The Press Box - Ep. 191: 'The Masked Man Show' With Dan St. Germain

Episode Date: October 5, 2016

The Ringer's David Shoemaker and Dan St. Germain discuss the TNA sale (6:00), Ric Flair–Halle Berry rumors (12:00), Sasha's big win (22:00), 'No Mercy' headliners (35:00), and Dolph vs. Miz (43:00). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it's Bill Simmons. Today's episode of Channel 33 is brought to you by Seat Geek, the presenting sponsor for my podcast, as well as the only fan-friendly app for buying and selling tickets for sports and music. With just two taps on your phone, you can instantly buy Seekkeek tickets to an event, and you can enter that event just using your phone.

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any given Wednesday, which runs every Wednesday night at 10 p.m. on HBO. And reruns on HBO Now, HBO Go, and HBO on. demand. And now without further ado, here is the Masked Man, David. Shoemaker. Welcome to the Masked Man Show. I'm here with my dear friend Dan St. Germain. How you doing, Dan? Oh, I'm great. King of Sadstile himself is here. Yeah, that's good. You're like the multi-time podcast champion, only just because

you have so many podcasts. We were just, we're sitting here watching, and it's okay, we're sitting here watching Brian Kendrick's, who Brian Kendrick won against T.J. Perkins on Ron Monday. He's reasserted himself as the number one contender for the new Cruiserweight Championship. And, and we decided to celebrate that by watching this 2011 interview he gave to truth is scary about lizard creatures running America, 9-11 being a hologram, the moon being artificial. It's funny because right, the recommended video is, It says Rob Van Dam talks New World Order 9-11, JFK. Listen, there was a great article.

I think it was on Deadspan a year or two, a year or so ago, about why MMA fighters are all conspiracy theorists, because there's all this. It's like left unattended for 45 minutes. Any UFC fighter will tweet about, you know, about the Jews being behind 9-11 or something. You know, like it's crazy, but I think that there's probably some connection here.

One, I think is, you know, self-medication for injuries and stuff. Absolutely. Brian Kendrick, I mean, listen, I'm all for smoking weed. Like, do it all you want, have a good time. But, and especially if it helps you on some sort of, like, emotional or, you know, pain relief level. The NFL coming down on weed and W.B. coming down on weed is absolutely atrocious, in my mind. There is a different level of marijuana usage, which, you know, might.

Do you think this is marijuana this guy? That might make lizard, lizard rulers. Reptillions, excuse me. There are four types of extraterrestrial. the grays, the reptilians. Oh, man, okay. Yeah, we have a lot of stuff to talk about today that's not just the Brian Kendrick's, like, outside.

But please check it out. Because, I mean, wrestlers, wrestling opinions on the Rothschilds and the families that control America, it's just terrific. I think that at the same time there is something about the fighting game, which leads people to believe. Yeah. I think you just have a lot of, you have a whole lot of free time where you can really do nothing.

Like you have days set aside to sit around because you've been working out so hard, you've been taking all these bumps, whatever. And you're on the road a lot, so it's not even like you have routines. So I think that there's a lot of time that you have available for like weird internet deep dives and watching YouTube videos

and also reading comments and stuff on Twitter where people reaffirm your crazy ideas and stuff like that. I will say I believe in some of that stuff. Yes, absolutely. I do not believe the reptilians are real. I do not believe 9-11 is a hologram. I believe the moon is real. Like, I don't go to the extreme level.

You just said I believe some of that stuff and then took away all of my favorite theories. Right. I don't believe Sandy Hook was a conspiracy. I'm going to get Brian Kendrick on. I'm going to try to get Brian Kendrick on the show because I think he should get his own show on the ringer. I think he, yeah, that's fine with me, man. I want to hear his thoughts on the Mandela effect. That's why, like, there's a lot of, there's a lot of, there's a lot of, no, it's a relatively new one.

It was, it's a relatively new one. basically the idea that there's two parallel dimensions and they've been like smushed into one or some people have been sucked out of one into another and basically what it boils down to is that like any memory that you have from childhood that turns out to be slightly skewed is from that dimension.

You blame on the Mandel. Yeah, you blame on it being. Why is Nelson Mandela in that dimension? Because it started off because someone had the someone had the memory that Nelson Mandela had died in jail and like a bunch of people were like, yeah, me too. Yeah, me too.

So this is like the Barrenstein, Barrenstein bears. That's exactly what it is. That's like the number one part of it, except for, yeah. Mantella and Barrett's team bears, which is a great crossover if you ever read that book. The best episode of the Masked Man Show of all time. Listen, we have a bunch of stuff to talk about.

We have a pay-per-view coming up on Sunday because, of course, we do. No mercy all the time. It's going to be a good one. And then we have a bunch of stuff from, I mean, a big episode of Raw, weirdly to get to. And I think we should start off with these. We have some news notes that we really have to get. to.

There are a bunch of stuff. I'm going to, a bunch of little things. I want to fly through these as quickly as possible because we don't want to spend, we can spend the whole episode talking about any of these things. And we also want to spend the last 10 minutes talking about the Mandela effect. Yeah, we got to get, we got to bring this back around full circle. Okay, number one, TNA is for sale. It's not sold yet.

I don't know if you saw, by the way, TNA spoiler is about to happen because I don't know the difference between things that happened to tapings that aren't going to have, whatever. I'm just reading. I heard the guys from Blind Melon are going to buy it. It's going to be a grudge warfare from the early 90s. Geez. Okay, so now the newest rumor is that WWE is buying the tape library, but not the promotion,

which sort of makes sense. Pretty smart move by WWE. Well, without the tape library is kind of only valuable to WWE in a way. I mean, like it would be nice for TNA, however, it continues to exist to be able to show clips of the past. But as long as the wrestlers cycle out, could you pick five wrestlers from T&A? that you'd, I think I could pick more than five. Yeah, yeah. Sam and I looked at this last week.

I mean, basically it's like you get, I mean, there are five former WWE guys that you'd be happy to have back, right? I mean, and they have some young talent that I wouldn't, or some people that have never made the cross-harto. I think he's good. I mean, he spent some time in WWE, like you're in NXT anyway.

Nice body. If you're a body guy, EC3 is that, yeah, I mean, there's definitely, I mean, yeah, Drew Galloway is there. I mean, there's a lot of good people. And then they switched They again, spoilers, switch the championship. They headbound for glory on Sunday

Then switch the, then gave the championship on Monday at a taping To Eddie Edwards, which is I'm pretty sure I said on the podcast last week That he should have been their champion for a while, which is very strange. I am so out of the loop. I mean, I watched a little bit when Angle came And then I just totally. Well, anyway, WWE

That was years and years ago. It remains to be seen what happens. Billy Corrigan is out there talking a lot of talking up the future of the company we'll see if anything happens by the time the people listen to this Eric Bischoff probably bought the company

so let's see let's see what other news we got Rick Flair I came out this week and said that he slept with Hallie Berry back in the day Hallie Barry's people formally have denied this since then do you have any thoughts on the subject?

I mean of course I hope it's true I wouldn't under you know Like, I think they're comparable at some point. He's the greatest wrestler for all time, and she's a pretty good actress, you know. She won an Oscar, but it's not like she's known as, you know, Viola Davis or Merrill Streep or something. I was talking to Kenny Herzog, who's another, who writes a Rolling Stone about wrestling and stuff. He's great about this.

I would love to, I would love to, like, map out just some, like, giant infographic of their respective careers and find the exact point where it would have made sense that Rick Flair is a famous enough wrestler and she's not quite a famous enough star? I looked at that and the time of her divorce she would have been too famous to have sex with. Like the time that he pinpoints it as? Yeah.

Oh, he said right after her divorce? Yeah, he said right after her divorce. So early 90s, like the first divorce or the first breakup or whatever. And she would have been too famous then because I think she was around at that point. I think that he met someone who looked like her at a car show and they had sex in the storage room

or the back room. There's just no way that she had sex with the reflars. Plus he's like a pretty big Republican and I don't know if like a smart black woman is going to have sex with somebody who's like a big GOP guy. Yeah, no, come on. He might vote like a Republican, but he certainly doesn't party like one. He does not party.

But, like, I was talking to Michael Orange, who's a comedian about this. And, like, the reason Flair is so, like, he's the greatest, right? But the reason he's the greatest is, like, he's the Brad Pitt, but for B parties. You know, like, he's fucked the hottest girl in Daytona Beach. He's not hooked up with the hottest girl in Hollywood. You know, he's, like, the king of the small. town. He's the guy who has sex with your wife in Paducah, Kentucky, not the guy

who, you know... He's a wrestling heel, yeah. He's a guy... Yeah. He's not, like, but he's not like at the, you know, he's not at the Ritz or the, you know, like, I don't think he's pulling that. He's like, like, if I got really famous, whatever, you know, like, if, like... And you are, uh, among the Mountain Duke Code Red crowd, by the way. If I, that's not, come on, you'd be nice. But the, uh, yeah, no, but, like, anybody listening to this, I'm saying, like, if you're just average Joe, if you get famous, the trajectory of who you date is basically like, like, you know, maybe like day one of your fame is you get to hook up with all the girls from back home that never gave you the time of day.

Right. And then like day two through four is like the hottest girl in every city that you, that you, you know, pass through. But then like you really, you plateau really quickly. It seems like everybody, like as soon as you can get celebrity, so as soon as you can date other celebrities, that's just what you're doing. I've messaged girls who have like a tiny bit of fame, and they blow you off pretty quick. They give you a couple texts, and then that's it. What I'm saying is Rick Flair did what really is really the smartest celebrity of any definition around. Yeah.

Is he just stuck with the second phase. He didn't bother, well, Halle Berry Dallions aside. He's just sticking with the hottest girl in every town, which is the move. Yeah, it's a great move. If every town you're hooking up with the girls like Coors Light sends to bars, you know what I mean? Like to give you free merch and stuff, you've got a pretty good life. You know what I mean? And by the way, I don't even know where that, like, you've got to get to a point because even, like, I remember when I got, this is like a brag, but I got on Fallon and I was like a girl that I was obsessed.

The Jimmy Fallon show? Oh, yeah, baby. Before it began the tonight show, so not as impressive. You didn't have to qualify it. But yeah, thank you. But I remember I messaged a girl and I was like, hey, so I just did Fallon some girls in Love with in college. He goes, that's great for you. Like, it still was like, I still was like a popper.

I think sending the text message was the error. You should have let her watch it on DVR or whatever. There's a lot of sad aspects of my personality, David. Yeah, that's true. All right, so final verdict. Did Rick Flair sleep with Halliberry, yay or nay? I'm going to go with nay, but my heart says yay. My mind says nay, but my heart says yay.

Yeah, I'm with you on that. Okay. Continuing and weird out of the ring news, this is more on the sad side. Two different wrestlers have been stabbed, I believe, since the last time we recorded a podcast. One of which in the most wrestling way possible, which is driving back to the trailer park.

Jamie Noble, yeah, I think he had already gotten back and then left to have a serious conversation. Also, he works at WWE and he was in the trailer park. I thought that that's something you do after you get fired from WWA. I thought that's the Randy the Ram move. Again, wrestlers are known for either being really profitly get really wasteful with their money

or for being really conservative of spending and saving the money. Yeah. If you're on the road 300 days a year, then like live in a trailer, man. I think it's a good move, honestly. Him and his wife live in a trailer, and he's offering $500 to anyone who is able to find out who the stabber is. That's not true, is it? Does he not know who the stabbard is?

He's no idea. He's offering $200 for him. Did he see them? What happened was, I read details of the case last night. He cut someone off in traffic or something. like that. And they showed up. They followed him to the trailer park. And they said he tried to apologize. I don't think that that's probably what happened. I'm sure that they got in. Oh, the story from Jamie's side. Right. I'm sure they probably got into it. And then they, like, and two other guys

came out of the car and three people stabbed him. I don't know if it's a Sean Michael's thing where it's just one person who stabbed him and they said it was three. But either way, the guy got, the guy got stabbed pretty good. I mean, he's still in the hospital, apparently. So I hope he gets well. I always liked his work. And I love them with Seth Rowlands. Thank goodness there weren't any guns involved because the DVD died. Second of all, they're like, who solves problems with a knife in 2016?

Like, I'm happy there weren't any guns. The bad guy in every Sylvester Stallone movie in the first scene in the 80s. Maybe that's it. And Nighthawks. Oh, man, we've got to start working on our Jamie Noble-inspired screenplay. This is going to, it's going to be really good stuff. But also then Alberto Del Rio, who I love the guy. He is so much more interesting outside WWE than inside WW.

Exactly. Exactly the point. He's made himself into this character in a way that we all I always dream guys are going to when they when they got in the indie scene But he has sort of a reputation For for for not showing up I think there was some sort of a sick children's charity during his last time outside of WWE that he that he Mysteriously didn't make it therefore But now he didn't make his first big show with AAA

Which is a little bit down the dumps compared to maybe if you have a idea in your head of what AAA is is not quite right there, you know, where it used to be in the Mexican wrestling landscape. But the, he missed, he just no-showed his first show and said then after the fact he Instagrammed a photo of himself having me stabbed. Those are pretty gnarly those photos, though. Yeah, he said he had car trouble and then there was a stabbing and then whatever. What's outside of restaurant or something? Yeah.

Wow, I don't even know what to think. I mean, like my, like, my, like, that's actually normal car trouble in Mexico. It's not that transmission. It's like, yeah, cartels stab me. Yeah, that's what car trouble means. It's just so crazy. It's so crazy. Like, I'm gonna, man, I mean, Del Rio is, is, is working the craziest gimmick.

He's a fucking badass out. He gets, you know, he survives a stabbing. He gets to hook up with Page. He's what, like 15 years younger than him? Yeah, he got fired. He basically didn't get fired. He ended up leaving WWE under a cloud of, like, them trying to break him and Page up. That was the, there was the rumors.

Right. Vince does not like interracial dating. He's, oh, my God. he's basically like the quintessential bad boy, right? He's just like, I'm going to date her no matter what you say.

Right, are they still dating? I think so. Good for him. I think she's tweeted like, you know, 12 or 13 tattoos on an almost daily basis. A different tattoo that she gets... I'm just kidding. That's not true.

No, she has two, right? Huh? She has two tattoos. Of Del Rio? Yeah. Yeah, I have no idea. Why is it? They hate that guy.

It's so crazy that they... Because I know if Triple H hates, I hear the Triple H anyway, he hates that dude. And it's like, he keeps coming back. I don't even know why they asked him to come back if this was the trajectory, you know. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I think that there's at some point you're, when you're working the WW payroll. I mean, they brought him back because they needed that SummerSlam pop, like, and they got it.

Right. That was the hell in the cell? Yeah. Yeah, you're right. It was in Brooklyn. Is that one thing? No, it was in L.A. I'm so confused.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. So. United States Championship. ship to have. Yeah, they needed that. They just needed the pop that night. I mean, they really needed something to, like,

excite to make, to make you remember. It was in L.A. If you've been to an event in L.A., it's like 60%, 70% of Hispanic, you know. Well, I don't even think, yes. I think that probably matters, but I think on a bigger level, it's like you just want, like,

it's worth the contract just to get that pop and to hope that you can squeeze whatever else out of that, right? It could have gone a different way, and I think that everybody who said they could. Why are they so pissed that he, like, wrestlers date each other? So it's so weird to me.

The impression that I got was that it was more about kind of protecting Page who they have a lot in fascinating. It sounds really racy, doesn't it? It sounds a little racisty. You can imagine some, like, if it was like your sister dating like some dude you know, like there's certain people. But that's not my sister, you know, like that's... Okay, or your friend. Let's just say that like a good friend, like a employee relationship. That's what I'm...

But it's a family. Like, they got to look at, like, if a young, if a young, incredibly talented comedian that you know, immediately hooked up with like whoever like the Sam Kinnison of the current comedy season is. It happens a lot. But you feel that in your stomach. You're just like, oh, that's a bad look.

Like she's going to go down a bad path. Or the reverse way. I don't know. She comes from a wrestling family, so I think the damage is already done. Like her mom was having her wrestle when she was 16, so she's already trash. I think before 16, yeah.

Anyway, I don't know why we're way down this rabbit hole. Okay, that's it. Okay, we got one more news bomb, and that is that Meltzer and many others are reporting that we might be getting Goldberg versus Brock Lesnar at Survivor Series. What? Who cares? Okay. I'm sorry, but I'm like, wasn't that booed out of the building at WrestleMania 20? Yeah. We're back to get some respect.

Like, what is the gimmick? I mean, it would be kind of cool if they feuded with the people who booed him in WrestleMania 20. Like they did like the Ron our test thing where they just go into the crowd and start beating up. If you, like, bring a ticket stub from WrestleMania 20 and you can get in the ring? And you're allowed to fight Goldberg. Plus, he's, like, not in this, even in that commercial, he's not in the same shape that it used to be. No, I mean, it's, and it's totally feasible. HG. H, baby.

Yeah. You got to get back into shape. That's fine. These guys should be doing whatever they want to do. So, probably Survivor Series is Lesner versus Goldberg. Yeah. Do we, do you think we're in a place now where Goldberg, I mean, where Lesner is only fighting these, like, silly special matches? I don't know, but I think that they need to change his character a little bit.

Lesnar? Yeah, he's going to be on Bray Wyatt territory soon where he desperately needs a character change. Like, I understand that, like, unless you want him to, unless you're having him put over, like, Finn Bal or WrestleMania, you need to, like, show a different side. He's been the monster heel guy for now over four years. It's not like they try to change him in eight months. He's had the same character for over four years now. And they kind of were going to let him run as a bit. It seemed like they were pushing them towards the baby face sort of side of things.

And then he just took another vacation than they forgot about it. You know, like it's not like they forgot about it. It's just it's a weird. You know, there's a lot more I think you can get out of Haman. And, you know, listen, WrestleMania 31, he was, that was probably the pinnacle of awesome Lesnar-esque. Yeah. Lesnar stuff, like right before, right when, you know, Rollins beat Raines and the cash in. But I think that now we're getting to the point of like, all right, man, we got to do something a little different.

This is my, this is it. This is the, I'll put a bow on this. But, like, this is my biggest problem with this feud, or if it comes to pass, is that I don't care about it. In the ring, they can go at each other. They can have a good match, whatever. Like, I'm willing to suspend all my disbelief when two guys are in the ring together. But the promos, at least in 2016, have to be a little bit legit. have to be a little bit work shooty, you know.

And there is no ver, there is, if he was actually trying to, if Paul Heyman was actually cutting a promo on Bill Goldberg, yeah, a two-minute promo would end Bill Goldberg's career forever. It would not be hard for someone as smart and as eloquent as Paul Heyman to just destroy Goldberg to the point that no one ever wanted to see him again. Yeah, that's a good point. And the fact that he's not going to do it is crazy, right? Like, it's like that, that's going to be the biggest, like,

that's going to be the biggest work in all of pro wrestling in the past 10 years is Paul Hayman like pretending that Goldberg is real. I will say this. There is no one more annoying on like the podcast circuit than Bill Goldberg. It really is. He was on my podcast. Oh, he was. So yeah, there I listened to it.

But like there is no one who like, like that guy there's never been a wrestler who should thank booking more than him. You know what I mean? And that's what I mean. Like if Paul Heyman gets on there and he's just like, you're a gimmick. Brock Lesnar as a fighter. away.

Right, exactly. And that's it. Yeah. Anyway, inevitably, they're going to bring back. And by the way, I love pro wrestling families. You know, saying that Page is trashed. That was wrong. I'm actually in love with her, so I...

You're just jealous. I'm a little jealous. There's a new W.W. There's new raw intro music. Do you like it? Did you notice? I didn't notice. I zip through the beginning because...

I think we need to stop with the intro music. I like the... There's no one to introduce, right? There's been some good ones. I love it. wha, wah, wah, wah, where that was the first one. Was that what's happening?

No. Oh, you're doing, you're doing it. The raw music. And then there was, and she refused to see the change in me. Exactly. But there comes a point where like even, you know, Friends goes to a shorter version of the theme song, right?

We can just do like two bars of music. They have three hours to fill. They should do like a whole. They're trying to look like a live sporting event. A 10 minute beginning. Yeah, well, anyway. I think that's it. We got to talk about some real, real news here.

I mean, some actual things that happened this week. We're going to preview No Mercy. Do you want to do Raw first? Yeah, let's talk about Raw. I don't know how much there is to talk about. I think the real, I mean, there's a lot we could touch on. The biggest thing that happened. How great the range is on Netflix?

Let's talk about that. The Range? That's the Ashton Coucher show. You're right. We published an article about it on the ring or two weeks ago. Yeah. I'm sure you guys loved it. I think it was good.

I don't know. The piece was more about binge watching sitcoms, which is a weird phenomenon that's kind of, you know, a new part of our experience. But anyway, moving on, I binge watch. I ended up binge watching a lot of wrestling this week because I had a seven-year-old's birthday party. Ericson, an seven-year-old turning eight.

Do you watch it on your phone or does he watch it with you? Oh, no, he's not watching wrestling. He's, I mean, he's watched on occasion, but mostly it's like I was celebrating his birthday so I like binge watch a lot of it in two big chunks Oh, that's rude. So wrong, I mean I guess what's confused,

I bring this up every week, so I don't want to keep having this meta discussion about what WW is doing with their schedule, although the fact that we have another pay-per-view this week, like literally every episode of the show is going to be either like a pay-per-view recap or a pay-per-view preview. And that's just the way that it's set up now.

It's a little rough. but it does seem like they're making a deliberate decision to have like legitimate championship matches every week on one or the other of these shows, right? Yeah. Like we had, like last week, didn't we have a world heavyweight championship match on Smackdown? Oh, yes, we did.

And then the week before. US championship, world championship. And tag team championship. And then like the week before that wasn't there like a universal championship? It seems like every week we're getting a major, major match on one of the two shows, and every other week we're getting a pay-per-view. This week's version of the major match was Charlotte versus Sasha for the raw women's championship. Sasha went over.

Here's my problem with it. I don't mean to be Mr. Hater here. I'm interested. I feel like a lot of these women's... My friend would... My friend, Dan Black, who has his own wrestling podcast, would... He kept saying this thing, and he was like, we don't talk about other wrestling podcasts on the mask.

Sorry. I'm just kidding. I'm actually co-hosting the Marty Genetti podcast now. I didn't want to break it to everybody. It's actually in Backman Arby's. But, yeah, Dan Black said this to me, where he was like, I'm really sick of every single angle being like, this is the first time we've ever done this.

This is such historic. This is so historic for women. Yeah. Like, it's just at the point where it's like, okay guys can we move past that and just have normal angles? Can you just, what would be really revolutionary is just doing it? Yeah.

And they literally recreated the last win that she had a month or month and a half ago. Like they recreated it totally. And it was really, I was really annoyed by it because I was like they had her crying at the end. They had this being like this big pass off on the title. She did the Sean Michaels look at the title thing again while weeping.

And I'm like, can we, I don't know what this does except for gets a pop at the staple center. I understand the corkscrew off the top was amazing, but even the match, it was good, but it wasn't as good as the last one. It wasn't as good as the one in NXT. And everybody's talking about how great it is. I'm like, you're just recreating old moments. And it's not even old moments.

No, it's like from a month I had ago. Yeah, if it was, right, if it was two years later and it was just like, you know, shades, as Jim Ross would say, shades of the match they had, you know, that, that everybody remembered, that'd be great. Right. And even her match with, I'm sorry, even Sasha and Bailey's, like, when they did, like, the two matches, the second one was evoked the first one without feeling like it was repetitive. It was a different match.

And I don't think this was, you know, totally repetitive. But I guess I do agree with you. When she won the title the first time and then dropped the title, I thought it was more of, like, just, I mean, one, she got the title that brief, my theory was, one, she got the title that briefly, kind of pop the crowd, but two, to sort of make it clear that she's the number one contender and that that was their plan all along for her to give it back. People were saying at the time it was because she was injured and she kind of got pulled out. And that, in retrospect, makes a whole lot of sense and feels like what they're doing now,

as you say, is just like, we're just redoing. It's like when someone botches a move on a, you know, on a television taping, they just do the spot over again and pretend like, you know, everybody they're alive thinks is confused. but at home you only see the good spot, right? Yeah. This is like that except we're the live crowd. We're seeing a botched spot be done over. And it's just, we just, you just sort of have to shake your head

and pretend that it only happened one time. I don't know. You know, like, I'm just getting, like, the whole, she's so much better when she's, like, got some attitude. Sasha? Yeah, we talked about this last week. She's a heel. I mean, that's just it.

Yeah. And it's, it's, they put, they took the, I mean, if we're over faces and heels, that's fine. But like... We're not, by the way. Right. I listen to you guys. But if you're, if we're not,

why do you take your only, like, the one actual, like, great baby face, female baby face on the roster and put her on Smackdown? And, like, now Raw is like, everybody, it's like... Yeah, Sasha, like, Charlotte is killing it as a heel. Sasha's working, Sasha works best as a heel. By the way, there's a way that she can be a heel, like, be a, there's a way that she can be at her best and still feud with Charlotte. Like, you know, WrestleMania, I mean, I'm sorry, Royal Rumble last year, they had that huge pop when she came out after the Charlotte Becky Lynch match. And then she kicked Becky Lynch out of the ring and then beat up Charlotte.

That's what you should do. You have the stokehold thing where he beats everybody up. You don't have to make her a heel or a face, but this weird, you know. And I got to, like, I think she's really good on the mic. but she does this one thing. I think it's just her vocal patterns. She has a weird, like, middle, like, draggy thing. She does with their voice.

I just want a vocal close to just fix that one thing she does because it's, like, perfect up until this middle... I have no idea what you're talking about. But now I want to know. It's like I'm... It's like a little bit of a... I don't know what it is. It's like she is it.

Like, I had problems with my Ls when I was in grammar school, you know? So I think she just... You've come a long way, man. Come a long way, man. Professional performer now. Listen, I'm really happy for Sasha. I'm really excited to see where they're going because, you know, all in all, like, this was, like, I want Sasha to do well. I want, and I love that WW is getting behind her, and I'm interested to see where they're going to go.

Yeah, she were my favorites. By the way, but also, I'm just going to one more note about the Becky thing. Like, Bailey, who I think is great, Bailey in a world full of heels is a really sad figure, right? but Bailey with something with like with Becky with other like more more traditional baby faces to bounce off of is a much more compelling character too like it's just crazy it's splitting up the division has been great for Alexa Bliss and great for Carmella and actually really I mean like the whole Smackdown side is Smackdown is just a way better show whoever is in Troy Trowell it's two hours and the expectations are lower and it's a little bit you know they're booking a little bit more old school and yeah it works it's working really well for them but if that was if Smackdown was raw we would be complaining about it. Like, it's just that our expectations for our hire. Really?

I don't know about that, man. And, you know, I think there's so many problems. I think this cruiserweight division is a huge problem. And I'll tell you why. You know, they brought it back being like, yeah, it'll be like the beginning of, you know, hour of WCW. But the problem is that, like, a lot of their big faces and heels now wrestle in a cruiserweight style. Yeah.

But they wrestle in a more believable cruiserweight style where they make each move more. important so now it just feels like you're watching a video game well this was I think the bull was really like the big opportunity that they lost in the brand split I don't mind the cruiserweight division I think it's great and actually I think going to what you were saying in the cruiserweight classic they had cruiser weights guys who were under 210 or whatever who were wrestling mat-based styles who were wrestling you know they had all different styles yeah and I think when they actually made the the guys they brought on to raw are all more aerial based, you know, but I think that having a bigger division with different styles

and having really just being a weight class situation is a better look. I also think, oh, part of the T&A news that we skipped is that Aaron Rex, formerly known as Damien Sandow, won the new T&A Grand Championship at Bound for Glory on Sunday. I mean that is. It's a new belt, which I think is great. It's sort of like the Ring of Honor Pure title where they, it's just like, it's not a different weight class. it's just a different style and the matches have different rules.

Right? So this is like a three, five minute round sort of setup. It's more like MMA. So it's points? Yeah, if someone doesn't win by a traditional pin or submission, then the referees get to decide or whoever gets to decide. Who's in charge of the points? I'm sure it's like the ringside announced.

They just bring out like doin' two dinks and they like make the decision. But I like, but I really like the idea of having multiple belts with different stakes, with different sets of rules. and that's a better way to have two co-equal titles than one on Ron and one on SmackDown. And it's a similar thing with the Cruiserweight title. It's okay if it's just different. Like, you just have to be lighter.

Like that makes sense. That's an intuitive thing. If you have to wear a big mask and a old one dragon mask, that should count more because of the lack of visibility from the mask. I totally agree. And it's really hard to turn your head. Of course. of which, geez, Louise, did you see that, that Tyson kid tweet?

No. He had like an inspirational... Talked about 9-11 or, no. He talked to, he was talking about had like an inspirational tweet the other day where he showed like his scar on the back of his neck, juxtaposed against a picture of his exact spot post-surgery where it was like a gnarly scar, you know? And it was, like, it was very, I'm sure, like, I hope that, I hope he recovers. I hope he's doing, you know, like, more power to the guy for really working hard and

trying to, you know, get back to 100%. but his tweet was basically like, like, I don't have the mobility I used to have, and I can't feel my head, but I'm trying every day to get, like, you can't. Dude, it's time to open your wrestling school at that point.

I can't feel my head. I mean, that's just, oh, anyway. So anyway. They have rough lives of these guys. Are him and Natty still together? Yes, so what do you think she, like, divorce him when he broke his neck? I don't know.

I guess wrestling seemed crazier things. Anyway, any other notes from Raw before we move on to No Mercy? I love that New Day is getting at... Can we just talk about how awful Ashton Coucher and the Danny, like how awful the commentary was? I'm not even... It's just one of those things that happens and I'm not going to complain. Although that one, I want someone to send me an audio clip of that part.

What did Action Coucher sing? Like he sang, it's like at the very end of the match, he sang like one bar of a pop song and then like you could tell one word in. He second guessed it. but just sort of kept going. It was like the saddest little thing. You just shouldn't have, like they shouldn't be talking, like you guys touched upon this last week.

You shouldn't have Kevin Owens interacting with those dudes. Like, they're just, and I just thought like they acted too cool for it. At least Hugh Jackman when he came in, he's like, yeah, I'm in it. You know, and they just acted like they were, like you guys aren't cool celebrities. No one ever thought Ashton Coucher was like Ryan Gosling or some shit like that.

Like, you are in it, dude. I mean Milakunis thought it somehow. I don't know. Right. I don't give a fuck about that 70s show. Okay? So, y'all can blow me. Fucking don't ruin my wrestling show.

This is like the crad, the bluest you've ever worked. It's an Ashton Coucher riff. I don't really know. I like that the New Day got a look with Kevin Owens and Jericho. Like it feels like they're actually letting the New Day, like, you know, reach for that Brad, the proverbial brass way.

They should be pushing them to the moon. They're the best part of Raw. And I thought Owens and Jericho were on fire. as they, you know, whatever. They're really funny. That list thing is really funny. I will say the valet, there been a lot of questions

about the valet on my Twitter and I've been avoiding them, but I did watch. Wait until they find it. It's Dipperstein in a wig. Wait till I find out. That it's going to be terrible. The,

but the, but the, the valet was watching around with me and she looks up halfway through that, the Seth Rallens interview with Michael Cole, which I wasn't 100% in on. She was just like,

they shouldn't talk like this more often. This is the first time I've ever liked him. She hates him. him and I was just like oh wait were you getting worked and she was like what do you mean it was like did you just hate him because he was such an irritating heel and he was like yeah the way he like laughs the way he like he's the when he's cocky he's just insufferable but I do think there's something to that like it worked or not worked like he was I didn't love that interview because I I I sort of my initial reaction was that like that was the fakesst work shoot sort of interview I've ever

seen in my life and so I wasn't all in but personality wise I think they've really found to kind of the right mode for Rollins. He doesn't need to be a Saccharine baby face. He needs to care just enough. Yeah, but they still need to put them over as a baby face, and they haven't done it yet. And it's just weird. I still think that it's,

they still haven't figured it out yet. I think, I think with a lot of these things, they're, you know, are they going to have a Hell and a Cell match? That's kind of like a weird. Roman Raines and a Reddh.

Well, they are, yeah, and then they're saying Charlotte and Sasha are going to have one. At the-Hell and a cell. Oh, Helen a cell, of course. I get all these paper views confused. I thought that, yeah, okay. They need to bring back war games if you guys are going to do. People say this all the time.

They're never going to bring back war games. I want four rings in the ring. That's it. That's just like 100 seats that WWE can charge $5,000 a pop for that aren't going to be in the arena. Well, you know, I don't know. If you guys ante up. Don't come back to me with me in your logic. If we do a Kickstarter where it's like we're going to pay, it's two rings, first of all.

But yeah, if we have a Kickstarter where we pay for all the floor seats at WWW. is missing out on, maybe we can get him to listen. Yeah. I don't have to pay for Scott Hall's eighth trip to rehab, I think, instead. That's not nice. Sorry. I've been to rehab. That was mean.

Sorry. You can talk about it. All right. All right, quick break. Let's talk about Raw. Let's talk about Sasha's Big Night. But before we get there, I just got to have a little word from our sponsor. The Mask Man Show this week is brought to you by Casper, which in my mind is the

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On Sunday, you mentioned it before. We got No Mercy. It's going to be fun. The greatest W.W.B. Paperview may be of all time. If you had to tell me, like, I don't want to downgrade this. I'm actually stoked about this paper view. But if you had to, like, just guess, not based on the real world, but, like, no mercy, 2016. When you envision it in your head, are you, like, alone in your apartment and your underwear?

or you like at a party with a bunch of people? Are you at the event? Like, what is the level of exciting? Well, I think SmackDatz done a good job. I mean, the vein event is awesome. You guys were talking last week about the attitude era and how it never matched the main event pop. I think this is the closest, this main event,

like, not in the sense that it's, like, really dirty or edgy, but, like, in the sense that these are all three important guys who all have their unique personalities who want to fight each other. And it's, it's, it doesn't feel thrown together at all. And it feels like that attitude era where these big personalities are, are going to clash. And it's, and it really does, you know, there are two faces and a heel in that match, but you kind of like everybody in it. And I think that they've gotten a weird place too where almost anyone who wins is going to get a pop, which is nuts.

Yeah. Because of the way they've booked it. Yeah. Not just the, we're at a pay-per-view, so we're going to act like we're at, like, the greatest WrestleMania of all time. Right. Which is one of my favorite crowd phenomenons, and I don't even hate it. I love, I love when you go to a show and you get, when, like, the first, you get the first,

This is Awesome Chan of the Night. It's always a little bit of a, like, premature. This is an awesome champ. Yeah. Yeah, because you just, because everybody there just wants to be a part of a, this is awesome moment, right? So you just get, like, so you're just like, so you're just like, Every time something gets better and better. But it's the same thing.

You pop for a big, as if every title changes. Fight forever is the next one, right? That's the upgrade of it. This is awesome. Yeah, we got to every... Talk about that. That's, yeah. I mean, but that one is really rarefied still.

Like, it's not... Then on top of that, for wrestling fans, it's, I have no one. Sorry. That's terrible. You're never allowed on this show again. So, yeah, I agree. There's a lot of... A lot of stuff we're talking about.

Kurt Hawkins is on the card. Not particularly worth talking about. talking about, although I'm interested, I'm glad that they've been giving him. It's not to be announced. Everybody's favorite wrestler. There's, there's Nikki Bella versus Carmelo, which is a nice, like, lower card match that they've done a good buildup on. Nikki Bell was hotter than Ever, doesn't she?

I don't know what they're doing. Yeah, man, it's that neck surgery. He's later, he can't feel as much. Beauty and the Man Beast versus the Uso's. It's going to be fun. All these matches are fun. You're right. Somehow by making the most, like, old,

school tag division possible, they've made tag wrestling interesting again. Again, I'm not 100% sure that we've been pretty interesting the past couple years. No, yeah, but it's, this is, this is the, I mean, I'm very excited for this match. Yeah. Compared to how I normally, I think I feel. Becky Lynch versus Alexa Bliss. That'll be good. It'll be good. Randy Orton versus Bray Wyatt. I mean, you guys talked about it last week, but especially this week when that feud just turned into an episode of pawn stars. Why is he? So, so Sister Abigail is back. I'm not, I wasn't aware. She was in that storage unit

the whole time. I love that we had to take like a wrestling crappy thing I've ever seen. I think that he had the isolation allowed him to meditate and she came back to him in a metaphysical sort of way. I think it's Luke Harper.

He's supposed to be back. He's been back. I would read the dirt sheets. He's backstage. I had no idea. You just totally spoiled that for me. Oh, come on. Yeah.

I mean, they did it. I got Somerswam when he inter, when he feuded when rains and where, why? Like two summers ago. If it turns out that Luke Arbor is just explicitly Sister Abigail, like that's his nickname? Is that going to ruin your, never mind. No, I'd be fine with it.

They've like, I don't know what they've got to, they've got to have Bray White come back as someone else at this point. Well, let's, okay, so we talk, that's enough. There's nothing that's going to happen. I mean, that match could be very good. I sort of. Can we talk about, I'm sorry, can we talk about Randy Orton, like, acting like a vampire bat with a guy, this is the way you see the world upside down when he's like, Oh yeah.

It was so corny. I appreciated by the end, and I said this last week, I thought that it was the worst that I was so mad at that storyline, all watching it last week from start to finish until the very last sequence when Orton just appeared behind him, and it was just like so corny that I was just like, I'd give myself over to it. And then this week, I don't think it was nearly,

there was no moment where I just was excited, like happy, you know, like, childishly happy like that. But I do appreciate the fact that they had a plan, and they just stuck with it. You know, like, this was... I wanted really, like, to Orton when he opened up the storage unit, and Bray White wasn't there,

that he opened up another one, and it was, like, Savio Vega cooking beans or something. That's really offensive. Yeah, but yeah. All right, it could be quang. I don't know. It could be anybody.

It could be the missing link. It's not even a Puerto Rican stereotype, David. Don't put fucking racist words in my manner. I just said it. I was just offended by the idiocy of it. That was it. The, um, so, yeah, that could be a good match. The buildup forward has been really silly.

But who knows? You know, whatever. I don't think that, I just hope we don't get, if this feud lasts another month and who knows if it will, I just don't want another month of wandering around backstage. It was almost, it felt a lot like Bray Wyatt had a doctor's appointment that he forgot about. And so they had to film an entire episode's worth of, like, vignettes in 15 minutes backstage,

like three in the afternoon. And they opened with another hot Bray Wyatt cane match. Yeah, very strange. Anyway, so the two big matches that we got to talk about. One, the Mizz versus Dolf Ziegler, which... Awesome, I don't know how much there is to say, but the build has been fucking incredible. Again, and especially because last week the promo they did was so awesome, and I'm like, how are they going to top it?

And they maybe not topped it, but they made it interesting and it was still good, you know? So I can't say enough about this feud. Do you think the Spirit Squad members will stick around? Have you read anything about that on the jersey? It's going to be so awkward for that one dude to run into John Cena, because John Cena broke up his marriage. That was the river backstage that... Who, Kenny Done?

Kenny was married to what's her name? I don't think this is going to get edited out. Sorry, I mean, it's all over the dirt. It's like a big dirt sheet thing. Purportedly... All right, reportedly. Cina broke up their engagement. Listen, I think just like you were saying before

when we were talking about Paige in Del Rio, I think if we, you know, if wrestlers were like not going to show up for work because somebody in the locker room slept with their ex or something like that, And everybody would be at work. We've got Hardy, Matt Hardy and Edge and all that stuff, you know. Yeah, and that's just the one we know about, the ones we know about.

Yeah. So anyway, they've done a great, back to Dove Ziegler, who is tried to break up his fair share of wrestling relationships on screen. Now he only dates Fox News contributors. That's on Instagram. I don't think I can say that. I thought that was secret. They put it on Instagram. Okay.

Well, you guys can Google away. Doff's, so, I feel like my only problem with this entire, with this storyline, and it's a very minor one, is that Doff is too much of a baby face. Like, Dolf is like, it's like he's put aside his previous character for like the past 10 years in favor of just being this very straight, very vanilla, like, I got to prove something to myself and my fans, like they're the ones who mean everything to me. Like, no, I mean, his Twitter handles Heel Ziegler. Like, his character is that he's kind of a dick. Now, I get it that he's, you know, in a different spot in his life and his career and he's trying to prove something. I just wish there was a little bit more continuity, and I don't mean continuity, like, bringing back Coen White videos. You know, you always say, like, long-term booking, like, now we're setting up a great heel turn for him.

You're right. You're right. I mean, I think that there's, I just think that I love Dolph Ziegler, and I don't love this version of Dolf Ziegler as much. He's got to win the Sunday, right? Yeah, that's the thing. Have you ever been so excited for a match that you? you know how it's going to end. Right, and then this is going to win the title back.

Because they made it really explicit. This isn't like you go to Nxte or you go to Raw. Like this is like he's really quitting. So I'm guessing he's not really quitting. Although if he was really going to quit and just go, you know, whatever, run for Congress somewhere. I don't think you have to quit to do that clearly. But anyway, if he was going to do something else. He's going to try to be on the UCB House team.

I guarantee you. But if he were going to do that, this would be the greatest way to go out. Just, like, have him almost win the match. And then just, like, Maurice interference, just, like, the shittiest, like, schmahs. Also, it's, like, it's great that, like, his retirement match would be at no mercy, like, a B-paper-view. Oh, yeah, it would be so... Not even made-event, like, right below the main event. And then just have the Miz come out and, like, a t-shirt with his Dahlv Ziegler's face and an X through it, you know, just, like, he missed or just starts retiring people.

This would be great. Okay, so I think we can agree Ziegler's going to win, but we're both going to be really excited because there does feel like there's a... like a 1% chance that he could want to just go be a comedian. Yes. From everything I under, I mean, if you go on his Twitter, it seems like he's way more excited about comedy than wrestling. All right.

There was like a weird, oh, he is giving it too much credit. This room probably got a fresh coat of paint soon, but you could imagine in its earlier incarnation when it was just like black walls, that this is where you kill people. This is where you put the bodies, basically.

We're in like the attic room above the production room, and there's like, yeah, creepy old, like soundboard controls on the wall and pipes on the ceiling, and it's, yeah, it's a mess. Anyway, we got one more match to talk about. Okay. It's the WWE World. championship match between AJ styles, Dean Ambrose. Oh, I thought we talked about it.

Well, you mentioned it for sure. What's your pick? My pick? I mean, there's been rumblings this scene is going to win, but I don't see A.J. Them taking it off A.J. just yet. Yeah. Ambrose would definitely be the wild card, despite the fact that he was very recently champion. Ambrose would be the biggest surprise.

AJ, right? I would go with A. You think AJ retain? I think retaining automatically is not a big surprise. Yeah, I don't think it's a big surprise. Yeah. No, I just think Ambrose is the biggest surprise. the biggest surprise and I

because of that I can't write it off they've been surprising doing minor surprises left and right but yeah I think I think AJ retaining and then then transitioning to maybe a straight AJ Sina fused Well the money isn't tried Sina winning his title back from

AJ right or they do or they go AJ or they let Ambrose and Sina feud on their own AJ feuds with somebody else and then Sina comes circles back around for the title at Survivor Series or Royal Rumble Maybe. I see like Ambrose Miz seems like a really good feud and so does A.J. seen it again. Yeah.

We'll see what happens. Yeah. Either right, I've had a lot of fun and I give it whoever's putting the Smackdown stuff together backstage. These three guys, I'm just going to like, John's, these three guys have had great chemistry on the mic and everything else and they've been wonderful at putting their finishers on each other onto like the concrete floor, et cetera. I don't think anybody would say that Ambrose, I mean, seen. seen as good as he's been in the ring over the past couple years, no one puts him or Ambrose in, like, the top five or ten of W.W. In-ring performers, just strictly in-ring?

I would put him. I would put Tina at top-five. Not top five. Oh, yeah. In-ring? It's about telling a story. He can't do what T.J. Perkins does. I'm all about him.

I think he's above most of the guys we talk about. But, yeah, I would say he's number two under A. No. Yep. Oh, this is a serious. I would say he's in the top ten, not in the top five. All right. Well, maybe I'm wrong.

I think Seth Rons is above him. Roman Rains. I'm just kidding. I'm just trolling with the Roman Rans. Since Rollins's injury, I don't know if he's going on this. Kevin Owens. Yeah, I still think Cina's better than Owens. I think you put in the spot, you can put Jericho above him.

You can put Sammy Zane above him. I would say Cina. Anyway, but I was going to say something. I was going to go the other direction on this. I was going to say, despite the fact that maybe Ambrose and Cina aren't your top five or your top 10, I'm going to say we're going to, this is a, This is a steep bet. I'm going to say we're going to be saying match of the year candidate after this.

Whoa. Just a prediction. I have no way to know. It could be a two-second schmaws. But, like, I feel like these guys... Trying to think of the worst. It big show, like, just KO punches everybody, and that's just a double disqualification. Wouldn't that be so great?

Wouldn't that be great if Big Show just did one roundhouse punch and all three of them fell over, knocked out? They're in different areas of the ring. It's just like the sonar from it or the seismic waves. Sonar. But I do think that there's a real chance of this. I mean, I think that the John Sina, like, you know, record breaker campaign is like a legit. We're definitely going to be there soon, you know,

the 16-time World Championship thing. Anyway, we got to get out of here. It's weird for me to watch this match. I just want to say as relieving because I have this weird parallel universe memory that John Sina had already won 16 championships. And so I'm starting to question whether or not, you know, a lot of things that I see in the world are true. Are you telling me you're living in the Brian Kendrick?

I'm just saying that there's some ideas. Wait a second. Is there a mandala? Mandela? Mandela. Is there a mandala realm? Yes. This is what I'm saying.

Is it there is a Mandela effect world of professional wrestling? We got to get out of. Dan, plug your stuff. Yes, I got to plug my shit. I'm at Skyline Comedy Club in Appleton, Wisconsin. So all you Appleton ladies, who! If you want to ride Sad Space Mountain, come by this weekend. And next, and then the weekend after that, I'll be in Royal Oak at the comedy club there,

a Comedy Castle, and Royal Oak. So check that out. I have another podcast, my dumb friends. I've been doing a podcast, Nicky Glazer. And I'm on the road next month as well. So if you think this is good, wait until you see me on stage because it's almost as good. I'm going to borrow from Depperstine slash Rosenberg here, but should we

just call it a Jace Mountain when it's you? I'm trying to think of like another like, if you babies want to ride the log flume, woo! Rock flume sounds like some German shitting on chest stuff. It does. No, it's not good. Anyway, we got to get out of here. I'm at David

Chewaker on Twitter. I never tweet. If you go to the ringer.com and see the beautiful artwork that I put together for the website. And also, to read the articles because they're good. But I think that's it, man. Enjoy no mercy this weekend. Congratulations to Sasha. Our hearts, our heart and thoughts go out to do real.

Unknowable. Yeah, because of everything they've been through. And who knows if this is real? Shout out to Brian Kendrick. Yeah, Brian Kendrick, we're with you every step of the way. And I'm with you too.