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August 29, 2023 • 107 mins
PWTorch editor Wade Keller presents the Tuesday Flagship edition of the Wade Keller Pro Wrestling Podcast with guest co-host Nick Hausman of the Haus of Wrestling. They discuss these topics:
  • C.M. Punk-Jack Perry backstage incident and ramifications
  • Preview of WWE Fastlane
  • State of AEW All Out with a thin line-up and maybe no Punk in Chicago
  • Bray Wyatt's legacy
  • John Cena's returning, but what will he do?
  • MJF vs. Adam Cole and where it goes from here
  • Effy seeking Dennis Rodman


Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/wade-keller-pro-wrestling-podcast--3076978/support.
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Transcript

Episode Transcript

Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
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(02:13):
Wade fifty to get fifty percent off. Now PW Torchens Freaker bring you the
Wade Killer Pro Wrestling Podcast. It'stime for the weekly flagship talking current events

(02:37):
in pro wrestling. Nick, we'regonna talk all in, but we have
another pay per view here, allOut, coming up in less than a
week, five days to be precise. And I'm wondering if Cempunk is going
to be on the show. Whatdo you think? I'm very much leaning

(02:59):
in the direction of he's not.It doesn't look like it, does it.
Well, there's there's an investigation goingon and maybe Punk is cleared of
all issues, or maybe like withWWE, when wrestlers would get suspended for
drug violation, they would finish theiradvertise states because you don't want to let
the fans down. So maybe maybeTony Kahn says in a public statement that

(03:23):
due to an incident at all insee him, Punk will be suspended as
of this Monday, but in orderto not let down his fans who bought
tickets and anticipation being on the show, He'll be on it. I mean,
how would you feel about that?I'm actually I started being facetious,
but it has been done before,the argument of we don't want to let
fans down by suspending someone. Ifif he came in, did a match

(03:43):
and left, would that be palatablegiven the nature of the suspension, which
is just something that happens a lotin wrestling, wrestlers getting in fights.
So you know, I know Santanna'sfrustrated by people talking about it. He
posts that on Twitter, but youknow he's not frustrated with Jack Perry for
instigating it, or you know,Punk for being in the vicinity of Perry
and not just turning his back andwalking away. He's mad at people being

(04:06):
interested in it. But frankly,he's got a point. It does happen
a lot, and I mean,I couldn't see Tony knoing, Hey,
this wasn't a suspension because he drovedrunk or pulled a gun on somebody or
you know, it's like it isjust a backstage thing and we want to
discipline them, but we don't wantto let the fans down. I started
being facetious. No, I'm startingto think maybe that would be the right

(04:27):
approach to take, given that thiswasn't that big of a deal. It
was more just sort of the accumulationof things. Well, I think this
suspension is an interesting move because Idon't really know that seam punk like wants
to be in or around a Wat the moment. You know, usually
a suspension as a punishment, rightif the guy doesn't want to be there.

(04:48):
You're kind of trying to get aheadof it a little bit. It
would seem to me by saying thisguy's not here because we don't want him
here, And I don't know thatthat's one hundred percent the case in this
situation, right, So is thatyour is that your reporting or sorts of
saying Punk actually at this point wouldrather not be in a W at all,
or would like some time away untilsome things are addressed like I don't

(05:09):
put some context around that. Iknow. I mean, like I said,
and in my initial report, youknow, I think it's his future
in a w and in pro wrestling. It is very questionable right now.
You know, this thing has justdragged on and on and on, and
you know it's not just like verbalsparring. You know, you show up

(05:30):
and you know you're multiple physical altercations. It's just you know, it all
just it can it can there's abreaking point at some point, the straw
that broke the camel's back. Now, whether or not we're completely there,
I mean, there's a couple ofdays to try to make something work,

(05:50):
I guess, but I there arepeople that don't want Punk there, and
I think I think that the wellmaybe Poy isn't at the moment. I
don't know that Punk wants to bethere at the moment. You know.
So the suspension is kind of irrelevantto me. It's more just kind of,
ah, okay, well this iswhy this guy's not here. He's

(06:11):
suspended. Okay, cool, youknow, but even if he wasn't suspended,
I'd still put his datus for allout kind of up in the air
at the moment. Yeah, yeah, I mean he has he has a
history of not one if he doesn'tif he's not having fun, or he's
you know, mentally and physically brokendown, And in this case it is
probably just mentally frustrated, although physicallymight be broken down too. I mean
at his age, getting back intothe wrestling game, but taking some taking

(06:33):
whatever samo Joe dishes out. Notthat samo Joe's got a rep for being
overly stiff in a reckless way,you know, and like, well,
I won't list the names, butbut you know that's got to hurt the
next day. It's my point,So you know what I mean, He
has a history of going, hey, if it's not fun, I don't
want part of this. But Ibet he still wants the money. Yeah,
I mean, but he's got alot of money. I think the
reason he's was caught ride in thattrain is because he's thrifty. That's the

(06:59):
funny. Doesn't drink right, doesn'tdrink, lives in a he's got the
same condo. I think he's gota I think he's got his condo in
Chicago. I think he's another housein LA Because he's trying to get the
Hollywood thing going on now. Butreally, like he rides a bicycle around
the city. I know that muchbecause he's puts spotting around all the time.
Right, guys got lots of money. Itematt doesn't have any kids,
right, he pays lawyers. Yeah, but I don't think he likes I

(07:24):
don't think I think that him.Actually, I actually think that him appearing
and coming back and playing ball asmuch as he has is because he doesn't
want to spend money on lawyers,right, I mean, why would you
want to Why would you want tocontinue to go through litigation, pay lawyers,
spend your days in courtrooms when youcould just say, effort, let's

(07:46):
just try, let's just see howit goes, right, And I think
that's kind of how we've gotten tothis point. Is I think there's like
an aversion to one he just spendmoney on lawyers, Like that's where the
guy keeps showing up, right.So well, Also, I mean I'll
throw in the Chicago Blackhawks season.It's starting in what two months less six

(08:07):
weeks something like that, you know, training camp in about a month.
You have I have no idea,Wade. If you follow hockey, it's
your But if you follow seamp Punk'scareer. I mean, you've got to
brush up on the Blackhawks in orderto have full context of Here's here's the
people. People have a lot ofpeople seem to put Punk and Eye in

(08:28):
a lot of conversation recently. Ican't think of two people that probably are
more opposite. Like I smoke weed, I drink craft beer. I listened
to Jimmy Buffett and classic country music. I don't think that I could ever
sit and hang out with Punk inany setting for a prolonged period of time,
just to be very clear about that. So no, I know,
I I throw the Chicago black Hawksthing in there because I could imagine it

(08:52):
not being a zero factory and whetherhe wants to keep doing this. Not
that Blackhawks are expected as far asI don't have a great season, but
I'm not sure. So back onon a more serious track though, sure
the I feel like this story isa lot about seem Punk and not enough
about Jack Perry. I thought thatwas incredibly immature, bad judgment on Jack

(09:16):
Perry's part live on pay per viewto say that, and I was I
was taken back a little bit bySantana, you know, saying why do
you guys care, because you know, if we take a couple of steps
back Jack Perry. And then Ireported yesterday at putwarch dot com that Jack
Perry, from multiple people I talkedto, was expected to be quote punished
more that they were basically managed themmore angry at him, and he is

(09:39):
more expendable, and he they mightwant to make an example out of him
because he did instigate this. Itis not He of course has knowledge that
Punk doesn't let this stuff go.Other wrestlers would just go out that guy's
in eight I'll pay him back inyou know, four months, and away
he'll never know. You know.With Punk, it's like I gotta if
I see this guy and he getsin my face, I'm not going to

(10:00):
turn around and walk away, I'mgonna I'm it's I'm gonna get in his
face too, and we're gonna havea discussion and maybe a fight. So
Perry knows that's Punk's approach to thistype of situation and he doesn't let things
go and move on. So thatwas to me. If I'm Tony Conn
and I saw that, and myfirst reaction right in the report live on

(10:20):
Peel your Torch dot com Sunday afternoonwas Oh, this is gonna be really
good for locker room harmony. Imean, you know that was going to
turn into an issue. My jobwas just dropped. And I don't I
mean, what do you sense?Do you sense people are talking enough about
Jack Perry instigating this? It's alwaysabout Punk, right, because he's like
the bigger star. Arnold Schwarzenegger gota fight with Rory Culkin. You know,

(10:43):
no offense to Rory Culkin. Actuallybecause of succession. I think Rory
would be succession he is, Butagain, oh is he the one show?
It's Schwarzenegger baby, all right?Nineteen ninety. Hey, I'm just
saying anyway, as Accession fan,you should have chosen a better example.
I'd care much more about Roy whatever. Dude, all right, they are

(11:05):
not on the same planet. They'renot on the same planet Hollywood as each
other. But people can go nuts. People go in the comments section if
they want about that. Look.I agree. I think it is a
very interesting and valid point where you'remaking about people not looking at Jack in
the same light as Punk. AndI do think there is the kind of
celebrity factor there about who looks atwhat? But you know, I've I've

(11:28):
seen a lot of people compare theJack Lyne and the Hangman at a Page
line the Pegwarmer line that Punk made, and they're like, oh, well,
if he's gonna instigate, this guy'sgonna instigate. And I do think
there's like some differences here if we'regonna since we're having a new show,
let's get into the nuance, rightfor sure, like Punk improvised it would

(11:50):
appear this hangman Page line. Imean, at least that's what he says,
but he obviously had thought of somekind of joke that he didn't land
Like whatever he was saying was somethingI think that he had thought about,
and whatever it came out wrong.So improvised line allegedly right that he makes
on the cuff, realizes it landedwrong and goes in the back, gets
out his phone, text hangman AdamPage and apologize us. Now we it's

(12:13):
been reported me elsewhere. This thisapology happen, right, And we don't
know if Page ever got back tohim or not, but we do know
that Punk certainly didn't make this line. Not apologize and then get weird around
Adam Page. The next time theysaw each other, right, or vice
versa for that matter. In thissituation, we have somebody who seems to

(12:37):
have absolutely planned this line right,look right to the camera after smacking the
real glass, which I'm sure hefought for, to say this one specific
thing right, then goes in theback unrepentant. No not hey man,
you know what spur the moment.I shouldn't have gotten hot with you the

(12:58):
way I did out sounds like hewalked into gorilla position where Punk was supposed
to be and walked weirdly near him, making Punk and everyone very uncomfortable,
and things just escalated from there.And that the way that those two situations
played out, the Pegwarmer line versusthe real glass crimea river situation, I

(13:22):
don't think they're the same. Theywere handled very differently, and it's just
it's the bigger issue here is therefrain of punk news where everybody just starts
to lump everything together, everything becomesthe same in one way or another.
And this is such a complicated situationwhere not everybody is totally right or wrong.

(13:45):
But I just think it's the repetitionof punk news where everything just starts
to kind of be pro or againstwhatever camp I guess you've picked at this
side in the point that we're at. Yeah, no, we'll put thank
you for subscribing to the Wade KellerPro Wrestling podcast and Wade Keller Pro Wrestling
post shows. Don't forget we gota whole lineup of other shows called the

(14:05):
pw torch Daily Casts. It's free. Just search pw torch in your podcast
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search pw torch in your podcast staffor check out links to the latest shows
at our main website, pwtorch dotcom. I think you know Jack Perry

(14:30):
is somebody who went on television andmade fun of cauliflower ears on Kyla Riley.
I believe it was. And Iwas just like Paul him forward,
like do you understand how you earnthose through time on the math through wrestling?
And he thought it was something tomock instead of like a badge of
honor within his own community. Imean, he's put his foot in his
mouth multiple times, and you knowhe's he's quote a young kid in his

(14:54):
you know what, mid twenties.Uh so you know, some people are
like, well, you gotta givehim more slack, Okay, I actually
I think there's something a little somethingtoo that relative to see on Punk,
A guy in his mid forties who'veseen it all, understands that he has
now been seen as somebody who canbe easily poked and prodded into reacting.
And when if you're if his obligateobligation, if if his goal is harmony,

(15:20):
and I reported last month, youknow if the first four weeks on
Collision were good, because he verystrategically and deliberately, sometimes controversially, said
here's the people I don't want aroundCollision because I want to enjoy my job.
I don't want people around who aregoing to going to cause problems.
He's trying to create a peaceful environment, sometimes in a controversial way with some
of his choices, but still that'shis goal. He knows that there are

(15:43):
people who know, who know strategicallyand set out to set him off.
There does come a point in responsibilitywhen you're the top paid guy or one
of the top paid guys, dependingon Kenny of the buck, steals now
to turn the other cheek, towalk away from situations, even when someone
is walking oddly close to you ortrying to instigate you because you're a locker

(16:07):
room leader, because you're a veteran, and because you frankly have a history
including that meltown a year ago duringthe media Q and A that took a
lot of attention away from things oversomething that happened months earlier. So that's
where you know, when you sayit's nuance. There's playing to go around.
Yes there is, But I thinkPunk is getting his fair share of
criticism. I just don't think JackPerry is from what I'm hearing. You

(16:27):
know, the people I'm talked toan Awa are like, well, Pump
should have walked away, and I'mlike, yes, yes, but the
lead set should be Jack Perry shouldn'thave said what he said that that started
this all. Why was Jack Perryand Gorilla? Well, he didn't just
finish his match and Punk was juststarting his. So I mean, it's
not like his match was an hourearlier. They were back to back matches,
but there was a video package inbetween. So I'm I'm again I'm

(16:48):
sitting here saying Perry does there's moremore more attention than he's getting. I
don't need to push back against yours. Yes, you're right. Why why
did management let Jack Perry be anywhereother than in his locker room to keep
him and Punk away? I mean, if I'm told, yeah, right,
yeah, Like you just saw theline, right, You're like,
it's Punk standing right there. AndI the way it has been related to
me, and it's interesting you framedit as the matches that just happened,

(17:11):
because the way it was drammed tome is not that they were like ships
passing in the night. It waslike Punk has in Gorilla and then Perry
like re entered the Gorilla area.Right, So again, Nuance, I
don't know exactly what's right. Neitherof us were in the room, you
know. And I what we foundin this situation real quick, a little
aside here is we're finding going backto last year at all in we're gonna

(17:33):
get sides of the story, andit's pretty clear from the reporting which side
is which camp is feeding information becauseyou can have he he pie faced me,
No, he shoved me. Youknow, like everything is just every
every all the details are the sameexcept who started it. And so when
it comes to exactly what happened,I think that's why Tonakh wants an internal

(17:55):
investigation, find a neutral party tosay, all right, this is the
spin from this camp. This isa spin from this camp. People remember
things differently too. What do wehave in terms of neutral observers saying happened?
And so because you're we're clearly gettingsourcing where each side is trying to
make the other look bad and havethat end up in headlines on websites.
Well, I think if you actuallyread my report, a lot of people

(18:17):
were surprised that, you know,in my reporting, first contact from what
I say, came from Punk pushingPerry right, or pie face as others
have said, subscribed to me asa shove. And but I don't trust
that. I don't accurately, bythe way, this is what a firm
was for. This is not thefirst time I've heard of a pie facing
situation backstage, daw and it's theweirdest phrase anyway, pie facing. So

(18:44):
the first I think there was thefirst Chevy. Probably I think Punk was
the one to say something to Perryfirst, after Perry was like in his
space, right, But again,kind of going back to the point of
like, why were these two guyseven around each other anyway, right,
Like there was tons of time timebetween the line Perry said into the camera

(19:04):
about the glass, to go,oh, we should let's just make sure
for the sake of everything, let'sjust keep those two apart, you know,
because that this could be something.Right, How nobody thought of that?
Right? It is a little oddto me because I go back to
the AW all in or all allout, all out incident last year,

(19:26):
Wade, where we had Wade,I love seeing your name, where we
had where we had people higher upin AW walking the young Bucks and Kenny
Omega and these people to see thempunks locker room right, not like these
guys went on their own. Therewas like I don't know if I'd describe

(19:48):
it as management, but like veryinfluential, high ranking people. I get
in trouble these days when I referto people who are management at AW because
I guess Tony is management and veryup grabs well as you can pile in
there, and you know, howhow is it that in these two situations
there's so obviously like reason for securitymanagement to come in and be like,

(20:15):
all right, well, hey thiscould be a situation. Even if it's
not. I think it's probably forthe best that we keep them apart for
the time being, right, Idon't want to get that. I don't
understand it. I just scrolled throughthe pay per view line up of all
the wrestlers on the show, andI'm like, who would be that person
that Tony conon headset would tell,would say, hey, you, you
and you escort Perry to his lockerroom. You you, and you tell

(20:36):
Punk to stay back until Perry getsin his locker room. We don't want
a story here, Like, Idon't know who that leader is on this
lineup of wrestlers, Like is BillyGunn neutral enough to do that? What
agent or producer or coach has hassort of the the respect of Perry and
Punk enough to be the one tokind of make sure they don't cross paths?
Like there is sort of a voidof that sort of locker room enforcer.

(21:00):
It's not staying you know, that'snot his thing. And you wrote
about this in your report, younoting how h you know, people feel
like Tony has kind of allowed thisenvironment to foster where people feel like they
can say things that are like shootingon people on live TV, right,
where there's kind of a wild westednessabout what's going on in AW at the

(21:22):
moment, who can be the fastestdraw and running the other person or the
okay, corral, it it isit is, uh, you know,
I just it's a it's a refrain. You know. I hear a lot
about lack of communication, attempts atcommunication that don't go how people are expecting,
and I I'm just a little I'ma little confused about you know.

(21:45):
I can usually kind of make somesense of how we got to a certain
point or what what you know,AW or Tony's you know, trying to
make happen in this situation, butI'm really at a loss right now.
People seemed pretty genuinely on edge andupset, and I hate to say untenable,
but I do not I do notforesee a situation where the elite and

(22:10):
see him Punk are at a tableanytime soon and this situation gets any less
edgy. Okay, that you broughtup a great point. People talk about
all we need to do is getthese people in the room, have Tony
Kahn mediate and set the ground rulesand hash it out. What you're saying
see on sounds to match what I'vepicked up on and concluded myself, which

(22:30):
is there's no amount of discussion ormediation, even a professional mediator who I
think can get Punk and his teamhis camp generically speaking, and the anti
punk or the elite camp on thesame page. And but but the other
problem is I don't think Tony Khanhas shown interest in doing that. But

(22:52):
I say that with limited information becauseit's not like he's told me that.
It's just more the end result.And I mean I talked enough people where
it's like, oh, Tony's reallytried, Like I haven't heard that from
anybody, and I think they wouldsay that if that was a case.
I just don't. And this isn'treally an indictment of Tony other than he
should have by now hired somebody whois interested in that kind of thing,
who would have that kind of authorityand stop them out. But it doesn't

(23:14):
seem to be what Tony's interested in. Tony wants to book dream cards,
and he wants to succeed and makehis dad proud, and he wants big
crowds enjoying a product that he creates, and that those are great traits not
every risking promoter has. Although itchecks all those boxes and those are good
boxes to check. But another thingyou need, if it's not your passion,
is some sort of person who's goodat locker room politics management. And

(23:41):
it just doesn't seem well, it'spretty clear that's not something he's skilled that
or necessarily even interested in doing,and that is growing into a problem.
Now, maybe you subtract seem Punkand from the equation, or see Punk
subtracts himself as you're framing things mightbe more of the case, and maybe
things settle down quite a bit,you know, I mean, but it
isn't an issue, and maybe tkIS is taking inventory on that possibility at

(24:03):
this point in the pros and cons. I mean, you know, Collision
ratings have been good for Saturday Night, but Punk's not breaking records. I
think I think the curiosity over Punkand the passion for him to be back
on TV and the him being destinationappointment television is not the case. I
think Tony sees that it would hurtto lose Punk, but it wouldn't devastate
the company at this point. Yeah, I think that there's the big elephant

(24:29):
in the room. Four days ago, he was in the Hollywood Reporter talking
all things a w business, andhe noted in The Hollywood Reporter that they
are about to get into TV rightsrenewal fees with Warner Brothers Discovery, which
is an update for everybody. Thosearen't done yet, right, Tony does
not know how much money he's goingto be getting from Warner Brothers Discovery yet

(24:51):
for the next round of TV rights. I don't think he wants to lose
anybody of val you until that inkis dry. Not the Punk, not
the Bucks for obvious reasons, incomparisons to Cody, not see him punk,
because he's such a draw on Saturdaysand in general brings a lot of
cloud to the company. I havea hunch, just a hunch, that

(25:17):
when Tony gets that bag of money, this could all change very very very
very quickly. Right. I thinkpeople who may want to get out could
be let out. I think peoplewho want to move moved around, or
maybe a hammer gets put down.But I think once that deal goes through,
that is when we could we couldsee reform. But until then,

(25:37):
he's in a situation where he's justtrying to get through the night. Wait
right, yeah, Oh, he'sjust trying trying. Like again, I
always try to look at things like, go, why is this happening?
Why is it this way? Andall I can convince myself of in this
moment is this guy just doesn't wantto lose anything that is to take value

(26:00):
away from this company while he isin those negotiations. Gary, that's it.
Yeah. And then and then ina way, and in a way,
it gives the it gives the leverage. Yeah, And like that's why
these guys get away whatever they want, because they're like, dude, if
you don't play ball my way,I'm out go get your own bag.
And that's not just one or twopeople, that's like a couple of people

(26:23):
in the company with Cloud. Yeah. Though that context is important and and
it it does point to the possibilitythat wants a new TV deal is signed,
a different Tony Khan emerges, anempowered Tony kh emerges with a TV
deal. Now, if a TVexecutives are listening to this and they're going,
oh, wait, he We're gonnapay him a bunch of money,
and then he's gonna get rid ofsome of the top names that we believe

(26:45):
are part of the product that we'repaying for. That they may not like
that, but you know, whatever, I mean that's that's they're probably not.
I'm just reading the tea leaves.Yeah, my job is to look
at My job is to look atand stay engaged with what what is going
on in pro wrestling every day.And I mean, I'm not saying that
Tony's gonna like let people go orcut ties or immediately, you know,

(27:07):
not deliver on what hescoverse things.He'll take chances, he'll he'll be more
of an enforcer with the risk beingwrestlers will push back, is what you're
saying, Like he has to bea little more meat in order to try
to get from point A to pointB of a done deal, correct,
right, I just think on theother side of the deal, he might
take a little less crap. Yep, you know, just a prediction.

(27:32):
Yep. VP sale Alert we're runninga sale going into all in and all
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(27:53):
not work on Patreon, and youhave a choice between three coupon codes.
If you think MGF is going tocome out of all as a heal,
use coupon code MJF. If youthink Adam Cole is going to come out
of the all in event as aheel, choose coupon code Coal Cli.
But if you think they're going toremain friends coming out of All In,
then use coupon code Friends. Sothe choices are MJFF, Friends or Coal,

(28:18):
And when you enter that coupon code, it'll activate nine dollars off one
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(28:40):
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Conversation VAP exclusive with Sean Waltman thisweek talking about Terry Funk, who he
wrestled ten years ago by the way, at an indie show and also was

(29:03):
on shows with him early in hiscareer and grew up a fan of his.
So again, that's pwtorch dot com. Slash go viip and then enter
coupon code MJF if you think he'sturning heel, Cole if you think he's
turning heel, or friends if youthink they stay friends. Right, let's
pause, Let's introduce ourselves. Weredeep into the show here, but we'll

(29:25):
let people know who we are andwhat we're doing here. This is the
Wade Keller Pro Wrestling Podcast, theTuesday flagship for August twenty nine, twenty
twenty three. I'm Wade Keller,editor, publisher and founder of the long
running Pro Wrestling Torch weekly newsletter andthe website pewtorch dot com with news,
live TV and pay preview coverage,special features, editorials, flashbacks, and
more. Check it out pwtorch dotCom and the host of various podcasts,

(29:48):
including the wad Keller Prosing Post showsfollowing rot Donham It's Smacked on a Collision
And those are our red logo shows, and then this our blue Logo show
featuring our flagship interviews and flashbacks andmore. And the other voice you here
on the show is Nick Houseman.He is of the House of Wrestling.
He is a veteran wrestling writer andreporter. He has now ventured off onto

(30:10):
his own, establishing his own brandand reporting scoops throughout the week. Nick,
welcome, thank you, Wade wowplug veteran. Yes, you are
god you you've you've ever you hostedthe Sean Waltman podcast for a while.
I did you have interviewed uh manyapprosing's top names. So Nick, seriously

(30:33):
tell people how they can read andhear and see more of your reporting.
Tell people what you're up to.Absolutely. House of Wrestling dot Com h
Aus of Wrestling dot com through theweek, throughout the week. Yeah,
we tried to drop some scoops therefor you all to take in. We
all do a lot of exclusive interviews. We've got stuff up all the time.
I'm always out on site at events, a lot of events. I

(30:53):
was just in uh, I wasjust at SummerSlam this past summer, I
was at in Money in the bankin London. I don't want to do
lond twice aid to pick one.I usually get more interviews from WWE.
That's the only reason I didn't goto all in. There you go,
But no, we have lots ofon site coverage, lots of interview coverage,
lot of backstage scoops. We dopodcasts, we do videos, and
we did yesterday wait, the mosttraffic, most single day traffic we've ever

(31:15):
done in the history of the site. So thank you everybody out there for
supporting us. Continue to support us. And I have between one and three
huge pieces of news that I willbe making and hopefully within the next month.
So strap in. We got somecool stuff going over at a House
of Wrestling. So if it's betweenone and three, then it means it's
two big news stories. Well they'renot stories necessarily way, they are just

(31:41):
very cool things that House of Wrestlingshould be doing here between one and three,
very cool things. I'll say thatnice, nice, All right,
very good. Let's uh. Iwant to shift back to the original topic
briefly, and then I want toget to some other non seam pump Chuck
Perry news items all out with outseem Punk if that happens. First of

(32:01):
all, what do you put theodds that he's not on the show after
our initial discussion that we had beenstraight off from. And is that a
big deal for ticket buying fans ordo you think fans be okay with it?
It's not like Punk Joe. Youknow, Punk Joe happened. There's
nothing else obvious for Punk to bedoing. The MGF Adam Cole storyline has

(32:22):
been extended beyond its original vision.It's not like there's this major match that
fans we're looking forward to for SamPunk. Do you think they can kind
of get away with him not beingon the show without too much backlash?
That is a great question. Thisshow was already a little behind the eight
ball with fans complaining about the lackof build on such a short notice right

(32:44):
after all in, there's really nothingon the card at the moment that just
jumps off the page and grabs you. It's like a nice episode of Dynamite
right now. Yeah, it reallyis. And that you know what is
going to happen with Punk? Youknow, I don't really know what they
had planned, but him and Maxwith their titles certainly seemed very feasible to

(33:06):
me. Yeah, it's gonna beweird. It's gonna be super weird.
You know, I don't I don'treally know. Yikes, I don't really
know, man, I don't knowwhat he's doing it next year again,
supposedly that's the plan. Yeah,yeah, dude, I don't know.
I don't get it. I mean, I think, you know, again,

(33:28):
why is this happening? I thinkTony likes the idea of stringing together.
I think if he could, hewould do fifty two big events a
year, crossed out across dynamite andpay per views. There would be some
kind of big themed event every singleweek, and he's just bouncing from one
to the next. That's the pacein which he's moving right now. Like
as frost Ringing Porters nick, wewe get to see every we watch everything

(33:52):
that's a big event. But NFLbeat writers don't watch every NFL game.
I mean some probably do, butvery few because i'd be daunting task.
It could get to the point,I mean, it has to a degree
with how much wrestling is on whereyou kind of gotta pick and choose.
You know, I'm not going topay close attention next to your impact this
week or his rampage skippable or speakthrough it later. But if he did

(34:13):
fifty, I mean, I knowyou're exaggerating to make a point, but
you're also telling the truth at thesame time. Just Tony would like to
do that because he loves, youknow, big, big, exciting wrestling
matches and big lineups. If themore events that AW does, the more
Peep fans will start picking and choosing. And I think there's going to be
some data, because Tony's a dataperson too, a metrics person, There's
gonna be some data about All Inand All Out and how many people decided

(34:37):
to choose between them. And thenyou also have you know, the paralysis
of choice where it's like, well, I only want to buy one,
I'm not sure which one I shouldbuy, And then you skip all In
because you think, ah, Idon't want to work spend Sunday afternoon in
the summer watching a show, soI'll watch Sunday night next week. And
then you see the lineup and youdon't think it's worth it, and you're
kind of frustrated he didn't watch AllIn, Like I just I think he's

(34:58):
playing with fire a little bit interms of of the pattern of wrestling fans
willing to spend their money and andspend their time watching the product when it
isn't just paste out at a ata good rate, and when you buy
an event, you feel like you'regetting the absolute best lineup that can be
given on that particular month. Yeah, and it's it's interesting because it's really
kind of it's it's very removed fromhis original vision of the company. You

(35:23):
know, the original vision of thecompany he has is four big kind of
tent pole events. Uh, theywere working towards getting a weekly TV show,
and they were telling some longer storiesin between those pay per views.
You know, there was like areal build, you know, like expectation.
Now you know it is it's somany more shows. It's longer shows

(35:44):
right the out. The length ofthe shows has gotten longer. The amount
of singles matches and just straight uptag matches is weirdly down. It's just
it's it's it depart from where heoriginally started off with. I think what
the company was supposed to look likeSports Lass Records. It's a health insurance

(36:05):
remember ever, it was gonna havehealth insurance. Wait, let's find out
we both we should we should askabout that somewhere. You know, it's
just different. It's just very differentthan where we started. And I don't
really know where we're going. Youknow. This The unfortunate thing about the
Sea Punk Jack Perry situation really isunlike previous times where I felt like something

(36:25):
happened and then Tony and Punk wouldreal quickly, you know, share a
moment and talk things out, andthen they'd move on. They fegret the
next thing to do. That thelack of from what I'm gathering, communication
between Tony and Punk is very differentthan than than these situations in the past,
and it just, you know,I haven't felt this way. I

(36:50):
left to go on a cruise toAntarctica at the beginning of December, and
I left thinking Seaapunk is done withaw I came back a month later from
the end of the world and hewas back, and I was somewhat shot.
You know, this is the firsttime since like last December, that
I felt like, yeah, thisis not right. Don't feel the same,

(37:13):
you know. I invite you toemail the show with feedback or questions
or comments. That email address isWade Keller podcast at pewtorch dot com.
That's Wade Keller podcast at pwtorch dotcom. Also welcome your feedback on Twitter.
You can follow us on Twitter atPW Torch and follow me at the
Wade Keller. That's at PW Torchand at the Wade Keller. Well,

(37:39):
the communication in Punk and Tony Kahnis not where it once was. And
I don't know if that's well,they're overseas, it's you know, it's
it's just it's a super stressful weekor Tony Kahn's getting frustrated with with Punk
and not just him exclusively, butthat you know, he's sort of ice.
You know, he has a repfor you know, he'll i people

(38:00):
if he gets mad at them withPunk Keys. I don't know if the
coddle is a word, but hewas a big fan of Sam Punk and
you know, and it's it shouldbe. Top stars get treated differently than
mid card and lower card wrests aresame thing on a football team, in
the star quarterback gets more attention forthe coach and management than than the third
string quarterback or a backup lineman.But that might be changing. Sean ross
Stapp's reporting that that Sampunk has notis saying he has not been informed he's

(38:22):
been suspended. Do you know anythingabout the communication between Khan and Punk and
if that if there's signs of therelationship being strained and communication breaking down compared
to the past where you say they'veshared moments in the past. Yeah,
I did not know Sean and reportedthat. I can confirm that. I

(38:43):
what did Sean say? Can youread it back to me? What Sean's
reporting? Yep, So his tweetis we're told that as of now,
Sampunk has not been informed of asuspension by a AW But no word on
Jack Perry. And that's a fightI didn't want to get into. I've
heard the opposite. Okay, I'veheard. I've heard they and I very
rarely disagree with Sean. I dobelieve Punk has been informed of the suspension.

(39:05):
I don't know when that tweet wasput out. Uh so I think
that was I'll just I'll put itthat way. I think I'm under the
impression that Punk is aware of it. But uh that is not an indication
of the two sides speaking. I'llleave it. I'll put it that,
I'll put it that way. Itjust it, you know, he put

(39:28):
out the tweet twenty nine minutes agoas a part recording here. So yeah,
I mean I'm under the as oftwenty ten minutes ago, it was
under the impression Punk and his teamknew about it. I uh m hm,
I uh man. I'm trying topack gather my thoughts. I had
a thought and I got lost thinkingof the relationship between Punk and Tony Conn

(39:51):
and if that showing signs of disintegratingat all, or I don't I so,
so, you know, everybody's beenin I would think a relationship.
Unless you're a young person listening tothis who's fresh to the dating scene,
it has never been hurt. Youwill be. Everybody's been in a relationship

(40:12):
where it just doesn't it doesn't workout right, and you break up and
you know that moment, you knowwhat it feels like where you're just like,
I've tried, I really do likeyou, right, but or maybe
you don't know. Sometimes at theend of a breakup you really don't like
them, you know, but Ihave to be done here and this to

(40:34):
me with the lack of communication,and again I think that you know,
they didn't ever say Punk was suspendedafter all out I don't think they ever
said anybody was formally suspended. Idon't know that they ever confirmed that.
I think the term suspension was somethingthat the press ran with because it was
an easy way to explain their absencefrom TV, when again, the more

(40:57):
nuanced observation about that situation was theyall just were taken off of TV and
taken their belts are taken away andnot suspended. It was just kind of
a we need to figure out what'sgoing on here, and I don't know
what happened its internal investigation. Idon't really know that anything happened with this
internal investigation. Elite came back,Punk came back, There was no resolution.

(41:20):
Now we're all fighting again, rightthis to me, I don't know.
I watched a lot of ninety DayFiance. Feels kind of like the
throws of like the end of arelationship, the way that things aren't you
know. But again, I don'twant to be I don't want to overstate
things. I don't want to,you know. Again, for wrestling's very
complicated and things change, and moneything money, you know, money,

(41:42):
lawyers, whatever. It doesn't feelit doesn't feel like the two sides.
It doesn't feel like the relationship isthere like it once was. Yeah,
yeah, all right, let's let'sshift gears and talk about Bray Wyatt came
up, came out yesterday some detailson his death, that he died while
taking a nap, that it wasrelated heart condition that they believe is connected

(42:07):
to the aftermath of having COVID,and he was advised to where a defibrillator
because apparently doctors foresaw the possibility ofsome issues and at the time that he
took the nappy didn't have it on. And you know, we saw Becky
Lynch sobbing last night. I justI feel for the Raw wrestlers, you
know, SmackDown. It was verythat crew dealt with it at that moment.

(42:28):
The Raw wrestlers had, you know, the whole weekend, you know,
to talk to each other on thephone, tweet, you know,
messaging and that kind of thing.But you know, gathering for the first
time, it's it's just it's reopeningup all all the emotions. And you
could just see that coming through withBecky at the end of Raw and the
tributes to him. He was,you know, a major presence in that

(42:52):
locker room and the stories coming outand the visuals we had of him backstage,
with the smiles and the hugs andthe warmth that people felt towards him.
You can just tell this hit thislocker room hard. I mean,
Terry Funk was a legend. Hewas seventy nine years old. He had
a full career, you know,full life. We all hope to live
to one hundred and be healthy andhappy and cognizant and all that until then.
But you know, seventy nine isnot a shocking situation, especially with

(43:14):
a life he lived very white shocking, although we had some time to prepare
for possibilities. Oral reports that hehad some some you know, life threatening
health issues, and he had beenpulled from TV and had absences, So
in that sense, it's not asjarring as it could have been. But
still, that's somebody everybody was expectingto just work through his issues, come
back and have a whole other chapterof his career. It still hasn't sunk

(43:36):
in with me, and I thinkit really don't sunk in his word.
I don't think we really even know. And it's going to take a couple
of years to get a sense ofhis impact on this generation of wrestling fans
and the wrestling product. But youknow, he was not just another wrestler.
There were you know, there werestrengths and weaknesses overall in terms of
his entering wrestling, but as acreative kind of visionary wanting to do things

(44:01):
differently, and the amount of thoughtthat went into what he did was was
remarkable and it's going to He's goingto be remembered. His career is going
to be remembered and analyzed in away that a lot of wrestlers careers are
not even cut short. Nick youryour thoughts on the death of Bray a

(44:22):
huge loss right such a young age. Pushed people to present themselves differently,
thought outside the box, engaged puppetryand all this other stuff that a lot
of people would be kind of scaredto do. Butt heads with Vince McMahon
when he felt like there was bettercreative they could do everything I've heard about

(44:42):
the guy is nothing but great personally, and I mean, you know that
it's just terrible. You know,this is somebody that affected and influenced so
many people. You're gonna have wrestlersfor years talking about how Bray Wyant influenced
them or are they adapted parts ofhis move set or presentation is no homage

(45:06):
to him. I mean it's goingto go on decades. This guy's the
lasting legacy and you know, kindof like you know, a James Dean
or a Jimmy Hendrix. You know, it's it's really amazing what some people
could do in such a short periodof time. And it's a reminder to

(45:29):
appreciate and be good too, andnice to those around you and enjoy the
ride as much as you can,which I do hope that people are reflecting
on here in the Twilight of Bravespassing. Thanks for downloading today's show.
Take it to the next level witha VIP membership. Get shows like this,

(45:49):
the Wait Tiler Prosing Podcast, WaitTiler Prossing post show, and the
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(46:14):
the benefits, all the bonus contentand the ad free listening experience. Pwtorge
dot com, slash go vi ip. Brian go Werks, who worked with
Bray, told Wrestling Wrestling News CEOthat you know, he highlighted how different

(46:35):
Bray was from a lot of wrestlers. You know that that you know,
his character's goal wasn't to wear atitle around his waist necessarily, you know,
pin shoulders to the mat. Hewas doing something in a different way.
Off to the side, he said, Bray is operating on a much
different plane than everyone else. Iwould have loved to like everyone basically,
Yeah, agreed, go back,treasure the material that we do have,
the legacy that he left as faras a performer, but all these odd
pourings, the tributes that are coming, you can tell, whether you knew

(46:57):
him or you didn't know him,what a genuine human being he was above
being a performer, and he wasa remarkable performer. He was even more
valued and more loved and treasured asa human being. And I think you
know that that's a thing. It'slike you've got the human being aspect of
it, and how just devastated peopleare and then you know from us from
a distance looking at his body ofwork, there there's a lot to be
studied and and I think he wasinfluential. I think most wrestler's mindsets and

(47:23):
most promoters and booker's mindset is tonot go to the in the direction that
Bray White did with his character,which is good because it might come across
as a pale imitation or derivative orjust fail without that that dedication and vision
that bray had in his desire tokind of push in different directions what pro
wresting can be. But there aregoing to be people who study what he

(47:45):
did and incorporate asset and already havemuch certainly incorporate things that he did into
into what they do in the future. I mean, his his his influence
and likeacy might be hard to track, but it's there and it's going to
be one of those forever. Whatif you know, right there was there
was so much meat there, rightyou know? I feel bad because I

(48:08):
was at the Royal Rumble and Isaw this Mountain dew pitch black match between
Bray Wyatt and Lly Knight, andfor eight months now, I any chance
I can get have brought up howI thought that was one of the worst
matches live I've ever seen. Andnow I feel bad having said that so
many times, considering that it washis last time on television. With that,

(48:34):
with that, with that said,it was he was still very in
the throes of this return. Hewas trying things out. You know,
there were already rumors he was goingto have this faction with his brother and
others bringing these puppets to life,and you could see they were maybe slow
rolling to that. They didn't wantto do it right out of the gate.
They wanted to, you know,let it, let it tease,

(48:55):
let it play out. And wewill never know what that looks like or
would have looked like. And Ithink that's another thing people are gonna be
talking about when they talk about,you know, Wyndham, Rotunda Bray Wyatt,
is not just what he did,but what could have been. Oh
man, you know they were theywere angling here, Oh you were Cross,
They were doing anything with Cross atthe time. And man, him

(49:15):
and him and Scarlett would have benefitedso much if he was around, Like
all those kind of what if conversationsyou're gonna get just because of the void
he leaves and what people expected fromhim in the industry. Yeah, uh
tough, just a tough week,you know, between Terry Funk and Bray
Wyatt and heckt even Bob Barker.I mean I drew up watching him and
uh, I thought, you knowit was I liked that w W didn't

(49:37):
go well. You know, we'vetalked about Terry and Bray will We'll save
Bob Barker and I made Bob wasn'ta big part of WWW. But people
really liked and liked him and andunderstandably would have I think felt bad if
they didn't mention that he was thisbeloved guest host on rass. So just
a so many, so many thingswere w W WE a cover and last

(49:58):
night's Rob How do you how doyou think THEE has done in terms of
balancing this all out? You know, they delayed some things on SmackDown that
We're planned, their video packages onon Funk and Bray and last night Bob
Barker. They you know, kindof got back to business pretty quickly on
raw, transitioning you know, fromthe in memorium to send me Zane's upbeat
music and getting kind of back tobusiness. But I think for people who

(50:20):
are fans Bray White fans, TerryFunk, fans about Barker, and also
wanting to have their escape and watchWWE entertainment, which is sort of be
done at World Wresting Entertainment Entertainment.They I think WWW found a good balance.
I think they did it really tastefullyand and and I think did a
good job with their video packages representingeverybody involved. They did what they do

(50:43):
better than anybody else. Yeah,I mean the video package. I mean,
you know, you couldn't ask forsomebody to another, You could ask
for a better entity to put together. And in memorium, their team over
there is obviously just legendary and soquick and proficient and professional when it comes
to that kind of stuff. Ithought it was. I agree. I
think it was very tasteful. Idon't want to complain about it. I

(51:06):
do. I think that my expectationsfollowing the Brody Lee Tribute were maybe too
high, just because I really enjoyedhow as part of that show, literally
everything flowed into Brody, from thematches to the segments. You know,
there was a constant refrain, andit really allowed people some time to really
appreciate this man and reflect on himand think on him, and there were

(51:28):
some great moments on that show.It was jarring to me coming out of
that opener and going right into Graceand Waller Ray mystereo, just because it
didn't really have anything to do witheither Bray or Terry. But that's again,
that's nitpicky. I think you knowyou couldn't. You couldn't. I

(51:50):
mean, what are we complained?This man was appreciated, his friends were
there, they cried, they hadthe rocking chair. There was beautiful moments.
Just for me. I guess Ispoiled by the Brody Lee tribute.
I would have liked a little bitmore in some areas. Yeah, fair,
fair enough. I think they're selfaware that democacle going there. Their
goal was to entertain fans, andthat's what we're gonna do tonight in tribute

(52:12):
to them. You know, it'sa little bit of a self awareness.
You know, we are going tokind of get back to business here,
but it's we're going to frame itas doing what what Brian Terry love too.
Yeah no, and that was Imean, if you're gonna do it,
that's how you frame it, andthat's how you do it. Shit,
the show most must go on,you know kind of deal. I
guess, just kind of accepting thatand having to go along with it.
You know, it's not an easyask for everyone. I'll put it that

(52:35):
way. Every Sunday night, catchWrestling Night in America on pwtrch Dailycast dot
com, hosted by me pwtrch columnistsGreg Parks. Each week, I'll welcome
a co host from the Torch familyto discuss the big shows in pro wrestling.
Taking your calls and emails. Youcan listen live most weeks beginning at
eight pm Eastern on Sunday nights witha WWE or Impact Paper review. We

(53:00):
go on the air at the conclusionof that pay per view. You can
listen live, but of course,the full show is available for download on
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live stream link to find the nextscheduled live show link. Search Pwtorch and
Apple Podcasts or your podcast app tosubscribe the Wrestling Night in America every Sunday
pwtorch Dailycast dot com. So wetalked about the very thin lineup for All

(53:35):
Out so far. Do you thinkand I'm actually mean ask a question.
I'm going to shift to Fastling,but I actually met as this M MJF
and Adam Cole. Do you thinkall out we'll have something involving them?
And if so, what? Becausemy understanding or the impression I've been given
is what we saw Sunday with MGFand Cole was not the original tension,

(54:00):
but it's going so well. Fanslike it. The uh the ratings have
been good. You know, I'vesuspected and speculated that whatever the plan was,
this is one of those things thatthey're likely or at least possibly going
to extend further than originally planned.But that can also mess up whatever big
angle they had planned. It wasgonna gonna lead to a big grudge match

(54:22):
if there was a turn at allout, and now Tony Kahn is left
maybe without cm punk and maybe withoutan MGF versus Cole grudge match with Coal
as heel or m jeff as aheel having turned on the other that that
hurts too. What what do youthink they should do with Coal and MGFF
on Sunday night? I think we'regoing to see those r WE tag titles
NNA happen yep. I mean Idon't what else can they do? Right?

(54:45):
But is that? Who are theiropponents? And is that enough?
Is it? Is it Jericho Guavara? So they just do a quick angle
to set something up that's just asout of the blue essentially. Maybe,
Yeah, because I don't think.I don't I don't think Matt Taven and
Mike Bennett and Roderick Strong against Ohno. Oh, actually that's pretty good

(55:07):
because they did tease it at theend there. Sure, right, But
is that is that a good useof mcf and cole two wrestlers who the
aw audience has either little no orlittle familiarity with and very little investment in.
I mean, Roddy they do becausehe's spend part of the storyline.
But Bennett and Taven, I mean, they've barely been introduced to the audience.

(55:29):
Oh, I think I Tavid's great. I'm not saying they haven't been
it are both great. Oh.I actually really like this idea, but
they I mean one or two shutI don't. I don't know if I
don't know how much of it pushesthe needle. Yeah, but I like
it and it makes sense too,because like the Kingdom is you don't arguably
great Ring of Honor tag team ofall time. I mean outside of the

(55:50):
Briscos. I don't want to saythat. I'm sorry, yeah, but
they're one of They're one of thegreatest Ring of Honter tag teams of all
time. And sure throw it down. Make it all about the Kingdom,
baby, I like it. That'swhat you're selling second pay per view in
in in an eight day period ona tag team that has been barely introduced
to the modern eight e W audience, which is gigantically bigger than anything Roah

(56:15):
has ever had. You're You're you'revery much playing to win the ch audience
at that point. You would reallylike to have a month or two to
build that up more and build themup more than have them to show up
on TV and have excon explain whothey are. And I you know what,
I'm I think it's happening. I'mnot gonna I'm not saying it's I
think it is most likely. Ithink it is most likely. You pitched
it out there and I was like, yep, that makes sense. I

(56:37):
was popping that Roderick Strong was involvedin the main event of this Windley show
like a historic show. I waspopping that Maddie, Tavan and Bennett we're
in tacitly involved at the main eventas well. Yeah, they were presented
in the main event of the biggestshow of all time. Right, Sure

(56:58):
they can. They con had aheadline, they could compete. Sure,
go ahead. I am I don'tknow. I will not second your statement
that it's the biggest show of alltime. It was the most paid attended
show of all time. Whatever.Yeah, no, no, I know,
I'm just I'm just we're going toNorth Korea, all right. No,
Well that wasn't a paid that wasnot a paid audience, but it

(57:19):
was. It was a very bigshow. But I just I think,
you know, objectively speaking, there'sprobably a WrestleMania or two in a Summer
Slam or two that I'm just gonnaI'm just gonna call it a historic show.
It wasn't. Anytime I talk abouthow it is a historic show,
I get in an argument. Igot an argument with Brandon Thurston on him
and Pollock last week about it noteven really an argument. I just get
corrected and I'm really tired. We'llcorrect it on what about like, what

(57:44):
what makes the show? To hisstory, it's not the most attended.
Is it the most paid attendance?Is that what I'm supposed to say?
Yeah, well, I mean thatis. I think that's true because like,
didn't WrestleMania thirty five to eighty twothousand people and then asked it at
eighty one on or was there eightytwo thousand total? And they weren't all
best. That's the thing I think. I think Aw's contention is we're being

(58:05):
more honest with our numbers than thanw W. E is Jesus Christ.
I know, I'm so tired ofthis talking about tickets and why it's a
It was a big There was morepeople there than Summer sim ninety two,
great, very historic show. Regardless, these guys were all of them,
were all they were all a partof it. Look the main of it.

(58:27):
Picture if you were dup MJF hadhim Cole Roderick strong when he got
involved, made you feel something right, And he's the conduit and look he
ran too his buddies, Mattie Tavenand Mike Bennett, and look, Matt
has not gotten a chance to beMatt Taven nor has been it, I
know, for for what it's worth, But you don't find a pay per

(58:49):
view with people who haven't had achance to establish who they are first.
That's that's critique. I would Iwould think that they are not going to
headline. I'm looking at the cardhere right now now, I mean Omegan
talking Omega taccause she might be gettingthe might be closing the show out.
I would think Punk versus Somebody waswas. I mean, I don't even

(59:12):
I don't even know. I mean, I don't think it was. I
don't know who it could be anybody. Punk versus Somebody would be the main
event with Punk out. Well,we got we're ready to Moxley already.
Imoxley's gonna take on maybe Orange orPenta. I don't know. Man,
there's not a headline match on that. This is not a show with WIT
four headline matches. Any of themcan headline. So there's some heavy lifting

(59:34):
to be done on Wednesday. Jeffm Jeff Colt, do do uh like
love have mixed feelings about the storyline, hate it all options on the table.
What do you What do you thinkof what they've been doing and where
do you think it ultimately lands?Man, Uh, it's not for It's
not been totally for me. II don't like the vignettes they're doing with

(59:54):
They're buddy buddy like. It feelslike kind of like a sci fi level
production quality that doesn't feel big tome, kind of an adult swimish miss
to it that you have to kindof really like that niche to kind of
enjoy that tone. So I don'treally love the vignettes. I I am

(01:00:19):
someone who likes to see a definedbaby face and a defined heel facing off
in a big money match, andthat's not what this is. And I
know there are people that love mJF and Adam Cole. I don't,
I guess dislike them, you know, but I there was no are they
gonna turn it? They knock gonnaturn I guess was the sell for this

(01:00:42):
match. Then they do the preshow tag and you're like, oh,
well one of them is gonna turn. That's gonna set up the heat for
the main event. We're gonna sellit another one hundred thousand buys off of
that, And then they just hadthe match. They won the titles,
and they went along and I waslike, Okay, I don't know anybody's
plunking down. I don't know thatyou got any more money from the decision
to do that right, and Iyou know, with all that said,

(01:01:06):
the match was very entertaining. Ididn't like the first double clothesline pinfall.
I thought that was a little welltoo cute, well too cool for school
for me. But I thought everythingafter that was just ball to the wall,
great intensity. Loved the Roderick Strongstuff. I actually didn't dislike the
match, but as far as likethe pairing, the kind of vignette stuff,

(01:01:28):
some of the comedy stuff not necessarilyfor me. VP sale Alert we're
running a sale going into all Inand All Out as we conclude the summer,
and you can get nine dollars offany v IP subscription, which brings
a one month subscription down to justninety nine cents. Just go to Pwtorch
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(01:01:52):
do a Patreon membership because a couponcode does not work on Patreon, and
you have a choice between three couponcodes. If you think MJF is going
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If you think Adam Cole is goingto come out of the all in event
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(01:02:13):
So the choices are MJFF Friends orCoal And when you enter that coupon
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bring a year subscription down to ninetydollars or a one months updown to ninety
nine cents. Pwtorch dot Com slashGo VIP that will include are All In

(01:02:37):
Post Event VIP exclusive round table onSunday. It'll include the All Out Post
Event Roundtable a week from this weekend, and you can also catch up on
our VP exclusive Summer Slim round Table. Plus you get all our free shows
with the ads and plugs removed anda ton of other content. And that
also includes my forty minute Keller ConversationVAP exclusive with Sean Waltman this week talking

(01:02:58):
about Terry Funk, who he wrestledten years ago by the way at an
indie show and also was on showswith him early in his career and grew
up a fan of his. Soagain that's Pwtorch dot Com, slash go
viip and then enter coupon code MJF. If you think he's turning heel Cole
if you think he's turning heel,or friends, if you think they stay
friends. Do you think every singleidea they had to tease a turn or

(01:03:24):
a misunderstanding was utilized or do youthink they paired it down into just twenty
seven for that match? I thinkthey pays the match. Well, you
know, I thought I thought thatthe kind of I mean, if you're
gonna tell that story, right,they wanted to tell that story of two
people that started on the same pageand kind of slowly drift apart and then

(01:03:44):
get real intense and you know inthe income back together. I love story
if you will. I thought itwas very thought it was good. I
think the match is fine. Well, no, it was. It was
more than fine. I just feltthat there was at their crowd was eating
it up. So I mean,I like hesitate to be like well in
my view, but I think itcould have benefited from knocking about you know,

(01:04:09):
a small handful of some of thehints of I'm gonna turn on you.
I'm gonna turn on you. Yourback is turned. I'm having a
devious thought that I'm having to repressbecause of my nature. I think they
just did a little too much ofthat, and I thought that it had
less impact because of it. Andso that's my joking, like did they
pare it down from seventy to twentyseven or did they just go with every

(01:04:29):
idea they had and fitted in witha length of time that they had.
So anyway, I mean it's sois this is it wise to run a
storyline longer? That is somewhat polarizing? This this you know we talked about,
you know Bray, why it brokethe rule, not broke through was
but you know, thought outs outsidethe normal parameters of of you know,

(01:04:50):
face heel fight for a title.As Brian Goortz mentioned, you know,
isn't your goal to pin shoulders tothe mat. And with Bray there was
something else going on with him,With Colin m jaff it has turned into
a buddy comedy, you know,ongoing movie or series something like that of
skits. You know, to me, my pet peeve is when you know,
and I don't know how many peoplecare or think about it. But

(01:05:12):
when there's like six, you know, multiple camera angles, and you can
see that when they cut from onecamera angle to another, there's no camera
that just filmed the face of theother guys, so you know they did
this more than once. You're notjust filming something happening. Drives me nuts.
It doesn't belong on a wrest andshow. I like consistent narrative structure.
So everybody has something that they likethat bothers other people about this,
and it is. It is apolarizing storyline. My question again is where

(01:05:36):
does this land? Like? Doesdoes should m jeff and Cole both be
baby faces split off? Do youstretch this out until you've sold all the
T shirts you can and time itout to some big blowoff match in November?
After all? Where Cole does goheal and joins Roddy and and Tavan
Ben? Like? What what doyou think is the proper way to steer

(01:05:58):
this to get to an end point? I would? I mean, if
we're going along with the thought thatit's going to be Tavan and Bennett versus
Cole and MJF in a non mainevent match at all Out, I think
the obvious answer is to have AdamCole turn on MJF and reform the Kingdom
and make that an act again,which I think everybody involved would like to

(01:06:23):
do, or maybe I mean ifMac I don't know, but Pece Max
is so over right now, Iwould I you know, I know that
they're real hesitant about turning baby Face. I don't know that he's thrilled about
that idea, but he's a babyface right now and it'd be much easier
to turn Adam Cole and have himwork with the with Tavan and Bennett and
Maria for that matter. At themoment, if they do a turn Sunday,

(01:06:45):
it all out and the turn happensin a tag match, they should
have done the turn at all.In to me, not doing it,
Yeah, like new not doing theturn and not having an MGFF face Adam
Cole fending as a heel against him, do you have trying to get his
title back or you know whatever.That's a much better sell, especially in
light of the fact that Tony Khanknew several hours earlier something happened with the

(01:07:10):
Punk and it had across his mind. Am I gonna have to suspend him?
Is he gonna be? I?Mean, maybe it didn't cross his
mind because he still wrapped up inthe show. But you need a main
event for the show. You shouldhave done the turn if you're gonna do
if you're not gonna delay the turnuntil November, you should have done it
last Sunday, two days ago.I was you know again, everybody really
enjoyed the main event. It wasa very it was a story they wanted

(01:07:30):
to tell, and that they toldthat story. Well, I will argue
that you would have probably sold abunch more paper ifew buys had one of
them turned each on each other inzero hour. And maybe you think that
that would have been blowing it tooearly, but I think you could have
done the exact same end to thatshow and had done the turn on the

(01:07:53):
pre show. Yeah, okay,let's shift as I intended to do a
few minutes ago to payback and Wdodwe with a pay perty that seems to
exist in part to hurt all outsby right, although a W's doing a
good job of that on their own, as we've covered. Perhaps we'll see
what happens Wednesday and Saturday on Dynamanand Collision, But this is a show

(01:08:15):
with multiple main event possibilities first evercage match with Stratus against Becky Lynch cage
matches. I've been around long enoughthat used to be the absolute main event.
Even if there was a title matchon the show, you got Seth,
Rollins and Chinsk, which the hypehas over delivered i think compared to
expectations a few weeks ago if youtold people that would be the the you

(01:08:36):
know, major title match on thisshow. And then Kohen Sammy against Judgment
Day Judgment Days Faction that has beenthe centerpiece of Raw, and I think,
you know, with the dissension betweenour tension between Damian Priest and Finn
Balor and the money to make briefcasein the mix, and Kao and Sammy
as a popular take team, youcould headline with them, and then you
even have the women's title match AryRipley and Raquel. It's it's an ensemble

(01:09:00):
show, but it's an ensemble showwith multiple matches where you could have imagine
depending on the finish planned because thatsometimes dictates things which match closes off the
show. Ripley Rodriguez is not goingto fish the show, but I could
see Seth shinske Becky Trish or Chao, Sammy and Judgment Day again depending on
the finish of the match and howthey want to end the show. But
it is a show without Roman reignsor a bloodline match, and it isn't

(01:09:27):
an A level event. I thinkw B is willing to live with that.
What's your overall take on on wherewe are with paypack right now?
Just days away? You know,I'm kind of excited about it, you
know, I like these pay perviews that people look past, you know,
I think there's some really good matchmatchups here. I would be very
surprised if Rollins and Knockamora didn't closethe show. The Knockamora promo from everybody

(01:09:55):
I've seen in social media as avaried multi headed monster, but by and
large people seem to I think thatthat Knockamorrow, this knocka moro promo,
and the storyline of going after Rollinsback, you know, is is great.
Like this is this is some ofthe best work that Knockamore has done.
It's the best presentation that he's had. I don't believe he's gonna win,

(01:10:16):
but this has actually worked. Andyou know, with with Rain's not
on the show, this is achance to show Rollins as the main event,
and I think that for this show, this is going to be a
chance for people to show what theycan do without the bloodline around, right,
There's no bloodline distraction here. You'reeverybody's gonna be talking about knock on

(01:10:38):
Wood hopefully something coming out of thisshow that is not the bloodline, right,
and that has not been the casefor years now for pay per views.
So who's going to go out theretonight and really sell this thing?
Knockmore Rollins. I agree Lynch Stratusvery well could main event as well.
For a lot of reasons. Itmaybe should, but man, I think
theory ray mysterio, There's been alot of history there, if there's been

(01:11:01):
some build there. Again, clearlydefined heel baby Face. The fans will
be into this match. Miss LaNight clearly defined heel baby Face. Missus
promo as La Night on Raw washilarious, you know yeah, I mean,
just another home run for this guyup and now the card to find

(01:11:26):
heal baby faces, great workers,a chance from all to shine without the
bloodline around. I do think thishas a chance to be a real sleeper.
I'll give it potential slam banger statushere. You don't have to wait
for the weight Keiller Pro Wrestling postshow to find out what I thought of
Monday Night Raw and SmackDown. Eachweek, you can check out my reports

(01:11:49):
that are updated live throughout Raw andSmackDown at pwtorch dot com. My written
report we'll tell you what's happening indetail in case you missed the show,
and it will also annaly lies keysegments and give my random thoughts end quips
on what I am watching as itairs. So check it out every Monday
night and Tuesday Night at pewtorch dotcom. That also applies to WWE pay

(01:12:12):
perviews. I covered those live atpwtorch dot com with a detailed written report
with star ratings, and of courseyou can find other TV reports from other
contributors to pwtorch such as n Xt ROAH, Impact Wrestling and more.
Check it out pwtorch dot com yourfirst stop for TV and pay per view
written reports. It is a funshow when it is a little off the

(01:12:43):
radar, but the hype in thebuild over delivers. What do you think
about La night? He was youknow, the hot topic? You know
two three weeks ago, He's stillis a hot topic, but you know
it's it's it's more a little bitin the in the in the flow of
things right now than oh, youknow the pre Summer Slam. Why is
any in the world title match?Why is any world champion? They need
to go with him? What doyou think about the strategy of wwwd Miss

(01:13:08):
just go out there and shine aspotlight on the online critiques and frankly internal
behind the scenes critiques of l A. Knight and to have that become something
heels are saying it. I aminterested in comparing it to the authority on
air diminishing Daniel Bryan and that hecan't be the face of the company because

(01:13:29):
look at him. And with LAKnight they're like, now is he really
that? Is he really a star? As he just costs playing the attitude
era? Is it a mistake orbrilliant or somewhere in between to have Miss
do what he's doing, Setting asidewhether the entertainment factor has been there,
is it helping or hurting La Nightto introduce to the non social media polarized

(01:13:49):
opinion opinion opinions that La Knight maybeis just a catchphrase and a loss or
two away from fans for getting himon. Well, I how you gave
the authority the pairing with uh,the pairing with Brian Danielson or Daniel Bryan
at the time, because it wasthe miss who made that cool. If

(01:14:10):
I'm not mistakes like the missus workwith Brian Danielson is and and Brian has
talked about this like a lot overthe years, how him and miss are
very different people, but they learnedso much working from each other, right,
And I think that miss is doingit. La Knight a huge favor

(01:14:32):
here. I think that they arerunning back a lot of the Brian Danielson
stuff. The only kind of differenceI would guess I guess you could quibble
with is that you know La Knightwon the Slim Jim Battle Royal. They
fed Daniels and nothing but losses untilhe finally got a big win. But
I think this is a huge favor. I think their work together it's been

(01:14:53):
great. I think La Knight isholding his own on the stick I'm here
for. I'm trying not to judgeit. Everybody's having such a good time.
I'm with this guy and having somuch fun. I don't want to
piss anybody's parade heres, we're havinga good times great so of a respected
veteran wrestler not active in a companyright now. Not Sean Watman, who
interviewed last week about Terry Funk.Just if people are thinking, oh,

(01:15:14):
it's him, was lamenting that wrestlersand he's worked behind the you know,
behind the scenes in recent years thatwrestlers these days are all about social media
buzz. Is it entertaining in themoment and does it get a crowd pop
at the expense of big picture?Does a strong money? Does this fit
kind of the larger vision and narrativestructure of of what I'm part of,

(01:15:36):
And is this going to lead tosomething besides those sort of ephemeral sugar rush
crowd pops and reactions. And sothat's kind of my larger question with Ala
Night, is it's entertaining? WeI don't know. I don't know if
I'm ready to go back and sayeverything they did with Daniel Bryan was brilliant.
It should be and worked and shouldbe redone. I think telling the
audience Daniel Bryan sucks when the audienceloved him from that summer of Brian with

(01:15:59):
Kine was was WWB struggling with withgoing with him and trying to have these
on air counseling sessions about why youso into this guy, we're telling you
on air why you shouldn't be.I still think that that's why I brought
up the authority, because that's thepart that just seemed to go on and
on when when the fans were readyto embrace him, and W's whole program
was why look at him? SoI don't want to It's sort of like

(01:16:20):
conctent Man, greatest champ of alltime. No, that was said ironically
at the time, it was notactually anything anyone believed, but it was
said so much that a whole generationof people didn't know what said ironically,
and frankly it was absurd, andpeople started to believe that that was real.
So I don't want to frame thatDaniel Bryan thing as as the best
way to go with about maximizing DanielBryan. Obviously it wasn't a disaster.

(01:16:43):
He's landed well. But with lA Night, that's my point is should
they have interrupted the momentum of LANight and fans being behind him to do
this multi month sidebar of mis going. You understand he's not what you think
he is. He's this instead anddrawing a ton of attention to it to
try to quote recapture the so calledmagic of Miss Brian. That's what I'm
sort of struggling with, is isthis a setback for La Knight. I'm

(01:17:05):
frankly I don't think Ellen I shouldhave been pushing the main events and become
world champion. I think I actuallyam more on missus side in terms of
what they're saying about him. Butbut I don't know that you draw attention
to it. I think you wantto hide weaknesses, not highlight them.
So I'm struggling with that aspect ofit. I think I would have gone
with La Knight with a push,not at the top tier. But I

(01:17:26):
went to spend weeks telling fans you'llunderstand he's not all you think he is.
So that what do you think aboutthat deck? I just think it's
great TV. I I don't lookthat's what all they wrestlers say. It's
great TV, but it's a biggermoney drawing. I think that. On
the other side of this, Ijust don't think he's gonna give Brian Daniel
treatment it. Danielson couldn't talk likeLa Knight could. I think that a

(01:17:49):
lot of the kind of things thatkept Daniel back from getting through that period
more quickly. La Knight doesn't Lathose He has those qualities and spades.
You know. WWE tells stories,they like talkers, they like English talkers.
Right, this guy goes out thereand jaw jacts with Miss and he

(01:18:10):
doesn't He doesn't look bad, youknow. I think this is definitely a
test where they're gonna say, hey, we're gonna take the loudest argument in
the room about why you suck,prove them wrong, and if on the
other side of it they're loving youstill, we'll get on to other business.
I think that's I think that's whatthis is. And this is not
uncommon that they use MISS to dothis. Miss has been used a lot

(01:18:30):
of times, and you either makeit through and succeed or oftentimes it can
hurt you. But I don't thinkit's gonna hurt La Night. I think
he's gonna roll right through this,and I think he's gonna be great on
the other side. Need an extradose of positivity in your wrestling podcasts?
Will come join me Alan fell Overin the Progress Paradise at peut Retort VIP
as we bask on the bright sideof wrestling and focus on some of the

(01:18:54):
great matches and shows from around theworld, be at the US, Japan,
Europe or Mexican go There's always aplace for resting's past in the Paradise
too, and we've done fun historicalshows such as the We Love Liger series
celebrating the glorious career of Juician thunderLighter and our I Was there When shows
where our guests will join me totalk about a classic bout that they were

(01:19:15):
in attendance for. We love varietyand you can expect lots of it at
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(01:19:38):
or you can stream them directly fromour ad free VIP mobile site.
See you in the Paradise. I'mvery I mean to me, I'm very
much looking forward to what they dowith miss and La Knight, because I
want to see how La Knight deliversagainst somebody like miss in the rank because
La n I can talk. DanielBryan got himself over with fans not because

(01:20:02):
of catchphrases or charisma or a swaggeror promos. He got over because fans
ate up the story he told inthe ring with not once in a generation,
but top tier of his generation inring work, pulling fans in emotionally
into his matches, being a toplevel performer on the stage. In the

(01:20:23):
context that this is all about,which is trying to win a match,
hit moves, sell, make comebacks. It's what you do, the moves
that you do, what you doin between the moves. All that that
stuff is where La Night is weak. We shouldn't say all of that,
because there's stuff he does in betweenmoves in terms of posturing of the crowd
and stuff. But Bran Daniel Bryangot over because of what he did in
the ropes bell to bell, andhe was massively over beyond ww's expectations.

(01:20:49):
The knock in La Night is he'sover because of all the superfluous stuff.
A superfluous its owns more driski thanI mean, but the extra but when
the bell rings, you have tobe able to tell a story. In
the ring and is that is thatenough of a weakness that ultimately kind of
like the criticism of bray Wyatt,there was a lot of intrigue because it

(01:21:09):
was good television or fun television,compelling, you know, pulled you in.
But when the bell rang, hecouldn't tell the story in the ring
and it held him back. Ithink that is what I'm looking forward to
seeing Sunday la Knight overcome against somebodylike Miss, who I think is a
good opponent to not put Elie Nightin position to have to keep up with

(01:21:30):
a with a ricochet or a FinnBalor in terms of ring work, and
that's where Lae Knight stumbles literally,but instead tell us tell a fun story
playing off of a character. SoI think matching with Miss is smart in
that sense, even if I amnot sure hanging a lantern on La Night's
weaknesses and telling eighty percent of theaudience weren't on Twitter reading people critical of

(01:21:53):
him, telling all of them allof his weaknesses before you start pushing him
as a good idea. I mean, look, John Cena came out look
Dawst the theory of the face andsaid, you are boring. They need
to pipe crowd noise in to makeyour matches interesting. I think this is
a far cry from that, AndI was idiotic at John Cena and unbecoming

(01:22:13):
of somebody of his stature, Andpeople backstage are frustrated because Sean Cina shows
up and he's got his idea ofwhat he wants to do, and everyone's
just thank you for being here.John as opposed to this is a really
bad idea. So that bar wasset very low. You're right, this
isn't that low. That doesn't offsetmy concerns about this approach either. John
Cina, like how you're like Nick, you can't be a nihilist. You
have to feel something one way oranother here. You can't just say all

(01:22:36):
things are evil and that's the wayit is. No I respect that,
and John, I think he's had, believe it or not, has shown
a propensity for very low IQ momentsabout how this industry works, and has
gotten over despite that. Not becauseof moments like that. I think his
instincts were bad there, and Iknow from hearing from people in WB that
they were bummed out that that's thedirection that he was allowed to take,

(01:22:58):
or that he chose to take.Hey, Hey, it was certainly caught
me out guard. But it's oneof those moments. You're gonna look at
that forever, right, and theautin theory will be a success, no
doubt about it. People will lookback on this, they'll say, I
can't believe they said that to thisguy's face, right, And that's kind
of what they want, right,like the three dimensional chess that you know,

(01:23:20):
really experienced promoters or bookers or whateveryou want to call them, that
kind of like, oh, Iknow they're gonna twinge this way, and
you know it's it's difficult. It'slike dropping a bomb in a war zone,
right, you know where it's supposedto be, and you hope you
drop it at the right time andit goes right where it's supposed to be.
And that's kind of I think they'retrying to find that sweet spot right

(01:23:43):
now with La Night. They wantto land it just the right way.
They want people to feel just theright way. And usually when they are
in those situations, they call ona guy like the miss or they call
on the miss I should say elsewhereon payback Becky and Trish, what if
you thought of Trish and what shehas done? I have enjoyed her promos

(01:24:05):
more than most because I think Ihad set my expectations so low because I
think as a baby face she wasso awful on promos and I like this
sort of snide demeanor in cadence toher promos that is driving other people nuts.
I think I think this has overdeliveredon my expectations, but a lot

(01:24:28):
of people, I think most peopleare are thinking it's it's been not good
and awful and Becky should be ina different spot. What do you think
of of this match? And thentake on add on to that, what
do you think of the what doesit mean that we see uh Tiffany Stretton
in in shown on camera a coupleof times. Also, I look,
I'll over delivered in my opinion forsure. I think this is one of

(01:24:53):
the best presentations of Trish ever,just because I think she is invested in
it and you can tell she's feelingit and isn't just being told what to
do like you can tell she's participatingin this. She's getting Zoe starkover,
which is great. And I thinkthat this will be a program that will

(01:25:14):
be looked back on more favorably intime than it is looking right now ut
Tiffty Stratton. I think winner ofthe cage match. Maybe it comes down
to an XTN Tuesday Night. Maybemaybe you see Trish mixing it up with
Tiffany Stratton after she loses to Becky, which I think is very maybe reasonable

(01:25:36):
to kind of finish this whole thingup. So yeah, that's what I
think. I think the match wouldbe good and seems really excited to do
it. I know she's talked abouthow she's never done a cage match and
she's really excited about it. Giveyourself a reason to look forward to.
Go into the mailbox each week witha PW Torch newsletter paper copy. Subscription
details at pwtorch dot com slash paperCopy. It's twelve pages every week,

(01:25:58):
packed with my TV ports, alongwith exclusive features such as my cover story
on the top story of the week, our pay per view roundtable reviews from
the Torch staff, exclusive feature lengthcolumns from Greg Parks, Rich Fan,
Sean Radikin, Alan Coonahan and ZachHaydorn, Torch Talk transcripts, the latest
news, and more. Pwtorch dotcom slash paper Copy. Take a break

(01:26:20):
from screen time and settle in everyweek with a megados of wrestling news and
analysis with a Pro Wrestling Torch newsletterpaper copy edition. In the year twenty
twenty two. You can get afull year of home delivery for just ninety
nine dollars, or try us foran eight week trial subscription pwtorch dot com
slash paper copy. Do you thinkBecky should just be co centerpiece star of

(01:26:49):
whatever wrestling show that she's on andin the world title picture or do you
like that she's been on a sidebarbecause there's I think there's a value in
taking somebody you know at the samebasically three four people on top all the
time, trading world titles, andthen there's this drop off and there's this
whole other tier. Sometimes there's valuein that top star moving to the side,

(01:27:09):
letting other people established themselves. CertainlyRare Ripley has, there's been some
breathing room for the title to bethe title picture, to grow off to
the side while Becky's doing something else, and then when Becky gets reintroduced,
it feels fresh again rather than stale. I see that. I get that
approach, and Tristratus a big enoughstar of the past, intergenerational feud.
I'm for it, but I dounderstand people going they screwed up Becky.

(01:27:30):
The formulas simple stop making it socomplicated. It's like, you know the
argument John seen in Austin Theory.Just come out and don't deconstruct the character
in some medicines, just play upthat this is a rising star who is
cheating to win and to braggadocious andand play into the character aspect of it,
as opposed to trying to get thatthat sugar rush pop from breaking the

(01:27:51):
fourth while and doing meta stuff withwith With Becky, the formulas make her
a baby face and build up heelsmonths ahead of time and have her knock
them down one after another. Thewhole Cogen eighties formula and all this other
stuff is just needless complication to somebodywho is organically popular, and you don't
need to complicate your take on that. Great observations. I think it definitely

(01:28:14):
feels like they're building towards Becky andRiha Ripley at Survivor series, right,
That's why they've been building her upbusiness baby face and keeping her away from
the title picture with Riha. Ithink that this is one of the great
things about Trisian Becky is that thereis no title, right. You know,
one of the biggest arguments that we'rehaving right now and pro wrestling is
about how women should be presented inthe business right and how much representation women

(01:28:39):
get in the business. And here'sa great example of how you do not
need a title. You could taketwo women and you can have them work
together for a prolonged period of timeand make a blood feud that not just
them. They pulled the Zoe Starkinto this. You could get her over
at the same time. There's gonnabe different weeks, whether you're going to
be having them against different opponents,maybe teaing together, whatever. The same
kind of storytelling you do with men, you just do it with women.

(01:29:02):
It's crazy. And this is agreat example of how that works. And
you know you're coming out of allin last night, there's like ten matches,
twelve matches on the show, onewomen's match, one women's match less
than ten minutes long. Why you'relooking at a six match card here I'm
looking at right now, two ofthese matches are women's matches, and as

(01:29:25):
you so eloquently put, one matchthat does not have the title, that
is feeling important, and another matchthat is for a title but feels important
because they've protected that title and builta story around that title. With Ria
Ripley setting up and knocking down thesebaby faces they're throwing her way. It's
not complicated, and it's effective andit's possible. And I just think this

(01:29:45):
is, you know, for asmuch hay as people are making right now
about when women are booked poorly,I think it's fine to point out when
women are being booked pretty well.And I look at this card and I
think it looks like book pretty wellin my opinion for the show. Let's
close uh the w topic here withJohn Seeda's return. They've been hyping he'll

(01:30:05):
be around for the better part ofthe next two months, all but one
week on SmackDown he'll do his firstindie appearance. What should they do with
John Cena? Should he come inand and ruin other wrestler's momentum by deconstructing
them live on the air? Shouldshould? Should he should? Or should
he come in and try to leavethings better than when he arrived? And

(01:30:28):
if so, what is that involvedat this point? Who is the logical
opponent for him? Over on SmackDownwhere he will be up hearing well,
he's gonna tag with Seth Rollins.It looks like www. Superstar Spectacle.
I don't know if David made it. I know that they put out a
tweet announcing that, so that's official. I don't know if they explicitly said
they were against going against gender andbeer or singer or whatever, but I

(01:30:50):
would imagine that it's going to bethe case whatever. With that said,
the reason I bring that up isthey're positioning him near and around Seth Rollins,
So I think it's reasonable to thinkthat maybe he worked with Rollins a
little bit, but he's gonna beon SmackDown and Rolins is on Raw,
so oh runs backdown. He shouldcome into SmackDown and just teared on Grayson

(01:31:12):
Waller and leave him, Uh ina in a pile, in a pile
of deconstructed garden. Do you runback him in Roman? You know?
Does he get involved in the bloodlinestuff? Uh? I don't think so.
I don't think so either Waller.They've got history. I guess that
would make sense. He could dostuff with Waller. You know, it's
it's I'm gonna say what everybody says, we've seen at it turn him.

(01:31:33):
He'll right right. I mean,he's got that Hogan kind of vibe going
on right now. He's been doingthe red and yellow for twenty years.
Time to change it up. Brother. I know it's gonna really risk my
reputation, but you know, buthe won't go all though. If he
did that to go after Seth,he would do it in some you know,
halfhearted next general you know, uh, next next level way. That

(01:31:58):
would just muddy the water because hewouldn't want to really be a heel.
I don't know, man, Ithink he'd have fun with it. A
seven weeks he'll run from John Cena. Maybe at the end of it he
learns the error of his ways.I said, some dumb That sounds dumb,
but well, you agree. Nothingjumps out as like top tier obvious
opponent for him, which is whatmakes things interesting, you know. Yeah.

(01:32:20):
I just I don't nothing jumps outon that on that roster where I'm
like, oh that that's a goodfit for John to spend that many weeks
on SmackDown doing something. Yeah,yeah, for sure. I mean it's
all about what he wants to do, right, you know, like better
I mean, you know, Ido know that. You know, they
he shows he says, he showsup, They tell him who to work
with, and he does his bestto make it happen. I'm looking at

(01:32:42):
the roster here right now. Yeah, Theory aj styles Lashly sound SmackDown,
Grayson Waller makes sense, could workwith Yeah, carry a cross, I
guess got Ray there, do makemuch sense? Yeah, Roman Amos,
everythy seems want to work with Shamusthese days. Yeah, it's really no

(01:33:02):
one pops off the page to me, I know. So stay tuned,
everybody, stay tuned. All right, Dennis Rodman back on the Pro Wrestling
Radar. Nick gives some context.We'll close with this note. All right,
great, So Dennis Rodman's gonna beat Starcast. Okay. He is

(01:33:24):
obviously a member of the NWOH it'spart of the Chicago Bulls legendary. He
has also been courting controversy in recentyears, see North Korea and doing things
like that. Regardless, he's gotto be at Starcast. And there's also
gonna be another show this weekend calledBig Gay Brunch. It's hosted by Effie.
I believe it's the Grand Sports GrandSports Storium or something. Like that

(01:33:45):
out in. Hoffmann states anyway,all the information is online. Don't quote
me for gospel. Long story short, Effie wants Dennis Rodman to appear at
Big Gay Brunch. Dennis Rodman infamouslymarried himself in a wedding dress, very
flamboyant, gender bendean personality, andhe should be a big gay brunch now.

(01:34:06):
Effie put out a video saying DennisRodman's campus informed Star casts Camp that
he has no interest in appearing,but that if Effie wants to try to
contact him directly, he's willing toto plead his case. Well, the
only way he could do that wasin a video that's on his social media.
And if you want to help Effieget Dennis Rodman to Big Gay Brunch

(01:34:28):
this Saturday, go retweet that andtweet Dennis Rodman be like, hey,
Dennis Rodman, you should show upat Big Gay Brunch and be a part
of that. That's all I'm saying. Pro wrestling's weird. I love it,
man, I didn't say that aboutit. I'll be a big gay
Brunch. By the way, ifanybody's going to Big Gay Brunch, I'll

(01:34:48):
be there walking around. I knowmy Buddy Noah from Canada's gonna be in
for it, and a bunch ofpeople are gonna be there, so come
on out. It's my favorite,one of my favorite shows the year.
I love going to the big gayBrunch show in Chicago. Awesome. Well,
have fun this weekend, Nick,it was great having you on.
Everyone. Check him out at Houseof Wrestling h a U s of Wrestling

(01:35:09):
dot com and check out his podcast. Nick. It's been fun reconnecting.
Thank you very much for having meon. Wait, I had our wonderful
time chatting with you today. Wewill a lot to talk to you again
soon. Thank you to our listenersand keep spreading the work and we'll talk
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(01:37:15):
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(01:37:40):
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I have the show for you.I'm pwtwitch dot com contributor to Frank Petty
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