The Press Box - Ep. 186: 'The Masked Man Show' With Dave Schilling

Episode Date: September 22, 2016

David Shoemaker welcomes The Guardian’s Dave Schilling to discuss Seth Rollins's face turn (08:15) and a great week of 'Smackdown' (18:55), and to preview ‘Clash of Champions’ (44:45). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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with my dear friend Dave Schilling. Dave, you look really good in that sleeveless hoodie with the RKO logo on it. I really want to commend you on that. How are you doing today? I'm ready to strike, man. It can come out of nowhere. Is the sleeveless hoodie an evolutionary step forward

for wrestling gear, or is it a step back? I think it's good for Orton because he can show off his tattoos and it's part of his gimmick. But, I mean, I think he was better off when he was wearing suits and he was an evolution. And he looked sharp. I was thinking about that during Smackdown when I watched it. It was like, Ah, Orton should go back to being kind of like a dapper, cool assassin character. I'm not sure how in the in like, if you want to let him be himself to a certain extent, I don't know if he's a suit guy. Probably not.

Maybe I've seen him in public a couple of times and he's very much, like when he was feuding with Lesnar, that was. pure, that was pure undistilled Orton. It was just track pants and a t-shirt. And, you know, I mean, that's what he wears when he goes to, like, fancy restaurants. Oh, I mean, that might not be true. But, yeah, I think that's Orton's most comfortable moment. Anyway, I don't know why we're talking about Randy Orton. I guess wrestling fashion is always current.

But we were talking on the way in here about how there's too much WWB wrestling available. I never thought that I would have that opinion because I like wrestling. But now I think about how many hours of my week are devoted to either watching it, thinking about it, or talking about it. And it's starting to overwhelm me. And I think it's adversely affecting the ratings for Raw and SmackDown. Oh, yeah. I think that there's no scarcity to wrestling anymore. I used to sit around waiting for Monday or Thursday when Smackdown was on Thursday.

Yeah, I mean, there are, there's so many ways to tackle or, you know, tackle this issue. friend of the show, Latoya Ferguson, actually wrote a good piece today about how SmackDown was a better go-home show than Raw this week, despite the fact that Raw was the one actually having a go-home show. And I thought it was a great piece

that's on the AV Club. Everybody should check it out. Yeah, she's one of the best wrestling writers besides yourself, of course. It was a real, well, I don't know as much as I write anymore, but yeah, I mean, it was really good and made a smart point,

but one kind of interesting side note where she was like, you know, No Mercy, which is the next Smackdown pay-per-view. She's like, oh, we still actually have two weeks to build a note mercy. And I'm just like crying silently to myself as I read it where I'm just like, wait, there's two weeks to a paper. We haven't even had Clash of Champions yet.

And now it's already two weeks of, you know, whatever, three weeks. Clash of Champions is on Sunday. Yeah. I just watched Backlash. I watched Raw this week with Dan St. Germain and one of his friends, also named Dan. and it's weird. It was notable that three huge wrestling fans were sitting in a room and there were a number of times throughout the night

where someone was like, oh, did you see Cruiserweight Classic? Oh, did you see Smackdown last week? And like the other two had just not seen it. Right. I mean, we're all supposed to be giant wrestling fans. And, you know, the first few weeks of the brand split, I felt like they did a really good job of keeping things vital. The back, wait, what did we just have, backlash, right?

Backlash did the sort of bare minimum of keeping Smackdown pay-per-views relevant by putting the title on AJ. But still, it's just, like, I think the overload is finally setting in. There are a lot of belts. There are a lot of pay-per-views. There's Cruiserweight Classic and an X-T, and they're going to do a women's tournament. I hear a rumor about doing some sort of women's Cruiserweight Classic-style event. It's network exclusive. Then you have to watch Talking Smack right after Smackdown.

You're not even done with the show, and now there's an after show. Yeah. I was actually watching Alexa Bliss and Becky on SmackDown yesterday thinking, why didn't they just do weight divisions? I mean, I mean, it's like UFC fighting, you know? Right. Just like make SmackDown the slightly lighter women. And you can fudge it.

It doesn't matter. But it's like the delineation between the two women's divisions is so arbitrary. And like everybody has said, splitting the. division up was probably not the best move for you know for i mean you can make the case either way but if that were a floating title that both shows could have women's wrestling same with the cruiser same with the tag um it's definitely uh cost sasha and bailey a lot of momentum it forces dana brook to sort of be the only other person in the division constantly losing yeah so she can't really build up any momentum on her own for when she does split with charlotte because she has to

keep losing because Bailey's being protected. Charlotte's the champion. Sasha's being protected. There's nobody who is just a pure jobber except for her. That's on the wrong. And the people losing an Ia Jacks. Right, exactly. Yeah, I mean, we're jumping, we don't need to spend too much time on the women's

division in theory, but, I mean, why not? I totally agree with you. And I think that it's hard to be booking just with the size of the roster. I mean, the kind of limited size of the roster. That said, you know, a lot of the little touches that they've been doing along the way when they've been forced to tell these sort of these storylines that are, they're sort of naturally compressed. I mean, like when Charlotte just like shoved Dana to the ground on Monday,

that was like one of the most, I mean, that got me out of my chair. That was one of like kind of the most interesting moments I've seen in wrestling in a while because like that's not a thing you usually see in the women's division. and physical aggression between friends or between nominal partners. But yeah, it's some interesting stuff. So we'll get to a full clash of champions preview rundown in a minute.

Was there anything else that jumped out to you from Raw that you want to get into before we get there? I mean, I think the biggest, most notable thing. Actually, here's a good segue. You were talking about how ratings are down, right? Last week we had a note for the show that we didn't actually end up talking about, but just somebody posted on Reddit, the theory that Raw ratings are down because there's no baby faces on the show.

Now, after Monday night, we do have a baby. We do have a giant baby face on Raw. It remains to be seen whether or not they waited too long and whether the crowd's going to accept them. But boy, oh boy, did Seth Rawlins ever turn baby face on Monday. It was remarkable to see his move set in service of, of baby face sort of match structure. Because people have been saying for years,

like, oh, you know, when he throws that Falcon Arrow, that should be a pop, you know, a crowd pop moment as opposed to, you know, all the sort of like rest holds and grinding that he's forced to do. When that's really something that guys like the Mizz and Kevin Owens are great at, because they're not necessarily as explosive or exciting when they're controlling a match.

They're guys who know how to sort of drag it along, and understand the psychology of things. And Seth Rollins is very dynamic. So I think all those people were right. I think his matches are going to be significantly better. Hopefully he hurts fewer people. Not that it's his fault, but it is a thing that's been happening. And a lot of those moves, you know, I think the turnbuckle power bomb is something that he's

going to retire forever. Because that feels like a heel tactic as opposed to a face tactic. Yeah. I mean, talking about hurting people, obviously it's sort of beside the point. but his knee to the back of Rusef to knock him off the little off of the entrance ramp and then the crossbody onto him. And even to a slightly lesser extent, the crossbody off the cage at the end of the show were about as tinder a version of those various moves as you've ever possibly seen. And I think part of that is working more safely. I think a lot of it's working baby face.

You know, you don't want to just be brutal. And also part of it is doing weird spots that probably he's not done a million times in his life. but yeah, I think that because, you know, I'm really not knocking, I don't want to knock WWE for the way they've treated the Rollins character. I think that in my dream booking world, this is how you do it. You don't, you know, he doesn't get screwed over by Triple H and then suddenly start, like, inviting Make a Wish Kids to sit ringside for his matches. Like, it's not, that's not how real human beings work.

So, like, the way that they're doing it with a little bit of nuance, I'm totally behind. that I'm more interested in the sort of meta question of whether or not fans are going to be able to adapt when they when WWE does things in more interesting nuanced ways right so if they if the day that he came back from his injury if they had just been like he's a baby face now you know having beat up all the bad guys the crowd would have immediately been cheering for every move it would have been fine if he had come out the night after he got screwed over by Triple H and just cut a real baby face promo and just thank the fans and you know whatever. they'd be reacting to him a lot differently. Now, he's been working in the ring in increasingly baby-faced way since that point, but even on Monday night where they were giving him the real baby-face, you know, shine, fans didn't know quite how to respond to the Falcon Arrow.

You know, like the points in the match where we hope the crowd would be popping in two weeks or three weeks, they're not there yet. Right. But do you, so what do you think? Do you think that it's going to work out, A, and do you think that, you know, is the world ready for babyface icon Seth Rollins? I think he has the chops to do it.

I think that his promo skills are slightly underrated. I still don't think he's as good as Kevin Owens on the mic or even the Miz or Ambrose. But he's up there. He's very good at that. So I think he can carry feuds through his mic work. I think his in-ring work is spectacular when he's really locked in. going to benefit him this sort of change and role and there is precedent for wwe sort of subtly turning people they did that with the new day you know the new day never really started like

high-fiving anybody or anything they just started working against heels i think it was the the dudley boys was around that time when they were feeding with the dudley boys where they sort of both just switched sure the difference is that you know there's there is uh there's not a lot of of historical context for a wrestling promotion not having a number one baby face right you know i mean it's not like not having the one guy for kids to cheer forward it's to sell the t-shirts now roman raines actually takes up a lot of that that uh that airspace or whatever but but he's not he's he's by no definition a number one baby face yeah i'm still frustrated with how strongly they book him too not because i think that he's a bad performer um i think he's incredibly underrated in his series with a j

his matches with Kevin Owens these last two weeks have been great and he's been part of it. But he's clearly not that guy. And I think they have to cut their losses with him and really actually move him down the card and not have him main event Raws because they don't think people want to see that. It's funny because you can argue it both ways. I think I agree with you as it pertains to Raines, but at the same time, I like in the brand split era. I love that we're in a place where, you know, the Mizz in the main event last week on SmackDown in the tag match, like, that felt really cool and fresh. Yeah. Because it's like, oh, this mid-carder has earned, well, I mean, he's been all over the card.

But this guy who was a mid-carder two days ago has, like really earned the main event on Smackdown. Yeah. Like, it made a lot of sense, and it felt cool. Roman Raines is the best thing, you know, the best use that they've made of Roman Raines since his suspension is trying to trick us and successfully. tricking us into thinking he was about to get that next title shot over and over and over again, right? Yeah. And he does a good job of making other people, like he made Kevin Owens in a certain way by being available for that, you know, for that role.

But yeah, I mean, it's, I think now it's clear that he's in this program with Rusef. He's, I mean, the fact that they keep teasing him into the title picture in some ways is a great use of him or a great use of a wrestler of his stature, I'll say. But yeah, it's always a little bit weird with Roman Raines because we have that uneasiness that like we want to see a reset. I mean, even those of us like you and I who aren't mad about Roman Raines still would, yeah, like you said, would be interested in a little bit of a reset. Move him out of this part of the card. Let Seth and Kevin Owens have their moment, have their feud. And right now we're still wondering what Triple H's role in this is.

What is Roman Raines going to do with the title picture? And he's supposed to have a match with Ruseb. So why is he going through the motions with Kevin Owens, even though these are great matches? Yeah. I think it's just a symptom of the fact that Finn Baller got hurt. Finn Baller was clearly the guy they were going to use to carry them through the fall and into WrestleMania season. And what would happen after that, I don't know. But he was supposed to be set up as the top guy on Raw.

Dude, I mean, I have all the faith in the world in Finn Baller. but just hearing you say that, and you're right, hearing that said out loud made my stomach kind of turn because I was just imagining that Finn Baller would inevitably be getting blamed for the ratings right now. Yeah, he's probably better off being on the shelf, but it's not better for the show in terms of the creative and the story structure because I don't think they ever wanted

Seth Rollins to be a baby face. This is just, they're stuck with it, and they're figuring out on the fly. It's funny because when he was, he obviously worked a lot in Ring of Honor. and I mean that was but some of that was just the way he looked and the you know he was very green

and so and kind of hooked up with the with the heel faction to hide him a little bit although he was one of the best workers even at the age of like 14 or whatever it was when he was like doing jumps off the top rope but the but the but he's when he came up through not an XC one of FCW

everybody thought he was going to just debut as a baby face or Even when the shield broke up, everybody was assuming there's your baby face. He did your ex-Shon Michaels. Yeah, exactly. I mean, I remember how many years ago when I was scouting the shield guys, I said, this is the guy that Vince is going to look at and say what I couldn't have, like, CM Punk wasn't mine. Jeff Hardy was never really mine, but if you put them together, like, Seth Rollins will be

mine, and it'll be my version of that. Yeah. But, like, he was immediately the heel. And I talked to Seth about this on the record, I think, where I was just like, this is kind of a surprising turn, right? I mean, and he was just like, dude, I can do anything. This isn't, you know, and I want to do everything. That's important in this business, in my opinion, as an observer, as not, you know,

someone who's working in the industry, but someone who's a fan, is you want to be able to have variations. You want there to be a lot of options, booking options. Sure. When you get stuck with someone who really can't play the other side, like the MIS, God bless the Miz, I love the Miz, but do you ever see the Miz really having a strong baby face run?

Triple H sort of ended up being that way where his baby face run was a little stagnant and a little weak and they had to turn him pretty quickly after WrestleMania 18. Yeah. Some people are better at one thing than the other, but it's much better for the writers,

I'm sure, to be able to say, well, Seth Rollins, we really need you to be the top guy on the face side. Or Kevin Owens, I know you can probably turn, but we need you to be a heel. Or John Cena, well, John Cena is a bad example. Actually, never mind. John Cena will never turn heel.

Well, it's an interesting thing now, and I think, and I've been thinking about that for a column I want to write, but it's, you know, just the question of the heel turn slash face turn, what it means in the upper ranks now. Like, obviously there's this idea of going in a more real sports, I said with air quotes, real sports direction where everybody's just like, they're fighters. And yes, you have like rivalries and some people get more fans behind them at times. I mean,

I think that's the sort of general direction. WW is trying to go, not that they'll ever fully leave behind the trappings of, you know, face versus heel and everything. But if you look at, you look at Smackdown, which, as I said, had a great week this week. We have John C.E. who is the one guy who's like the epitome of being a baby face although he is he was also the biggest heel in the industry for three years while he was the biggest bait like the the king baby face Dean Ambrose is is pseudo heel turning on the strength of his rivalry with John Sina at the same time though slapping hands at the end of the show with the audience yeah didn't that seem weird to you I don't think so I think that they're just letting him sort of

like occupy that middle territory and see how the crowd reacts. Maybe that's the test. Maybe with the crowd yanks their handback like too slow ambrose, then like they'll look the other way. And AJ Stiles was legitimately the biggest baby face in the company, if you gauge by crowd reaction anyway. And they just turn him healed to feed with John Cena. Now I don't,

I'm not saying that's a problem. I think that we may be in an era where he'll sell more shirts. You know, we might be the NWO, you know, Renaissance or whatever. We might be in an era where. where it's easier to maintain a character over this, over a career if they're, if they're predominantly heels, you know?

And I'm not talking about like monster heels or like despicable heels, but guys like the guys like Ambrose and AJ who just want to win really badly, you know? And if you look over on Raw, I mean, Kevin Owens is working heel in a way that like, nobody this side of Paul Heyman knows how to do, but he's still like the most, one of the most beloved fighters on the Rock. roster, right? Yeah. I think that's a symptom of the audience for WWE getting so much older.

And I think it was Dave Meltzer, someone who reported this data, that it's the average age for a WWE viewer is in their 40s. Wow. It's like getting very old. And they're not getting this sort of like Hulk Hogan, Sean Michaels, Brett Hart fans. The kids who, when I was growing up, were really into it. grew up to be adult fans now. They don't, what's the next generation of wrestling fan?

So right now, they're dealing with a lot of people at the live events who probably just hate the idea of like the raw, raw baby face. Yeah. And so Seth Rollins, Kevin Owens, um, Ambrose, all these people that have sort of heelish tendencies get big, big entrance pops. They get cheered against sort of generic. happy, smiley people like Apollo Cruz, who, if maybe he turned heel, that would help his career a little bit.

Well, I think there's a lot of things. There's a lot that Apollo Cruz needs to do. You could fantasy book Apollo Cruz in a lot of different ways besides just turning him heel. He lost clean on Smackdown? Oh, yeah. Yeah, that wasn't quite a squash. But it was just a setup for the Baron Corvin-Jack Swagger feud that we've all been waiting for.

Oh, my God. I don't understand. I don't want to go off on a huge tangent here. But Baron Corbin always, without fail, gets put with some of the worst possible opponents. Every single angle that he's done has been someone who he has to carry, but he's not ready to carry anyone. If it's Calisto, if it's Apollo Cruz, and now, Jack Swagger, these are three guys who don't really have a lot of heat right now, and the poor guy is stuck in sort of limbo. You're talking about carrying them in terms of just like the heat, like the hype of the match. Yeah.

Yeah. I mean, I could spend an hour of fantasy booking him and not quite and never come to a good conclusion. I mean, we talk, I've talked about him on previous shows where it's like they're kind of booking him exactly right. But like it's just not the place or time or particularly the guy. Like it's, I mean, there was a lot. I remember there was that brief rumor that he was going to. six months, when was it, that he was going to team up with Ambrose and Reigns when they were having a six-man tag match with like a mystery partner?

Was it like a Somerslam match? I'm like, I'm trying to piece it together now because I was at the match live. And W.W.E. had done this hilarious thing where they like leaked like the, like someone got an Instagram of like the ring entrance when they were prepping it that day and it was him and everybody got went off that. But like in retrospect, I mean, Barron hanging out with Dean Ambrose is not the worst idea. You know, him just kind of being like, not quite Sean Diesel, but just like, they look like dudes who might get a beer together.

Exactly. Yeah. I would love that. I would love for him, for Ambrose to have a stable or a manager or a bodyguard or an enforcer or something. Yeah. Just to freshen up his character a little bit. Sure.

Yeah. I mean, it's just like, yeah. Amber seems like the kind of guy where it's just like, if you can hang, then, like, we're going to be okay. Yeah. If you can make it, if you can survive the car ride with me from like, you know, St. Louis to Topeka, then like we're good. And that could be part of his on-screen character. You know, and I almost feel like there was a no factions, there was a seem to be an unofficial no factions rule in WWE for a long time. But you're always, well, maybe I should just say the fans, the fans remembered the four horsemen and the dangerous alliance and whatever else, what much more fondly than WWE ever did. Right.

So there'd be like Nexus. There'd be like the force of nature faction, but never just like the, we're four guys who are on the same wavelength or whatever. You get the social outcasts now. And obviously there's a lot of counter examples. Probably because they're holding it in check for like the shield. They want the shield to really matter when there's three guys, you know, the team up. It's not just, oh, let's get Jimmy Hart and five dudes who have nothing to do and make the first family. Yeah.

There's nothing like that. And I think it would be really beneficial for all these dudes who really don't have a lot. going on. Yeah, I mean, you have to imagine that if Paul, if they gave Pauley a new dangerous alliance and it was, you know, three current wrestlers and maybe one, like, you know, one or two people from the IndyC or from NXT, they're calling up and just say, like, this is my new fact. Like, that would be such a big moment in wrestling for all the fans like us, you know, in general, that, like, it would necessarily be the, the A storyline for the next two months. Right. And then it has to have a payoff. It can't just be a faction. It's, you know, a faction.

It's hard. But then, yeah, you see what happened with the nexus, and you question whether or not they can pull that off. Yeah, it's tough. It's tough. It's tough for a faction. The faction has to exist outside of a single storyline, and that, that I think is tough. Because this gets around to the entire, this put a lit on this whole conversation. If the fan base is indeed aging, and certainly the fact that we're sitting here having this conversation,

and it's being produced as a podcast for The Ringer is some evidence to that point. and there's too much programming and there's this ongoing question of like what the audience, not who the audience is know so much as who the audience WW is booking for is because they kind of have to make everybody happy. I think that to me,

the problem with the amount of content is that it's A, is that A, they make it all feel mandatory, which is fine, that's the promotional job, but part of that's going to be us wrapping our minds around what is not mandatory. But B, there's a lot of, a lot of monotony.

Now, NXT feels a little different. That's why we all love it. It's why we love Lucha Underground. That's why we love, you know, go to PWG, go to Ring of Honor, whatever. TNA even.

I mean, they've done some cool stuff. Delayed or decay I finally watched. And I was just horrified and also completely delighted by the whole thing. But, and the Cruiserweight Classic is probably the best example of making something feel very different.

But at the end of the day, it's not that different. And if you're producing 10 hours of necessary content every week, especially for an older fan base, we've got to have some variety, man. We've seen it all. I love Mr. Robot. I'm not going to watch 10 hours of Mr. Robot this week, you know, even if they put it out there, like, there's just no way. Yeah. And I think that, you know, they, WWE, I think by branding things more differently, that will allow us to understand which things, which shows are going to be our cup of tea. We all complain about the video packages,

because we all feel like we've seen all this stuff before because we have because we like watch all the shows, you know. But if you're only, but if you, but the video packages are not a big deal if you're not watching. If you're only watching one of the shows or two of the shows, it does help you keep up, you know. So, you know, maybe there's a, maybe as the brand extension goes on, we'll get more of a split. We'll get more of a some, some feel for that kind of stuff. And listen, they've not done, I mean, the Cruiserweight Classic was all, all, all things considered a great success. Now, the fans on Monday Night Raw who were literally sitting on their hands as quiet as they could be for that cruiserweight match might disagree. I don't think all of them were keeping up with the network.

God only knows how many people actually watch this stuff. And so it's hard to gauge. Granted, when an NXT person shows up and they get a huge pop when they debut, it makes you think, oh, people are watching NXT. That's getting over. Yeah. But we don't really know if the Cruiserweight Classic got over. I mean, we can't look at t-shirt sales or how that stuff works out because T-J. Perkins doesn't have a T-shirt yet. So who knows, man?

I want to talk more about those. I would actually have a great T-shirt idea. But before we talk about my T-shirt idea, Dave, I think I can say with some confidence that you wear underwear every day. Absolutely. There's nothing really more intrinsically pro-wrestling than briefs. Well, it's dudes walking around in their underwear. Yeah, exactly. We all wear underwear, most of us do anyway.

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Get yours at Dollar Shaveclub.com slash masked. That's M-A-S-K-E-D. Dollar Shaveclub.com slash masked. I appreciate you sitting around through that wonderful lad. You're talking about T.J. Perkins T-shirts. Now, I had this idea this week. I'm sure a million people have had this idea before. But this is my WWB, please steal my idea pitch of the week.

Ready? At the end of pay-per-views, like the live show, why do they not have T-shirts for whoever just won the title? Like they do when somebody wins the NBA championship. That's a great idea. At the end of a show, especially the successful shows, when you go to SummerSlam, you go to WrestleMania, when you're most hyped up is when you're on the way out,

and there's no T-shirts left, there's no men's larges anyway. I mean, unless you're just like, unless you desperately want, you know, the social outcast shirt or whatever it is. Extra-large and small goes the fastest, but then large is hard to get to. Yeah, I mean, it's tough. It's tough to get the right size. When you're walking out, you're like, holy shit, AJ Stiles just won the title, or Dean Ambrose or Seth Rawlins, Kevin owns, whoever.

when you're the most excited about the guy who just won or the woman who just won, they should have championship. They should have t-shirts. Just say like it's SummerSlam 2016. Finn Baller is your new champion. Whatever. Just have like really simple text, just those crappy t-shirts they do every time the spurs win a title or whatever.

And just sell them for 25 bucks out of boxes if people are streaming out. Like who's not going to buy that? People would do that as a memento of the occasion. Yeah, they have the memento shirts, but it just has the matches. It's like, I don't get it. I think there's still sort of a fear of acknowledging too much that this is scripted. Wait, but they do this in real sports. Oh, I know.

You just print twice as many shirts and you send the rest to starving children somewhere. WWE doesn't even really have to do that. Well, here's another problem, right? What if someone is like, oh, they're printing a bunch of Finn Baller T-shirts where he wins the title at SummerSlam? That's actually, that's a really good point. Although we don't really get that many leaks. There's like a WWE merch Twitter account that seems slightly unaffiliated. So maybe there are some leaks that I just haven't made myself aware of.

But like, you'd think that there would be somebody saying, hey, by the way, we're printing three different Finn Baller shirts and SummerSlam's coming up. Maybe this is meaningful. Like if there were going to be leaks. Right. But it's one thing to say, oh, they're doing this new Kevin Owens raw T-shirt. You don't know that that means Kevin Owens is going over. in that was a fatal four way or triple threat match or whatever it was listen if it's really that big of a problem they can probably get some t-shirt machines in Titan towers like they could just print they can be the in secret under cover of darkness I don't know that might break some like monopoly laws or something if you're like if you're doing if you're if you're expanding horizontal lands that are vertically or whatever but the but yeah it's a I just think that would be so cool like I've bought I'd say 95% of my wrestling t-shirt purchases in my life

were just crimes of passion. Yeah. I'll come home and I've had too many drinks and I'm like, I really wanted Sasha Banks tank top. Like, when am I going to show my arms anywhere? Nowhere. Yeah, I have a Sasha Bank shirt that I proudly wore at WrestleMania this year and that was the last time I'll wear it.

I mean, maybe I'll find another use. But like, I went to two days of PWG and I said on the podcast, but all of the wrestlers sit around before the show and at intermission. And after the show, they sit around the ring just like selling all of the various t-shirts. It's really cool. And I refuse to buy one because I was like, once I buy one, I'm going to buy 20. Yep. And at the very end of the last night, I was walking out and I was just like, forget it.

And I walked over to Tommy End. And I was just like, all right, this is the last time you're ever going to be wrestling an indie show. You're going to be WWB champion to think you're great. Like, I'll have whichever of those two shirts you can grab in a large. And he was like, I got no larges. And I was like, you know what? Probably for the best. Yeah.

You dodged it a very expensive bullet. I'm not going to walk around Los Angeles looking like I'm in a thrash band or whatever. I hide all of my wrestling t-shirts. It's so ridiculous. But I still buy them. But you bring up a really good point is that there are some things that real sports, not real sports, but non-scripted sports do, that professional wrestling should start to bring into their product.

They're already starting. So what are your ideas? Well, I mean, all the Cruiserweight classic stuff where there's, you know, leaderboards, and they have statistics and sort of analysis that goes beyond the heel-face dichotomy. Because we sit through Raw and SmackDown, and we have the three-man teams where it's the play-by-play guy and then sort of a comical heel. Sure. And then an incredibly generic punching bag. And that doesn't really do that much to get over the product. anymore because we're all too savvy.

Yeah. We can't be manipulated the way that they think that we can. And they're not playing to the idea of this being a competition. You know, having a point structure for wins and losses to make it meaningful. And so you know, oh, this guy's moving up the leaderboard and he or she is in line for a title shot coming up. So that it's not always like, well, we just need to match these people together or do a run-in or something. it would structure the whole product in a more logical fashion. I think that they haven't done it is just stubbornness.

I think that's a good idea. I think, you know, I've done low-key rants about the announced teams in the past. And I always find it funny that, like, I really enjoyed David Otunga, his first, like, two weeks trying out on Smackdown before the brand split. Right? I thought he was a breath of fresh air. Certainly, JBL is a great example of somebody who every wrestling fan was head over heels for, for about a month and a half. Right.

And then it, I mean, honestly, I think that I love Morrow. Morrow, I think that I put the over under on fans turning on him at like five months. It's already kind of started with all the pop culture references. And he is more over the top than Michael Cole ever was, and that was one of Michael Coles, like, he will knock Michael Cole for. Now, he does it in a different way, and it's really sometimes very entertaining, but. There's more, I think, sort of self-awareness to more of. True. Than there is with Michael Cole.

Yeah, he's not tainted by it. It's a sort of Joey Stiles sort of like, it's like, he can scream like, this is the biggest moment in Russ? And you're just like, oh, it is. You're right, okay, that's fine. Yeah, this is okay. I also think that JBL really is playing three different characters. Yeah.

He's playing JBL the heel. He's playing JBL the sports announcer who actually knows about the matches and is a really like astute observer of the business. of what a match is. He understands that. And every once in a while he says something really profound. And then he's also on the third level, someone who is obviously friends with a lot of people in the back

and still part of the product and a host on WWE Network. If he just picked one, like one persona, it might work. Yeah, I mean, the thing is, and WW has, I understand the idea of having the raw team and the SmackDown team make the shows feel different. and unique entities, you sit them at different spots. By actually going to what you were saying about the former wrestler thing, that was one of a weirdly awkward moment on Raw this week where Michael Cole just was like,

Corey Graves, you've had a lot of massive injuries in your career. What do you think this wrestler is going through right now or whatever? It just seemed like a little bit inappropriate. I don't know why. But my, you know, the idea that I had a million years ago that I still, that I still abide by is that like we shouldn't have set announced teams. Like you turn on basketball, like college. basketball on Saturday on ABC, like, you don't know what announced team you're getting.

You know, like, you, if you, if you're a student of the sport, you know, with, like, the pool, the potential pool of announced teams are, you know, but, yeah, I mean, I think that, like, honestly, like, I've made this case before. Michael Cole should just be your pay-per-view announcer. Like, he's the play-by-play guy that matters, and it signals to you, like, this is a big, this is a big event, right? And let him, like, be a manager of the guys in the back, and he'll occasionally pop up on raw or whatever.

But, like, it would just be interesting. I would like JBL a lot more if I didn't know I was getting him every Tuesday, right? Didn't they sort of do that with JR for a while where it was like in the period as the like the end of his career he would sort of pop up when it was it mattered? Well, I think there was there were some, there were certainly some WrestleMania matches where the veterans who were in them lobbied for JR to be calling the match. Yeah. Yeah, it was when he was still employed, but and you know, I think he was still under his initial, his original like full-time employment contract but wasn't being utilized very. much right um but yeah i mean listen i there's i think i don't i hate when people kill the like rag on the announcers because i think they're all generally talented people but it's just the it's again

it's the monotony and that's the thing that wdbd needs to break you know break their break themselves out it's formula and i think you combine the the glut of content with the formula being used so often in all of this content and going back and rewatching old stuff like i'll watch an old raw every once in a while and like oh it's basically the same formula yes um so if the announced teams were given a little bit more free reign if there was a they didn't have to fit into these you know heel-faced dynamics if there was only one person like they used to do with joey styles and ecw where it was just him or you have uh you know of daniel brian every once in a while doing commentary just something to make it feel different yeah

Well, listen, it's in some ways they have the opportunity to do more, to be, you know, more different than, for the shows to be more different than one another. But the way that it's just such a barrage now of pay-per-views and whatnot, that it's, they put themselves in a weird position, you know? I mean, it's not, it's not super easy for them to, to differentiate the two shows when you're so bleary-eyed from watching wrestling that you don't know which show is on right now. Yeah. We've gotten through, like, 30 minutes of this show already, and we've barely talked about Clash of Champions, and it's on Sunday. That is a great, the semi-segway,

that we're going to just take full advantage of right now. Clash of Champions, this Sunday, it is the first Raw pay-per-view of the brand split era, correct? Yes. They've done... Raw has been doing a lot of things well. I agree with LaToy's piece. It wasn't the best go-home show on Monday.

But in a general sense, I think the transformation of Mick Foley over the past month, has been really, really impressive. He is a legitimate authority figure, something I didn't honestly think he was capable of at this point in his career. Maybe a little bit too much of him on Monday night. I think he got more screen time than he did

when he was WWE champion. But as an actor playing a role, he's as good at that as you could ask for. Stephanie, I think they're using in the right amount. Kevin Owens, I think also, like they could be, you know, Dan, I think it was Dan, St. Germain when I was watching it with him was sort of making the complaint that like in a three-hour show, oh no, I think it was the other day, but anyway, it was, you know,

when you watch on Hulu, you get a really different impression because it's condensed in 90 minutes. And it feels sort of like an old wrestling show where like the champion is taking up 40 of the 90 minutes in one way or another. The opening promo, the match he has, the sitting at commentary, some backstage segments. Because they get all the high, like the main event. stuff gets into the Hulu version and you miss the cruiser weights or whoever. Although I don't know the answer to this. I meant to check to see if the cruiser weights would made it on to Hulu because that is sort

of a meaningful question. I'm sorry I don't know the answer. I'll put it on Twitter or something or someone can tweet me. But Kevin Owens, I feel like they're using in the right amount if it gets, if there's a little bit too much of everything. The women's angle has been really good, I feel like, but I mean just overall and, you know, Roussef Raines, well, let's just go. match by match because I feel like there's things that they're doing right.

Pre-show featuring Alicia Fox versus Naya Jacks in this grudge match that, well, you know, perfect place to put this match is the pre-show because it's going to be a squash. It'll probably be five to seven minutes of, you know, Alicia will get some offense in, and then she'll get pummeled. I'm trying to think, like, who will. was the who was the who is the equivalent of this in like the rusef push like was it like big e or like jack swagger who got the first who got the first match where the first not completely squash match i think it was jack swagger because i was actually going back and trying to

understand jack swagger through youtube clips because i what a terrible life he's such a mystery to me of like why is he still on tv and all these things and wanted they repackage him he comes out turns baby face with Zeb Coulter and is defending America against against Rusev and that sets up some match and I think that was his first like match where he actually had to fight. Rusef. Yeah. And then of course he goes over. Swagger, I mean, listen, if you want to understand Jack Swagger, go back and watch when he was

Smackdown champion. This is like 30 years ago now, it seems like, but he was briefly Smackdown champion and he had a, had a eagle mascot that came out to the ring with him. It was a dark time. It was a dark time. I loved that era. He like he cut his, right after he won the title,

then he had a big promo with like all of his like high school trophies in the ring. And like, he's just, he's just, there's not a lot of charisma there. But why are we talking about Jack Swagger? That's a good question. It'll be a short match.

She's going to go over and I wonder, you know, if this is the moment where they elevate her to the title scene. If this is the last thing that she does, because there's not really anybody else for her to, to go again. I mean, what would be the next raw pay-per-view? I'm going to see if Wikipedia is actually differentiating. I think what is the next one now?

No, they're not, sadly. But it's whatever's after no mercy. But, I mean, you could, it's interesting because on Smackdown, there's a chance that we're heading to, wait, who won the tag team match on Smackdown? You mean the Uso's match? Yeah, the Uso's win? Uso's, yeah, it's versus Slater and Rhino. For the titles, yeah.

Right. They had that, yeah, I remember Slater talking about it backstage now. But there was a moment where it seemed like we might be heading towards a pay-per-view with two tag-team matches, or it was like the Uso's American Alpha having a grudge match that did not have the title involved. And I was like, that's different and sort of interesting. You could definitely see a scenario where there's a raw pay-per-view where Bailey and Sasha have a match that where the title's not involved, and then it's like Charlotte Nia Jacks or, you know, some variation of those four women.

Right. And that would be great. So I think we can agree that Nia Jackson is going to win that one? I would be a fool, and I should be kicked off of this show if I said that Alicia Fox is going to win this match. Alicia Fox is criminally underrated and deserves a push. I hope that she wins. But I think the betting line should have more to do with the time she spends not getting beat. Right.

The next match is Cruiserweight Championship match. This is a real thing now. T.J. Perkins, the shocking winner. Sorry if you haven't seen this, guys. The shocking winner, to my mind of the Cruiserweight Classic and new Cruiserweight champ versus, again, to me, kind of a shock. The Brian Kendrick is the number one contender. Sam Donsky texted me last night.

Yeah, text me during Raw, where he was just like, I guess, I like Brian Kendrick as a contender and I guess it makes sense and so much as like he's kind of the only guy on the cruiserweight roster with a storyline being that like he was fired once and now he's back you know like he's held the titles in wwee before yeah isn't doesn't he well they're they're now the second longest tag title reign of all time kendrick and who was his partner uh spanky kendrick and uh jupal london yeah exactly they were they were they had the record for the longest tag title reign until the new day broke it that's crazy I literally didn't realize that.

How do you feel about T.J. Perkins as your champ? Who do you think is going to win this match? I don't want to be that guy who throws cold water on the cruiserweight division after one night. But I think this is going to not go over well with the live crowd unless they do a lot of high spots and turn in a five-star classic. I don't expect it to be a five-star classic. I expect it to be a 10-minute match. And I think T.J. Perkins is going to win because what the hell? hell is the point of switching the title when he hasn't even defended it yet?

I think so. I think you're right. I think Brian Kendrick turns really heel, or at least works really heel in this match. And yeah, they just try to, you got to just sort of insinuate this. And in some sense, again, this is the same thing with some of the women's division issues that they've had with, with, you know, acclimating the fan. Same thing with the Seth Ron's heel turn to some extent. that WWE should not base the future of the cruiserweight division on the reaction this gets on Sunday, nor should they. Right. I mean, they need to, you just got to keep plugging and let this become the new normal, sort of.

Yeah, people have to be used to. The first cruiserweight match on Nitra wasn't like people in the aisles ripping off their t-shirts and throwing them into the crowd because they were having such a great time. Right. It was just a wrestling match. And Eric Bischoff had the, maybe not the foresight, but at least. the desperation required to just keep doing it because he had such a long show to fill and you had to have something different. And Ross certainly has a lot of time to fill and need something different. So whatever happens with this match, they just had to keep going. Here's what I liked about the match on

Monday. Well, one thing is they're just going to let him be a slow burn. I mean, like, if anything's going to matter in this division, it's Cedric Alexander eventually claiming the belt, Right. Graham Metallic. I don't, I like that guy. I guess I was just staring at him wondering, like, why, is there, would there be a problem with having a luchedore who wasn't in full superhero garb? Like, can he not just wear a mask and also, and just like a jacket? Well, I thought what was cool about Ray Mysteria when he came to WWE was he's wearing the mask, but he's also a regular person.

Yeah. With a mask on. Yeah. And I always thought that was weird that he even put the mask back on because he unmasked when he was in the filthy animal. Oh yeah. Remember that horrible stable? One of the shocking things is how little evidence of his unmasked period there is on the internet. Like if you Google Ray Mysterio face, you get like the same one photo.

I'm sure there's a million of them out there. But yeah, it's still, it's like the internet has forgotten, or at least most fans have. I have one embarrassing thing that I had to reveal is this week I watched Halloween Havoc 99. I watched the whole thing. Wow. I don't know why. I think there was an article. Was that the...

That was the first Vince Rousseau-Ed Ferrara pay-per-view. That was the one where Hogan lays down for Sting. Anyway, the point of it is, Ray comes out without his mask, and I forgot that he ever unmasked. It's crazy. But the Cruiserweight Division would do really well

if they brought Calisto over from SmackDown. I don't know why he's on SmackDown. It's weird that they did not choose to make Calisto or Sincara or Neville or anybody just put him in there I mean, maybe they'll integrate them later on. And certainly, if you're going to have a hard weight limit, then a lot of people, a lot of everyone except for Calisto is exempt.

Neville would probably have to lose a few pounds. Because he's pretty thick. As much, I was sort of surprised, although it helps his character. I was surprised with the fact that they were actually using the fact that Cedric had to drop 30 pounds as part of the gimmick. That's what's awesome about. What they did with the Cruiserweight Classic is they made it. feel legitimate through that kind of stuff? Yeah, I think that that's really, I think it was a great decision.

I just mean it's, that does sort of like limit the amount of crossovers you can have. Right. I was fantasy booking that Jericho would go back to the Cruiserweight division because like, like three weeks ago he used the lion tamer instead of the walls of Jericho. And I was just like, oh, this is a sign. How great would that be if he was just like, I've held this title longer than any of you. I'm the original cruiserweight now like give it back or whatever. That would be an amazing heel run for him.

but I don't know if he would want to do it. I think he worked so hard to escape that label. But at this point, anything Jericho does is the most fun thing on the bar. By the way, credit to Jericho for putting pants back on. So who do you think Perkins is going to win? Oh, yeah. I don't see there being a title change this soon. Yeah, I think that's probably right.

But Kendrick will probably just like turn on him and they'll be a nice little program for a couple months and then they'll do a switch on raw or something. Yeah, I think that's probably about right. Cesarro versus Seamus, shockingly, this has gone to the full seven. It's a best of seven match. I never would have guessed after it was 3-0 that this would end up being 7 matches. I've never talked about that on the show. That was the worst booking I've ever heard.

I don't mind it's starting off as 3-0 and then have the run for four. We saw that, I mean, the most legendary in WC, the one not the... Booker T and Benoit. Was that start off 3-0? I don't remember what it was. Anyway, this has happened many times before. Cesaro lost to him as twice before it started. The crazy thing was that they booked,

was it Cizaro's first win came on the non-televised show? Yeah, the house show. Why not have him win on the Raw before and then have Seamus win on the Untelevised show so then we get like the chance for him to, like his first chance to be eliminated is now on Raw. On TV where it actually matches. It was absolutely crazy.

Anyway, I don't know. I don't want to distract from the fact that these two guys have good chemistry and they've been having really, really good matches. And like, it's just contrived. This is a sort of gimmick that you can't do in this way with an older audience that's seen the Booker T. Ben-War of Best of Seven and whichever other one that there was, we can't remember. Yeah.

You know? No, I mean, you're totally right. But I think that there's ways in which a lot of these storylines can play to different audiences, in different ways. And I think that if we want to keep giving WWE advice, like, you know, I mean, they may be doing stuff like this. I don't know, but you have the network. Like, on Saturday or Friday or Thursday or whatever,

all six of the matches should just be press play on one thing and you see them in sequence. Yep. Right? None of like, you don't have to search them out. There's no, I don't want a video package. I want all six of these matches. I want to sit down for like 45 minutes and just watch these two guys go.

Yeah, and see the, the, the, the, the, the, Maybe some voiceover or something. That'd be great. Like have analysis of, oh, this is that moment where Seamus starts working on the shoulder again or whatever. Like those sorts of psychology things that a lot of wrestling fans sort of know about but don't really. It'd be great.

I would love that, but they're never going to do that. That's too much. That's too much like sports. Yeah. Maybe. I don't think that's that hard. I mean, I think it's really weird when they, it would be a really weird. There are things that are not hard that they just choose.

choose not to do. We've been watching this product long enough to know that there's some things where it's like Vince doesn't like tournaments so they don't do tournaments anymore. There's all kinds of things that just don't really that no one wants to do, that there's just a lack of will. But as for this match, I mean, we know who's going over. There's no question. He's going over. Cizaro's going over. You think so? Yes. And Cizaro is the next guy in line for Roussehouse. I would have thought that Ziegler was going to win on Tuesday night, man. But yeah, I think that's, I think, I think that you got to go. You got to hope for Cesaro, right?

Yeah, Cizaro Rusev is a logical next step for both guys. Because Rains is not going to win that belt. What a waste of, of that belt. It would be on Roman Rames. Somebody said that the, I mean, somebody just, like, offhandedly said that they would, that they assumed that Rain was going to win and that they would have a unit, not a unification, but a champ versus chant match at the night. at the next pay-per-view.

Unification. That'd be hilarious if they just did more and more unifications, though. After inventing all these belts, it's like, oh, we don't need all these. It's just a never-end. It's like the sneeches. Do you remember that Dr. Seuss book where it's just the never-ending cycle of, like, taking belts apart and putting them back together? Remember when the World Heavyweight Championship was merged with the IC title, and there was no IC title on Raw?

Oh, yeah. That was a ludicrous moment in professional wrestling history. All right. Next match. we just talked about it Roman Reins versus Rusef this is a tough one to book because

you're building up Rusev as a monster heel yeah you're building up Roman Rains as a resilient baby face and he's obviously still considered one of like the one B to Seth Rollins's one A

and they don't eat I mean they've been fighting like I mean they hate each other and there's only one clean victory in this entire feud and that's Roman Rains pinning him in a non-title match on Raw. Right.

With a spear. Yeah. I mean, yeah. I mean, and we are, we were, the last time they fought at a pay-per-view, it was a, like, 30-second shmash-hmas, no finish. So it's hard to imagine that they would, it's not impossible to imagine. I guess choice A would be like a legitimate 10, 12-minute match that then goes to a no decision, right? Going to hit each other with chairs a million times or something.

thing. It would go against, I think, the tenants of the industry, the storytelling tenants, to never have a blowoff. Someone's got to go over. Someone's got to Highlander quickening transfer their power to the other guy. So the answer is either Rousseff wins. I'm just fantasy booking. The answer seems to be either Rousseff wins with some sort of outside interference from

whoever Roman Reigns is going to feud with next, right? Bray Wyatt appears in the ring. It's not going to be Bray, but this is the Bray Wyatt spot. This is a Bray Wyatt Memorial paperpiece spot. Or Roman Raines wins and then maybe quickly drops the title back to Rusef on Rob because of a similar situation. Sure. Like he wins, he challenges Kevin Owens and he gets the big title match and then somehow

just does away with the belt. Or maybe they do do champion versus champion and then he has to relinquish the U.S. title, although I don't know what that does for the U.S. title, but maybe it helps it. I don't know. So anyway, if you had to pick, I'm not talking about interference, disqualification, anything

like that. Whose hand will be raised at the end of Sunday night? I think the person who has the most to gain from this is Rusev. It is not Roman Rains. Roman Rains will be the most overheal on Raw, no matter what.

He'll get the biggest anti-pop of anybody, win or lose. And honestly, every time he loses, there are more people who are cheering for him. Like it gets to be a little bit better every single time he lays down clean for someone. Losing to Finn Baller, losing semi-clean to Kevin Owens is creating this sort of underdog narrative for him

that I think is going to be beneficial down the line if they do decide he's going back up. Yeah. So I think he loses either with Lana interference or just he loses, you know, feet on the ropes or a handful of tights or something. I think, just to be contrary, I'm going to say Roman Raines is going to win. If I were on the booking team, I think I would have the match quick, like within five or six minutes devolve into like hitting each other with chairs outside the ring. Foley comes in, restarts the match. Like we're not going to end this with a DQ.

and then after five or six more minutes Rusef again just like just or in this time it's like if Rusef gets disqualified he loses the title and at some point Rousseff just says I don't care and just beats Roman Range with the chair for like five minutes loses the belt and walks off says like I don't need the belt like that's how I thought.

That's not a bad way to do it. Anyway, Sammy Zane versus Chris Jericho in weird like a the sneaky like great match on the card. It's going to be good but not as good as I think we expect. Jericho's lost a couple steps. I sure he wouldn't meet as much. Years ago, years ago said that Jericho Punk at WrestleMania was going to be like the Savage

Steamboat on that card. I mean, that was the spot it was filling. Yeah. But it like just as watching that and how many years ago was that? Five? Five? Four or five? Yeah.

I was just like, yeah, that's not Chris Jericho anymore. He's a step slower. And it's not sad to watch in the way that like watching Macho Man the last few years of his career was sad to watch. but he's not there he's not at the point where he can go full speed against Sammy Zane

but it'll be a good match it'll be lots of interesting psychology I'm sure Yeah and it'll be interesting to see how it sort of sets up the path forward I mean I don't think the winner loser doesn't matter quite as much But like this is the most interesting

The thing about this match And it's a great It's just a great job of booking Where like both of these guys are Championship match adjacent You know and like it's And to see where they And to see how this plays

into that is the most interesting part. Yeah, they're dudes who have nothing going on, but they make sense together. Yeah. I think you got, I pick Sammy Zane. What do you think? I'm going the other way. I'm going to go. I think this is something that has legs.

That highlight real segment that they did had that sort of like fake shoot aspect to it, that they're really ramping up on both shows. And I think that there's a lot of ground that they can cover, bringing in Kevin Owens, taking him out, having all kinds of. callbacks to nxte or to jericho's career or to sammy zane's love of chris jericho when he was coming up there's just so much fertile ground storytelling ground you have to keep this going so i see nefarious deeds for chris jericho and victory i think that if this is going to uh i think if this is going to have legs you're right maybe then then jericho winning is a good idea um i could see it going

either way though so i'm going to stick with zane next charlotte versus sasha versus bailey the triple threat for the raw women's championship. So if I had to pick someone for this match, even though it seems like there's a lot of possibilities, the only one that makes sense to me is Sasha winning. Bailey, it's too soon. Charlotte's run its course. It's her as a champion.

I think they only switched the bell at SummerSlam because they thought that Sasha had a bad back injury. So now whatever their plan was before that, they can go back to it. Let Charlotte and Dana have their weird feud. I don't know what they're doing, And part of that, and that's not a knock. It's a compliment.

I mean, it does, they hype every, they hype all of these matches up as giant moments where it's like, I really thought that, and that's because they're trying to give this esteem to the women's division, which it deserves, and they're doing that for the right reasons. And I'm not knocking it. But it does seem like, like, I thought when Sasha dropped the belt that we were going to have a six month, we're going to have a run all the way to WrestleMania for chasing the belt. Now it feels like if we see, if Charlotte wins again, despite Sasha being so close, we've seen Charlotte do this before, right? You're right that it's too soon for Bailey, but, like, I mean, it's a three-way. So, I mean, I guess anybody could win in a very kind of schmazy way.

Dana Brooke is obviously going to be involved to some extent. They could go a lot of different directions with this. I agree. We were talking about Naya Jax earlier, and now I'm thinking about this match, I don't think Nia Jax is in the main event at least for another month, because if either of the baby faces win,

there's a rematch there's a you know we got to kind of get them clear of this this existing feud yeah and she can't she can't lose that's the thing is nia jacks once she loses where does her heat go so she can't work with anybody that's that important because she's going to have to take a pinfall one of the really interesting things to me about them booking her as a monster and i think i hope it doesn't blow up in their face you know i mean that's just the trajectory of every monster heel that's come before right uh you know you're better off booking, you know, I mean, like, look, I'm, I can't think of the right example, but for, but, but, but, but, but an example is like, Ryback, after his giant monster push at the beginning, he kind of found a

spot as just a regular wrestler who happened to look like really intimidating, you know, and he could eat a pen and it was okay. Um, they got to figure out a way to transition IJax into the realm of humanity, though I don't fault them for, for, uh, trying to get her all the hype they can. You know what they do? Simple. They get Kevin Nash to shock her with the cattle broad. Oh yeah. All right. I'm all in on that.

That thing, that's a terrible idea. I don't endorse that at all. I think it is a terrible idea. You're right. Next we have, so wait, your pick is Sasha.

Yeah. I have to pick. I'm, oof. I'm conflicted. We got the gravity of history on one side and my inability to really see a way out of this

on the other. I'm just going to take a flyer on Bailey. Wow. It's, it would be, it's not, I feel like that would get approved and creative and then shot down because of the significance of this title belt

or the desired significance of the title belt. We want to keep it on Charlotte for a longer period of time. But I don't know. She had the belt for almost a year if you count the Deva's title. Yeah. I mean, or if maybe it was a full year, it's run its course, move on. But not Bailey.

Because there's money in Bailey getting it at a later date and dragging that out. That's my opinion, I could be wrong. All right. New Day versus Gallows and Anderson? Well, first of all, this is going to be the match where I go use the bathroom because I just think they've really botched

the buildup to this. These are two teams that I like, too. I like both of these teams, and I just don't care about the story. Rarely do you see a decision to change the booking made into the, brought into the booking, but when the new day came out and were just like, you remember when you guys were funny for the past several weeks? That sucks. Yeah, that was not good. That was a waste

of everybody's time. And then Anderson and Gallows came out and the announcers were like, yeah, they just, they really, like, that really made them mad. And now they're back to the old Gallows in Anderson. It was very weird. I think they handled it very well, but there still is the stench of death on this whole program. So my desire is for Gales and Anderson. It win the belts, let the new day sort of refresh themselves a bit, because their act as the champions is getting a bit stale. Yeah. And find something else for them to do. Do you think Galison Anderson should win then?

Yeah, and then have them work with Inzo and Cass. Yeah. Because you can't do Inzo and Cass versus the New Day. There's just too much wackiness going on. I think it would be the easiest booking in the world to have Galaz and Anderson win, even if it's in a sketchy fashion, and have the New Day come out on Monday or the Monday after that and just say, like we're being inspired by our loss and one of us is going to be the next WW champion and just go from there.

That would be great. Move them up. Yeah. It's time for them to function as a faction as opposed to free bird rules kind of thing. I like that. That would be an ideal sort of thing to use that heat and they're in ringability

in the upper levels of the card instead of having them work with these sort of tag teams that aren't on their level. And everybody said, I mean, I had this conversation on Monday night, but, you know, people always ask which one of them is the champion, like, who has the chance? And the interesting thing is I think you can make the case for all of them. And part of that is, I mean, they all have different skill sets. And I think Biggie probably, Biggie probably gets the most votes from people that I talk to. But Xavier's got, he's a very, very gifted talker and performer. And Kofi, I think Kofi is actually the sleeper candidate. I mean, I think he, you could slot him into a title match, especially against someone like Rollins, or, or, are Kevin Owens really, really seamlessly. Absolutely, yeah. All three of them are very good workers. But I think that the real answer is it doesn't matter.

That if it's like, if it's like the actual fabulous freebirds where Michael PS Hayes is working a title match and his two buddies are outside, well, like, it doesn't matter that Michael Hayes is your third choice for who deserves the title on the freebirds, you know? Because the heat is evenly distributed. Yeah. I don't think that's the case with Enzo and Cass where without Inzo, Cass is just a big dude. the catchphrase. All three of those guys are equally as over and equally as talented. Wait, are Inso and Cass versus the Shining Star is not on this card? I don't, I'm sure it's going to be a pre-show match.

Because if Naya Jacks versus Alicia Fox is the only pre-show match, and it's three minutes or five minutes or whatever, if that. Maybe they're just going to hold it in reserve in case, you know, like Randy Orton's concussion is contagious and somebody else can't go for the pay-review. I shouldn't make light of concussions. Yeah, good point. We got to get out of here. One more match, Kevin Owens versus Seth Rawlins, for the WWE Universal Championship.

There is only one thing that I think you can guarantee about this match, and it is that Triple H will be involved. Wow. That's actually a really bold. I think that we've talked about wrestling logic a few times in the show. Judging by wrestling logic, 100% I agree with you. Judging by the really bizarre itinerant schedule of the WWE Legends, I... And the fact that the... the triple age's involvement was pre was necessitated by by fin getting hurt yeah that i could see them

just throwing just saying like we're just going to throw triple h out there and just and no future plans for him like we'll just wait for that to come back around later um i think that by lot but logically you're right i i i would side with you there i think that's the best case scenario i don't actively want to see triple h be a part of this angle um but they talk about it enough. You're right. It has come up a million times. And Stephanie's sort of equivocation about whether, about her involvement.

Yeah. What are his motives? Why do he do that he hasn't had that 20 minute long raw promo that opens the show or he's screaming into the mic about. And listen, I was waiting for that after Kevin Owens won. I wanted that promo. So maybe I'll get it a week in next Monday. You probably will.

I think that he's going to get involved. There's going to be. shenanigans of some kind and Kevin Owens is going to win because it's just again too soon as someone who knows wrestling you can kind of tell when there's going to be a title change and I think we both like to be

surprised but more often than not we are not surprised I think that you're totally right and I think the part of the heat part of the stink that Ron's has to get off of him before he is fully embraced as the champ I mean as the baby face of the show is the stink of him holding a title that he really didn't deserve for a really long period of time? No, I'm talking about deserve in K-Fabe.

Right. But for the average fans, the fans that aren't necessarily whooping his every move, those fans, I mean, there are a lot of fans who are just not Seth Rollins fans. Like, he was just too, he was too good of a heel for too long of a time. And I think putting the title back on him would revert to a, it would seem more like a reversion to, you know, know, to course or whatever. Yeah, and also let's, you know, think about his two shield buddies and when they won the title. So Roman Raines wins the belt.

He's already really kind of not popular. And you see the machinations of the writing staff of like, he's the guy. Let's build him up as the guy. And then the audience really just turns on him completely because they know he's not an underdog. He is the anointed one. Dean Ambrose wins the belt and money in the bank. and slowly but surely he gets to the point where he's being booed at backlash against arguably a really strong heel in a j styles if seth rollins wins the title on sunday you're going to see that sort of

dissipation of his heat because i think that the audience responds the most to the idea of the underdog the guy or or woman who is not faded in the stars to be the best which is why kevin owens gets a you deserve it, Chan, after he wins a belt, or Becky Lynch, or all these people, they're quote-unquote underdogs. And Seth Rollins has to build that credibility up. Yeah, I think that's totally right. It's interesting that, like, we're kind of three weeks into the Seth Rollins' baby-face experiment, but we spent so much of this episode talking about it.

I mean, Monday night was just the baby-faced turn. I mean, from the beginning of the show, but climaxing in that the big save in the cage match, you know? I mean, like, that's his baby face as it gets. And I was actually watching that beatdown thinking, like, like, I mean, Roman Reins doesn't have any friends, right? I mean, that's like, that's the most interesting part. And Seth Rollins of all people saves him. Yeah.

I mean, Mick Foley made a joke earlier in the show about how Roman Reins gets booed, right? Yeah. Like, that was, I was wondering if they were just going to really go down that path. But, yeah, it was interesting for Seth to do that. And I guess there'll probably be some drama that spills out from that. Yeah. Anyway, Magnum T.A. versus Nikita Koloff was the best of seven series that I was thinking. Okay, good.

Good. Well worth watching on the network. Absolutely, yeah. And that was, I think, right before the car crash. Watch that instead of Talking Smack this week. Not that Talking Smack is not great. Talking Smack is the best. But watch wrestling.

Talking Smack is doing a good job of being a different thing than the other product that you don't have to watch every week. Now, I'm sorry, Renee Young, if you're listening to this show. He's great. Daniel Bryan is great. I would watch that. If they just told me what happened on Raw every week, I would, if it was like Sports Center, I would just like fill me in. So you don't have to watch Raw?

Yeah, I mean, I might still watch Raw. I'm just saying. If there are various ways to do it. You've got one week where it's just like, I'm not going to watch Raw. Yeah, I guess I could always do Hulu. Listen, WW Network, not Hulu, is showing this pay-per-view this weekend. So watch it. So we'll have something to talk about next week.

And Dave, thank you so much for stopping by. You're very welcome. If anybody goes to the event and they have T-shirts celebrating Kevin Owen's inevitable victory on Sunday, just don't even have to tweet me. Just nod and smile and say, the masked man thought of that. Send him one. He would love a free one. Oh, yeah, I should probably get the prototype.

Absolutely. Anyway, enjoy Clash of Champions. Enjoy your weekend before Clash of Champions. Get to get out of the house, do something fun, and forget about the fact that there's a wrestling pay-per-view on every day. Enjoy your life. Enjoy your life, humanoids.