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00:00:01
Despy Bleeds Again
60 Plays2 years ago
Chris and Garrett are chatting GCW's Tournament of Survival, Cage of Survival, wrestling video games and Chris breaks the bad news about Chris Candido & Sunny to Garrett.
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Transcript
Introduction and Hosts
00:00:34
Speaker
Hey everybody, welcome to another episode of Predetermined, a Pro Wrestling Hangout. I'm your host, Garrett Callender, and with me, as always, another man who is also a host of this show, Chris Binks.
00:00:46
Speaker
I'm glad to be here, Garrett.
Wrestling Travels and Memories
00:00:48
Speaker
I'm sad that I couldn't be in what appeared to be a weird basement in Atlantic City over the weekend, because it looked fun. I guess I would have been nice to be in Osaka too. Although I guess after the results of what occurred in Osaka, really fucking sad not to be in Toronto in like three weeks.
00:01:11
Speaker
Yeah. Um, one of those was very doable for you. You know, it was, it was very close. The other, a little further away, the other one slightly less, but still far. Um, damn it. You are right. After they started kind of saying some stuff they might get in Toronto, I do feel a little screwed with our, uh, forbidden door.
00:01:34
Speaker
Yeah, you know, I'm not one to complain about much, Garrett. I do recognize, like, we're very lucky. We've gotten to travel a lot for wrestling, and we've been in the room for a lot of stuff that I'll probably tell my kid about, and I don't wanna be ungrateful. I literally wear a hat that says always grateful to try to remind myself to always be grateful, but last year,
Missed Matches and Anticipations
00:02:01
Speaker
I was supposed to see Bryan Danielson against Zack Sabre Jr. and I saw Zack Sabre Jr. get squashed by like the B minus version of Bryan Danielson. This year, Bryan Danielson, not only is he gonna be on the show, it seems like he's gonna wrestle fucking Okada. That's a hard pill to swallow, especially- It's a hard one. We're in the United States and don't have tickets to this show.
00:02:28
Speaker
What are we a month away from this? It's the end of the month, right? It's the 24th. It's going to be like two weeks from Sunday.
New Japan Dominion Recap
00:02:37
Speaker
So for those who haven't seen or caught up on New Japan Dominion yet, the show is good and enjoyable. We'll maybe call it a couple of points of it.
00:02:48
Speaker
So, semi-main event, right? It's Okada, Tanahashi, and Ishii against Mox and Shooter and Claudio. First of all, just pointing out, by the way, that I sent this to you, Gary. I know you didn't see the rest of the match. The match itself was enjoyable, but Ishii shoot headbutting Mox so hard that he started bleeding. It's a real thing that happened. That headbutt was, and it wasn't like it was on the top of his head.
00:03:18
Speaker
It was like Ishii cocked his head, like he cocked his body like a shotgun and then just sent his fire hydrant shaped body into the middle of John Moxley's eyes.
00:03:34
Speaker
I was thinking about this, Garrett, because I was really listening to last week's episode, and we spent a lot of time talking about our dear friend, Arne Anderson, and his blood packets.
Authenticity in Wrestling
00:03:45
Speaker
And it struck me that you were watching that show with people who aren't wrestling fans.
00:03:51
Speaker
And they probably watch the Arne Anderson, oh, you have fake blood. And you're like, yeah, that's definitely fake blood. You don't actually, it's like, and you're like, but sometimes it's real blood. And they're like, yeah, yeah, whatever. And it's like, it does feel like it cheapens things a little when Arne's like cut the fake blood in the mouth. And then a week later, or just even later in the show, obviously Mox bled again. But like, specifically here, Mox is just getting headbutted so hard that he starts bleeding. And someone's like, oh, that's fake blood. It's like, no.
00:04:20
Speaker
No, he's doing horrible damage to himself to entertain us. And the bleep blood is the result of that. So are you saying that aren't Anderson's killing the business? Yes. Disrespecting mocks. I did find out from my buddy who was watching it with me that his wife said something later about the blood during the main event, like as they were on their drive home. Right. And he's like, no, that was that was real.
00:04:50
Speaker
And she goes, what? No, but like earlier, he's like, no, no, earlier that was not, but he's like, it like my friend who does not watch wrestling, but here's me talk about it enough. Like, no, they will like actually cut themselves. And then the blood poured that easy. He said, everything you saw in the main event was real. And that blew her mind.
00:05:11
Speaker
But thanks to goddamn Uncle Arne, she was sitting there looking at her phone the whole time, looking up occasionally, thinking that I just watched some horror movie carry pig blood from the ceiling bullshit.
00:05:29
Speaker
Anyway, so it's a good match. If you get the chance to see it, I recommend it. It's pretty enjoyable.
Okada's Character Dynamics
00:05:37
Speaker
Okada and co win. He beats Okada pin shooter because continuing the thing where Okada is just a dick to the young boys. He's like, fuck you, young boy. It's great. It's just so he's just so angry about it. He's just like, don't challenge me. I'm Okada. You're just a young boy shooter. Come on. You're your box is young boy.
00:05:58
Speaker
It is kind of insulting. It's pretty funny. But Mox afterwards, he's like, OK, yeah, you won this one, but we're the best in the world. I know because we hang out with the best in the world and I've got a message from him and they go to this video and Daniel Sin is just he's in the desert, maybe in the Grand Canyon somewhere. I don't know. It's beautiful. It's picturesque.
00:06:21
Speaker
I'm trying to watch
00:06:36
Speaker
Danielson starts talking and my mom is just talking in my ear and I'm trying to be like, no, mom, come on. I'm trying not to be a dick. My parents are about to watch my daughter. I love my parents. They're great. Um, but they just like to talk and I'm trying to explain that the words of this little man in the desert are very, very meaningful to me. I got to know what's happening. But I do, I do get that Danielson's basically like, Oh, Kata, I want you. Um, and he's like, it's going to be like the desert.
00:07:07
Speaker
for you, you are the rain maker, but there's no rain in the desert. And Okada's response, at least as best translated by Chris Charlton, because I do not speak Japanese, was, I can make it rain anywhere, bitch. And so, I am in, I am, I think they're gonna do the match, that's, they could do a tag match or something like that, but it pretty clearly teased that. And like, man, there's my, whatever $50, there's my $50, I'm in, super in, just, here's my money, Tony Khan.
00:07:38
Speaker
yeah yeah that's that's a main event anywhere in the world yeah it sounded like our friend lul like literally was just like i'm i'm flying to toronto now which good on lul i'm with him again if i had if i had did not have other plans that weekend already i would also be on a plane to toronto he's definitely been there where like something happened
00:08:03
Speaker
and we immediately are just on our phone purchasing tickets to a thing. I definitely did it to Revolution for the punk MJF dog collar match. I think I was at one of the go-home shows to it and then was just watching their promos and just was on my phone buying a ticket. But yeah, I do like where he's like, all right, wet boy, I hope you're ready for some dry mouth, because I'm a fucking desert.
00:08:33
Speaker
Yeah, it's going to be, and they also tease.
Upcoming Matches Speculation
00:08:36
Speaker
So the opening match, right, was Osprey against Lance Archer. Winner gets the shot at Kenny Omega's US title. Another good one, kind of short sprint, but kind of a super fun. Those guys had a great match. You were at that, right? The G1 in Dallas, right? Those two guys had an awesome banger back then. This was not quite on that level, but it was still really good.
00:08:58
Speaker
And, and then Osprey is like, I'll take you, I'll take you on anywhere. Kenny, Kenny, I'll even come to Canada, which is pretty clearly, cause it was like, yeah, could they have done the match in England or something? Who knows? But pretty clearly they're like, we're going to do this at forbidden door. So if that's the top two, I, they don't even, again, they don't even need to announce the rest of a card. They've got my money. They can just.
00:09:20
Speaker
I'm in. So, Kenny won the first one. Then Osprey gets round two in Canada. Maybe he beats Kenny in Canada and they turn around and go for three in England. Could go three in England? Could go three at Wrestle Kingdom again? I don't know. They could do five, I don't know.
00:09:41
Speaker
I don't, yeah, I'll watch them all. I'll watch every single one. So potentially those two matches are better than anything we got on that card, other than we did get to see something I think we forget about, because it was so buried in the middle of the card. We got to see Sting no sell two super kicks from the Young Bucks. And that was maybe the only moment from that show that I kind of cherish.
00:10:09
Speaker
I mean, Orange Cassidy against Osprey was very entertaining. Yeah, that's true. That was, yeah.
00:10:15
Speaker
Again, at the end of the day, I think we all like that show. It's just the weight of the expectations of that show. That show really sort of sunk for us under the weight of knowing what we were supposed to see and didn't. And we were just like, this is really good, but it's not the dream magic I had in my mind. It's one of the reasons I try to avoid fantasy booking. It's just really hard when someone's like, no, this was supposed to be the thing you saw, and a guy got hurt.
00:10:43
Speaker
But hey, you know, for that show, if it weren't for that show, we would have never seen Beastman. It's true. We would have never eaten at the Billy Goat Tavern, which led to us doing the podcast again. It's true. We should be. I'm very appreciative of that. And I will we will get to watch this on television and we will get to go to many other.
00:11:04
Speaker
incredible wrestling matches in the future. We're gonna be okay, guys. I don't, again, listeners, this is not a woe is us. I'm just, this show looks incredible. I'm grateful. This show looks amazing. Yeah, it's just one that I'm a little jealous of our friends up north that get to make a drive to Toronto. That, or fly, I don't know.
00:11:27
Speaker
However, one would get to Toronto. Yeah. I mean, my understanding from South Park is that Canada has one road that you drive down and you just kind of go down there and it's just it's all just one road. The other I will say, so I thought the whole show was pretty good. A couple of other points to make.
00:11:54
Speaker
So let's see, Zack Sabre versus Jeff Cobb was really good if anyone is looking for something to check out. Was that for a title? That was for the TV title. OK. So Nana against Yoda Tsuji was surprisingly good. I kind of buy Yoda Tsuji as a main vendor now, I guess I would see if he can keep it up. But I was kind of like, I thought he might win the title at points and wasn't disappointed in that. So good for him on that. He's apparently hanging with LIJ. We'll see how long that lasts.
00:12:23
Speaker
The fact that they could get you to think that for a little bit tells me that there was some decent storytelling involved. Yeah, yeah. So a negative thing from the show, maybe negative, maybe more mediocre thing.
Humor and Pop Culture References
00:12:41
Speaker
What are you drinking there, Garrett?
00:12:43
Speaker
I am drinking a tropical punch prime for the first time since that one where I had the ice pop. Went to the grocery store, found a shelf stocked full of primes, took every single one of the ice pops they had and one of each other flavor.
00:13:00
Speaker
And I know Matt said that his son told him that red is the least desirable flavor, which is fruit or tropical punch. I wanted to, you know, I got to give them all a fair shot. Sure. How's the mouth feel, Garrett? Damn, it just tastes like Hawaiian punch.
00:13:19
Speaker
OK, but 20 calories, you know, like, OK, I I really think that if I were an outdoorsman and I were chopping wood, getting sweaty, hot, take a sip of this, I'd be quenched. Fucking send me a case of these. Please, please, Logan Ball, I'm your biggest fan. Yeah, I mean, that sounds like a red
00:13:47
Speaker
The tropical punch, fruit punch kind of stuff was, I'm not against them, but it's not, I'm not the, I'm not the, uh, the number one guy on those. So it sounds like that's a good one though. I'll keep an eye out for that. I got to get the whole group at some point.
00:13:59
Speaker
You got to you got to run the rainbow on these guys. I did read an article tonight because I was looking to see if I had any booze that I could mix with a prime for this this show. I didn't. It seems like the only thing that people make with Prime is just mixing this and vodka. I do not have vodka. That also seems that exciting. That sounds like a college kid drink.
00:14:21
Speaker
But I did see an article as I was Googling Prime. Let me see, I think I still got it here. It says, it was from the independent and the headline was, it tastes foul, it's impossible to buy, but Prime has become a playground obsession. And it said, if you're a teenage boy, the most important social capital you can have on the playground right now isn't the latest iPhone or which sneaker brand is currently trendy. It's actually an energy drink.
00:14:51
Speaker
I do like the idea, Garrett, that you could go to the playground and be the coolest kid. Like if you took your son to the playground and maybe there were some like middle, maybe probably not high school kids, but like maybe middle school kids around or something, and you're just drinking a prime, they're all looking like, man, that guy's fucking cool.
00:15:09
Speaker
That's a cool dad over there. He's drinking prime. He's like smoking cigarettes now. If it were 2023 and James Dean were still alive, this is what he would be drinking. He wouldn't be smoking cigarettes. He's a devil without a cause. He's drinking some prime. I'll tell you this, skinny Marlon Brando and fat Marlon Brando both would have enjoyed a prime.
00:15:36
Speaker
Um, so what I was saying was the, um, here's what, here's, I was noticing the other day, actually, when they were talking about like the bullet club gold or whatever, I was like, you know, there's not that many guys in the main bullet club
Bullet Club Dynamics
00:15:48
Speaker
at this point. How's the torture seems like a separate thing. There's like, it's like Finley, Kenta. I'm like, I don't know. There's not that many guys at this point. They rectified that on this show. Um, they basically, they took every.
00:16:01
Speaker
a young Lion graduate that didn't have anything to do. And he just gave them Bullet Club t-shirts. We've got a lot left over. Clark Conners. Clark's in it? Yeah, Gabe Kidd. There's a British guy who was apparently in the United Empire for like two weeks. And now he's turned, I tell you. And he's in Bullet Club. And I'm supposed to be mad about this, given Kelly seemed very offended.
00:16:27
Speaker
So yeah, they're all just in Bullet Club now. There's like four more of them just hanging out wearing t-shirts. Going like cheering for David Finley during his match. Bullet Club sounds like...
00:16:42
Speaker
Like, okay, so like last night I just watched The House Bunny with my wife. Anna Faris' movie where she is going to be in a sorority, or she's gonna be the house mom of a sorority, but she has to go to the loser house and try and make them cool. And I feel like right now that Bullet Club might be the loser house. Yeah, Bullet Club's like the NWOC team now.
00:17:05
Speaker
Like David Finley is like Stevie Ray. Um, I think this makes Kenta like Scott Norton maybe. I mean, all these other guys are, they're all, they're all Virgil. They're all just collected. They're all just each Virgil.
00:17:26
Speaker
That would be amazing to throw into a promo against Bullet Club. And it would just take one promo and they'd be done forever. There's no coming back from it. I really think that like, I don't know, I like Clark Conners. He's good. He just needs something to do. And Ishimori is good. Coughlin's good too, kids. I mean, they're all fine. I think the matches
Eddie Kingston and GCW Highlights
00:17:51
Speaker
will be okay. A bunch of those guys,
00:17:53
Speaker
At least two of them are in the G1. I think, I think they put kid in the G1. Um, and, uh, I think there's at least one, I think at least one more of them that they put in the G1. Uh, looking at the picture. Yeah. They put Coughlin in there too. I mean, they got 32 spots this year, so they got a lot of slots to fill, but they're all in there and they can, they can do their best and.
00:18:21
Speaker
And you said, right, that Eddie Kingston's in the G1 this year. Yeah, that's the good news. That's the good news from the show. We're going to get to watch Eddie Kingston and the motherfucking G1. Again, I'm a little down the G1 after last year, the four block thing, but goddamn, I'm watching every Eddie Kingston match in the G1, even if he's got a wrestle Chase Owens. Even if he, because he might beat up Chase Owens pretty good.
00:18:45
Speaker
Well, he's I mean, it's interesting. Like I noticed actually when they were doing the announcements, even the announcer sounds kind of disappointed in like the Chase Owens. He's like, oh, Chase Owens. Like there's a palpable disappointment in his voice. He's like reading it as he's going like, oh, man, come on, guys. Ghetto. We can't get anyone else here. Chase Owens has dirt on Ghetto. That's the only way he's still in that company.
00:19:13
Speaker
You know, I just realized though, I'm looking at the picture again. I don't think they put Yujiro in this year. So I guess that's a win. We don't have to watch Yujiro Takahashi G1 matches. That's good. Let's step up. It's the small victories. It's a small victory. So we'll find out I guess soon when, which block Kingston's in. That'll be exciting. So Garrett, I'm curious.
00:19:38
Speaker
The other big thing this weekend in terms of wrestling was the GCW shows. I know you were watching it as we started talking. Are you at the finish yet of the second night? I just hit play. Oh, you just hit play. I just did as you started talking about it. Well, maybe we'll start talking about the GCW shows. So for the listeners, Garrett has not seen the finish of Cage of Survival yet.
00:20:07
Speaker
Um, which I will point out, um, isn't really a cage. It's like, I think they, there was a long break in this thing. I think they just gave up making a cage and they made like a partial fence of survival.
00:20:22
Speaker
I am very, cause yeah, as I was clicking through the timer of how much time was left, it would be like, we need six more minutes. And then it would hit the zero and be like, actually, can you give us six more minutes? I think they did that three times. And then when it came back on, I'm like, what the fuck is this? There are only, there are only three parts of a cage that one of them just kind of popped up. Yeah, I'm sorry. Two, two parts of a cage. One is.
00:20:50
Speaker
in the cage position. One is like ratchet strapped to the turnbuckle at an angle and they just put a sheet of glass on it. Do you think when they got kicked out of the carousel room, like how the fuck are we going to set this up in the basement? Because I see like there's pipes all over the basement with that look like there's just there's too much shit down there. I like the basement. Any basement you got a basement's all got shit in them. You know, we all know this.
00:21:20
Speaker
See a box of old T-shirts in the corner. Oh, no, those are club. Yeah, I mean, it's so the first night, right. So they did a tournament of survival. One disappointment I had, I was assuming the Green Phantom was going to be like someone under a mask.
00:21:42
Speaker
and not just a person wrestling that just lost and didn't. We never revealed who that person was. So, yeah, I don't know who they are, where they're from. I mean, I would assume Mexico because they were a mat like a luchador, right? But no, they did not wrestle in a way that suggested luchador. They suggested they may be from the like the Midwest or something. And they weren't a replacement, were they? Like they were on the corner. They were announced.
00:22:11
Speaker
It's very strange. I missed that match. I came in at the tail end of Despy, John Wayne and in Tremont. That one was good. I like that was great to see. Again, we've been we've been stumping since last year for GCW Desperado Red. And I was a little disappointed he didn't advance, but that match was really, really good.
00:22:37
Speaker
the tree bump where he just fell into the web of barbed wire and just could not get up. Just like, ah. You just got to give up at a certain point. I also realized, I think Despy really likes the can spot. A hundred percent. He's like, I'm into the cans. That's good for me. I like it. You did the cans in Nashville. Then he did the cans with June Kasai.
00:23:00
Speaker
Did him the first night, did him night two. So he must be like, yeah, that's what he's like. Either that spot just looks, I mean, it looks like it hurts. I'm always expecting to see somebody get sliced up, but no one ever does. So it must just be an easy deathmatch spot. And honestly, you used to see it a lot more than you do now. Hmm.
Desperado's Deathmatch Persona
00:23:21
Speaker
And people kind of overdid it. Like, Desi's bringing it back.
00:23:26
Speaker
Despy is my favorite wrestler right now. Like, Deathmatch Despy is the coolest dude. I think we need a specific Deathmatch Despy t-shirt.
00:23:37
Speaker
I'd buy that. Ooh, yeah. It seemed like, yeah, he's having a good time. Like, honestly, of everything I watched this weekend, I will say this main event has been very good, I think. Oh, the barbed wire webbing is just... Yeah, they took a bit of a pretty nasty bump there too. I watched Reena take a dive into that and she is tangled up. She's got that long hair.
00:24:03
Speaker
But I don't know, it seems like Despy has his very specific spots he's willing to do in death match. And I am completely fine with those spots. They absolutely work for him. And at the end of that match, when he grabbed the microphone and just like, I need to thank John fucking Moxley. I think Moxley woke something up in Despy. Yeah. He's found something in himself. He had not found before.
00:24:30
Speaker
And it's, it's good to see. I, I'm, I really liked not to skip around too much, but I thought the, he had the matching up with Janela was really fun at night too. I thought they just, I was like, that's going to be, it seemed like that was going to be a good matchup. And that was a really strong in the way that both worked the match with Tremont and John Wayne. Right. That's like, Despy working, like very pure death match guys. Janela and he could kind of go both ways in terms of the.
00:24:57
Speaker
the sort of spot energy, but also death match that I thought that was a really fun mix between those two. Janela putting Despy on the ground, turning the barbed wire door upside down to face Despy, going up on the ladder and giving him the double stomp through the door. That is such a brutal spot to do to somebody. I like Despy's willingness to just jump into this.
00:25:24
Speaker
It's just, there's, I don't know, when a guy who doesn't normally do death matches just like goes headfirst into it and seems to really enjoy it. There's something very fun about that. I mean, that was kind of the same reason it was so fun watching Cardona do it. Because he went so headfirst into it. Yeah, I'm trying to think of who's like left on the, I mean, Despy against Gage obviously would be interesting.
00:25:51
Speaker
We did get to see him against, against Tremont and John Wayne. You know what? Despy and Rena, that's the magic I want. I want Despy and Rena. That'd be good. Um, you know what? Actually, I'm going to do you one better. Despy and American cheeseburger. Despy gets canceled. Send him over there with cologne. Despy against Slack.
00:26:13
Speaker
Oh, that would, that would be, that would be fun. Despy speeding, Despy speeding Slack Japanese food. Just Slack just totally confused at the taste of sushi. Raw fish, is it dangerous? Sometimes it gave Jeremy Piven mercury poisoning and he had to miss a run he was doing in a play. Yeah. But it's like, Slack, you just ate a cheeseburger covered in glass. So.
00:26:43
Speaker
I think you can take this risk here. My flavor palette understands that. Also, if you're worried about the mercury poisoning, the light tubes are much more concerning. At this point, that's like, that's, that slacks go-go juice. That's, you know, that makes them stronger. Um, so overall, I mean, did you, did you think it was a good tournament, tournament of survival? Were you satisfied with where it went?
00:27:14
Speaker
I thought, I will say, I thought some of the choices in terms of like the semis didn't, the semis I didn't love. Um, it felt like everyone was kind of tired and saving a little bit. I thought the final with John Wayne and Reno was, was good. Um, it just felt like there was maybe one too many, maybe they should have gone to a four way.
00:27:37
Speaker
after the first round or so. I don't know, it just felt like the semis really just kind of, not dragged, but they just felt a little bit shorter and just like everyone was just kind of burnt and hurt, you know. I feel like that's pretty common in them though, right? Right. You know, like going a little easy in the second round to save it for the end. I don't know, I did really enjoy the three-way women's match. I love,
00:28:05
Speaker
I want to see more Casey Kirk and GCW. Honestly, more of the Kirk's to skip ahead a second, though, you said the next night the Kirk's versus versus Cardona was not super good. No, it was a very like the Cardona and Dlander kind of went for heat and stalling and like the actual match itself was fine, but like you'll be OK without seeing it at the end. Right. You know, Edo and Gage come out.
00:28:35
Speaker
and Cardona takes some shots after cheating to win. A nasty light tube shot too. I honestly figured he was gonna move and Kirk was taking it to the head. Cause he's got Cardona's arms behind his back. But Cardona took it from Edo and she hit him kind of in the neck shoulder area. And the way that bundle of light tubes broke, it first cut up his back.
00:29:03
Speaker
because his back just immediately started spurting. And then just his whole side of the body, which he sold so perfectly. Him just shouting over and over at the camera, look at me, look at me. I like Casey, I like Casey Kirk's vibe. I had not watched a lot of her before this weekend, but I just,
00:29:29
Speaker
I just like the energy of a little woman who will hit you with light tubes. Uh, she just seems like, uh, again, like she reminds me of like, what if my mom was violent?
00:29:45
Speaker
Because Hart, so there, so she's what, like barely a little over five foot tall, right? And Brandon Kirk is a normal tall man. I think he looks like he's six foot, six two maybe, which is totally my parents. My dad is six two, my mom is five foot, but somehow my mom's definitely the scarier one of the two, you know? You know, it doesn't have to be the biggest dog in the fight and sometimes it's the craziest.
00:30:12
Speaker
Right. Exactly. Exactly. You think you think the big guy is going to be the nerve. People always like, oh, like your dad and my dad kind of looks a little like Tony Soprano. They're like, oh, that guy. It's like, no, that's the softy. He'll cry. He'll cry at Rocky. You know, he's not a mom's never hit. He's never he's not a monster. My mom's never hit anyone with a light tube that I'm aware of. I mean, she was she was a public school teacher for 40 years. So I'm sure she considered it. That hardens you.
00:30:41
Speaker
Yeah, during the women's match though, just as far as height is concerned, they did kind of look like a cell service bars. Like they were like the perfect length. And my wife watched that match with me and she goes, that's Soyurek? And I was like, yeah, she goes, she shaped like Mrs. Incredible from the Incredibles. She's like, she's very tall, she's very skinny and she's got a big ass.
00:31:10
Speaker
Have you got to watch out with that, Garrett, because you're going to be watching The Incredibles with your kid and you're going to be like, you know, that's a good point. She really. She really is my type. I've never been into moms, but I guess now. But this is I'm curious. So now that your wife has watched you watch Sawyer wreck, how does she feel about this?
00:31:39
Speaker
I think that she knows I have no game and there's nothing to fear. True. It's not that she knows that you're loyal and love her. It's that. Yeah, it's I stand no chance and. No, I think both. I think both. I don't know. We've got. I we I feel like I say enough.
00:32:08
Speaker
Here's what you gotta do. Yes, you can enjoy a lady wrestler, but you also have to equally talk about how hot the guys are. If you just are constantly talking about the attractiveness of certain people, then that buys you some points. You can say more the other way. Unless it's about Selma Hayek. That's off limits in this house. So who is the handsomest guy on Tournament of Survival?
00:32:40
Speaker
Excluding Despy, because he wasn't wearing the mask. He was wearing the mask, I mean. So I looked up a picture of Despy with no mask. And when I typed an El Desperado wrestler, no, the first thing that popped up, not no mask, it popped up no legs. I'm like, what the fuck does that mean? And it meant nothing. It didn't link me to anything. He does not currently have bionic legs. OK.
00:33:06
Speaker
He's a pretty handsome guy under there, though. Yeah, I mean, he did. It was I think it was best of the super juniors 2020 in the final where the mask came off and we were all like, is he just never going to wear the mask again? Because people seem to love him and he's so handsome. And then you just put it back on.
00:33:21
Speaker
Isn't that kind of what happened with Ray? I remember a minute in WCW where Ray just had no mask. Well, Ray lost the mask. He lost it like a mask mask versus hair or whatever matched to Kevin Nash. And then WWE was just like, screw this, we can sell these masks to children. Put that mask on. Way more t-shirts get sold when we don't see your face. Yeah.
00:33:46
Speaker
Sorry, I've seen them starting to build structures. Okay, so we might begin to get to the finish of this main event, which we'll have a lot to stop now. I think Masha looks really cool in her outfit. I like her denim vest with the band patches. And part of me was thinking, do you really want to bloody this up? This is a good vest, but that makes it so much fucking cooler if it got all bloodied up in a fight. If you're just walking up to the band show and just like, yeah,
00:34:15
Speaker
What happened to your vest? Oh, you know, I wrestled in it. It was called a cage, but really it only had one and a half walls. It was a basin of survival. It counts. Oh, man. Yeah, we're climbing this thing.
00:34:34
Speaker
Fuck, I feel like I'm just watching this and just bouncing around GCW. I feel like I've just been all over the place. What are we talking about? Who's handsome, Garrett? Who's handsome? Who's the tansomest man in Cage's survival or tournament survival? He wasn't even in it, but he was in between, and I think it's gotta be Brandon Kirk. He wasn't even in the tournament. He's a good looking guy. I think, you know,
00:35:01
Speaker
I think the sequel pay is he's just got like a kind face, you know? He has really grown on me, especially him doing deathmatch wearing like a pair of beets. He's become like a deathmatch cartoon character and I really, really like that about him. Getting nervous, we're on some scaffolding here.
00:35:27
Speaker
We're on some scaffolding. And Garrett is watching the main event here. He has not seen what's about to happen. Both things that are about to happen for those who are aware. So again, and just to clarify this for anyone who isn't aware, so Rina wins tournament of survival. That means she gets to wrestle Masha the next night, main event in cage, quote unquote, of survival. They build this big thing.
00:35:56
Speaker
Tell me what, tell everyone what you're seeing, Garrett. Guy in a black cloak comes out wearing like ski goggles. Tell them what the spot was before.
00:36:06
Speaker
Oh, so, uh, Rena and Masha were on top of the scaffolding and she kind of side saddle picked up Rena and just kind of hopped off. And I was really worried she was going to land weird, but I mean, they crashed through, what was it? Doors covered in barbed wire on top of chairs. It was a real mess of shit. Um, so who's, who's under that black hood? That red headed fuck.
00:36:35
Speaker
Blake Christian, who just, I just watched Penn. Oh, and he's getting trash thrown at him. Yeah. But this isn't like fun trash. This is like, boo, this sucks trash. Yeah. This is, this is, we may not be coming back to this basement trash is my, it was my takeaway.
Blake Christian's Role and Fan Reactions
00:36:53
Speaker
So, and just for everyone who maybe again, hasn't seen it. So Blake Christian, right? Had the title shot from the brass ring thing that he could cash in at any time. That from spring break.
00:37:05
Speaker
from spring break, right? So he cashes this in right after the big spot through and then both of them are down. He gives Masha a curb stomp and pins her and people throw things at him. I gotta say, this really feels like a potential jump the shark moment.
00:37:33
Speaker
I don't know where they're going with this and I just don't, I was trying to game out like what they could do, like what these main events could be like with Blake Christian and I'm not interested. Yeah, just main events of just like pretty good wrestling
00:37:58
Speaker
I think that's it though, right? Like, cause what we, I like a good GCW main event to be a big brawl. I feel like the best main events they have are just people brawling around a room, going through doors. It doesn't even necessarily have to have glass to be a good main event, but I don't know. He is good. So it's hard. He's a good wrestler, technically.
00:38:26
Speaker
I don't know. You're right, though. It doesn't it doesn't have me excited for what's to come. It's. He does. I'm trying to even think, though, like when Ricky Shane Page came in and stole the title off Gage, did we like Ricky hadn't really been there yet at that point. That was like him coming into the company, I guess. So I was thinking about this about because Ricky Shane is obviously the analog here, right? Because Ricky Shane did basically the exact same thing in terms of stealing the belt.
00:38:57
Speaker
Right. Gray wins. He comes in, he pins him, you know, um, Ricky, of course ended up having a long run with the title in part because of COVID. Um, but he had his gang, right? Like that was kind of the thing there was that it was.
00:39:16
Speaker
you know, Ricky being backed up by 4-4-0, right? So the payoff to that was both Gage and RSP at Spring Break in 2021, but it was also deathmatch war games, right? There was a direction there where lots of people got screwed over by Ricky over time, and they all banded together to fight against Ricky.
00:39:41
Speaker
For for a good story, I thought, I mean, a relatively simple but well told story, I think, over the course, especially on the end is right over that year of GCW that you've got a climax like that. That's pretty good. Cardona, of course, wins the title in. I mean, that's totally different because that match is sort of incredible in its own way. And of course, he cheats with RSP and he doesn't him holding the belt that long. Right.
00:40:10
Speaker
It's, it's a transitional thing more of a bit. So now almost two years after that, right? After a year of almost a year, oh, exactly a year of mocks holding the title and then the gauge and Masha stuff, you know, we've got another heel who's a chicken shit, right? That's his whole thing. He's not going to be do death matches. He's not going to mean, but he doesn't have a crew, right? So he's going to wrestle like, is he going to wrestle like Mansur?
00:40:40
Speaker
and like try to have a brawl or like, what's, I don't know. And he's just going to cheat to win. It's, it's, it's just not, I don't know. I just, I don't like the, I can't, I'm having trouble constructing the matches that I'm interested in or even the ones that'll be good. I mean, I guess we'll just kind of have to see, hopefully they've got something up their sleeve, like a big get of somebody who's coming.
00:41:07
Speaker
into GCW or maybe, maybe, maybe that's a setup for, this is a setup for someone that regard. Otherwise, this very much feels like he's, he's there just incredible. Ooh. Yeah. Yeah. All this really did was elevate Masha a little bit. I think they succeeded in that.
00:41:34
Speaker
she looked good in that match there was some really cool shit in that match it was it sucks that that's the end to take away from that being a really fun main event for those ladies yeah it was a little disappointing in that regard in the sense of like man that was kind of a good match that we didn't get a finish to all i guess we kind of did the scaffold spot is kind of the finish and it's just
00:41:55
Speaker
You know, Masha would have rolled over and cover, and like the finishers should be Masha rolling over and covering her, and so she's got Christian running in. I don't think ruins too much in that regard. But yeah, I guess I'd be interested in seeing Masha try to beat the crap out of him. That's kind of an interesting thing. But unless she's taken the title back right away, maybe that's where they're going. I kind of doubt it.
00:42:21
Speaker
Do you think the reason that we think this kind of sucks is the reason he isn't signed somewhere right now? No, not necessarily, I will say, because I think what the problem in GCW I think is what a GCW champion is supposed to be.
00:42:40
Speaker
I think, I think that's the issue. It's not, I think he's fine. I don't think he's like the, the best, but if he, the role that he's playing in our weight, right? Undercard spunky baby face spot guy. I think he does reasonably well and he could be signed as that if that's what he wanted, I think. But the idea that he's the lead heel is it's great to see him try good trying.
00:43:07
Speaker
You know? Yeah. I guess if you do look at a lineup of everybody that's won the GCW title, the funny one is supposed to be Matt Cardona. That's the one that as you're going down, but then like you skip one more and you get to him and it's like, okay, just kind of a regular guy who isn't going to do these matches, unless like the payoff in this is he does have to do one of these matches.
00:43:33
Speaker
I guess that could be interesting and we'll see again. I'm open here. Um, part of the other thing I realized this weekend though, I'm curious though, cause we've got like two plus months before they do. It's only, I guess it's only two, but they've got two months before they do Atlantic city again.
00:43:50
Speaker
It kind of hit me that one of the things, another parallel with GCW and late ECW is that ECW would tour, they would sell tickets in a lot of different places. But even in that last year, like they could kind of like tread water for a while. And then you'd be like, Oh shit, ECW arena this weekend, maybe like some angles are going to happen. Like stuff's really going to move because they're at the arena.
00:44:12
Speaker
I feel like that's GCW Atlantic City now where you're like, oh, I got to watch these because like stuff might happen as opposed to no offense to Columbus.
GCW Events and Locations
00:44:22
Speaker
But like unless the match is there's a match you really want to see, like shit's not really going to happen in Columbus. You know, it really is like going to a GCW house show. Yeah. It I mean, that's what like, you know, going to Huntsville, Alabama, like, you know, once again, no offense to Huntsville.
00:44:44
Speaker
But they did set up. I mean, you guys produce Bobby Eaton. I mean, you know, they did set up a fun angle at the end of Tournament of Survival when I don't think we mentioned that where Gage and let's see what they came out to save Rina because all the the freedoms guys came out and were beating up Rina, including the masked man, June Kasai, which have we seen June in a United States ring in a while? Like, I don't know. It's been a bit for if I.
00:45:15
Speaker
We've definitely seen him in GCW Japan, but I don't know if we've actually seen him over here. And I don't know, the idea of getting to watch him engage lockup is really exciting because I'm kind of wondering because they brought everybody out and the vibe of it was like, oh man, is this them setting up for war games? Right. That would be a very cool, you know, deathmatch war games. But it kind of has me wondering too, are they just starting to promote
00:45:44
Speaker
Cause I think next month they're headed back to Japan. Yeah. It might, it might be that they could do deathmatch war games in Japan. That'd be pretty cool. You can't bring gauge though. Cause gauge can't, maybe they found a way though. I mean, yeah. Can't he go get kind of the Fe deal where he's like, I know I'm on probation, but
00:46:05
Speaker
This is my livelihood and I need to travel. But Nick Gage, they're like, you will, you robbed a bank, sir. You, you don't get to do this. He's like, but look, here are two photos of me holding babies. I pardoned from Biden a couple of weeks. Biden's just like, Biden's meeting him. He's just like, he's just like, you sir, Nick Gage, you are America. I'm pardoning you. Or let's go the other way. When they start campaigning next year, Trump,
00:46:35
Speaker
He's like, Garrett, I know you want my vote. I swear to God, I'll pardon Nick Gage. I'm like, really? Clean slate, he can go to Japan. You can watch Gage wrestle in England. And I'm like, God. What do I have? Trump was, yeah, he just spent a lot of time in Atlantic City. That, oh. I don't know, I don't know if that'd get my vote. I don't even think Nick Gage would want me to vote for that. Don't do it, Garrett. Respect yourself.
00:47:05
Speaker
No matter how bad you want to see me wrestle June Kasai in Japan. No, I've got a beautiful life. Garrett, don't compromise this country just for a match that I'm going to have. Okay. Garrett, we'll find a way to do this match somewhere else. Don't worry about it. Don't compromise yourself. Garrett, be true to yourself. Do you remember how bad those four years affected your mental health? I'm all about mental health.
00:47:34
Speaker
Um, just speaking of gauge and something I forgot to mention last week when he came out and he saved Sawyer wreck at the end of the match from, from last week, he had Sawyer wreck do the it's MDK all fucking day. And then at the end she goes, I fucking love you people in the Nick gauge voice. And that was very delight. Um,
00:47:57
Speaker
Yeah, overall, I thought, I don't know, I'm excited for what they're doing with freedoms. I like the idea that we actually maybe get a storyline going into the Japan show because I don't think we've ever had one other than like this guy from GCW really, really wants to wrestle this guy because he's a big fan. That's been the only story.
00:48:17
Speaker
I don't know. That's, that's fun. But I think, man, if they brought them back to Chicago and did death match war games, that might be worth a little drive. Cause those freedoms guys are fucking crazy. Maybe Despy's going to show up in Japan. Cause I mean that's during the G one, right? So he's free. Shit.
00:48:37
Speaker
That would be, is he allowed? Like, is Despy allowed to wrestle? I guess he did it with Jun Kasai. Right. He does stuff outside of New Japan. So I think, yeah. Again, we'll see, I guess. I don't want to, again, I don't want a fantasy book and make ourselves sad because it doesn't happen. Despy's like, of course I'll be there. He's like, do you have a 12 pack of seven up? We'll drink all those, cut the cans in half, build myself a little ouchy board and we're going to get going on this.
00:49:09
Speaker
He is. I'm just imagining him going to Tai Chi and being like, you got to finish this 12 pack, but we got like a cancer cut. You should come over to freedoms with me. It's like, what's that? It's a sack of syringes. They throw them at you like darts. Tai Chi's like, I'll watch them over here.
00:49:36
Speaker
It is a shame. He's a good friend. You'll come watch. Don't worry. He's not wrestling, though. It is a shame that while Mox was over there, Despy was over here and they I bet those guys would have had a beer after that show. You know, they would have. That's a good point. They could. Yeah, that's a shame for them. Soon. I bet he really would have had a conversation where he's like, you woke something up in me. I get why you do what you do. This is incredible.
00:50:04
Speaker
Is there any, so in the Forbidden Door, you have those two matches. Is there anything else they've even teased at this point? Not really. I think there's not much. I mean, Fantasmo said something about the Forbidden Door because obviously he's still, he's not part of Bullet Club anymore, but he's aligned with, you know, Jay and, and Juice. So that maybe something happens related to that, but
00:50:34
Speaker
Other than that, they really have not. Oh, I guess they've teased Zach Sabre against Samoa Joe. They've been doing some ROH stuff where both guys are like, I'm the television champion. I'm the television champion. So that that seems like a potential match on the table. I guess I just sort of thought that would happen at the next ROH pay-per-view or something. Which I think they announced. No, I think that's going to be forbidden door, because that's I think the next ROH pay-per-view is during the G1. OK.
00:51:03
Speaker
Where that's in Jersey, right? Yeah, they announced it for Trenton, New Jersey, which is kind of far. I was like, looking at it, I'm like, Trenton, that's kind of interesting. I guess if they announced like a real banger of a show and like facts, like tried to talk me into it, I guess that could happen. But I'm also we're going the next night is the New York collision show.
00:51:33
Speaker
which is much closer. And so is that at the normal spot they do? Yeah, that's at the Prudential Center, the big the jersey, the Devil's Arena. And I was hoping since they're announcing this other show, that means more tour dates. Come back to fucking Nashville, please. We haven't had a show since the build to revolution last year. Oh, wow. Yeah, that's kind of surprising.
00:52:04
Speaker
Like it's crazy how little wrestling we get here.
Wrestling Events and Gaming
00:52:08
Speaker
I feel like WWE comes through with like a raw once a year and a house show. And then GCW, we had one of their very first touring shows or towards the beginning. It did well, they loved it, came back, had two great shows here and then have been to like Huntsville, Alabama more times now than they've been here. I feel like you might get
00:52:34
Speaker
a dynamite or a collision in August. Cause I'm just looking, they tend to cluster them and I'm looking and it's like Tampa, Greenville, South Carolina, Columbus, Ohio, Greensboro, North Carolina. Like that may be like middle of August to get one. What's fun. So punk is back or like, and what he's going to have, they've announced that TK is going to announce like a big match.
00:53:03
Speaker
that punk's gonna have the main event. Yeah, by the time you hear this, they'll probably have announced this, but right now we just know that CM punk is back and all biting is legal.
00:53:19
Speaker
It's just funny that he's back now and the video games finally about to come out and like they had to spend all that time like taking him off the front of it and the discs and everything. And now he's like, I'm back. I'm like, you're not even in the goddamn game anymore. He's probably still in there. I don't know. They're definitely doing that modern video game thing where you don't get all the characters unless you pay extra money. Yeah, I heard about that. Like FTR is like DLC or something or.
00:53:50
Speaker
You know what, I won't do that for any games, but I'll do it for AEW. Give me just like a flat rate I can pay for like everything that they're ever gonna release. You have my money, I'm gonna play this game. And they said they're not gonna release one every year, like the 2K games. They said that it's just gonna be a game that has updates and DLC, because not enough changes in between. That's cool if they're like, look, we're gonna do a new version every two, three years when we've got like
00:54:19
Speaker
a full new thing to sort of update. I think that's kind of a cool thing as opposed to just like we're going to do one every year just for shits and giggles. Just so you can have, so collectors can pay.
00:54:31
Speaker
70 games are $70 now. Yeah. But you see, well, first of all, weirdly, you think back super NES games for like 50 or 60 bucks. So 70 bucks now is actually pretty good from the inflation perspective. Also, they say that now. But if this sells like a million copies, there's going to be Fight Forever 2024. I'll buy it 100 percent like these are as long as it's good. They've really been. I feel like I've seen a lot of footage of different wrestlers talking about. I think I watched Britt Baker play it.
00:55:02
Speaker
And they were talking about how it's a game. You can just pick up and figure out the controls. Where if you try and pick up a 2k game, I don't care how much time I get with a 2k game. I'm never going to figure it out. There's too many buttons. Yeah. That's the way they're pitching it. That's the kind of wrestling game I like to play, which is like, you can. Easy to, easy to pick up hard to master is exactly what I want. I want to be able to just pick up this game and have fun playing against my friends.
00:55:32
Speaker
And if I end up spending a lot of time with it, I will. And if, but if not, like, can I just, can I, Garrett, can I just like, can I fly to Nashville with like a bag of pizza chips and some prime and we'll just just order a pizza? No, you just, uh, you, you throw, but before I get there, throw some, um, control your, uh, control your nutrition on some like, yeah, some on some on the grill. We'll make a, we'll make a couple, we'll make some chicken breasts. It's like we're Brian cage.
00:56:02
Speaker
We'll just eat them out of Tupperwares. We got chips, chicken breast and a Tupperware in prime. And we'll just play for like 24 hours straight. That sounds great to me. I mean, also we can just get you a switch and we could play online against each other.
00:56:23
Speaker
This is, that's a less funny concept though, Garrett. I like you coming. I mean, I'm not going to get you the switch. If it means you're going to come here and eat chicken breast with me, but I, you know, how much is it? Like they're not, it's the cheapest of the video game systems. I don't remember how much they are now. I'm curious. Cause I've, I was, I don't know. I just haven't, it'll be the lesser. It'll be the lesser of the graphics between them. Um, if you want like the cheapest video game system.
00:56:53
Speaker
That would have the best graphics. It would be one of the X, like the new X-Box. I mean, it looks like it's 300 bucks. Oh no. The Nintendo switch light is 200 light means it's handheld and you don't get to plug it into your TV. So you'll just be doing it. So the Nintendo switch is like $300. Oh, then an X-Box. I think it's 300 bucks as well. If you'd get the one that doesn't take this. So yeah, let's see. X-Box.
00:57:24
Speaker
It's very exciting. Xbox is 272 right now on the Xbox 360. Oh, the 360. That's too far back. Oh, OK. There's the 360, then there's the one. And now we're on to the Xbox Series S and X, I think. The Series S says there's a 2021 version that's $250. I think that's the one I have. OK, that'll work. If you tell me that works.
00:57:54
Speaker
Yeah, the Series S just means no discs. It's only gonna run off Wi-Fi. You have to download everything. So you won't have a physical copy of the game. You would just have it downloaded into this Xbox. I'm gonna be okay with that. I think I'm gonna accept that in my life. But no, I plan on playing this game a lot. This is something I'm very excited about. And I think... Yeah. I'm curious what the story modes are, though.
00:58:24
Speaker
Cause I'm, I'm a big story mode guy. I like, like build your own wrestler and send him through his story. Or like you want to be Daniel Bryan going through the, I'm sorry, Brian Danielson.
00:58:36
Speaker
I'll go. I'll go either way. Like I've liked there was a Smackdown versus Raw, maybe 2008 from for the Wii that actually used the Wii controller. And it was basically like there's like six separate stories where it's like Road to WrestleMania. Essentially, it's like you you picked. It wasn't it wasn't it wasn't a creative character. It was like.
00:58:55
Speaker
your CM punk on the road to WrestleMania, your whoever on the road to WrestleMania. And I enjoyed those quite a bit. I also have liked making a character. My favorite all time wrestling game other than WrestleFest, obviously. Amazing. Is the two day of reckoning games.
00:59:16
Speaker
in which you create your own character. And this is my, have we discussed this before? I'm worried I've discussed, maybe I've just discussed this with my friend, Beth, who has a video game, had a video game podcast. But Dave- I don't think we have. Okay, so here's the story in Dave. So there's a lot of different aspects of this. You're sort of on your way up and you start to basically be a threat to Triple H essentially.
00:59:46
Speaker
And your girlfriend is Stacey Keebler. So Triple H kidnaps her and you have to like, basically you have to like win her freedom at WrestleMania. Wow. I like a big stakes storyline in wrestling and that's a woman's freedom. Right.
01:00:07
Speaker
It. Yeah. That's it. That's it. Wow. So this it was the game was called Day of Reckoning. There were two of them. There was Day of Reckoning one and two. They were for the Nintendo GameCube. I got one of those because my best friend and former roommate like left one like he left behind a GameCube.
01:00:26
Speaker
And I just went online and was like, what wrestling games are available for this? And I bought all four of them. Two of them are dog shit. And the other two were the Day of Reckoning games. And I played the shit out of those things when I was studying for the bar. I've never heard of this game. So was this, were all four games WWE games then? Yes. Yes. There were two WWE games before there was like a WrestleMania 18 and something else. I forget what the other one was called. Okay.
01:00:54
Speaker
Man, I just miss the days. It sounds like those games were probably similar to like the ones I loved that I remember playing more on PlayStation too. And it would have been like smack down, just bring it or something like that. And those we would play for hours after school, like just doing like tornado tags and the weapons matches and just, you know, you could just throw some limp biscuit on the CD player.
01:01:22
Speaker
He blasted that. So mom's hearing swear words a bunch upstairs and uh, just, just be Steve Blackman, super kicking people. Your mom's like, at least he's not doing the drugs. That's a hundred percent, a hundred percent. They're like, well, he's straight edge and that is lame in its own, right? But
01:01:43
Speaker
I will just, I just want to point out, so the podcast, my friend Beth did with, uh, other friends, uh, Emily and Ashton, uh, it was called choose your character. They did like two seasons of it and it's really good. If you've ever been like, if you're a video game person, but you want to talk about like the sort of feelings behind video games and the stories and the sort of what it evokes, I always thought it was a really great podcast. I'm not even a video game person. I would listen to it. Um, and they did an episode on day of reckoning where Beth had to explain
01:02:11
Speaker
you know, the story, and their co-hosts are like, ah. So are these, is Beth or any of the other co-hosts wrestling fans? Or they just- Beth is a huge fan. Beth and I like watched WrestleMania together, like, but Beth's partner Ashton, like literally you could almost hear in Ashton's voice as this is being explained, like, I can't believe I married you.
01:02:40
Speaker
Now, does he think it's a bad storyline as far as wrestling goes or just video games in general?
01:02:50
Speaker
I think Ashton thought it was just not a great story. Like in wrestling, you know, again, Ashton's not a wrestling fan. So I think she's kind of like, this is just, I can't believe like the, why do the wrestling people do? Why is this a good story? And that's like, it's beautiful. Like you get to set her free. It's nice.
01:03:10
Speaker
Yeah, that's that's all anyone wants us to be free. Yeah. You know, like, let me guess, you thought that Aladdin was fucking stupid when Robin Williams got to be free at the end. Yeah. You know, that's all we're fighting for is get those chains off. Yeah. But I'm really again, I'm just really curious what the story set up is. The other thing that I really liked about Dave Reckoning was that I could this is like this game is from 2004, 2005, something like that. OK.
01:03:37
Speaker
And so part of what they did in the creator wrestler is they let you use indie moves. So like moves that none of the characters would have, but they're built in. And so my character had two finishers. It was low keys, key crusher as a pinning, like a pinning. And the submission move was the Anaconda vice CM Punk.
01:04:06
Speaker
because CM Punk was not in the game with his way before he was still an ROH, but you could do the Anakin device. And I was like, all right, I got low key and CM Punk's finishers. That's pretty cool. So let's see what they I feel like there's none of none of those like exist in wrestling now, like every move is known to everyone. So unless they've added like new Vikingo moves recently.
01:04:31
Speaker
what we'll have to do with this game is get Derek to custom make us characters. Derek in high school, in junior high, would put in hours creating our friend group in these wrestling games, and they would look so much like, it's like even my guy, I don't remember what moves he gave me, but he definitely was wearing a Heartagram top hat.
01:05:01
Speaker
I'd be curious Derek and we'll, we'll, we'll message Eric. We'll see if he can get on that. Um, so I do want to talk about before we, uh, as we, as we started to move towards wrapping it up, uh, we did watch the first episode of dark side of the ring.
Dark Side of the Ring Preview
01:05:15
Speaker
Uh, I'm very excited for the season because a lot of my favorites they're talking about. And this first one was about Chris Candido and Tammy. Um, like as an episode of like telling the whole story, not
01:05:30
Speaker
the best, and in part, I thought it did a really good job of telling Candido's story and not so much a good job of telling Tammy's story. So he talked about, so what do you know, Gary? Because you obviously, what do you know about like the two of them? I'm curious. Nothing. Nothing? Literally nothing. No. So I mean, anything you say to me right now is going to be a surprise. All right. So I've got some shocking things for you about Sonny. So. So.
01:06:00
Speaker
So Chris and Tammy, Chris is from New Jersey, big fan growing up, like obsessed with wrestling. Grandfather, I think the only thing they mentioned is his grandfather was a wrestler, like worked for WWF. He was like a, an underneath guy. And, um, he like gets noticed in the early nineties. He's like wrestling in the Indies. Um, in, in New Jersey, he's in high school and he meets while he's wrestling, like in the front row, he meets this girl who's Tammy, right? Who became Sonny.
01:06:29
Speaker
And Chris gets noticed by Jim Cornette, who has a lot of great stuff in this episode, but he goes down to Smokey Mountain. And as Cornette says, he's like, I'm trying to figure out how to pay the both of them enough to like move from New Jersey to Tennessee. And he's like, maybe I can use Tammy as a manager. And she's of course, fucking great. Like people love, basically he gives her like a Hillary Clinton character in Tennessee in 1994. Everyone hates her mega heat. You know, it's going really well.
01:06:59
Speaker
And so they get signed to the WWF in 1995 and they are fitness instructors, the body Donnas skip he skip and she's sunny. Um, he eventually gets a tag team partner who's Dr. Tom Pritchard with blonde hair and like, like short hair and he's, he's zip. Um, Dr. Tom Pritchard, it's very funny to hear him talk about being forced to be zip. He's like this terrible. Um, but the, um,
01:07:28
Speaker
What happens is of course, the Sunny becomes a huge deal, right? Because she's the, um, the most downloaded woman on AOL in 1996. All the horny boys are finding those pictures and they're very excited to see Sunny. So she gets, becomes a very, very big star, far eclipsing Chris very, very quickly. And she ends up sleeping with Sean Michaels.
01:07:54
Speaker
That they talk about in the episode. They don't talk about how she allegedly was sleeping with Brett Hart too. And there's a very famous promo. We, you know, we talk about like Adam Page saying something about workers rights that piss CM punk off. Shawn Michaels on live fucking television to Brett Hart's face, mind you talks about how Brett has been having sunny days. Um, which I believe is what prompted them to literally just fucking fist fight each other in the backstage of raw.
01:08:24
Speaker
Um, and, and then lots of, and they also end up doing, um, so Chris, so, so he's still with her. Chris is still with her at this point. Well, so all three of them are Eskimo brothers. Yes. Although whether Chris knew or like.
01:08:44
Speaker
like denied it to himself. No one's ever been able to like get a clear read on like how where was he? Was he like in denial or whatever? So he ends up going to ECW becomes because he gets tired of being a low card guy in WWF becomes part of the triple threat. Right. Some of the diamond here in the looks like a nice shirt. Yeah. The Candido ECW shirt on and he becomes a star, but she ends up becoming
01:09:14
Speaker
She gets pulled up. WWF gets obsessed with Sable. They end up releasing her. She goes to ECW with them. They both do like just a shit ton of drugs together. There's a WCW run, too. There's a very brief XPW run that we could watch just if you really want to get it to see that they do that like the darkest of the times. Oh, it gets a lot darker. Gary, it gets so much darker. Oh, man. This could put like this is a dark side of the ring.
01:09:43
Speaker
Yeah, I know they're both not with us anymore. No. Sonny's alive. Sonny's with us currently. Oh yeah. Okay. So let's do the two tracks here, right? So they both end up doing a bunch of drugs in the early 2000s. Candido cleans himself up, goes to TNA,
01:10:03
Speaker
Is like having like a resurgence, right? In 2004, 2005, right? Suddenly he, he's the small guy who can wrestle and people love that, right? This is AJ Styles, a amazing red. He's bigger than fucking amazing red. You know, people is, he's starting to have this resurgence. He like.
01:10:23
Speaker
injures his ankle, breaks his ankle in a cage match, gets surgery, flies too quickly after the surgery to get back to do like an angle for TNA, gets a blood clot. That's what kills him. All the somas, all the drugs, all the bumps. He takes an easy bump, breaks his ankle, dies from a blood clot at the age of 33.
01:10:45
Speaker
that since I did not know that. Yeah, I never knew that's how he died. Yeah. And that was actually I think the most affecting part of the episode is that like Cornette and Tom Pritchard and Lance Storm all talk about like hearing about it. And like I'm like, man, this is Dark Side of the Ring. These guys must have interviewed a lot of sad, emotional men in their life. Right. I mean, this is a lot of these shows or go to sad places. Watching like Jim Cornette
01:11:13
Speaker
just break down in tears, Prichard's to all of them. Like the fact that the dark side people were like, yeah, this is, these people are so broken up about this, that this is noteworthy, that we have to show it is like, it is affecting to see them talk about like hearing about that. I actually remember where I was when I learned that Candido died because sort of a weird story. Our friend, Tom.
01:11:36
Speaker
We became like part of, we were first year, my first year in law school, we became kind of friendly and he was telling me, he's like, he mentioned something. He's like, Oh yeah. Can, can you do that? I'm like, what? Like we, like that was, he, he like found out we were at a bar. I can still see us at the bar, but finding out he like found out that like, I was a wrestling fan. We started talking about wrestling and he meet like a casual reference to this. I'm like,
01:11:57
Speaker
what Chris Candido died like, I think I might need to like leave this bar right now. I don't know if I can continue to like drink in this like lower east side bar right now. I think I probably did. I drank a lot in my early twenties. But yeah, so Sunny of course, right? Chris dies. She keeps doing drugs, keeps doing pills, gets a million DUIs, does,
01:12:24
Speaker
At first she does a website called like wrestling vixens or something like with three X's with Missy Hyatt. That's very soft core porn. Then later she does porn. Yeah. And then more recently she.
01:12:45
Speaker
with driving with a suspended license after God knows how many DUIs crashes into the back of a 75 year old's man's car and he dies. So she's in jail now. She's in jail. And I see that she's a Hall of Famer.
01:13:03
Speaker
She is a Hall of Famer. She, Sunny is actually the, um, the example when people have been like, why isn't China in the Hall of Fame? And they're like, well, you know, we can't have kids knowing about her doing porn. And it's like, Sunny's still in. And she did. She killed a guy. China never killed anyone that we're aware of. Oh, I mean, if they had to take every murderer out of the Hall of Fame,
01:13:30
Speaker
It's true. It's true. Yes, she's she's just in she's in jail. Right now. So OK, so what I'm looking at is like her mugshot. Holy shit. Yeah, yeah, you can. Yeah, it's a lot. It's a lot less arousing than the shots from the mid 90s. Well, when they're side by side like.
01:13:54
Speaker
That's that is the darkest side of the ring. But that's the thing. They didn't even they talked about her killing the guy, but they did not talk about her doing porn, which I think is. Like, that's part of the like, it's it's weird, you know, I mean, it's not that weird, is it? It's just. Tammy, Tammy's looked rough ever since, like, again, because of the drugs and stuff like it was such a like even in the early 2000s, because I saw she was at indie shows a whole bunch.
01:14:25
Speaker
And it was like, is she okay? Like it was like, is she okay in like 2002? You know what I mean? Like not looking great. Cause she'd been on, you know, a boatload of drugs and booze. And, um, I do have a picture, I think with her and Missy Hyatt somewhere. I could try to find that in my parents' house. That's a cherished memory. It's a cherished memory. Yeah. I don't know why I thought that was what I needed, but it's a very awkward shot.
01:14:55
Speaker
Very, very awkward. I'm Googling naughty stuff. And actually not being very successful. All right, well, I mean, yeah, that is a, that is a sad, I mean, it's all very sad. Not like, I guess I was expecting like Candido's thing is very sad and tragic, but I think I was expecting his death
01:15:24
Speaker
to come from a much darker place. It more comes from a sadder, like, man, this is a very tragic thing to happen to such a young man. Yeah, it's like the darkness in his life that he was overcoming and him dying right then. That's what's sad about it. It's like, man, if he keeps it together, he's probably still
01:15:49
Speaker
Like he's probably working backstage at AEW like today. If he keeps it together, you know what I mean? That's what's kind of sad about it. He is. He would have had a long, probably had a long career in that regard. And that's like Sam kennison getting clean and then getting killed by a drunk driver.
Chris Candido's Legacy
01:16:06
Speaker
Right.
01:16:09
Speaker
That's I mean, that's that's a goddamn shame. Yeah, I will recommend anyone, if any listeners watched it and really want to know more about Candido, John Cosper, who was on one of the episodes from all in that we did on The Best There Ever Was, wrote a sort of co-wrote not a biography with Chris's brother, Johnny Candido. That is really, really good. I read it a couple of years ago. It's a very enjoyable read.
01:16:35
Speaker
enjoyable in the sense that it's well written and it's good and it's a great story. Obviously, it ends as sadly as the dark side of the ring does. Also, the one I would point out, people talk about him being an influence. I always note that when we interviewed MJF at all in, right, the one thing he said that was not in KV, right, was we kind of got him to talk about his influences, like people he liked.
01:16:59
Speaker
And one of the people he mentioned is Chris Candido, um, which makes sense. Again, I think Candido was maybe at least partially involved in training Brian Myers, at least the little bits early on, um, who was obviously a trainer for one of the trainers for MJF. And I, I actually always thought.
01:17:19
Speaker
One of the guys you can see a lot of their style in MJF is Candido. Like if you watch a Candido match, they're kind of built the same. That's kind of part of it. They're built like a little bit shorter, but very stocky. And the way they move in the ring, like you can like, you can like draw a line between Candido and MJF. I wish I could get a kind of wish dark side talked about a little bit. I think, I think he is really, he's the influence on a lot of people and clearly on again, like one of the top stars in the business right now.
01:17:50
Speaker
What would be like, I remember Candido, but I don't remember a ton of Candido matches. Is there like a couple of standouts in your mind that I should check out before next week that kind of do a really good job showcasing him? It's tricky. I mean, the one the heat wave match with with Storm is really, really good. And that might be one of his better matches.
01:18:16
Speaker
at least of the ones that are like really widely available. He had some good ones with Jerry Lynn. Um, him and Candida, him and Storm together against RVD and Sabu. They had some pretty good matches. Um, again, he unfortunately kind of came of age at a time where he didn't get the opponents all the time that would have been to really let him be like, Oh man, Chris Candido against this guy. Like he got some of that, but not as much as you would have wanted in retrospect.
01:18:47
Speaker
So that's part of the, I think the other like aspect of his career is that aspect too, where you're like, he was before his time. And so as a result, you kind of have to like see the potential for what he could have done. Like you see the talent, you see, yeah, exact, perfect frame, yeah. Yeah. But so yeah, I would say, I mean, I can try to find, I'll see if I can find a link to one of the, like ECW,
01:19:15
Speaker
either like the house shows or TV and send you like one or two to take a look at. Okay.
Future Content and Social Media
01:19:20
Speaker
We gotta find out whose dark side, we're recording this on a Monday, but I'm curious who dark side of the ring the next two weeks are. Schedule, there we go, we got the schedule here. Magnum TA is next, oh and then next week is Adrian Adonis, that's the one I'm, one of the ones I'm most looking forward to.
01:19:43
Speaker
see what they have to say about old Adrian. I think both of those will be pretty good. Yeah. Good show. Good show. All right. Well, we'll watch wrestling and talk about it next week. Do we have any big shows coming up? Is there anything happening between now and next week? If not, we'll find something. Yeah, we'll find we'll find stuff to watch. But yeah, I don't think much is much big is going down. Let's just forgetting things because so much happened in the last week or so. So much wrestling.
01:20:13
Speaker
All right, guys, thanks for tuning in. We'll be back next week. Uh, rate, review, subscribe at pre-determined podcasts on Instagram at guard, Ted on Instagram at Chris Miggs on Instagram at Jimmy Lloyd's IMDB page. Uh, fax is still on his summer hiatus or his summer sabbatical. I believe we, we said, or maybe we didn't even say that, but, uh, either way, we'll be back next week. Thanks for listening in our goddamn music.