play.

Speaker 4 (35:23):
Okay, So.

Speaker 5 (35:26):
As it stands now, I would say it's as I mentioned,
the women at the top from a wrestling standpoint, faces
the WWE rear Ripley, Bianca bell Air.

Speaker 1 (35:41):
Obviously I should have said Riya. I didn't mean to
leave rouductions. Yeah, she obviously is.

Speaker 3 (35:46):
A big exclusion that I should have brought up.

Speaker 5 (35:48):
Yeah, she's like her own like when they're doing those
ESPN lists and you leave off you know, Randy Moss
or a Jordan or something like that, like you just
assume they have their own wing. So that I was
just so those three. Then you have the legacies. You
have Charlotte, then you have a little stare down, you
have Bailey, and then kind of Natalia and then kind

(36:12):
of X, where X could be any returning woman that
they're going to use for that paper view period, like
it's a Trish or it's a Bella. And then when
you start talking about this newer generation that's come in,
I would say she's above both Jade and Julia. She's
I think also Tiffy in terms of Roxanmperez. Yes of her,

(36:40):
and then big gap rest of the NXT roster that's
on its way up. The reason I think that she
is so far because Julie. I really thought this would
have been Julia, if I'm quite honestly, when they were
all signed that Julia was gonna be the Oscar of
this class or this generation of women wrestlers through NXT.

(37:02):
She is one of the most charismatic women I've seen
wressel for stardom. Her ability to integrate violence the one
thing for folks that you don't see on raw the
biggest thing Julia had to get rid of when she
left Japan and came to the United States. This isn't
like a Padeo, a Tommy slash Kenta situation where he

(37:25):
rebuilt himself to prove he could do that which he
should have done, and no one should have even given
him half a green.

Speaker 4 (37:30):
Light to do that. That was the dumbest thing they
ever did. In the case of Julia.

Speaker 5 (37:35):
She like putting people through Japanese tables, and those who
don't know a lot of those Japanese tables are legit wood,
and so she would do a lot of brawls. She'd
use a lot of chair shots in addition to the
Northern Lights bomb and some of her other great moves, and.

Speaker 4 (37:48):
She was a very hard hitter. You can't do that
so much in WWA.

Speaker 5 (37:53):
So she's adapted her style, but I think there's a
little bit, especially because of her size, we've seen a
little bit she's almost like Kyrie and that there was
a sacrifice of physicality when she made that translation, so
to speak. EO has maintained it and watching her when
she went back to Japan this past summer, it was
embarrassing to realize how good that woman is and how

(38:14):
much of a she stays in second gear in the
United States. It was one of those y'all forgot moments,
as they say in sports, where she wanted to remind
people almost to the detriment of Tammy Haishishida, where who
was basically outclassed by one of her sempis. And so
that's a problem when you look at what's going on
with Stephanie. First, Booker t was instrumental in giving over

(38:38):
the Devil's Kiss, and she has the look. She is
the best combination right now of the technical ability and
kind of the like wild outfits of Osca coupled with
the charisma of early Page and so when you put
those together, that's a pretty stark package, and so I

(38:59):
think she's going to go pretty far.

Speaker 4 (39:01):
The biggest issue I think.

Speaker 5 (39:02):
That would be there for her is her ability to
speak English, but she's working on that and if she
can master it, or if she could get to the
point like with EO and OSCA, where she can stay
in her native tongue and emote to the point where folks,
as she's said many times in these promos, wrestling is
her first language, She'll be able to translate that quite easily.

Speaker 1 (39:24):
We're about to go to a commercial break. Why listen
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(39:45):
ads and plugs through Patreon. Full VIP membership starts at
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ad and plug free listening experience with a VIP or
Patreon membership. All right, let's talk about the brock lesterond
John Cena match. What is your sense in the social

(40:07):
media landscape and all the reporting entities out there the
reception for that match, how are people reacting to it?
And then what do you agree or disagree with in
terms of some of the common reactions to the story
they told and how they told it.

Speaker 5 (40:22):
Well, I guess the first thing would be for gertis
reaction where he mentioned that there were kids when you
saw crowd shots, there were kids crying, and so when
you get that sort of emotion as a wrestler, that's
a win as sure. But then, as I mentioned during
the round table, you had the sign that said he
shouldn't be here and we all know why, referring to

(40:44):
brock Lesner. Much like those signs where I sold, the
kid need to go to this wrestling show. Yep, if
there is a cont and I know you joked on
the round table during the show like there was a
blood stain, and you know the person was dragged away
in the next scene.

Speaker 4 (40:56):
But I didn't see him the rest of the night.
Oh God, that guy was gone.

Speaker 5 (41:01):
And so if brock Lesner gets these nuisance signs, and
also again to a point I made last week, and
I'll make it here on the flagship for in case
someone hasn't heard me before you no knowledge. Paul Hayman
went on ESPN and said that brock Lesner is uncancellable
and people nowadays need to just get over it and deal.

(41:24):
And so the fact that he came out, despite storyline
wise that making no sense to resume his role as
the advocate for brock Lesner was as much a middle
finger of those folks like that fan who had the
sign and anything he said on First Take with Stephen A. Smith,
and that's if I could deviate from WWE and just

(41:47):
do a wrestling real quick wave, this will take you
can tie me two minutes. That is the one thing
that fundamentally bothers me about modern pro wrestling, because Paul
gets away with a life because it's Paul Hayman, and
kind of he has that umbrella. But if we're gonna
say that what he says and what he does are
so morally reprehensible and deplorable, you can't say AW is

(42:08):
the superior moral brand where everything is an aping of
early nineties ECW. When you have a show called September
to remember. Really, I mean, I'm watching September to Remember
and Wressell Paluza within a week of each other.

Speaker 4 (42:26):
I watched Wressell.

Speaker 5 (42:27):
Paluza and November to Remember when I was a teenager
on like Scrambled TV on ECWTV over the course of
a month, and it's it's like, Okay, let's do something new.
As much as AW is so like future looking with
like the wrestling style and stuff like that, there's so
much of it that is an homage to ECW, where
there's certain parts of it where you know, like you

(42:47):
got your thrance, your impact players the way that you know,
in hindsight you look at how Francine or don Marie
or Nicole Bass or some of the other women were portrayed,
but they had the power in that portrayal as opposed
to like this is just your job or else you
got to sleep with the boss, as opposed to the
way things were going in WWE. But at the same time,

(43:11):
so many wrestlers from MECW were dead, and if you're
not going to honor that.

Speaker 4 (43:17):
And you're gonna bring it back and do like.

Speaker 5 (43:20):
All these death match adjacent matches just because the sickles
like them.

Speaker 4 (43:25):
We could do better, guys, we could do better.

Speaker 5 (43:27):
But anyway back to Russell Blues and Lesser and Sina,
we could do better, and that's gonna be my bridge.
I thought this was the same match we saw what
almost ten years ago when Sina had the crap kicked
out of him by Lesner and he had his blood
all over his chest and all that.

Speaker 3 (43:41):
And he gets sold it one week and then unsold
it the next.

Speaker 5 (43:44):
Yeah, he gave him that five off the stairs and
the very next week Scena was like, I'm fine, guys,
And so I think we're gonna see the same thing here,
and so that's disappointing, But it's also so many more
matches before the end of the year and he's out
of here.

Speaker 4 (43:58):
So I'm assuming that's what Sina's gonna do.

Speaker 1 (44:01):
What was the point of the booking? No, I mean,
and I don't ask that not thinking like, oh, what's
the point? I mean, literally, like, what do you think
is the story they're telling with Lesner and Sena? Is
it more about Lesner?

Speaker 3 (44:11):
Is it more about.

Speaker 4 (44:12):
Sena or is it about I think it's both equally.

Speaker 5 (44:15):
I think for Sena it's another mountain to climb, and
for Lesner, it's re establishing that he is a force
of nature and someone not to be messed with when
he shows up in wrestling, And so as a result,
I think my biggest question is is this a John
Cena that's going to seek revenge and actually care next

(44:35):
week that he had the crap kicked out of him
on a pl on ESTPN Or is it going to
be happy go Lucky John that says, well, chucks, he
had me that night. Let me move on to something else.
I only have four dates left. And then conversely, on
the Rock Lesner's side, is this the man who Paul
Hayman described as the slayer of the last real champion

(44:57):
and everything else he mentioned? So does that mean he's
going to go after Cody again or Seth again for
a title, Because if he's not going for titles and
he's just here to randomly fight people, I don't really
know other than giving him a paycheck to make up
for the time they had him on ice, what they're
doing with.

Speaker 1 (45:17):
Them with with with Seene of obviously, we're just we're
getting down to the last three months here of the year,
and we know his end date. What left is there
in terms of a story arc with him that you
are hoping they do and is there something that you're

(45:38):
you hope that they don't do in terms of how
they close out a story arc, like is, for instance,
Drew so upset with losing to Cody that that he
goes after scene in sa vicious way and then Drew
gets to be the designated heel who loses the Sena
before See It retires. Do we get another dream match?
I don't dream match a nostalgia match with AJ and Sena? Like,
what what's on the table given the story that they told?

(45:59):
And I my hunch is it's probably going to be
seen it going, Yeah, let'n got the better of me.
But that's not how I want things to end. And
then someone interrupts him and they just pivot.

Speaker 4 (46:09):
Yep, That's exactly where I see it going.

Speaker 5 (46:12):
It's going to be a scene of mind wipe, just
like you know the first what seven or eight title
losses he had where it was just oh, i'll get
him next sent yeah.

Speaker 1 (46:22):
All right, or Cody beat me. That's SummerSlam. And I'm
not going to mention his name or talk about a
good match it was, or talk about what it means
to lose the title. Last champion still, Yeah, I'm still
the last Roal champion. And it's logan pauling and throw
a bunch of metrics about these you know, ultra rich,
multi millionaire celebrities and expect fans to feel that's relatable. Yeah,
I mean, yeah, it's just so I'm whatever. Yeah, that's

(46:46):
what he does.

Speaker 5 (46:49):
Yeah, it's it's the men in black, you know, you
pull out the little pen, just look into the light, boop,
and then right back to where we were. And we've
seen a man for twenty years in his George, so
imagining growth out of it is kind of a fool's
Errand if I'm.

Speaker 3 (47:05):
Honest, who do you want to see him? Face?

Speaker 1 (47:07):
Though?

Speaker 5 (47:08):
I wanted him to actually have a better winning record
and lose to a bronze breaker or someone like that
to be made in his final match, but Brock just
did what I wanted Braun to do. So I don't know,
I don't know who I would care to see at
this point because it took the mystique of this guy
humbled the greatest champion in the history of the company trademark.

(47:32):
And that's why I wonder if you're bringing Brock back
to do that. Who does it serve? Who is bron
gonna now have his I got punched in the diverticulitis
and now I lost on a banana peel match with
m because it's never Brock getting humbled. It's always that match,
that formula. We see him whoop the tar with several

(47:56):
f fives out of a smaller wrestler. They shove him
into a post or run him into a table, hit
him with a kindows stick. The ref gets somehow thrown
at a lateral angle at his diverticulatus and now, oh no,
my one weakness and that's it. I mean, as long
as they're in the Broc listener business, that works. But

(48:17):
at this point, much like with Sina, who is going
to be that next person that becomes a Brock listener
because right now Braun is floating there. There could be
some other folks, but really Braun's the only one I
see with a valid well in the I don't know
if it'll be like the anti KOFE, but Opa fe

(48:38):
me someone.

Speaker 4 (48:38):
I think if he makes it, when he makes it
to the main roster, should be a monster.

Speaker 1 (48:44):
That that's part of you brought it up a little
before I was going to, but like, is there with
John Cena gonna be some regret that there wasn't somebody
who got a chance to share the playing field with him?

Speaker 3 (48:58):
Who will get.

Speaker 1 (48:58):
Called up like in may you know, but what would
have been in his Oba Fammi like, and I don't
even know who else will.

Speaker 3 (49:05):
Be on that list that you might bring up.

Speaker 4 (49:06):
There be it for me?

Speaker 1 (49:07):
Okay, okay, And that's not great. Actually, when you think
about NXT, you hope that there'd be a list. But
do you think that's a mistake or do you think
ahead just the timing didn't work out, so be it.

Speaker 5 (49:19):
I think part of it's the time and part of
it they just wanted they John wanted.

Speaker 4 (49:23):
To wrestle his friends.

Speaker 3 (49:26):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (49:27):
The way I think about it is a few weeks
ago when he wrestled Sammy's Ain and it was the
reducts of the match with Sammy separated his shoulder in
that US Open series. That was cool, but that also
took away an opportunity for another Sammy Zin to be
created in the same situation with Sina, and we didn't

(49:49):
get that. And that's where I think about Oba Femi.
If the last night he had an open contract and
Oba Femi comes out and rushes him and just wrecks him.
And we hadn't seen Sena get humbled like that during
this run. That makes Oba Feme look like he is
the next big thing. Instead. If ober Femei comes into

(50:14):
a fifty to fifty feud with Oh Bronson Reed, that
doesn't do anything for either of them because Bronson's just
getting rehabbed and kind of moving to a pretty strong spot,
especially with his promo ability.

Speaker 4 (50:27):
That feud with Roman Reigns did so much for him.

Speaker 5 (50:30):
I mean, right now, we're looking at guys feuding with
Roman Reigns and getting more out of it than feud
with Sina, And that's wild to me. Roman's there less
and he's doing more.

Speaker 4 (50:39):
Mm hmm.

Speaker 8 (50:47):
I'm Kelly Wells, host of PWT Talks NXT, 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 cover the good, the bad,
and the ugly on the way to becoming a star
in WWE. Check us out live on YouTube or stream

(51:07):
later wherever you get your podcasts.

Speaker 1 (51:17):
Yeah, I mean, if Sena can leave things better off,
and it's just going to be him wrestling people on
his wish list, whether he'll admit it or not, or
whether it's drue or not.

Speaker 3 (51:27):
You know. And when it came to the cross, the.

Speaker 1 (51:30):
Cross impressions that Paula Beck and Johnsena gave about the
brock Lesner situation, Yeah, you know, leaving the leaving WW
better off is going to be something that we can
judge in January or February or March, you know, give
our first assessment to it. Okay, Sena, did he create
a new star, did he create new interest in somebody?
Or did all as all he did feed him. He

(51:51):
was fed to brock Lesnar to help build up brock Lesnar.
But there's a transference to bron Breaker who when he
eventually beats Lesnar, he beat the guy who storied Seenas.
So that's Scena helping but an indirect way. But I
don't know what else you're gonna look at and go, yeah,
he helped. I mean, I guess you could say losing
to Cody, but he didn't validate it afterwards. He gave

(52:13):
nothing afterwards, and it almost made it just kind of
feel ephemeral.

Speaker 3 (52:16):
The effect of it. Sena could have.

Speaker 1 (52:18):
Really made a big deal and really endorse Cody. There's
I keep harping on it, but it's such a lost
opportunity with what they have with Cody right now to
not have Seena effusively put him over. And it just
you get the sense that isn't crossing Sena's mind or
it is something he intentionally doesn't want to do, and
it's unfortunate. I mean, there's a performative minimal there's a

(52:38):
minimal performative pat on the back, whisper in the air,
but it's not really anything that feels, you know, Seene
as like, oh I did my job at SummerSlam, not
gonna move on and it so I don't know when
we look at this, if we're gonna get he stole
a here from Cody being a top star by coming
back in. When I say stole, it sounds like this
was an active, aggressive move on it's part.

Speaker 3 (53:00):
I'm just saying.

Speaker 1 (53:00):
The effect is we spent a whole year with Seena
getting a lot of the oxygen in the room that
could have gone to Cody and somebody else or several
other people. So there's some negative that comes along with that. Now,
obviously there's a ton of people who are like, I
need to go to the show, and I want to
be there the last time seen is in my town.

Speaker 3 (53:15):
I don't want to buy his merchant.

Speaker 1 (53:16):
All that, But there aren't metric changes that are that show.
Oh my god, the impact Seena made gave WW this
momentum and they reached new heights. They were selling out
stadium shows. They're drawing huge crowds for Ron smacked on
a regular basis before Scena showed up. He's riding a
wave created by Roman reigns in Paul Hayman and sammy's

(53:38):
A and j Uso and Cody Roads and where you Ripley.

Speaker 3 (53:42):
So I don't know Rich, I just I'm you know.

Speaker 1 (53:45):
I've held off on trying to do a big picture
assessment for Sena in terms of the positive and negative
because I think there's still three months of a story
to tell and then we got to take a deep
breath next year. But I'm going to do it and
now and throw it to you. What case can be
made that Sena helped as opposed to slide his own
pockets and had a company with a lot of momentum,
shine a spotlight on him and make it seem like

(54:06):
he was, you know, a contributor to that in a
big way, when in fact he just was kind of
riding the wave of his name value in Dede's existing momentum.

Speaker 5 (54:16):
I think, like with Sting's retirement an aaw, this is
something that needed to happen, just to kind of put
a period in an underline on what happened, because Johnson
is one of their biggest stars. On the contrary, though,
I think for the folks helped, there really wasn't. This
was just a happening that needed to happen. And it's
interesting because when you think about Darby Allen in a

(54:39):
w Sting's retirement helped him as much as it did
rehab Sting's bad WWE run because it showed that he
could have an understudy, slash and apprentice that he doesn't
turn on, who doesn't turn on him and now has
a legacy where Sting has said you're my guy, and

(55:00):
whatever happens next, you can handle it. There isn't anyone
we say the Sena pointed to and is like, this
is the next big thing, this is the next guy,
this is the future and for him, Sena didn't have
a person to do that because Austin had already had
the Brocklesner situation pop up and them screwing around with
his head and all the stuff Vince did that really

(55:23):
was poorly thought out, in my humble opinion. And so
when you look at Sina, there is no understudy. If anything,
his legacy, even with Sammy Zay, has been undone by
Sammy's legacy with Roman.

Speaker 4 (55:40):
And that's the strongest one I could think.

Speaker 5 (55:42):
Of, because Russev's that one match has now died of
death because WrestleMania. You know, you had the tank and
all that, but Russev's hasn't grown past that. So there
really isn't I can't think of anyone that would be
a good replacement or a good person that I would
think of.

Speaker 4 (56:00):
Is hey, this is awesome. This is what Sena's left
is a legacy.

Speaker 1 (56:05):
Yeah, and some people have a soft spot for Seena.
I don't blame them for it. There's part of me
that's a little shocked because I think with some people
they were the ones booing him.

Speaker 3 (56:13):
I shouldn't say I'm shocked. That's the wrong word.

Speaker 1 (56:17):
There's people who grew up booing him, who now are
deciding to cheer him, And I'm curious what he did
other than remind them of their childhood or remind them
of their twenties when they were booing him that now
they're they're channing thank you Sina. It's it, It's just
it feels weird, like what why did all of you

(56:39):
go from booing him to channing thank you Sina? Unless
it's kids grew up or is it just propaganda is
too strong a word, but like the the framing of
it by wod Be just it's like, well, that's what
we're doing. We're just paying a tribute to this guy
who was who did two decades of main eventing and
now you get to see him and it's sort of
just celebrity culture come to life with these live audiences

(57:01):
just kind of, you know, following the lead of the
story that they're supposed to or the story that Debi
is telling them. So there's been these feel good moments,
but I don't want to get lost in that and
not evaluate kind of the question we just covered, which
is is he is this a selfish, self indulgent, ungracious
farewell where Sina gave something to thinks he was part

(57:24):
of but there was no lasting positive after that. You know,
It's it's sort of a junk food farewell tour. It's
like it tasted good in the moment, but there's sort
of this drag afterwards as opposed to added momentum. And
I mean, that's kind of how I'm looking at this,
especially because of how Nonchalanty was as a heel, how
nonchalanty was about turning back babyface.

Speaker 3 (57:45):
I don't worry about the details. I'll give you a
little lie.

Speaker 1 (57:48):
And as someone told me to do something and I
changed my mind, I mean, and Cody helped nudge me
in that direction, so much of it just sen people
are going to look back when they're away from the
the buzz and the excitement and the promotion and the
hype and just be like, what was that and what
did we give up in order.

Speaker 3 (58:06):
To get that?

Speaker 5 (58:08):
And as as you said that, I will think of
one person, Logan Paul. But I think it was more
Logan Paul proven that Sina still had those matches in him, yeah,
than Sina having a moment for Logan Paul, if that
makes sense.

Speaker 1 (58:22):
Yeah, yeah, And I mean, and I just don't know
that Logan need it. I mean, no, you know, Logan
was Logan. Logan's just he's not. Actually, Logan is gonna
be Logan no matter what. I think he's sort of
I don't think he's got a better place because of
what he did with Sena.

Speaker 5 (58:36):
I also don't know if anything is in a better
place in my mind set as a wrestler, because he
proved he could take someone that's an established vetterman that
hadn't had good matches, and then get a good match
out of him that which showed again another level of
wrestling acumen I was not aware that man had. Yeah,
so it's a feather in his cap. It's not even
the thing Sena did. It's by being in there with Sina.

(58:58):
He made Sena look better than seen A probably should
have done his own.

Speaker 4 (59:01):
Same with Cody.

Speaker 1 (59:02):
Yeah, yep, yeah, let's you ready to shift?

Speaker 4 (59:07):
Yeah?

Speaker 1 (59:07):
A little bit okay, but still on resolution though the
tag match, anything about that, we're not really talking about it.
I mean, what what stood out for you? And did
that help or hurt the show or was it just
sort of fine?

Speaker 4 (59:19):
It was fine?

Speaker 5 (59:20):
I didn't I mean, and we even saw in raw
the story continues. I just don't get and this is
something you and Bruce talked about like several years ago.
WWE's obsession with proven that every face, no one is
truly good. And I don't mean in the Holister Black,
no man is truly good. No might never ever truly
eat full. I mean you have three baby faces between

(59:43):
the USSO brothers and Jimmy and Jay and La Knight
and there's just absolutely just dirt worst behavior between Jay
and what's going on with La Knight and Jimmy's caught
in the middle or Big Jim.

Speaker 1 (01:00:00):
I guess yeah, I think the assumption right now and
I think it's it's safe as overstating it, but I
understand it is Jay is gonna go.

Speaker 3 (01:00:11):
Heal or be the heel.

Speaker 1 (01:00:12):
In the context of the story they're telling, is there
a twist coming up where they're actually gonna have ell
A Knight turn heel and you know the fans are
behind him, but there's gonna be something where they're kind
of they're kind of Jay seems like he's being less
understanding of things that are happening and overreacting more than night,
but ultimately it's building up at night he's gonna snap

(01:00:33):
and they think they can get something out of Elle
Knight as a heel, and because I don't sense that's
the pick right now, correct me if I'm wrong and
you think the perception is it's a toss up for
people leaning towards Night. But if someone turns heel, I'm
not ruling out that night sneaking up and he's going
to be somebody who they then position as an opponent,
say for Cody next.

Speaker 4 (01:00:53):
Year, and I think that would be good for him.

Speaker 5 (01:00:56):
I don't understand, especially with if they think that Jay's
up for the challenge of being a heel, he has
to do what Seth Rollins refused to, which is fundamentally
change your entrance so that you don't get crowd participation
and then boom.

Speaker 4 (01:01:12):
If Jay can do that, hey, I'm with it.

Speaker 5 (01:01:14):
If you're down with and it can't be like Jimmy
did where it was Yeat no Yeat, which is basically
feeding back into the original Yeat. I want to see
if Jay go's heel something again to what Roman did
where I acknowledged me was something for years that people
hated to do until he was almost a babyface.

Speaker 4 (01:01:36):
Or you know the uh.

Speaker 5 (01:01:39):
I think again, going back to Bronson Reid as much
as people like bron Breaker. Bronson Reid calling himself the
shoe Lafalla and the tribal Thief are so good. But
it's just good enough and just corny enough that a
heel said it, and you're just like, oh.

Speaker 4 (01:01:57):
And I want more with Braun.

Speaker 5 (01:02:00):
I mean, I see with Braun Breaker a lot of
it's just Steiner adjacent and and that's almost an insult
and not intentionally, but they try to play him off
as this dumb brute that occasionally has good ideas as
opposed to Braun can just be as I liked him
when he first got to WWE, and particularly on the

(01:02:22):
main roster, this unhinged like every sports team has the
unhinged free agent or unhinged draft pick that you just
have to kind of hope he keeps it together in
season and you can win the championship. M and so
with Jay, I think he's emerged as a top character.
But if you're gonna turn him heel, you're taking away

(01:02:44):
one of his superpowers with the yeat and the crowd participation.
Does he have enough and if he's willing to risk it,
I applaud him, And let's see it, but I also
want to make sure you don't ruin a really good thing.

Speaker 4 (01:02:57):
You have.

Speaker 1 (01:02:59):
M You don't have to wait for the way Keller
Pro Wrestling post show to find out what I thought
of Monday Night Raw and SmackDown. Each week, you can
check out my reports that are updated live throughout Raw
and SmackDown at pwtorch dot com. My written report will
tell you what's happening in detail in case you missed
the show, and it will also analyze key segments and

(01:03:22):
give my random thoughts quips on what I'm watching as
it airs. So check it out every Monday night and
Tuesday night at pewtorch dot com. That also applies to wwepayperviews.
I cover those live at pw torch dot com with
a detailed written report with star ratings. And of course
you can find other TV reports from other contributors to
pw torch such as nxt roh, Impact Wrestling and more.

(01:03:45):
Check it out pwtorch dot com your first stop for
TV and pay per view written reports. All right, let's
shift to aw A few topics to cover here. One

(01:04:07):
just the people have said okay or some media's going
to Saudi Arabia.

Speaker 3 (01:04:12):
What is.

Speaker 1 (01:04:15):
What should be done domestically to counter that? Is that
an opportunity for AW to make a statement and go,
we're now your hometown team and do a big weekend.
What do you think about that concept and incorporate the
latest into it in terms of what we know.

Speaker 5 (01:04:31):
Sure, so I think it makes a lot of sense,
but it is a dangerous game because we know how
many people show up to AW pay per views. It's
usually somewhere between conservatively, let's say ten to twenty one
thousand when we count the stadium shows they've had in
the last few last like eight months. So if you

(01:04:55):
have the ability to guarantee you're going to have all
those folks, then decide that they're going to go to
Game Changer Wrestling or Beyond Wrestling or any of the
other folks Kaiju Big Battle. Great, that works, but if
you can't, that doesn't help any wrestling.

Speaker 4 (01:05:15):
That doesn't help those folks get people.

Speaker 5 (01:05:17):
One of the suggestions I would have is teaming up
with Conrad Thompson and having another star cast in the
area that you're gonna be so that way those folks
are already going to be there for autograph signings, and
photo ops, which makes it easier for the promoter because
trans is already covered and it's just a matter of
now figuring out how much you want to pay them
for the appearance, et cetera, et cetera, and knowing that

(01:05:37):
you're going to have a certain largest of people, because
when we look at WrestleMania weekends, they know it's going
to be upwards of call it forty to fifty thousand
people and even more now that would do We're going
to have matches outside of what is going on WrestleMania weekend, like,

(01:05:59):
for instance, couple of WrestleManias. I've gone to everything except
WrestleMania and seeing the side shows like Stardom and things
like that, and then I would go and watch WrestleMania
and Airbnb with you know, like Travis when it was
in Philadelphia and wh and my buddy Chris who does
wrestling coast to coast here, and we watch it, and
then I'd review with you and Todd and then wait

(01:06:21):
and watch the next crazy things from the nbcne.

Speaker 4 (01:06:24):
If you can do that, great for Tony.

Speaker 5 (01:06:28):
It should be somewhere that isn't the twenty you know,
like twenty three hundred arena.

Speaker 4 (01:06:34):
It shouldn't be anything that's like nostalgia.

Speaker 5 (01:06:36):
If you want to plant your flag, do what WWE
do with WCW and have a show at Madison Square,
guard and have a show in New York, somewhere where
it's going to be easy for the talent to get
to lots of hubs, somewhere where you see it as
a traditional stronghold of WWE and you can kind of
thumb your nose while they're in Saudi Arabia and somewhere
where you logistically can show proof of con that. Maybe

(01:07:00):
you want to make a loop and you know, I
think at the end of the month, Aw's coming to Pittsburgh.
Maybe when you're in the Pittsburgh area Philly area, you
want to also loop up to the you know, for them,
New Jersey has been where they've been going. Maybe you
want to jump across the tunnel and do some stuff
in New York proper ringa Bonnor did it, you should

(01:07:22):
be able to do it. And so that's what I think.
And then Tony did the pre press conference for All
Out and he mentioned he has big plans for AW
Revolution that year as a WrestleMania adjacent counter program, and
since it's already that town of the year, that makes

(01:07:43):
a lot of sense. I just hope they kind of
think it through because currently there are a number of
for instance, outside of Jericho when he had a contract
with him, you know, the Game Changer doesn't have a
lot of AW wrestlers anymore.

Speaker 4 (01:07:59):
At some point there was a.

Speaker 5 (01:08:00):
Calling out and that kind of win sideways and some
of the wrestlers are now AW tallent like like your
Blake Christians. I want to see if it's going to
be this wrestling festival, this celebration of wrestling, this wrestling revolution,
you need to tie yourself to everybody, not just kind

(01:08:20):
of like throw under the bus folks if they are
tied with the WWID program, or if any way you
feel like they're not just entirely all the way aw.

Speaker 1 (01:08:33):
All right, let's I want to give some conversation to
something we already talked about about on the VP side
of things, but frame it a little bit differently, and
that is, how does all out now compare now that
you've also seen Wressell paloozat Wrestle Dream and all kinds
of other things. In my head, start with Wrestle before
I got to Palosa and especially when it's talking to AW.

(01:08:56):
But what kind of contrast was there? Because this is
a big moment. I think we maybe underestimate a little
bit what Saturday was because it's sort of overwhelming in
a way, just there was a lot to take in
with an overlap, but it was the start of do
B on ESPN and then it's AW trying to go,
wait a second, we got our afternoon show and we
really want to make the statement big crowd in Toronto,

(01:09:19):
a well received show. What now a few days removed
from it is all out going to be remembered for
and is part of it the contrast to the product
and the reaction to the ESPN debut of Russell Pluza right.

Speaker 5 (01:09:34):
And so much wigde with the cycle of media and life,
not just wrestling the way it is. I honestly don't
think in a year most will remember anything outside of
the Hangman Page match with the proto star Cayle Fletcher
or whatever other nicknames he is as the first step

(01:09:55):
towards Kyle Fletcher being a legitimate event. So that match
wasn't to be the match that says he's the guy
that was the match that said he could be the
guy if he keeps going. I likened it in our
roundtable discussion the print version two, there was a storyline
a few months ago where there was a heel in
New Japan and Tanahashi says, I see the good in him,

(01:10:18):
and they fought, and eventually the guy turned face like
that's what and that's what I kind of see page
trying to do elicit the goodness that is in Fletcher,
what could be there and challenge him. Let's win without
the Kallus family, Let's win without cutting corners. Beat me
in the moment as the guy who deserves the moment,

(01:10:39):
and he might. He didn't do it this time, but
if he keeps pushing again very Japanese, very parressed in
terms of the storyline they're selling. If he keeps pushing himself,
Fletcher could do it. And so that I believe will
be the thing that most people remember. Some sickos may remember,

(01:11:00):
or the MJF Brisco match, but I honestly think not,
which again goes back to my point I made on
the roundtable for all of these comments, and you know,
it's very crass, like in the nineties, folks would do
things like dead baby jokes and things like that. That's
how I feel they're doing with Jay Briscoe, Like you're
constantly bringing up Jay Briscoe's death, and the more you

(01:11:21):
do it, the more you minimize it, and you treat
it as just this get out of heat free card,
like you don't have to earn your heat. You just
have to say at least I'm not your dead brother
and then keep it moving.

Speaker 4 (01:11:34):
And it's very.

Speaker 5 (01:11:36):
It's very and I get annoyed every time, but we
start talking about this. It's very annoying because in life
he wasn't allowed to be on TV, and now in death,
we can't go a week without a heel using his
name to invoke his brother to fight them.

Speaker 9 (01:11:53):
Yeah, do you remember when Hulk Hogan shocked the world
and formed the New World Order? Or when Stone Cold
Steve Austin passed down on the Sharpshooter to break the
hit Manhart. I'm Torch contributor Frank petty Any and I've
reviewed these shows and many more for my exclusive VIP podcast,

(01:12:15):
Pro Wrestling Than and Now. Together with a rotating chair
of co hosts, we go back ten, twenty even thirty
years review pay per views from top to bottom talk
about where the wrestlers were at the time and compare
what took place then to what is taking place now.
You get exclusive access to these and other podcasts as
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(01:12:37):
with the Apple Podcasts app. Visit pwtorch dot com slash
go vip for details and sign up for.

Speaker 3 (01:12:51):
All Right.

Speaker 1 (01:12:53):
Where does AW go from All Out? We've got Fletcher
comes up short, but that could be what the show
is remembered for not announcing a lot, but we have
the mystery of Tony Kahn's important announcement uh. And then
you have the conglomeration against Don Kelli's family being advertised
ocatafront and center on on on the team with the

(01:13:15):
with the Kestro right behind him, but also mean to
share a collagrance Chris stant letter for the women's title,
but nothing else announced for this show. What is Aw's
identity coming out of All Out?

Speaker 3 (01:13:26):
And what did it?

Speaker 1 (01:13:29):
Did it eliminate anything from your array of things that
you were thinking where they might be going as we
close out the yearth.

Speaker 4 (01:13:36):
Well, I look at the men's title scene.

Speaker 5 (01:13:38):
We got to figure out what's next for hanging and
so I'm interested in that MJF perpetually with his contract
when he's gonna declare it and cash it in. And
then you also have from the tag title the bucks
are they Are they going to continue to try to
be serious?

Speaker 4 (01:13:57):
Are they also going to keep blowing their money and
have arious things happened to them?

Speaker 5 (01:14:02):
And age I'm sorry Adam Copeland and Christian Cage. Are
they gonna send to the title scene along you know,
all these other contenders.

Speaker 4 (01:14:13):
And then with the.

Speaker 5 (01:14:14):
Injuries to Ospray and Swerve, is this now the time
where Darby Allen moves into that spot again and makes
himself one of the top acts in the company.

Speaker 4 (01:14:27):
On the women's side, this loss, while experimental to Chris
stat Lander, who wants to be called Chris Straplander, which
instantly undermines everything I said on Saturday as far as
giving her a chance.

Speaker 5 (01:14:42):
Because come on, that's like the worst nickname. That's again,
first of all, you shouldn't give yourself a nickname. That's
just the general rule. And if it's gonna be something
like that, that's rough. This gives an opportunity for Tony
Storm to reseed Sasha.

Speaker 4 (01:14:56):
I'm in one of those.

Speaker 5 (01:14:58):
Fake name dumb Mercedes having the opportunity to get one
of her future tenth belts and tie Ultimate Dragon without
having beaten you know, Tony storm for it, and then
Tony can have a rubber match or maybe Athena if
she magically can appear on aw television for her once

(01:15:21):
every six year surjourn. But there's a question. There's a
vacuum at the top there for the women, and so
I want to see who feels that. And then the
next question is, and this is one of the most
fun storylines in AW right now, how does Don callis?
And again this goes back to like the coaching analogy,
how does the coach with two star receivers give them

(01:15:44):
both the ball? You have Okata and you have to
catch to and they hate each other's guts and they
don't hide it anymore, and the coach has to figure
out who's getting the third and five pass. That is
so fun to me because as heels, it's gonna eventually
turn to catch the babyface. But in the interim it's

(01:16:04):
getting Okada into at least third gear for a few minutes,
So I'll take it.

Speaker 1 (01:16:11):
They are teasing the big mystery announcement. It's been a
while since Tony con has done this. Rich any speculation
women's tag titles gotcha? Yep, I think it's say I'm
gonna kind of throw that out there.

Speaker 5 (01:16:25):
The only other thing I could say is a women's
Continental Classic, because one of his comments typically when asked
that question during media Q and a's is that he
doesn't think he had enough healthy women to do it.
But then what made me think, if it's not the
tag titles, it would be that is we just had
several ten women tags where it's like, hey, there's the number,

(01:16:48):
you got the number right here, and you just had
them all wrestle, and you have Athena who again exists.
So yeah, there's I think those would be the two
biggest things for me as.

Speaker 1 (01:16:59):
The yep, Orange Cassidy back, where does he fit in?
Tony Kahn got a lot out of him, A little
down on this being the way he returns just I
mean a little I don't want to overstate it, but
it's like, I don't know, you know, he says, whatever,
it was cute, But I think they went for cute
more than framing somebody who's been you know, when he

(01:17:20):
was around the last couple of years when he was
active up, the go to utility guy that Tony just
trusted and I don't know, I mean, they'll get a
nice pop. But and it's good to have him back
in the mix because you know, he's one of the
people who sometimes wasn't always mentioned when when people were
listening to babyfaces that are out of action or not. Yeah,
just not able to be on the show that depleted things.

(01:17:40):
Getting Orange back is helpful, But it does feel like
this type of return is a mister partner in a
six man tag at least initially. And they can change
my opinion based on what they do tomorrow night in
the match. You know, they can set something up that
feels bigger for him and maybe and I hope they
do and then and then I'll kind of withdraw this.
But if he's just going to be a guy who
just shows up to be a mister partner in a
throw away six men tag match, I'll I'll be a

(01:18:02):
little down on that. I think he deserves a little
bit better with kind of the legacy he's built up
as that gatekeeper, top of the second tier type, just
reliable switch hitter, pinch hitter, bullpen.

Speaker 3 (01:18:14):
Guy, you know, for for Tony that he just leaned on.

Speaker 5 (01:18:17):
Yeah, he's the He's Yeah, he's the again I'll go
with I'll stick with baseball. He's the guy who could
be middle leaf, close or give you six innings, depending
on when you need it.

Speaker 4 (01:18:27):
And I like.

Speaker 5 (01:18:29):
The fact that he got the he got a very
orange Cassidy announcement, very understated, but I'm hoping that belies
a bigger story they have for him. So they and
and it's tough because his whole gimmick is I don't
care about stuff until I do m and part of
that is letting him come in understatedly that I don't

(01:18:53):
think that's a word, but I have to make it
up for the purpose of this conversation, and that understated
appearance must then lead this something otherwise he is going
to get to find down and that has been an
issue at times where AW wrestlers. He's the person that
created his own legacy in that company. He started as
what people you know always pejoratively call a meme wrestler,

(01:19:14):
but has been, like you said, the number two gatekeeper
in the company. And that's a pretty strong resume for
him and Darby Allen, I would say from my experience
watching them in the Indies to watching them on televised
wrestling weekly, they have had the biggest glow ups in
terms of being positive in serious lights and not just

(01:19:37):
aspects of their gimmick. As much as I hate Darby
doing getting lawn darted on the coffins and thrown into
crowds at me, I would prefer him doing that on
television against a Moxley as opposed to Ethan Page. And
that's no offense to Ethen Page, but that dude spent
a week in a hospital with a concussion for a show.

Speaker 4 (01:19:57):
I'm sure that didn't pay nearly what it should have for.

Speaker 5 (01:20:00):
And then with Orange, I remember watching you know the
very first Joeys, you know, the spring Break and he
wrestled the Invisible Man and the cluster f Battle Royal,
and it's him wrestling Air. I don't mean to destroy
the gimmick, but there is no Invisible Man or Invisible
Stand or whomever.

Speaker 4 (01:20:18):
Else was in those Battle Royals.

Speaker 5 (01:20:19):
Over the years, he had fun with it, but again
at some point when he needed to get cereal serious
and wrestled Jericho, or he needed to get serious and
and just have blood feuds with other folks like Moxley. Again,
Moxley is the common denominator. He has done more for
these guys than anyone I think on that roster. But
the difference is once they're done with Moxley, there isn't

(01:20:43):
that next thing I've seen that's elevated them, like a
guy like Hangman, who has kind of persevered and kind
of cracked through. Even though that was someone Tony has
said many times that's what he knew he wanted. And
so that's where I you know, that's where I'm a
little bit on orange.

Speaker 1 (01:21:01):
Yeah, yep, all right, anything else on the aw side
of things you want to bring up, No, I don't
think so.

Speaker 6 (01:21:08):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:21:09):
Like I said, point people to our vp roundtable. Todd, Martin
Rich and I reviewed the show Saturday night, and that
is available for VPP members. Okay, give the latest on Rampay,
Jackson's Son and the felony charges. Give a brief recap
to people who are like, wait, what are they talking
about it? If they missed that story, because it did

(01:21:31):
flash across the landscape. But then all of a sudden
we had this big weekend.

Speaker 4 (01:21:35):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (01:21:36):
Sure, so for those on a were Rampage Jackson's Son
Rajah went to a wrestling show and during the kind
of pre met stuff, got to go backstage and was
chatting with a wrestler.

Speaker 4 (01:21:47):
The wrestler thought he was a worker.

Speaker 5 (01:21:49):
And kind of gat him up a little bit, hit
him with a beer bottle, and eventually it was revealed
he was just a bystander, civilian so to speak. Apologies
were made, and Rajah keeps and maintains a live blog
by way of video at all times, and so his
fans had been giving him a hard time two days

(01:22:11):
prior when in a sparring match, a smaller teammate of
his knocked him out, and you know, they wouldn't let
him hear the end of it. And so now they
see this and then not let him hear the end
of it, and he tells them on video after having
talked with one of the other workers in the promotion,
I'm going to give this dude a receipt, and by receipt,

(01:22:32):
I'm going to punch him as many times as I
can until these people get me off of He gets
to the match he's supposed to do a spot where
he does.

Speaker 4 (01:22:39):
A run in.

Speaker 5 (01:22:40):
He gets in there, mounts the man and proceeds to
hit him as hard as he can twenty to twenty
five times the gentleman's cycles. Stu wound up having to
go to the hospital, lost several teeth, face reconstruct like
he's just a mess. And Rajah, while continuing his live
video after having been ejected from the arena after this

(01:23:02):
heinous behavior, had the gentleman tell him, hey, this guy's
really hurt, like hospital bad. And he's like, oh my
bad and hangs up on the guy on video. So
this is from the minute it happens to the minute
this man shows no remorse is on video. And one
of the issues that local police had were the fact

(01:23:26):
that they wanted to make sure that they weren't being
worked before they brought charges, and so it took about
a month. So now he's been charging. He was a
felony arrest for let's see, I may double check here

(01:23:47):
from the notes from the article I had. Yeah, so yeah,
it's just one felony for assault. Stue was in the hospital.

Speaker 4 (01:23:56):
For a week. I appreciate rampage Jackson at.

Speaker 5 (01:24:02):
First, he said, you know, he was making an excuse
to saying Rajah had concussion post concussion syndrome and was
not himself now he's like, I'm doing okay, I'm holding
up well. The situations out of my control. He effed up,
he effed up. He's got to learn this lesson. And
Ariolhuani interviewed him earlier at the beginning of the month,

(01:24:25):
and he told Ariel that Raja I should probably go
to jail over the incident. He's got to do a
little time, do a little community service, go to anger
management class in therapy. It wasn't attempted murder. He wasn't
trying to kill that guy. That's my son. I know
my son, Raja I probably didn't even know how bad
he hurt that guy. And I want to preface those
statements with the statement that Rampage made to him during

(01:24:49):
the stream, which was saying to him basically a step
away from homophobic slurs in terms of why you were
around those wrestlers hugging each other and doing all this
gay s and so that's that sort of I now,

(01:25:10):
publicly he's saying the right things, but in the moment,
his father is also adding to the situation. So this
is a mess, and hopefully justice has served him by that.
I mean, Stu is made whole, He's all right and
able to resume his career because he's a military veteran
had PTSD and now this is even more PTSD added

(01:25:31):
to wrestling was his escape, and his escape became a nightmare,
and so I feel for him with that.

Speaker 1 (01:25:38):
Thanks for downloading today's show. Take it to the next
level with a VIP membership. Get shows like this, the
way Keller Prosing Podcast, Way Keller Prosing Post Show, and
the pw Torch daily casts on our pw Torch VIP
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(01:25:59):
Everything with Rich Fan and The Fix with Todd Martin
signature VIP series that you're missing out without a VIP membership.
So go vip here in twenty twenty two and enjoy
all the benefits, all the bonus content and the ad
free listening experience. Pwtors dot com slash go viip. All right,
Let's hit a couple of other topics to close out here.

(01:26:20):
One Mickey James announced for the TNA Hall of Fame
this week. Where does she fit in? We talked a
lot about women's wrestling in terms of the future. Where
is Mickey James when it comes to her impact on
the business, and I mean help women's titles in WWE
and TNA. It'll be a bone for glory by the way,

(01:26:41):
October twelfth, What do you think about this announcement?

Speaker 3 (01:26:44):
Obviously she's identified very much with TNA in addition to WWE,
obviously tied to Nick All this GMA SmackDown.

Speaker 1 (01:26:50):
But talk about her her legacy and her impact, her
strength and her weaknesses.

Speaker 3 (01:26:56):
Did she reach her potential? Where would she be if
she was dropped into a different era? Take it however
you want.

Speaker 4 (01:27:01):
Sure.

Speaker 5 (01:27:02):
She is a very interesting case because in addition to
her wrestling, she has her music career, which is done.
You know, obviously she's not Tabler Swift, but she's done
pretty well for herself in country music.

Speaker 4 (01:27:14):
I thought that she is She was a woman that
was kind of like.

Speaker 5 (01:27:22):
All over the place because I remember her when I
first saw her.

Speaker 4 (01:27:26):
I want to say it was.

Speaker 5 (01:27:29):
Ring of honor. It was either the Ring of Honor.
I feel like it was a Ring of honor, and
then going into because she was like Alexis Larie and
she was messaging she was kind of with Ricochet, Jay
Lethal and those guys who were kind of in this
group where they pretended like they were all on drugs.

(01:27:54):
And then I saw a little bit in TNA with
the gathering and all that stuff, and then eventually back
into WWE and the Stalker of trist Stratus and she,
like I said, she was a woman out of time
because she showed up during the height of TNA in
terms of the way w TNA not total non self

(01:28:15):
action and had to deal with all of the sexuality
she had to bring to the job just to have
the job.

Speaker 4 (01:28:24):
And then when they found the models and they.

Speaker 5 (01:28:28):
Thought that she did not fit whomever was in the
back and their ideal of feminine beauty, they called her
Piggy James. And then she goes to TNA and she
alongside Killed Kim and Awesome Kong become truly the spine

(01:28:50):
of an outstanding women's division. She then gets to bounce,
and that's nothing, nothing's better than when you have that ability.

Speaker 4 (01:28:59):
She gets to.

Speaker 5 (01:28:59):
Bounce between both companies and the ends as this legend
and legend of Gee Chase in person, depending on like
when she made those returns. I think Mickey has been
a really good addition to wrestling. I think over her
career she's been really important because she's one of the

(01:29:20):
women who got the pushback, and she's one of the
women that applauded aj Lee when she said this is
an evolution, not a diva's era. And so when she
moved and she jumped into her new adventures with NWA
or with the Impact as a knockouts champion, as an ambassador,

(01:29:41):
as a leader of women with wrestling, she did pretty
well for herself. And one of the things I always
appreciated about Mickey was that as much as it was
easy for them, they could have done it so many times.
Her and all this never really did what we're seeing
now with AJM Punk and Becky and Seth. They both

(01:30:03):
had distinct successful careers without having to constantly refer to
their spouse.

Speaker 3 (01:30:09):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:30:13):
Oh, and then also she was instrumental.

Speaker 5 (01:30:16):
We just talked about like what is seen as legacy
when you think about before she had got pregnant, when
you think of Trinity Slash. Oh no, now I forgot
her rest air ww name.

Speaker 4 (01:30:31):
I hate when my brain does this the glow Naomi
there you go.

Speaker 5 (01:30:37):
Yeah, so we think about Naomi she reinvented herself in
TNA and she beat Mickey for the title. And so
the way that she didn't bigfoot her because she could have,
you know, tenas a wrestling company like any other, So
politically she could have pushed back and she didn't. And

(01:30:59):
Naomi was very appreciative of all the women there because
they were so open and welcoming, and that's been honestly,
that's been one of the hallmarks of TNA wrestling once
the evolution of it happened with Gail and with Mickey.
These women look out for each other. I remember going
to a wrestling show in Philly and there were a

(01:31:19):
few like Cody Diener and some of the other folks,
Like a lot of these the TNA women were wrestling
on their own, and Gail and Mickey even two three
years ago were like up in the gan tree watching
and supporting them. That's a level of authenticity, Like no
one knew where they were there. The only reason I

(01:31:41):
knew was because I happened to look up because it
was insanely hot and I was hoping a window was open.
It was one of the few wrestling matches I've ever
been inside of a church and you know, if anyone
remembers in the mid nineties, when wrestling wasn't as popular,
they wrestled in a lot of high.

Speaker 4 (01:31:57):
Schools and a lot of churches.

Speaker 5 (01:31:59):
Yes, Like if I told you now, I saw Triple H,
Shawn Michaels, Duke Drosi, the Undertaker, Big Boss Man, And
I'm trying to who else was on the show, like
Bob Holly inside of high school that was smaller than
my high school, and they just wrestled like they were
on TV. No one would believe that now, but that's

(01:32:19):
where they were at. And so I think Mickey's legacy
is one of forging her own path, not cal telling
to chauvinism, and being a really good advocate for her
colleagues without ever doing it at the expense of her
colleagues or her dignity.

Speaker 1 (01:32:41):
Well stated, just final thing. We didn't talk a lot
about Rob, but we had the big opening segment Cody
and Seth face to face. They're going to be a
cron jewel battling for the ring, but also it's a
Champ versus Champ. I didn't dwelve on the ring a lot,
just kind of covered what needed to be covered. I
guess for that, what do you think about that decision
to have Cody and Seth now face each other and
have that be the center of attention for a few weeks.

Speaker 4 (01:33:01):
Here makes sense.

Speaker 5 (01:33:03):
It's a nice placeholder going into Crown Jewel if you
got WrestleMania going there in two years. This is just
like the Rumble going in January, a way to start
giving a little, to.

Speaker 4 (01:33:13):
Get a lot.

Speaker 5 (01:33:15):
To be honest, you get a champion versus champion, match
winner gets a ring.

Speaker 4 (01:33:20):
Okay, cool?

Speaker 5 (01:33:24):
It just seems very what's the word and a climactic
And so if going forward that's what you see, like
this is the time of the year at Crown Jewel
where you get champion versus champion and you kind of
just accept it. Cool, But I don't necessarily feel that
outside of saving their legs and saving it what could

(01:33:45):
be a good storyline there is?

Speaker 4 (01:33:47):
That's not much anything else I can take up for it.

Speaker 1 (01:33:50):
Yeah, yep, anything else from raw jump out to you
that you want to come in on.

Speaker 5 (01:33:55):
I enjoy the continued craziness with EO, Kyrie and OSCA.
I also did want to conclude Oscar celebrating as of
yesterday ten years in WWE Wow, and so I really
appreciated that because we hadn't talked about it before bringing
up Mickey j Because Mickey James and Oscar, I think
are two very similar women in their career paths. Where Oscar,

(01:34:18):
when she first started wrestling in Japan, a lot of
it was her sex appeal, and she kind of had
to lean into that and take the jokes about having larger,
you know, breasts than some of our other compatriots, and
people would say things and she would do things in
matches that were just if people saw Conna, and she
even mentioned it in her You know, I've obtained every record,

(01:34:40):
everything there is to obtain, but these are all mery
way points. What's universal value and beauty is pioneering a
new era, possessing the power to change the times. That's
why I pursue how I bring change and ideals to
the ring. Creating before and after Kana and before and
after Osca. Creating a path is far more difficult than
walking a path that others have made, and therein lies

(01:35:00):
the most beautiful aesthetic of all. For me, living as
a pioneer in living with conviction, philosophy and aesthetics is a.

Speaker 4 (01:35:07):
Very important way of life.

Speaker 5 (01:35:08):
And a couple of years ago, Oscar had a really
good quote about the fact that when you think about
folks rating matches, she hates it because forever she would
not enjoy her good matches if she did not have clunkers.
And she just said it was like, how could I
enjoy having great matches if I never had a bad one?

Speaker 4 (01:35:27):
Mm, And that is so.

Speaker 5 (01:35:31):
And so when I think of Mickey James and I
think Oscar, those are two women that made lemonade out
of lemons. They got with their first roles where it
was more sexual and then as they got a chance
to show whatever they wanted to show to their sasy
side I'll call it, but also wrestling the style they
felt comfortable. And because that's the thing with Mickey, she
was a good wrestler. One of the things that annoyed

(01:35:52):
me on the way out where I talk about politics
is it wasn't lost on me.

Speaker 4 (01:35:55):
She wasn't the reason the ratings were where it was at.

Speaker 5 (01:35:58):
But the fact that Mickey got replaced by the Undertaker's
wife who's claimed to fame in wrestling was basically she
was there. I mean, Lake Cool was the group. It
wasn't Michelle just on her own. But again, you have
to present some people in a certain light, otherwise they're
not going to get any chance to shoe it. I

(01:36:18):
like the fact that Oscar and Mickey James or wrestlers
that shine a light on other people to make wrestling
awesome and amazing while also letting in their greatness speak
for themselves.

Speaker 4 (01:36:29):
Rich, thank you, oh, thank you, Wade as all yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:36:32):
Fun, fun show.

Speaker 1 (01:36:33):
Appreciate everybody listening, and I'll be buying tomorrow night after Dynamite.
So join us live on YouTube Channet the People Who
Torch channel, and if not, you can download the show
of course on the Way Teller Part Slaying. Post show
feed and Rich, have a great rest of your weekend.
We'll circle back and talk soon.

Speaker 4 (01:36:49):
Sounds good, excellent.

Speaker 1 (01:37:07):
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