83 Weeks with Eric Bischoff - Episode 429: Why The nWo Still Matters

Episode Date: June 5, 2026

On this episode of 83 Weeks, Eric Bischoff and Conrad Thompson welcome one of the most respected voices in combat sports and professional wrestling, Ariel Helwani, for a wide ranging conversation on the biggest topics in the business today. The trio dives into the remarkable rise of Danhausen and why his current run is resonating with fans in a way few performers have managed in recent years. Eric explains why Danhausen has his finger firmly on the pulse of the modern wrestling audience and what promoters can learn from his success. Eric and Ariel also explore why the nWo remains one of the most influential acts in wrestling history, discussing its lasting impact on fans and the fascinating story behind the group nearly having a television show of its own. Three decades later, the black-and-white phenomenon continues to shape the industry. Plus, has WWE creative finally jumped the shark? Eric doesn't hold back as he shares his thoughts on some of the company's recent creative decisions. The conversation also turns to Cody Rhodes, with Bischoff explaining why he's losing interest in Cody as a babyface champion and what could reignite that connection with the audience. Finally, it's a special edition of "On The Nose: WCW Edition" as Ariel Helwani joins Eric and Conrad to test his knowledge and opinions on some of WCW's biggest moments, personalities, and controversies.       THIS WEEKS SPONSORS BLUECHEW - Right now, when you buy two months of BlueChew Gold, you get the third for FREE with promo code 83WEEKS. Visit http://BlueChew.com  for more details and important safety information, and we thank BlueChew for sponsoring the podcast. JCW LUNACY- Juggalo Championship Wrestling drops BRAND NEW episodes of Lunacy every Thursday at 7pm ET exclusively on their YouTube channel http://youtube.com/@psychopathic_records check it out! SAVE WITH CONARD - Stop throwing money away by paying those high interest rates on your credit card. Roll them into one low monthly payment and on top of that, skip your next two house payments. Go to https://www.savewithconrad.com  to learn more.     https://youtu.be/Zxlk2WCFNkw

Today's episode comes to you from the Blue Chew Studio right now. When you buy two months of Blue Chew Gold, you get the third for free with the promo code 83 weeks at bluechew.com. Hey, hey, it's Conrad, the mortgage guy, and you're listening to 83 weeks with Eric, fish off. Eric, what's going on, man? How are you? I'm good. I'm getting ready to go to the block party in downtown Cody from five to seven tonight. I can't wait.

What is a block party in downtown? do you look like a lot of beer i would guess right yeah i mean it's you know it's summertime yellowstone parks right down the road so you get a lot of tourists coming through so you get a lot of families you know not so much you know part of years but you get a lot of families a lot of cowboy wannabes some real cowboys because we got a rodeo every night all summer long so you get some real cowboys coming to town and it's just everybody hanging out it's got that kind of western vibe to it's kind of nice well we appreciate you guys hanging out with us we are going to going to be celebrating the 30-year anniversary of the NWO all summer long.

We've got a very special guest later on, so stay tuned for that. But I wanted to briefly touch on the talk of last weekend. It was the WWE PLE. They had the clash in Italy, and I don't know that everybody loved it. Specifically, two storylines I want to talk about. I guess we'll start with Brock Lesnar first. You know, there's been a lot of discussion about, is Brock retired? Is he not?

You were critical of the creative last week. and I've seen two schools of thought. I've seen some people, including Dave Meltzer, say he can't believe they beat Obafemmy. He felt like, you know, would continue this unbeaten streak, if you will, and hey, can this guy be beaten? And maybe it builds to a title shot, maybe not. There's rumor in innuendo that Obafemi may be facing Roman rains next year at WrestleMania. So should he have remained unbeaten? Well, it didn't happen.

Brock Lesnar beat him after seven F-5s. So now they're tied at one apiece. It does feel like Brock versus Oba three is coming up sooner rather than later. What'd you think of that creative decision, not to have Oba dominate Brock or pick up a win over Brock, but let's tie it up and set up a rubber match, I suppose. A rubber match that I don't care about because none of it makes sense. The first one didn't make sense. The second one didn't make sense.

Well, the first one made sense. But the second one didn't make sense. There was no story. There was no setup. There was no why. You know, people tell us how great storylines are and, you know, it's subjective. Everybody's got different opinions. But for me, if a story at any given time doesn't either answer the question why

or provoke you to try to figure out why a character is embarking on a certain journey or destination or goal, then you're not really interested. And Barack got beat. He had tears in his eyes. I believed him. He took off his stuff. He left it in the ring. All of the things that are a signature goodbye.

And he came back. Why? I don't know. Doesn't matter. Oh, doesn't it? Well, then neither does the match that follows the lack of why. And therefore, neither will the rubber match, if indeed there is one. unless somewhere along the line, somebody tells me why he took his shit off and left it in the ring.

And then jump back into the ring without an explanation. There's got to be a reason why. It doesn't even have to be that good. Just give me something. Something to believe in. This much. And then maybe. But without it, it's just, eh.

It's like just moving pieces. around on the chess board or on the checker board that doesn't really set anything up. It doesn't really matter. But you are moving checkers around. So there's that. It's not like Oba hasn't been beaten at all in WWE, but I do think that a lot of people were hoping for or drawing the comparison to Bill Goldberg.

Do you think that's a compliment or is that even a fair comparison? I mean, I know they weren't necessarily doing an unbeaten streak. But anytime you see a wrestler who dominates like this, it's going to draw Goldberg like comparisons, right? Well, you may admit probably, you know, um, especially amongst the, you know,

internet wrestling community who are all looking for things to, to talk about and argue about and criticize each other about. Because that's, you know, that's a life luck. And to me, it wasn't whether he got beat or not. Yes,

it's important because, you know, if a guy is, has an unbeaten streak, even if it's not from day one, you, like, Goldbirds was. But if you've got here, if you're into a pretty substantial unbeaten streak,

that's that's capital. That's currency. That has value. So if you're going to cash it in, cash it in in something of equal to or greater value. And as much as it pains me to agree even remotely with Dave Meltzer, beating Obafimi, and I didn't see it, so maybe it was more dramatic than my imagination will allow me to think about right now, but it just seems like a waste. It's like you had this huge stockpile of currency,

money, capital, value, and you cashed it in on something that you pretend it didn't even happen. Brock's retirement. Yeah, that's confusing. And maybe there's an answer. Maybe something's going to reveal itself. I always hold out hope because I do think the core talent in the WWWWWW

writing room is outstanding. And they have all the capabilities in the world. But something has to happen to get them kind of back on track. Because some of these questions, my reaction and I'm having fun with it, probably a little over animated than I truly feel. But it's, there's a hole. It just makes no sense. So anything else we talk about about Obafimi and Brock Lesnar will fall into the much

less than category for me until something happens to make it different than. Well, we saw Alba, we saw Obelous a few matches in NXT. Ricky Saints, Tony DiAngelo, a couple of times. But that was NXT. The main roster, I think you would argue, hey, more people watch. main roster stuff and they do the NXT stuff. So maybe it doesn't matter. But what we know is they're probably setting up a big rubber match.

Now, it still remains to be determined. Will that happen at Night of Champions in Saudi Arabia later this month? Or will they kick the can to SummerSlam? SummerSlam is going to be in Brock's hometown and the rumor and innuendo. And this is in large part due to an interview that John Siener did where he made reference to something along the lines of. I'm paraphrasing here. Yeah,

Brock's going to finish it up next year in Minnesota. So it does sound like, hey, they're circling SummerSlam as this big send off for the Minnesota boy and his home state. But if that happens with Oba, then maybe we never get the Gunther match. I don't know.

We don't even really know for sure that Brock is going to retire. But would you be interested to see Oba, I mean, Brock and Gunther? Or do you think the, the bigger money matches in Oba Femi, do you have a preference on what should happen in Saudi

and what should happen in SummerSlam? I don't think about Saudi or SummerSlam, you know, one over the other too much, but I would much rather see a great story between Oba and Brock

than Gunther and Brock. I'm sorry, I'm not buying Gunther and Brock. I'm not buying it. There's just certain things physically, visually, that I cannot suspend my disbelief long enough to believe in it. And Brock and Gunther, no disrespect to Guthr. I think he's been great in a lot of ways.

I love his character. I think he's powerful and powerful as a character. I think he's a lot of great things, but I don't think he's a great opponent for Brock. Not for that type of match. Oba, I believe. He gives me enough to believe. in. I'm 71 years old. I produce thousands and thousands and thousands of hours of professional

wrestling. I'm cynical as they come. You can't even get my attention unless you're doing something really freaking good. I would be interested in Oban Brock. You couldn't get my attention with Gunther and Brock at all. I think that's interesting because I just mentioned that Oba actually has a pinfall loss to Ricky Starks or I'm sorry, Ricky Saints in WWB. And I know we're talking about different performers, but based on size, because although you didn't necessarily say that, are you referencing size, the size difference between Gunther and Lesnar and Lesnar? It's just, you see these two guys, you see Brock and Gunther facing off at a bar where you put your money. Brock every time. Brock and Obel facing off at the bar where you put your money.

Brock every time. That's because you know Brock. But it's because you know his background. But if you're talking just physically, just we're talking to. We're talking about suspension of disbelief in leaning into something that's not real, but feels like it could be. You have to, these, Gunther and Brock from somebody who just, you just got off the freaking starship. The UFO thing is real. We've talked about it now on the news.

These little Martians are walking around. They show up every once in a while. They show up in a wrestling event for the first time. The Martian looks over. He sees Brock. He sees over. He's thinking, yeah, this could be good. The other Martian goes, yeah, but what about that guy, Gunther?

in a Martian who doesn't know any of these people. He doesn't know what their capabilities are, their technical backgrounds or amateur professional background. They know nothing. All they know is what they see. Nobody's going to look at Gunther and Brock, Martian or otherwise and go, oh, I want to see that one. It's not there. Just not there.

Did you feel the same way about Cody versus Brock? Because they did a series of three. And that's kind of what this Oba Brock thing sort of reminds a lot of people of. They did a series of three with Cody. And Cody wound up, you know, coming out victorious on that. But we also know Cody's real-life background. I think he only lost like one or two matches in high school. I mean, he's a pretty badass high school, granted, not NCAA,

but still a very accomplished, capable, you know, amateur wrestler. But the size difference is still there. But really, that's true for almost everybody with Brock, right? Yeah, it's a little different. First of all, I don't think anybody knew or cared about Cody's amateur background in high school, regardless of how stellar it was compared to you to Brock Lesnar. There is no comparison. Any more than there is to, well, I want to use that analogy.

It's so stupid. But here's what Cody did have. He didn't have the size. It was not believable. In real life, despite Cody's real life technical abilities, it would be ugly as ugh but Cody's a sympathetic

baby face in that story and people get emotional for that and the emotion of a sympathetic baby face allows you to overcome your resistance to buy into the reality of it. You're now emotionally involved

it changes things Gunther's not going to be able just because of the gifts God gave him and I do mean gifts in the most positive way, but he's got a look, he's got a vibe, he's got a body that is not sympathetic in any way, shape, or form. He couldn't sell a sympathetic baby face if he tried.

So Cody had that ability in that scenario that Gunther for sure is not going to have, and very few other people would. And Cody played the sympathetic baby face he was the Al Pacino of professional wrestling in that role. Yes, agree. He nailed it. I know you didn't have a chance to see it.

You were doing real American freestyle, so I want to catch you up in case you missed it. A lot of fans, myself included, kind of thought Goonther was going to beat Cody for the world title this past weekend in Italy that did not wind up being the case. Cody got the pen, but Goonther had his foot under the ropes and the referee didn't see it. And I think a lot of fans were disappointed. They were thinking, hey, we're going to see a title change. That did not happen. It does feel like they're going to be setting up a rematch for that, and that makes a lot of sense.

You've seen that timing is everything in wrestling. Do you think that it's important that they take the belt off of Cody? I know before Kevin Sullivan passed, he felt like WWE made the right call by not having Cody win the world title at WrestleMania 39. He felt like he hadn't slayed enough dragons. And I know there's sort of two schools of thought. the WWF way back when wanted to have a baby face champion, whether it was Bruno San Martino or Hulk Hogan or later John Sina, taking on all comers, all challengers.

Meanwhile, the NWA and specifically Jim Crockett promotions, and later yourself with Hulk Hogan as the leader of the NWO, you like having a heel champion and they often say, hey, the money is in the chase. You want the baby face chasing the world title. Do you think that WWE and Cody specifically is better served as the champion? or chasing the title in 2026. I hate saying this because I really have so much respect for Cody and affection for the entire family,

not just Cody. I'm over Cody as a baby face champion. It's not that I don't like it. It's just that I'm kind of had my fill of it. There's just not a lot of desire for me to see what the next iteration of Cody as a baby face is going to bring. because we've been seeing it a lot for the last couple of years. I personally think that for me, doesn't mean I'm right for everybody else.

For me, I would, I'd get that belt off of him somehow, some way that would begin his journey into Healddom. Because I think there's a lot of story, a lot of great work. Cody's acting, performing ability, because he's an actor. He is an actor.

He could bring that heel character to life in a way that not too many people could. He doesn't have very many people have his acting ability. I mean, he's really good. And I want to see that. That gets me excited. Babyface Cody, sorry, been there, done that a lot. I can't wait to see what's next. It does feel like a lot of people are wondering, you know, what direction do they head with Cody?

we see the reports and we hear the reports that Cody's the number one guy in merch followed by Danhausen. Danhausen, of course, has been crown champion in interviews by Cody saying, no, he's killing us all at merch right now. So Danhausen's having a moment. But I do think that we've seen, if anything else, the P&L is going to drive creative with TKO more often than not. But I agree with you. I think a lot of fans, they want to see something different than with Cody. and I do think that the money may be in the chase. So I kind of assumed that they were going to take the title off of him,

but a lot of people are speculating about what the next big show is going to be. There's a report this week from self-made P.W. Who said, here's the deal with Seth Rollins situation. I asked about Seth and Roman at SummerSlam, and I was told, look, Roman is going to work Obafemi and Seth Rollins. And I was told one match will be at SummerSlam and the other is going to be at WrestleMania, unless Duane decides to wrestle in Saudi.

That's what I was told. Roman is going to work South and Oba, and one of those is getting SummerSlam and one's getting mania. When you look at next year's WrestleMania in Saudi Arabia, what do you think is the marquee match they're going to be thinking about a year out? Is it Roman and Oba or something else? I obviously don't know because I'm not in touch with any of the, anybody in Saudi.

I have no idea what the audience is interested in in Saudi. They may be interested in different things than our domestic U.S. audiences is interested in. Example, I don't even know if this is true anymore. But in 2019, when I spent 45 minutes in WWE, one of the big topics of conversation every single week, and it was always the same conversation with the same ending, by the way, which is, okay, what are we going to do in Saudi?

and everybody would sit around a table with Vince McMahon, and we'd throw these names out and what if this and what if that, and we spent hours talking about what Saudi could look like. And then we'd not come to a decision, and we'd agree to meet later on the week and discuss a new plan, which was the same as the previous plan, which is let's throw names around and see what works. During the course of that chaos that I was exposed to,

I'm sure it got better later on, but when I was there, and Bruce had some issues, he was dealing with in Houston, so he wasn't really there. It was a little chaotic. But one of the things I kept hearing was that Saudis had their own ideas about who should be on the card, based on the Saudi audience preferences. One of them, Yoko Zuna. What does that tell you? That the Saudi audience, at least at that time, wasn't watching the current product.

They were watching stuff that was quite old. So a lot of the talent, now this is 2019. This is six, seven years ago, whatever. So things probably have changed. But back then, their idea of marquee matchups were guys that were either dead or no longer in the business or capable of her, which was a lot of them. They had to do not touch rule in WWE. And just about everybody other than Goldberg fell into that category. when those names would come up.

Now, again, maybe the audience has gotten more current and it's a completely different environment. But my exposure, six, seven years ago, was they want older names that are not easily available, which makes me think Rock, because if that same kind of vintage hangover, we'll call it, legacy hangover, is still part of the audience composition in terms of what they want to see,

then obviously bringing Rock, John Cena in some kind of non-wrestling related role is probably going to check those, we'll call them nostalgia boxes, those fans that are looking to the early 2000s or mid-2000s as the peak in a WWE period. You got Rock, you can bring John Cena in to participate, a couple other nice little moves, and then balance the rest of the card out with younger talent.

But I do see Rock on the card in Saudi for WrestleMania. you. I think that's going to be interesting to see how it shakes out, but I also wonder what they're going to claim on the other side. I do want to talk to you a little bit about some quotes from Nick Con earlier this week, but before we do, I want to talk about our friends over at BluChu. You know, the future of erectile function is here. Blue Chute Gold is changing the way millions of men are having sex in 2026. Their new arousal boosting formula combines passion and performance into one tablet that dissolves under your tongue for super fast onset. No more waiting for a pill to kick in, no more moments ruined by performance anxiety,

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Hey, so let's briefly talk about WrestleMania 40. I don't know if you saw this, but there's a great interview that we've got some quotes from about Nick Conn and WWE's approach to social media criticism. Specifically, he says, we will never respond to social media criticism. If ratings are down, if revenues down, if relevancy's down, it's up to us. A year ago, we got together.

Triple H, Legentil, myself, and a guy named Sean Michaels, who runs our developmental system, Hall of Fame wrestler. And we said, hey, look, we have John Cena on his retirement tour. Rock came back, and now he's going to be filming Jumanji and Smashing Machine at the time. Our other big stars, C&Punks 46, we got a number of men who were 40 years or older. and they're performing at the high level. We've got to accelerate the next generation of talent, so what do we need to do to accelerate it?

Sean Michael said, we need to take them on the road, so they get crowd response of a live crowd. That's part of what makes wrestling unique. If you're getting cheered, great. If you're getting booed, great. If there's no response, terrible. So you need that live crowd to figure that out,

so we made an investment in that. But I think this is great. I love that we're addressing, you know, what's possible with the future and how you're going to prepare the next generation. And I know that you have sort of teeter tottered at different times about the value and how shows. It does feel like moving some of those talent up, like Obafemi, like Javon Evans, like a lot of

Patrick Williams and others. They've done really, really well on the main roster. Do you think house shows still have a value? Is it important that they have these reps in front of a live crowd outside of what you might call the studio wrestling approach of NXT in the Performance Center. You're muted, Eric. Sorry about that. I do and I feel very strongly about it.

I want to be really, really clear, though, from a business perspective, revenue perspective, house shows are a money-losing proposition. It is what it is. It's everything you can think of that's associated with the cost of doing a house show has gotten so much more expensive. And the ability to turn out enough of a crowd consistently enough to make a live event tour schedule like WW used to have,

turning that profitable, I think it's impossible in today's environment. That being said, I think house shows are a critical importance, much to the point I think Nick was trying to make and Sean Michaels, obviously made, you can't fully develop talent in an artificial environment. And I don't care what anybody says, Jeff Jared or anybody else that's tried it and failed because it doesn't work. You can't get talent to the level of performance they need to be until you get them in front of a real audience. And a real audience is one that parts with their cash to buy to the ticket that gets them access to that seat. That's a real, that's a real fan.

The, the, hey, come down, you know, free TV taping. Bring your friends. Bring your own food. Bring a bottle of wine. We don't care. Come on in. It's free. That's not a real audience. That's a Pavlovian dog audience that is there simply because they want to be on TV and be a part of the show. You're not getting the same reactions. You're not getting the same insight. Think of it is a really, really bad data research group. Data research is only as good as the group that you're researching. Bad information in, bad information out. When you go into an artificial studio environment, it is bad data in. So whatever you think you're learning, you're really not. Now, I think NXT is probably the closest anybody's gotten to it, but it's still not a real audience.

and I think it's worth whatever money they lose because you're really investing in talent development. It's an accounting thing, really. But if you look at a limited live event tour as part of the developmental process and the costs associated with it as the cost related to developing talent, then I think it's an absolute necessity. Otherwise, you're going to get two-dimensional talent. You'll be good at a lot of shit. They can be good at moves. They can be good at a lot of things.

But they're never going to learn how to manipulate the audience if they've never had an opportunity to learn how to do it. And it's an art form and its instinct and it's repetitions. It's not something anybody's going to teach you in a wrestling school. It's not anything you're going to learn in an artificial studio environment. The only way you're going to learn is to go out and succeed and fall on your ass in front of actual paying customers. I can't argue that.

I do think that I appreciate when you referenced Jeff. I think Jeff made the decision based on economics. Like if they took the show on the road, the business goes under. So, you know, necessity. You don't take the show on your road, the business goes under. So either way,

one takes a little longer. Let's talk a little bit about the social media piece with Nick Con again. He says that WWE will never respond to social media criticism and he even doubled down on the WrestleMania 40 talk. He says that the plans for WrestleMania 40 never changed. Here's the exact quote. By the way, the plan was always how it ended up in Philly two years ago. It's a predetermined outcome in wrestling.

You want to throw the fans off. You want to let things bake and then boom, it ends up the way we wanted it to end up. It never changed. That was just online rumors and gossip that we were changing. It never changed. We convinced Dwayne Johnson to come back. He's on our board of directors. it was a tag team match.

He's about the same age as I am. So two years ago, let's say he was 50. He was obviously in phenomenal shape. He did everything that we asked of him and then some. That was always the result we were looking for. Now, the issue here, Eric, is that's not what was presented to us. I mean, even on WWB programming, that's not the way they presented it on their unreal program.

And there was a, you may recall, there was a whole, we want Cody movement. and WWE's unreal programming does show that they wanted Rock to challenge Roman. And then very quickly, they smartly pivoted back to Cody versus Roman. And that was going to be a night two affair. And Rock and Roman were going to team to take on Cody and Seth on night one. So maybe Nick is confused here or maybe he's just selling.

I'm not exactly sure. But I know he's talking to a business reporter. here. So we want to keep that in mind. He's not talking to an internet wrestling journalist, if you will. But WWB does make mistakes. Why wouldn't he just acknowledge, hey, we listen to our audience. And they told us what they wanted and we try to make them happy. But he's going the other way saying, ah, we don't listen to any of that. But they very clearly did. It's kind of weird. I'm not going to get into a debate over what Nick Kahn said based on an interview with the reporter that had something to do with the unscripted scripted, quote,

quote reality show. I'm just not getting into that muck. Look, I didn't like what they did. You didn't like what they did. The audience didn't like what they did. But I wasn't inside. I wasn't sitting in the room. Neither were you. Neither was Dave Meltzer. Neither was the internet wrestling community. Until someone lies to my face or leads me down a path that I know is wrong, I'm going to give a guy like Nick Con the benefit of the doubt in that conversation, only because, because I wasn't in the room. And I don't know.

I just know what I saw and what I saw I didn't really like. Now, that's a fair statement. I guess I was just wondering as the guy who's sort of the head pirate, he's running this pirate ship. There are two schools of thought to approach this. You could lean into the, hey, we want to super serve our fans.

And then you could go the other way of saying the old Vince McMahon, they don't know what they want. I'll tell them what they want. And it feels like this is Nick doing a little bit of that. Yeah. Look, in general, was he talking specifically to a segment of the audience? I look, I think the internet wrestling community is like just as a whole, as a profile, one of the lowest forms of intellectual life on the freaking planet.

Those are listeners. These, these, not all of them, obviously. I've often said we have the smartest wrestling fans anywhere out there, at least listening to this show. But if you, and this is true across all different forms of social media, it's not exclusive to wrestling necessarily, but the voices amass in social media across the board, not just wrestling, are the lowest form of intellectual life,

the most uninformed people you can possibly pay attention to. And I've learned now, because it used to be entertaining to me when I'd see some of these commentary, Again, not just wrestling, social media. And insert any initial you want for Internet community. It doesn't really matter. The discourse is so childish.

It's like these people, for the most part, are outside of any real social circles. And the only people that will tolerate them are other people that are kind of as bad as they are. when it comes to their outlook on life and the things that they need to get a reaction to and from. So I agree with Nick. It's the same reason I don't listen to social media across the board. It's not just wrestling. So I'm not just picking on wrestling fans. I'm just saying, why would anybody listen to freaking social media?

If you do, you're an idiot. If you're going to build your business and base your business around the opinions of the, Bottom feeders that compromise 80% of social media commentary. Good luck with that. I think we'll agree to disagree. You know, the way to WrestleMania 40, if you'll recall, when they had the Rocks were to take Cody's spot. YouTube videos got massive thumbs down.

They had to turn the comments off. Like it's the most dislike video, I think, that WWBs ever posted. And I hear what you're saying about, yes, there is some ugliness on the IWC, especially when you're talking about social media, but I don't know. It feels like the thumbs down was a pretty overwhelming sentiment amongst the fan base. What was the thumbs down about? Was the thumbs down about his comment,

which is we're not going to listen to social media? Or was the thumbs down about what they saw as part of a wrestling agent? Because the two aren't necessarily connected. Nick Conn was saying we don't listen to negative commentary on social media. I don't think you'll find a Fortune 100 company, 500 company, or a thousand company out there where you're going to have. have a leader or someone in senior management. So, no, man.

Social media, man, we should. Our board of directors pays really close attention to that. This is, it's, this is a, I don't know. Silly. I'm not arguing the whole, uh, let's not make our decisions based on the IWC, but to say, hey, this was the plan all along. I don't know if that's completely honest. Okay.

But I also understand that he's talking, he's doing a business interview. He's not, he's not doing an IWC. type interview and that's different. And I know that a lot of our listeners may not recognize that, but I do. And I do think that most of the time, they do want you to go on a story of the ups and the downs. And that makes total sense. I'm on board with all that.

But this one in particular, it's like, if you're going to sell us that this is a reality show and then you're going to have your head chief say, well, that reality show is kind of bullshit. That's not really a reality show because that's kind of what he's insinuating. It's like you can't have it both ways. It's like keep up the story of that. we told on Unreal or tell the real story on Unreal. I don't know.

It feels weird to me, Eric. What doesn't feel weird, though, is the success of Danhausen. Boy, we have hammered that here on this program and it feels like it grows every single week. We'll talk about him in the Knicks a little later, but he recently gave some advice with Bailey's group. And I don't know if you've seen this, but Bailey has this great training group that she gets together and she brings in people from all over to go ahead and learn their craft and

hone their craft and get a little better. But also one of the things she does is she brings in guest speakers. And I was so proud to see that Danhausen was one of her recent attendees. And I thought the advice she gave was fantastic. And I wanted to get your take on it. Danhausen told the students about marketing yourself and pro wrestling. And here's this quote, the athletic part is important, but it's not everything, which is good because not all of us

are super athletic. I'm not, but I made that a strength. And you guys can do that too. as long as you focus on what you do well. I think it was William Regal that said, I just hide all the shit that I'm bad at and focus on the things I'm good at. That seems to work.

I've used that and it seems to work for me. If you're an independent wrestler and doing merch, I try to follow the rule of, would I wear this? And if I wouldn't wear this, I do not release it because that shit sucks. That's kind of the character too. What do you like?

What movies do you like? What music do you like? I know Becca does the pop star thing. You've taken that and made a character out of that. that and that's something people can connect with and stands out. And that's the best thing is to stand out. I know convincing people on your character is not easy. It's just kind of deciding if you want to die on that hill.

Is it really worth it? Then yes, fight for it and be like, this is my shit. This is our time, five to ten minutes to show these people who we are and this is who I am. And can I think of a way for us to get into this? I think it's just a way of being respectful and being nice. And I think this is pretty cool that he's telling this story that character matters and being committed to the character and understanding your character and really committing long term to that. What do you make of this advice, Eric? I, by the way, reposted some of that I saw on social media.

I do my part to try to make it someplace valuable. But I love that. I love that. It epitomizes where wrestling is today. And by that I mean where the art form is, because it's gone so far to the extreme athleticism at the expense of story and character. It's athleticism and, oh, shit, moments

at the expense of anything that resembles a character or a story. and I've been complaining about that for five or six years here on this show. And what Danhausen is saying, which is the same thing, you know, what do the kids call us old heads? Guys like, it doesn't matter, I won't name drop. Guys that have talked openly about where wrestling is at today versus where it was when they were at the top of their game. it comes down to great characters and great stories.

And you don't get that in today's product, but what Danhausen was talking about was the basics. Figure out your character and dig deep into that character and become that character. Know what that character likes for breakfast. Or as Danhausen said, what he likes to eat, what movies he or she likes. Imagine your character in real life. so that you can portray that character in an entertaining way out in front of the people. You know what to turn the volume up on.

You know the little things that work and what people react to. Going back to the live audience aspect of this, you're not going to learn this shit in a sound stage. I guarantee you you're not going to learn it in a sound stage. But practice those things, learn those things. That's how you develop it. I would imagine, I don't want to speak for them, But I would imagine Dan Housen's journey was one of a little bit of trial and error.

He had a general idea, but he went out and he tried things. Some of it worked. Some of it didn't. Tweaked it, modified it. Did more of the things that worked that got a great reaction, did less of the things that didn't. That's all part of becoming the character. And I think when he talks about that aspect of the product being lost in his own way, I think that's really, really good advice for even people who are veterans in the business in their own minds, especially veterans in the business today.

And that is just to become a much, much better character because you can't have a great story without a great character. And you can't have a great character without a great story. They go hand in hand. And I love reading that, especially from a young guy who's breaking into the business at a time when it's exploding. and I think his input is important. And I think the success of his character will become important because it will teach people the hard way, the good way, I guess, by example, of what works.

Well, we'll see how you guys think about the insane clown posse and J.C.W. Lunacy. Does that work? Let's take a look. J.C.W. Lunacy, new episodes every Thursday night at 7 p.m. on YouTube. For over 25 years, J.C.W. has delivered the very best in pro wrestling entertainment, bringing fans deep storytelling drama, gut-busting comedy, and an unbelievable in-ring action. From wild characters to unforgettable rivalries, don't miss a single moment. Tune in every Thursday night at 7 p.m. on YouTube, J.C.W. Lunacy.

All right, Eric, it's not every week that we have a very special guest, but we are joined by a very special guest. as we're continuing our celebration on 30 years of the NWO. Ladies and gentlemen, let's welcome into the program. Mr. Ariel Hawani. Ariel, how are you, man? Wow, I feel like I made it. I feel like I got called up to the big leagues. Conrad knows me.

He actually said my name. I mean, I've been listening to you for years and years. I've had the great pleasure of having Eric on my program before, so I'm not marking out as much. But the fact that EZE is asking me to come on his program is a big deal in its own right. And so I am giddy. I feel like I've won some sort of wrestling lottery here, fantasy camp, if you will.

It's great to be here with you guys. That is awesome. Thank you for that, Ariel. I've been such a big fan of yours for, I don't know, like 16 years. I'll never forget your sit down with jail son and way back when the black and white. Man, it's just the greatest thing ever. And the idea that we have a 17-time MMA journalist of the year with us. How about that?

We appreciate having you. I appreciate that, although it's 15. and so I don't want to give myself the old Barry H. Barry Horowitz. Shout out to him. It is 15, but thank you for the two extra ones, Conrad. I do appreciate it. By the way, was it on a show with Tony Chavani where he called me to you a slap dick or something? Was that your show with him or was that another show?

That sounds right. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. That sounds right. I felt excited about that one too. That was a great one. You remember that whole ordeal? That was fun.

Well, we're glad that you're taking a break from the area of Hwani show to join us. And we're talking about 30 years of the end. And Eric, I don't know. I was a little gunshot about having another guest this week after you got and quartered about or my pal, Todd Martin from the PW Torch. Can we get you to be nice to Ariel today? Is that possible? Well, Ariel knows this stuff.

See, this is the difference between having a guest that actually knows what they're talking about and having some knucklehead cosplay wannabe out here, doing a bunch of garbage that he read in a trade magazine and has his only really talent is the ability to ingest things that he reads doesn't really understand and make it sound like he does that was the limit in scope that individual's skill sets are on the other hand as you pointed out this guy knows what he's talking about well he's talking about what everybody's talking about right now of course mr hillwani the nicks are winning uh did you ever imagine that this would be the case i mean how excited are you are now you're going to see me go like full-blown fanboy um i'm i'm a

lifelong Knicks fan. I became a Knicks fan in 1990. My favorite sports team, my favorite athlete is Patrick Ewing. And I can't actually function. This is actually a gift what you guys are doing for me right here because it's just giving me 30 minutes to do something else that's productive in life because I'm just watching highlights after highlights, after highlights, reading articles, telling my kids, do you realize how big this is? Do you realize this is once in a lifetime? You realize that I'm a 43-year-old man. I've never seen anything remotely close to this. It's not normal. I don't want them to take this for granted.

So yes, I'm on cloud nine. I just pray they can get three more. Because you know why I pray they can get three more? Because I want to stop caring as much as I do. It pains me how much I care. And I feel like if they win, I'll be done. I'll be able to live a productive life and die in peace. And so I just want to relieve myself.

As I've said to my friends, a lifetime of pain will be erased and a lifetime of angst will be relieved if these guys can do it. Three more now, guys. Three more. I don't know if you're basketball fans, but I am flying in the air right now. I don't know how to process all of this.

Tell the truth, how nervous were you when Jalen Brunson went down in the first quarter and again in the second. Oh, my God. I was nervous all day. I had a stomachache all day. I had to do my show yesterday, and I couldn't think about anything other than the game.

Then the game starts, and I swear I thought I was going to faint. It was dizzying. The pace was dizzying, those stupid T-shirts that they're wearing in the crowd, the pink, the green, all that stuff. That was making me nauseous. And then Jalen gets hurt, goes to the back. Then he hurts his ankle in the second. I was like, please, God, not like this. Please, we have suffered enough.

Please, for the love of God, 53 years. Obviously, I'm 43. I saw them in 94, 99. It's just very painful. The spurs, God bless them. Great people, great franchise, all that stuff and more. But let's be honest, they've won a bunch of times. They don't need this. They don't want this as badly as we do. Just give us one. I don't want a dynasty, by the way. I just want one. I just want to know what it feels like to have one. I'm a Knicks fan and a Bill's fan. I've never seen one. I just want to know what that feels like when it's over, the confetti, the hat, the t-shirt, you buy the merch. That's what I want to experience. And I've never been closer than right now. Here's what's going to happen when you get you win. And I think you will. I think there's a great chance that you will. That

neuro pathway, that dopamine hit that you're going to get when you finally get there, once it embeds itself into your brain within a very short period of time, you're going to be craving a similarly intense dopamine hit than only another championship. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, I want one. I don't want to get greedy. I swear to God, I will trade the next 10 years of sub 500 basketball if we could just get this one. I'm not going to be. That's commitment. I don't want dynasty. I just want one. I want to be like those old guys who talked to me about the 19, 70 and 1973 Knicks. Walt Frazier, Willis Reed, Dave the Busher, Bill Bradley,

Phil Jackson for that one year, Earl the Pro Monroe, et cetera, et cetera. Red Holstman, the head coach. I want to be like those guys in 20, 30 years, telling them about the 2026 New York Knicks. That's what I want in my life. That's all I've ever wanted in my life as a fan. And so, yeah, it's just, it's hard to believe that this is happening right now, 12 in a row, by the way.

I do want to ask, how much credit do you give to Dan Housen? Honestly, I didn't want to jump on. on that bandwagon, but I'm so desperate that I'm fully joking on that bandway. I am giving him all the credit. I have said, if there's a parade down Broadway in a couple weeks, that dude better be on one of those buses. Like there's a bunch of buses. Just put him on one of them. It's been great. What a run he's on. I tweeted when he came out of that thing at that pay-per-view a few months ago, or the PLE, I just wrote on top Gobbledy Gooker. It reminded me of the Gobblede Gooker. And I've I've been proven wrong.

He has been, he's been on a generational run. Like, even attaching himself to this has been phenomenal. Everything he's been doing has been great. I didn't expect this.

I always liked Danhausen. I always thought he was fun, but he felt to me from afar, like a bit of an Indiac. He does not come across that way for whatever reason now. He is a nice little comedic relief. He's great for the kids.

He's phenomenal on the microphone, showing up on ESPN, doing the stuff with all the guys there. And so, yes, I just want to say to Danhausen, we don't want the smoke. We will pay you. If those guys aren't paying you enough, we will pay you to end this curse once and for

all. And we accept you and love you. And I hope, I actually really do hope that they accept him as well because Jalen was asked about him and he sort of no-souled him as a true pro. I hope they put him at the parade if, if, if, if it happens, because I think that would be very, very fun. Yeah, Ariel, I just want to thank you for ever being indebted to you for exposing me to the term

indiac I just you never heard that before no I never have and I'm probably probably be one of this wouldn't be one of those words that I overuse for some time. Okay please just give me credit

every time you do that so I can get a little bit more over okay I got to ask hypothetically if the nick are successful and the curse is lifted will you come back on the show in full Danhausen paint can me get you to paint up as Danhausen if I mean how bad do you

want this Knicks championship. You know how big my list is now of, hey, if the Knicks win, will you do this? It all started many, many moons ago. And I told my children, if the Knicks win, I will take my clothes off and run up and down the street naked. And they keep reminding me of this. And I'm, I'm sticking to it. It's going to be probably late 1130, 12. Who's going to be up at that point? Another guy. Nobody just listened to you talk about it before for sure. There won't be TMZ out there with cameras waiting outside the Kwanian House. Is that back? Can I get arrested for that? Who knows? He'll be okay. It'll be good for business. Someone tweeted me last year and said if the Knicks win last year, can I rub you up and down with oil?

And I said, yes. That's how desperate I was. He then tweets me today, screen grabs it and says, is this still on? And I said yes. And so that's on the list as well. I told my team, we're going to Vegas in July for the Cona McGregor fight. And there's this amazing Japanese restaurant that have only been to once there, Omacase, which is in case you don't know, like there's no menu, they just bring you all the stuff. It's about 800 a person. And there's a team of seven of us.

I said, Nick's win. We're all going my treat. I'll happily pay for everyone. And some of them don't even like sushi, but I said, you've got to try this place. It's unbelievable. And so if we want to add that to the list, too, I'm not saying no to anything at this point. Do you want my left leg as well? Happily.

I have no problem donating that to Jalen and everyone. I can't stress enough how much this all means to me. I don't know why. I can't even put it into words. My mom reminded me in the eighth grade when Patrick Ewing missed the finger roll in 1995 that she was driving me to school. I'm in eighth grade, by the way, in tears in the back of the car telling her, I don't know how I'm going to live for the next five months because they're coming back in October.

What am I going to do with myself? I love these guys so much. That's how obsessed I was with that team. and I have similar feelings about this team as a grown man. The greatest gift is being able to experience this with my two young boys, them staying up with me last night and watching it. It's the greatest thing. And I'm actually happy that it took this long because it wouldn't have meant the same

if they were like, you know, one year old or two years old. Well, we're pulling for you, man. I know all about sports fandom and I got my fingers crossed for you. I bet on the next last night, so I'm in the same basket as you. I do want to talk a little wrestling, though. Sure, sure. that you loved the AAA show this past weekend. I'm not sure if Eric had a chance to catch it.

He was doing Real American Freestyle. But what did you think of the presentation with the two El Gronde Americanos? Oh, my dear. So, okay, so I adore pro wrestling as well. I'm very passionate about the things that I love. Pro wrestling was the first thing that I ever fell in love with. I remember walking into a video store and seeing Hulk Hogan and Mr. T on the cover of the box, WrestleMania 1.

I was born in 82. I'm pretty sure it was like 86 or 87 when I saw it. And I was, I was transfixed at that point. Brett the Hitman Hearts, my favorite wrestler of all time. He's the first pro athlete I ever loved. And then, of course,

I started to find out about the Knicks and all that stuff. And so I have a deep, deep passion and appreciation and affection for pro wrestling. And I'll be honest, at times it kind of comes and goes in waves. It's cyclical. As you grow older, you start doing other things. As I immersed myself in MMA,

I started to drift away from it. But then, you know, I get a little bit older. Things are interesting. I'm back in it. And what those two individuals did, Chad Gable and Ludwig Kaiser, and what everyone at AAA did, of course, Undertaker being the Booker and all that stuff for the last few months, to me, felt very nostalgic. It reminded me why I loved this form of entertainment so much.

It was, if 10 was the high mark, it was a 15 out of 10 angle, in my opinion. It was, it was the feud of the year, the match of the year. they had the entrance of the year. There was something so real about the way in which this man, Ludwig Kaiser, embraced this angle, which was amazing because it all starts with Chad Gable getting the angle and getting the gimmick, and all of a sudden it's sort of like a comedy act.

And he, you know, he does a great job of getting it over, so to speak. But it really goes to the next level. It doesn't become what it became without Ludwig. And you come to find out this guy speaks Spanish. He's, you know, and I've talked about it on my show, and I've done great feedback about it from Mexican Lucha Libre fans. It wasn't just that he spoke Spanish. He spoke Spanish the Mexican way.

He immersed himself in our culture. Obviously, his girlfriend is Mexican. Obviously, he's talking about, like, you know, a Mexican is born whenever the hell they want and things like that. And he really embraced the culture. And of course, Lucha Libre, and they embraced him. And so to see the passion, the emotion, the entrance, the hat falling off as he's walking out.

And then, you know, the musician putting it on. his head. That was amazing. Like just the little things they couldn't miss. The match was amazing. The ups and downs, the ebbs and flows, tremendous. The crowd was off the charts, definitely crowd. I'm so happy they didn't do it at, you know, WrestleMania or anything like that. She did a great job, Andrea, she did an amazing job as, as her role in the angle as well. It was just magic. It was magic. It was a reminder why we love this so much when they do it right. When wrestling is done right, pro wrestling when it's done right and it tugs on those emotions and you completely forget that it's scripted that it's this and that you just you are just immersed in the story the good

the bad the ups and downs there's nothing better there's nothing better than that showmanship and they nailed it it was unbelievable i can't wait to see where they go here i never thought i'd be watching triple a on a youtube stream i mean i like wrestling but it's not that deep for me and here i am as a 43 year old man watching it and sad that it's over sad that the gimmick and the angle is over at least for now. And so I loved it. I absolutely loved it. Eric, if you haven't seen it, do yourself a favor at some point. I know you're extremely busy. Carve out 30 minutes tonight and just watch it because it was phenomenal. I definitely will. And hearing you describe it, Ariel, it's like it's music to my soul, so to speak, because you're talking about the art

form. You're talking about suspending disbelief when you, you know, when you forget that everything is scripted. Well, part of it, and that's especially hard to do in a AAA type of presentation when everything is so over the top. Just the gimmicks. The algorithm is about it visually that suggests that anything is real, quite the opposite. But the story, the characters, the work that was done before the match, meaning immersing, you know, Ludwig immersing himself in a culture, recognizing that just because you speak Spanish doesn't mean that the Mexican audience is going to like you for it,

especially if it's a Puerto Rican Spanish or whatever, right? embracing the culture that much was the pre-production and then to be able to bring the athleticism. And I'd be remiss if I didn't point out that Chad Gable is a phenomenal, phenomenal amateur wrestler. And is sniffing around real American freestyle, just throwing it out. Oh, I would love that.

Wouldn't we love that? But I will watch it, Ariel. I appreciate everything you said about it. Maybe once. Since you bring that up, can I turn the tables real quickly? How come, so we keep seeing the MMA guys come over, to best by knowledge, we haven't seen one pro wrestler come over just yet. Why is that?

I think it's just a matter of time. Okay. You know, there's some, there's some, you know, contractual issues that can kind of make that difficult. But we're having discussions and relatively serious ones, so I think it's just a matter of time. But also, I'm not going to mention any names, but I was having a conversation not too long ago with someone we all know.

And very excited about what we're doing at Real America FreeS. Again, it comes from a collegiate amateur wrestling background. And I said, hey, just, you know, throwing it out there, you know, what do you think? His response was something to the effect of, I can't kill my gimmick. It's been eight years since I stepped on the mat. Because our wrestlers, our athletes, even our crossover, the MMA athletes, you know, work out hours a day on their mat work, you know, their ground game, whether it be grappling, wrestling, whatever it made, jiu-jitsu. So it's not like, you know, these guys

haven't wrestled in a while. They've been wrestling full-time, a lot of them. So I think there's just a little bit of concern of the image and the reality when you step on the mat with an elite level wrestling like you find it at Real American Freestyle. I will say, though, I do think that if they employed a different approach, which is, hey, If I do this and do well, maybe don't win, but if I go up against, let's just say, in Armin Tarukin, I actually get street credit at that point. At that point, now we see you're a legitimate badass. As opposed to someone like Armin, who's that close to becoming UFC champion,

he, in my opinion, has a lot more to lose if he gets smoked by one of these guys. Like, if Kobe Covington drags him all over the mat and he looked very bad in that match, to me, his stock goes down. But if a pro wrestler, let's just say I'm throwing out Julius Creed because I've heard his name attached Chad Gable, goes in there and looks tremendous. I think that his, his lore becomes a lot more, you know, grander. And I think it actually makes him a lot more appealing as a pro wrestler to me. So I get that.

From your mouth to Nick concierge. Come on, Nick. Come on. Let them go. I mean, the UFC's letting them go. Open the door. I think it actually would help out a lot of these guys a lot more. Like at Julius Creed, I think would benefit tremendously from doing this.

I know Chad, obviously, Chad brought seeing my partner and the CEO at Real American Freestyle. He and Izzy are the ones that are really. really into the matchmaking side of the equation. I kind of focus on what I focus on because I'm very limited, evidently. But I know Chab really and Izzy both are really looking for those kind of great crossover opportunities to balance with, again, the Kyle Snyders of the world and the Bob Bassett's of the world. And we're bringing in enough elite best of the best size of layout we're going to be bringing

to the audience shortly. we're bringing enough of the absolute highest quality elite level, you know, freestyle wrestlers on the planet, but we think we need to balance it with some great entertaining, generally interesting matchups too. And I know Chad is a big supporter of that. I agree. That's been your secret sauce.

The balance has been tremendous. I've said it ad nauseum on my show. I respectfully didn't think this would happen so soon. Like I didn't think that you would be still less than a year out with this type of momentum. I even said to my production team before our show on Monday, thank God for RAAF.

Because if I'm being honest, MMA's been a little bit stale for the first half of 2026. And there have been many a Monday, which is typically our biggest show, where the vast majority of our show is talking about your stories, your matches, your personalities.

So thank God for you guys. And I hope you continue to have those MMA fighters a part of it because it's been great for us as media members to talk about. We will. And a big part of our success, frankly,

ability and your support. So thank you. Thank you. Well, let's talk a little pro wrestling. Yes, yes. We're here celebrating 30 years of the NWO. And it was 30 years ago last week that Scott Hall stormed into WCW Nitro and of course changed the course of wrestling history forever. And it was 30 years ago this week that Scott Hall showed back up. And this time he put his hands on EZE, Eric Bischoff. I'm curious, Ariel, were you watching WCW during this era? because it was 30 years ago this week that Scott Hall promised that he had a big surprise next week. And we know that's going to wind up being Kevin Nash, but were you a WCW fan in 1996? You don't know.

Wait, wait, wait, you know, I screwed that up. You know who I am, but you don't know why I'm here, right? That's what he said in the ring. Where, oh, where is the nacho man? Where or where? Oh, that was amazing. That was so damn cool. he looked so awesome in that jean jacket.

I think it was like a sleeveless gene jacket that he was wearing. He was the freaking man. I loved Scott Hall so much. And so I grew up in Montreal. In 1996, I'm in Montreal. I'm in eighth grade. And a lot of eighth grade references on this program. And you may not remember this Eric,

but back then we would get, so raw would be on a channel called tsn um the sports network and you guys were also but very very rarely were you live and more often than not you're on tuesdays sometimes um after a show called off the record with michael lansberg you remember off the record um michael lansberg used to do a lot of pro wrestling interviews at five or five 30 in the afternoon it was a big deal because it was you know, it was, you know, non-KFabe interviews. Vince would go on a bunch of times. I'm pretty sure I've seen.

Have you ever been on off the record back to that? I was on his show. Landsberg was a huge, first of all, he's a mark for himself, number one. But that's what a lot of guys like that are. And it is what it is. But he was a big fan of WWE and a big fan of Vince. So, of course, he invited me on his show at the very peak of the Monday Night Wars. And unfortunately for me, I was really.

full of myself. So I kind of turned the volume up on the character a little bit during a real interview. And of course, that's what he wanted because it played really well on camera. But I said some stupid shit that I wish I would have said, to be honest with you. But I did have fun with him. I have, because he's smart. He's very fast on his feet. Yes. I don't know if he still is. He's very, very fast on his feet. So it was challenging in a fun way, but probably went a little too far. Oh my God. I feel like I could see you sitting in the studio. I'm done. I need to watch that. Now, that's quite the tease. Like I'm, I treated them like a pissant. It's like I walked in, yeah, I had long hair. I watched him wearing a brown leather jacket. I treated him like,

why am I even here? Of course, I didn't really feel that way. Oh, that's great. I mean, I was a little too much in character. So were you doing the thing that like your WWE show sympathizer type of thing and I don't really like you because of that? Is that why you're, no, it's His questions were all positioned in such a way that I was on the defensive constantly. And rather than defend myself, because I get bored doing that, I just decide to go on the, I have much more fun being offensive than defensive. So I just kind of shifted gears and turned into a dick. Was that in the midst of the 83 weeks?

No, it was in the beginning. The beginning. Okay, so you're hot, right? Like you're feeling yourself a little bit. Oh, boy, did I? that's a I got a fine have you ever seen this Conrad have you seen this interview you have I actually talked with recently this week we've had controversy over the last week or so about the origins of the NWO and of course everybody's talking about the NWO 30 years later

Ariel there's been tons of fun gangs and wrestling going all the way back to the four horsemen and the freebirds and but I'm curious why do you think the NWO still resonates so much more than than anything else even DX it feels like the NWO was so much bigger. Why was that, do you think? Okay, I have several theories. And by the way, I never even finished answering your first question. I was watching, but WWF was more live back then. TSN would show you guys after the fact. And so it was a little bit harder, a little bit pre-internet. 97 is when we got internet. But I was very aware of what was going on and following, but it was just harder to keep up. But we didn't have TNT until like later on we got a satellite dish. So it's around like

98 where I'm able to watch live. Nitro. Anyway, back to your second question. So multiple things. I got I got really mad and I was one of the few I actually feel like who said this. When Sina turned heel, everyone said

that that was akin to Hulk Hogan turning heel. And I said, absolutely not. And I said it's not going to have the same impact. And I said we won't be talking about this in 20 years like we still do, you know, the NW and everything happened there. And I feel like I've been vindicated. I don't think that that's you know, a hot take

in any way, shape, or form. And so there's multiple things happening here. Number one, WWF at the time, is rather stale. And it feels a little bit cartoony, hokey. There's no edge to it. It's the same old, same old. And, you know, like, I'll be even be honest. Like, come 94, 95, that's part of the period where I'm starting to get really,

really bored of it. I love Brett and he's the man, but the rest just felt a little bit too babyish, if you will. And so on the other side of the fence, you hear about these two guys going over and everything, meaning going over to the other side, not going over as far as a match's concern, but you feel like everything that they're saying is real. And by then, you know, I'm 12, 13, 14 years old.

I know what wrestling is, but I've never seen anyone blur the lines like this. And so I'm legitimately asked, I'm still young enough to where I'm asking myself like, what's going on here? Like, were they really sent over? What is happening? You know, like that is Razoramone and that is diesel, but now they're themselves and they're the same guys and what's the deal and all that stuff. And so it was the first time I feel like in my life as a wrestling fan where it made you question, is this really what I think it is? You know, like everything that I was told wrestling was, is it actually different now?

Has it changed? And so there was a real sort of like sense of authenticity to it. It was done so well, and then it's Hulk of all people. I don't know if it has the same impact. Honestly, if it ends up being Sting or someone like that, as has been discussed, because we had never seen, you know, heal Hulk Hogan, and because he leaned into it so much, and he was so good at it, and it was such a perfect time for him to be that guy, it was amazing.

It was nirvana. It was everything that WWF wasn't. It was the antithesis of what WWF was at the time. It felt raw. It felt real. It felt important. It felt different. It felt fresh.

It was just so great. And it didn't feel, it didn't feel like trivialized. To me, like the Sina turn was way too late. It didn't feel real. It felt like John Sina was playing bad guy. I felt like Hulk Hogan was a bad guy. I felt like Scott Hall and Kevin Ash were bad guys. I felt like they were exactly the guys that I was seeing on TV.

I felt like the moment John Sina went through the curtains, he was like, who, how did I do? You know, it just didn't. And I know I'm older. but it just didn't hit the same way. And so because it was so fresh and so new and so authentic, I think we'll always remember the first one and we'll always remember the one that kind of kicked off that new era. There is no attitude era without the NWO.

Anyone who says otherwise is an absolute liar. And so NWO forced WWE to change things and re-evaluate things. We all know what happened afterwards. And so you always have to pay homage and respect to what ignited it all. And that, to me, was that angle. And so, yeah, it's the greatest faction. in wrestling history and it's one of the greatest angles in wrestling history and I don't think that anyone can really argue otherwise. The thing that I think a lot of people point to is

we didn't get a proper ending to the NWO story. We know how it got started and we all praise it is maybe the greatest wrestling angle of all time, but it's sort of just fizzled out. It didn't have the big finish that we expected. You were a fan. When would have been the proper time to end it, at least in your opinion? Oh, wow. That's a really good question. You know, and I agree I'm happy that you say that because I don't want to offend our company, Eric, but I will be honest just because that's the way I am. I did feel like over time it got convoluted and there were too many, you know, people in the faction and the red and black and the white and black and all that stuff.

It just became a lot. You know what I mean? Like to me, this is the perfect encapsulation of it. It became a lot, guys turning keel, the finishes and all that stuff. And so, you know, I'm reminded I have it somewhere here. My very good friend Mark Romondi wrote a great book on the NWO that I know you've, you've participated in Eric, and I'm sure you read as well. Say hello to the bad guys.

I loved it. And I recall in the book, and correct me if I'm mistaken here, it felt like Hogan Sting should have been the culmination. Am I wrong about that? and that was what like a year and a half later am i getting this right or am i getting this wrong if you would have done it there you wouldn't have you wouldn't have gotten hogan and goldberg so you still want that don't you yeah that was the lie of 98 so it feels like at least in my opinion i suggested last week maybe 99 eric thought maybe 98

but i don't want to miss the goldberg win i think i think you still could have got to Goldberg and it still would have meant, it wouldn't have meant as much. Because wasn't it swollen at that point anyway? I still, was Goldberg Hogan big because it was NWO Hogan or just because it was Hogan? Well, it was because it was the title, it was. No, I know that. But if NWO wasn't a thing and it was still Hulk Hogan by himself without the NWO, I feel like it would have still been big.

Still would have been big. But I think long term, business wise, just long term, I think. I think finishing with Halpsting, ending the NWO story there, whatever date that would have been. I still think 98. And then using that as a springboard to launch into a derivative, something, not just another faction of the NWO, but using that outcome to set the stage for another epic kind of confrontation between two individuals or, again, two groups. Did you ever consider, can I ask? I know that there were times where it took over and whatnot,

but were there ever serious discussions about truly a separate TV show like Raw and Smackdown and once WCW. I know that it was at times like NWO taking over, but like truly two separate brands. Absolutely. And that was one of the frustrating things for me because because of the success of Nitro on T&T, and I don't want to throw out of date because I'll screw up the timelines, my memory's not that good.

But somewhere along the line, I got a phone call from Harvey Schiller who said he had just got off the phone with Ted Turner. And Ted wanted Thursday night, TBS, to have its own show, just like TNT did. So in other words, I was told I got to come up with another two-hour program in prime time at the same level as Nitro. And at the time, it was like, what do I do? What do I do? Oh, I know what I do.

I'll give NWO, the NICO show. I'll give WCW the Thursday night show, and we'll have our own intercompetal rivalries. No different than the wrong Smackdown eventually. They're continuing to try to do it. It's just the brand extension idea, really. You just have two different shows. It's that simple.

The crossover, the drafts, all that nonsense, makes a little bit of internet chatter, but there's no real money in it. But yeah, that was the original plan, which was partially the reason that the NWO started to get bigger without it making a ton of sense because we were building. This was all leading up to whenever a Thunder debuted, it must have been 98 somewhere in there. Partially it was building up so that we could eventually do the split. Why didn't you? Things started getting ugly during the merger.

So Ted says, Eric, go do this. I say we don't have it in the budget. My boss says, doesn't matter. Find a way. Okay, that's my job. Go find a way. I found a way to produce the show. But the biggest challenge that I had, well, first of all, I had to bring in Brett Hart.

I needed new talent. Otherwise, I'd be polluting my talent pool with four hours of prime time wrestling with the same basically eight guys, right, that drive things. So we started hiring more talent at the same. time Turner corporate was slashing my budgets, pre-approved budgets that had been approved a year in advance, even though I was creating more revenue than I was projected to perform at that particular time, they were continuing to cut budgets, production budgets, travel budgets, advertising budgets, marketing budgets were all being crushed because they were trying to manage their EBITA, their earnings before interest, depreciation, and amortization,

which is a big formula during the merger for guys, executives who own stock options to cash out big. So my company was being gutted while I was being asked to produce a new primetime show with the same level of production and everything else is T&T. So it was just a, it was like a crossroads of bad traffic. Okay, okay. Can I ask one more real quick. Sorry, I don't mean to hijack. No, this is fun.

Why did you end up on Wednesday and not Thursday for Thunder? I thought we were Thursday. Were we Wednesday? Yeah, it was Thursday. No, I was Wednesday. We're in Canada. You were in Canada. It wasn't on,

Thunder wasn't on Wednesdays? No, it's on Thursday Thunder. No, I'm, this, it was, Thunder was never on Wednesdays? This is the Mandela effect, I think, maybe. Golly. I'm going to look this up right now. Sorry, I, this is got,

because I'm a big stickler for facts. WCW Thunder on Wednesday. I mean, here I am. Here I am going up against Conrad. Wouldn't it be funny if it comes back and we find out that because you're in Canada, you're on a one-week tape delay? And it really was on Wednesday nights for you, but you were watching last week's show. According to Wikipedia, which isn't the greatest source, but I'm doing this very fast,

WCW Thunder switch from Thursday evenings to Wednesday on January 12, 2000. So I'm a little bit late here, but I think by the end, it was a Wednesday product. For two months, it was. For how long? For like two months maybe. No, no, it's 2000. You're right. So that's a year.

Yeah. The last year. Just goes to show I know ball right here. I'm watching 2001 WCW. Who else is watching WCW greed? Literally nobody. Literally nobody. Blood rising.

Wow. You're scary. You have a hell of a memory, dude. Oh my God. Low key, as the kids say, I actually kind of enjoyed that. period. Ooh. Like the,

the, the, um, okay, like when, the, the, the movie with David Arquette and all that,

uh, ready to rumble. I actually, I thought that was fun. I didn't, everyone has their thing about Arquette and all that. I didn't take it so seriously. Now,

it got a little crazy at the end with the Russo stuff and all that, but there were some great matches back to team Canada. I was a fan of team Canada as a Canadian. I enjoy Lance Storm. Can I be serious for a minute? Like, I liked him. I,

I, I really enjoyed some of those guys. So I, you know, know that's sort of the dark period there, but I was sad to see it end. I was not in favor of the merger. Ariel, did you see David in his, when he went down to Mexico and trained with the luchadors? Unbelievable. Unbelievable. Unbelievable. Yeah, he's great. I understood why people were upset. I wasn't really offended by it. I just like, oh, okay, this is something different. At times, the things came off as a little bit desperate and hot-shotting, if you will. but I was I was there to the very end.

I was 100% there to the very end. I was. I knew somebody was and now I get to meet him. I was there. I was there. I like it when it's a little bit wacky. I like it when you know, when your back's against the wall and you've got to come up with things.

It's no fun rooting for the front runner, if you will. Well, let's talk about the front runner of current wrestling. You know, I don't know if everybody listening knows this, but there's a big discussion online this week. There's one tweet in particular that has over 1.5 million views and over 100,000,

responses. And it basically asked the question, when did Triple H's booking jump the shark? And I saw a few weeks ago, Ariel, you felt specifically like AEW needed a change. Maybe they were struggling a little bit storyline wise. Why do you think that is and do you think it represents an opportunity for AEW? Or how do you reconcile wrestling creative as we sit here in 2026? Okay, that's a great question. So I'll preface this by saying, Paul Levick and I, he's not my good friend. We don't go out for dinner, but I really, really do like him as a person.

And I've really enjoyed our interactions. I interviewed him once in London before the first clash of the castle. And it was a great interview about his health problems. And I'll always be very appreciative for that. And we've had a couple of, you know, text messages and stuff like that. And so I really do like him as a person. And I feel like at times he is handcuffed and he is being hamstrung because I do feel like the real rise of TKO, if you will, coincided with this particular downturn, if you will.

And so I don't feel like it's 100% fair to always blame him. But look, you ask for that position. You're the guy. You're the face. No different than being the head coach of a basketball team. And sometimes your GM is making bad deals. And now you have to deal with whatever they're doing to a degree. It's similar.

And so I want to preface this. But there's no question about it. I have said, and so I'm not backtracking, I have said that I find the product right now soulless. I really did not like WrestleMania. WrestleMania really, it upset me, to be honest, because I adore everything about wrestling and I adore the pomp and circumstance that comes with WrestleMania. I like the backstage vignettes and the interviews. Like, that to me is what I grew up on.

Hulk Hogan choking Bob Yucer like this in the back, excuse me, Andre the Giant, choking Bob Yucer like this. in the back. It's amazing. Hulk Hogan with mean gene in the back in the locker room after he wins. These are massive, massive moments. And I felt like the WrestleMania product that we saw a few months, a few weeks back in Vegas was completely stripped of all of that.

The commercials and all that also didn't make it feel all that important. And so I'm just, there's nothing that's grabbing my attention. It feels very corporate right now. I feel like some of the wrestlers aren't, they're not motivated. There's just something that feels off about it. Let's backtrack now.

February of 2023, I'm in Montreal for Elimination Chamber. Sammy Zane versus Roman Raines. It was nuclear hot. It was so hot. It was one of the best events that I've ever been to live, one of the best matches. I believe that Sammy was going to go over.

And it would have been an unbelievable scene. And I believe till this day that Sammy should have gone over, truly. and then maybe he wins the belt back and all that stuff and more. All right, fine. They end up having a great WrestleMania match, Roman and Cody, and that culminates with Philadelphia. If you were to ask me where I kind of felt like, like there's nothing left, it was that Philadelphia match.

The Philadelphia match felt like the apex, and everything since then has felt a little less than. Last year's WrestleMania, I don't think was good. The Sina retirement tour, I didn't think was good. The Sina retirement match, Don't get me started on that. I could do 30 minutes just on how bad I thought that was. And I feel like I've been vindicated when it comes to that one because what has become of Gunther?

What has become of this guy? And he got the great honor of beating John Cena, which I thought was a big mistake. And so I feel like the apex was Philadelphia. And I feel like everything since. Now, when I pinpoint one exact moment where it feels like it got us to hear no, but it felt like a slow trickle. Now, I have said on my show, and this may upset people. And I know it did when I said it, that I said it, that I got us to hear, that I view Tony Khan as the little engine that could.

I understand that's ridiculous to some because he's a billionaire, the son of a billionaire. But right now, Tony Khan is in a position where he has no corporate overlord looking over him. He answers to himself. And he comes across in his latest interviews as just a fan and as someone who truly has passion for what he's doing and someone who loves this business.

Hate the product or not, you can't deny that. And so he has an opportunity, I think, in the next less than a year or so, culminating with next year's WrestleMania, which is going to be in Saudi Arabia, to do something very special. I think this is his chance. Culminating with doing something for the fan base here in North America, and everyone that loves to

travel to North America for WrestleMania Week and all the indie shows, Joey Janella and all that stuff. By the way, quick plug, we have a Joey Janella documentary that just premiered on my YouTube channel today, so a great timing there about the spring break of a few weeks ago. He has a great chance to almost be a massive baby face.

And I think the product, I watched double or nothing. I enjoyed it. Do I love everything? Do I think sometimes the shows are a little bit too long? Absolutely. The angles convoluted, too many titles, absolutely absolute. But he has a chance now to, I think, curry a lot of favor with the wrestling fans here on this side of the globe. And so it's a really interesting time. I love this. And I'm not rooting against one faction or one organization or the other. I love WW. That's what first introduced me to all of this. And I know people there and I only wish the best for them. But I'm just being honest by high feel about the product. And right now it's not captivating my attention like it did when I'm talking about,

you know, Montreal and Philadelphia and all that stuff. One of the things I like about your take on that is it brings me back to, again, the merger, AOL time Warner, Turner merger. And I remember shortly after it went down, I think it was Dick Cheatham, our head of finance or somebody on the corporate side of Turner broadcasting. And I said to him, man, everybody was so worried about what this merger was going to feel like. it's no big deal, man, nothing's really changed. And he pulled me aside and he said, Eric, it's going to take 18 months.

Mark my words. Go mark your calendar. It's going to take 18 months. And when it happens, you're going to feel it. And sure enough, there was less than that. It was like 12 months later, budget's getting hacked. People I've never heard of before telling us how to operate, not just WCW, but CNN.

It takes a while. And I think that coincides with your take, Ariel about the timing and TKO corporate coming in. There is a period of transition. And it really is a clash of cultures as much it is anything else. Cultures control the process. I think they're going to work through it just fine. But I think your observation is right on the money.

And I think it's driven by TKL taking over a new business and that culture finally having to mesh. Yeah, I think they'll be fine as well. as I've said, this business combat sports really is very cyclical. And so there's always going to be moments where the UFC is a little bit down. I feel like they're a little bit down right now too. And then all of a sudden, here comes Connor McGregor back and everyone's going Gaga over him. And so this is not necessarily an indictment.

It's a really, really hard thing. I do feel like there are some things where you're like, hmm, a couple of years ago, I don't feel like they were making these choices, making these decisions. They wouldn't have done it this way. And there's still a lot. Like I love the Roman and punk match in a silo. thought it was tremendous. And I thought Roman and Punk were tremendous leading up to that match as well. And they have such great talent on the roster, but not getting them, you know,

like in there for like, what is it, like seven minutes a match, whatever that average was. It was disheartening. And so the roster is great. Obviously, the production is great, all that stuff and more. But it's a little bit like even the ESPN marriage has felt just a little bit clunky. You know, like when I'm watching ESPN and I tune in to see them talk about the Knicks this morning. Yeah, it's great. It feels natural like they're all into it. When they have Obafemi showing up and it's Mike Greenberg asking him questions as if the match is real against Brock Lesnar, doing the SportsCenter thing with him, it doesn't feel like, well, we know what this is. Teach me about who Obafemi is in his backstory. That's the way ESPN should cover WWE. Tell me about

who these people are. Get me emotionally invested in them as characters and as human beings and And then I'll tune in to watch them. It's like when the wrestlers come on my show, when Joe Hendry comes on my show, I'm not asking him questions about, so do you think you're going to win this weekend? No, you ask him, you weave it in. And then ultimately you get people interested. You know what, I really like that guy. I want more of that guy. Carrying Cross, I get that there's like a little bit of KFave.

They're like, that dude's awesome. I want to follow that guy. I don't say, hey, Carrie, do you think you guys are going to go over this? No, that's silly. And so they're just kind of working out the kinks. and there's a lot of smart people there and I think they'll all figure it out in due time. They don't need to hear it for me.

But right now it just all feels a little bit of... Maybe they do. Maybe they do. I don't know. I don't think they do. I don't think they do. Well, we think we're having a great time talking wrestling with you. I do want to finish with a fun segment that you do every Tuesday called On the Nose.

And occasionally fans will ride in and they'll ask questions. And sometimes they even ask your crew to blind rank everything from their favorite fights to their favorite foods and all kinds of crazy stuff. So why don't we do some for WCW? Oh, want you to blind rank some of the biggest moments in WCW history. So we'll start with, uh,

now remember Eric, what we're going to do is he's going to rank these one through five. And he's not going to know what all the options are. He's got to commit to a number. So we'll start first with the 30 year anniversary last week. Scott Hall showing up in the denim jacket on Nitro. Where is that on the list? Top five.

By the way, shout out to your. producer, my great friend, Aunt Evans, because this feels like it came from his brain. He's such great guy. I've known Aunt for so many years, and he's always had my back. And so I appreciate him very much. And I appreciate him inviting me on your show. But one of my great friends of my career, that is such a tough one because I'm inclined to say one, but I feel like a bigger one may come. And so I'll just say since he kicked it off, I'll go safe in three. Okay. So Scott Hall showing up on Nitro is number three. We'll follow it up with Eric Bischoff getting power bombed off the stage by Kevin Nash.

Yeah. So tough because I know, okay, so massive, but I almost feel like, I feel like Eric joining the team was a little bit bigger for me, at least because I didn't see it coming. So I'll go four. All right. We talked about it earlier. What about Goldberg pinning Hulk Hogan on Nitro? Listen, as a young Jewish boy, Goldberg was my hero. I love Bill Goldberg because he showed all of us, you know, all us scrawny Jewish kids that you can be a superhero and you can be pretty damn tough and also be proud of your faith, which I've always appreciated about Bill.

So that was, that was a really big one for me personally. What a scene that was at the Georgia Dome? That was unbelievable. July, July, what? It was around my birthday. I remember. July 8, July 8. July 8, I remember.

It felt like a little birthday gift for me. So thank you for that, Eric. Everyone complains about it being on TNT. I thought it was phenomenal, by the way. So thank you because my parents didn't let me buy all the paper views all the time. I'll go, gosh, you know what? I'm putting it over so much. I'll go with one.

Why not? Okay. Well, that makes me curious. Where are you going to rank Vince McMahon showing up on Nitro announcing he's bought WCW? The fate, the very fate of WCW is in my hand. Remember that? Remember when he said that? What he went like this?

That crazy SOB. What about when he, F-I-R-E-D, Jeff Jared on television. That was wild as well. Crazy. What a crazy, crazy time. I have a crazy memory. I know it was March of 2001. I'm going to say, was it the 23rd?

26th. 26th. The only one who could top me in this regard is you, Conrad. Your memory is unbelievable. Okay, so I only have one slot left, right? But where do you rank Vince? Well, but I, no. In the blind ranking, I think it has to be five. and to be honest, that was kind of depressing.

That was more depressing. I wasn't happy about the acquisition, but then once it happened, I was like, okay, let's see. I went, this is how big of a mark I was. I just so happened to be in New York. I wasn't living in New York at the time. I was still in Montreal, but my family was on a family vacation in New York City,

July of 2001, same night as the invasion pay-per-view. and I went to WWF New York by myself to watch that because I was so into like, oh my God, WCW coming over. And it was like a fart in church. No one wanted to watch it. It was crap. So five, five, because it wasn't good for the business. I can't believe it, but that means by default.

Number two is Hulk Hocke and turning heel and forming the NWO. You know what? I could live with that. That probably should have been number one. I probably should have known that that was coming. But I could kind of live with that. That God, it wasn't number five. In reality, it has to be one,

but I'm okay with Goldberg getting the top spot over him. There's sentimental reasons behind the Goldberghogan match being number one, and that's okay. And you know what? I'm probably the only person on the planet who's a diehard, Brett Hart fan. Like, I will defend him until my last breath and also a Goldberg fan. And I hate the fact that they are forever at odds, but I do love the two of them for separate reasons. Eric, what do you think of Ariel's list?

What would be your number one? Well, that's a fair because it's not blind for me. And again, I don't have much emotional attachment to things. And for me, you know, Hogan Turning Heel has to be my number one. I would just Scott Hall, you know, they're kind of like you can't have with the one without putting over the other because, you know, part one, part two kind of thing, right? So I'd put that at number two. and I can't remember the rest of the list. But that would be my number one and number two.

That's fair. Yeah, I could see that. I could see that. I mean, that's the tricky thing about these blind rankings. But overall, five great choices. The Vince one, though, is tough. Like, it's just, to me, that was more sad. It wasn't celebratory, if you will.

We loved having you on, man. We're so thankful that you're with Yahoo and doing the uncrown vertical. And I know that you cover MMA, you cover boxing, but I'm so delighted that you still cover wrestling, and I think they're uniquely qualified to answer this. We had a conversation with Eric last week about, hey, what do you think your legacy will be? Because I maintained last week here on the show that I feel like,

at least to the wrestling fans, for the rest of his life, and even when he's no longer with us a thousand years from now, that the NWO is going to be Eric's legacy, but you have your ear to the ground on all things, MMA and combat sports. Real American freestyle, Do you think it will eclipse his legacy with the NWO? What do you think? Wouldn't that be a great story?

How many people in their, what, second act, third act? How many acts has this been, Eric, how many people have that opportunity for their last act to be their greatest act, right? Like to be their lasting legacy, if you will. And that's an amazing thing. I mean, it's so impressive. I've talked about this on my show, never here before, because my first time here. but I'll never forget sitting in this exact chair, this exact chair, Chad Bronstine texting me saying like, hey, do you have a second?

Chad's been great to me and I have a lot of respect for him. Brilliant mind when it comes to business and sport and all that stuff. I say absolutely. And I'm sitting literally in this chair. My phone is on speaker right here. And he's like, hey, I got some pretty cool people by my side. And it's Chad, Eric Bischoff and Hulk Hogan, may he rest in peace. And like, come on, man.

like if you would have told 1997 me that I'd ever be in a position where Hulk Hogan even knows I exist on this planet. Eric Bischoff knows I exist on this planet. Like I would have laughed in your face. And they told me about it back then. And that was, I believe, February of 25. It launches in August, the first event it's in August. And it's just been unbelievable.

And so, yeah, why not? I think to pro wrestling fans, it will always be NWO. But could you imagine if the legacy is, hey, you were this guy. revolutionary trailblazer pioneer in this world. And then in this other world, the real stuff as well, no one. Like you will be by yourself on that Mount Rushmore. There could be no one else that had an impact in both forms of wrestling the way in which you have. So I'm not trying to glaze you as the kids like to say, but you should be, I think, very proud of what you've done so far.

And I really truly hope that R.A.F because, you know, it continues because it's given guys like Armine. Could you imagine if Armand's Rukian has been on the sidelines for all these months, he's become a fixture. It's given guys like him, guys like Chris Wyman, Kobe Covington, Tony Ferguson coming up, Hams that now. It's given those MMA fighters that I feel so strongly about, hold so near and dear to my heart, an opportunity to make more money because I don't think they get paid enough in their day job, which is MMA fighting. So I think it's a brilliant thing.

It's a beautiful thing. And I owe Chad and everyone on the team a visit. He reminds me almost every day that I haven't been to an event just yet, and I promise him in short order, I will rectify that. Thank you, Ariel. What a nice thing to say. And what it does is if it puts the right kind of pressure on me. I hope I live up to half of the opportunity that you just laid out.

So thank you for that. Ariel, I want to put you on the spot. I'm going to my first Real American freestyle event next weekend in St. Louis. I don't have anybody to sit with. You want to come? Oh, next weekend, absolutely not. You know why? Because there might be a Knicks game that night, June 13th.

I've laid out the schedule. No one can bother me for the next two. and a half weeks. So there's a good, this all, you bookended this really nicely, Conrad, because now you know that I'm a real fan and I have a good excuse. But that is a great card, by the way. Hamzaa Chimae versus Dylan Danes is a tremendous, tremendous match. So I think you're going to be in for something special. Also, Armant's Rukin against Tony Ferguson. You see how I know this off the top of my head? I know your whole, your whole schedule, your whole summer schedule. They just announced July 11th, Georgia, Marab Duwali Shealy against Henry Sehudo, July 18th,

Ascran some way somehow rising from, you know, the depths of hell. He's going to be coming back. He was almost dead a year ago going up. Hey, you're going to kick out of this. Ben sent me a text a little while ago because we were talking about doing some rehearsals and different things. And he said, hey, is it okay if I steal the Undertaker's gimmick and come to the ring in the basket?

Oh, my God. And top up out of the casket for my ring entrance. Oh, my God. What did you say? What did you say? I said, hmm, I'll get back to you on that. I'm kind of thinking about it. that's Ben Ascran for you. A year ago, this guy,

I remember texting Chil Sunnan and being like, is Ben Ascran dead? And to think that he's going to be wrestling Balal. I actually have a theory. I'm shocked Balal took this match. It's a lose, lose for him. You lose to Ben Ascran. You're like, hey man, you just lost to a guy

who almost died. You beat Ben Ascran. You're a bully. You beat the guy who almost died. So credit to him for taking the fight, but I don't know if I would have done it. Ariel, this was a blast. We got to have you back. I hope everybody checks out uncrowned. I'm so grateful that Yahoo and you guys are working together. You've been absolutely crushing it, and we can't thank you enough for all the time today, man. You're the godfather, Conrad. You do a tremendous job, so please keep it up. Keep doing your thing. Tell Tony Chivani, I'm not that

bad of a guy, you know. I accept his apology. And I love you guys and aunt as well. And so thank you. This was a great honor for me. I really appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you, guys. Well, we greatly appreciate. Ariel Hawani spending so much time with us. Hope you guys will check him out on Uncrowned. It's so cool that Yahoo has invested in Ariel and he just does such a great job. But before we get out of here, we've been talking all things NWO, Eric. I did want to spend a few minutes and talk about the parallels that a lot of people are drawing.

I know you were doing real American freestyle, so maybe you missed this, but the bloodline is back. And a lot of people are drawing comparisons now to the NWO. As crazy as this sounds, the bloodline has now lasted longer. than the entire NWO storyline, which I kind of can't believe. The bloodline is, I guess, the, the WWE's NWO, and I mean that both good and bad. Jacob Pahoo is now getting involved in the mix with the bloodline, and I don't know that everybody picked that. If you'll recall, a lot of people last week were saying, hey, this might be a time to put the title on Jacob Pahoo. Roman is there and we're sticking with the whole bloodline concept.

Chat me up. Do you think the bloodline still has life in it? Are they repeating the same mistakes that we've seen with the NWO? I mean, it does feel like we've seen every version of the bloodline. I mean, once upon a time, it was bloodline versus bloodline. Now we're back with the bloodline. Matter of fact, I think the bloodline story might not just be longer than the NWO. It might actually be, it's not quite.

longer than WCW, but by the time it's done, it might actually outlast WCW. What do you think of the bloodline being the lead story now in the, in, in WWE? Let's, we'll wait and see, right? It could be, history tells us it has the potential of being very, very, very good. I've said this before on this show. I think the bloodline storyline is absolutely the best storyline. that's ever been produced, written and produced, in this industry. Nothing's even close.

Doesn't mean it'll have the same impact on the industry as the NWO did for a lot of other reasons that have nothing to do with the quality of the story. I think the answer to your question lies in the execution of the story. Your question is, can this be interesting and good? Essentially, the answer is, sure. Let me look at the cast of characters you have to work with. If you were casting a movie, and this was a wrestling movie, would you look at that cast and say,

I think we can find a writer that can write a pretty good story. With those characters, we can make a movie. I think you're there. I think the writing team has proven that they're quite, as I said earlier, They have the ability, the knowledge, the instinct, and the talent. The question becomes getting everybody on board, getting corporate and creative together in a room and letting creative kind of have the last vote.

If you can get to that point and this writing team that we've seen do great work does what they're capable of doing, then I think this can be a phenomenal way of utilizing. the bloodline. But if it's not, and it's a, I see this, I've seen this so many different places and experienced it myself, a camel is a horse that's created by committee. Meaning, if you're going to create based on a lot of input from different people, because corporately that's kind of like the cool thing to do, be inclusive, you're going to get a lot of opinions and you're going to make a lot of compromises along the way and that your core instincts

are going to get diluted and watered down. That happens so often in corporate in America, including professional wrestling. I experience it. I've seen others experience it. I've been witnessed to it. It happens. It's part of the process. But I do think that WWE will get through this hump with D.K.L. I think creative will settle into a rhythm and things will be just fine. And if I'm right, bloodline can be really, really good. And we'll be talking about what a success it is. If it's not, if they can kind of get where they need to be creatively and corporately, then it might be a mess. We'll see. I do wonder, you know, is this, are they almost being forced into this position? Because if you take a look at the vision, it feels like, respectfully,

that group's been snake bitten, mostly by injury. But we know that Logan Paul's down now with a torn tricep. Seth Rollins was heard as a part of the vision. Brian Breaker was heard as part of the vision. Bronson Reed was heard as part of the vision. And you had Paul Heyman attached there. So it does feel like, hey, that was going to be one of your lead heel factions. But if everybody's out and everybody's on the shelf and now we've got to kind of reshuffle

the deck, do we just go back to what we know? That's why I draw a parallel here with the NWO. And I wonder along the way, are we hurting Jacob Poutu? I mean, once upon a time he was positioned like he was this unbeatable monster. Now he's been to the knee. And of course, the story isn't finished yet. But what do you think about where they are now? Is this required because they don't have the vision there and they needed something and it's just familiar?

And is Jacob Patoo a casualty or am I overthinking that? Probably overthinking it, trying to think too much like the Booker when neither one of us have really the kind of information anybody in the creative team would need to do a good job analyzing this. And that's the other part is what are the reasons why I'm reluctant to be too critical of booking unless it's something that's really blatantly obvious to me structurally. Because so much of what goes into creative decisions has nothing to do with what we all, including me in the internet wrestling community, see on television. There's so much more to it than that.

And to really answer a question like that about Fatu, you have to know the whole story. And none of us do. None of us do. Well, no, that's a fair statement. I, um, I know that wrestling fans like new. We hear that all the time from JR on his podcast, grilling JR. And I kind of thought, hey, Jacob Potu can be one of these new guys that they may strap the rocket to. And it certainly felt that way when he's getting main events against Cody and then against

Roman. Roman's beat him twice now. And now he's literally kneeled in front of Roman. I don't know. We'll hang on and see how it's going, but let us know in the comments below. What do you guys think? Are you ready for year six of the bloodline? Do you think they've gone too far with Jacob Pitu?

Are you hoping for something different? Let us know in the comments below and we will keep the conversation going. Before we get out of here, Eric, I do want to ask you about Mick Foley. We saw him debut a couple of weeks ago with AEW. He got a huge reaction. He did some interviews this week that everybody's clipping up and having some fun with. He explained why he left WWE and why he's excited about

AEW, but he also officially left the door open for one more match. And now there's lots of reports coming out literally while we're recording right now that it does feel like Tony Khan is going to book one more match. Now, I know you pled with him last week and you said, hey, please don't do

a match, Mick. It looks like he's going to. If you're going to see him do a match, would you prefer it be a singles with an MJF? Does it make sense to do a tag? Like, how do you best take care of Foley and make the story interesting? I know you're not necessarily in love with it, but if you were going to do it, what's the right way to do it to make sure that everybody's sort of taken care of if that makes sense?

I'd use Mick to the greatest ability I could, which is I'd keep a microphone in his mouth representing his team, and I'd surround him with one or more people that can take care of all of the action required and give the final moment to Mick Foley because that's all that the audience wants to see. Nobody, nobody wants to see Mick Foley wrestle a match. Everybody would love to see Mick, Mick Foley be in a hero's position at the end of a match. However little he may need to participate, and hopefully it will be very freaking little, because anything more than very freaking little will be way too much. If he pulls a sock out, don't you hope instead of calling it Mr. Soco, it's Mr.

sicko. I mean, it's right there. You got to do it. I mean, that's low-hanging fruit, Conrad. That is such good. And the thing about low-hanging fruit is that shit is usually the sweetest. You know, everybody talks about low-hanging fruit as being something fucking bad. I got

news for you. Low-hanging fruit. You're talking about a kid that had an apple tree and a cherry tree in my yard growing up, believe it or not, in Detroit. And when those apples got ripe and they got heavy, And they were really low hanging.

They were the best apples in the freaking world. So I think Mr. Sicko is the low hanging fruit that AEW fans need. I don't know what we're going to do to make them, Mr. Sicko, they're going to put little thumbtacks on it. We'll see.

I got my fingers crossed. I hope he gets to do exactly what he wants to do. I think he's earned it. Oh, no, let's fill it with broken shards of glass. Let's go full sicko. Come on now. If you're going to do it,

do it. No, just kidding. Okay. Somebody will, somebody will think I was serious. Well, we were serious that we were so appreciative that we got to spend some time with Ariel Hawani.

We hope everybody would check them out on Uncrowned on Yahoo. And we'll see you next week talking about the good, the bad, the ugly of professional wrestling right here on 83 weeks with Eric Fish Off.