The Ariel Helwani Show - The Uncrowned Wrestling Show | Sheamus leaves WWE, CM Punk abruptly ends Sami Zayn’s reign

Episode Date: July 8, 2026

Solomonster can’t believe it’s been 30 years since Hulk Hogan turned heel and formed the NWO, but it remains one of the most important moments in wrestling history (00:25). After discussing that, he addresses Sheamus' shocking WWE departure, why it happened and what it means for his future (06:50). CM Punk returned on Raw in Chicago and abruptly ended the nine-day reign of Sami Zayn as WWE champion.  The polarizing decision likely leads to a major match for SummerSlam, but what it means for Sami is less certain (30:34). Plus, news on four names reportedly on their way to WWE, including AEW and TNA talent (49:32). Tony Khan announces the date and location for AEW All Out 2026, plus a preview for a big “Beach Break” Dynamite episode, with MJF against Kenny Omega for the AEW World championship, with a major stipulation (57:32). Finally, listener questions regarding Oba Femi and Paul Heyman and the best year of Bret Hart’s career, as well as a note on the latest Dark Side of the Ring premiere (1:07:27).

Welcome to the uncrowned wrestling show. Salomonster here with you for Tuesday. July the 7th, 2006. We have a new WWE champion, a very eventful Monday night, and we have a lot to dive into there. But a few weeks ago, I talked about the 30th anniversary

of the famous Austin 316 speech at the King of the Ring. One of those moments that we could not have predicted would end up being such an iconic thing and would make him and that kind of, company so much money after all these years. But I woke up this morning and I realized that today is the 30th anniversary of another iconic moment in wrestling history. And without question, one of the most important nights in the history of professional wrestling. Because it was on this day in 1996 in Daytona Beach, Florida, that WCW held its bash at the beach pay-per-view. With what is to this

day, the biggest most shocking heel turn of all time, when Hulk Hogan, right, the red and yellow American hero for so many years, sided with Kevin Nash and Scott Hall, the evil invaders, to form the new world order. It's pretty nutty that Austin 316 and the formation of the NWO all happened within a month of each other. And to this day, 30 years later, those, they still have to be the highest selling wrestling t-shirts ever. I mean, I cannot think of another wrestling t-shirt. shirt outside of those two that is still going strong even after all these years. I mean, like even today, they've released and they've re-released so many different versions of those designs. If you go on WWE shop right now, I'm sure you could still find them both. I mean,

they're still printing money with those shirts. I don't think I can really overstate just how big of a deal this was at the time if you were a wrestling fan. Like, I always thought the only thing that could be comparable in today's era. And why I say today, today, I'm talking the last like 10, 15 years. And even then, like, it would not have had the impact that Hogan's turn had. But the closest thing that would have been comparable would be a John Sina heel turn. But that would have been like 14 or 15 years ago. You know, by the time they finally did it last year, it was too late. And then they bungled it anyway. But I truly don't think an angle like the NWO could even work today. Right. I mean, too much has been exposed. Back

then people still believed, to a degree. Like, there were fans who believed that Hall and Nash were sent over by Vince McMahon, at least until Eric Bischoff forced them to say otherwise on TV because W.W.E. was threatening to sue them. Today, you would never be able to get enough people over the age of six to believe any of this shit. And the genesis of the NWO can somewhat be traced back to an invasion angle that was taking place in Japan at the time. It was a time when Eric Bischoff was doing a lot of traveling back and forth between the U.S. and Japan.

Back then, you had the UWFI, which was more of a shoot-style wrestling promotion. They had a working agreement with New Japan Pro Wrestling. And a lot of those UWFI stars, if not all of them, lost to New Japan stars, save for one match where one of their stars beat the great Muda, Kji Muto, to win the IWGP heavyweight title. Now, today you can find plenty of examples of non-New Japan

talents holding the IWGP belt, but back then, it was very rare. And Bischoff was in attendance for Big Tokyo Dome show later on where I believe the belt switched back, but this was in April of 1996. This was one month before Scott Hall debuted on Nitro, and the entire NWO angle kicked off. These days, Bischoff gets very defensive about this. He claims the idea had nothing to do with Japan. But when he was on talk as Jericho five years ago, he flat out said, you know, while it was more about how wrestling in general was being presented in Japan, because it was a more serious presentation. And so that really, if anything kind of influenced anything he did with WCW, it was that.

It had an influence over how he wanted WCW to be presented. But he did say in that interview that he was aware of the interpromotional stuff that was going on. And that's essentially where the idea started. I'm not saying he stole the idea from New Japan. Like there have been plenty of invasion angles over the years in wrestling, but he gets very defensive about it these days. And I'm not really sure why. You know, if it was a germ of an idea,

he was able to take it and blow it up into something that had not been seen before and has not been seen since. You know, Bischoff had to convince Hogan to even be the third man that night. You know, he had approached Hogan earlier that year about turning heel. Because let's be honest, his act was, as stale as month old bread by that point, right? He was still an attraction for them, but his schick was getting old. And he said Hogan wasn't interested.

But after a while, he finally came around to the idea. Eric had gone to staying in the meantime with the idea of being the third man with the NWO, which would not have worked out. Let me say this. The NWO would not have worked with anyone but Hulk Hogan in that role. I don't care if they had gotten Bredhart a year early in 96. you know, to come over with Hall and Nash. It may have worked for like a few months,

and after that it would have fizzled out. The only way this works is with Hogan in that spot. It had to be him. And I've never forget that night, you know, when he dropped the leg on Randy Savage and everybody realized what was going on. I mean, there were a lot of people who were actually cheering and excited and shocked, obviously, by what they were seeing.

But you had fans, man, they were throwing garbage. Poor mean Gene, you know, he gets into the ring to interview. Hogan when the match is over. He got hit in the face with a cup. I remember he had blood on his nose. Now, that's he. So anyway, I had to say something about it because I can't believe 30 years have gone by since then, but so it has. And to his credit, there has never been another wrestler that can say that they have lifted two different companies to the kind of business booms that Hulk Hogan did. One is a baby face and the other is a heel. That just doesn't happen. Of course,

They kept it going for too long and they ran it into the ground. They went with their pat-hand for too long. Kind of reminds you of the bloodline a little bit. WWE's going to run with that until the wheels fall off. WrestleMania 45 is going to roll around. We're still going to be getting bloodline civil wars on TV. Now, before we get to the big news of last night, there was another big news story that broke only a couple of days ago,

and it concerns someone who I thought could potentially end up being a life, in WIFR in W.E. And when I say lifer, I mean, finish out the rest of his in-ring career and then retire in this company and basically just be a W.W.E. who is Seamus, who has held almost every championship that there is to hold in W.W.E., every accolade, every achievement that you can think of. He's worked with all the major names of this era. John Sina, Randy Orton, Big Show. I don't know if he ever worked with Undertaker. I don't think they did. But he's worked with virtually everybody there is to work with. and Seamus has been MIA now. All of this year, he was out with a major shoulder injury, not his first. I don't know where he is in his recovery. He seems to be in pretty good condition now. I don't know if he's been medically cleared or if he was nearing, you know, being cleared. But nevertheless, it's all moot now because Seamus is gone from WWE after nearly two decades.

Fightful Select reported on Sunday that Seamus recently turned down a contract extension. It was really more of a restructuring to remain with the company and that he will be leaving when his current deal expires, although we don't have an exact date on when that is going to be. But Fightful says that his contract does expire soon. And the report also noted that WWE had previously approached him about taking a restructured deal, which he is said to have swiftly rejected. And you can see on his social media, Seamus is now going by his real name. He is removed, I mean, outside of his social media handles, he's removed all mentions of WWE from his bios.

He's already been moved to the alumni section on www.com. So even though nobody is officially commenting on this, you know, where there's smoke, there's fire. And again, he underwent shoulder surgery in December. The last time we saw him in the ring was November 17th at Madison Square Garden. That was on Raw. and it was in a six-man tag where he teamed up with John Sina in Sina's final raw match and Ray Mysterio in a win over the Judgment Day.

So John Sina's final raw match ended up being Seamus' final raw match, and we just had no idea. We didn't know it at the time. Now, I'm sitting here when this news breaks on Sunday, and I'm confused as all hell, because I can remember sometime in the fall of 2024, and it might have been Dave Meltzer, who was first to report that Seamus had signed a new multi-year contract with WWE.

And then only a few months after that, Seamus himself was sitting down with Chris Van Vleet, and he confirmed that, yes, he had recently signed a new five-year deal that would take him into his 50s. He was joking with Chris. I was talking to my wife, 52, I'll be 52 at the end of this deal. And Seamus is 48 right now. So the math isn't really mathing on this.

Clearly something happened. and evidently he is going to be free and clear very soon. Again, we just don't have an exact date, but that's a hell of a lot sooner than the five years that everybody thought he was signed for. Now, him being asked to take a pay cut, that in and of itself is not really surprising because we've heard a lot of stories about this recently.

That's why the new day is no longer in WWE and very likely is going to be showing up in AEW very soon. And I wouldn't be surprised if others followed suit. Kofy Kingston, Xavier Woods, they had been working there for many, many years. Kofi, just about as long as Seamus has. You know, Kofi had nearly two full decades, going back to developmental in that company.

Former W.W.E. champion. He's another one who, when you really think about it, I mean, he never won a Rumble or a King of the Ring or anything like that, but so many championships, so many accolades, and asked to take a pay cut, and they said, no, thank you. You know, we know our value, and if you don't value us at that level that you agree to

and signed us at, then we'll take our services somewhere else. And effectively, that's what Seamus said. And Seamus, I'm sure, was making very good money, probably into the seven figures for as long as he had been there for. And he was just not open to taking a pay cut. It must have been a sizable pay cut, too. I mean, there were reports that some of these pay cuts that TKO were asking for were as much as half of what they were making, as much as 50%.

So I don't know what they asked Seamus to take, but clearly it was enough that he was not interested in it. The Dave Meltzer on Wrestling Observer Radio said this. He said the TKO thing from talking to people there on Seamus and other situations is that they are very willing to pay really big money to people who they perceive as stars, like a sports team. But when it's older wrestlers who they perceive as being on their downside and have big contracts, they're very much like an NFL team that will go, rather than pay a guy

giant salary who's on the downside, we would rather spend our resources on somebody younger who also we can pay less to. Of course. Of course. Look, this boils down to something that's actually very simple. Because I can see it from both sides. I can see it from both perspectives. If you're someone like Seamus,

who's been there for a very long time, you are the performer. You know what you're capable of. You know what you bring to the table. You know what your value is based on your longevity and based on your skill set, and what you have brought to the table up to this point, right, for the company that you work for. Shamis has a perceived value, what he thinks he's worth. It doesn't jive with what TKO and WWE think he's worth.

And so at that point, you have a decision to make. You can take the pay cut and probably still make really good money in the six figures. Or you can say, you know what, this is a slap in the face. Right? This is disrespectful. I think I'm worth more than this. This is what we agree to. I signed a five-year deal. two years ago, or maybe not even two years ago. And so you should live up to your end, and this is what I should be paid. And if they're not willing to accept that, then I totally understand shameous walking away from that. And I'm sure that's a very difficult thing for him to do at 48 years old, having spent roughly two decades of his life working for these people. You know, you get used to it.

You know, you have friends who work there that you don't want to leave. and there's just a routine that you have, and they own your entire career. All the footage of Seamus from start to finish is now owned by WWE. They own his legacy, the name. He's not going to be able to go anywhere else and be Seamus, I don't think.

So it's not an easy decision, I'm sure, to walk away from that. Especially when you probably thought you were going to retire here, right, and then go into the Hall of Fame. From the perspective of TKO in WWE, you look at a guy like, Shemus, who is closing in on 50, and he does have a history of injuries. He has spinal stenosis,

which is something that is progressive. It's not going to get better, right? It's only going to get worse. It's a narrowing of the spinal column. And he had a very serious neck injury sometime within the last couple of years, which he thought might be career ending. He's had shoulder problems. The reason that he's been out for all of this year is because he had a shoulder injury that he had to undergo surgery for. And he wrestles a very hard style, you know, very snug. So he's been beaten up. You know, his body has been thrashed over the years. And so, yes, he's not going to be the same performer that he was five, ten, twelve years ago. And if they're not using him to the extent that they used to, and let's just say for argument's sake, he's getting paid $1.2 million a year. Let's just

say. You look at that and you go, is this guy worth $1.2 million? Are we getting $1.2 million worth out of Seamus? We could be, maybe if we were utilizing him. Let's say if he was healthy, we can just use him more often and maybe we can get something out of him. But they're not. So, of course, I can look at their perspective and they're looking at this and going, why are we paying him all this money? Let's come to him and offer him less to stay. Right? But that's not what you offered him two years ago. So you really, should stick to the deal. If they feel otherwise, then Seamus should be free to go somewhere else. And maybe that answers the question as to why, how could he sign a five-year deal? But

supposedly he's going to be a free agent in a matter of weeks. Right. That may be the answer right there. And they come to an understanding. You want to restructure my deal. I'm not willing to accept that. So let's part ways. Right. And it just comes down to that. It's another veteran, you know, again, like we talked about New Day, our truth at one point, he was let go until there was this big, uproar on social media and from the locker room, and then they brought him back within a few weeks. But it's another veteran presence that has been, you know, effectively stripped away from that locker room. And guys age out and they retire.

And, I mean, this is, I mean, look, shit happens, right? Not everybody is going to be there forever. But it does feel like slowly but surely a lot of these faces are being phased out. He'd been there for a long time. He first signed with the company. It was, I want to say, late 2006, early 2007. And in the time that he spent in WW, three times, WWE champion, the very first WWE championship that this man won.

He beat John Cena in a match on pay-per-view. And it was within, I want to say, two or three months of him debuting on the main roster. That's how quickly he was thrust into the main event scene. former world heavyweight champion, multiple-time United States champion, multiple-time tag team champion, King of the Ring, Royal Rumble winner,

Money in the Bank winner. The only thing that eluded him for his entire career that he gave a shit about, he never won the intercontinental title. This was like the one story that was left to tell with Seamus and WWE, a guy who grew up a wrestling fan watching all of these great guys hold the workhorse championship.

Brett Hard and Mr. Perfect and Razor Ramon and, you know, down the line even if you want to go into the mid-90s, right? So many great talents that held that belt. And it's kind of crazy to think that of all the things that he accomplished and did, he never did hold the IC title. And it's not like they didn't have plenty of chances to put the belt on him. They had a big opportunity to do that at Clash at the Castle a few years ago in that great match he had with Gunther. and they had a great triple threat match, a WrestleMania 39, where I believe the belt was on the line with him

and Drew McIntyre and Gunther. And they just never did it. They never pulled the trigger, and now it's never going to happen, and that sucks. That's actually very disappointing because that was like the one last great story to tell, to give him that memorable moment.

In a company that loves to tell stories, there was a story there to be told, and now it won't be. But again, you know, you can't ignore the history of injuries. You ask yourself, gone, what does this mean for the future? Is he going to retire? You know, is he just going to hang it up? Sure doesn't sound like it because in that same interview with Chris Van Vleet that he did last year, he was asked point blank, is there an end date that you have for your career? He goes, no,

I'm going to go until the wheels fall off. I'm going to do this until I physically cannot do it anymore because I love what I do. So unless he has come to the conclusion with this latest injury that he physically cannot do it anymore. And I don't think he's come to that conclusion. I think it's safe to say that he's not retiring. So where is he going to end up? What's he going to do? What can he contribute to a TNA or an AEW? Where does he want to go? Does you want to work overseas? Does you want to kind of freelance and freestyle and do his own thing and do some indies and go here and there? He can pretty much do whatever he wants. It's very rare that somebody with the kind of like WWE pedigree that he has becomes a free agent.

Hits the free agent market at this stage of his career. It's very rare. So believe me, he's going to be in high demand. He's going to make a lot of money. But what does he want to do? Does he have any goals? Like, man, I never thought I would be free. I would love to work fucking Corican Hall in Japan.

I don't know. I don't know what's in his head. And then there's the money situation. If he wants to sign somewhere, who can pay him? Right? We hear a lot about TNA and there's issues there where they can't necessarily pay people what they feel there were. A lot of people have voluntarily left T&A over the last six to 12 months, and I'm sure money is a big part of why. The obvious one would be AEW. It would not be a problem

for Tony Kahn to cut a check and pay Seamus. Does he want him? Does he need him? Does he need Seamus? No, he does not. Does he want to bring Seamus in? I'm sure he probably does. I'm sure he has a lot a respect for him. He knows what kind of performer he is. Tony Kahn's all about, you know, bangor after bangor on Dynamite, and we know Seamus can deliver that. Fightful had a report. They said AEW sources told Fightful Select that they had no idea that Seamus would be departing WWE. Shamus and Claudio Castignoli remained close, and Claudio is expected to be one of many to push for Seamus in AEW. So that came from Sean Ross Sapp last night. night. Now, Seamus and Sassaro, or Claudio, as he is now, very successful tag team run together

as the bar in WWE multiple times, like four or five times, I think. They held the tag team championships. I mean, look, they could make great opponents. They could make great partners. Could we see Seamus as a death rider in the near future? I don't know. It's certainly possible. I'm sure Claudio would love to work with his friend again. But there's a flip side to this, because on Wrestling Observer Live, Brian Alvarez was talking about the possibility of Seamus ending up in A.A.W., and this is what he was told. He said, I did talk to a lot of people today in AEW who were like,

are we really going to take this guy? And let me make this abundantly clear. Everybody I talked to was like, I really like Shamus. I really like him. But the basic gist of it is that there are so many people under contract, and there are so many people that already cannot even get on TV, and we're going to hire another 48-year-old. Everyone's got ideas like Seamus and Sassaro being in the death riders and doing matches,

which would be great. Nobody had anything against Seamus personally. It was just sort of like, here comes another one, because the new day is probably coming in, and then Seamus would be coming in. That's three more spots where people who have been there for a long time or who should be on the way up or who should be younger are going to be iced out again,

people weren't really thrilled about that idea. You could add the Motor City machine guns to that as well. I would be very surprised if the Motor City machine guns don't end up on AW television at the end of this month when they're in Detroit, when they are in the Motor City, because that's, I think, going to be around the time.

They'll be free from their 90 days at that point. So think about that. Like, we may be in a situation here. we're in the next month, month and a half. If Tony Kahn wants to, he can bring in Seamus. He can bring in both members of New Day and both members of the Motor City Machine Guns. That's five spots to be occupied on television at a time when, yes, there are a lot of people under contract in that company who are struggling to get airtime on their shows. I totally can understand how somebody on the AEW roster who is either on the,

assent or trying to be on the ascent, would kind of look at this and just feel defeated. You know, right now you got Adam Copeland and Christian Cage as the tag team champions, and you have all these other big names who, in some cases, are also, you know, getting up there in age. And they're stars, you know, Kenny Omega is a star. Adam Copeland is still a star, maybe not to the level that he used to be, but he's still a star. And so, of course, stars are going to get air time. but there's a reason why somebody like Big Bill, and I'll talk about him in a little bit, Big Bill gave his notice. He's leaving A.E.W. Of course he is. That's actually a great example to use because

Big Bill's a big guy, right? Hence Big Bill. And so they put him in this learning tree faction last year. And it was him and Brian Keith, and they were trying to elevate the two of them by putting them in a group with Chris Jericho, right? I am the learning tree. So they sat under the proverbial learning tree here for a while, and everything seemed to be building towards the eventual split where Bill would hopefully come out of that group as maybe like a big baby face and he can have a match with Jericho and beat Jericho. And whatever value Jericho still has, you know, in terms of beating him. Beating Chris Jericho in 2026 doesn't mean what it would have meant in 2019 or 2020 in the early days of AEW. But Jericho is still a legend. He's still a future Hall of

Famer. It would mean something. They never even did the match. Jericho went away. Literally, they did an angle on TV where Jericho said, you know, and I'm paraphrasing here, but basically he was like, I'm going to go away. Like, you guys got to figure out what's going on with you because there was some tension there in the group, and I'm going to leave. And he left, and he never came back last year.

We didn't see him again for over a year. So we never got the match with Jericho and Bill. So in the meantime, Bill and Brian Keith, they're just fucking floundering. They're doing stuff mostly in Ring of Honor. Occasionally, maybe they'll be on AEW collision. And Bill's career just completely hit the skids. And so somebody like him, and he's not like super young or anything anymore, but still, like, he's trying to make his way up the ladder.

And he had his opportunity. It seemed like maybe there was going to be a chance. And then it just evaporated. Why would he stay with AEW if he has a contract coming up? He knows what his ceiling is. His head has already bounced off of it. So how many big bills do you think are there right now backstage in AEW? Probably quite a few.

I can totally understand it from their perspective. Shamus, man, I love Seamus. Great performer. I would love to even work with him. But man, he's going to take my spot. I'm never going to get ahead. It's a real problem. It's a very real problem.

It's a bloated roster that they got over there in AEW with a lot of guys that just are not being utilized to their full potential. Now, I believe that Nick Lepicolo is Seamus's agent, or he was, but I believe he still may be, because Seamus signed with Paradigm last year for representation. And I believe Lepicolo was his agent at the time. Now, Lepiccolo left paradigm earlier this year. But if he reps Seamus and anybody who wants to negotiate has to go through him to do so, that's going to be very interesting.

That's going to be a tough negotiation because Nick Lepicelip, does not like Tony Con. And I'm sure Tony Con does not like Nick Lipikolo. He claimed that LePicolo has claimed that he was doxed by them, although he docks Tony Khan by posting his personal cell phone number on social media at one point, which I'm sure did not endear himself to Tony Khan. He also claims he's been blocked online by AW. If you didn't know that this guy was an agent to various stars, like you see some of these

posts online, you would think he was some sort of online. The point is there is not a good relationship. It is frosty, to say the least. Not that there is any kind of relationship as far as him and AEW goes. He just posted on Twitter. Was it yesterday? He just posted the other day. He says, don't piss off the snowman or the dirt sheets. Tony definitely doesn't influence. And in some cases, control. Congrats on Booker of the year. Now, good luck negotiating with the person that you made them afraid to write about. So I don't know, you know, again, what his status is as far as representing Seamus, it would seem like he still does. That's going to make things very dicey. But at the end of the day, you know, if you represent somebody, you're working for them. And so if Seamus really wants to go to AEW, then it's going to have no choice. But to try to negotiate with AEW to make something happen. But when Seamus came back from that first shoulder injury a couple of years ago, not the most recent,

one, which obviously he never came back from. But when he came back from that injury, maybe like 2024, he would be on television, not every week, but like whenever he was out there, it didn't matter what they gave him to do or what the match was, and it was usually, it wasn't anything like a major story or anything like that. He was their most consistently reliable in-ring performer. This man was incapable of going out there and having anything but a good match. there was no such thing as a bad Seamus match.

I mean, you could say that for most of his career, honestly, but especially in the last few years, like when he came back from that previous injury. And the whole like bangor after bangor after bangor thing, that wasn't just a slogan. Like that wasn't just a cat phrase. It was like a way of life for this guy. So despite all of the injuries and the wear and tear and yes, he's, you know, he's getting up there, he is still a valuable asset to whoever picks him up.

You know, he doesn't have to be a featured guy in the main event scene. He doesn't have to be a world champion, but he's someone that you can reliably put out there. And Tony Khan, we know how important it is to Tony Khan to have great wrestling matches on TV every week. Seamus is the kind of guy that will go out there. He has a name from where he came from previously. I don't know what kind of draw he would be, but you know you can send him out there. He can work with anybody on that roster. And my God, like you look at that roster and there are so many people for him to work with.

And I'm not just talking about former friends of his, you know, old pals from WWE, Claudio, Moxley. Like, I'm talking like younger, newer guys. I'm talking like some of the international talents they have out of New Japan and CMLL, the idea of shame as being in the Continental Classic at the end of the year. Like Seamus in the C2, round robin? If his body could hold up, that would be incredible. It's just disappointing, though, that, you know, after such a long career there, he's not going to get that graceful exit on his own terms.

I'm not saying that he's at the level of a John Sina where he should have a year-long farewell tour or anything like that. And that was different anyway because Sina announced in advance that he was retiring. I doubt Seamus is retiring. But for him to go out with a whimper like this, I just think is really too bad.

I mean, it's kind of cool that his last match was, you know, at MSG and tagging up with Sina and Ray. I mean, that was kind of cool. But it would have been nice for him. him to have more of a formal exit. So hopefully we'll get to see him on TV again at some point, and he'll be able to go out there and have a whole new roster of people to work with wherever he lands. But yes, that's a big name.

Even though he may not have been used recently, that's still a big name gone from WWE. Sammy Zane, let's get into this, because this was the other big story of the week. And it all went down on Monday Night Raw last night. They were in Chicago. They were at the Allstate Arena. championship match was made. Let's take it back to Smackdown first real quick on Friday, because Sammy Zane showed up his very first Smackdown. And as it turned out, his only Smackdown as the WWE champion. And he was in a very celebratory mood. Cody Rhodes came out. Jay Uso

came out. One thing led to another. And we ended up with the main event of Cody Rhodes against Jay Uso, who was the runner up and this year's king of the ring. And Jay Uso is also in the news. And I'm not going to get into why. It's a personal thing. But if you want to know what's going on with Jay Uso and why he wasn't on Raw last night. I'm sure you can mozy on over to TMZ, and they'll fill you in on everything. But Jay Uso, he lost to Cody Rhodes on Friday. Cody Rhodes then became number one contender

to get his rematch for the WWE title that he lost at Night of Champions, and the match was made for Raw last night in Chicago, even though the WWE championship is really a Smackdown belt. Adam Pierce made the match for Monday Night Raw, because he's running both shows now. In the absence of Nick Alditz, who actually did show up on the show last night, but technically he's still on administrative leave. Apparently, that doesn't preclude you from gaining access and entry to the buildings if you just want to show up to work.

Adam Pierce is running bull shows. So to him it didn't matter, right? Or in Chicago, we'll do the match in Chicago. But there was another reason why they wanted to do this match in Chicago. And going into the show last night, the rumors were out there for a while, that this was going to be the return of CM Punk. We have not seen CM Punk since the time. the Raw after WrestleMania when he lost the world heavyweight championship to Roman Raines.

He had a promo. He had an encounter on Raw with Cody Rhodes. And we haven't seen him since. But for these, they're not even selfies. I mean, this creepy people snapping photos of him at the gym. And there's this whole discourse online now for weeks and weeks about CM Punk. My God, look at him. He's swole.

He's jacked. He looks like he's in the best shape of his life. What's he on? What's he taking? What's he doing in his time off? And then he was also doing commentary for the CFFC MMA show a few weeks ago. And that was it. I mean, otherwise, punk has kind of been MIA for a while.

And Chicago always made sense if they're going to bring him back. You bring him back in Chicago. He's going to get the best reaction. And the fans would love to see him there. But in my mind, in the mind of most people, we weren't thinking of this as, oh, punk is going to show up and he's going to walk out with the championship. It was a matter of, okay, when does punk come out? Does punk come out at the end of their show?

To tease a Summer Slam match, does he come out at the beginning of the show? And then end up doing commentary for the main event. Because punk is going to SmackDown. So you're kind of going over in your mind. How are they going to weave him, right, into the title picture? I don't think anybody was predicting he would actually leave with the time. They didn't just weave him into the title picture. They weave the belt onto him last night.

And so Sammy Zane, after 10 years, holds the WWE Championship for just nine days. We got a bait and switch in the main event. Although I don't think the fans in Chicago felt too cheated by it. Beginning of the show, Cody is attacked in the back by Gunther, who was also sent home, by the way, after his little brawl in the back. And brawl is probably too strong of a word, but he had to pull apart with Nick Aldous after Night of Champions. and so he was sent home and Nick Aldus was sent home, and yet both of them were in the building last night.

And as it turned out, Gunther wreaked some real havoc on this show because he power bombed Cody through a table in the back, and then as he was crawling towards the car that Sammy Zane had driven up to the arena, Gunther went over and slammed the car door on Cody's head. And he came up, he had some blood on him, and officials raced over to check.

Cody looked like he was on Dream Street, and this was a show-long storyline. Is Cody going to be okay? You're going to be medically cleared for the main event tonight. As it turned out, the answer is no. He was not medically cleared. Sammy Zane thought, well, this night felt kind of cursed anyway from the beginning, and I'm not even sure why I have to defend his belt on Raw in the first place.

So I'll see everybody on Smackdown. And Adam Pierce was like, not so fast. We promised people in Chicago a title match, we're going to give them a title match. And at that point, even the people in Chicago. I mean, you could hear the chance in the background. Everybody on the show, the announcers, they all had to play dumb like a bunch of idiots. but we all knew what this meant. And so, CM Punk walks out as the big surprise opponent for Sammy Zane at the end of Raw.

And it made me think of that last time we saw him on TV when he was talking to Cody. And Cody, you know, punk was basically like, look, you never know when a championship opportunity might fall out of the sky. And Cody told him any time, any place, right? But that was what people were hanging on to. Those words. Like, you never know when a title opportunity might fall out of the sky. And it did in Chicago last night. Punk comes out for all to talk about his gym photos.

He was in really good shape. You know, he wasn't out there looking like the Incredible Hulk or anything like that. But clearly he was making use of the time off that he had. He's in good shape. And he goes out there with Sammy and they had this great main event. They gave them 20 minutes. It's too bad. They broke it up with two commercial breaks, but they gave them 20 minutes.

The atmosphere in the building, it's one of those nights where I wish I could be in the building for it. Because these people were just losing their mind. They were so happy to see Punk back and not only is he back. It's almost like sensory overload for these people. They were overwhelmed. They weren't expecting them to be wrestling for the championship. And it was just a great atmosphere in the building, just electric. and in the end, CM Punk

pins Sammy Zane to win the eighth world championship that he has ever held in WWE, almost 15 years to the day that he won his first WWE title in that very building. CM Punk is once again the champion. CM Punk went from in his last match

losing the World Heavyweight Championship to in his very next match winning the WWE championship. Not bad. Not bad. So we have ourselves yet another summer of punk. And this also sends punk officially to Smackdown because he is now the champion of Smackdown. And as far as what this means for SummerSlam, I think it's pretty obvious what this means for SummerSlam.

This is the match. This was the play. This is what WWE wanted. They wanted the biggest match. They wanted the biggest attraction. CM Punk against Cody Rhodes. I just don't think people expected the belt to be on Punk and for Cody to be the challenger. Like if you would have told us.

people that heading into Night of Champions, not even two weeks ago, it would have sounded insane. But here we are. This clearly is the direction. And I'm very much torn on this. On the one hand, I am very much looking forward to seeing Cody Rhodes and CM Punk. It is a match that we have not gotten. Two big names that have not locked horns yet. They've dropped little hints and teases of it now, honestly, for a couple of years. And then they did it again. again after WrestleMania on Raw this year. So it's a fresh match. I mean, these are not necessarily fresh faces in the main event scene, but it's a fresh match.

It truly is one of the biggest matches that this company could do. And I don't want to call it a crisis because they're going to end up making a lot of money. But, yeah, I pointed out on my end, like on my other podcast, that SummerSlam last year ended up doing over 50,000 and 60,000 tickets sold for each night. SummerSlam this year, at least as of like a week ago, was at less than 25,000 tickets for each night at U.S. Bank Stadium, which is a smaller stadium, but still, that doesn't explain that huge drop-off. Like, clearly we are past the peak here, right, with WWE and ticket sales.

Point is they have a lot of tickets to sell in less than a month. They are going to want to go with the biggest possible matches that they can do. So on the one hand, we have Roman Reins and Seth Rollins for the World Heavyweight Championship. We know Brock Lesnar and Obafemie are going to have their hell in a cell match, right? Big attraction for Minneapolis. What is the biggest attraction that we can do on the Smackdown end for the WWE title? It's Cody Rhodes against CM Punk. Sammy Zane is not that guy.

Sammy Zane is not the draw, right, that they want to be headlining one of the nights of summer. slime. And it sucks, but that's just the reality of it. So I love Cody and Punk, if that's the match, great. Right? I'm looking forward to that. But not at the expense of Sammy Zane. You know, as a fan of his, and it was very cool to see him get his moment at night of champions. And finally, after all these years, he wins the big one, and he gets nine days. He did not even get one successful title defense under his belt. First match in, and they do him dirty. And it's a great match.

I mean, look, if you were going to go out to lose your championship, my God, I mean, it was a hell of a match last night, right? And it's an audience and a crowd there in the building that you would just fucking die for if you're a wrestler. So there were a lot of worse ways this could have gone. But did they do him dirty? Absolutely, they did. Because that's it. As far as I'm concerned, and I would love to be wrong about this, that's it.

Like, there's no second championship for Sammy Zane. He ain't getting the belt back at a few weeks. Like, there ain't nothing like that that's going to be happening. That was probably it. He reached the pinnacle. He got his hands on it. He lost it. And that's it.

I don't see them going back to Sammy Zane at any point here. I do think that Sammy, though, should be involved. And so the compromise here would be including Sammy in the match at SummerSlam and making it a three-way. Because he's very much part of this story now. And if Cody Rhodes wants his rematch, then, I mean, why wouldn't Sammy Zane get a rematch? But here's what I think we're going to end up getting. What I think they're going to end up doing is we got a Saturday night's main event coming up at Madison Square Garden on July 18th. The card for it is incomplete, but the card for it right now sucks.

We have Danhausen against J.D. McDunner. Now, I'm sure Dan Housen is going to be super over at MSG. and I'm sure Jalen Brunson is probably going to be, he's talking about having backup. I'm sure Jalen Brunson is probably going to be the backup that he's referring to. He's going to be in Dan Housen's corner, and everybody is going to go crazy for it in New York City. But it's still Dan Housen against J.D. McDonough,

and it's Paige and Bree Bella defending the women's tag team titles against fatal influence. And that's it. That's it. With two weeks, right, or less than two weeks to go. until Saturday night's main event. Madison Square Garden, the world's most famous arena. They're home away from home.

That's all they have announced so far. That is awful. I mean, that would be awful in any building, let alone Madison Square Garden. They're going to need at least one really big match on that show to save the show. I see them doing Cody Rhodes against Sammy Zane. The winner of that match becomes number one contender

and goes on to challenge CM Punk for the title at SummerSlam. Probably have Punk even sit in on commentary for the match. that's probably what they're going to end up doing, because I think ultimately they're not going to want Sammy in that match, even though he should be. They're going to want to kind of wrap this up, tie this up nicely. Cody becomes number one contender, and then they just go from there with what they feel

is the strongest match they can do. The problem with that for Sammy is that if he's not involved in that match, there is no other obvious match for him on that SummerSlam card. I mean, they can manufacture something in the few weeks after the Saturday night's main event show, they could have Sammy Zane end up doing something on television and manufacture something at the last minute for him to do,

but what would be the point of that? Other than just trying to be like, all right, we'll give him something to do. What would that even be? There is no other obvious person for him to work with if he's not working with any of these people. So imagine, you know, he wins the championship on one PLE, gets nine days with it,

drops it and then doesn't even get a match on the SummerSlam card, which by the way, is probably going to have 13 or 14 matches because they have two nights. And then can you imagine him being completely left off that show? What a slap in the face that would be? I'm just struggling to figure out like what would be the plan B if he's not involved with Cody and Punk. I don't know what that would be.

And I understand there's going to be a lot of people who are very upset over what happened last night. It's actually very interesting because from what I have seen, the reaction is very polarizing. You have the people that did not want Sammy to be champion in the first place. They thought it was an embarrassment, right? This guy doesn't look like a champion. He looks like a fucking cab driver and all this horrible, you know, fucking shit they were saying about him. And then on the other hand, you have these people who are very happy for Sammy.

Oh, this is so well deserved. It's been a long time coming. He's a great wrestler. This is a great moment. It was very split. And so there were going to be people who were ecstatic that this man, is no longer the champion, but then you have people who are very upset about the way it went down. And they have every right to be upset about that because, you know, you kind of invest in these people.

You want to see them succeed. You want to see them do well. At the end of the day, it's a work. And Sammy is going to be paid the same amount of money tomorrow that he was being paid yesterday when he went into that show. Unless TKO shows up with their pay cut request, which is always possible. But barring that, right, he's making the same amount. amount of money he was making a week ago. But you know it means something to these guys.

How could it not? You know, for him to finally be thrust into that position after all these years, at one point he probably figured it was never going to happen. And then it finally does, and he gets this outpouring of love, even from the people he works with. They posted videos on WWE social media of Becky Lynch, like, so emotional and giving him a big hug. Kevin Owen showed up, his best friend, and he's so happy for him.

and all these other people, this outpouring of love that he got from like the wrestling community. There are a lot of people, even those who work in that company, who were part of the show, it's very real to them. And so I'm sure there are a lot of people

who are feeling very badly for him. And you would just hope they have, you know, a good plan B to at least keep him in the mix. This last good guy stuff he's been doing on Smackdown has been some of the more, you know, interesting television they've been doing, I just hope they have a good plan for it.

He's not going to be the champion, but that doesn't mean that he can't be featured in a major role on the show. And yeah, I mentioned Kevin Owens. If ever there was a time for Kevin Owens to come back, my God, we can use Kevin Owens on Smackdown. Kevin Owens is fantastic. And Kevin Owens coming back

to sort of avenge what happened to his friend. Or if you want to look at it from the other perspective, he's pissed off that he wasn't the one to take the title from Sammy. So you already got a built-in story there for Kevin Owens if he comes back to Smackdown, for Kevin Owens and CM Punk to feud. We have not gotten a CM Punk Kevin Owens feud. There is some very real bad blood between the two of them,

going back to their Ring of Honor days, although I think that's all water under the bridge at this point. But we've never gotten a proper feud or match between the two of them. I would love to see that. Punk's got the belt now. I don't know what Owen's status is. I think he had surgery. I think it was a year ago this month that he had the spinal surgery.

I don't know where he is in his recovery. I don't know when he may be medically cleared. I hope when he is finally cleared that punk is still the champion. Because that is a match that we need to see. Now, a couple of other things from Raw last night. We have new tag team champions as well. The WWE title was not the only belt to change hands. Unfortunately, the vision.

regain the belts, which means the vision is not being broken up so soon. There were some reports that internally in the company, they were having a discussion about whether or not the vision should be broken up, should we keep them together. I'm in the camp of just stick the dynamite in and just detonate and blow the whole damn thing up. But they put the tag team titles back on them. So not only that, they added a new member. The reason they won the tag belts back from the Street Prophets is because Maxine Dupree, and they've been teasing a little something, something going on behind the scenes with

her and Austin Theory. She gave a low blow to Angelo Dawkins and cost the street profits their tag team titles. So Maxine Dupree is now the newest member of the Vision. She was making out with Austin Theory when the match was over. They all left the building

together. So we got a Maxine Heel turn last night. And they made the announcement that on Raw in Houston next Monday, we're going get a gauntlet match. The winner of this gauntlet match, seven men, the winner of this gauntlet, the last man standing, will become the number one contender for Penta's intercontinental title at SummerSlam. We have Chad Gable, Dominic Mysterio, Dragon Lee, Javan, Javan, Joe Hendry, Ethan Page, and Rusev, who was kept very strong last night. They had a tag team match. It was Ethan and Rusev

beating Dragon Lee and Chad Gable. Rusev got the win. He was putting everybody in the accolade and stretching him out. He looked like a monster. When was the last time Rusev even won a fucking match on Raw? They wanted to keep him strong going into the gauntlet, which he will not win.

I'm not worried about Rusev winning the gauntlet next week. What I'm concerned about is that WWE is going to miss a layup. And the only man that should be winning the gauntlet next week and going to Summer Slam in his hometown of Minneapolis is Chad Gable. Chad Gable should win the Intercontinental Championship at SummerSlam. Full stop.

This should be the easiest decision that Paul Levec will ever make. So if anybody other than Chad Gable wins that gauntlet next week, these people are out of their minds. Absolutely out of their minds. There are four names that are reportedly rumored to be on their way very soon to WWE. So let's zip through these. We'll start with Mike Santana.

This is the least surprising name of all. Mike Santana lost his TNA World Heavyweight Championship just recently to Nick Nemeth at Slammiversary. This comes after reports of his TNA deal being set to expire at some point this month if it has not already done so. PW Insider is reporting that he finished up with TNA at the pay-per-view. He was not at the television tapings last week. The expectation is that his deal will be officially up sometime in mid-July. This one, again, I would be very, very surprised if this goes any way other than him landing in WWE. He's been on NXT a whole bunch of times. Clearly, WW has a liking in him. I'm sure he wants

to go there. I can't imagine him going back to AEW, given now frustrated he was when he left there in the first place. And frankly, with the other talents that are rumored to be potentially landing in AEW, in addition to all of the existing talents they have on that roster there, I think Mike Santana going to AEW would be a horrendous mistake. So there's only one place for him to go. That's WWE. That's where I expect him to go. The only question is, does he go to NXT first?

Does he go to the main roster? I mean, he's main roster ready right now. If they have a need for him on RAR Smackdown, then by all means, you know, plug him in there. But I think an NXT run for a short period of time, maybe even an NXT championship run, would not be the worst idea for him. And when they have a good role and a good spot ready for him,

then you can plug him in there wherever you need it. Maybe he debuts on the main roster in the Royal Rumble next year. But he's going to be an asset wherever he goes. He'll be an asset to WWE. This is a guy with a great story who really had to go through a lot of shit, you know, to get to where he is right now and really shouldn't be where he is right now. You know, he was in a bad place. He was in a dark place.

I can't say that, you know, oh, he's going to be a WWE champion one day. He has it within him to be that. It really comes down to whether or not the company sees him. in that role. There's a lot of people right now competing for that spot. I don't know if Mike Santana fits in there any time in the near future, but he can still be a huge, you know, contributing piece of that roster. And I hope he has the chance to show what he can do to a wider audience. You know, he's very versatile. And I wish him nothing but the best. He's worked his ass off to get to where he is. Eric Young, gone from TNA. Eric Young had been off and on. Eric Young had been off and on.

in TNA since the early days. There were times where he left. He actually was in WWE previously, and then he came back to TNA. And it kind of felt like at this stage of his career, again, in the latter years of his run, that he would probably end his career in TNA, but I guess it was not meant to be.

And he requested his release, as so many others have recently. We keep hearing this over and over and over again. And it was granted, and the belief is that, that he is going to end up in WWE, although nothing is confirmed, but he has maintained a very good relationship with Triple H. He thinks the world of Triple H. And the belief, I think Brian Alvarez was the one who reported that he is expected to land in NXT as a player coach type.

And he may not start with them until September, but the belief is that he will end up in WWE. Yeah, the last time he was there, he opted to leave. This would have been, so, So let's back up a little bit here. He goes back to the NXT black and gold days. And he had led a faction called sanity, which eventually got called up to the main roster. The only member who really stuck was Nicky Cross. They never really gave sanity a chance to do much of anything on the main roster.

I don't think Vince McMahon liked them. So they didn't go anywhere. And, you know, the run was a flop. Really through no fault of their own. But then he was part of the COVID-Comberman. cuts six years ago. Now, he came back two years after that. This is after Vince McMahon, the Wall Street Journal stuff had broken, he had quote-unquote

stepped away, even though he was plotting his return the entire time. But Eric Young didn't know this. Eric Young came back to the company. He never wrestled a single time for them. We never saw him on TV. Nothing. Even though he was under contract with them. He was doing, I think, maybe some producing work.

But when he got wind of the fact that Vince McMahon looked to be on his way back, he actually requested his release. He didn't want to work there anymore. And he had to sign an NDA before they would even give it to him. But at the time, he said, you know, morally, I can't work for a human being like that. So that's how he feels about Vince McMahon. Triple H is the opposite. Again, he has nothing but love for Triple H.

I'm sure he would love to work for him. I'm sure Triple H would love to utilize him in some way, even if it's down in developmental. And it looks like that's where he is going to be headed. And look, he's a guy that has a wealth of experience that he can impart on people maybe he could be a great trainer. I don't know what his long-term goals are. Clearly, he still wants to wrestle,

so he'll be a player coach. Now, he did post on social media. Eric Young said, the internet is effing wild. Three things to know about the news. Number one, I asked for my release. They granted it. Number two, I was never on a handshake deal.

I've had a binding contract the entire time. And number three, I will work where I want, how I want, and for whom I want. My track record, resume, accolades, and reputation are proof of that. See you soon. So he will be on his way there very soon. And I mentioned Big Bill earlier. Two more names.

Big Bill and Enzo Amore. Big Bill has given notice that he is leaving AEW. So if his deal has not already expired, it will imminently. Fightful is saying the WWE is expected to pick up Enzo Amore as well so that they can reunite the two of them who were together many years ago. They had a very over act in NXT that they had brought to the main roster. As of mid-June, Enzo had not yet been signed because they were waiting for Big Bill to be available because they wouldn't have brought back Enzo Amore if it wasn't for Big Bill becoming available. And so we're going to get a cast in Enzo reunion, and they're going to be super over at the beginning of this.

They're going to be super over initially and they're going to get their chance over again. You know, S-A-W-T soft, right? All that stuff that was old is now going to be new again. And then if the plan is just to put them back together as a tag team, it's going to fizzle out pretty quick. Because in case you haven't noticed, there isn't much of a tag team division on either show right now in WW. WWE doesn't give a shit about tag team wrestling.

And so bringing in one new team is not going to make any meaningful difference. Even if they win the tag team titles, which they never did, by the way. They never won the tag team title. previously, so now they might. But so what? Like, what does that mean? I actually feel like that limits Big Bill. Like Big Bill, it's almost going to end up being like a lateral move for him, except here he'll get more TV time. But is you really going to be in that much of a better position than he was in an AEW, like that much better? I mean, you're limiting him by putting him in a tag team in a company that doesn't prioritize tag team wrestling. I think the long-term play here is Big Bill as a

single with Enzo as his manager. I don't need to see Enzo in the ring. Enzo on the mic is money. Enzo on the mic reppping people like Big Bill. If he wants to bring more people into the fold, that's fine. But him managing Big Bill, that's the play to me. You want to do the tag team thing initially and squeeze whatever you can out of the orange.

I mean, go ahead. But six months from now, I think it's a mistake if they're still on a tag team. Now over on the AEW side, Tony Khan announced on Monday yesterday that All Out, 2006 is returning to the now arena in Hoffman Estates, Illinois, Saturday night, September 26th. They have traditionally held All Out in that venue, but for maybe two years, I want to say. Well, last year they had the event in Toronto, and during the pandemic, it would have been held at Daley's place. but every other year they've had All Out, you know, in the Chicago area in that building. And they're not going back to Labor Day weekend.

Traditionally, All Out was a Labor Day weekend thing. WWE infringed upon that. And so they had to move to a different part of the calendar later in the month. But Tony Khan did a radio interview and he said, I want to make sure that the fans get the best possible experience at all out. That means giving four weeks between these pay-per-views to fully build up and have about a month between all in and all out. And that actually makes a lot of sense.

What we've had before is a scenario where AW will have all in at the end of August. And Tony kind of said he likes doing it on a bank holiday weekend. So you'll have all out at the very end of August. And then literally a week later, you have all out. That's not enough time. Even two weeks. It's not enough time. You got to space these things out.

So it actually makes a lot of sense to move all out, regardless of what WWE is doing. It makes a lot of sense to move all out to the end of September. I'm actually very happy he's doing that. What I'm hoping is that this whole 7 p.m. start time for the pay-per-view that they're doing with redemption later this month. I hope this carries over into All-Out. I didn't see any mentions of what time the show is starting, but I really hope they don't go back to 8 p.m. Hopefully they'll start this show an hour earlier because these are marathon pay-per-views, and I just think it works better if you bump up the start time.

That's how I feel. Mark Briscoe, his team got the big win in the Death's Door cage match of Forbidden Door, and that earned him a shot at the AW World Championship last Wednesday on Dynamite. And guess what? Surprise, surprise, he lost. Because of course. Because now we have bigger matches. We have bigger fish to fry than Mark Briscoe, all due respect. Although it sounds like he got injured in that match.

Maybe he was injured in the cage match at the pay-per-view, but there's apparently a legitimate injury. We may not see him for a while. We don't know what the injury is. So best to him. But we have a big match on Dynamite tomorrow. Tony Khan is loading this show up almost like a pay-per-view. And it's their beach break show.

They're going to be in Clearwater, Florida. It's kind of, I think it's an outdoor venue. I'm actually very curious to see how this is set up. I like the fact that they're finally doing one of these beach break shows. shows at an actual beach location. Like, they have done beach break in January in like cold climates before. And I never, I never understood that. It never made any sense to me.

So I'm glad they're doing this. And in the main event, MJF, for the second week in a row, is going to be defending the AW World Championship. Look at this guy. He thinks he's Darby Allen. He's defending the belt every week. He's defending it against Kenny Omega. Yes, they're not waiting until Redoubt.

in Montreal. They're doing the match tomorrow, which I don't really understand, and I understand even less why they're adding this stipulation tomorrow, which is if Kenny cannot beat MJF in the match, and that was what MJF said, you pay attention to the words he used. He said, if you can't beat me, right, if I win, you lose, even say anything about you have to win the belt. But if you lose, you can never again, like your buddy hangman, you can never again challenge for the AEW World Championship. That's a big stipulation for a big match to do on TV. Now, Dave Meltzer says the match was not originally scheduled to take place on dynamite.

The original plan was for it to happen at redemption. But for whatever reason, the decision was made to do it this week. I would have to expect that that will become very clear tomorrow why they're doing it tomorrow. It may well lead into a rematch. I really, I don't like that if that's how this works out because if you're just going to rematch them, you know, at redemption, then why do the match here? Why not just wait until redemption? I do wonder, though, if this is indicative of a hangman page return tomorrow. You know, do we end up in a situation where he gets worked into this somehow, but then

how does that work? If you can't challenge for the championship again, you know, because he lost MJF a few months ago, I'm not, I'm not sure. He's been name dropped an awful lot lately, though, in these MJF promos. I mean, even in the fight. finals of the Owen Hart tournament. I mean, you saw Swerve and Will Osprey. They were stealing his moves. You know, at one point, swerve used a dead eye. Osprey did a buckshot hidden blade.

There's been a lot of hints that Hangman is on his way back. Maybe it's tomorrow. I don't know. But it's very strange to me that they're giving this match away on dynamite with a big stipulation like that. They could do the finish in such a way where nobody wins. You know, there's like a double DQ or a time. limit draw if they were to go the full 60 minutes. But again, just to then run it back at redemption

and what? Do you retain the same stipulation? Is there a higher stipulation? A more, you know, like a more important stipulate? I don't know. I don't know. Maybe it will make sense at the end of the show tomorrow, but this is all very strange to me. And clearly there was some sort of audible that was called where they made the decision that we have to do it here, because redemption is absolutely the place where it makes sense to do it, especially if Kenny is going to win the belt. Right? You do that at redemption. The show is called redemption. I mean, do they want Kenny defending in Montreal? Are they going to run back Kenny and Okada on that show? Is Kenny going to have a whole bunch of matches in the lead-up to Wembley Stadium if he wins the belt where he's, you know, trying to exercise these various ghosts? And he wrestles Okada and he wrestles Andrade, maybe at Arena Mexico on Dynamite next month. And he wrestles

Kyle Flatt? Like, I don't know. I don't know. Maybe that's the plan. Maybe they're going to do with him what they did with Darby, and they're going to try to squeeze in a whole bunch of championship matches on TV between now and then. I don't know if Kenny's body could hold up. He ain't Darby Allen. You've got to be very judicious in how often you use Kenny Omega at this stage of his career. I do love how, though, in every single Kenny Omega match, they have to bring up the diverticulitis and they talk about it like anytime he takes a shot to the gut. They talk about it like his guts are going to just spill out onto the mat. It's like this fatal maneuver. The idea of Ketti Omega having all of these matches, though, on television leading up to Wembley is just kind of funny to me. But in addition to that match, we have Kinosukee, Tecester, putting his international title on the line at Beach Break tomorrow against Kyle Fletcher,

which is another match that you would have expected they would save for the next pay-per-view. At least here it seems to make sense to me, especially if they're going to do a title change, because Takeshda is part of the G1 climax again this year. He won the tournament last year. He's back in the G1 this year, and the G1 kicks off next week.

So he's going to be away for most of the next month. He's going to be in Japan. I don't know that he's going to be back on AEW television until maybe a couple of weeks before Wembley. If that's the case, this is an opportunity for them to take the belt off of him and put it on Kyle Fletcher. When Takesha comes back, you could easily rematch them. You could even work Okada in.

into it. They're all sort of interconnected. You could do some sort of three-way match. Chris Jericho and Tomaso Champa are having their big grudge match tomorrow, and they are doing a women's casino gauntlet match for a shot at the AEW World Championship at Redemption, which is currently held by Tecla, who is awesome. Athena, the Ring of Honor Women's World Champion, has earned the right to enter the gauntlet tomorrow at number one, which is very important because you know how these gauntlets work. The gauntlet could end at any time. So the earlier you're in the match, the better your chances are.

She's going to be opening the gauntlet with Maya World, who is entering in number two. So we have the teacher on one side. We have the pupil on the other. And I don't think either one of these ladies are winning. I am predicting the return of Willow Nightingale in this match. It's not hard to predict the return of Willow. I mean, they're running return vignettes for her already. But I think this is where she returns.

and I think she wins the gauntlet and I think she goes to redemption. I think she's going to win the world title from Tecla on that show. I think that we're looking at Willow defending the world championship against Mercedes in London. And it's weird to me

because Willow was already being built up for a return to TV. Meanwhile, they only this past week crowned a brand new TBS champion because they had stripped Willow of the belt in May when she was hurt. They waited, they had qualified, They had qualifying matches to build to this big six-way survival of the fittest,

elimination match on dynamite. Hikaru Shida is the new TBS champion. They finally crowned the new champion and Willow's already going to be back on TV. Like, what was the point? What was the point? Either she wasn't really that hurt and they got a good progress report. Or maybe this was all done by design. Maybe they didn't want to beat her to lose the TBS title and they had bigger plans.

for her. And we're going to see that borne out if she wins the gauntlet match tomorrow night. But that is the current lineup for Dynamite. It's going to be a big show. That's the key news of the week. I do have two questions here that were emailed into me. The Salammonster at gmail.com. If you want to send in a question or you can tweet me at Salamonstr on X, just to use the hashtag uncrowned. Marlin from Fort Worth, Texas, says, watching these promos and Paul Heyman in particular, one of the promos,

said that Oba was a violent man and given Hayman's track record of betraying his clients, I don't know why I cannot shake this feeling that Paul is leaving SummerSlam with Oba Femi. What do you make of this? I don't get that feeling.

I don't rule out the possibility that at some point they might not want to link up the two of them, especially if Brock really is winding down and Haman doesn't have him to work with anymore. Maybe they put him with Oba. I mean, look, I could sit here and tell you that Oba doesn't need Paul Heyman.

Oba actually cut a hell of a promo himself last night when he was in the ring with Hayman on TV. He doesn't need him. But then again, like, did C-on punk need Paul Heyman? Did Roman Raines need Paul Hamon? Actually, I think he kind of did. But, you know, it's not a matter of like, oh, this person needs Paul to talk for them. There is a different element that Heyman adds, because he's been around for so long,

he's represented so many big names. I'm not saying there can't be a benefit there to a pairing at one point of Paul Heyman and Obafemi. Do I see it happening at SummerSlam? I don't. I don't. We've heard Paul Heyman be complimentary in promos before to Cody Rhodes. And I've had similar questions that people have asked me, oh, do you think this means that Cody is going to end up with Paul? Is Cody going to – people have been begging for a Cody Rhodes heel turned out for like two years.

And that still hasn't panned out. So, no, I don't think he's leaving SummerSlam with Paul Heyman. If the plan is to do Oba and Roman at WrestleMania next year in Saudi, which seems like it's probably going to be the play, it could make things a little more interesting, I suppose, if Haman was with Oba given Haman's pass with Roman. But then it's all about Paul Haman again. You know, we've already been there, done that.

Like, WrestleMania last year, the triple threat with Roman and Seth and Punk, it wasn't really about any of those three. It was all about Paul Heyman. Where does his allegiance lie? It was the Paul Heyman story. And I just feel like if you're going to do something with Roman and Oba, it shouldn't be about Haman. So I don't see any real need for it.

And Connor from Jim Thorpe in honor of Brett Hart's recent birthday. Yes. That's right. The hit man turned 69 years young on July 2nd. He said, I present my argument. for 1997 as Brett's best year. He says, Tide Hogan as the only five-time

WWF champion, WrestleMania 13 masterpiece with Steve Austin, brilliant heel turn, best Mike work of his career, final time teaming with Owen, face rivals like Austin, Michael's Undertaker multiple times. Let me know if you agree or disagree.

I mean, when you set it up like that, it's kind of hard to disdiscope. agree. 1997 is Brett's best year. Me personally, just as like a big fan of his work, I tend to feel like 1994 is his best in-ring year. Maybe like physical peak, best in ring. Like I just have an affinity for 94 in the work he put together that year.

But 97, as far as his overall career, I mean, it's kind of hard to argue otherwise. I don't know that there's another year, frankly, that even comes close. 92 maybe just because he had that big mania match with Piper and then the big Wembley match with Bulldog and that was the year he won the WWF title for the first time. That would be the closest thing, honestly. And he was a much more seasoned, well-rounded performer five years later in 97. I mean, that's a pretty impressive resume right there. So yes, 1997 was Brett's best year.

But happy birthday to Brett. Very happy that he even made it to his 69th birthday. Every time I look at a picture of the Heart Foundation, faction from 97 and I realize that they're all dead except for Brett, it just depresses me all over again. It's very sad to see. I'm happy he's made it this far. Thank you guys for tuning in to another episode of Uncrowned. I hope you guys are enjoying the show. Be sure to leave a review and a rating in the app store or wherever you're streaming or you download your podcast. Of course, you can sub to this show on the Ariel Helwani show feed

or the dedicated feed that we have for the Uncrowned wrestling show. Just type that in. It should come right up. I'm going to be back with you next Tuesday for a brand new episode of Uncrowned. And also be aware, tonight. Starting tonight, it is the premiere season seven of Dark Side of the Ring on Vice TV. It's a double episode covering Jeff Jarrett and the rise of TNA. So at 9 p.m. Eastern tonight on Vice, back-to-back episodes.

And then I want to say 10 p.m. Eastern every week thereafter is a new episode. So the new season kicks off tonight. I've watched all six previous seasons. I still enjoy the show. I know some people feel like, well, they're running out of topics. They're running out of steam. There's some interesting ones this season. And when it comes to TNA, especially the early days,

there's plenty of material there. You want to get into some dark stuff. There is some material there. So anyway, be aware of that that kicks off tonight. If you want to check that out, that is on Vice, starting at 9 p.m. I saw Ariel actually had a really good interview in studio yesterday with Jeff Jared. If you want to go check that out, that is up on his channel as well.

All right, that's it. I'm out. I will see you guys back here for more uncrown next Tuesday. Until then, be well, stay safe. Have a great rest of your week. I am Jason Solomon. And when it comes to the news, if you didn't know, now you know. I'll see you next Tuesday.