My Mom's Basement - EPISODE 155 - AEW GRAND SLAM 2021 RECAP WITH ANDREW ZARIAN

Episode Date: September 27, 2021

Andrew Zarian of WON/F4W and the Mat Men Podcast joins Robbie in the Basement to recap AEW Grand Slam at Arthur Ashe Stadium in Queens - both Dynamite AND Rampage! 3Chi: Use code MMB at checkout to receive 5% off at 3Chi.com PaintYourLife.com: Text BASEMENT to 64000 for 20% off today! Subscribe to My Mom's Basement on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCIeZ96PqdsJYQ7DFLRx6MHw My Mom's Basement Merchandise: https://store.barstoolsports.com/collections/my-moms-basement Intro Music: “Basement Noise” by All Time Low Apple Music: https://music.apple.com/us/album/basement-noise/1499013757?i=1499013968 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/track/3Aq9W9BBCjsFOQqcYyO6IA?si=d9d0f74cf54a48deYou can find every episode of this show on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or YouTube. Prime Members can listen ad-free on Amazon Music. For more, visit barstool.link/mymomsbasement

Hey, My Mom's Basement listeners. You can find our episodes on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or YouTube, and Prime members can listen ad-free on Amazon Music. Just stupid boys making basement noise in the basement, noise in the basement. Just stupid boys making basement noise in the basement. Yeah, yeah. Hello and welcome back to My Mom's Basement presented by 3C and Barstool Sports. I am here to recap AEW Grand Slam with Andrew Zarian. This is a guy that I've been listening to and watching your coverage of wrestling for a long time, man.

From the Mat Men podcast to everything like that. So I'm glad that we could finally get you in the basement, get you to do something with us. How are you? Dude, this is awesome. Actually, I'm a fan of yours, and that's the crazy part, right? And I had no idea that you even, like, you were checking out the show until i think we we you retweeted something and then we ran into each other at the garden show for wwe i was like dude we got to do something because i mean it's tremendous what you're doing and everything and it's been the

last year has been uh out of control here for us yeah absolutely how long have you been covering wrestling because i i like i said i've been watching your stuff for a while it feels like since i was in like high school which i guess people make the joke oh what was that yesterday but yeah yeah yeah uh i think so we we oh like i started podcasting in 2009 and the wrestling stuff was like never anything for me it was just like a fun show i started in like 2011 after like the whole pipe bomb thing with cm punk uh rich and i were like hey dude you know like we talk about wrestling all day anyway we're just going back and forth on twitter why don't we do something so we started doing the show in 2011 but really like my main thing was technology um it's on hiatus now i do a show with this guy paul therod he's one of the biggest you

know microsoft uh people that covers microsoft and technology he's a tremendous journalist and author i mean this guy's been doing, uh, you know, media for like 20 some odd years. So when we were doing that, uh, the technology show, it got really popular and it kind of piggybacked.

Like all of a sudden people started tweeting me wrestling stuff that were like the tech fans. And I'm like, okay, you know what? There's something here. So, and then we just put in some 2016,

the show really got big. Uh, I took a day job a day job that became really demanding. And I think you know what my day job is, right? Yeah. Yeah. So I am the I'm the director of marketing for Sapphire here in New York. And we have a place in Vegas. So it kind of it kind of took over my life.

And the pandemic kind of, you know, we all had time and I was like, dude, you want to hit, you want to hit the button? And Rich is like, let's do it. And I, we just took this to a whole different level. Wow. That's awesome, man. And we're here to talk about AEW Grand Slam. It was at Arthur Ashe. I could not make the show and I was devastated. Barstool had an upfront thing. I had to go perform with with pup punk which is like a cool thing we get to do but man i'm such a big brian danielson fan i consider him my number one all time so missing out on his first match and missing out on the match that this was broke my heart not even getting to see it live oh it was tough let me ask you there were people in the building there were people

don't feel that bad because there were people in the building that missed that whole match because they were waiting online to buy beer. Oh, my God. Thousands of people. Well, that's what I wanted to start with. How was the whole Arthur Ashe experience as a wrestling fan, as a wrestling venue? You know, outside of that, like, I'm a kid from Queens. I'm born and raised here. I still live here.

I bought my childhood house. So, like, I'm really engraved in the infirmary. Oh, your childhood house. That's badass, man. So, uh, you know, for me,

it was like, I'm seven minutes from the Long Island rail, you know, to take the Long Island railroad drops and ride off at Arthur rash. I got to do this. Uh, really cool. I mean,

to take like, you know, I can be a little biased here because it's in my hometown. I thought it was really awesome. First. I mean, the big deal here is that it's the first major event, uh, that Arthur ashes ever had outside of tennis.

They did something with the WNBA, you know, 10 years ago, but that was through the Tennis Association. This was the first independent event that they booked. And it's generally because of New York City politics. That's the only thing. It's the Parks Department and it's, you know, the city owns the property, but they it for one dollar or or something you know it's like a trade-off with the tennis association and they just pay the taxes on it uh they're very protective of this property because it's in the park you know it's in flushing meadow park really historically very well known um it was really awesome i thought the venue looked great.

Other than the fact that the group that they had hired to handle concessions, I believe it's Levy. I could be wrong. They just were not prepared for a pro wrestling audience. Dude, you know how it is. We're a little different. We eat, we drink, we're loud, we buy shit, we spend a lot of money. I think it's a little bit different at the time, you know, for the U.S. Open, because everybody's a little bit more reserved when you go to the U.S. Open. You don't have a guy sticking their finger out at the main event and throwing, you know, throwing bottles. Like three title belts, one around each shoulder, one around the waist, you know.

So it was awesome. I mean, the building was really cool. The only problem was they just weren't ready for an event like this. I can't imagine being online for a beer and hearing like the bell ringing for Omega Danielson and being like, you know what? I'm going to stay on this line. Like, how do you not just run back to your seat at that point? You were committed. You were there for 35 minutes anyway.

Just one more minute and things might move. So they taped two shows. They taped Dynamite and Rampage. I want to get into both of them with you. So let's get right into it. There's a lot to cover. This podcast is sponsored by 3C. 3C is our presenting sponsor. Of course, they are the industry leader in Delta 8 THC products. If you like wrestling, you'll probably like 3C because 3C really enhances the wrestling experience. It enhances AEW and WWE shows week to week for me. Why? Because federally legal THC goes great with pro graphs, ladies and gentlemen. It gives you an amazing buzz and a great body feel, but with a much clearer head, less anxiety and paranoia that comes along with some different strains of weed. And it's available online at 3chi.com. That's the number three, chi.com and at retailers around the country. It must be 21

to purchase. And remember, this is not CBD. It is psychoactive. It will give you a buzz. So please use it responsibly. But if you go to 3chi.com right now, you'll shop for Delta 8 vapes, gummies, tinctures, oils. They've got cereal treats, brownies, cookies, root beer, taffy. Now they've got Delta 8 balls, which are kind of like Skittles. They're amazing. Try it all out. It's like Willy Wonka's chocolate factory of three G use a promo code MMB. You'll receive 5% off your complete order. Now let's get back into the show. We start with Brian Danielson versus Kenny Omega. Unbelievable that they kick off this, whatever, how, how, how long was the taping? Like start to finish from here to the end of the night? Six hours?

Five hours? Doors open at like 5.30. I think the first set of tapings began at seven. Yeah, so five hours. A little over that, five and a half hours. It is ballsy knowing you're going to put on such a good show that you're going to keep the crowd invested for that long after Omega Danielsonson because you know they're going to put on a classic and that's what they did the bell rang the crowd pops like crazy they go to a 30 minute time limit draw i love the

finish as like kind of an old school wrestling fan i consider myself even though i'm a young guy like i love the time limit draws i love the broadways um i love the iron man from wrestlemania 12 even though that's that i feel like revisionist history has been like no that match is actually boring and people walked out during isn't that wild isn't it so wild i love that match how do you not i i remember watching it live on pay-per-view that when it happened because you know know, obviously I was younger. But, you know, they're going to go an hour. They're going to have a one hour.

I mean, that was a big selling point. And now Revisionist History has made it into, well, you know, it was a really boring match. It was a ton of rest holds. Yeah, of course it was. It was an hour long match. What are you talking about? And it's evolved, right? You don't need Okada Omega 3 every single time you're trying to go the distance you

don't technically you shouldn't be doing that you should be slowing the pace down and telling the story different era 20 some odd years ago you got to look at it in in the eyes of 20 some odd years ago not by today's standards because that 30 minute match best tv match of all time oh my god not to take away from anything else but i so watching it live is is a whole different experience right because it was really loud in that building and i obviously people were excited but the i guess it had more to do with the building structure that everything is bouncing off everywhere um it got a little distracting to watch because you're trying to, it's so much sensory overload, right?

You see the big screen, you're watching the ring, you're hearing everybody, people around you. So I was like, let me watch it at home to see if it was as good. Dude, it was even better watching at home. It really was an impressive television match that nobody won and everybody was happy. And JR did such a good job on commentary. I mean, the entire commentary team. But when JR really shines, you know, it comes through a little extra.

And you can tell that he just had a genuine like, oh, my God, this match is incredible. I can't believe what I'm watching. And like you said, like, you don't have to overload it with high spots. They didn't overload this one with high spots. There were a couple. The dragon suplex on the ramp was crazy. The big dragon suplex off the top rope. There were a couple of dives, but they didn't really overload this with, with high spots necessarily. This was a great story that they told. It felt like the story that Kenny Omega maybe was a little better than

Bryan Danielson, even though he grabbed the label lock at the end and, you know, started getting him in that vulnerable position. I can't wait for the rematch. When do you think they do the rematch? Is this a program that you think they continue immediately? Like, what do they do with Hangman? I don't know, because right now, you know, the the opportunity that came to them and I know they were working on it for a while, right? I think a lot of the narrative that was online is like, oh, it just happened.

It just fell into their hands. They always had the plan in the back burner if this could happen you know i think tony and cm punk said that they were working on a deal like two years ago yeah uh and the pandemic kind of slowed things down and and that kind of that kind of comes into play where you know it was almost a blessing for them that they were able to have this big boom with everybody now because they had to hold off on everything but i would i don't i don't know you know the hangman stuff is interesting i know you got to get there at one point but do you get there now i know that aw is really big on the ranking and who deserves the title shot so i don't think and by the way that played a big part on why this was not a title match right yeah you they don't they're not a company you know they're

not a company that just gives the anybody that comes in a title shot so um i i would think maybe full gear i mean maybe you'd want to do that at full gear and then you you turn it into something but uh does danielson get a title shot i mean do you do that do you if they're they're in a really interesting situation right now that every decision matters uh where you know and on the wwe side because there's such a a you know an operation and it's kind of kind of constantly chugging along they don't not every decision is a point bright break situation for them, you know, moment for them.

They got to, they could make those mistakes. I think for AW, the eyes are on them a little bit more critically, so they can't have a mistake with this. I did. I would just pull the trigger and do it at full gear. You do hangman and Omega.

I would, I would do hangman and Omega. I would have hangman come in. I would do hangman and Omega. And this Hangman come in I would do Hangman and Omega And this may be a possibility Where if Hangman loses It could be a schmaz And you protect him in a way like that

And you could have it lead off to something else I don't know Just the opportunity is tremendous And now with the Bray Wyatt rumors That plays a huge part in decision making as well I don't know how I don't think any of us know their booking philosophy to a t at this point right because it's only been we've only seen

fully operational for a couple months in reality from november to march and then from you know the the beginning of live audiences to now so they really don't have a lot of experience with the live audience aspect of it and how that impacts booking. But I think if you're going to go forward with hang man, you want to have a strong comeback. You know what? I'm going to take it back. Save hang man for a little bit later.

I would go with Brian immediately at full gear. And I take back everything I said. And like the fans are going to a brian danielson title win at some point but like do you do you save that for hangman do you do you have kenny omega go over danielson it's such a almost tricky spot they put themselves into at this point yeah yeah and i think with wwe i mean they're kind of in the same thing too with roman right now right because like who whoever beats roman is the next you know Roman's a kingmaker just like how Brock was or how they how they attempted to do with Brock so better not be Brock Brock better not be they got to be Roman man I mean you know what I mean

here's the thing the likelihood of who beats Roman is a Brock Lesnar yeah but they don't have a Brock Lesnar other than you know that that's young they don't have a 30 they don't have a 35 year old Brock Lesnar they don't have a 40 year old Brock Lesnar you know and that's kind of scary when when you look at their roster but for AEW you know they got to also think you know who's the next guy that Kenny's gonna make because that title has to be prestigious has to be has to matter look at who their champions are yeah you know you got, you got Mox, you got Jericho, and you got Omega. Three potential, you know, top 10 on anybody's ranking right now. So whoever that next person is, it can't be just, you know, he's a young guy. We're going to try to push him.

Hangman had the momentum, but he's been off TV for a while. So you got to hold back. As a guy who grew up in Queens, knows the wwe's influence in new york who knows that they you know put the flagpole down and grew up with that basically in your backyard do you feel like this match we're gonna look back on as like a historic moment of like oh shit something happened there oh yeah the match the show um you know perception is king and and generally when i when i cover wrestling listen i love i love to do fantasy book and i love to do all that that stuff but for me it's more like the business end and that kind of dictates to me what direction they're going to

go because a lot of my sources are on the the business end the financial end the marketing side the uh the the partnership side because you know my day job and and how I'm intertwined with all those guys. So their decision making is a little different. But I would tell you, nobody's ever been able, nobody, nobody, nobody has ever run New York other than WWE. And WCW would run the Nassau Coliseum, but it was not a show that you wanted to really, not a desirable show. And that wasn't New York City. So this is the first time an attempt has been taken to compete in New York City with WWE.

I think I gave the statistic, if the numbers are accurate, right? I think JR announced 20,177 in the building. If that number is true, I've seen a conflicting report of 19,000, but let's say it's true, right? That would be the biggest pro wrestling event in New York City since probably 1980, if you were going to look at above 20,000, and that would have been the showdown at shea in 1980 the garden ran a couple shows that wwe put out as 20 000 uh 20 100 and something but again that was not an accurate number so this could have been the biggest show in the last 30 you know last 40 years 41 years in wwe in pro wrestling history in new york city so there's a lot of these numbers being thrown out there. But regardless of if it's 100 people short of that number, it's still 19,000 people in WWE's backyard went to see another show and they were beyond happy with. It's again, the perception is shifting,

not the business. And because WWE is going to be number one for a very, very, very long time. Ratings wise, too. I don't think AEW is going to beat them one for a very very very long time ratings wise too i don't think aw is going to beat them in overall ratings consistently however you're getting close and that that has to scare them a little bit do you think that aw is going to try to run msg i think everybody would love that but i don't think uh i don't think like would msg allow that i know they allowed the new japan thing and there was some like conflict with wwe would wwe try that? I know they allowed the New Japan thing, and there was some, like, conflict with WWE. Would WWE try to urge them not to rent the building out to AEW? I would think so.

I think for WWE, they have such a tight relation. Like, you go into the Garden. I mean, you've been there numerous times. All over the Garden, there's WWE stuff. Yeah, Hogan's boots from WrestleMania one and all that stuff. Yeah. The posters, the paint.

I mean, they, they, it's, it's everywhere this. So, uh, they're very intertwined and I don't see that relationship changing right

now. I, I think for ring of honor in new Japan, it was a novelty and they weren't in WWE. Wasn't running the garden at that time. So, you know, it didn't really hurt anybody.

It was a one-off, but now you got another game in town. That's, that's kind of, you know it didn't really hurt anybody it was a one-off but now you got another game in town that's that's kind of you know it's it's it's not going to catch up for a while but it's catching up you know it's running after that car we'll see uh i don't i don't see it happening uh barclays would be more realistic but i don't know if barclays would even do it but listen you got a you got a whole lot of other buildings in the city right you got now you got arthur ash you got ubs you can do the coliseum if you want to go out there uh you have options yeah no it's a good point um the elite came down to separate the guys they eventually attacked Brian Christian

Luchasaurus and Jungle Boy came to the rescue and how do you follow up that match almost impossible I say almost because there's one guy that could do it. And one guy that could do it with a microphone in his hand. That was CM Punk. The pop that he got after you just watched that classic television match speaks to the superstar that he truly is. At this point, seven years removed from wrestling just for that promo crowd going bananas for him. Absolutely bananas. It is. But you know what everybody was saying, especially in that building that I spoke to,

it was really evident that that star like that. CM Punk is not going to be a, and this was not, not my opinion, but a lot of people, CM Punk is not going to be that guy that makes the difference as far as the match quality goes. I think he's a great act and a great name to elevate them.

But I mean, from everything that we saw, it's going to be Daniel Bryan, Bryan Danielson. It's going to be Danielson that becomes that, you know, the bar has been set so high now for quality. It's just other people are going to follow. Listen, Punk's promo was great. He even came out and said, he's like, how the hell do you follow that match? Yeah, I think everybody knew. And I felt really bad for the next match that followed.

Yeah. And the next match was MJF and Brian Pillman Jr. There's not much to say about this. I feel like MJF beat Pillman, but it was it just felt like kind of a standard television match. And it was shitty that these guys got stuck in that position. Yeah, that was I would have even held off on this match to be honest and i would have put something from rampage on there uh it was it i felt bad for pelman more than mjf because this was pelman's coming out story yeah this was his moment uh they did that hot angle the week prior you know we got how crazy was it that his sister had the baby too if she i mean what are the odds right it's just one of those happenstances that works um i felt bad for i felt bad for pillman but you

know you could still see that he's he's still getting there i don't think it's going to be a detriment to to his growth because i think the end story here is that listen you know you want me to book this we were talking about how i hate fantasy book i would have pelman i mean just annihilate him week after week and break him and he turns into the loose cannon yeah and that's how he finally is able to beat uh mjf but now you have a total personality change and he's a complete lunatic that's on the verge of being a heel uh i would if if if he could do this if he could if he could figure out and if he's confident enough to do it that's the only way you would get this to work and i think he would be a tremendous star if they do that i know some people will say like no

don't just make him do the dad's gimmick or whatever i think there is a way to make it work as a guy who is a big star wars fan and in star wars you know they just constantly rework the old stories yeah work in new ways i like that in pro wrestling as well i like bringing that dynamic in i like brian pillman jr's loose cannon jr like that sounds awesome to me yeah and you know what he could and he could make it his own he doesn't have to be his dad but you know and think about the the play on here where you could be like you know the apple doesn't fall too far from the tree. He's as crazy as his dad. The same process.

And you could have, I mean, these really, you know, adult style promos going back and forth. It could work. And you could almost say like he's the loose cannon earlier in his career, like without the injuries that held his father back. Something like that. Yeah. I mean, there's so many of them up next. We had Malachi black versus Cody roads. This was one of the most talked about matches and angles and,

you know, both characters on Twitter for good reasons, for bad reasons. I don't know if I'm allowed to say this. I liked it. I enjoyed this. I thought it was good. Did people not like it?

I saw people shitting on it. I saw people shitting on it. I saw people shitting on Cody a lot, giving him a lot of shit for why isn't he turning heel. I don't think Cody needs to be a heel. I think as long as he's getting the booze that he's getting, it's almost like a John Cena situation in the WWE. He's a homewander. Yeah, exactly.

And I think he kind of knows that. Did you see the fucking size of the cape he walked out in? Yeah. Well, I think that's what it was. And think that right i mean you're you follow i mean you're a comic book guy you like star wars you're like all that stuff uh so do i uh you know to do the homelander thing where he's like this baby face to the world but everybody like the like the real fans know what a piece of crap he is and you can have that play out where sometimes people are cheering him but other times if if it's somebody you like you're booing him i thought he played i dude you know in reality

like i think it's fun to boo him for most people but i think for a lot of people they genuinely hate the guy uh they don't like him and i was talking i'm like i don't get the code hate and people like i don't get it how do you how do you not get it how do you not see that he's this piece of crap person and like all these conspiracy theories about him and i'm like oh man you know what this is this is the new kayfabe uh you know everybody's all worked out a e dub a e dub a e dub and it's like listen he was pretty instrumental in the whole like i don't know people people aren't gonna give him his due for a while but i think eventually it'll come back to him just like it came back to cena and he loves that shit by the

way he loves that he's being booed it's fantastic no absolutely especially when this is like uh hitting right before the big reality show that could be a whole episode right there um roads to the top check it out on tnt or whatever um ftr versus darby and sting this was awesome this was listen i didn't like seeing sting in the wwe very much i was at wrestlemania 31 and i loved like that live it was fun i remember dave melter was there and he actually said it was such a fun match live and then i went and watched it on the broadcast and i was like oh the commentary just the vibe everything kind of i don't know something took away from it the nostalgia the nostalgia sold it for me for that match i didn't hate it like a lot of other people um but i

everybody said the same exact thing people that i know in the building everybody said that that match was so good live and it didn't translate to tv it did it worked for me because listen dude i got hogan showing up. He's doing his nonsense. You're wearing a Raw's War shirt. Of course it did with the NWO showing up. All that, yeah. I loved all that stuff.

So it was cool. Listen, should Hunter have won? At the end, does it really matter? It didn't really matter. It's unfortunate we didn't get to see Sting do more in WWE because I thought that match with Rollins was really good. Yeah. It wasn't a bad match. Before his body before like his body just before his body gave out yeah yeah

and that was just sad to see that was just like oh man but now it looks like he turned back the clock like he looks better than he did in wwa 62 years old he he's moving i mean i heard dave say like well he's moving like a 52 year old i'm like i don't know i don't I don't know what that comparison would mean, but I thought I thought he's moving great. And they did do some camera magic. I don't know if you noticed that when he does that stinger splash now, they shoot it like exactly how it should have ever been shot. And that's from the bottom. So when he goes up for that big spot, he's getting off the ground like this much. You know, he doesn't run, but he doesn't you know he doesn't run but he doesn't have like

the old man run and he doesn't get up like an older guy like my knees i have a torn mcl acl ham uh meniscus you know everything is torn in my knee so when i get up i'm doing like the old man like i'm grabbing onto something dude this dude is popping up 23 years old i have arthritis i'm like yeah you know sting is but yeah exactly he could friggin kip up he's still able to hit a sharpshooter which every time he goes to throw on the scorpion death lock i'm like oh man i hope he could sit back on this one because there's been a few times where like some older guys like brett hart and his old wwe run there a few times where he just couldn't sit back on it and every time he winds up sitting back on it in the right way. And I'm like, all right, he's not making, you know, the guy tapping out look like a schmuck.

And I love FTR and the NWO gear to face sting. You know, those boys were just having the time of their lives, basically cosplaying as, you know, Arne and Tully back in the day. Well, you know, and what the the the new day came out in the in the NWO gear, what, two weeks prior. So I think it was I think it was a little little nod at each other. Yeah. I mean, they're cosplaying as Ar was a little, little nod at each other. Yeah. I mean, that cosplaying is Arn and Tully, but there,

there's such, there are, it's rare that you're better. And I think they're way better as far as in ring goes as then Arn and Tully, not to take anything away from them, but there's such a great modern day representation of that era of wrestling. Yeah. And they've always been that there were the mechanics in NXT,

right? Yeah. I remember watching them at, as nxt access yeah yeah yeah and it was like yeah the mechanics versus kyle o'reilly and bobby fish or something and it was like an incredible match yeah fantastic they were they were unbelievable i think i think i saw them are they here let me see yeah they were on yeah the revival they were on this card that i was at at uh at nxt and um in at the garden theater you know at oh i was at that one yeah yeah i just talked to live morgan about that because she came out and dropped the pizza yeah she came out and dude can i tell you i thought and tell live this because i've been i all everybody i was with like all my boys right and we we brought it we snuck in a little bottle

like we all had like little bottles of vodka so we like snuck it in we were like it was just nice and hammered we were all starving when she dropped that pizza we we all looked at each other and said oh my god this is the best gimmick ever drop the pizza pick it up and eat it every time just do that it got over with us so much that day when she talked about it getting pops yeah because she made sonia eat it it was like a about it getting pops yeah because she made sonia eat it it was like a whole it was fantastic yeah no she's great she's she's really uh she's one of my favorites to watch because uh from people that i know that know her uh she's just fantastic and she everybody says that yeah she's fantastic everybody backstage loves her we're recording

this sunday before extreme rules i'm very excited for her to get this opportunity like a singles match on pay-per-view and everything she's always posting training videos where she looks awesome and she has a ring in her barn like literally in her backyard which is pretty awesome as a wrestler girl you know yeah exactly she's from the new york area um how do you not cheer for her how do you not how do you especially with a 201 area code um brit baker versus ruby soho was the main event of this show i thought rightfully so if you're going to open up the show with kenny omega versus brian danielson this is the rightful main event and it was a great match i love ruby soho and i have for a long time i went and watched her in

freelance wrestling when she was sally stitches she's working like a luchador gimmick, and it was awesome. She worked Eric Cannon and just like an incredible back and forth match. And she's finally getting to show a lot of her arsenal, a lot of what she can do as far as selling. She sells like a rag doll. It's crazy. And Britt Baker is almost the perfect foil for her in terms of the the first heel to knock her down brit's really become uh and and and i hate doing this comparison but she's really become like the relatable charlotte for them yeah you know like i always say that the

the wwe side is so big on the theatrics and the the you know everybody has to have a look and a pose and an outfit and on the aw side yeah they do that but it's a little bit less and i i think you kind of could connect because it's more it's more the the the common person that was able to do something tremendous rather than it being the cartoon character that in the second generation definitely adds to it as well you know charlotte is fantastic but she's so unobtainable for 99 of the people that watch her on tv you will you will never be a charlotte flair but you know what brit baker she hurt she's a dentist she has a different career she's really

good at this you look at and you're like i relate to this person yeah she lived her passion and she's still she's still a common person she goes to work during the week so i thought that's really that that always matters to me the the relatability oh definitely like you know scott all kevin ash nothing is relatable to them but goddamn they're cool you know, Scott or Kevin Nash. Nothing is relatable to them, but goddamn, they're cool. Yeah. They're the larger than life rock stars, though. Yeah. You can get away with it if you're the larger than life rock star.

You're that charismatic and stuff. I moved in. I moved in with my girlfriend a few months ago, and my favorite thing has been watching her watch wrestling and see who she connects to. And Britt Baker is like one of the first names who she knew immediately for the dnd girl like yeah like immediately she's like oh i like that girl that girl's really cool and she knew the whole dentist story like she's the one that can bridge that gap and bring people in like they almost need to give her a reality show you saw what total divas did to bring women into the wwe business wise and just fan wise it was a huge

difference for them if they give brit baker something about being a dentist and a wrestler or something who knows it's a great story man it really is it's a fantastic story yeah um aew rampage up next did they give you any break like what kind of thing was like that what was like what would what was this like in the arena like did you get five minutes in between they did they train you know they transitioned the mat and the the signage and everything they ended they started cleaning up and then they went into it they got a couple minutes and then right into punk uh right into the first match yeah and how was the crowd for that like it sounded great on television but were they dead at all so it's never the same when you get two pops you know he

came out already and like an hour before and he got up he got that big pop uh it was it was loud it wasn't as loud as brian danielson but i think that's because you got it you got two pops i think the fact that he was in his trunks like brought a dm trunks yeah he's back in his trunk so uh he did get a big reaction i think i think hobbs got you know i think a lot of people respected hobbs too in that moment yeah um it was a slower match uh i think hobbs was listen how do you not get a little nervous but like he got he got the jitters out i was gonna say it seemed like he maybe had a little bit of jitters which is okay in this position yeah exactly especially with cm punk across the ring from you like hey don't hurt this guy he's he's our new golden egg yeah but also

think about it right he's a young guy hobbs right he's he's never been in front of 20 000 people uh you know he he's his career is beginning to boom you're walking down that ramp and look at all the things that go through your mind like oh crap holy moly i'm wrestling cm punk right now i'm on national tv right now there's 20 000 people here right now i better not screw this up yeah you know it's a lot that goes through your mind uh i thought he did a great job and i think cm punk gave him a ton in that match a ton he did i mean punk said he's here to help he'll help put the younger guys over and even if cm punk is going over them he's going to help them he's going to make them look great that's what he did for hobbs here and i gotta admit cm punk was in the barstool office earlier

this week and i went up to him and it's gonna make some people angry but i said punk don't listen to all the people online i like the long boys i like the long pants i said don't go exclusive to him because he said originally he got the trunks and the long boys. I like the long pants. I said, don't go exclusive to him. Cause he said, originally he got the trunks and the long boys made for all out. And he was just like day of, he was going to make the decision. And he said, he just didn't want to shave his legs. So he's like, all right, we're going long boys. Why doesn't he?

I mean, first of all, I, I, I totally get it. I totally get it. Uh, you know what he should do though? He should do like all the, all three of them. He should do the shorts. He should do the old school. Yeah. Yeah. yeah yeah he could do like the old school basketball shorts he could do the mma gear he could do the the the trunks and why not long legs why not just go back and forth yeah i wouldn't hate that at all think of the merch imagine he came comes out in like a orange singlet for the next friggin Taz match. Like Taz. Like Taz, yeah. Yeah, exactly. Cowl over the head.

Punk defeated Hobbs. He wound up getting stitches after the match. I don't know what busted him open. Did you wind up seeing it? I don't know what it was. No, I didn't end up seeing it. I saw that it was a little busted open, but I have no idea what it was. Yeah, I think it was something near the turnbuckle or something.

Maybe he clipped himself. It could have been the turnbuckle spot. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Up next, I was surprised that they did this next, but it made sense with the ending of the show. We got the super click Adam Cole and the Young Bucks versus the Jurassic Express and Christian. What was that Adam Cole response like?

That was big. Definitely. That was really big. They're really into him. And I kind of like that he's he's not in a singles program right now yeah you know like let him let him adjust a little bit let him get comfortable a little bit um it's crazy how seamless it's felt though it feels like the adam cole that was in nxt is the adam cole that's in aew more or less well it feels if you know the

last i mean he's been there for a couple of weeks now, but you're absolutely right. And it also feels like he was, he's been there for a long time. Exactly. Yeah. It's so natural. You know, Danielson is a little different. Like you're more, you know, because he's in a singles program that he's kind of aligned with, you know, Christian and those guys and jungle boy and those guys but when you look at when you look at adam cole i feel like i'm like oh he's been doing this act forever like this is

this has been his thing and it has been right he was part of the bullet club he was part of that group he traveled up and down you know the country with them he was in ring of honor with them and new japan with them so for him it has to be an easy you know glove to fit into such a star that entrance music is great he's hitting the boom already with the crowd the adam cole baby rock star he's a rock star an absolute rock star definitely someone that should not have been a manager um we had the men of the year defeated chris jericho and jake hager and then afterwards i got just to my delight as an MMA fan as the guy that covers MMA and wrestling for Barstool American top team invading the ring Paige Van Zandt her husband we got uh Andre Orlovsky we got Junior Dos Santos we got Jorge

Masvidal he comes out in the track suit he's looking awesome he's got the hair like corn road back and everything and he just sets up in the corner and as he's doing this everyone everyone knows what's coming jericho gets up page van zandt hits him with a couple body shots and then he baptizes jericho ben askren style with a running knee sends him to the shadow realm as he says and jericho sold it like a fucking champion as well he sold it like van askren he went stiff as a board and mazdal went off to him like i wouldn't be surprised if we see a video coming out in the couple months of like chris jericho watching the running knee backstage with mazdal right before they went out like all right i'll do it exactly like that you know what they showed to me this honestly showed that you know ufc has been really

adamant on i mean except for connor right because connor was an anomaly but traditionally they've been like no we don't want that that carny pro wrestling style personality we don't like that masvidal is key i mean if we learned anything inject these characters yeah you know like you're you're in front of wrestling fans and shockingly you'd be the crossover is not as high as you would imagine for ufc for like mma and wrestling i know a lot of wrestling covers both like yeah there's a weird there's a weird wall for some people where there really is like i'm a huge mma fan yeah i'm a big mma i've been watching it since i mean i was a huge pride fan uh because of the showmanship i've been watching ufc since it started the first pay-per-view my father and i watch couldn't believe you know he was shocked that this was happening you know this is actually

a sport he loved it so you know i've been following it for years but it really when i talk ufc on the show uh people snooze they're like i don't want to talk about stop talking ufc so i stop but i mean you can't deny what a star jorge is yeah and you know what he was there i was at aew uh i think it was in april maybe march thinking back we were there to do uh like the media segment with jericho and mjf doing like they did the press conference on dynamite and masvidal was there and he was backstage and he was wearing the robe i wonder if they were in talks back then to like bring him in or something and i asked dana white about this he actually hadn't seen it i was just curious as to whether or not like dana white and

the ufc would have to give them clearance to do something like this? And he was like, no. He said no. He wasn't aware, but then he watched it live on the interview, and he got such a kick out of it. He thought it was awesome. And he says that because he's such good friends with the Khan family and Tony and his father that he's very cool with it. And you know what's interesting about him? Like with Masvidal, he's been around forever.

He's had, I think, 50 professional fights. So I think for him, it's really that that he fit in so well with this you know he's at the end of his career more than anything else you know the last two fights with uh with uh kamara kamara usman you know he he what was it uh it was a unanimous decision the first one and uh and a brutal yeah so you know he may be approaching the end but you know the dude is super talented and he didn't even have to say anything he just came out it was a charisma yeah i watched him come out and hit a flying knee with dan dan lambert as his manager like every time give me that yeah i got such a kick out of it i loved it um up next we got kind

of just the fun uh buffer match Let's get everyone on this show. Let's get everyone in there. It was the Lucha Brothers, Santana and Ortiz defeating Private Party and Butcher and the Blade. Fun. I feel like not much to say about it, right? Yes. I mean, you know what it was. It was a showcase for Ortiz and Santana.

They came out, got a big New York City pop. It was cool. They got the face paint on. They're doing a Lost Boys thing. I mean, they're they're big stars i would have loved to see a program for them for them to win the tag titles yeah i and i also thought that they were going to go down the path of miro and uh and kingston for this show but they went in a whole different direction they did yeah and which i was i was okay with by the

end of this show it would have been cool to see miro and kingston if they hadn't done that though um miro came out next he attacked sammy while he was doing the whole sign gimmick setting up the match for next week or i guess this week if you're listening to this on monday and up next we had penelope ford defeating anna jay at the end we had the the big Hardy family office coming out, and then the heroes came out and made the save, Orange Cassidy, Chris Datlander. Another one where you just get a bunch of stars on the show.

You get a bunch of people to run out and get a pop, right? Yeah, I thought it was just to get the reaction. What did you think of it overall? I thought it was fine. I kind of skimmed through it, to be honest, as I was going through the show. I didn't even watch the whole match it was okay it was fine uh you know i think a lot of people are getting tired at that point also yeah i could imagine that but to waken everyone up to liven up the mood we got the lights out match the main event of the entire grand slam

evening the entire grand slam week if you were watching on TV. Eddie Kingston and Jon Moxley versus Minoru Suzuki and Lance Archer. Suzuki-Goon versus Eddie Kingston and Mox. This was awesome. It was exactly what it needed to be, I think. They got the weapons involved immediately. They got the smoke and mirrors involved. And by the end, we got an all-time new york wrestling moment and this i

don't know how it hit for the people that like weren't the ring of honor fans weren't the independent wrestling fans weren't going to shows in queens and at the raway rec center and in brooklyn and all these random places but homicide comes out to make the save on his protege eddie kingston you know i did an interview with eddie kingston last week and he just kept bringing up homicide as a mentor as someone that he was so proud to be associated with and be from new york with and everything i went crazy for homicide so i uh i i i help run a independent promotion in jersey uh calledalyst Wrestling. And Homicide is one of our main acts. So I, listen, for me, I was like, yo, this is awesome. You know, he's like one of our main guys.

He helps all the young talent. Did you know? I had, I didn't know, but I had a feeling that, because somebody outside of that told me that there's going to be a surprise at the end that New York's going to be a surprise at the end. And then you think, who could it be? Yeah. And then, yeah, like I wasn't told who it was, but I everybody is like, is there a surprise?

And I didn't know how to respond. Yeah. Like it's a New York surprise. I'm like, oh, my God, there's so many you could do. You know, there's so many people you could find. You could even have like, you know-key or you know amazing red like anybody from like like new york indie group that i like grew up homicide is a perfect pick this guy's a lunatic uh if people don't know homicide his old school roh run i mean still he's still amazing but

his old school shit with brian danielson with everyone back then mind-blowing matches from homicide like a true like innovator of the current independent wrestling style as well yeah yeah it's he was fantastic man i thought it was great i loved it amazing moment of the show it's it's such a it's such a sign of tony khan and aew and whoever put this together if eddie kingston was involved i'm sure he was, just knowing what the crowd and what the diehards are going to want and delivering on that. It's impressive.

Yeah, no. He really... He was a good pick for the end. And dude, by the way, I've gotten to see Minoru Suzuki twice in my life now and I'm done. I'm happy. I've never seen him again. I've seen i because i was at that msg show so i saw suzuki i saw liger and i saw muda there i'd love to see muda again

if they could use muda for something in aw i mean that was i mean malachi's got the mist now yeah maybe bring him in in some way like that i don't know i got a funny uh liger story so i was at i think it was ring of honor final battle god i don't even know what which final battle it was but liger was on the show and i think it was cody's first final battle it was either his first or his second in new york backstage at the hammerstein ballroom and carrie silken says cody why don't you make the toast tonight like usually carrie would make the toast at the end of final battle but just cody why don't you make it so everyone crowds into this really tiny room backstage cody's making a toast everyone's pouring champagne in glasses and then diet pepsi for the people that don't drink i don't

really drink much so i said pass me a diet pepsi and i'm all the way in the back of the room i've said i'm not going to take up space this is for the wrestlers i just kind of want to hear it it's a cool moment to be a part of as a longtime fan and stuff and as cody's making a speech i get a tap on the shoulder and i turn around and it's liger in full gimmick except the mask oh and he said did he have the face paint on or no just nothing normal like not normal but literally the full give the shoulder pads everything except the mask and i turned around you know white as a ghost like oh my god this am i supposed to see this under like exactly like should i go like this sir um and he said can you pass diet pepsi and i said yeah yeah absolutely

and i passed him a diet pepsi and because he was the last one to make it to the room he couldn't get into the room and when cody raised the, he just put his glass out to like cling mine. I posted to juice and thunder Liger. And we both took a sip of diet. That's great, man. It was one of the greatest moments of my young life. Yeah.

Yeah. That's fantastic. That really is an awesome story. One more question from the night itself, before we get into a couple of fan questions that people send in, what the hell was up with Lil Uzi Vert showing up? He was there. He was at the show.

And Tony brought him out on stage. Yeah. Tony brought him out on stage. He did a thing with him. I thought that was pretty cool. Like really shocking. Yeah. Really surprised.

But you know, they're getting behind that whole celebrity thing. Yeah. You know, they have, and by the way, week prior, week prior,

we had Rosario Dawson. Yeah. As a Star Wars fan, I know I was going crazy about that. And especially as a Clerks 2 fan as well. Well, Jersey Girl also, right? Yeah. We got a couple questions from people that sent them in on Twitter. Thank you to everyone who sent them in.

I think we got like, yeah, we got five. We get right out of here. We're back making new memories in a new world. And I found that the best way to hold on to these memories is to turn them into art that lasts forever from paintyourlife.com. You can get a professional hand-painted portrait created from any photo, or you can combine photos. You can literally mix and match, like, hey, I like this picture of this person, but this picture of this person, can we put them together, make it look like they got their arm around each other? You can. You can do that. You can work with the artists they have. You select your own artists. So you, you know, the style that you want and everything. These are real artists.

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It might have been you I saw on Twitter. I agree with that. I don't love the presentation. I do like character work in wrestling, so I don't hate all of the wacky characters that they've debuted on their show. I don't hate Braun Breaker. I know that some people do.

I love Braun Breaker. I hate the name. Yeah, the name isn't great. He should be a steiner obviously but um i i like him there's things that i like about it and i'm not gonna it's too early for me to come out and say i hate it or i dislike it i wish the presentation was different but i think there's seeds of like early 90s wrestling there which i used to love which i grew up on so there's a nostalgic part of me that likes it yeah i you know i there's a reason for everything right and sometimes like the things that we see is a fraction of what the actual conversation was

actual planning that goes into it so a lot of people off the bat were pissed right they're not going to concentrate on independent talent anymore they're not going to concentrate on these acts anymore but let's let's look at the landscape right at the time that nxt boomed so from 2013 yeah 2014 yeah on 2014 yeah right 2014 to 2019 the that nxt boom who were they competing with ring of honor and the indies more than anything else were they competing with ring of honor and the indies more than anything else they were competing with ring of honor um and it just so happened where their entire concept was okay fine uh nxt is developmental still but now we're becoming almost like a touring brand you know almost at almost at that point. And they loaded up the roster.

And they used it as a finishing school initially. Yep. For a guy like Nakamura was down there. There's no reason why Nakamura was down there at all. Right? Yeah. There's no reason why Finn Balor was down there. Bobby Roode.

Why the hell would he be in NXT if it's developmental? So rather than developmental, they became a finishing school for some of these guys. But now, because things are so competitive, if you have an opportunity for a guy like, let's see, MJF, right? You have a guy like MJF. Would you put him in NXT now? No, you wouldn't. You would put him on the main roster because you're in a competition.

So I think what happened between the Indies dying, the WWE global expansion stopping because they're shutting down the Japan thing and the South America expansion, the Middle East expansion. So they've slowed all of that down. Why would you put a top star or perceived top star on a product that only 700,000 people are watching? Or let's say at most 800,000 people are watching when you could put them on a show that 2 million people are watching or 1.8 million people are watching. So it's more of an adjustment to cater towards the market now. But, you know, they want to go with big athletes. I hadn't thought about it like that, to be honest,

when you put it like that. Yeah. So a lot of it is shifted and you know, they see it this way. How profitable was NXT with the direction that they were going in initially, right? Cause now that there's so many eyeballs and they got a tour and

they got to do this, they got to do that. These they're paying these athletes, these guys like a Matt Riddle way more than they were paying initially when NXT started. So it's all of this that gets put into the decision making. They're not saying no to independent talent. They're not saying no to wrestlers to come over there.

But they are saying, listen, we're not going to have guys like Ricochet. Maybe you would. But a guy like Ricochet, he was in nxt he had a big big following and then he went to main roster they did nothing with him they're not going to concentrate on a guy like him anymore unfortunately instead they're going to bring in a guy like uh you know gabe's gable steveson yeah yeah and i i have real doubts about him signing and people being like yeah smart move like they're gonna make him a star and then he's gonna go to the ufc i have doubts that they can make him a star i i have and i don't want to be super negative about it but yeah i'm afraid that he's gonna be cain velasquez 2.0 and

we're gonna be like what the hell and wrestling fans are gonna reject him i think they're gonna they're gonna they want to make him into an angle you When Kurt Angle came in, you know what's really funny? When he first came in, nobody knew, and this says so much about the communication and the days of the internet. This guy won the freaking gold medal in the Olympics, an American hero. He goes to WWE, he goes into the developmental,

and nobody knows his freaking name. They used to call him Kurt Angel. Everybody used to write Kurt Angel. Or Angle or Kirk Angel I mean these are these are the writers everybody got his name wrong because nobody knew yeah but the one thing everybody said about him is that he will never be a star because he can't speak he's a terrible promo and when when Steveson came out for uh duringSlam that I don't know, did that air that that segment? I can't remember. I don't know if it did because I was there.

OK, he came out and he cut this, you know, like it was like an introductory thing and he sounded terrible. And it was like, oh, yeah, this guy's I'm like, do you remember Kurt Angle when he first came out? Yeah, I'd love to see him as a big star. I just I just had so much more faith in the star making ability of the company at that point. At that point. At this point. Like, who's the last huge star that they made? Roman, I guess.

Right. Exactly. Right. Like, and it's been a while since Roman has been at that level. I feel like people kind of have known Roman's name for a while now. And here's the thing, right? You want the good news and everybody's upset about this upset about this was roman an independent wrestler no no he was a football player that had a wrestle that came from a wrestling family uh one of the greatest wrestling families and he

became the biggest star ever so he didn't have i mean he was brought up into business right he was smartened up but he wasn't a indie talent that did the grind for 50 bucks he was a guy that was he was a made man from the beginning and they put him in the position so if they could create that and that's the direction i have no problem with it yeah uh there's plenty of other places now you have i mean it's worked for decades at this point in wrestling you know take our athlete from somewhere else and let's put him in wrestling and smarten him up and like you said like just show him the ropes of the business no pun intended and that's how it always worked pun intended. And that's how it always worked. Yeah.

I mean, really, that's how it always worked. The biggest stars in pro wrestling were not independent wrestlers that became, you know, for the most part, that became that became. That's why it was so cool when the independent stars, you know, would rise. We'll do it. Exactly. Yeah. The next question we got is from Trey Adkins. He just says KO and Johnny Gargano, leaving or staying? I would

love Kevin to leave. I think he could do some really cool stuff, but again, what does he do if he goes there? I think the expectation of going to AEW and becoming the world champion, I think that's what a lot of people want, a proper push, but it has to fit.

Creativity plays a big part. It depends if he's happy or not if he's happy then he's going to stay he's going to think about his family they're in florida he's going to think about them i i think i would love to see kevin owns i think johnny gargano has a really good spot there i think he's going to stay too i think johnny with you know the baby coming him loving living in florida him and candace always go to disney and stuff they always post that i i think johnny's gonna stay he seems like a guy who always wanted to work wwe i would be very surprised if he left um kevin i know kevin i don't know if he's gonna stay i don't know if he's gonna leave i wouldn't be

surprised if he left because like all of his friends are in the other company the mount rushmore coordinates tweet he put out you know after all out like i don't know if that was just shouting them out or what but i think it's way more likely that kevin owens leaves than johnny gargano and how about how about uh how about sammy yeah his contract's up after kevin right or yeah yeah but i don't know if he has any injury time on there, but that would be, imagine both of them going to AEW and somehow combining, like,

could you imagine coming back and you do that match in AEW, you know, we've seen a million times. I mean, it never gets old. I mean, it never gets old. I'll watch it forever.

I mean, fight forever. I think it was like one of their, you know, shirts. So there you go. Um, this one,

Carissa Lopez sent in which pay-per-view event from any promotion excites you the most. And why I assume she means just which, you know, which, which title, which brand, and maybe I'll get hate for this,

but my answer is WrestleMania. And my why is nostalgia. Like it's waking up and decorating the house with like pay-per-view cutouts that i clipped out of wwe magazine and like just playing the video game all day leading up to it and watching all the pay-per-view videos in the lead up like it's still wrestlemania for me still think back to wrestlemania 19 20 21 the first three that i watched like such good memories so there's's nothing like a WrestleMania day for me. I always feel like it's Christmas,

even when I'm not excited about the card. You know what it is? I have the same why, but a different answer. Mine is Royal Rumble. Oh, it's a great one. Same exact thing. I mean, it's up there for me, yeah. Yeah, same for nostalgia, man.

And you know what? And you can always get non-fans into it, right? Exactly. That's one of the best things about the Rumble. You could call them up and be like, come on, it's the Rumble. You never know what's going to happen. We'll drawfans into it right like that's one of the best things about the rumble you could like call them up and be like come on it's the rumble you never know what's gonna happen we'll draw numbers yeah and they show up like uh you know i i used to before we started doing the watch alongs which is kind of i love doing them but it's been like a damper as far as like having fun i just have like 20 people right you gotta i gotta be on yeah and i

can't i can't get drunk and and put and put on wrestling gear and start sliding down my stairs like usual I used to have like 20-30 people at my house for Royal Rumble and people would come more for Royal Rumble than Wrestlemania because Wrestlemania was way longer but we would do like a whole betting pool main prize I think the last time we did it

was like 800 bucks was the pool and like this girlfriend of a friend of ours that came to the show The last time we did it was like 800 bucks was the pool. And like this, a girlfriend of a friend of a friend of ours that came to the show was not like knows because of our brothers, but she got so freaking into it. Like she got so into the rumble and you know, she had taken like an edible too.

So she was like, really feeling it. Yeah. She was like three G promo code. MMB. There you go. Do it. So she, she was just like, so into into it so when they did it her you know she was the number that drew she couldn't

believe it she became a lifelong fan this was like years ago she goes like everything now because of that because of the rumble so when i see that i'm like yeah dude that's awesome that's amazing yeah we did that we were so we were in um i think we were in atlanta for the super bowl like as a company barstool like so many of us went down there and we're all in this one giant day like airbnb the giant mansion for all of us to like sleep in the basement of so we're all watching the rumble there together and like you said it's 20 30 people some not into wrestling we all drew numbers we all did the betting pool and when it's down to the final two and they're on the apron and they're doing the classic pro wrestling spots but to a room who

doesn't watch pro wrestling and doesn't know the angle leading into it so usually in recent years you know when like roman is on with shinsuke or something you're like okay shinsuke is going to beat roman here as a wrestling fan you kind of put it together the non-wrestling fans who know nothing don't know that like it's you know over time in the nba finals and it's a buzzer beater coming it's like the greatest moment ever for them so that's a great answer royal rumble if you guys aren't doing royal rumble parties at this point get on that invite your non-wrestling fans you can make them lifelong wrestling do like a barstool royal rumble party man we should yeah we honestly should we do big live stream um fahim writes in any update on bray wyatt to aew or impact i have no sources in this realm so say that again because you broke up any update on bray

wyatt to aew or impact uh the bray wyatt stuff heated up i think dave said that uh he believes the likely place he's going is aw uh i i believe i i i gotta double check i don't know if this was a dave report but i was on russell talk with denise and uh adam on friday and i believe they said that uh he had the option to waive his 90 day so i don't know if he's on a 90 day or not but this wednesday they're in rochester brody's hometown brody's hometown and they've been doing that whole dark order falling apart you know angle and that civil war storyline between them so something you know maybe you don't debut him to bring them together yeah you don't debut him but maybe they do a vignette

you know that'd be crazy that the true leader of the dark order is finally coming or you could have evil luno come over and say no no the leader's back yeah he's here and then you could tease that for whatever week you know i was never i was never super high on bray while i was when he was in nxt i loved the cult leader gimmick i even liked him leading up to like the the john cena promo was okay the the the wrestlemania thing but then when you get the kid involved that extreme rules and the i i didn't love the the hokey pokey demon shit i hated hated hated the um the the fiend hated it hated all the matches hated the gimmick hated all of it that would really bring me in if they made him dark order

you know back to the cult leader gimmick. I like that. You know what it was about that? Like, I didn't hate the Fiend stuff as much, but I did hate how they couldn't figure out how to. He got himself over with that. Yeah, it was more about how they decided to book him, I guess, than it was. I don't think they knew. And to be honest, like, The Undertaker is the same story. I don't think they ever really understood how to book the undertaker until he told them what to do i think it was yeah they

realized i like it was booking of the undertaker was like in the mid-2000s it was like 2006 undertaker i feel like or even like american badass undertaker i liked yeah but like think about that guy right that's another very similar gimmick he He's an undead. Nothing destroys him. He no-sells everything. World wrestling, the way we're talking about this. I know, right? Think about it. He's an undead cowboy. I try to explain this to my wife all the time.

My wife is so fascinated by the Undertaker story because he's like, what is he? I'm like, well, he was possibly a mortician. He worked at a funeral parlor. He was an Undertaker. He would make this casket sometimes he was an all-around it was a one-stop shop he did everything for your funeral but he was also a zombie cowboy yeah who wrote a who wrote a motorcycle big into shoppers yeah but he came back to life he got resurrected as like a sons of anarchy character but uh just what a wonky

wonky story he has his brother that was a mute. You know, he was he was gaslit into thinking he was a mute and he was he was horribly scarred, but he wasn't. And then by the end of his career, we found out that he was married. You know, he was married. Yeah. And he doesn't like when people disrespect his wife, brother. I mean, it's unbelievable. Yeah.

And the final question from Jimmy Bell, thank you to everyone who wrote in questions for us, said, should there be more crossover between the three brands in the WWE? I think no, actually. I liked the brand split. I liked when WrestleMania, you know, when that Kurt Angle and Shawn Michaels matchup was made

and it was like, oh my God, these guys from separate brands, yeah, are going to happen. If you're going to do more crossover, I would like it between the authority figures. Have them in storyline competing with each other and almost make it so we want to gain allegiance towards a brand again. And we want to watch a show for that allegiance. I don't know the last time i felt like they did the brand split really well was when they did it in like 2016 and smackdown was just awesome for a couple months maybe a year raw was okay but when they were doing the aj styles versus john cena versus dean ambrose feud at the top and it was just like fun for months i loved that so i'm actually more partial

towards if you're gonna do a brand split go all in uh you know like i always think like what happened i think when they initially do like if they when they shake it up really shake it up it works yeah i think doing this half-assed like oh we're just going to pull the people that people aren't really interested in uh you know we're going to bring them in and maybe like one big star goes over i don't think that works. It's not enough. I think you really, if you do this draft, you got it.

You got to really shake it up every couple of years. And I, and I hope they do that with this one. Cause I know that this is a big refocusing moment for them. We had broken the story on the show that they were going to, the draft was supposed to happen early September and they delayed it by a month. And that's why the biggie thing kind of was weird that he went over the Raw. He was always supposed to go to Raw.

They delayed the draft, but they didn't delay the story. They were going to move Big E to the Raw side because he would be more in a prominent position there. Because they really, SmackDown needs and wants Roman. Of course. Fox wants Roman. Yeah. So, you know, to develop the big e world champion it would be great on raw uh that was always the plan that tag match by the way that was the plan also the the

three-way was not the plan that that just happened because they've been having awesome matches on house shows yeah that's we're just pretty cool that they're they're at least adjusting on the fly like that and putting it together all the time i mean they adjust all the time they get a lot of crap i'm in something majority of the time rightfully so but they also do some stuff really well uh you know they i mean the talent there is still tremendous like that's the thing that i i get it all the time i love both companies and i'm one of these guys that's like you know riding the fence of like you're in my boat i i want everything you know uh to go up from this the wrestling renaissance if you will you'll be like how could

you say this about wwe and it's like the things that i don't like about wwe have pretty much nothing to do with the talent for like 99 the most part it's not their fault and the roster is amazing so like how could i not root for that roster to do well and i want them to get better i want aew to force them to get better which in the past couple weeks it seems like maybe they poked them into getting kind of better like if aew had an influence on biggie winning the title which i think they did i'm happy about it i i'll give a little little insight on and by the way you work you work at barstool right you guys are tremendous uh nobody does nobody does it better than you guys absolutely i mean and when it comes to sales

right when it comes to success on tv your ad sales team is the driving force in radio which is my background if your sales team doesn't like you and you're the morning guy you're done you're getting canceled that that's literally how it works and i could tell you that on the wwe side on the nbc side uh talking to a lot of those sales guys they are feeling a perception shift and that gets scary when you're dealing with a buyer right you're dealing with the ad buyer and now your ad rate is set at something and your competitors is set at something and you know to some people that don't know wrestling they they're seeing it and meet people that do know wrestling. They're seeing a W as a cooler option that maybe is cheaper.

Yeah. That hits your demo a little bit deeper and might get you the social engagement. I think of when brands, you know, they advertise with Barstool. A lot of them like do it for the Twitter engagement and the people. Oh, my God, I can't believe they advertise with barstool a lot of them like do it for the twitter engagement and the people oh my god i can't believe they advertise with barstool like that would happen a lot more with aew than it would with wwe just by nature of people are used to it with wwe but by the way wwe nobody has the i mean especially in sports too uh the nfl rivals them uh but as far as presence of course social presence but as far as you know dealing with an advertiser and coming up with a plan for them wwe is is you know top notch absolutely

so i think for warner and you know aw has warner media yeah so that doesn't that doesn't hurt them at all not bad to have that powerhouse uh i have a friend that works there a warner and they're saying like they're i mean people are con they're the inventory that they will have for next year for ads they're in great shape so the outlook's looking great for 2022 for both companies it's exciting for wrestling fans yeah for us for us you know it's exciting i i love i love looking at the business and because that kind of dictates where we're headed and i would next year, it looks like it's going to be a fantastic year for pro wrestling. Well, I appreciate all of the insight you offered on this show. I appreciate you breaking down Grand Slam with me.

We'll have to do it again sometime. I would love to get you back in the basement. Andrew, thank you so much. Tell the people where they could find you, where they could find your podcast. Dude, Mat Men Podcast, we're everywhere. Podcasts are available. Been doing it for God knows how long. Rich is like a lifelong friend of mine.

He's a godfather to my kid. So the show kind of works based on the relationship. Big cosign for me. I've listened in the past. I think our listeners would love it. I'll take your endorsement, man. It means a lot. Definitely.

But Mat Men Podcast, where everywhere podcasts are available. I'm on Twitter, at Andrew Zarian. I'm on the Wrestling Observer on their website, F4W online. And I have an independent wrestling group in Jersey City called Catalyst Wrestling. If you like indie wrestling in Jersey, I got to get you out there, man. Yeah, I was just about to say in Jersey City, I have to come to a show.

I would love to. And of course, Sapphire, New York. I got to give them a plug. They pay the bills. So I got to plug Sapphire. Shout out Glennie Balls before we get out of here. Listen, Glennie, Glennie, I'm so sorry. They didn't let you in last time. I don't know what happened.

Unbelievable. Just call me. I'll fix it. I swear. We will get you some balls beachwear so you could let them in next time. Yeah, let's do it. Let's do it. All right, Andrew. Thank you so much.