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Episode 24: Would You Rather: Misawa Vs Kawada
53 Plays7 years ago
On this weeks episode Garrett & Derrick hangout and talk about the WWE Roster. Also at a listeners request the boys watched Misawa Vs. Kawada from All Japan in the 90's! There's also talk of the WWE UK Tournament, NXTUK and you better believe like usual Nick Gage gets a mention!
To win 2 tickets to All In in Chicago, leave a 5 star review and send us a screen cap of your review to predeterminedpodcast@gmail.com! Contest ends July 17th!
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Transcript
Playful 80s Music Banter
00:00:00
Speaker
Hey everybody, welcome to another episode of Predetermined, a pro wrestling hangout. I'm your host, Garrett Callender, and with me, as always, a man who will obey the rules that Corey Hart has laid out and he will not switch the blade at the guy in shades. Derek Halpin.
00:00:15
Speaker
How do you know I won't? Because you're a good guy. That's kind of a massive assumption. I'm not that good. I can be bad. That's having to tell me that you're bad leads me to believe that you're better than you think you are. I'm a loner, Dotty. A rebel.
00:00:32
Speaker
Did you get the reference on this one? I didn't. What the fuck are you talking about? I'm telling you some lyrics from Sunglasses at Night by Corey Hart. There's a point in that one with so much conviction. He says, don't switch the blade at the guy in shades. Well, here's the thing. I know that song and I play that song a lot, but I think if you're just saying it,
00:00:55
Speaker
without the without the melody don't know what the fuck you're talking about yeah shades oh no no if you'd said that I would have definitely gotten that reference well don't don't do it don't and you know what else you should do hit our goddamn music
00:01:45
Speaker
So that was an interesting beginning. Yeah, and just so you know, from the other room, my wife just texted me and said I could hear that. She fucking hates anything that people find joy in from the 80s that isn't Black Sabbath. What? Yeah, she doesn't like 80s music. She doesn't seem to like 80s movies. I feel like maybe she's gonna come in and argue with me here in a second. Probably not, because she would agree with everything I'm saying. The other day, I had sunglasses at night playing in the car. She was mad the whole time.
00:02:15
Speaker
Why doesn't your wife like the 80s? The 80s were great. I think it's just too much for her. I think she... She enjoys... What does that even mean? I don't know. I think she doesn't like all the happiness and the brightness.
00:02:28
Speaker
She doesn't like the neon?
Contest and Social Media Engagement
00:02:30
Speaker
Before we just continue on talking about what my wife hates, which is just a plethora of things, we wanna tell you about a little contest we're running. Right now, we are running a contest for a pair of tickets to all in.
00:02:45
Speaker
man we've been we've been plugging this thing for what like over a month now and God we've been we've been plugging it on social media we've been plugging it on the episode and you guys been doing pretty damn good we've been getting a bunch of reviews in so keep it up guys but not enough that your odds aren't still fantastic to win no I'm sure they I'm sure they still have great odds but still you know let me let me open this up and tell you okay well tell them real quick how you how to enter this contest
00:03:11
Speaker
Well, if you want to enter the contest to get two tickets to all in, it's pretty simple. What you got to do is you got to get on iTunes and you need to leave us a rating and a review. Leave us a review and talk about, you know, maybe your favorite episode, things you like about the show. And as you're writing the review before you click submit, screenshot it on your phone or
00:03:34
Speaker
on your computer, whatever, we don't care. Take a screenshot of it and then email that screenshot to us at predeterminedpodcast.gmail.com. Use the subject line, I want all in. And let us know your preferred contact info and then we will be doing the drawing as of right now. The plan is to do the drawing on July 17th.
00:03:56
Speaker
And as Garrett already stated, you have fantastic chances to win this contest. Great odds. So we've gotten actually in the last couple of weeks, we've gotten quite a few more reviews in though, so your odds are diminishing. Don't.
00:04:12
Speaker
It's a free contest. Enter the goddamn thing. I don't care. Actually, what's funny though, I didn't even consider this. In my head, I was like, everybody has iTunes. Everybody can do this. I've had more people message me to say I have an Android than I have had people enter the contest. Is Android the way of the future? The people who have Android will tell you that.
00:04:35
Speaker
But i think our point still stands one of the things we've been telling people who come to us saying that they have an android and not an iphone. We've been telling them there's no way you don't know somebody who doesn't have an iphone because there's a ton of people with iphones. You can use their phone. Use their phone to submit the rating and the review for a contest. Screenshot it on their phone. Text the screenshot to yourself. Email it to us at predeterminepodcast at gmail.com.
00:05:01
Speaker
Here's the subject line I want all in. Get your entry in. We got less than a month, Garrett. Less than a month, and we'll be drawing a name out of a hat. A predetermined hat to determine who's going to be going all in with us. Not with us directly, but they will be going to the same event we're going to. We'll meet up. We'll come say hi. We're going to be at Starcast. We're going to have a table. We're going to be sitting there podcasting. It's going to be great.
00:05:26
Speaker
But I do want to give a shout out to a couple people that left us nice reviews. Big Dan the sign man. He said his son turned him on to the show and gave him a few wrestling podcasts to listen to. He listened to ours and ours was his favorite.
00:05:41
Speaker
So you know what? I like that there's a father-son duo listening to our podcast. That just really warms my heart. That is exciting. It's also good to hear that we're somebody's favorite wrestling podcast. Isn't that exciting to you? Suck it, Stone Cold Steve Austin. Suck it, Rick Flair. Suck it, Bruce Prichard. Yeah. All of them. All of them. And you know what? I hope that this father-son duo, I hope they listen to it while on a fishing trip sometime. I hope that we fill some silence on that fishing trip.
00:06:08
Speaker
Thanks for having us along on your bonding experience. Also, thank you to Sparky1010, BigFossMan, and JohnnyBoy from the Pro Wrestling Tea Store. And TheRealLukes. Get a nice review if you're sitting here listening. We're getting some reviews, man. Hey, and you know what? Even if you don't want to enter the contest, do us that favor. Rate, review, subscribe. Love you forever for it. Let's talk about some pro wrestling, Derek.
00:06:35
Speaker
Yeah, let's talk about whatever you want to talk about, man. Where do you want to start this week's episode?
NXT TakeOver Recap
00:06:40
Speaker
There's been a lot going on. Last week's episode was you and me reviewing NXT TakeOver Chicago and Money in the Bank, which you were actually here for, and now we're back to being in separate locations.
00:06:54
Speaker
Doing what we do normally so I will say did you go back and rewatch because if anyone listening to this is like wow They don't sound like shit always well I haven't been at a wrestling show in a hot-ass building for two days my voice is back Did you go back and rewatch any of the matches from those two days? Yeah, absolutely
00:07:14
Speaker
Okay, one match I feel like we didn't give enough credit to, because we didn't- I feel like it just didn't play as well in the room as it did on television, and that's the Ronda Rousey Nia Jax match. What, because of how fucked up Ronda got? Absolutely! I feel like from where we were sitting, you couldn't tell how hard of a bump she was taking. She was getting tossed all over the goddamn place.
00:07:38
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, I definitely think that they were kind of using it as a can you take this kind of abuse match? Definitely. I mean, it's not UFC, but it's I mean, I think pro wrestling bumps are a little bit different, don't you think? For sure. I mean, you know, it actually with that match, I was just like, God, she's hitting her head on the ground a lot.
00:07:59
Speaker
Which will be a theme later on in this episode. When you were saying, is this different than MMA? Well, she was hitting her head on the ground a lot. I don't think that's normally WWE style bumps, but she was getting thrown like just head first into the barricade. She was getting ragdolled all over. I was actually really impressed with her ability to take a beating.
00:08:23
Speaker
Well, I would say her background helped her out a lot in that. And I mean, not that I'm taking a shot at Nia Jax. Does Nia have the reputation as being like a super safe worker? I guess to me, I don't really have an opinion on what Nia Jax's workload is. I feel like I've never really seen her just ragdoll people like that. Or has that been her matches forever and I've just not been paying attention because this is the biggest match she's ever had.
00:08:50
Speaker
I don't know, you probably haven't been paying attention. I know that if they had put Randy Orton in there against Ronda Rousey, he would have laid it in there to her. Oh my God. It all comes back to Randy Orton being mean to people and not giving a shit. He's like, you put her in there. I'm putting her through that table. I'm going to throw her as high as I can. God, I would love to see that. I was thinking, because you can't really do just every female wrestler in an intergender match. Some just it doesn't really work so well.
00:09:16
Speaker
but I was trying to think of what a dream intergender match would be. And I think Chris Jericho in New Japan versus Ronda Rousey would get really weird. That's your dream intergender match? Think about that. Chris Jericho, like this weird, evil version? No? That doesn't do anything for you. I don't know. It's just a weird... It's just a weird... I don't know. Maybe I haven't... That version of Chris Jericho has wrestled two matches. Yeah, and he's gonna call a lady fuckface.
00:09:48
Speaker
Among other things like he's going to talk about. I mean, at this point, though, Ronda Rousey losing her last couple matches in MMA,
Women on WWE 2K19 Cover?
00:09:56
Speaker
isn't that what every single wrestler is going to bring up from now on when they have to tell her she's not tough?
00:10:02
Speaker
Yeah, basically you failed at your last job. You're gonna fail at this job. Is that gonna be the running theme for a couple years? I think it's gonna have to be and I do think it's hilarious though when the WWE superstars come out and I think Alexa Bliss did it last week on Raw where she came out and was saying like this isn't the WWE. God damn it.
00:10:22
Speaker
I have an Amazon Echo in here and it really makes it hard to talk about Alexa Bliss because she goes off every single time I talk about it or when it's on TV.
00:10:35
Speaker
Can we talk about how unique and awesome that is? I can't be the only person that's had this problem. I feel like next to the TV is the perfect place to put your Amazon dot. That's actually hilarious. And just unfortunately we watch a show where one of the main characters has the name that you have to say to activate it. So now I have to avoid that. That's hilarious. Well done. I'm glad this came up during the podcast.
00:11:01
Speaker
Talked for so long about geography while I was trying to talk just now and I don't know what it thinks it heard. Oh My god, that's good stuff. Can I ask a question? Oh, yeah, what the fuck is Nia Jax? Did you watch raw this week? I watched highlights this week. I didn't I don't remember recall what she did. She came out as a babyface again backing up Natalia. I
00:11:25
Speaker
Jesus, is she just gonna be the big show now? I mean, I guess the, I guess that's a great way of putting it, is this, what, she was the baby face going up against Bliss at Mania, you know, cause she was getting bullied,
NXT as a Brand and WWE Dynamics
00:11:40
Speaker
then she beats Alexa, but then like a couple weeks after Mania, she's back to being a bully again, but without Alexa. And now- Well, she wasn't really a bully to Ronda was, she called her out, she called her shot on that one. She was kind of being a bully.
00:11:55
Speaker
Well, you can't being a bitch like she was picking on that local indie worker. Well, she was showing that she can get out of the arm bar. Yeah, but like like a smug asshole.
00:12:09
Speaker
Hey, I think it's fine. You know? And now she's wonderful. Now she's wonderful, and I agree. But I think that's because she has such a nice smile that if she smiles, you're just like, oh, can't be mad at her. But then if she looks mean, you're like, yeah, she's a pretty big lady. She could throw me around and act mean to me. She has a nice smile and pretty eyes. She really does. And she could probably ragdoll me even worse than Rhonda.
00:12:39
Speaker
That's the inner gender match, my new dream inner gender match. Derek Halpin versus Nia Jax. It's me in a ring calling out Brock Lesnar and making fun of his Minnesota accent and then out comes Nia Jax instead and just decimates me. Also Nia Jax versus Randy Orton.
00:13:01
Speaker
Oh, and here's the other thing I wanted to bring up because I wanted to make sure I asked what the fuck's going on with Nia's heel babyface stuff. But I saw this come up today on social media, and I think I saw you engaging this. I can't remember who it was between, so forgive me. But there were people saying it was a missed opportunity for the upcoming WWE 2K19 video game to not put a female athlete on the cover of the video game.
00:13:28
Speaker
Hell yeah. Well, I wanted to bring this up because this is actually the perfect segue for this. I think that's going to happen, but I'm actually kind of glad it's not happening yet. I want it to happen next year for the next whatever that one after this one for 2K20 because they'll totally put Rhonda on there. Yeah, but does Rhonda deserve to be on there or does Charlotte Flair deserve to be on there now?
00:13:54
Speaker
I would argue that they, I mean, but it's all for marketing purposes, so they're definitely gonna, I mean, did Brock deserve to be on there? When he was on there? Yes, at the time, I believe that game was sold to me because Lesnar was on the cover. But that's what I'm saying, is that like, I think if you wait another year and let Ronda get a few more matches under her belt,
00:14:14
Speaker
get that exposure, I think she could very well end up being the person. I don't think Stiles is the wrong choice. No, no, don't get me wrong. I think Stiles is easily, at least it's not Roman, right? Isn't that what everybody's thinking? Yeah, that's probably what everybody's thinking. But I think they obviously, they think Roman Reigns is the guy, but they're not putting him on the video game cover, because they know that he's not. That was the next question I was going to ask, is has he been on one of the covers and I just missed it? No, he has not.
00:14:44
Speaker
So he's not the guy. How can the man who's main evented like the last 20 Wrestlemanias not be on the cover? Fucking Stone Cold Steve Austin was on a more recent cover of WWE 2K than Roman Reigns has. And then Seth Rollins got on because he bitched about that.
00:15:04
Speaker
What yeah remember he like I think he said something on Twitter where? He's like there's a lot of guys on the current roster that would love to be on this cover He said something that ended up resulting in him getting the next cover
00:15:17
Speaker
Really, he bitched about it. Yeah, I mean, and I don't think he's wrong. Like, I know why they're putting Stone Cold on the cover, but you have a lot of talented dudes. Like, obviously, like, AJ Styles, one of the most deserving. Seth Rollins, definitely. Like, not that he just bitched and got on it. Like, deserving guy, really talented, talented worker. But, you know, I can also see why it would be hard for them to not just put the rock on the cover every single time.
00:15:43
Speaker
right I guess I guess that's like you make a good point about Charlotte being a deserving candidate for that I mean like I'm not gonna argue that I just think that like if they're gonna pull the trigger on it they're gonna do like somebody who has like the mainstream pull on it right well Charlotte is in ESPN magazine this month and she's naked ESPN's body issue man hey Seth Rollins isn't afraid to to hang some brain we should have thrown him in there too
00:16:12
Speaker
Wow. I don't think his was intentional, man. Hang some brain. Isn't that what the kids are saying? I don't know. I'm not one of the kids anymore, apparently. Lord. OK, but yeah, I mean, like if you could pick one female from the roster, who would be on the cover right now?
00:16:40
Speaker
Oh, like, oh, for 2K. I thought we were talking about ESPN's body issue. No! We're not that kind of show. Well, that's what we were just talking about. Um, I don't know. I think they got it right with Styles. I mean, by all accounts, weren't we? We were just talking about this last week when you were here. Isn't he actually leading merchandise sales right now? I believe so. From what I... So it kind of makes sense. I mean, I was just saying, like, out of the ladies, would Charlotte be your go-to other than Ronda?
00:17:11
Speaker
Probably, yeah. I mean, you could probably make an argument for a couple of them. I mean, beyond Rhonda. I mean, like Charlotte, I'm sure there'd be people out there screaming, what about Sasha? I'm over here screaming, put Candace on there. And there's other people screaming, she's had two matches. When do you think they'll get around to pushing Candace down there in NXT? Like any day now? I think it has to be when the Johnny Champa feud is over.
00:17:40
Speaker
Aren't they right now pretending that it's over? Are they? Okay, I was talking to somebody about this today. Hi, John. I have to say the name of who I am. Somebody. Somebody. It was my friend, John. So he was saying that he would completely put off them meeting up again until Champa has the belt and Johnny's chasing him.
00:18:02
Speaker
That makes some sense.
00:18:27
Speaker
You could totally do that, but there's a couple ways you can go about it, which is right now Champa and Aleister Black are teasing a match with each other. And after the things that Champa's done to Gargano, it would make so much sense for Champa to have a title shot against Aleister Black and for Gargano to cost Champa the match. And for that to be how that continues their feud. But you've kind of sold me on it. I like the idea of them holding off and them doing this part three
Future of NXT Championships and Feuds
00:18:57
Speaker
as you know for the NXT championship because it is that big I think it's warranted the championship at this point it hasn't needed it but I mean it totally elevates that championship to a whole other level just because of how great the feud has been yeah the as of now they have not needed a belt
00:19:14
Speaker
And I think for the third match, you won't need it. But if you have a fourth one, just to elevate it that little bit more and knowing what had come before and been like, you know, you saw what happened the first three times. Now picture when there's gold on the line kind of thing. I just picture them having just a murder fest. Like they're just going to kill each other to get there.
00:19:35
Speaker
I guess the question would be though if you end up putting the title into their feud Since their feud has been main eventing the the NXT pay-per-views without the title when you put the title into it Who's on the like who's like under that? I don't know carrying it without it. Well at that point if if Champa ends up getting the belt does that mean Aleister Black is probably gone and
00:19:59
Speaker
you mean called up yes he called up at this point because we're hearing rumors that velveteen dream is going to get called up which to me i don't know i part of me thinks he could go the way of tyler breeze when he gets called up but the other part of me thinks they just got a homegrown guy this over why would you ruin that isn't this isn't this what they wanted
00:20:22
Speaker
I can tell you what I think, which is that if it was my decision, I would be holding Velveteen Dream down in NXT for as long as I can. Cuz I do not trust that guy getting booked properly on the main roster. And I know I'm not the only one who feels this way.
00:20:40
Speaker
I think we're back in a time though with NXT where we could leave guys there for a while and just have this be the show. They've got such a crazy good roster right now that, you know, it's kind of like when they left Finn Balor there for a really long time because he was just the face of the show. And right now I could easily see so many of the guys that are on there being the face of the show.
00:21:05
Speaker
You know, I've been a big advocate for that. I've been saying that NXT should probably just be its own brand and I'm not necessarily nuts about them calling guys up, you know, like in a pattern, like at the same time every year, like to me, like.
00:21:19
Speaker
Like, let some stuff simmer, especially now that they have the North American Championship there, and you can actually rotate guys up and down from the NXT Championship to the North American Championship into the tag division and back up again. Like, it shouldn't just be like, oh, there you go, you got your title reign in, now you're getting called up to the main roster. Yeah, I think it was you that said this, where you wouldn't mind seeing a guy lose a belt and get it back a couple times, not just, you have it for this period of time, you lost it, now you're gone.
00:21:50
Speaker
Which brings up a topic that you and I have never really dove into before, considering we talk about everything for wrestling. I'm at a point now, especially with WWE television, I wouldn't mind seeing not like super fast hot potato with the titles,
00:22:11
Speaker
But I don't know if the current media market is conducive to long title reigns, I guess is what I'm trying to say. We don't have that attention span anymore. Yeah, like four fucking months is an eternity. But the thing is, if you have somebody like AJ Styles and they're just winning for a year,
00:22:35
Speaker
I feel like that's a lot easier to handle because he's there every fucking day. But when you have your other belt just stuck in limbo, then you have two guys that are just holding onto these titles. I think if you're playing hot potato with one of them, that's fine. I think if you were doing it with both of them, it could get messy. I don't know, what do you-
00:22:55
Speaker
I guess my rebuttal to that and I would be interested to hear from our listeners on this and by no means am I planting a flag on the ground and saying no I'm absolutely certain this is what they need to do. I guess my opinion is just there's something about the way the speed of the media moves now with Twitter and with YouTube and with people catching up on highlights.
00:23:17
Speaker
I'm not saying that you need to tune in every week and there needs to be a new champion, but we've talked about how strong their roster is before. And I think there's a potential for a bunch of different stars on that show. And I don't think you should like, I don't want to look back on this period and be like, Oh yeah, there were basically like three champions. It was, it was Lesnar, it was Reigns and it was Styles. Like they have so much more talent just beyond that. And that's not a knock on those three guys.
00:23:47
Speaker
I think, like, isn't it kind of criminal that they did make the jump and say, okay, we're going with Finn Balor as our first ever Universal Championship and he got injured and he didn't get injured by an accident from like something that he did or like some, like it was another wrestler accidentally hurting him and they didn't really reward him for coming back. Like, I mean, it's been coming up on a year, right? Over a year since he's been back. Well, basically lost his title and he lost his gimmick.
00:24:17
Speaker
and kind of lost his spot. Like what was it that they saw, what was it that Vince saw in Finn Balor at that SummerSlam that he decided to put him over Rollins and make him the first Universal Champion that when he came back was like, ah, that doesn't work for me now. Well, do you think that he kind of had that mentality of, okay, we'll do this as an experiment and see how it works?
00:24:40
Speaker
And then he did it and he's like, see what happens when I put your indie fucks with a belt. But that's what I'm meaning is that a fucking another indie fuck was the guy who heard him. And it's somebody that everyone raves about, which is Rollins. I mean, this isn't me taking a dig at Rollins. Maybe we've talked about this before. I just, I think it's odd. I think
00:25:02
Speaker
You have a potential where like every couple months they could swap that belt. I don't even really want to talk about fucking title prestige. To me, that's almost like tongue in cheek bullshit that like like fans talk about. But I don't know if it's necessarily true. So you believe that the man makes the title. The title doesn't make the man. I think I think it changes. I think it depends on who it is.
00:25:29
Speaker
I don't think there's a one size fits all policy on that. I think typically you like it when the man makes the title, but I think you have a roster right now that everyone's like, yeah, there's a lot of fucking talent on that roster right now. I could feasibly see each show having four or five guys be the champion. And they're not really doing that, especially on Raw because it's been held down by a part-timer who everyone kind of quietly knows doesn't give a shit for a long time. We don't have to go down the Brock Lesnar path
00:25:57
Speaker
for that discussion right now, but don't you think that Raw has like five guys that could be Universal Champion right now? Oh, easily. Easily. I mean, what do we have? Braun Strowman, Kevin Owens, Bobby Lashley.
00:26:14
Speaker
Nice try. No, I mean, what, what? Braun Strowman, Kevin Owens, Finn Balor, Seth Rollins. Fuck, I'm probably blanking on some other ones. I'm sure Dean can probably be thrown in there at some point if he comes back.
00:26:31
Speaker
Just sorry just I had just mentioned John I just got a text While we're recording that says Hardy versus Nakamura got cancelled cuz last night in Bakersfield Shinsuke Nakamura got bit by a police dog
00:26:49
Speaker
Yeah, no, I noted that before the episode. I was going to break that out during the episode. So thanks, John. You stole my scoop. He scooped your heat. God damn it, John. Sorry, continue. That's fucking weird, though. Yeah, no, I guess Nakamura got bit by a police dog and he will not be fighting for the US title. We are recording this before SmackDown right now, in case anyone's wondering. They probably don't give a shit. He tried to low blow that dog. Dog caught him.
00:27:17
Speaker
The dog was not neutered. But I think even going back to when we were talking about the build to money in the bank, there were several guys in that match that you could argue should have had either a main event run or a run with the title. And your boy, Ms. was one of them. You could make the argument that, you know,
00:27:38
Speaker
He has made the most of his opportunities the last couple years. He's made himself into a top guy again with his promos, with his in-ring work, and proving drastically the last couple years, in my opinion. And...
00:27:50
Speaker
I don't think it would have been wild to see him. I don't think it would have been too out of the question to see him get run with a top belt on either show. I really thought that we could end up there, but now I'm kind of worried that they're just like, well, he's a top guy now. He doesn't need a belt. But I think he's the best when he has something to brag about. I completely agree. Isn't that the way it works with heels?
00:28:13
Speaker
Most of the time. I mean, not every time. I mean, like, obviously right now it depends how good the heel is. I mean, Champa doesn't need anything to be able to just come off as a brick. And yet he may be going for something here, so... Which... I don't know, man. Do you see him as the guy to take that from Aleister Black?
00:28:33
Speaker
Because you could say the same thing about what's happening on the raw roster with the NXT roster because they just keep bringing on these new guys and the majority of the people watching have an idea of these people's past. So you see somebody like Ricochet come on and I feel like a lot of people immediately want to be like well he should be in the title picture.
00:28:54
Speaker
because he's fucking ricochet. But he gets there and we have to watch him go through a series of months to get to the point. They break him back down. Yeah, because they treat it like what you don't know who he is. You don't know who he is. Like, this is nothing compared to that. Yeah, and I get it. Or that's nothing compared to this, I mean.
00:29:13
Speaker
Well, yeah, they treat it like the way you would see a minor league call up in professional sport. Like the guy was raking down in the minor leagues, but now that he's called up to the big leagues, now he's got to adjust and they're going to adjust back to him and he's not the top dog. He's a small fish in a big pond or whatever they say.
00:29:33
Speaker
You know, I think, and what's weird is that since this is pro wrestling, they don't have to pretend to do that. And they didn't do it with Balor. And they didn't do it with Owens. When those guys came up from NXT, they were beating top guys on day one.
00:29:49
Speaker
and it's weird, it almost sucks the life out of their character. Isn't Ember Moon kind of going through that right now too, where she came up and she was the hot new female call-up and then like her call-up has kind of gotten lost in the shuffle with the Ronda Rousey stuff?
00:30:04
Speaker
Yeah, there's a lot of those call-ups that, I don't know, there's so many of them that it seems like they had so much momentum and they assume that people aren't watching NXT that are watching Raw. But the crowd that's there paying to see that show knows who those people are. And I think- Which I- Oh, go ahead. Doesn't that just mean that they know who they are?
00:30:26
Speaker
I think so but I think they've got this idea that there's the people who are just gonna watch on TV who are the casual fans but that I don't know but then you've got the people who are paying to go to it that are the you know the more hardcore fans I I just think if if the argument was made to me that the audience or the kids or just whatever the viewers in general that they don't know who the people in the next year I would say that's bullshit
00:30:52
Speaker
I think that if Velveteen Dream debuted on Raw next week, the fans would react huge because they know who the fuck it is. And the thing is, if the people at home watching hear how big the people on TV reacted to that person, they're going to know something's up. Well, that was one of the reasons Styles got such a big push immediately when he made his WWE debut is because they were wondering, is the WWE crowd going to even know who the hell this is? And he got a huge pop.
00:31:21
Speaker
I mean, it's the same old fucking argument that we have on here anytime we talk about WWE or Vince, which is that it's just out of touch. I think there's, they think things that are just not true and they base entire strategies around things that are not true. Well, would you, I don't know, do you think it's a good idea to, I mean, obviously with everyone, you're not gonna throw them on there and just immediately push them up. Cause there's people like No Way Jose, he's a good wrestler, but that gimmick has never get into the main event.
00:31:49
Speaker
Oh for sure, and I think he's holding down his spot on that roster. I think he's doing what he's there to do. He's getting paid, he's showing up, he's having fun, and kids at house shows are gonna love him.
Title Reigns in Modern Media
00:32:00
Speaker
Right. Right, and there's nothing wrong with that. No, you're not gonna get paid the big main event money. Not every guy gets to be the big main event guy. And that's okay, as long as you're happy, man.
00:32:12
Speaker
It's like you're talking No Way Jose off a ledge. Like, hang in there, bud. You're going to be all right. Well, I just remember I got upset. I got so upset, you know, a little over, like, I got upset, like, you know, 11, 11, 12 years ago, I was a big fan of Carlito, Caribbean cool. I knew that's who you're going to be.
00:32:32
Speaker
And I really thought he was, he was, he got himself over, he was original, he was different. And I thought he was worthy of a main event run and this never happened. And there's just certain guys that just aren't going to get that shot. So going back to my argument about the fucking roster and the main championship, I don't think this is that. I think there's legitimately on each brand, there's multiple guys that you could see rotating through that, that main event spot, like,
00:32:59
Speaker
I don't say it has to be like, I'm not going to say it has to be like the attitude era. I don't think you need to tune in to Raw every week because the belt might change hands this week, but it would certainly help with creating the environment of it being must see television again. If you don't know when a title change is going to come, you don't know when you're going to tune in and get Daniel Bryan versus AJ Styles or, or Seth Rollins versus Roman Reigns or whatever for a championship.
00:33:23
Speaker
I think there's this business model of we need to save it for the pay-per-view. Like, and I don't think there's anything wrong with occasionally giving something really nice and juicy away for free on TV, because guess what? It makes people want to tune in the next week. Well, especially with, remember the time they were just playing Hot Potato with the women's tag belt and it was going back and forth between Charlotte and Sasha?
00:33:47
Speaker
Yeah, we got to see an awesome moment on television, which was Sasha Banks giving Charlotte the bank statement on the rail in the middle of the crowd. Yeah, that was awesome. That was a great moment that ended raw and it felt like an actual main event rather than just, you know, it wasn't a multi person match or.
00:34:06
Speaker
I don't know, man. I would love to hear from fans about how they feel about Hot Potato in the title a little bit more. Not every week, but especially when you've had Raw be a three hour fucking program and you've had their main championship not there for over a year. Like I understand that the Intercontinental Championship is quote unquote more prestigious because of it, but fucking come on, man. It's still a secondary title.
00:34:32
Speaker
It's not the world title. The world title should be there a little bit more often. Well, when you have this many top guys that are obviously can't all be the top guy, because there are just too many people. There's not enough spots for all these guys. If you could grab somebody from that roster, from the WWE roster and throw them into Ring of Honor to be Ring of Honor, like one of Ring of Honor's top guys now, who would you do that to?
Wrestlers Thriving in Other Promotions
00:34:58
Speaker
if I could grab any guy off of their roster and essentially save them from WWE. Or a lady, because honestly, the ladies division on Ring of Honor could use any of them. You were saying that Sasha Banks has been saying on Twitter basically asking to go back to NXT.
00:35:20
Speaker
Has she? Was that you that said that to me? I don't think so. That might have been John again. John's getting a lot of shout outs on this. John's, speaking of takeover, John's taken over this episode. No, I didn't know anything about that. I knew that Cena had been advocating to go back, like to do something down in NXT. But I didn't know anything about Max. What do you think his reaction would be down in NXT when he came out? Do you think he'd get booed or do you think the crowd would just be so excited to see him at full sail?
00:36:01
Speaker
I don't know, I liked our storyline of him just going down there to get wins because it's been too long since he's had a victory. And he just feels like he can go down there and squash like EC3 and shit like that. You know what? Don't do that. Have him go down, take down the tag team division. Just a bunch of handicap matches where he takes down like Otis and Jizz and then he takes down War Machine. I don't know. I know I want to see it. I think that'd be something different. Anytime you get to do something a little bit different, that'd be cool.
00:36:15
Speaker
I think a little bit of both and I think I want to see it really bad.
00:36:31
Speaker
So. But going back to Ring of Honor, you can grab one guy, throw him in Ring of Honor. I would like to see Daniel Bryan get back out there on the indie scene. I think everybody would be in favor of that. I'd like to see Finn Balor maybe get better utilized in an environment where guys his size are a little bit more prevalent. You might be surprised with my answer. Who's your answer? Dean Ambrose.
00:36:54
Speaker
really in my head right now I don't have a place for him in WWE but I could see him as being a guy that goes on and takes on this heel version of the Bullet Club like because he's fucking crazy because he's crazy and he would get to like wrestle those you know harder hidden matches that he seems to enjoy right I think I think you miss it a little bit yeah
00:37:18
Speaker
I don't know, maybe when he comes back, I keep theorizing, you know, I'm sure he'll come back and have some sort of interaction with Rollins, but I could also see him winding up on SmackDown really soon. I just don't even know what you throw him into the middle of. Intercontinental title scene?
00:37:35
Speaker
Presumably at this point, if you throw them into the middle of the Intercontinental Championship scene, you have moved the title off of Lesnar. And now there's a couple guys that are actually full-time wrestlers working that scene. So there may be a spot that opens up for them that way.
00:37:52
Speaker
Yeah, man, we have some other stuff we gotta talk about, man. We've been talking about this NXT WWE roster stuff
Iconic Wrestling Match Reviews
00:37:59
Speaker
for a while. We had a listener of ours suggest some matches to us. Garrett, you watched a fuckload of wrestling recently. Yeah, I should have watched more.
00:38:09
Speaker
But let me pull up Andrew. He asked if we would watch the Misawa versus Kawata series from all Japan in the 90s. And I'll go ahead and tell you, I didn't know anything about this going in, which now surprises me because as I was reading about it, which I read everything after, I watched these four matches having read nothing. I just went straight in.
00:38:38
Speaker
because I just wanted to be able to give my thoughts, not knowing anything going on with the story, just only the wrestling. So the ones we watched were from $6,394, $724.95, $6,697, and $122.99.
00:38:59
Speaker
kind of probably lost in the shuffle with a lot of today's wrestling fans too. I don't think this is getting brought up a lot, but it's also, I guess considered one of the most iconic pro wrestling rivalries. Yeah. So that's what I'm reading. Like after I had watched these and started reading it, reading about it, I saw that their match from June 3rd, 1994 was the only other match that Dave Meltzer had given six stars to.
00:39:25
Speaker
And so not knowing anything, I start with the first match. Masawa versus Kawada. When this, I hope I'm saying both names correctly, always worried about that. Always worried about sounding like a dumbbell.
00:39:41
Speaker
Okay, so when this comes on, immediately, it's the 90s. And they are 90s and hard in this episode. Like, when you look at that crowd, even in Japan, you're like, this is the 90s. This looks like it was shot on the same cameras they shot double dare on.
00:40:00
Speaker
Oh, that's a good quote for the bank. And when I look at these two wrestlers, so just describing them visually, Kawada looks like a pro wrestler. Looks like a mean son of a bitch with a goatee.
00:40:18
Speaker
All right, other guy, Misawa. As I look at this man, I don't necessarily get pro wrestler out of him. What I get, what I get is picture if a man was like, you know, somebody came over and is like, hey, I'll grant you a wish, but all you have to do is a would you rather? And he's like, well, I do want my family to be wealthy and happy. I take that would you rather.
00:40:41
Speaker
and the would you rather ended up being would you like would you rather have to fight a match a year against this man where you have to put everything on the line like you have to give every last bit of energy you have or stick a needle in your own urethra
00:40:59
Speaker
And he's like, I'm going to fight those matches, my friend. And I don't think he knew what he was getting into. Not much better than the needle in the pea hole. Jesus. These matches, OK, just to go like real quickly through them and then we'll move back a little bit. The first one, very much a Japanese style match, started out slow, got more hard hitting. I was into it, but like wasn't super in love with it yet.
00:41:24
Speaker
By the second one, I was getting a little more invested. By the third match, they were like, fuck it. No grappling, I'm gonna break this fucker's arm. And they just start killing each other right at the top. And that match, just the third match, they're just murdering each other. And by that one as well, let me see, Kasawa is missing his fucking teeth. I think that's part of the fun in watching this series of matches the way we did, is we're watching these guys gradually get older.
00:41:54
Speaker
They're aging in pro wrestling years. Which is, I mean, they look okay, other than, you know, missing some teeth. And by that fourth one, god damn. The end, I guess, to that match. I looked it up. You can get a 14 disc set of these dudes' matches.
00:42:16
Speaker
It can just be its own network. It's 14 discs that span 17 years of these guys career and 38 matches.
00:42:27
Speaker
38 matches and they're just stiff as hell with each other. Like this is the big, I don't know, like you said, double dare camera, you're watching like the beginning, you're watching the beginning of just stiff ass fucking forearm shots to the face, bleeding out of the ear. And that is just a few minutes into the first match. Right. But guys are getting dropped on their heads, back of their heads, back of their necks. Like it's, it's fucking brutal. Like it's not pretty.
00:42:58
Speaker
And it's just, oh my God. So Kawada does this thing where he'll push your head down and just give you like 13 really fast little kicks to the face. And it is the cutest, most devastating move I've ever seen. What? Cause it's so rapid fire, but it's still a guy getting kicked in the face. It's just like boom, boom, boom. But he's moving his legs so little, so quickly. Like it's just like these little like, it's almost like a cat kicking with his back legs.
00:43:27
Speaker
but everything looks like the most devastating movie you've ever seen. And from what I was reading, as you get closer to that 97 time, like that 97 match that I watched, that's around the time, I guess, that it was really big in that company to just be dumping motherfuckers on their head.
00:43:46
Speaker
Like straight down? Just straight down. Like every bump is just... They're like, if you can get this as close to breaking his neck as possible without doing it, we're gonna call that an A+. Looks great on TV. Oh my god, and even by that third one, there's a moment when he whips... Fuck, I don't even remember who whipped who into it. I want to say it was Kawada whipped Masawa into it, but it was like he just ran as fast as he could straight into a goddamn brick wall.
00:44:17
Speaker
These guys truly gave their all in these matches. When did All Japan close down? Is it closed down? I mean, I assume you don't hear about it. Maybe I'm wrong. If it hasn't closed down, it's at least not getting spoken of. I'm embarrassed and I'm not gonna cut this out. I don't know a shit ton about All Japan. Well, clearly.
00:44:42
Speaker
Well, I mean, but this was sent in to us by a listener and like, we just wanted to go out of our way to let you guys know. You send us some crazy shit, stuff that we need to watch in the world of pro wrestling. We will watch it. Oh man. And just so you know, I watched the first and last match twice.
00:45:01
Speaker
because by the end of it I realized like holy shit I really really love these four matches so I went back to rewatch the first one just because you know that's the one that got six stars but the matches also got more hard-hitting as they went so I feel like those ones got me more excited and I knew the characters a little bit better so I needed to check that out
00:45:24
Speaker
Again, and I can't recommend these four matches enough I mean like I said I think the the third one that I watched Which do I need to read what the dates were on those again? Just so if people want to go check those ones out
00:45:38
Speaker
Why don't you go ahead but I just I think people are gonna find a lot of these matches on YouTube if you just type in you know Kawata and Masawa. Yeah definitely go out of your way to look these up. It's not like when we were watching the the punk matches that went two fucking hours. These are you know pretty normal length matches. The first one is probably the longest at what just under 40 minutes and then the others go between like 25 and 35 minutes each but
00:46:06
Speaker
they're absolutely worth your time and did you notice how loud the crowd was during these? Yeah and and the crowd being loud was exciting. I think it's hard for me to listen to like Japanese commentary when I don't know what they're saying but they're yelling like like they're it's like they're climaxing when these matches are going on.
00:46:27
Speaker
I'm like, oh my god, I wish I knew what they were saying. Oh, there's one of their names that just went by. But, uh, oh, and I, I fucked my neck up. Uh, so I've been taking muscle relaxers. And just so you know, when you're a little high watching this, uh, it is, and they're just screaming in Japanese and these two motherfuckers are just giving each other stiff elbows to the face. Just a stiff kick to the face. They're screaming in Japanese. I'm stoned.
00:46:52
Speaker
It is insane. So get in the right mindset, watch these matches, have a great fucking evening. It's a little bit like some homework. Like you're going back in time, you know, a couple decades to watch some pro wrestling. And I don't, I'm not gonna, I don't know nearly enough about, you know, Japanese wrestling. I don't know where the strong style originated, but there's, there's a hard line of it going straight through this fucking feud.
00:47:20
Speaker
So yeah, what I was reading is these two started out as a tag team
00:47:25
Speaker
And then it became where they were fighting each other. And it got to the point where these, they said that these were two of the four pillars of all Japan wrestling. So these were like, you know, two of the biggest guys going at it. And they're doing it to the best of their abilities. And from what I was reading, a lot of this was ahead of its time. Cause I was, you know, when you get told to watch something, you know, from the eighties or nineties, you're worried that it's going to feel dated.
00:47:51
Speaker
And this style of match did not feel dated to me. This felt, you know, just like watching a Suzuki match or an Ishii match. Just a really, just two hard-hitting motherfuckers, even though one of them looks like he lost a bet and has to do this. Is a would you rather?
00:48:09
Speaker
yeah i think i just think i think being stiff that doesn't that doesn't age like when it looks like a shoot fight at different parts i think pete that i think that works every time well tell him how the fourth fucking match ends which i guess was kind of the end of uh
00:48:24
Speaker
I believe they said Big Giant Baba was the Booker at the time and he had booked this whole feud and that in 1999 this was like the end of him being the Booker there and this was like his grand finale to this story and being the Booker at All Japan. I think I mean I know that it's Kawata basically dumping the Sawas straight down on top of his head. Like it looked like he was picking him up to do something else and then like it was like
00:48:53
Speaker
either he said fuck it this is what I'm doing and changes his like plan I mean I don't know like he just it's I it looked like a botched powerbomb that the guy giving it said fuck it I'm dropping him on top of his head which that move does have a name
00:49:10
Speaker
Really? Yeah, that's his move. That's a fucking move he does. And what that move is called should just be, let's take away the smoke and mirrors of this magic trick and just dump this fucker on his head because it's gonna hurt you too. Well right, but then he follows it up with a brain buster to just kind of accentuate that and then he pins him. It's like just in case you're wondering, I'm working the neck. I'm working the top of the fucking cranium.
00:49:37
Speaker
That's what I'm working. I'm trying to murder this man. Yeah, I just wanted to give people the heads up of the way it looked, because I have a feeling that a lot of people are going to be like, ah, this is going to feel dated. But like you said, a shoot punch to the face is never going to be dated.
00:49:54
Speaker
Now, you will have double dare cam. Yeah, you get that double dare nostalgia of like, God, this is what TV used to look like. Ah, yes. But fucking fight through it. It's on YouTube. It's free for you, for real. Masawa versus Kawada. Look up the four matches we said. I'll post those specific four that Andrew told us to watch so that you can do the same. We'll put it on our Twitter and our Facebook.
00:50:16
Speaker
Cannot recommend those enough. Andrew, thank you very much for shooting those at us. If anybody else has any match recommendations for the love of God, throw them at me, like Derek said. Doesn't matter how weird it is, doesn't matter how old it is, we will watch what you want us to watch.
00:50:33
Speaker
Um, I guess I mean, we could talk about the UK tournament a little bit if you want to talk about that. Yeah. Oh, real quick, though, could we bring up one more thing?
Vader's Career Retrospective
00:50:44
Speaker
One other thing. Vader. So between our last episode and now, Vader passed away.
00:50:52
Speaker
Yeah, it's been a while. Big Van Vader passing away really affected the pro wrestling community a lot. A lot of people were very, very sad about that, and I think even non-pro wrestling fans, because there's still that demographic that saw him on Boy Meets World as Frankie's dad. Everyone kept bringing up his spot on Boy Meets World. I didn't feel like nearly enough people were bringing up his spot on Baywatch. Please tell me I don't remember this. Are you out of your fucking mind? Who is he on with?
00:51:22
Speaker
There was a series, I think it was more than one, there was a series of Baywatch episodes where it was Macho Man and Randy Savage had like, they were supposed to open up a beach gym there. Wait, Vader and Randy Savage has a beach gym in this. No, Macho Man and Hulk Hogan. Okay. Sorry. Hulk Hogan and Macho Man Randy Savage open up a beach gym and then Flair
00:51:46
Speaker
Vader and maybe Kevin Sullivan Show up and there's a wrestling match of between like like I don't know like Fucking the people listening don't know what I'm talking about season six episode 15 bash at the beach. I think that's what it was called No, it is. I'm looking at it right now. Oh, you didn't fucking believe me. I've got it pulled up Yeah, no, this is some legit shit. I actually just watched a gif of Vader crushing a basketball in his bare hands while wearing his mask
00:52:16
Speaker
This is a real thing. So homework for you, go watch this episode of Baywatch. Good shit. I'm all in on that. Just because I missed Vader. And before this, I was like, you know what? I could use a little Vader to cleanse my palate after watching these two Japanese men just destroy each other. So instead, I watched him and Cactus Jack destroy each other at Halloween Havoc 1993.
00:52:45
Speaker
Yeah, I will be the first to admit, I really don't have a ton of history with Vader. I don't remember watching a ton of his matches. I know that he's widely regarded as one of the best big men of all time, if not the best. Watching a dude that size do backflips off the top rope is, it's disturbing. It's kind of, it actually made me think like, okay, I bet Keith Lee was a big Vader fan.
00:53:15
Speaker
No, I just, I think there's a lot of people who were sad by him. I knew he had cancer for a while. Widely regarded as a great guy. Transcended. Oh, he was, he was, he was just in a lot of television shows. I mean, it wasn't just wrestling. Like he appeared in other things. So yeah, mainstream as hell. And sad that he's gone.
00:53:34
Speaker
And I think even if somebody, if they said they didn't know who Vader was, I think if they saw a picture of him in the red mask, they'd be like, okay, I know who that guy is. But I always heard these stories about him being one of the most sensitive wrestlers, that it was really easy to make him cry. Did you ever hear that? Yeah, I did. I heard that Shawn Michaels was an asshole to him.
00:53:53
Speaker
Is he the one that made Vader cry? I don't remember who the story was. Yeah, I guess they were working a program together that was supposed to last a while and I guess that Shawn Michaels went off on him for being a little bit too stiff and nixed the feud and called Vader like a fat piece of shit or something and it really upset him.
00:54:21
Speaker
It's just funny that a guy who is known for being such a stiff wrestler, like especially in this Halloween Havoc, you see him and Cactus Jack just slamming each other on this entrance ramp.
00:54:32
Speaker
and it's just such a hard thud every single time and it's a Texas death match and they're just both covered in blood by the end and just hitting soap. God, you're watching Vader take head shots with a chair. See?
00:54:47
Speaker
Now that's never gonna, I mean, it's out of style, but it's never gonna not be shocking. Like there's gonna be a point in, you know, like 2030 when the wrestler's just doing a thousand flips in a row and people are like, I don't wanna watch Attitude Era. That's gonna feel old. It's like, well, watch this old man get hit in the face with a steel chair and tell me if that feels dated.
00:55:08
Speaker
it's the same with those stiff forearm shots to the face man they just they aren't gonna go out of style but during this did make me realize this I don't know Jesse the body Ventura was on commentary with Tony Schiavone for that one and I feel like if I were inebriated I
00:55:26
Speaker
I could really enjoy some Jesse Ventura commentary because JBL was always my go to commentator if I were inebriated to be like, oh, that's everything he's saying is hilarious to me right now. Well, you have the WWE Network, so you can do that anytime you want, man.
00:55:44
Speaker
Just hearing at one point, Jesse the body Ventura starts counting with the ref after the ref has already counted. So like the ref has already counted one and then Jesse Ventura goes, one, two, and he kicks out at two and the ref's like, that was three. He's like, oh, I guess I missed one. Yes, you did, sir. And then at a certain point, they're in a corner just beating the shit out of each other. They're both bleeding. And I guess he gets blood all over. He's like, we're getting sprayed with blood right now. I look like a doctor.
00:56:14
Speaker
He very calmly takes getting covered in Leon White's blood. Well, you took getting Nick Gage's blood on you pretty nice.
Preview of Joey Janela Event
00:56:24
Speaker
Speaking of hard fucking hitters, did you see the second match announced for Joey Janela's lost in New York? Of course I did. Dude, I didn't tell you this yet. I got second row tickets. I've been paying attention to social media, man.
00:56:41
Speaker
So, Queen of the Ring and I will be sitting second row to see Nick Gage take on Meng. Do you know how scary that is, Derek?
00:56:52
Speaker
Yeah, cause I was at a GCW show before where Nick Gage was doing all sorts of scary shit and... Dude, I don't know. Ming's getting up there. He's 59! Yeah. But if you look up anything about him, all you hear are the terrifying stories. Even Vader said this was the stiffest wrestler he had ever worked with.
00:57:15
Speaker
And there's like, I mean, some of these, I don't even know if they're urban legends or truth, but you hear multiple wrestlers tell stories. One, he gouged a guy's eye out that made fun of his hair. That seems about right. Said that wrestler had a glass eye the rest of his life and quit wrestling immediately, as you should. And also, they said there was a story where they were in a, I think they said Boston.
00:57:40
Speaker
They said they were in an airport bar. The baby faces were on one side of the bar, so Meng said on the other side. And some guy's like, oh, you do that fake stuff, right? And he said, come over here. I'll show you how fake it is. Bit the fucking guy's nose off. Like goddamn Oswald Cobblepot and Batman Returns. That's a great reference. You're going to be second row for that shit. Meng versus Nick Gage.
00:58:07
Speaker
And then the other match announced we have PCO versus Matt Riddle. What, Joey Janela, what are you doing? What are you doing? You know what you signed up for. I'm excited. I'm excited. Cause last time, you know, I had to sit in a building for 15 hours to get to Joey Janela spring break. This time I'm just flying on an airplane to New York and then going to go to Queens to hang out with Queen.
00:58:32
Speaker
Dang out with the queen of the ring. That makes sense. You know what? That's just good sense right there. That's good booking. You want to talk about Zack Gibson winning the UK tournament and getting to face Pete Dunne?
UK Tournament Outcomes and Highlights
00:58:45
Speaker
Yeah, that actually, I didn't get to watch the match with Pete Dunne just yet. I do know how it ends. But I'll be honest, I thought Travis Banks was going over. For real? I did. I'm a Travis Banks fan. I do enjoy him. So I guess maybe I was hoping he would go over.
00:59:02
Speaker
You know, when they started the tournament, I was actually thinking that the way they had it booked, I really thought that Jordan Devlin would get his redemption, but that ended up not being the case. Yeah, there were a few guys there that, like, it was pretty cool to see on WWE television, just, you know, like Flash Morgan Webster. I wish they would have gotten Walter in that tournament, but I think this is not... No, they did have a couple big men in there.
00:59:27
Speaker
They had Joe Coffee and Dave Mastiff. Oh my god, I would have killed to see Walter in that. His time will come. He was busy taking on Adam Cole over at Evolve. Were you surprised that they didn't put Zach Gibson over Pete Dunne or did you that we kind of expected? That did surprise me because to me it was like they had this whole tournament to build up to a guy who could finally beat Pete Dunne. But that is not true. It was a tournament to decide a number one contender to get their ass kicked by Pete Dunne.
00:59:55
Speaker
I guess it is them doubling down on Pete Dunne, which I don't mind because he's been great. Oh, he's awesome. I like that they've just chosen a guy and just ran with it where he's not always on TV. But at this point, are we to believe that there's going to be more UK people on NXT? I would think so. Do you think there's a point where NXT expands beyond the one hour?
01:00:17
Speaker
I guess it would depend if, you know, if Fox decided to actually pick it up and put it on FS1, maybe? Oh, did you see the other big news from today? I guess Raw signed an extension with USA Network. For 20 billion dollars. Eh, probably. I know it's for five years. And all the syrup in Canada. Shit, man. Five more years of that.
01:00:44
Speaker
Oh, I did see it get referenced that they called Smackdown Live the flagship show. That's just what they're telling Fox. Fox doesn't know shit. Well, this was on WWE's feed. Oh, I saw what they're saying. And it was right after the Raw announcement. So interesting choice. They're putting on quite the show. Yeah, and then, oh, we didn't mention Undisputed doesn't have the belts anymore over there. Yeah, just hold on.
01:01:16
Speaker
Did something else happen that I don't know about? Yeah. What happened? Spoiler, I think we're pretty sure Undisputed gets the belts back. They get them back on what, like fucking Wednesday? Yeah. Wait, so is there still NXT this week, even though we had NXT UK today? Undisputed got the belts back.
01:01:37
Speaker
I can tell you that. So that was just a nice surprise for the UK crowd. And then they got them back before they left. I get alerts from my WWE app, Garrett. And these apps give me spoilers. And the spoiler I got the other night was that NXT got the tag titles back. Sorry, Undisputed got the tag titles back. Well, I'm going to go ahead and tell you that's disappointing. I really like Mustache Mountain. And I did see, though, that WWE put a trademark on British Strong Style.
01:02:06
Speaker
Well, that was smart because they're probably gonna be plugging the shit out of that in the next few years. So I guess they, you know, they own those words now. That'll be nice for everyone else in the UK. Yeah. I was super excited, though, to see Tony Storm on there. I love Tony Storm. I'm really excited that she signed a deal similar to Pete Dunne where, you know, she's going to get to keep doing progress, but then pop over to WWE now and then. And it would be cool to see her get a belt and, you know, be a dominant badass lady over there and
01:02:35
Speaker
You know, when I saw Mustache Mountain, when those belts are th- Okay, maybe Tony Storm can take Shayna. No. No.
01:02:42
Speaker
I do think it's cool because of the UK tournament, because of the stuff with NXT, they are letting guys work with other promotions a little bit while still doing stuff for WWE. They're not making them commit to such a small segment of their company and then taking away opportunities from them. I think it's cool. Like Kenny Omega said, I think it's like a working relationship between New Japan and WWE would be outstanding if they could work that out.
01:03:11
Speaker
And as he says that, they end up signing a working relationship with Noah over in Japan. So now they're sharing Kenta or shit, what's Kenta's name on NXT or WWE?
01:03:26
Speaker
Tore his arm. He's been gone forever. Then he came back. Hasn't done shit. Hideo Itami? Hideo Itami. So now he's gonna be going back and forth between Noah and NXT, I guess. Or he's not on the main roster, is he? Or is he on 205 Live? Where the fuck is he? I thought he was on 205 Live? That makes sense. That makes sense. Where in the world is Kenta? I'm literally on my phone right now trying to find the stuff about Undisputed Era, but because it was a spoiler that I don't like,
01:03:57
Speaker
Yep, four days ago. Breaking Undisputed Era win back NXT Tag Team Championships in one of the greatest tag team matches I've ever seen. So is that in full sail? I think that was in England.
01:04:16
Speaker
That's weird to give it to him and take him away. That almost makes it like they were doing a couple house shows. So they're like, it's cool if we drop it, because they'll leave with it. And it's like, it never happened. That's kind of what it feels like. But it gave the crowd a thrill. I was surprised, though, during that match, how split the crowd was. I figured it would be 100% towards Mustache Mountain. But it was really a 50-50 split between the two.
01:04:37
Speaker
Well, you're an idiot because you were just in attendance for NXT TakeOver and you saw how over undisputed era is. Yeah, but it was just, you know, the hometown boys that, you know, I would have thought, especially since they're such baby faces. Undisputed era is the shit, man. It's crazy. I was not expecting to see that many children wearing undisputed era shirts. Yeah, I think that's the thing is that, like,
01:05:00
Speaker
I don't know. They're the new hot stable. Can you name a stable in WWE that's more over than they are? All of it. B team. Tag team. It's not a stable. Does Rhino and Slater count? That's a tag team, not a stable. It's a stable if you count all of his kids. You did it. Got you there. That's a good joke. Hey, you know what? I think it's time to get out of here. Hey, everybody.
01:05:27
Speaker
Thank you so much for listening. Thanks for hanging out with us. Come back again next Thursday. Come on every Thursday. Follow us on Twitter at WrestleHangout. Follow us on Instagram at Predetermined Podcasts. Follow us on Facebook at WrestleHangout.
01:05:42
Speaker
And you know what? Tell us what you want us to talk about. If you've got some matches that you want us to discuss, I would be happy to do it. I want more matches like the ones that Andrew gave me, because those were fucking awesome. I'd be willing to watch those all day long. Hit us up with weird matches. We're into that shit. And just like I said...
01:05:58
Speaker
Check the social media stuff, guys. We do we do some fun stuff on there. We've been doing some fun things on Twitter. Been having people submit, you know, their favorite mic workers, their favorite wrestlers, all that kind of stuff. So we're starting conversations over there. If you're bored during the day and you can figure out how to get on your phone during work hours and just chat with us about wrestling, we're doing it. We're both texting you from work. Do it. Hey, Garrett. Yes, Derek.
01:06:25
Speaker
There's a line that we say at the end of this show every time. And that line is? Hit our goddamn music.
01:07:06
Speaker
you