83 Weeks with Eric Bischoff - Episode 317: WrestleMania XL Fallout

Episode Date: April 8, 2024

On this episode of 83Weeks, Eric Bischoff and host Conrad Thompson breakdown what many are calling the "Greatest WrestleMania" of all time WrestleMania XL. Eric shares his thoughts on Cody finally closing the chapter on his story and what he expects to see next. He also talks about all the latest news and notes of everything happening in professional wrestling this past week. THE PERFECT JEAN - F*%k your khakis and get The Perfect Jean 15% off with the code 83WEEKS15 at theperfectjean.nyc/83WEEKS15 #theperfectjeanpod HENSON SHAVING - It’s time to say no to subscriptions and yes to a razor that’ll last you a lifetime. Visit HENSONSHAVING.com/BISCHOFF to pick the razor for you and use code BISCHOFF and you’ll get two years' worth of blades free with your razor–just make sure to add them to your cart. EARNIN - Download the EarnIn app today. Type in 83 WEEKS under PODCAST when you sign up. EarnIn, the most loved way to get paid as you work. FANATICS - When you - or someone you know - is shopping for the latest WWE gear, you can support 83 Weeks too simply by using our dedicated link! https://wwe-shop.sjv.io/c/5036600/1371040/16449 SAVE WITH CONRAD - Stop throwing your money on rent! Get into a house with NO MONEY DOWN and roughly the same monthly payment at https://nationsgo.com/conrad/ ADVERTISE WITH ERIC - If your business targets 25-54 year old men, there's no better place to advertise than right here with us on 83 Weeks. You've heard us do ads for some of the same companies for years...why? Because it works! And with our super targeted audience, there's very little waste. Go to https://www.podcastheat.com/advertise now and find out more about advertising with 83 Weeks. Join this channel to get access to perks: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCCqQc7Pa1u4plPXq-d1pHqQ/join BECOME A 83 WEEK MEMBER NOW: https://www.youtube.com/@83weeks/membership Get all of your 83 Weeks merchandise at https://boxofgimmicks.com/collections/83-weeks FOLLOW ALL OF OUR SOCIAL MEDIA at https://83weekslinks.com/ On AdFreeShows.com, you get early, ad-free access to more than a dozen of your favorite wrestling podcasts, starting at just $9! And now, you can enjoy the first week...completely FREE! Sign up for a free trial - and get a taste of what Ad Free Shows is all about. Start your free trial today at https://www.patreon.com/adfreeshows. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey, hey, it's Conrad Thompson, and you're listening to 83 weeks with Eric Fischoff. Eric, what's going on, man? How are you? I'm good. I'm good. Just got home from Vegas, literally 20 minutes ago. It's now 7.05 a.m. Mountain time.

We're going to crank out this podcast. and I'm going to jump back in my truck and drive back up to Billings, Montana, two-hour drive to catch a flight to Melbourne and Australia. So, come on now. You're running and gunning today. Man, it's wide open, too.

It's WrestleMania season. It feels like that more than ever as you and I are recording right now. Cody Rhodes is on Good Morning America. He is indeed the new world champion. I guess it's the Today Show. Whatever it is, the NBC affiliate. You know that Cody Rhodes is there.

with the big gold belt around his waist. Boy, this felt like the story that would never end. And it finally did in dramatic fashion. But night after we saw Jimmy and we saw Jay and we saw Solo and we saw Sina. We even saw The Freaking Undertaker. It was a special line. What was that? What was that with the?

The Undertaker's got like all of a sudden he's got a part on for Rock. That was weird. I felt like that was the stone cold spot that they didn't get to pull off. Ah, that makes sense. Okay. I mean, even the text came out the day of the show when Triple H was reporting it. He posted it at 316 and everybody online put their tinfoil hats on and the glass never broke. That's one prediction.

You and I got wrong. We both assumed given the setting we saw in Chicago a few weeks ago where the final boss was putting a beat down on Cody Rhodes and the rain. the way they framed up that tractor trailer you and I felt sure John Cena I wonder if something happened at the very end I mean that was just too perfect of a setup it was too perfect of a setup

I don't have any inside information but the rumor and innuendo was that Rock and and Austin have had more than a professional rivalry for quite a while I mean to the point where I was even told at WrestleMania 30 10 years ago Brock wasn't coming out or if If Stone Cold wasn't coming out last, he wasn't coming out sort of thing when it was

Hogan and Rock and Austin altogether. So we'll see, you know, listen, who knows what's real, who knows what's not. But I think Stone Cold was on his ranch playing with his cat when Cody Rhodes became the man. And good for him. Listen, it's rare that somebody goes away and does their thing. And he had his fun a couple years ago, I guess, with Kevin Owens. Last night was all about Cody Rhodes. You see the baby faces, specifically Randy Orton and Sammy Zane throwed him on their shoulders.

It felt very WrestleMania 10 like. They asked him at the press conference if it reminded him of when Dusty first won the world title back in 81. And he said maybe it was just a happy accident. Maybe it was just the, it was kismet. It was the cosmic timing of the way things shake out. man, it's a big exhale for Cody Rhodes. You know, he has been after this for so long. What a great story.

And now he's back. What do you make of the news that he finally finished the story as we're looking on YouTube and we see Mama Rhodes in the ring with Tiel Margaret and Cody's father-in-law Otis who just kicked out on cancer? I mean, it was a special night. Look at Michelle. She's so happy. Yes.

Cody's mom. That's so awesome. You know, I woke up this morning and one of the first thoughts of my mind is I wonder what's going through Cody's mind. I mean, trying to put myself in his shoes to imagine what it's like to feel what Cody feels, what Cody feels having finished this story. and all the things that he overcame and Andrew going back to last year and, you know, leaving AEW, coming back to WW.

The journey has been such a roller coaster, Cody over the last couple of years, and even leading right into WrestleMania when there was some doubt, probably in Cody's mind as well as the rest of us, as to whether or not he was even going to get the chance to end this story the way he had,

dreamt probably since he was a kid about ending this story. It was in doubt. It was in jeopardy. I mean, for us, maybe not internally. Maybe internally they always knew what they were going to do or what they wanted to do just weren't quite sure how they were going to get there because the tumult and all the craziness had been going on in WWE prior to rock showing up, obviously. But I just wonder what it feels like. You know, I can only imagine what it felt like. And he finally got his hand raised in front of that 75 or 77 or 72.

How many, many thousands of people were there? I would just wonder what that emotion felt. What's going through his mind today? It's got to be a little bit overwhelming, you know, when you have literally willed something into existence. I mean, he spoke this into existence. He called his shot and now WW is hotter than ever. And he's the top guy.

I mean, they in this era they made roman rains and and the the story of roman rains is going to be interesting with the benefit of hindsight because you can't tell that story without looking at the first several years where he was seemingly pushed down our throats nobody was about it he's on camera for 10 seconds with paul hayman and the audience decides they feel differently about it and they begin the bloodline story that carried us on the biggest wave of success financially the company ever had and he became a real

torchbearer for WWE in the process because I felt like the main event represented eras here you said hey what's up with the Undertaker having a heart on you know they they said right up front at the beginning of 9-1 Triple H welcomed us to the show and said

welcome to a new era and I felt like that main event showed us a few eras the Undertaker's era from the early 90s and the rock attitude era from the late 90s and early 2000 and then you know the entire john sena era was represented with john sena and then the roman era and now seemingly cody is the guy this was a stretch of the guys who are the guy and that's the reason i felt like that was

probably stone cold spot yeah you're right and and i get why for whatever reason for a variety of reasons, I'm sure. They didn't do anything with Hogan, but he did feel left out in the main event to me. Like, if this really is sort of the generations of WWE and the different eras of wrestling in WWB, like Hulk Hogan sitting in a box clapping would have been a cool visual for me. But, you know, I get the Hulk doesn't travel a bunch these days and it is what it is. No, and it was disappointing that we didn't see Hulk. It would have been a great nod because I think people definitely.

look at Hulk. Look, Hulk has overcome so much physically, mentally, emotionally, and in terms of public relations. And I think the public is finally, to a large degree, you know, accepted the fact that Hulk made a mistake, said something horrible, bad reflection on him, certainly, and around him. I think people have kind of, I don't want to say they've forgiven, or excuse me, I don't want to say they've forgotten, but I do think to a large degree they're they have forgiven and it would have been nice to see Hulk there but you pointed out and I haven't talked to him been running pretty hard myself I haven't talked to too many my guess is the travel just would have got to him he just isn't really capable of traveling a lot

he's capable of it he just doesn't want to do it it's just too hard but it would have been nice to see him there but again what a night Cody for Michelle for teal the entire family so happy for him. I would have liked to see Dustin at ringside. I put the offer out there to Tony Khan. I said, Tony, if you give Dustin the jet, let him sit at ringside, let him be there for his brothers, the end of the journey and to celebrate with the rest of the family. I said, Tony, if you let him go and you send the jet to get him there and back, I'll quit. I'll lay off you for the next month. I'll give you a month off. Won't point out anything, won't talk about anything going on fire month but clearly tony didn't take me up on the offer they just

well dustin was there in a box sitting next to uh ricky starks and a bunch of uh q t marshall and a bunch of cody's pals but i'm with you it would have been nice to have standing on camera and listen i know we're going to talk about a w at the end but it sort of taught me off guard Dustin Rhodes is getting a title shot against the AEW world champion against another Samoan with the real name Joe this Wednesday night. Irony, right? What? Coincidence?

Maybe. What? I think not. I mean, listen, I didn't know what to say. I mean, I for one, really love that story and wanted to tell that story at Rick Flair's last match about Dusty and Cody having won the NWA World Championship, but it alluded Dustin. We didn't get a chance to do that. I do think he's one of the best wrestlers to never hold the world title.

It would be a cool moment. I thought that from the beginning if he was one of the first or maybe the first AEW world champion, but hey, maybe it could happen, but boy, I just did not see that coming. I didn't see something else coming on Wednesday. Yes, we are going to talk about that, but I thought we should talk about. about WrestleMania, at least to start. We opened the show with Triple H welcoming us to a new era. This is indeed the first WrestleMania without Vince McMahon.

And believe it or not, his trainer actually posted on social media, he being Vince McMahon, about how sad it is that this is the first WrestleMania without Vince McMahon. That in and of itself is still a weird sentence, is it not? It sure is. It just, it's hard. But it was so cool on Friday, you know, to see Shane in the audience, Stephanie there. I'm very happy to see that. But yeah, it does feel strange.

And those, you know, Hall of Fame pictures that you get once you get inducted to the Hall of Fame, it's a package that they send you home with eventually. No Vince McMahon in those pictures. That's, it's, it is weird, man. It's still settling in in many ways. it was weird even in the Bray Wyatt documentary that just got released over the last week or so I had a chance to catch up and watch that and boy Vince McMahon is not in there either even the little puppet like it never happened kind of surreal you think I wonder why I mean

it doesn't I kind of understand it but does it really matter does it is it really that necessary to erase people like that even Even Chris Benoit. I mean, get it, a horrible, horrible, horrible thing happened. People died and it was about as horrible as it can get. But does erasing that history make it any better? I'm just not a big fan of a racing history of any kind. I don't think it serves a real purpose.

I don't know. What do you think? Is it necessary? I think they're all just trying to protect the stock price right now. I think, you know, eventually when this is all settled, the legal wranglings are settled and justice is served, whatever that may look like, I think eventually they'll warm back up to that idea. I think right now everybody's being careful not to celebrate Vince McMahon.

I think you can acknowledge him without celebrating him. And I think that's the double-edged sword that everybody's sort of carrying for now. that makes sense they continually showed the weather and people who sat in the crowd I was not in the crowd but I've heard from people who were in the crowd

they were stone cold frozen on Saturday night and that's the reason they were so quiet a day and night difference between the crowd vibe and feel and a lot of that was based on the weather we saw a windshield in the high 40s

and guys are running around and their underwear wrestling. We saw this a few years ago, WrestleMania 29. I guess it was 11 years ago. When are we going to learn and stop having WrestleMania is in the northeast in the winter? No shit, right? Outside in the northeast?

I mean, you don't know what you're going to get. What do you do? What if it's pouring down rain? What do you do? It's a great question. I mean, we saw it a couple of years ago. They had like a tarp over the ring and it started to just fill with water and you were just waiting on that thing to spring of leak. But yeah, I mean,

listen, I guess it's not going to be an issue in the very near future, but it sort of still shocks me that this is like a surprise. I mean, when I was asked on more than one occasion, are you going to WrestleMania? I'm like, in Philadelphia, outside. I mean, it's subject to snow. It's Philly. The first. Like a week ago, there was a blizzard in that area.

I mean, a week ago, it's threading the needle a little close. And they got earthquakes in New York now. I'm going to stay my happy ass in the South. There's absolutely no reason now to go to New York. Now you throw it in an earthquake on top of the rest of the shit show that's going on there. Wow. No reason to go to New York. Let's talk about the first match on the show.

It was Becky Lynch, the man. And she was challenging against Ria Ripley, who has just been probably the most breakout performer of this era of WWE on the lady's side. I mean, just a megastar. And she won. And I got to tell you, this kind of surprised me that Ria won. I know that she's been super hot. I know that you don't want to stop the momentum.

I get we want to keep building. But I felt like a couple of weeks ago when I saw Becky doing an interview to media promoting her book, and she was critical of the stink face spot that went viral over a house show. with Ria Ripley when Ria started commenting in regards to that criticism about Becky's daughter I thought okay kids are involved now

this is sort of the inverse of that old baby face making a promise deal the baby face is going to win that was not the case Ria Ripley won and looked like quite a star doing it we find out after the fact that Becky Lynch wrestled that match with strep throat and I guess Ria Ripley, just minutes before going through the curtain,

had a full-blown panic attack of sorts. And I'm glad we're talking about these things, and I'm glad these ladies went out and had what Jordan might have called a flu game. It was super fun. What did you think? First of all, this is news to me that Ria had a panic attack. I think that's be interesting. I can imagine it.

Wow. And Becky, having strep thrown. that's a lot of pressure you're going out there knowing you're not 100% oh it's the biggest show of the pretty cool both of these ladies i said it you know when we were talking about predictions last week going into russamia this is one that i was really looking forward to because the build for these two has been so good it just they've threaded the needle they've delivered enough action and tension all while building anticipation without over exposing the feud really, really, really well done.

I like you. I'm surprised Ria Juan. I really thought they were going to go with Becky. But Ria is she, and maybe it is because she is on such a role. And if I'm not mistaken, Becky's contract is coming up soon. So that might have been a factor. Don't know. I wouldn't think so.

Where's she going? Yeah. That's like anybody in W, especially at that level. You know, it's different if you're maybe an XT or something. sitting home for a long time and really haven't seen a lot of action. You might think in the past could be green. I don't know how anybody would think that. I mean, the money is greener and get that part.

But money and schedule would be the only two reasons. Yeah. And creative. I mean, I say who would, but I mean, let's be real. Three people just did. Sasha Banks, Will Osprey Okada. They all chose more money, lighter schedule, and maybe a little more creative freedom.

but someone who's enjoyed the amount of success Becky Lynch has that's just hard for me to imagine if anything I could see you're retiring I don't think that'll happen I mean at this point you know considering the the breakneck pace they used to carry Eric when they were doing house shows on Friday night Saturday night Sunday night and then they would do a Monday Tuesday I mean you're talking about you'd have two days home and so now it's like you got two days gone that's a that's a way different

ball game and I for one hope she doesn't retire I think she's still I know I know I love her work I love her character I think she's such a bro she carries herself so well yeah she's really a good representative of not just the women's division but WWE in general she's a very very much a class act she carries herself well interviews and they're in general public she's completely class act I hope she doesn't retire either but it's just you know with the baby and kids it kind of changes your outlook on things so well but here's the thing on that doesn't retire but yeah she'd probably get the bus and yeah and he'll help take care of the kid

and travel around the world together that's awesome too i was going to say you know you know she and set have the bus and they're making towns together so if anything her being on the road is keeping the family together that makes sense let's uh let's talk about the match itself though they had a barn burner 17 minutes and nine seconds before we clicked record last week you know you were sort of saying we're actually on the show not before I you didn't know if you would start with Becky and Ria you felt like maybe that wasn't the right way to start that is the way they started I thought it was fantastic and then we got going with a crazy tag team ladder mat and when I say

crazy it was pretty wild we would see a town down under which is Austin Theory and Grayson Waller and awesome truth which is our truth and the Miz split up the tag belts so Eric this was uh more than we expected we had not one set of the tag belts up there but two so we were going to sort of split the unified tag team titles somebody's going to be the raw tag team champion and somebody's going to be the smackdown tag team champion but it will no longer be the judgment day uh DIY Johnny Gargano and Tomasso Champa were out there doing their best DX impression new day was Kofi Kingston and Xavier Woods.

They were in there, and the New Catch Republic made a big WrestleMania debut, Pete Dunn and Tyler Bate. But 17 minutes and 21 seconds later, two 17 minute matches back to back. Our truth got a WrestleMania moment, and I for one, am here for it. That may be, aside from Cody, finishing this story and family all being there for it, I don't think that there's going to be. a feel-good moment that'll top that. But this has to be close.

People love our truth. Yes. I mean, he's just such a cool guy and an amazing athlete. I don't know how old he is, but he's up there. And to be able to continue to perform the way he does. He's such an entertaining guy. Love to see this. Love to see it.

Well, something else I know you love to see is the perfect gene. I got to tell you, we. have uh we've all struggled with this as guys right i mean the reality is the perfect gene gave us this whole script to read and i'm literally reading it word for word right now including this sentence that said my wife has tried these jeans and they're fucking awesome but this is still a script for me maybe you'll never know today's sponsor the perfect gene finally signed all of your Difficulties. They make great-looking, perfect-fitting jeans that are as comfortable as sweatpants.

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Fuck your khakis. Get the perfect gene. What a tagline. I just got an alert. Uh-oh. Reminding me that there's a solar eclipse today. How about that shit? And Cody Rhodes won at WrestleMania.

What kind of care? 18 states, 18 states. have a state of emergency because it's going to get fucking dark it gets dark every day what is the deal what are people afraid this reminds me of when in 1999

when you know people thought the planes were going to fall out of the skies and computers were going to eat themselves alive what the hell it's going to get dark for what seven minutes and it's a state of emergency see they're sending out notifications like amber alerts reminding people that it's going to get dark what's the fuck it used to get dark every day but it's a it's a brand new day you see it's

a new era of w w cody rhodes is champ it doesn't get dark anymore oh there you go it's just a new thing they're trying hey we uh we also saw a couple of philadelphia eagles do a run in we saw Lane Johnson and Jason Kelsey in their favorite Philadelphia Eagles covered Ray Mysterio inspired masks. There to put a beat down on Santos Escobar and Dominic Mysterio to save the day for our heroes, Ray Mysterio and late replacement and Trade. Boy. How much fun is Jason Kelsey having now?

It's the best retirement ever. What? I mean, I'm living vicariously through him. I'm having fun. watching him have fun what a great i never met him but i'd like to it seems like a hell of a fun guy how about and draught a front and center too i want to talk about a guy who uh man he's out a string of luck here i mean got the easy exit from a w got the big russomania or a royal rumble surprise return and it didn't look like he had big russomani plans but unfortunately uh an injury

created an opportunity. I guess that's fortunately for him. Andrade and Ray Mysterio pick up the win here. Next up we saw Lil Wayne, who was invited on Monday Night Rawl by Jay Uso to come to WrestleMania. And he performed the single worst live performance in the history of WrestleMania.

Boy, Lil Wayne, Lord bless him. It got paid, I hope. Maybe I don't. I don't know. But what followed was Jimmy versus Jay Uso. And you just knew when the bloodline story first started and these guys had some problems. This was where this story would wind up.

Brother versus Brother. Of course, last year they finished night one in the main event against Sammy and Kevin Owens. This year, it's mono-imano, brother versus brother. And boy, the internet decided that this was the worst WrestleMania match of all time. they went 11 minutes and 7 seconds and cagematch.com and the people who vote over there, I guess there's been 601 votes, gave this a 2.88 out of 10, Eric.

You know, I know that we have often given the flowers to the bloodline story and said this is the best story in history and even Kevin Sullivan has echoed that. But this was a miss. I wonder why. I don't know, right? I mean, it's not like they don't have chemistry. It's not like they're not familiar. I think the crowd being cold, like physically cold, had to be part of it.

I don't know. Compared to last year's WrestleMania, it felt less than, which is weird because we would normally think of a singles match as being the blow off, not a tag match. But I don't know. Do you think that fans, by and large, don't want to see. Jimmy versus Jay? Are they over this feud? God, I don't know.

I wouldn't imagine that, though. I just can't imagine that because it's a natural story. It happens in real life. It's a relatable story. Beed jealousy. Those other deadly sins. I want a couple more if you want. So I don't think it's a story or lack thereof.

It's, I don't know. I guess it's possible. You could be right. man, you could just have two guys that were waiting to feel the crowd, kind of let the crowd dictate a little bit what's going to happen, work with the crowd, and perhaps they didn't get any feedback, and it just threw them off.

I don't know. It's a weird one. Next up, we had a six-man tag team or six-woman tag team. Bianca Bel Air, Jake Cargill, and Naomi, pick up the win over damage control. That got a 5.4-1 rating from Cage Match Totnet off a 500. and 30 votes.

The only way, this is. Look how colorful this is. If you're watching here on 83 weeks or on YouTube with us, that's a colorful shot. Wait till you see. Talk about living your gimmick.

Holy smokes. That's awesome. Wait to you see the shots of Seth Rollins coming in. Listen, this was a big match because, you know, and we're going to hear about it in the post-match press conference

from the ladies where they talked about how important representation was. And we didn't just have one strong black female we had three Bianca Bel Air Jade Cargill and Naomi an incredible presentation I mean like the Charlie's Angels

like a superhero movie coming together I mean if all of a sudden laser beam started shooting out right now and there was a thunder clap it would make sense if you're watching along with us on YouTube and I think this is awesome I think it's awesome for both sides both our baby faces and damage control

they went eight minutes and three seconds and this is not the Ron Panty's match from years ago at WrestleMania well how things have changed right yeah I mean and look I I don't know who was the real impetus in our catalyst I should say

in WWE to make that change from eye candy and the type of provocative use of women in WWE and then

And it was the evolution. It changed. I've always been told that was a Stephanie McMahon initiative, and she was the one that was really behind it, the driving force for it. Man, what a difference a decade makes, right? I mean, the way the women are presented today and the women themselves, it's not just how they're presented. The women are stepping up their game and deliver. We're talking about Ria and Becky. I mean, phenomenal, phenomenal performances in the ring.

This isn't just like, okay, well, we've got to give the women their time, too, because, you know, equity and all that stuff, that's not it. These are phenomenal athletes that absolutely deserve to be there for no other reason than they're fucking amazing athletes. And everything else is secondary. Good as it is, progressive as it is, right as it is. It's not the reason. Reason is because they're amazingly talented performers. And I think when young girls who are, and Becky talked about this in one of her interviews last week, when she, you know, let everybody know how she felt about the sting face and all that.

And Becky was very articulate and convincing to me. She didn't come off whiny and feeling or positioning herself as some kind of victim. She talked about the fact when young girls watch wrestling, what are they going to be inspired by? What are they going to think they're going to have to do when they get into the ring? And when you see athletic, you know, Jay Cargo and Bianca, I mean, do you see the abs between those two? My God, it looked like a bodybuilding fitness contest in there. They're just such phenomenal athletes, so happy for all of them. And again, I just wonder what it's like to be Jay Cargo.

I mean, I'd like to spend like 20 minutes in her head just to see what it's like because she's so nice. He just says, she's green. The ink is still drying on her. I'm a professional wrestler card. And here she is. I think it's awesome. It just makes me happy for them. It's weird.

I really am living vicariously through it. It's awesome. Speaking of being happy for them, let's all be happy for Sammy Zane and Gunther. Oh, Sammy. Yes. My emotional favorite. I bet, I said last week.

I'm going to place an emotional bit on Sammy because he's done so well. He's given us such a look into what he's capable of doing. And I think last year he was, my opinion, you know, you never, very rarely do give the supporting cast, the star of the show. But Sammy did such an amazing job. And I think he brought Bloodline to a whole different level last year. And then he just kind of, I guess, I don't want to say faded away, but it became less significant. We didn't see a lot of Sammy for quite a while. Now he's coming back, tied up with Gable.

That's kind of a cool thing. It's an interesting dynamic between those two. But to see Sammy get his moment like this, I didn't expect it. I thought Gunther was going to get it because he's got so much momentum. Didn't make sense. Logically is what I said. It doesn't make any sense logically that Sammy will get it. There's way too many arguments why he won't.

But I still want to see it anyway and then it happened. I'm so happy for Sammy. He deserves it. how could you not be happy for sammy i thought they had the match of the night uh they went 15 minutes and 29 seconds they got 700 votes so far over on cage match and uh it got 8.51 it is the highest reviewed show or match from night one or wrestlemania and if you're watching with us right there eric see on youtube that's sammy zane hitting the brain buster uh which was a move made famous by his alter ego, if you will.

El Generico, yeah, but the idea that El Generico had a little tribute match when our tribute move, when Sammy Zane beat the longest reigning intercontinental champion in history, that's pretty wild. And it was a nice touch on his way to the ring that he ran in. to his buddy, Kevin Owens, just outside of guerrilla, a really special match, a special moment. And I know that I don't, I mean, I want to, I want this to last and be cherished a moment that Sammy got with his wife and son and, hey, that was awesome.

But I'm really ready for Chad Gable to turn on his ass now. I listen to you. Well, I mean, listen, I watch wrestling for the story and I think that's going to be a great story. I mean, they have, they have clearly been Rocky inspired. And I guess if there is one disappointment, I really wished that we would have got something with Rocky and Cody. I wanted Cody running through the streets and the gray sweats or running up the stairs or some VO from Sylvester Stallone. We heard it. There was a, there was an attempt made, but it just didn't happen. But what did happen is the main event. It's the biggest tag match in history.

It's Cody Rhodes looking to Seth Rollins of all people to take on the bloodline. Final boss and the tribal chief, The Rock and Roman Raines. It's the first time the rock has been in the ring in a long time. And it's funny because when the entrances for the main event started, I turned to my dad came over and watched with me. I turned to dad and I said, hey, if you want, we could watch an entire basketball game during the entrance. I mean, because it was 44 minutes once the bell rang.

But, of course, that's not what everybody was talking about. Everybody's talking about the fact that the rock picks up the win, so it's going to be bloodline rules, and it was clean. It was with a rock bottom and a people's elbow. 44 minutes, 34 seconds, the rock wins. Got to be the right finish. It gives you lots of storytelling opportunities. in the future, right?

That's the fun part about WrestleMania for me. Obviously, the spectacle is fun and the buildup and the stories. I mean, everything about WrestleMania is kind of amazing, really. But one of the more interesting aspects of WrestleMania is, okay, now we're setting the stage for what's going to happen the rest of the year. Not completely. I'm sure that it's not in concrete. But they have a pretty good direction, and you can see the stories getting set up now.

So we're really beginning, you know, in Act 1, in many cases, in some cases, and in seeing how those stories are going to develop. And I'm going to say this right now. I think the star of the show, I'll do respect to Cody and everybody else that performed. I think the star of the show has been creative. Oh, no doubt. Whether Paul Levick, Bruce Pritchard, you know, Ed Koski, the entire team of creative that work with those gentlemen. I think they're the stars of the show, the creative leading up to

WrestleMania, and again, going back to, especially with all the drama that we had back in January, I mean, to be able to pull it all together and write such amazing story with nuance and layers, and then to be able to, in doing so in a way so that it allows you beginning tonight, Monday Night Raw, or starting to, reveal and and track stories going into the next big really it's awesome I love it the uh he was going to turn on Sammy really 100% awesome you know he he would be a really because he's a funny guy Chad Gabel's funny be a badass heel though but yeah he's got that current angle switch

yes delph nick nemath switch could giggle and laugh make you make you have fun and then just kind of pull your arms and legs off whenever he wants to. It's a cool character. Interesting. Sammy's really good too. Sammy's a good improv. So that should be a ton of fun.

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Maybe when I was a teenager, you know, like I was 13 or 14, you get a little hair coming out here or there, and you think, oh, I'm a man, the chicks are going to dig me. It was different back then. But, you know, once you've, you know, gotten older and shaving is, you just a pain in the ass, just takes time, but I actually enjoy it. And I find myself walking around rubbing my face because it's like a baby's butt. I mean, it's so soft and smooth. And I tell Mrs. B all the time, honey, feel my face?

Just, just, yeah, feel it. Stroke it lightly. Sounds weird, right? Shouldn't be talking about that. But yeah, I look forward to shaving. And Mrs. B picked up my razor in the shower. we were in Las Vegas and we were changing rooms. And she said, honey, I'll get your stuff.

And she told me this, swear to God. She goes, I looked at that razor. I've seen it sitting around. I've never picked it up. She goes, I thought it was like really light, like plastic. She goes, that's a hell of a razor. It's got some heft to it. That's why you say, why you said,

minute you pick it up, you'll feel the difference and it gets better from there. It did get better from there. night one was behind us. The Rock had won. It was going to be bloodline rules. We saw Mama Roads at ringside. We saw the rock tripping recover. We saw a table spot. I thought this was a risky proposition. We actually talked about it last night. You had three guys expected to go back to back to back. Four if you can't, Damien Priest, I suppose. But they pulled it off and then afterwards a really fun press conference where we got

a little bit of news Triple H basically said Brock's still with us he's just at home being Brock that surprised me and I thought okay I mean listen we saw quietly

they discounted all of his merch put it all on sale and we saw quietly where he was moved off the website and then quietly put back on the website as you and I are recording the night It wouldn't surprise me if Brock popped back up. Wow. I don't know.

Just saying it wasn't surprised. We also saw before the show. You seem to have, you know what, I don't mean to interrupt your flow. Yeah. But you have this unique ability to predict things. I remember, it just came to me just now. It just came to your last week here. You think there's any chance we'll ever see the security camera footage from W?

I said, Conrad, why would, no, why would anybody do that? We'll talk about it more. But it's just, I find it fascinating how you have these little nuggets, addictions, and poof, make them true. Maybe I've just been paying too much attention. Or maybe you're, maybe I'm rubbing off on you and you're becoming present to as well. Yes.

When you say the word prescient, it's like there should be glitter in the air. Yeah. The sounds of tinkling. I dusted off the word plethora in seventh grade to the amazement of everybody, and I've never forgotten it. So whenever you dust off plethora, we have that in common too. Never told you.

Hey, the finish of night one I thought was going to play into night two. Because along the way there, before the rock hit the rock bottom and the people's elbow, he got speared by Roman reigns. So there's these little. nuggets that you assume are going to lead to something in the future. So we'll see what happens.

We should also talk about night two because we're only halfway there. And after Triple H opened the show night one, Stephanie McMahon opened it on night two. We haven't seen Stephanie in a long, long time in WWE until Friday night after Smackdown was finished. and you're having to fire up your peacock and watch the Hall of Fame. There she was seated right next to Triple H, right by Cody Rhodes, right up front.

And now she's going to open the show night two. This was surreal. I just never imagined we would see this. And here we go. I know. And here's how I feel about it. I'm happy. I know that's going to get heat, right?

Oh, yeah, but she's, you know, people are going to dig up the nonsense. And that's not nonsense. People are going to dig up the controversy and the allegations of the lawsuit. Yes, Stephanie. His name is moving in there. What did she know and who did, when did she know and all that kind of stuff? Look, it exists. It's there.

But my God, it was just good to see Stephanie there and Shane. Because we've been talking about ever since, you know, I don't really want to spend any time talking about Vince's situation, but one of the things that I think impacted me the most was how the rest of the family was impacted by it and how unfortunate, sad that they have to feel awkward in public or just carrying that around, wondering what people are thinking. And my bet is there was so much love and support around Stephanie and Shane and their families. that I imagine they both felt really, really good to be part of them.

I was, I for one, was very, very happy to see it. For Paul, for Stephanie, for shame, the respective families, I think it's, I'm very happy to see it. It's another one of those feel-good moments for me. Well, that felt pretty good that they were starting out hot on night two. Drew McIntyre and Seth Rollins go 10 minutes and 47. seconds and what a visual it was see Drew McIntyre coming to the ring with with the bagpipes

and all the swords I mean it was special and Seth Rollins not to be outdone looks like he was just a part of Willy Wonka in the chocolate factory on explosion I mean you talked about colorful this looks like a Marty Girl Parade got sick and threw up on the way there. Black, he left damage because you control in the dirt as far as color and present. Look at this. Not to be out done, right? And

Holy smokes. Yeah, listen, it was a wild presentation. That's all there is to say here. Drew gets the win. I think a lot of people had that on their bingo card. He's been doing a lot of really, really great work. That means Seth's going to go

0 and 2 at this year's WrestleMania. One of the real unsung heroes and MVP's of WWE, in my opinion, for the last year. Both of these guys. And almost immediately Drew goes over to ringside

and hugs his wife. They celebrate with the title. Then he goes and starts trolling seeing punk and sits down on the desk in front of punk where punk was doing commentary, starts talking trash to him. Punk eventually has seen enough.

Throws his feet out from underneath Drew. Drew takes a big bump. Funk starts to take off the arm brace. We're going to get some physicality. And all of a sudden that music hits and here he comes. Damien Priest after all this time finally cashes in and he does it successfully. Seven seconds later, Damien Priest is the world champion.

The former punishment Martinez. This is a guy who. a lot of people counted out a long time ago I was so happy for him the former Ring of Honor television champion now making it all the way to win one of the big belts at WrestleMania

what a great success story Damien Priest has been and it's interesting to me you know if you take a look at the presentation it's a lot of black and purple and some smart asses online had fun and tried to take away and diminish. But I'm really happy for Damian Priest.

What a cool story. What are they saying online to take away? What are they shitting on? Who's shitting on preschool right here? They're calling him bisexual Undertaker. It's not fair. It's not cool. Just hate her shit.

It's like any, it's just like it's life. You know, or you've got a small percentage of people that say stupid shit loud. and it just takes the fun out of it. I'm happy for him. And it's interesting too. Here we go.

I don't know, Drew and Punk. I mean, they have to lay the foundation for it. They've got an act one ready to go. We saw the inciting incident, which is a typical first act one requisite. We've got it now. Exciting moment. The only question now is whether punk stays healthy.

I hope so. You've done a good job with this. You set it up well before WrestleMania. And this little incident really creates the anticipation for it. Now the only question is if punk stays healthy. I don't know. Would you invest this much in Punk and McIntyre this soon, not knowing where Punk's at physically? well you're going to get you're going to get he'll be at one of the PLEs I don't know if he'll

be at the April one but he'll be at the May one got to assume and yeah I think you I think you double down if anything on punk and because I think you know punk's real draw to me has always been his microphone more so than he's a great wrestler I'm not arguing now but I'm just saying if I could watch punk wrestler I could watch him cut a promo give me the promo and but I'm that way with most guys. guys. But I would still prefer to see them build the story that way and then pay it off. So we got, you know, four, eight weeks before he's got to actually do something. But yeah, we're heavy on story. What a way to start the show title switch right away.

And then it's time for our Philadelphia street fight. It's a six-man tag team where we've got the pride, Street Profits, and Bobby Lashley. What a cool faction that is. Befab and tow there. taken on the final testament they're trying Lord bless them carrying cross has had a cool look for forever and he's changed it

a few times still looks cool every time always has a cool entrance for whatever reason he hasn't had the success in WWV and I can't put my finger on why but you told us last week hey man

watch out for this you got the authors of pain get Caring Cross Paul Illering and Scarlett all in tow really a fun presentation for the group and the match kind of was what it was. It was made more interesting I guess by seeing Bubba Ray Dudley

who I gotta say it looked a little weird tucked in referee shirt. I'm used to Bubba Ray Dudley the way we normally see him and it looks like respectfully he's on Alex Jones's bowling team here just doesn't look nearly as cool as I'm used to see in Bubba Ray look I know he doesn't have that New York street vibe does he and now there was a moment in the match where they tried to turn the volume up he had to reach into his pockets

and put on the the Dudley glasses for a big pop he did the last with the street profits it was fun for what it was. I was really happy to see bully out there. But maybe we should get him like some camo, a camo, Dudley boy inspired top. I don't know, just

the regular referee stripes. Like that's, that's too lame for bully Ray. Yeah, it's just not flattering. It's just not flattering. Put him in one of those leather cuts. Like I want the Bubba Ray bully Ray character. I don't want all it right down the middle.

Yeah, even sleeveless. You could have just cut the sleeves off that maybe. Yeah. Could have helped anything. Either way, it was fun for what it was. We wanted to send folks home happy on a special ECW night, if you will. That match was even more fun. It was presented by gin and juice, which is Snoop Dogg's new album.

So Snoop's going to wrap his way out and show off the new title and dance around in the ring. But do hilarious commentary. I mean, hilarious comments. Commentary. Give me more of Snoop on commentary. I think we first saw it with Triller like three years ago on a pay-per-view boxing mat, if you want to call it boxing. You know, I'm surprised we saw Snoop. I thought Snoop's association with WWE would have gone by the way of Mercedes Monet.

I didn't think he'd be back after she left. But I'm glad he is because he is entertaining as hell. I think he was around then, now, forever. he was around before Sasha was. I mean, this is a way to promote his album. I mean, make no mistake. Like, this was a business deal. It's all business.

All business. It was all business for L.A. Knight, too. He got his WrestleMania moment with a big win over A.J. Stiles. They went 12 minutes and 28 seconds. This was as T&A as it gets. Even the referee, former T&A.

Rudy Charles. But L.A. Knight, man, AJ Stiles, 12 minutes and 28 seconds. they got a 7.0 rating over on Cage match. Barn burner. You knew it was going to be though, right? How could it not be with those two? Especially, you know, not especially, but considering AJ and he looks freaking awesome.

He looks better than he ever has. He's probably slowed down just a little bit on some of the really crazy aerial stuff. But he's so impressive. He knew that it was going to be a great match. What tickled me, uh, is there's a segment, and I want you to go out of your way to watch this, because I know why you would have tuned out during it, Eric, but they're doing a little sponsor shout-out for Slim Jim.

They're doing more sponsorship dollars than ever before on this show. A lot of matches are sponsored individually, including L.A. Knight. I mean, he drove up in a Slim Jim car, and they've got the Slim Jim LED boards out there around the ring posts and all that jam. But at one point, they've clearly given away a bunch of stuff. slim jims to this particular section of the crowd. And the cameraman is panning the crowd, showing

all these people, yay! Celebrating that they got free meat snacks. Yay, I got a slim gym. I'm in WrestleMania. Yay! And then we get to one guy who looks like he's deep throat and a penis with this thing. And the cameraman does everything he can

to get off of this guy simulating fallatio with his slim gym. But boy, he's really getting after it. He's committed to the bit. And the cameraman is trying everything he can to get away. And I got to tell you, I watched it three times. It tickled me every time.

I know it's juvenile and it's stupid and I shouldn't care. And we should not encourage this behavior. But you're human. You're you. It's okay to laugh at silly shit. I fucking died laughing. I mean, listen, all I can do is think about that cameraman and how he's just, okay somebody's in my ear saying all right get the fucking slim gym shot all right here we go

oh shit get off the shot get off the shot that's amazing it's so stupid but so funny uh next up logan paul is going to be in a three-way dance with kevin owens and randy orton heavy on story here randy orton teasing he's working together with kevin owens and then teasing like oh but I mean I will give him an RKO and Kevin just sort of looking at him like really I mean so great what a cool moment and I even like the moment ahead of time where we saw walking through guerrilla

just like the night before where Kevin Owens was standing there waiting to well wish and all that jazz for Sammy Zane before he challenged for the Intercontinental title Sammy is here to do the same for Kevin Owens but it doesn't work for Kevin Owens because Logan Paul retains he had the prime hydration station right there at ringside he danced around with a bottle and everybody now is familiar with the gag it's like the new version of the Pete Rose gag and the chicken suitor gasware

okay who's in there this year it was not KSI it was a streamer I show speed or whatever the fuck his name is and I bet you hardly anybody knew them right well listen I don't think that the over 50 audience that watches WWE knew who he was, but those kids who were playing those games, they were very familiar. Listen, it was a fun match. I was sort of blown away

watching Logan Paul again. The new has still not worn off this for me. I get he is a believable athlete based on his height and his stature and his presentation. But even the way he moves, He's so athletic. And I just don't think that people have that perception of him.

And it feels like he exceeds expectations every time. And this is one of those. Now, granted, you can say that pretty much with any Kevin Owens or Randy Orton match. At this point, those guys are, they're into the master class level of professional wrestling. They could make a match with Eric Bischoff look pretty fucking good. But man, they did it for Logan here. Logan continues to be a maid man and pay dividends. I assume we'll see him next in Saudi Arabia.

What was this, his 12th match? Something like that, yeah. Something crazy. That's working out, right? He must live in the ring. Must like work out 10 or 12 hours a day. You don't get that. You're not born that good.

You know, professional wrestling is such a unique art form. And yes, if you have an athletic background, you know, you're probably going to pick it up faster than someone perhaps who has no athletic background, honestly, but a background as an athlete isn't going to give you the skill set at such a short period of time that we've seen on Logan Park. It's just fucking nuts. I, uh, I've been under the impression. I don't know if this is accurate or not, but I've been under the impression that he

trains these matches and works them out, move by move at times with Sean Michaels. If you're going to have somebody working with you hand at hand at the performance center or your own private ring, helping you put together and execute a pay-per-view match, can you think of anyone better to walk you

through that than Sean Michael? No, and similar styles, right? Yes. He knows it's a little bigger, but the style is very, very similar. Offence is very similar. That explains some timing. It's one of the things that made Sean, excuse me, that made Sean Michaels the caliber of performer that he was selling in his timing. Say the same thing about Randy Orton. So yeah, Logan Paul's got John Michaels for a coach

really helping him lay out his matches and focusing on those matches. That explains some of it. He's still a freak. God's sake. Let's talk a little bit about the WrestleMania moment for Bailey. We predicted this. Bailey wins against E.O. Sky. Got plenty of time to 14 minutes and 22 seconds. It got an 8.68 rating out of the vote so far.

And it's a title change. Bailey wins. What an impressive night. What an impressive moment. and I know that I said last week this is going to be her WrestleMania moment and a few people were after me saying well in 2017 she won a four-way

yeah but I'm under the impression that this one had to mean more for Bailey first of all Bailey in 2017 and Bailey in 2024 are totally different same can be said for women's wrestling and for that matter WWV but this was also a singles match and I really respect E.S. Guy

her talented in-ring performer she is. But boy, the crowd was just dead for her entrance. They were ready to see Bailey get this moment. I think we were all sort of in this together, whether she's been a heel or she's been a baby face. We were pulling for her. I was glad to see Bailey get her hand raised, Eric. Me too.

She's an amazing person, very, very nice person and a real pro. And she's just been grinding and just working. getting better and better. And betterness had to put up with a lot, a lot of ups and downs in her career so far. I know there was back in 2019 when I was there and work. So, yeah, you love to see people persevere and to see a payoff the way that it did. And I'm with you. You can have all the great matches you want, you know, get great cage match rankings. And this is new to me, this cage match ranking thing. But I'd rather hear about that than Dave Meltzer stars. Let's put it that way. So I'm all about it. But,

But there's nothing like being out there by yourself in a singles match, as opposed to being part of the team and sixth man, whatever. Being out there when it's just you and your opponent telling a story, that's the best way to shine. Absolutely. This was her opportunity to do. What do you think? What do you think? Where does Becky go from here? Where does the story go?

No. That's a great question. I mean, as we understand it, I guess we should just timeout. We'll come back to WrestleMania for a minute. But for as long as I've been watching wrestling, whenever WrestleMania is finished, we can go do a European tour.

It's somewhere along that tour. The Monday after WrestleMania is always huge. I expect that tonight. They've set another gate record, Eric. Last Monday, or Monday before last, was the highest grossing in the history, blah, blah, blah. That was Chicago. They beat it in New York last week.

They're going to beat it again tonight. Wow. They're on this crazy run right now. But I, for one, am used to a European tour, some new storyline starting, and a draft, and unfortunately, some releases. I don't know what's next for Bailey. I think it's great that we have so much talent on this roster. I mean, realistically, would anybody be surprised if it was Naomi or it was Jade or it was Bianca or, or, I mean, there's so many talented ladies there.

And that's not even talking about Tiffany Stratton and all the other great superstars in NXT. But I do think we're going to see some more of what made the Monday after WrestleMania great. And we're going to see some debuts tonight. Do you think, again, I don't have any inside information. I'm just guessing. but you go back even say like 10 years

and Page debuted the Monday after WrestleMania in New Orleans you think we see Braun Breaker and others tonight on Raw making a splash I hope so I hope so and I think you're right I've never really

thought about it in that respect but it is just like it's an opportunity for new stories the next you know ABCD stories to emerge over time Yeah, surprise appearances, debuts, if you will, fresh talent. I'd like to see Brownbreaker regularly, picture, main story, not a main story, not an A story. Give him a C, give him a D story.

Let's just let him start to develop more on that role show, main show. I'd love to see it. By the way, I know we're not supposed to play audio. from WWE. But this is from social media, and it's from a social media clip. Samantha, who is the ring announcer for WWE, was choked up announcing the winner of WrestleMania.

Take a listen. I'm just feeling to you're trying to this is isn't awesome like I was I've got my group chat

we've referenced them before and it's a group chat of guys who just that's really the only thing we have in common that's pro wrestling and we're just constantly chatting about it throughout our day and one of my friends went i probably shouldn't say their name but he woke up this morning and message the group chat i'm still on a high from last night and between people's voice cracking and breaking and crying when cody won and now other people who were in the stands who wake up on their way to their job today and they're like man i'm still on a high from last night that's really

wrestling storytelling done right, is it not? It does my soul so good to hear you say that. Wrestling storytelling. Yes. What have we been talking about in this podcast for so long, particularly in regard to creator, both in WWE in the past and certainly with regard to EW comes up in time. But when wrestling story is done well,

it's as powerful is a great move. it's it because it creates emotion it makes people feel differently than able to feel in the normal course of their day that's why you go to movies to escape or you watch television to escape and you watch wrestling to escape to put yourself to live vicariously through the characters that you love or you hate ring and when the story is there it just it brings out so much emotion in people that's what makes professional wrestling such a unique art it's physical dialogue you know most of the story takes place inside of the ring and you've got narrative on the outside your ring announcers help to kind of support you know the narrative that's necessary to kind of fill in the blanks

of a story. The talent themselves get an opportunity on the microphone to do it. But for the most part, the magic story is told physically. And when it all comes together, when you have great creative, when your storylines, your arcs of your story are hitting those plot points and all of the things you need to do to make a legitimate story, a compelling story that creates emotion and people remember they'll always remember the story they may not remember the match they may for the most part they remember the stories the reasons why these two performers athletes wrestlers whatever you want to call them what why did they wrestle what was behind it remember the story when it's good and like i said you know 20 minutes ago an hour

ago i think the storytelling the creative team for wwe is the vs for this WrestleMania, it's been so good. And it's what makes me excited about, you know, I'm not going to be able to watch Rawl tonight. Obviously, I'm going to be on a plane, but my way to Melbourne. But I watch it when we get to Melbourne, and I'm because I'm excited to see where it's going to go with this. I have so much confidence in the storytelling capabilities in WWE right now.

I'm more excited about WWE today than I was last week. That's how good it's been. it was an incredible night night two of WrestleMania and of course it finished with Cody finishing the story in no particular order Jimmy comes in and interferes Jay counteracts and spears him

off of the ramp here comes solo we hit the spike and then we hit a spear and a spike somehow some way Cody kicks out both times. That's what we hear

John Sina's music. He runs down, starts clearing house. And as you might imagine, it's not too terribly long before the Rock is here. Considering the history that Rock and Sina have

at WrestleMania, this was really cool. And then the belt holes. And it's the Undertaker who we saw in a suite earlier in the night. You're watching on social media.

And here he is in street clothes with a choke slam that I think the rock forgot maybe how choke slams go but we got one

we got one and it's been it's been a little while and I think the thing two things I want to touch on here I was surprised about maybe more than anything

we went not one but two nights of WrestleMania and we didn't hear a single rock promo that's weird that is weird isn't it What else is weird is the fact that we didn't just get the baby face raising the title above his head and some fireworks go off and there's the credits.

We got a full in-ring happy horseshit send-off. I'm saying that negative. I'm just saying that's the way Bruce would sometimes call things. Oh, let's do all the happy horse shit. But this is a director. That's a director talk. Yes. This will do.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And some happy horseshit at the end. We're good. There you go. we got all the happy horse shit at the end. It was very non-WWE-like. He gets Mama Rhodes in there. He gets the whole family in there.

They lift him up on their shoulders. They present him the belt. Triple H gives him a big hug. He grabs a microphone, cuts a promo. This isn't happening off air. This is on the main feed of WrestleMania. Normally we get this sort of talk once the cameras are finished. But from the ring, he called down

Triple H, and unbelievably, he called down Bruce Pritchard. So Bruce Pritchard, our pal, is in the ring, hugging Cody Rhodes, celebrating the finish of the story. We're not privy to everything Paul says or Bruce says. It's just a real moment, and the cameras are capturing it, just like they might at Centerfield after a Super Bowl. Everything doesn't have to be miced up or produced, but that felt like such a departure from the way WWE has been presented.

There were kids in the ring. Cody's mom was in the ring. Cody's agent, Wittenstein, was in the ring. These are things that just normally wouldn't happen. What did you make of this presentation last night? And not just that it happened, but it happened on air. I don't know whose decision it was to make this departure, to go down this path, possibly a collective decision.

Perhaps it was Paul of X decision. He knows. And actually, who cares? Because it was such a field. I think it's so important for this event. It's branding. This is an event that brings people together and talk about sending people home happy. This is, this was authentic and legit.

It's not that, you know, confetti coming down from the sky and, you know, everybody rush into the rain to congratulate the winner of the match. That's all real. It's not unauthentic because you actually do. feel happy for your peers as they're reaching that level of success. And you get to be a part of it and share it in the ring. The feeling is real. But when you're bringing in family and encouraging that type of thing,

it just adds so much value to the experience to everybody watching at home, wherever they are, to the people in the venue that get to share that moment. I've said vicariously now three times on his show so far, maybe a record. I'm not sure. even the audience in the arena gets to live vicariously through that magic moment they're seeing happen right in front of them and they can see the tears they can see the joy they can feel the joy it's a vibe it's it's an energy and you get to experience that along with the people in the ring nothing more magic than that and it actually transcends it transmutes i think that's a word

transmutes i'm going to have to look it up when this is over but i think the energy transmutes around the world and even people watching at home can feel it. That's how real it is. Whose ever idea it was, bingo. Awesome. Cherry on top. The MVP. The fact that we know some of those people have relationships with them

probably makes it a little more meaningful for you and I. But even if you don't have a direct relationship with Cody or Michelle, his mother, or his sister or anybody else, You can, you could, I'll start tearing up if I think about it. You know what I did Saturday afternoon? My daughter, Montana, had a marathon in Las Vegas. This was her seventh marathon. I'm going to put her over just a little.

This was her seventh marathon. And she really, really wanted to qualify for the Boston marathon because you have to hit a certain time to even get an invitation to race in Boston. It's kind of like the holy grail for, you know, beginning marathon runners, even advanced ones, like my daughter. But anyway, we go down to meet her at the finish line. And I've got about an hour and a half to myself. And I was just walking around looking at shit.

And I started thinking about Dusty. And I was trying to imagine what the conversation would be if I were sitting down at a bar having a beer with Dusty as we're waiting for WrestleMania night two to happen. and what we saw inside of the ring was kind of a version of that you can feel the emotion so happy so happy for everybody involved how could you not be it was a special moment it's a special day and a lot of it a big part of it was set rawlins and i thought that that was understated but well done. Ultimately, what beat Roman Rains is Roman Rains

choosing to check the box of that grudge, that turn, that betrayal 10 years ago when the shield broke up. So when they played the shield music and here came Seth Rollins in full shield garb, yielding a chair.

Roman saw his opportunity. He took it. He could have went after Cody and maintained the title or he could have went after his former enemy and rebut that. What a story beat. What a beat in that story, though. That's what I mean.

That's such a little, such a little thing that had so much power in that particular story. It's, you know, envy, jealousy, greed, you know, some of the seven deadly sins, whatever. You can always rely upon one of them to be, to, to, to, to, to, you know. that beat in a story you need because everybody understood it. It tied it all together. It made sense. It wasn't a story beat just for the sake of it. It was a story beat

that had relevance to awesome. Let's also talk about something else that makes sense. We're talking about our friends at Earnan. Life doesn't happen biweekly, so why should payday? The money you earn can be in your hands

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When you download the Earn-In app, type in 83 weeks under podcast when you sign up. It'll really help the show. That's 83 weeks under podcast. By the way, Earn-in is a financial technology company, not a bank, subject to your earnings. your available earnings, daily max, pay period max, and location. See earn-in.com slash TOS for details. Bank products are issued by Evolved Bank and Trust member FDIC. Seriously, earn-in is the app that's helping millions of Americans to feel self-sufficient

without falling into debt traps. Go right now, download the Earn-N app, and be sure to look for podcast. I'll type in 83 weeks. It'll really help the show. So listen, Eric, it's a big night. It's a special moment. Our pal Bruce got shouted out and came down to the ring and gave Cody a big hug. And then when they went backstage, night's over.

So we think just one more press conference to go. But before Cody got on stage, as I understand it, Triple H, Bruce Pritchard and Nick Con pulled him aside and told him they'd been thinking about him. I gave him a special gift that he showed off the post-match press conference. If you've seen Cody Rhodes documentary that came out last year in advance of WrestleMania and you know the story of how he got into wrestling and how it wasn't the original plan, the American Dream son wanted to have Hollywood dreams. So times were tough on the American Dream.

Rusty Rhodes, but he wanted to support his children. So he pined his solid gold 18-karrot date just Rolex on a Jubilee band for $10,000. Kids came home. He handed them $10,000 in a rubber band and said, go to Hollywood, chase your dreams, make it happen. And in order to do that, he gave of himself the very same thing we all saw as wrestling fans every weekend on TBS when he was cutting promos about the horseman

and Rick Flair there that gold Rolex was and Cody as he's being handed that knot in a rubber band had no idea what it represented had no idea what his dad had done to get it and of course when he found out that his dad passed years later hey mom where's dad's Rolex son he sold that upon that than you and teal California somehow some way WWE

helped from some very smart jewelers found the really rare Dusty Rhodes gold Rolex listen the day date that you've seen Rick Flair wear and a lot of people in wrestling wear that's the common watch

but Dusty was a little different the date just a yellow gold date just is not easy to find but they found one and Cody clearly moved showing it off very emotionally at the post-match presser man I'm going to tell you

wrestling is pretty fucking dumb sometimes but when it's good that just ain't nothing better when it's good it's the best this is good this is so good this is what professional wrestling did people talk about what's best for business what we saw at wrestle me emotion got it's good tearing me up damn it i hate it when

it happens this is awesome this is what's best for business this what a move so awesome so special shout out to uh to bruce and Paul and Nick for such a thoughtful gift. And shout out to the whole Rhodes clan. Boy, they've been put through it, man. I hate that Cody had to enjoy last night without his dad. But I can't imagine how proud he was there, bro. He was there.

That's exactly what Hunter said. But that watch, it's just a reminder that, hey, your dad's here. Can't see him, but we can feel him. he's here and i know he had dusty would have been so proud this morning a today show with the world title and a gold Rolex fresh off the russomania main event two nights in a row that's pretty special down out he not only finished the story he's telling a brand new one it's funny you say that because he's already tweeted that out this morning and uh boy cody knows how to use Twitter effectively when he

wants to. Not only can he sell out a 10,000 seat arena on a bet with Dave Meltzer, but he can also post the new WWE world title sitting next to what should have been his dad's world title. When one good story ends, an even better one begins.

Man, what a cool shot that is. What a cool moment this is. And well, there's still some other news to talk about. I can't believe this is real. We'll get to that in a minute.

As the clock struck midnight today, Eric, because we're only nine hours into the day right now. Matt Hardy is a free agent. Didn't see that on my bingo card. We heard a few weeks ago he had been offered a new contract by AEW. We saw over the weekend, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. He and his brother Jeff had seven hours of lines each day

so they're clearly over like Rover with the autographed crowd. Sean Ralsap broke the news right after midnight. Matt Hardy's officially a free agent. And he talks to remain with AEW, but his contract expired at midnight and he said he's chosen to not sign a deal offered to him. I'll have more details as they emerge.

So at least for now, Matt Hardy on the outside looking in, I don't know what's next Do you know what Jeff's contractual status is? I do not. I assume that, you know, he did miss some time there,

so they may have added that time back. But I also know they didn't come together, as you'll recall, Matt was first. Right. Would you be surprised to see the Hardee's in WW again? Yes.

I would But I said the same thing about CM Punk I would only because WWE doesn't And this is no disrespect to Jeff or Matt These I know you people out there listening Are going to take it this way Because that's what you do

Take something that's meant to be An honest opinion or observation in this case And twist it and turn it Make it sound like I'm burying some somebody. I'm not doing. What I am doing is pointing out that WWE right now is on a role creatively, roster-wise. There's not a lot of holes. There's not a lot of need. So regardless of how talented someone it may be, there's not a need. If there's not a vacancy, if there's not a slot to be filled, it makes it a little more difficult. And I think right now with the stories,

with the talent, everything going, the way it's going with WWP. I just don't feel that there's a big need, which is exactly what I said about CM Punk, and then they brought him in. So don't fucking listen to me. You can ask me questions, and I'll go on and on and on and give you my opinion, but clearly I'm not right all the time.

About 8% of the time I get it wrong. 7 and change. 7.6% I think is where I'm at right now. I'll get something. That being said, I just don't, I don't see it. I really don't. I can see, especially Matt, I think Matt's a good teacher.

Matt likes to teach. He's passionate. Could I see him working in the, down at the performance center? Absolutely. But in the ring again, competing, I just think the injuries, time, things that happen naturally over time as you age. I just don't see it. But like I said, hopefully I'm wrong for their sake.

I'm not under contract right now. I got to think their last match is going to be in WWE. Well, it would be a beautiful setup if that's possible. It's kind of what I was asking about why I was asking about Jeff. Yeah. Matt going back to WWE on his own, I think is less likely. Matt and Jeff, if Jeff's available, more likely because of what you just said. I didn't think of that, you know, last match kind of send off retirement, but definitely could see that.

Well, we'll stay tuned and see what happens, but I know we're all going to be tuned in this Wednesday. I can't believe this is real, but boy, what a crazy week this was last week. We saw on Monday, Vince McMahon responded to that lawsuit from January, and boy, he overshared. And he was using the MLW attorney who just beat WWE. And he sold another $100 million worth of stock. And then Punk went on Ariel Hawani and just burned it down and did one crazy promo after another. I mean, just spilling the tea, as the kids would say. Fast forward, kind of a big night for wrestling on Friday night with a big Smackdown

and then the Hall of Fame where Paul Heyman took his rightful spot. Great, fabulous speech there. but then two nights of WrestleMania and somewhere lost in all of that was the fact that collision was actually taped right after Dynamite on Wednesday and it aired right after Alabama got the shit beat out of them in the final four on Saturday night

so it started at 11.30 Eastern but more than halfway through the show so well past 1230 Eastern or the middle of the night now it sounded like a pickup that Chivani would have recorded meaning it wouldn't have been something I would guess that was recorded on Wednesday I think it would have been done in post

just based on the way it sounded Shavani announced that this coming Wednesday Matthew and Nicholas the Youngbucks are going to present the backstage footage from all in London and they're going to discuss it for the first time. Now, this footage would not be the quote-unquote brawl-out footage

from Chicago the year prior. This would be last year where he famously got into it with Jungle Boy Jack Perry and then there was some sort of a skirmish and a pull apart. Punk was on the first match of the pay-per-view. Perry was finishing up the last match on the pre-show. That's where the interaction happened. And I heard that week

That it was filmed That it was recorded That AW had gotten the footage From Wembley Stadium And I thought to myself Self If this footage is as bad as they think it is

As they say it is Where people reviewed it and then made the decision Allegedly Punk's got to go If they were getting any backlash The thing to do would be to show it that's the way I felt in like early September. Here we are now.

Punk doesn't work there. Punk works for another company. He's already gotten injured in that company. He's on the sidelines for a while. He's not even a major participant in WrestleMania this week. And still, we're going to see this. And I can't help but think is this in response to Cody's promo?

Meltzer would say, my gut was bad idea. But when we see it, whatever. after punk did the interview I obviously contacted many many people in the company and the general thing was we're moving past that we don't want to deal with it. Some of that's true and some of it's not true

but whatever we got to move forward Tony's the boss and Tony never said that I'll presume this airing is because there's proof that what punk said wasn't true and that's sort of the logical leap I made last week with you Eric that if punk is saying

here's what happened if there's anything that can be refuted with that video evidence, we knew AEW had it. And now since we've recorded it, they've decided they're going to release it. And everyone is there reporting this. I shouldn't say everyone. Alvarez, I believe, and Dave Meltzer are both saying,

this is not a bait and switch. They are going to show it. It almost feels like the curtain call. where we heard about it, but we weren't supposed to see it. And then when they showed it on WW TV and made it part of the story, I liked it. But I am curious, where is this story going since punk is gone?

I assume Jungle Boy is about to be back on the show. And this is the way they bring him back. That's the only thing I can think that makes sense out of this, Eric. That doesn't make sense. I mean, I know what you're saying. It's the only thing that you can think of that, seems like perhaps there was a thought process put it to it. I don't, I, I think you're giving them too much credit.

This is an emotional reaction that has absolutely no upside. Think about it. If the footage, and I'm not, you know, I'm not real knowledgeable this situation. But if the footage that we're going to see in any way, especially with the narrative that's coming from the bucks, because they're going to have the ability to spin and add color to what we're going to see. Security footage typically isn't great footage. So there's going to be, and you're not going to hear the audio, most likely.

You're not going to hear audio that goes along with the footage. So that's where the narrative comes in. But let's just say, for example, for sake of argument, this footage puts punk in a bad light, it puts Jungle Boy Jack Perry in a good language. it's fucking I can't believe they're spending this guy but let's just say it puts punk in a bad light so what what does that do for anybody

right it does nothing or what if it's ambiguous what if you see it in other than the commentary that you're going to get from the bucks you can't really decide for yourself one way or the other what does it get you same thing Or what if people look at it?

I go, well, this is all bullshit. I can't believe that punk got fired over that. What does that get you? Nothing. There's no upside here. There's nothing that's going to happen that's positive. You're living in the past and reliving an incident that is a reflection of your horrible leadership and lack of management, Tony.

You created that backstage environment by not being a leader, by not having management in place, by allowing this kind of thing to go on. Because this isn't like the first and only time. It's just, I don't know. It's the most bizarre thing. I don't know that, you know, I've said, as hard as I can be on an AED. W, I point out their lack of storytelling ability or lack of ability to even format a television show, just fundamental shit. You know, I talk about those things all the time.

In the back of my mind, I'm hoping that eventually somebody's going to go, okay, let's just try what he says. Let's just put a little more emphasis on story. Let's go buy a book and read about what it takes to build a great story and see if we can do it. Now, I'm hoping that a light bulb, light bulb is going to go off in somebody's head and they're going to, huh, maybe we can, I got an idea, let's try this. Because what we're doing here at AEW is not working. You're not only not growing your audience, you can't hold on to the one you started out with. They're leaving in droves. We had on wise choices, aunt Evans, YouTube expert.

guy that built the UFC's YouTube channel as well as others knows this shit. We talked about where AEW is on YouTube and where it's been over the last six months. You know, where it's been, it's been falling off a fucking cliff. So Dave Meltzer likes to say, well, you can't judge by ratings. The company's way more successful than the ratings reflect. Because, you know, fewer people are watching television. No shit, Sherlock. That's been a conversation that's been going on in the television industry for, oh, I don't know.

12 years or more, it's not news, Dave. You don't have to study anything, Dave. It's right there in your fucking face. But guess what? Even if that was the excuse that people want to buy into, because when it comes to AEW, a lot of people want to buy into excuses. Yeah.

And spin in ridiculous ways of doing math. But even if you wanted to believe it's true and, you know, those ratings are going down because fewer people are watching television. Okay, well, what about YouTube? Is that a dying medium, Dave? Is it an outlier for some reason? It's not. It's just another indicator like live ticket sales. Tickets. AEW is having a hard time selling 3,500 tickets for dynamite. I mean, come on. It's impossible for me to think of ways that it can do things more in. correctly and miss the mark any more than they already have. But they keep coming up with the shit. Like, I don't know, let's show footage from the security cam at Wembley.

That happened, what? Is that six months ago? More. Five years ago? How long ago that was? Who cares? It's history. And all it's going to do is make you look bad.

The question is how bad is it going to look in how many different ways? It's just bizarre out. Bizarre. Well, we're going to talk. about it. I'm sure later this week we're going to be talking about it. But, you know, it isn't. What do you think? Do you think I'm wrong? Am I overreacting? I don't, I don't, I don't see the upside. I mean, it feels like an on your heels move. I saw somebody say, and I know you're going to get hot when I say this, but I saw somebody say this feels like a WCW move.

and let me let me extrapolate what I think that meant what I think the poster was intending there was a time where the WWF was on their heels and WCW was kicking their ass orally I mean he couldn't tell which way it was up and then fast forward when that momentum turned it turned quickly and kind of hard and there was a time where when that momentum turned

it just felt like almost nothing WCW could do could gain any ground back. And I think that is where this move sort of feels like. I would agree. I would agree with that. That is an accurate observation on the poster's part of that was the intent for the meaning and certainly on your analysis of it because it was true. There was a time what I felt like we could do no wrong.

Yes. Absolutely do no wrong. And before long, there was a point where we. felt like we could absolutely do no right. Once you lose momentum, you've heard me say a million times. Creating momentum is a lot easier than maintaining it. Maintaining momentum is a real challenge. Very, very difficult. And then once you feel that momentum slip through your fingers and you know it, you can feel it in the marrow of your bones, in your core puzzles. You can feel it. and then you feel like there's nothing I can do to turn this around.

Observation. I don't want that to be the case. I am pulling for AEW. I think wrestling is a better place with AEW. But I got to think, I got to hope, I got to cross my fingers. This is all some way to reintroduce Jack Perry

and leverage something that really happened to add to his credibility and his presentation. And interestingly enough, Jack Perry is wrestling here in America this Friday night. It's the windy city riot. There's only about 400 tickets still available. This is a New Japan show. It's a big deal for New Japan to be here in America. And Jack Perry is on the card.

So we'll see what happens. We'll also see what happened over the weekend with, and I know you missed this because you were traveling and had all kinds of family. stuff going on, but I want to encourage you go out of your way to watch a Mark Briscoe video. It was the last minute hype for the pay-per-view. He was going to be challenging Eddie Kingston for the Ring of Honor World Championship. You've said your piece about that title and about Eddie Kingston. But this story, Eric, is one that I think you could get behind. As I understand it, it was Eddie who discovered through a little bit of research, because he's

a wrestling nerd junkie like all of us, that it was 11 years ago. to the day that Mark's brother Jay won the Ring of Honor World title for the very first time and 11 years later to the day just a couple years removed from his tragic passing Mark Briscoe became the man

and won the world title for the very first time but the video that got us there Eric was it was his brother's words in his head he was thinking about quitting but he kept thinking about when his brother said and it would cut to that. And I was like, dude, this is as good of a hype video. This is like

a movie. And I realize that it's not on the scale of the Cody Road story, but I will say wrestling storytelling was on full display this weekend, whether you're a Mark Briscoe fan or Cody Rhodes fan. And I just want to echo

something that we said at the top of the show. Monday Night Raw tonight is the highest grossing Monday Night Raw of all time. Over 18,000 people are in there. They set the NXT record over the weekend for stand and deliver the most attended NXT show in history. Not one,

but two, record nights at WrestleMania as far as gate, as far as attendance, as far as merch, as far as sponsorship. Wrestling right now, man, more specifically, WWE right now

feels like they are hotter than ever. How long do you think this momentum, this momentum can be sustained and when do you start to worry about what's next for Cody Rhodes because if I've learned anything from hanging out

with you besides more than less than different than is that sometimes when the hawkster would stroke that old flu man chew and want to know and then what that's where the heavy lifting begins

what would you expect is this momentum momentum sustainable are we going to see some pushback from the WWE audience because wrestling fans, if nothing else, Daniel Bryan has proved us they're fickle. We want something new.

We want something new. We want something new. We want something new. Oh, man, show me my old favorites. Where do you think this shakes out with Cody? Who would be the perfect first opponent for him? Is it Gunther?

Is it Brock? Is it someone, I mean, the rumor in innuendo is that Jacob Fatu is recently. signed. Will it be him from the blood lot? What do you think is next for Cody if you had to guess? God, it's hard. Let me, let me back up just a little bit. Here's the challenge for Cody going forward. And this has got nothing to do with Cody himself. It's the audience's appetite for baby faces. How long can a baby face champion stay at the top? You've got a shit ton of heels

like that are really over, lined up and ready to go, as Hulk Hogan did, for example, you can get some mileage out of that. But that'll be the challenge. Now, long term, you know, short term, I have no idea because there's so many different options. You can go one in a million ways, right, with the roster that exists currently in WWE.

That's, relatively speaking, the easiest part. Part part will be six months from now or a year from now. is it rock is rock in this thing kind of like for real or was rock really only interested in or able i should say in and participating in this russomania that that's a big question because there's a story there with rock no and that for cody that would be an amazing opportunity Cody's stock will go that much higher if you're in a long-term program with the rock but we don't know if rocks what his plans are so if it's not the rock i think my my it's not a chat not a concern but what i'm aware of is that cody can burn through those heels pretty quickly go back to

seth do they find a way to weave it around back with set perhaps i just think match wise that could be a interesting opportunity as well a million different ways i don't know but the one thing i am concerned with is how the lifespan of a baby face particularly like Cody because Cody's Cody is like a throwback in my opinion yeah he's an old school baby face he's about as pure of a baby face as I've seen and like I don't know feels like forever at least so that'll be really interesting to see how long audience stays with him as that cures the driven snow baby face. I, for one, I'm looking forward to it.

I'm ready to see Gunther Challenge in Germany. I'm ready to see Cody take on all comers. I want to see him and Drew. I mean, there's going to be a lot of really, really fun stuff in this coming year. And especially since we know that the Rock seemingly is in this for the long haul. I mean, as I understand it, he's going to work on the Smashing Machine movie right now.

But that does lend it. itself to he's going to be available later in the year and you got to think that spear that's going to mean something so stay tuned for that we woke up to news this morning from brandon thurston there's a uh a release that wrestlenomics has released from tk o and endeavor there's two separate agreements where endeavor is buying 142.6 million dollars and a hundred and fifty million for a total of around $293 million of stock back from Vince McMahon. So Brandon says, by my count, after the transaction closes on Tuesday and Wednesday, respectively, Vince will have 8,021,405 remaining TKO shares. And by my math, Vince will be down to owning about 4.7% of the stock.

What do you think about this news? I mean, it was sort of referenced at the top of the program over the weekend. Hey, this is a whole new era. You heard Paul Heyman even say on Hall of Fame, this is the Paul of Beck era. I heard Stephanie try to say this is the Triple H era. This is the Paul Levec era. Josh Nason over on Twitter says this is especially notable once McMahon is confirmed to be below the 5% threshold required to file beneficial ownership documentation with the SEC.

It feels as if we're scrubbing my man's name off. Let's say you. It sure feels that way. Right? Sure. feels away. And we found out last week that TCO is taking their company private again. This could have something to do with that.

There's some interesting chatter and I'll have a little more detail. Maybe by the time we do wise choices because I'll be doing that live from Australia at some point this week. So if you haven't subscribed to 83weeks.com, go now, subscribe 83 weeks.com. hit the notification buttons. This is the YouTube channel where we improv. We react daily a couple times a week, depending on what's going on in the business. So it's not a set schedule.

It's not like strictly business used to be or 83 weeks. Our podcast is. This is something that will come at you depending on what's going on in the world. And we're going to talk about it. I may have a little bit more information, but there's some interesting things going on at Comcast rate. There could be bigger moves and bigger plays taking place. I want to do a little more digging before I talk about it too much because, you know,

that's the way you should do it. We'll see. A lot of moving pieces. Lots. We will see. We're going to see what happens tonight on Monday Night Raw. We're going to see what happens on Wednesday with the all-in footage. And I'm sure we'll be back later this week with another live YouTube show.

In case you missed it, Strictly Business is no more. So this will be the only podcast, the one you're listening to right now on 83 weeks. This will be the only episode that you get this week from our feed on the RSS. But for all things, Eric Bischoff, look no further

than the YouTube channel. That's 83 weeks.com. Make sure you hit that subscribe button, turn on the notifications bell, and you just don't want to miss when we're going live. I mean, you'll be able to ask questions right there with Eric Bischoff. And we appreciate you guys

showing up and showing out early with us on a Monday morning, the Monday after WrestleMania. We got a ton of great questions. Let's rifle through a few of these, Eric, and then I know we've got to get on the road. Josh any wants to know. Any thoughts on opening both nights

with championship matches instead of a build? See, starting off hot, seem to work this time. No, it worked. You know, it worked. And I guess it gets a lot easier when you've got great stories. and the audience is with it and with each match.

So look, it's working. Now, sometimes you have to bust up the paradigm and start over and try something new. And if it's working, I'm sure we're going to see a lot more of it. George Slade says, do you think this will be the biggest dusty finish of all time? And Cody loses the belt tonight, wrong? Well, that's so dark. Come on, George. There's no need to be so dark.

No, that's not going to happen. Not going to have. Travis Medley says, as it stands right now, Raw has two world champions on their roster because you see Raines taking Damien Priest's title tonight and starting a new dominant rain. No, I don't see that. And I think the draft is right around the corner,

so that'll handle itself, right? I think no idea, no inside information like you always say. I'll be surprised if we don't see, Roman take a break for him. Yeah, agree. He needs a little dose of the absence. Absence makes a heart growth under factor. Not a lot.

Just a little shot because he's been great. And I know he's not been as active of a champion as a lot of people. Roman reigns, the character has been in our face now since what, 2017. You give him a break. I'm with you. Give him, give the character a break. Make the audience want to see him. return, especially if you're going to go with him and rock down the row, anything like that.

Give it a little bit of a rest because honestly, the audience needs a rest now. Because their emotions were so high and WWE did such a phenomenal job of maintaining that momentum and nurturing that arc and they were so disciplined and stayed off, now you've got to let the audience go, oh, what's next? But you've got to give them a little. I think Roman would be best served just to have some time away from. from the cameras. Josh says,

how about the championship t-shirts for the winners? Like when teams win championships, love that. You can see these shirts, by the way, at shop wrestlingmerch.com. They've got great new shirts

for everyone who won new hardware, whether it's Cody, whether it's Damian Priest, whether it's Rea Ripley, whether it's Bailey. It definitely feels

like somebody just won the national championship or the Super Bowl. They've got the shirts immediately available and they're for you right now at shop wrestlingmerch.com. It costs absolutely nothing but supports the show here.

Josh says, thoughts on the show this Wednesday that peels back the curtain and they talk about the creative shift when the fans pressured for the Cody story. Is this too much exposure of the business? You know, you and I talked about this in real time as it was happening in late January and early February.

And WWE actually acknowledge acknowledged it, leaned into it, and said, no, this wasn't the plan. We were going with Rock and Roman, but the fans responded and we answered. Are you surprised they're having that put together and ready by this Wednesday already? No. W.W.E is phenomenal when it comes to this kind of thing. If they put their minds to it, they'll be working 24-7 and cranking out magic. I'm not surprised at all.

So there you go, boys and girls. we're looking forward to a big week we're going to see the documentary on Wednesday we're going to roll that beautiful all-in footage on Wednesday and tonight a new era of Monday Night Raw kicks off with our new champion not the tribal chief but the American nightmare Cody Rhodes

we'll be back later this week talking the latest and greatest and it'll be live join us at 83 weeks.com and by the way you can get all these shows early and ad free over at adfree shows.com Appreciate everybody's showing up and being part of our live studio audience. I saw Chris,

who I think had a chance to catch WrestleMania and David and PJ and Coach Keith and so many others. Thanks, everybody, for hopping on early on a Monday after WrestleMania. And man, I'm looking forward to it. We'll see you sooner rather than later, right here

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