The Ariel Helwani Show - The Uncrowned Wrestling Show debut | The winding road to the WrestleMania 42 main event

Episode Date: February 10, 2026

It’s the WORLD PREMIERE of The Uncrowned Wrestling Show!The Solomonster is here talking all things pro wrestling, starting with Roman Reigns and CM Punk making it clear why they own the REAL WrestleMania main event this year, and Drew McIntyre’s response on Smackdown last Friday (01:45).  He also discusses how WWE arrived at this point through LOTS of changes to the WrestleMania card, as well as the latest on Bron Breakker’s injury that may keep him off the card in Las Vegas, and an idea for a replacement match involving Bad Bunny (05:25).  He runs down the latest on all the Elimination Chamber qualifying matches, as well as rumors of internal criticism of Paul Levesque due to lagging Mania ticket sales (12:17).  Cody Rhodes revealed a recent pitch he made to WWE brass about bringing back house shows and Solomonster discusses why the pros far outweigh the cons of such a move (32:02).  AEW was in the news, too, with talk of its Double or Nothing PPV coming to New York City this year, and there’s much to say about Ricochet blasting WWE for tarnishing his legacy, as well as Grand Slam Australia predictions (32:02).  Then he closes things with news on The Sandman’s retirement match and a most unique final opponent for him this April (48:07).

Welcome to the uncrowned wrestling show, the premiere episode one. Brought to you by Ariel Helwani and Yahoo Sports. My name is Jason Solomon. You can call me the Solomonster. I'm going to be with you each and every Tuesday talking about what's happening in the world of pro wrestling. What better time to kick things off than WrestleMania season. But before we do that, I want to take a moment to thank Ariel for bringing me on board. This is going to be a fun ride for me.

I hope it is for you as well. And let me tell you a little bit about myself, if you don't already know. I have been the host of a podcast called Solomonster Sounds Off since 2007. Back then, they didn't even call them podcasts. They were audio shows. That's how far back I go with this stuff. But that show is still going strong almost 20 years later, and you can also find me on YouTube if you want to put a face to the name.

I'm also one of the voices for House of Glory Wrestling, one of the biggest independent wrestling promotions in the country. and I've had the pleasure of interviewing lots of wrestling personalities over the years. I've been very blessed to do what I do. So that gives you a sense of who I am. And if you're a fan of Brett the Hitman Heart and you agree that the 1992 Royal Rumble is the best Royal Rumble, then you and I can be friends. The way this is going to work is I'm going to be chiming in with my thoughts on the key stories of the week in and out of the ring.

This is not meant to be a straight news show. I've got a lot of opinions on a lot of things, just like you do, especially on this WrestleMania build so far. So why don't we start there? Last week, we learned what our WrestleMania main event is going to be in Las Vegas this year. Note that I said main event, as in singular, because no matter what Smackdown puts up against it, the true main event this year is going to be CM Punk against Roman Reigns for the World Heavyweight Championship after Roman won his second Royal Royal Royal Royal Royal.

Rumble. Easily the highlight of the night last Monday was the in-ring promo involving the two of them at the very end of the show. And CM Punk was CM Punk. We all know what CM Punk can do on the microphone. It's what he made a career out of it. Roman Raines, when he has somebody good to spar with, he's as good as anybody right now. We just don't get to see him very often. So to me, watching that promo last week, I thought it was the best Roman Raines promo he's ever cut. And in one night, in one 10 or 12 minute segment, they were able to get me and a lot of other people very excited for a match that up until a couple of weeks ago, we didn't even know was going to be possible at this year's WrestleMania. But boy, did they make Drew McIntyre and the WWE title feel like Little

Brother. But you know what? I like that. Drew gave it right back to them on Smackdown, as he should have. And he talked about the importance of the WWE Championship, all the men, right, real men that have held it over the years. You know, he did what he could in that promo. But again, there's no doubt as to the real main event this year. The part of that promo where he blasted them for aura farming, that hit a little close to home. That hit a little close to home.

It feels like that's all of WWE these days. That's all they do, all the big names. But if you remember last year at WrestleMania, we had Roman and Punk in the same match on opposite sides of the ring, but it was a very different situation. It was a triple threat. Seth Rollins was involved, and it was all about Paul Heyman, where his allegiance lies. And it was an excellent match, but this is a very different situation because now we get one-on-one.

The best matches are one-on-one, especially when you have a personal issue between two guys. Like, the best wrestling feuds are the ones where you can buy into it as being real. And sometimes they're more real than you may think, but it's that illusion of tension. Like, we don't get enough of that these days. So when we do, I think it tends to stand out more. Now, we did not see Roman on Raw last night. Punk is now feuding with Finn Baller, heading into the elimination chamber. Right now, Roman Raines is booked for five of the next nine raw episodes that we have left heading into WrestleMania.

Four in March and just one in April at the moment, which I believe is the final Raw before WrestleMania. And honestly, that's better than I thought we would get. but it's that part-time status that holds me back from just having any desire to see him as champion again. Because we need less of that. You know, we need less part-time champions. It's just it actively drags the shows down when you have these bigger names. And we've seen this over the years in WWE where you have somebody who's part-time, they're just not around week to week. They put a belt on them.

And sure, I mean, you get some big PLE matches out of it. But there's so much content on the weekly shows that when these people are not around, It just actively drags the shows down. So I don't have an issue with Roman being involved in a marquee match of WrestleMania. He's a marquee performer. Of course he's going to have one of the top matches or the top match of WrestleMania. The idea of him walking out of Las Vegas as the World Heavyweight Champion has no appeal to me. Unless he's going to be working more often, there's no indication that that's actually going to happen.

As far as how we got here to Punk and Roman, it's been a journey in itself. according to Dave Meltzer in the latest wrestling observer newsletter. Meltzer says that the two main events have changed twice since plans were made for this year's show. The original plan before he got hurt was for Seth Rollins to defend the world heavyweight title against Roman Reigns. Even though Roman and Seth,

clearly they have more history than Roman and Punk do. Reigns against punk, it's the bigger of the two matches. So, I mean, we're getting the better end of the deal here. But he reports that the idea on the WWE title side was for CM Punk to win the elimination chamber and challenge Cody Rhodes. Now, I'm cool with Punk against Roman, but Punk against Cody, that's another match that we need to see at some point. So WrestleMania could have looked very different this year, and that means CM Punk would have won the elimination chamber in his hometown of Chicago. Instead, Punk is going to be defending the title against Finn Baller on that. that show. A good old pin baller, as I call him. I mean, I hate to, but that's what he is.

Meltzer says that with Seth's injury, punk got the belt, and the idea was that Bron Breaker would win the Royal Rumble match. He would choose punk and then win the title of WrestleMania. I guess that would be the night that they officially anoint him and give him his crowning moment. It doesn't really mesh, though, with the idea of them doing punk against Cody. So I get the sense that they had lots of ideas. is that they were throwing at the wall, and a lot of it just didn't stick, including Cody Roman 3, which would have been terrible to do that match three times in a four-year span. Drew McIntyre was said to have pushed very hard to win the WWE title from Cody Rhodes in their

three stages of hell match because he had already lost to him multiple times. And he's not wrong, by the way. Cody also agreed that Drew should win, and so he did, and now we're faced with the prospect of another Cody Rhodes Drew McIntyre singles match at WrestleMania. And I hope that that does not happen. They have to introduce someone else into that mix. Jacob Fatu would make the most sense. Even Randy Orton, right? Someone.

Because we have already seen Cody and Drew so many times. It's old hat at this point, unless you toss somebody else in there. And so that is where things stand for WrestleMania night one and night two. Now, I mentioned Bronbreaker. Let's talk about Raw last night. At the top of the show, Michael Cole announced that Braun Breaker was injured in training last week, and he sustained an undisclosed injury for which he underwent surgery, and he is now out indefinitely. Later in the show, Paul Heyman claimed that it was a hiatal hernia that Breaker sustained

when he was furiously trading and deadlifting more weight than any human being should be deadlifting by themselves, I'm sure. Her Dave Meltzer, and later confirmed by Mike Johnson at pwinsider.com, they had the news earlier than we heard about it on Raw last night, said Braun Breaker underwent surgery for what was said to be a serious hernia. Johnson says that Breaker was hurt not at the Royal Rumble, which is what you might think, given how quickly he was eliminated, he entered at number two, had no offense whatsoever and was dumped out first. It actually had nothing to do with that.

It was when he flipped the announced desk over and a fit of rage on Raw last Monday. And what the hell are those new tables made out of? Yeah, I remember Excalibur on Dynamite every week he would joke. Our tables are made of solid oak. Maybe these tables really are. I don't know. But by Wednesday, evidently, it was determined that Breaker would need to have surgery. Now, Mike Johnson later added that the word going around is that Breaker's hernia was an ongoing issue,

but it was only determined that he would need surgery following his appearance on Raw last week. So I guess him flipping the table over only exacerbated what was a pre-existing injury. The idea for Breaker, I mean, we don't know for sure, but it seems to be that they are hopeful, Seth Rawlins is going to be back in time for WrestleMania, and they would do Seth Rollins against Braun Breaker. With Braun not involved in a title match, that's the match that would make the most sense, just by process of elimination. By the way, that group is cursed. The vision is cursed.

First Seth gets hurt, so they boot him out. Breaker's the next in line, and now he's out. Now, if they believe that Rollins will be cleared in time for a mania match, and Bronn Breaker makes it back in time, then you could take the two walking wounded and you can do a match. But the latest update for Meltzer last night at Wrestling Observer Radio is not good. He's claiming that Breaker could be out for up to 12. weeks or at worst six months.

That is brutal. You certainly don't want to rush him back too soon, and they're not going to. I mean, they get to be cautious with him. Yeah, this is Bronbreaker. This is not Cota Ibuschie, who routinely dismisses what his doctors say because he thinks he knows better. So the timing absolutely sucks, but let's just, let's game this out here. Let's say that Bronbreaker is not back in time. It's very easy to say, well, just keep Seth off.

the show and just wait. But if you're a performer like Seth Rollins, right, the goal that you're working towards right now is to be back for the biggest show of the year. If he's ready to go, you can't deny him that. And sure, I mean, you could do Rollins against Bronson Reed, you could do Rollins against Logan Paul. It's been done before. I saw what Logan Paul said about Bad Bunny before the Super Bowl halftime show the other

night. Somebody asked him, you're going to be watching the halftime show. he goes, no, and he walks off. And then lots of people on social media instantly thought, well, Logan Paul against Bad Bunny at WrestleMania, it's got to be happening, right? I've heard nothing to suggest that it is. I've read nothing to suggest that it is. I think it's just this pie in the sky idea.

I am sure that they would love it. Are you kidding me? The most downloaded recording artist in the world coming off the Super Bowl halftime show, TKO would give their firstborn to get that man on the show. If there's any chance of that happening, I think the play isn't Logan Paul against Bad Bunny. I think you do a tag team match. Seth Rollins and Bad Bunny against Bronson Reed and Logan Paul.

I think that would work. And if Bad Bunny is not on the show, they could still do a tag match. You could just substitute L.A. Knight in there. He and Rollins sharing a common cause, right? Getting revenge on the vision. Now, the Elimination Chamber qualifiers continued on Raw last night. with Ria Ripley over Lyra Valcuria and Ivy Nile, and we had L.A. Knight over Penta and Austin Theory,

with yet another attack from this mystery masked man, the man in black, who was clearly Grayson Waller in disguise. Whoever it is, once the reveal actually happens, it looked an awful lot like Grayson Waller, the way he was moving around out there. And again, Austin Theory takes the pin, no surprise there. That's his role.

I've been saying that since he was introduced into the vision. The only reason, the only legitimate reason that Austin Theory was added to the vision was so that they had a fall guy. That is his role. He'll get a win here and there, but by and large, his role is to eat the pin in these types of matches, and that's exactly what he did last night. Now, look, it's good to have these qualifying matches on TV. I think that they bring purpose to these shows, and they do them for other events.

They've done them in the past for King and Queen of the Ring, right? Anytime you have qualifying matches that tie into a larger PLE, I think it's generally a good thing. But I got to say, you know, WWE, it feels like it is in what I call copy and paste mode where all of these shows feel the same. There's no real spark. I hope they can pick things up as we move along here on this road to WrestleMania. But I see there's also talk that Paul Aveck may be on the hot seat in that he is getting a lot of internals. criticism for WrestleMania ticket sales lagging. I believe they're roughly 20% behind where they were this time last year, in the same venue. And far be it for me to defend WWE creative. I'm not.

It's been stale for a while now. But what do you think is going to happen when you continue to charge people an arm and a leg for tickets to a show with uninspired creative? They have chased away a lot of people from attending their shows because of the outrageous ticket prices. And that's less a Paul Levec thing and more of a TKO thing. That's a Nick Con thing. When you prioritize short-term gain, you end up with long-term pain. And I think that's what we may be starting to see. Those seats aren't filling up quite as fast as they used to.

And frankly, it's well-deserved after they announced New Orleans for WrestleMania this year, and then they yanked it away from them just to bring it back to Las Vegas for no reason other than pure greed. That greed is going to bite them on the end. ass. None of this is surprising to me. But Tiffany Stratton is in the elimination chamber. She beat out Lash Legend in Chelsea Green last Friday to qualify. Shout out to Chelsea Green. She badly sprained her ankle in that match.

And from what I see from the news reports online, nothing is broken or torn or anything like that. Hopefully she won't be out for too long. This Friday, it's going to be Alexa Bliss, Julia and Zelina Vega. So Alexa is getting in. And you know Charlotte will too. So that would give us Charlotte, Alexa, and Tiffany in the chamber from the Smackdown side. And Ria Ripley, so far, from the Monday Night Raw side.

And if Ria is in, then it stands to reason that E.O. Sky is going to end up in there as well. Next Monday, it's going to be O'Ska, Bailey, and Natty fighting for another spot. That should belong to Oscar. In the Menge Chamber, Randy Orton qualified, on Friday over Alistair Black and Solo Sequoia. L.A. Knight qualified last night. And this Friday is where things get very interesting, because it is Cody Rhodes

against Jacob Fattu against Sammy Zane, which is a big match, because those are three names, really all of which you would reasonably expect to see in the elimination chamber. But only one of these names can get in. And it could go any number of ways. I don't see Fah 2 winning. I'm sticking with Cody.

I think Cody Rhodes wins, but I just can't shake this feeling that they're going to work Sammy Zane in there, which I think would be a big surprise to a lot of people. So I'm going to propose this. You chime in, you let me know what you think. Sammy shocks the world on Friday. And they do an angle later on to get Cody and Jacob into the title match of WrestleMania, right?

It would make sense in this situation, by the way, for Randy Orton to win the chamber. and we may well end up with a fatal four-way of WrestleMania. Because WrestleMania is airing later than usual again this year. I think as late as it's ever been. Last year, I think it was the latest it was ever. And this year is probably the latest that we have ever had a WrestleMania. Usually it's not that deep into April. Which means they've got a lot more television to produce between now and then.

They need to find ways to keep things interesting. So if Cody does go in there and win on Friday and then he goes to the chamber and he wins the chamber, it's like, okay, yeah, you can do that. That would be the easiest, you know, path to go. But I don't know that that's going to make for a very interesting television between now and mania. So I don't think it would be a terrible idea. You have Sammy sneak in there. And you just find another way to work Cody and or Jacob into the title match because you got plenty of time, you know, between now and mid-April.

Trick Williams is another one. I expect him to be in a qualifying match and to get in. I would love to see Ilya Draganov qualify. He's not going to win, but just for him to be in that mix. I think he would add a lot to that match. And two new matches were added to the elimination chamber card on Raw last night. I mentioned Finn Baller. He's going to be challenging CM Punk for the World Heavyweight Championship,

and we know how that's going to go. Look, I mean, is it predictable? Sure. But this is nothing new here. I mean, they try to come up with matches in the interim between the Rumble of Mania, just to keep things interesting. CM Punk's not just going to sit on his ass for the next three months, right? So, Finn Baller is a fine opponent.

They're going to have a very good match. I don't know that anybody in the world honestly expects it to go any way other than the first match went. Because Finn Baller, I mean, he's got business with the judgment day. He's got business with Dominic Mysterio. They have been teasing a match between them for so long, and they keep dragging their feet on this. This is one of the things about Triple H's creative. Is that it just he takes forever sometimes to get to the point. There were people who thought we were going to get a Baller and Dominic match on the

WrestleMania card last year. Now we're heading into Vegas this year. I would say the Baller stands out probably as the likeliest challenger for the intercontinental title. Maybe as the demon at WrestleMania, but he's not going to be defending the World Heavyweight Championship. The other match that was added and made official, A.J. Lee is back. Just showed up last night, unannounced, and there she was in the back, wall. talking with CM Punk, and she came out in the opening segment to confront Becky Lynch, who was trying way too hard to act all out of her mind and manic, and she would not give AJ a shot

at her intercontinental title. She correctly pointed out that you're part-time. You've done nothing to deserve a title shot. You're barely even here. You're not even really on the roster. And AJ's response to this was to say, oh, okay, well, then I guess I'll just go back home to Chicago. And that's all it took for Becky to change her mind and all of a sudden, okay, you know what, I'll give you a title match. It didn't take a lot to convince Becky Lynch to change her mind. So that is how we got there. But it is a title match that will take place at Elimination Chamber. I thought they were going to hold off on this until WrestleMania.

And that's fine. I mean, it gives them a chance to get it. least two matches out of it. You know, we were seeing a lot of drama for a while a few months ago between Becky Lynch and referee Jessica Carr. And it felt like it was dropped. It really hasn't been focused on now in a while. I have to assume we're going to get back to that at some point. There's going to be some sort of payoff to all that. It would not at all surprise me if Jessica Carr is the referee for their match in Chicago. And she factors into the finish. some way. You know, whether or not she takes a bump or, you know, gets, gets herself intentionally

disqualified and there's more drama between Becky and Jessica, I can see that being kind of a way out of doing a proper finish in that match. And then when they run it back at WrestleMania, you know, she may factor into that match as well. I'm not expecting a title change here in Chicago. I think if they're going to do it, you save that for Mania. I think you save that for the bigger show. But the first match is now penciled in for elimination chamber. Let's talk about Cody Rhodes here for a second because this was something that caught my eye. And I actually think he makes a great point. He has his, what do you want to talk about? Podcast. And he had Jay Uso on as his guest last week. And in the course of the show, he revealed

that there was a point in time. He didn't say how far back it was, but he had made a pitch to WWE management for the company to bring back one house show loop per month. Because the company has greatly scaled back on the number of live events, non-televised live events that they do every year. Mark Shapiro, the COO of TKO, he has talked about them wanting to scale back even further here in 2006 and do even fewer shows. And so he has made several comments Cody has in recent months about how important those live events really are.

But on this, he said, I had suggested this to some of the top brass in the company for a myriad of reasons, camaraderie, the reps, the general sense of working here. It's hard to think that you work somewhere if you're only there a couple of days a week. Versus the schedule when we first started, where it was full tours, live events, then you come to TV, then you're homeless time. I had suggested to them, I said, run one weekend a month, call them house shows, make them almost poke the fourth wall a little bit in terms of what they are. They're canon, but they're not. You're going to see some of the stuff that you see on TV, but it's going to be a bit more of a mixed bag. And maybe you're going to see some people you've never seen before

who are getting their first rep in front of you. Run them that way where there's an intimacy to them that's advertised. This is a house show. That's what you guys are getting, and it's going to be awesome. They're so fun. Now, he didn't say how WWE responded to this suggestion. He did indicate that it was a while ago, and there's been no change since then.

So I don't know if they necessarily... It could have been one of those things where it's like, yeah, we'll take it under advisement here. But, you know, he said he really feels like it would help create a very team-like feeling in the locker room. And it would keep the roster in a rhythm by allowing them to wrestle more often. Now, the reason they started scaling back on these shows had likely more to do with them being money losers, or at the very least they weren't generating the kind of income that they would want them to. Because if they were making lots and lots of money off these live events and packing

in the buildings every single night, they would still be doing them. Or at least they would not have scaled back on them in the way that they have. So it's, you know, now what you end up with is you get the occasional house show or like a holiday tour when they go overseas. They go on these European tours. They run a lot of live events there. They just had that last month. And that's it. That's basically it. Now, if you've been a wrestling fan or a WWW. for long enough, you remember a time where they were running live events all the time. And the schedule that these men and women were keeping up, I mean, it was inhumane. If you go back to like the late 80s and even into the early 90s,

WWE in particular, you could have some nights where they're running an A, B, and C, and maybe even a D crew in certain cities. So they're all spread out all over the country. And they're running three or four shows any given night. I mean, these guys were on the road. It was just a ridiculous schedule that they kept up. So that coupled with all the bumps they were taking in those old-ass boxing rings that didn't even budge. Go back and watch an old match from back then.

Watch somebody take a superplex and the ring doesn't even move. Like all of these things were just a recipe for disaster and for guys to just be drinking and doing all kinds of horrible shit. I'm sure that they were doing that they shouldn't have been doing back then in excess. So the schedule is a hell of a lot better now. I don't know that anybody is advocating for them to go back to that, where they barely get to see their families and they just barely get to see their house, you know, twice a month. Like nobody is asking for that.

But I do feel like there should be some sort of happy medium where you still maintain these events a certain number of times each month. And it allows them, you know, as Cody said, like you may see someone who's getting their reps for the first time. You know, they're calling people up from NXT, right? And some of these people have been down at the performance center in NXT for a number of years. And they have, you know, a decent amount of experience, but you can't match the experience of performing in front of a packed live crowd, living, breathing human beings. Not in the performance center, not in some tiny little venue, which is fine. But, like, if you want them to get the experience of working in front of a crowd of 5,000 people, 8,000 people, 10,000. people like you do in

WWE every single week. The best way to do that is to put them out there in front of those people. And the occasional dark match before Raw or Smackdown, that's not going to cut it. There are people that they've called up, and I always cite Maxine Dupree as an example of this. Maxine Dupree,

who got a short run recently with the Women's Intercontinental Title, if you have watched her from the time that she was called up as part of this Alpha Academy stuff to where she is now on her own, she has improved. Now, that does not mean that she's great. It does not mean that she's fully seasoned, right? She's not. But she has made strides from where she was at the beginning, especially in

terms of just how she carries herself and her personality and her ability to cut promos and speak, you know, in front of a live audience. She's definitely improved from where she was before. But there was also a memorable live event. I don't remember, I want to say it was maybe 2024. It was in the last couple of years. And there was video of someone in the crowd as she was walking to the back after her match who was heckling her. And everybody had sympathy for Maxine and they were kind of rallying behind her. And it was like you felt bad for her because she was thrown right into the fire from the deep end. She had virtually no time, I think, in NXT before she got called up. And it's one thing to call somebody up and say, hey, we have a roll.

for you on the show. You're going to be a manager. You're going to be some sort of personality on the show. But no, you're going to wrestle. So she didn't have the kind of time down in developmental that a lot of other people are afforded. There are people who are, you know, they come into WWE from AEW or the Indies, and they have years of experience. And they could spend two or three years in NXT that they don't need to. But yet someone like her gets called up lickety split and she just gets thrown into the deep end of the pool and she's trying not to sink to the bottom. people like that are going to benefit from having live events where they can go out there and they're not on television. They don't have to worry about working a TV match, right? I've heard wrestlers talk about this and it makes sense. Working a TV match very different than working a live event match. You're probably not under the same time restrictions, but it's just very micromanaged. It's just different and I would imagine it's not as fun. It's a lot more loose.

And on live events in front of just a live audience and not with TV cameras present, you could try new moves, you could try new things in a match. Oh, hey, it worked. We'll try that on TV. Or, oh, well, let shit the bed. We won't do that again. Right. There's lots of benefits for the talent, not to mention just getting them in the ring and just

like Cody says, the reps. But in terms of, like, fans, I've been to a lot of house shows in my day. And you know what you're getting with a house show. You know that it's very unlikely, right? Something of any great importance is going to happen. You're going to get a title change. They're going to shoot a major angle, right? every now and then they would, which I think is smart, by the way.

You want to throw a little title change in there every now and then just to show people, hey, you should buy tickets to the show when we come to town because you never know what might happen. But generally speaking, you know nothing of any note is going to happen. You just want to buy a ticket and go to the show. And for two hours or two and a half hours, you want to just have fun. And you have fun when you can tell the talent is having fun. And that's what makes how shows so fun. The fact that they're doing less of them is a sin.

It really is too bad. Not to mention, of course, they've priced a lot of people out anyway. I can only imagine what the ticket prices would be for the live events to begin with. It's just a very different time now. But I think Cody makes a very good point. And there's a lot of other companies that don't run house shows either. AEW doesn't do them. TNA doesn't do them anymore anyway.

But the difference is, unlike in WWE, a lot of those talents, they get to book outside shots, right? They are wrestling on independent shows. Even if they have to clear it through AEW and TNA first, or if the company is booking them, they get to work outside of those promotions, however many times a week or a month, you know, that they want to work. In WWE, they're not afforded that option. You don't have that option. But I could see Cody's point also about the camaraderie of it. Because back then, these guys, I mean, this was their family.

They were around these people more than their actual family. And so you were able to foster friendships and relationships that way. Probably make some enemies, too, if you're around these guys for too long. And so there's less of that now. You know, you come to TV and, you know, you do your stuff for TV and you go home, right? The schedule's a lot better. But there has to be that happy medium. And I completely see where he's coming from and I think he's correct in that assessment.

And I don't think either TKO realize. it or necessarily cares. I don't think they give a shit. But I do think it is something that they should consider doing. It's good for the fans. And it probably would be good for the wrestlers, too. And there's probably a lot of other ones who share the same opinion that Cody has. But Cody has one of the loudest voices in the room. Right. You need people like that. You need a Cody Rhodes or a Roman Rains or a CM Punk to be your voice sometimes because their voice carries more weight than other people on the roster might carry. So if guys like that are stepping up and saying it, it's probably something worth considering.

But there is, think about this, there is less actual work, okay, going on in the ring right now in WWE, bell to bell, than at any other point in the last 40 years. And this is a big part of why that is. Not just because they're not running house shows. I mean, we can get into the whole four matches on a PLE. Raw last Monday night had three matches in the entire two and a half hours. So then you take out these events. And it's true, there is less work going on now than at any other point in the last four decades.

That is crazy. Over on the AEW side, some news that broke yesterday, which AEW has yet to confirm, Andrew Zarian of the Mattman Wrestling podcast is reporting that AEW Double or Nothing, which is one of the company's tent pole events, is coming to New York City for the first time, to Louis Armstrong Stadium in Queens, New York, which is located on the same tennis complex where AEW has run events previously from Arthur Ash Stadium. They're basically next to each other. Louis Armstrong is a smaller stadium.

It has a capacity of around 14,000 before stage setup is worked out. Arthur Ash has a capacity I want to save around 23,000. It's been the law of diminishing returns there for AEW. So attendance-wise, this makes sense. You know, it's better to fill up a stadium half the size than get half a crowd in a full-size. one. Double or nothing is typically held Memorial Day weekend. We just don't know if this will be that Saturday or Sunday. I'll tell you what, it would have been a hell of a thing to go to a Mets game at Cityfield during the day and then walk over to the stadium right after the game.

But I see the Mets are away that weekend. They're going to be playing the Marlins, which should be a good weekend for the Mets. But with this team, you never know. Don't get me started on that. Rickache. Rickache is the reigning AEW national champion. and he made headlines this week, so we should talk about this, in the course of promoting last week's AEW show in Las Vegas, he made headlines for blasting his time in WWE, calling his main roster call up in 2019 the worst thing that happened to his career.

This is what he said on the Mark Hoke Show, 101.5 FM. The ricochet that I am now is the ricochet I was on, on the independent scene and in Japan and doing the things that got me popular to where I am today. You've seen the Marvel movies, Thanos snaps, and there was a five-year blip of people who were just gone. That five years was like being blipped away into a different universe. It just wasn't what I was doing. It wasn't me.

Coming to AEW and finding that love, it's like when Tony Stark finally defeated Thanos and all the people came back. That's how I feel. Rikoshae finally came back to what he was doing. And I feel like that five years was just blipped away. I already know how this is going to sound and I already know how people are going to take this. But I think that the day we got called up to Raw was the worst thing that happened to Rikishay's wrestling career. The trajectory I was on compared to the trajectory I got for those five years,

it completely changed the public's image of Rikosha and who Rikishie was. Specifically, the wrestling side of it. That five years really tarnished Rikishay's wrestling legacy. that's easy to dump on ricochet. He's always on social media saying something or another. He's not wrong in saying that his time on the main roster did diminish the way that a lot of people thought of him as compared to how they looked at him prior to that, even when he was in NXT. You know, he still felt special when he was in NXT. For all the titles he won and the big names he worked with, like Brock Lesner and AJ Styles, a lot of fans thought that he was not being used the right way.

and evidently he feels the same way. It's easy to see all the great high flyers that we have now on TV, but years ago, there were very few who could do the things that Rikishay could do inside the ring. He built a reputation on the independency. He built a reputation in New Japan and in Lucha Underground under a mask later on is Prince Puma. W.W.E. had the chance to sign him in 2013. They brought him in for a tryout and he blew everybody away, but they didn't have a spot for him.

So it took years for him to finally make his way in, and they eventually did bring him in. They started him in NXT. And then he got called up to Monday Night Raw. And in NXT, again, he felt special. On Raw, he did not. Now, were there ways to protect him a little bit better? Absolutely. But a guy like Rikoschet, he was never going to be a priority for Vince McMahon.

You know, if he had the charisma and he could talk well enough, then maybe. But he didn't. that's not what he was known for. In WWE, they place a priority on certain things. Things like that, Rikoschet either didn't have or they thought he didn't have. In ring, he was not going to be able to go out there and have the kind of matches he wanted to have. Right? And his matches in WWE were fine.

They didn't blow anybody away. His biggest sin, I'll tell you what his biggest sin was. His biggest sin was being born 5'9 and not 6 foot 3.3. Maybe then he would have gotten more opportunities. But even then, I'm not sure how much higher he really expected to go. You know, he says they tarnished his legacy. If he was expecting to go out there and have the kind of matches every week that he was having on the Indies, he signed with the wrong place.

He tarnished his own legacy the minute he signed that contract. So he's as much to blame as they are if that's how he honestly feels. I think what led to him leaving for AEW is the same thing, that led Tomaso Champa to leave WW and go to AEW. Champa did an interview and said that it made him sick to his stomach to read comments online from people saying that he peaked in 2018 in NXT.

And I will say, you know, NXT, black and gold, Tomaso Champa, fantastic heel. Tremendous. I've said this before. If and when there is an NXT Hall of Fame, he's a first ballot Hall of Famer. that really was the best run in his career that he's at.

That champa from black and gold, in many people's eyes, is the best version of champa, and they wish they could see that guy again. And it made him sick because the champa of 2006, he says, is 100 times better than the champa of 2018. This is what he believes. He believes he is better than that guy in ring, on the microphone, at telling stories, all of it. He checks every box. but no one ever gets to see it.

And if he would have taken WWE's offer to renew his deal, because they did make an offer to him for him to stay, had he taken that, he knew that that was never going to change. And it would just drive him nuts. Every single day he would go on social media and continue to see those comments, and he would go crazy. So he left. And if that wasn't the driving force behind Rickettsay leaving,

it was probably pretty damn close. His WWE run, look, it was hard. hardly a waste. I don't know if he would call it a waste. Some people might use that word. It was hardly a waste. He had some success. But if you're not happy, then you leave when your contract is up. It's very simple. And that's what he did. Rikashe claims he had one contract that he signed in 2019, I guess. It must have been a five-year deal. And when it was over, he left. He didn't sign new contracts. He didn't renew or extend existing deals. When he was done, he was done. He was unhappy, and he left.

And he seems to be in a much happier place now in AEW. I would argue he's more or less at the same level there that he was in WWE. Only now, they made a new belt to give him because all the other ones were already occupied. But according to Rikishay, there are others in WWE right now who were in the same boat that he was at that time. And on X, he said, same thing happens to Baller, Shinske, Apollo, and many others. WWE kills legacies and love of the sport. It's what they do best. I do feel this way, and many others do as well.

That company kills the loved, and you end up being a shell of who you were and going through the motions. I'm not even going to sit here and say that he's wrong. I'm sure there are other performers who probably feel the same way. There are a lot of fans who feel that way. There's been a discourse around Shinske Nakamura as an example. for many, many years. There are people who are still waiting. Oh, I'm waiting to see that New Japan Shinske one more time.

What happened to that, Nakamura? He's going to come back one day. And he never does. But Shinske Nakamura has been there forever. And he stays. And I think it's shitty for him to be name-dropping people that still work there and basically speaking for them. Like, they could speak for themselves.

That should not be his decision to make. But also no one is holding a gun to their head every time they signed a new contract. Finn Baller has been there for a very long time. Shinske Nakamura has been there for a very long time. If they were that unhappy or they felt their legacies were being ruined, if it was that important to them, it's not like they haven't had plenty of opportunities to leave and go somewhere else. So they must not be too miserable if they're still there.

But I don't think it's his place to be putting them on black. last like that. Now, last week on Dynamite was a big shocking conclusion to the show. Brody King shocked the world by squashing MJF in 60 seconds. And normally, you know, that's not how you would book your world champion to lose in 60 seconds on television, but it fit the story they were trying to tell. MJF was telling Brody for weeks, you got to go out and beat someone of note. You got to beat someone elite before you ever get a shot at my world title.

So as soon as he made that comment, he shot himself in the foot. And in the end, King destroyed him on Wednesday with an assist from Hangman Adam Page, who came out to observe, which distracted MJF, who got choked out and dropped on his head, and now Brody King will challenge for the AEW World Title in Sydney, Australia this weekend. You know, the best thing to happen to AEW this year is the revolving door of challengers for MJF's world title. Dave Meltzer says that there are signs that it is having a positive impact on TV ratings and ticket sales. And why wouldn't it? Like, this is Pro Wrestling 101.

You have a heel champion that is despised. And you build up multiple challengers to take said title from him. Right? Who's it going to be? I don't know. It's not going to be Brody King. I could tell you that. But first it was Bandito, right?

They had their title match last month. Now it's Brody. Kenny Omega, his and his name. entire story arc this year is about him getting back into the world title picture to get his belt back. Hangman wants his belt back. Swerve Strickland wants his belt back. But now you got Andrade, El Edelow in the mix. Also, Andrade, by the way, who has been on an absolute tear this year so far. I have described it as Andrade being in his final form since he became a free man. He's already got a dozen matches under his belt this year. He's got three world

titles to his name, one from Mexico, one from Puerto Rico, and one from Germany, that he won just this week. He beat Kenny Omega on Wednesday. That is the biggest win of his AEW career. And he beat Omega to earn the right to challenge Hangman this weekend. And the winner of that match is going to go on to wrestle for the World Heavyweight Championship of Revolution next month in Los Angeles, where they are already closing in on 10,000 tickets sold for that show without a single match being announced. So they are clearly doing some. They are clearly doing some something right. You just hope they can continue that momentum going forward. But let's do some predictions for Grand Slam Australia. The show is this Saturday.

It's for an episode of collision. It's going to be airing on tape delay. I believe in their normal time slot on TNT. They have loaded this thing up with Orange Cassidy and timeless Tony Storm taking on Wheeler Yuda and Marina Shafir. And the loser of the fall gets their head shaved, which has got to be Wheeler Yuda. I mean, I'm going with Cassidy and Tony Storm for the win. I mean, the thought of Marina Shafir being turned into Moxley is nightmare fuel. Speaking of, John Moxley is going to be defending his continental title against Konoske, Takeshda. And I'm going with Takeshita for the win here to win the championship. So that way, when and if he wrestles Okada at Revolution, both belts can be on the line. Because Okada has

his international title. You could have to Keshda going into it with the continental title. and whoever wins that match, presumably Takesha would then unify them again into the unified title, which went on the shelf. There is no unified title at the moment. I assume they want to bring it back soon. So I'm going with Takesha to win the belt here. Willow Nightingale and Harley Cameron, they defend their women's tag team titles against Megabad. Megan Bain and Penelope Ford. I'm going with Megabad to win the titles. Hangman Adam Page, he battles Andrade L. Edelow.

and I'm going with Hangman to win. Look, I would love to see them go outside the box here and do heel versus heel in that revolution main event. I think, I don't think, I know. In that L.A. market, if you have Andrade in the main event challenging for the world championship, he ain't going to be no heel. Okay, he's going to be the de facto baby face in that match.

And I think it'll make for a very fun atmosphere, not to mention just a badass match. So I would love it. I would love it if they surprised me, and they had Andrade go over here. But everything just seems to me to be building to MJF against Hangman Page. You saw the match on Wednesday. It was Hangman who came out and distracted him and caused him to lose to Brody King. They had two matches last year.

Both times, Hangman beat MJF. So in their mind, I could see it where, okay, MJF is finally going to get that. elusive win over hangman, right? He could finally vanquish him and then move on to his next challenger. I just think that the story is there for hangman and MJF more so than it is for MJF and Andrade, which would just be a great, you know, freaking match to do. No real story to it. So I'm going with Hangman for the win. And MJF defends the AEW world title against Brody King. And MJF is going to retain. Brody King is not leaving Australia as the new world champion. And I'm going to throw this out there. You know, one person who we have not seen in about a year,

it's been a very long time, is Buddy Matthews. It was Brody King's former stablemate in the House of Black. And they were tag team partners as well for a while. It was at Grand Slam last year during his entrance of all things for his match with Okato where he took one wrong step in the ring and he really did a number on his ankle. And he continued to, and he worked on it. He worked almost 15, Minutes against Okada, on a badly injured ankle that he needed surgery for, ligament damage, all kinds of just nasty shit. And he's had some setbacks. It's been a tough road for Buddy Matthews.

And there really hasn't been anything said about him recently, but I was thinking about him. I'm like, all right, well, here we are now a year later, right? Back in Australia. And Brody is in the main event, right? Challenging for the World Championship. What a time it would be for Buddy Matthews to come back. even if he was just there for moral support and he was in the corner of his good friend and something goes down here in this match, be it, you know, by accident on purpose or

accidentally on purpose, something involving Buddy Matthews that ultimately is going to cost Brody King, the AEW World Title. That's what I think is going to happen here. Maybe it's wishful thinking on my part because I kind of miss the guy. I'd like to see him back, but I'm going to say the buddy Matthews shows up and he factors into this finish. in some way, and MJF retains his title. And one last item here. ECW legend

the Sandman. We all know the Sandman. He had declared previously that he would be wrestling his final match this April. I know it's pro wrestling, and when somebody says they're going to retire and they're going to wrestle their last match, they probably just mean for this year. But that's what he had announced. And now

his opponent has finally been revealed. It will be taking place at Joey Janella's Spring Break 10 in Las Vegas, WrestleMania weekend, and Sandman's opponents will be the Invisible Man. The same Invisible Man who debuted in the DDT promotion back in 2012, died in 2019,

but then came back to life and returned to the ring and worked a 90-person match at last year's spring break, which was ultimately won by 13-year-old Brody Lee Jr. As Sandman matches go, this one may not actually be too bad. He's had far worse. Now, you see, that's the kind of content that uncrowned has been missing. If that isn't a combat sport, then I don't know what is. I hope you have found this to be some time well spent here this week outside of the Sandman thing.

Next Tuesday, we'll do it all over again. Drop me any feedback you may have. And also, I would love to start incorporating some listener Q&A into the show as we go along. I've always done on my shows. You can email your questions to me at the Solomaster at gmail.com and put the word uncrowned somewhere in the subject line. Or you can tweet me on X at Solomonster with your question and be sure to include the hashtag uncrowned.

And just maybe I'll answer your question on the next show. So be well. Enjoy the rest of your week. And I will see you back here next Tuesday. Take care, guys.