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Wrestle Narnia
58 Plays1 year ago
Fax and Chris share their tales of being in Philly Mania weekend. Cheesesteak with Masato Tanaka and Chris finally talks to the Beef King himself Braun Strowman!
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Transcript
Introduction and Mispronunciations
00:00:36
Speaker
Hey everybody, welcome to another episode of Predeterminate Pro Wrestling. Hang out, Garrett Calendar, Chris Fax, Jimmy Miggs, Jimmy Miggs! Holy shit, I did everybody's names! Jimmy Miggs, fuck! Actually, that should be my new Vegas name. I'm ready to play some craps on Jimmy Miggs. Everybody's name's different in the Paul of Vascara. Chris Fax are just details about me that I've shared.
00:01:05
Speaker
I'm originally from Queens, New York. I was born at NYU Hospital. Chris Vax, just Chris Vax. You guys are back. It was your birthday. You guys were in Philly. I kept getting text updates. I kept getting photographs. Very jealous of certain things that were happening.
WrestleMania Weekend Adventures
00:01:25
Speaker
I think a few things happened that the listeners are gonna just be insanely delighted by. Where do you wanna start?
00:01:34
Speaker
I will say, Garrett, we felt the need to tell you things as one of our dearest friends, but we also were concerned. It was getting mean because such weird and interesting things kept happening to us over the course of three days. Like our truth said, that's on me. I should have just been there. I should have done it. I didn't do it. And I missed out on the good times.
00:01:59
Speaker
Yeah, so I think the craziest thing for anyone who hasn't been to a modern WrestleMania weekend is that if I were just reading these texts that either I am sending or Chris is like three feet away from me sending and I was just on the thread viewing them, I'd be like, there's no way all of these things are true.
00:02:20
Speaker
but they all are. It's like you're in this weird wrestling wonderland where just anything can happen. So I, Chris, if you don't mind me starting, I'm gonna just, I don't think we should go in chronological order. Let's just alternate with our favorite things. Sure. So I think I know what yours is and I'm gonna let you have that one. So my favorite one was Thursday night, you know, which is kind of like the first full day, you know, the collective is in full swing.
00:02:51
Speaker
The last show we went to was at the ECW Arena. It was the Super Show, right? The Memorial Super Show, Mark Hitchcock Memorial Super Show, fine show. It's not anything that happened at the show. Some good matches. Some good matches, but it was afterwards. This was our WrestleMania moment. We're going to remember this significantly more than any of the matches we saw. Most of which, when I was looking today, I had to look at the listing to remember what those matches were.
00:03:18
Speaker
Yeah, and like, fill it up is a great food city, but not everything's open all the time. So like, you're gonna eat good food every meal, but sometimes you're gonna be limited to just pizza and cheese steaks. So by the time that show was over, we hadn't eaten dinner, we're quite hungry. So we look, there's a cheese steak place, famous cheese steak place used to be Tony Luke's. Now it's called Tony and Nick's, Tony and Nick's. Yeah, Tony and Nick's, but it's the old Tony Luke's.
00:03:43
Speaker
They got, they got in some criminal trouble. The guy outside told us that they had to go testify at one point because someone didn't pay some taxes. He's literally, he's like, yeah, usually he's like, yeah, we had to go, uh, we had all had to go to court and testify. You know, we, we, we had the day off though. That was pretty sweet. Um,
00:04:00
Speaker
Prime is the special sauce. Yeah, but we're there. It's like 11 o'clock at night. And we ordered our cheese steaks, which were delicious, incidentally, that was nice. But the nicest part was, directly behind us in line, who was ordering cheese steaks with us, eating with us at the same venue, was Masato Tamaka.
00:04:19
Speaker
who just, we were just even joking like he has a secret Pennsylvania family. He just goes by Mike Tanaka. He doesn't even know that he has another family back in Japan. And just, he's just a cheesesteak guy. He's just like a retired teacher who just gets late night cheesesteaks at Tony Luke sometimes.
00:04:40
Speaker
Yeah, some people took pictures with Tanaka. We're like, no, no, no, this is a man. He's here to enjoy a cheesesteak. He's been here. It's right near the ECW arenas. This is probably his favorite cheesesteak place, a very important place in his life. And we're like, we're going to leave him be. And we're just going to leave it with our memories of knowing that we've eaten cheesesteaks with Masato Tanaka. What does casual Friday Masato Tanaka wear? Well, so he did work that show.
00:05:07
Speaker
So just to be clear, like he had the rest on. I assume, though. Yeah, he was just wearing like normal. I don't kind of track suit. Yeah, it was it was like that was like a wind breakery type like zip top. I don't remember what was down below, whether it was like sweatpants or traction pants or jeans or whatever. He doesn't throw on a pair of slacks, though, to go get a cheese. But again, he just looked like Mike Tanaka, you know, like, yeah, 52 year old substitute biology teacher.
00:05:37
Speaker
Yeah, there was a short white guy with him that I assume is his work friend in Philadelphia that only, he brought him to the show and he was like, actually I have this other life, but I'm swearing you to secrecy. You can't tell my wife. Right. Don't tell my American wife. If you ever find my Japanese wife, she does know I'm a pro wrestler. So it's fine with her.
00:06:03
Speaker
She knows I'm here. She doesn't, but don't tell her about the other family. It's very complicated. But there's a daughter who's named Micah and has a giant mullet. Cries every time he sees her. That's why we were joking is his American wife is just like a six foot three woman with a mullet. Looks kind of like my gossip. Thus my Micah Jr.
00:06:35
Speaker
But Chris, I feel like you, you deserve to give the best highlight.
Unexpected Conversations and Encounters
00:06:40
Speaker
So this is, this is the highlight of the weekend. It's honestly, it's one of the highlights of my, of my time as a wrestling fan, I think, honestly. So actually this, and this transitions nicely. So same night, same night, same night. So at this point, fast and I are sitting and eating cheesesteaks. Um, we'd seen two shows at this point, right? So we went to blood sport.
00:07:00
Speaker
earlier in the day, very good show, had a lot of fun, took a lovely walk along sort of industrial, sort of scary parts of Philly. During daylight, it was fine. There were a lot of wrestling fans walking from blood sport to the ECW arena. It's an interesting crowd. So we'd seen a couple of shows and we had a good time. We had tickets to JCW versus the world back up at the collective.
00:07:26
Speaker
And Fax is like, look, I'm not feeling well. I think I got to call it. He's like, you can go if you want. You can go alone. And I said, no, Fax, I'm tired too. You know, you're right. You're right. We should, we should take our time. Head back. Um, peace ourselves. There's a lot of wrestling. Yeah. Now I should note that at the, at blood sport, there are a lot of WWE people there to see Basler, right? CM Punk is there. Nick Khan's apparently there.
00:07:55
Speaker
And, uh, MVP MVP CJ Perry. And of course, uh, the beef King Braun Strowman is there. And I thought to myself, I should say something to him. I should talk to him about seasoning, but he was way across the room. That's kind of when I was like, did you go try to get to me? He's like, ah, he's all the way in the off in this corner. It's not going to work. And it's like, okay. So we take a cab back to our hotel.
00:08:21
Speaker
We walk in, and then the hotel has a big circular lobby bar right in the middle of the lobby, right as you walk in. And the first thing I see, as soon as I get through the doors to that hotel, is the goddamn Beef King, Braun Strowman, standing at the- Holding court. Holding court, talking with Jinder and a lovely lady, and- Wait, he was talking to Jinder Mahal?
00:08:46
Speaker
You didn't include that part in the text to me, so this is actually extra funny. Yeah, I mean, so there were just so many people, and again, apparently the hotel we were at, this is like not the first time it's happened. We just arbitrarily, like we chose basically the most reasonably priced decent hotel in Center City. Like we didn't have any, and apparently it's where all of the wrestlers and non-wrestling celebrities in some cases were all staying.
00:09:13
Speaker
Yeah. So like CM Punk was there with Day and Housin on one side, you had Gabriel Iglesias with like four other guys that were his exact size and body shape, all crammed into a booth. You know, that guy you always sit next to at GCW, like just the guy that you're like, man, these seats are too close together. I don't know if we're going to fit. And then you see that you're sitting between Gabriel Iglesias and his crew.
00:09:40
Speaker
Yeah, somehow you got like, cause they bought two tickets and two tickets and like your name just happens to be right in the middle. So I looked at this, I'm like, this is my opportunity. And so I'm like, hi, I'm sorry to bother you. I'll just be a minute. I just need to tell you how wonderful Beef King is. And this man, this large tattoo, very strong, very tall man,
00:10:09
Speaker
You're looking up. You're like looking up eyes. And when he looked like, he definitely was just like, oh, I'll take a picture or like sign an autograph or something. He didn't think he was getting into an actual conversation. Right. Until this. Until I start talking about Beef King and his eyes light up and he has, he's like, I don't, there's a blonde lady over there, but that's fine. I'm going to talk to you. You want to talk to me about beef seasoning, sir? I am in. Um, and so the first thing he tells me,
00:10:38
Speaker
is that he's working on expanding the line, right? He's got Beef King. He's actually invested in the cattle ranch. He says, do you watch Drag Race? And I was like, a little, talking about RuPaul's Drag Race, figuring that's pretty interesting. Didn't seem like something Braun would be into. But everyone's, you never know. And that's kind of interesting and cool that he would be into that. He's like, yeah, my business partner, he's a race car driver. And I was like, oh.
00:11:06
Speaker
That kind of drag race, that makes so much more sense. Which by the way, I didn't catch that last part. So it wasn't until like he was, Chris was telling you the story like a day later when I finally, the illusion was shattered for me. Cause I had spent 24 hours in a world where one of Brown Strowman's favorite shows is RuPaul's Drag Race.
00:11:34
Speaker
I'll tell you, when I read the text, I must have read it poorly because it never left my mind that Braun Strowman co-ran a cattle ranch with a drag queen. That's a reality show, Ed Wash. Yes, absolutely. But yeah, he's working. That cattle ranch currently operating, they're selling stuff. Am I going to get some beef?
00:12:02
Speaker
from the Beef King this summer and put some Beef King on it. Yes, I am. We looked up their full price list. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, yeah. I'm all in on this. I'm going to spend a lot of money. It's pricey. It's pricey beef. But if the Beef King is telling us, I mean, we trust. It's got to be the best.
00:12:20
Speaker
Yeah, I don't know if I necessarily believe in like, you know, I'm not like a big fan of like the royal family or anything, but I do trust in the Beef King. God save the Beef King. God bless the Beef King. Yeah, America's last monarchy. My other favorite thing, my other favorite thing that we learned in this, I was like, oh, it's interesting that, you know, you know, they're not selling anymore. Yeah, I'm going to do it through my thing because I've been having trouble. Dude's gourmet was having trouble keeping it in stock. And he's like,
00:12:50
Speaker
They said they had trouble getting the ingredients. And this is a quote, it's just salt, pepper, and garlic.
00:12:59
Speaker
How hard can it be? And I got to admit, I'm with the Beef King on that one. It's a beautiful seasoning, but it's not that complicated a seasoning. Honestly, most of us could probably make it on our own, but I trust the Beef King. You wouldn't get the ratios just right. You wouldn't get the ratios just right. I trust him. But so yeah, he's big things coming for the Beef King this year, for Beef and Beef King. And it was beautiful.
00:13:29
Speaker
I followed the new cattle ranch on Instagram and we left him be to talk to the blonde lady and drink whiskey. Did you tell him how often you cook with that seasoning and that you've impressed so many even non-wrestling guests that ask about the Beef King? Yes, no, I think that's part of what he got excited about because I was like, look, I use it all the time. My wife loves it. People love the Beef King. He's like, thanks, brother. Thanks.
00:14:00
Speaker
I promise you, you were the only person that brought that up to him this weekend and you made his WrestleMania weekend. And you were probably also the only person that he didn't know beforehand and isn't a pretty lady that approached him to talk to him that he actually enjoyed. Yeah, I was probably one of the few not wearing a title belt.
00:14:25
Speaker
Well, then I would say highlight number three is probably the next day at breakfast when we're eating a breakfast that the Amish like kind of diner set up where it's like it's just like like a bar like, you know, like the bar set up at a diner. And that's the entire place like that's the only type of seating they have. And the guy directly across from us while we're all eating our pancakes is just sitting down
00:14:50
Speaker
adult man sitting down eating breakfast at this counter by himself, of course, with a title belt around his waist as though it were the
Wrestling Culture and Venues
00:15:00
Speaker
thing keeping up his pants. Eating. Eating breakfast. Yeah. So which which title belt was it?
00:15:13
Speaker
I think it was the intercontinental title. I think it was a white intercontinental title, if I remember correctly. Yeah, that sounds right. You know, the one I wore to my wedding, you know, that I, it's the classiest of them. It's the worker's belt. And, you know, that's the one you wear there. I mean, it makes sense. Like, if I were the kind of guy who would carry a belt around a city for three days,
00:15:37
Speaker
If he had a booth, maybe he would've sat it next to him. He's not gonna sit it on the bar stool next to him, so... Well, at least if you're... Like, I don't get the people that wear him over the shoulder, because that's just a hassle.
00:15:47
Speaker
Really inconvenient. You got metal detector shoes to get into arenas. At least when you're wearing it, it's out of the way. It probably has some functionality. Maybe sometimes you ever see that you get jealous of one of your female friends because they're just like, oh, they write down a little note, piece of paper, put it in their cleavage. And you're like, I don't got a place to... You just tuck it down in the belt, right? It's like a fanny pack, an open top fanny pack.
00:16:15
Speaker
The, yeah, that is truly wrestling fan cleavage, the place between the belly and the title belt. Yeah, exactly. On a scale of like James Ellsworth to Gabriel and Glacius Crew. He was closer to the Ellsworth side. Ellsworth, yeah. Should we start being title belt guys? No. Or are we too far into our wrestling fandom?
00:16:41
Speaker
I think I might try start being a Bobby Lashley guy. Cause we also walked right by Bobby Lashley on the way to this place. And he looks like he's trying to be like a ninja. Like basically what he wears in backstage vignettes is actually what he wears in real life. Just like skin tight black Lycra.
00:17:09
Speaker
little thing on the head, not quite, not the headband, not the white headband, but like, I don't think it was a hood, maybe it was like a hat, black hat. I think the hat, yeah. Yeah, just kind of like looking kind of ninja-like. I mean, that was part of the interesting thing was the wrestler fashion choices in and around the hotel, right? We passed Walter a couple of times. A number of times. Pretty much every time we left the hotel, Walter was out doing something with his kids. Yeah.
00:17:38
Speaker
Great father. Great dad. But also, also a guy wears a nice top coat. You know, Walter, Walter looks very, very clean, very respectable. Yeah, turns out he didn't lose the weight for athletic reasons. It was all to just cut a finer profile in a nice blazer. Yeah.
00:17:59
Speaker
Josh Barnett, just casually wearing like a leather jacket with pins and like boots and just exactly what you would imagine Josh Barnett, what you would want Josh Barnett walking around to look like. Just like a biker. Just chilling on the street corner outside Reading Terminal Market talking to two Japanese men. I don't know about what. Well, I mean, they announced his Japan show coming up in like a month or two, so you'd have to imagine possibly that.
00:18:29
Speaker
Was there anyone wearing anything that surprised you? Well, here's one surprise I got was that I didn't realize that Dan Housen was talking to Punk initially because I had not seen Dan Housen without the paint. That was very surprising to me. That's true. I pointed out Punk while Chris is talking to Sherman. I'm just like, oh, there's a bunch right like 10 feet away from us. And then Chris is like, they'll show into the conversation with Braun. Like he looks just goes back to Braun.
00:18:56
Speaker
And then I just idle for a little minute. And I'm like, the one guy standing up looks kind of, because there's like four or five people at the bar. And I was like, the one guy right next to punk standing looks really, I'm like, it's fucking Dan Housen. Casual Friday, Dennis. Also, people surprising me in terms of their mode of dress. Dolph Ziggler, Nick Nemeth. Oh, he's ring gear. Yeah. We saw him twice in a day on Thursday.
00:19:26
Speaker
And I'm not sure what he's going for, what he's trying to tell us with himself. He had a good match, I thought, with Speedball Bailey at Bloodsport. But he was wearing tights that were camouflage, like army camouflage, but with rips, rips, quote unquote, that had like pink leopard.
00:19:50
Speaker
And then on the back of his ass was like a presidential seal that sounded like always a rebel or something. I don't know. Is he like- Well, and then later that night, he had different pants. These ones were silver hawks from 1988 cartoon silver pants. Also with the fake rips with pink leopard print underneath.
00:20:18
Speaker
Different presidential seal on the bot, but very similar. He's clearly going through an idea. It's like this is a cry for help. He's old school. He's not going to write a biography. He's not going to go on Twitter and talk about his feelings. But this is a cry for help. He wants the fans to know he's really going through some shit. Yeah. He wants people to ask him how the opposing viewpoints represented just on his pants are possibly reconciled.
00:20:48
Speaker
It's like he's wearing a Make America Great Again hat in rainbow. Like that's the vibe. Like even when Seth Rollins saw him, he's like, I don't know about those fashion choices. Did you give him our discount code for better help? We should, we should. We didn't meet.
00:21:12
Speaker
uh he wasn't around yeah um he ran from us and you know who else we didn't meet we met a lot of guys we didn't really meet the beast man when we went we saw the beast man we i high five the beast man beast man by the way one of the all-time great high fives i fist bump first try first try just absolutely knocked it out of the park full contact great sound
00:21:35
Speaker
But they did it confusingly. They did this show, was it Saturday morning? No, Friday morning. Friday, like at 1 o'clock. Friday morning, 1 o'clock. We go to the show. And with the show, you got into this meet and greet with all the old ECW guys and the other workers working the battleground show afterwards. But they actually like, and the show ended. And a lot of the rest of them started setting up their tables. And the Beastman started walking to one end.
00:22:02
Speaker
And, but then they, for whatever reason, even though every single person that show was allowed to go to the meet and greet, which was already started, they made everyone leave, get back online and get back in. It took like an hour. And by the time we got back in, Beastman was nowhere to be found. Gone. We looked all over. Suzuki was there, Sandman. Uh, Chris took a picture with the FBI. Yeah. I took a picture with Sabu and Fonzie. Um, Hollywood, Haley J was there as was her mom.
00:22:33
Speaker
the Dudley boys, Francine and Shane Douglas, Mikey Wipwreck, Hooventud Guerra, two cold Scorpio. Yep. Tatanka. Yeah. In clusterfuck number two entrant. Was Francine in the clusterfuck? I still haven't seen her. I don't believe she was. No, she's she's she's classy fact. She never did a clusterfuck. That's
00:22:59
Speaker
Yeah, you're thinking you're thinking of Bula in chastity. Number one and two were Jimmy Lloyd and Shane Douglas. So we didn't actually see Jimmy Lloyd wrestle, but I did get a piece of story about Jimmy Lloyd. I did. So we went to a wrestling for sale vintage t-shirt pop up before the battleground show. And there was some other guys in the back of a barbershop, a working barbershop.
00:23:29
Speaker
Fax attempted to toss me, to super kick me through the window, but I resisted. So we're still together. Yeah, I was a little sick. I bet. Yeah. I mean, Garrett, of course, did super kick Heater through one. That's why Heater's not on the show anymore. But that's a whole side thing. Heater went through glass. Now he's wrestling in glass in Japan. It's a complicated story. We're hoping Heater does better than Marty Gennady, who also might have been at that meet and greet.
00:24:00
Speaker
But I talked to a couple of these guys, I had some t-shirts out and they were like, oh yeah, we do stuff with Circle Six and New Fear City. And I mentioned, oh, we'll probably see him later and we'll talk more about wrestling in a skate park in a bit. But I mentioned, we're considering going to the block party where Jimmy Lloyd is wrestling in a street and it just seems like an appropriate place. And he's like, yeah,
00:24:28
Speaker
For sure. I know Jimmy Lloyd. That seems pretty right. It was like weird to get that just so straight up confirmed. He's actually, he says one of the voices who's screaming, you're fucking with a different boy. So he would know. He would know. That's a big celebrity gift. That's a big claim to fame. Yeah. It's not Beef King, but like next level after Beef King. Right. That's number two.
00:24:56
Speaker
We should talk a little bit about wrestling facts, right? Yeah, so why don't we just go over where we saw shows? Just the venues, right? So we had the- I need to hear about the attendees, the bathrooms, the overall vibe. So let's start with, these we'll do in chronological order for the first show we saw on a venue. So the first one would have been the Steelworkers Union.
00:25:19
Speaker
That's where- The sheet metal workers union. The sheet metal, sorry, the sheet metal workers union is where the collective was. And it was also far and away, I think the nicest venue for a collective or even really a GCW show period. Just really nice venue. It looks much smaller on TV when I watched some of it, but really nice venue. They did have cheese steaks. We didn't have any.
00:25:45
Speaker
Um, but they, they had the food looked solid. Nice bar. Uh, she workers just kind of middle of nowhere. As I know we're on the water, but just near nothing else. Your bathroom had a loose stack of nudie mags that you could peruse while you, uh, while you go to the bathroom. Yeah.
00:26:09
Speaker
Yeah, they did. That's true. Joey Janela took them, though. He iced them, so they're gone. The next venue, as mentioned, was the ECW Arena, now called the 2300 Arena. So they really renovated that place a few years ago, like, I don't know, five, six, seven years ago at this point. I don't even know, maybe more.
00:26:30
Speaker
But I will say the bathrooms and the smell of them have gone back to close to the closer to the old ECW arena days. Pretty good. But yeah, full bar same food that they've had for years. I will say speaking to the bathroom. So I just want to make one comment about the sheet metal workers union before we before we leave this, because my friend Jim pointed out they use that space for political fundraisers and stuff.
00:26:55
Speaker
So there is a very good chance that Joe Biden and Barack Obama have now pissed in the same place as Jimmy Lloyd. Well, Jimmy doesn't piss in toilets, but yeah, they've pissed in a room that he slept in, yes. They got in a car in an alleyway that Jimmy Lloyd has urinated and slept, yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
00:27:20
Speaker
I just wanted the world to process that. Because I don't think that's happened before. We were, I was like, Chris's friend Jen was explaining this to us. And I made a joke of like, oh, like, Rahm Emanuel and Jimmy Lloyd have shit in the same toilet. And she immediately goes, oh, no, probably Obama. And we're like, yeah, OK, cool. Cool, cool, cool.
00:27:40
Speaker
um but yeah the ecw arena was in it it's a again it's in fairly good shape other than yeah the bathrooms the men's rooms yeah good place to watch the show yeah i if you're ever in philly definitely get to show the ecw arena if you can uh it's worth it then let's see what was uh the next was a skate park oh right under a brick
00:28:03
Speaker
The pictures looked like that was a scene. That looked like it was amazing. A perfect vibe of the type of show you were at. It's literally an Uber drops us off in just like a park park under a bridge. And we're just like, OK, well, we hear stuff that sounds like it could be a wrestling show. Let's just walk in that direction through mud under a bridge and hope we find it. And then we did. And it's just like as soon as you're there and you're just in a skate park, it's a giant skate park.
00:28:33
Speaker
And it's like, okay, just keep following the sound, keep following the sound. And then all of a sudden you get to an area where you start seeing people like up on top of the pipes. And then you just see a guy with no shirt on and just like glass and blood all over his body. You're like, okay, yep, we're in the right place. We are in the right place for sure. Yeah. Um, definitely the hardest place to find a seat because basically you needed to like climb up, like climb up a skate ramp to get onto the spots.
00:29:04
Speaker
where one could see and that I think was great because I had not been working my body that hard this weekend other than in trying to process roast pork and so I felt like this was
00:29:18
Speaker
worth it. Like it was good for me to be like, yeah, I'm still moving. I'm working not as hard as the wrestlers. Let's be clear. But putting myself in just the slightest bit of danger as I tried to climb up these things, which was fair given that the wrestlers were bumping on a skate park.
00:29:36
Speaker
So a concrete skate park. I don't think there's another type. Very dirty. You know, wooden ramps and stuff. This is an outdoor concrete. Like this is like graffiti. Did you see, because you're having to American Ninja Warrior up a wall to get a vantage point. Did you see any fun attempts to get up where the person just decided, I guess I'm a ground boy today? New Fear City is very talented fans.
00:30:06
Speaker
Yeah, I didn't see any wipe outs. There was definitely some non-successful first attempts and none that resulted in a wipe out. We did see interestingly when the show ended, because then you're out, you're on top of the half pipes, right? And you got to get back down to get out.
00:30:23
Speaker
And like there were people right in front of us and I'm just glad that they were right in front of us and that we were not the ones closest to the wall because they were the ones that had to do that thing of like looking and and I was thinking the same thing and they're looking they're like I think I could probably just slide down this without hurting myself and but but it was literally into the pit where there's like broken glass tubes and blood all over the place and like he's just kind of idling for a minute you can tell what's going through this guy's head of like yeah
00:30:48
Speaker
I think I can do it. I'll just kind of slide on my butt. Like I think I can do it. And then ultimately decides against it and keeps going. And then it's like, okay, he made the decision for all of us, right? Because if he did it and didn't get hurt, the rest of us were going to have to do it. All right. And then, but if he doesn't do it, none of the rest of us are going to do it. That was his job was to decide if we were all doing this or not.
00:31:15
Speaker
We made it, we only saw two matches at the skate park. The first involved Tony Deppin dresses gritty, the flyers mascot, carrying a hockey stick wrapped in barbed wire and diving off a ramp onto others, which, I mean, seven stars. I mean, like what more could you want from professional wrestling than gritty hitting someone with a barbed wire wrapped hockey stick
00:31:44
Speaker
in a skate park in Philly. I'm incapable of thinking what would be, what more we could have wanted from that moment. Right. So you knew it was Deppin. Did the head come off of the costume? The head came off. The head came off on the dive, yeah.
00:32:02
Speaker
Yeah. That, okay. That man, that is just a, that's a sentence. Gritty is honestly a bigger celebrity than a lot of the wrestlers in his own right. Yeah. That's a, that's a big get. That's a big, the pictures just look fun as hell. Yeah. Cause then the last match was kid Osborne against, I actually can't remember the other guy's name.
00:32:28
Speaker
I can look through the pictures because at first I thought, I thought I recognized the other guy and then thought, is that Kit Osborne? Kit Osborne was one of the, but the other guy, he was wearing like a white tracksuit covered in blood. Very strong look. Very and very charismatically celebrating afterwards. He won the crowd over in a big way.
00:32:49
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. Took Kid Osborne out with some rope, but just light tubes in a skate park, outdoor, like it was kind of a beautiful and weird thing. It's possible that's why the cops wouldn't let them come back the next day. But, you know, that worked out on its own. We'll talk about that when we get to the rest of the venues. But that was a super, that was definitely a highlight just in terms of like,
00:33:14
Speaker
the quality of insanity. Dom De Niro. Dom De Niro. There you go. Yeah. Did they serve alcohol at this event? So there were definitely like, again, it's not wasn't really an event, right? Like, it just was a happening in a skate park.
00:33:33
Speaker
Now, when we walked out, we took like a kind of a long way around and there did look like there was some kind of bar set up, but like not for the event. Like there's just kind of a bar in the skate park, but like it's not like an actual bar. I think just sometimes people just, I don't know, but anyway, there didn't seem like there was anyone there serving drinks, but maybe they were there. There were definitely people drinking.
00:34:01
Speaker
There was merch you are under a bridge. We did buy some merch under the bridge. Yeah, fax has the great one of the greatest t shirts of all time. It just says Wawa on the top and then a giant skull and it says I shall die here. Which I love Wawa and that's a sentiment when I was a younger man, I would have
00:34:25
Speaker
I would have very much spoken that sentiment, but I felt that since Bax now lives in New Jersey, where there's far more Wawa's in New York, it felt like Bax's shirt to acquire. I have one that does say murder mania with Gritty's face on it, so that's also perfect. I'm good for at least one or two Wawa stops a week. By the way, and then the match that had just ended when we walked in, and I'm a little bummed because I've seen the video since on Instagram, was Casanova Valentine and Lou Nixon.
00:34:55
Speaker
Um, and it was actually, Lou Nixon was the one covered in glass when we walked in, which made me realize, oh yeah, we're in the right place. I recognize him. I recognize that bloody glass filled back. Then it was really what the Leah Chorus Center, which is where Ring of Honor was and where AEW normally does.
00:35:16
Speaker
uh better food than expected tough bag policy i don't know if you very tough bag policy let let's make this very brief because this is one of those very niche complaints but we've been going around all day we've gotten some shirts we've gotten a couple of random things
00:35:33
Speaker
You know, and I'm thinking, hey, we're going to be around different things. I brought a tote bag. Tote bags always safe to bring in places because they're open. They're easily searchable. Most places I go, very fine with tote bags. The Lea Chorus Center has a very strong anti-tote bag policy. Apparently, that is not allowed. And so they made me leave my tote bag. And they were just like, just leave it somewhere and you can see if it stays. So I left it on top of a garbage can by the entrance.
00:36:01
Speaker
I then went to the merch stand, bought a t-shirt because I was like, I'm going to be going to give you something, Mr. Merchman, because you're about to help me. And we just shoved the contents of my tote bag into four small plastic bags that we then had to deal with for the rest of the evening and definitely made me mad. But on the flip side, we did get that tote bag back in the end. So.
00:36:26
Speaker
That was what I was gonna ask next. If you took all of the contents out, or if you're just like, well, sitting this behind a trash can, hoping my shirts will be here. No, we had too much. Look, in that bag was the Wawa I Shall Die Here shirt, and there was no way we were taking any risks with that. None at all. You put on four shirts before you leave those out by the cans. Exactly.
00:36:52
Speaker
And we can do a full review of the ROH show at some point in this sort of conversation. I don't know if this is the right spot for it. Because I will point out we did see another wrestler eat that night. We went to Dim Sum. By the way, we went to Philadelphia. Dim Sum is fantastic. Get Dim Sum. Not a lot of those places are open late, but we did find one.
00:37:17
Speaker
It's a singing or a music dim sum place, which means that they're showing videos of what appears to be the Chinese or Korean version of the voice, just on a loop, on a giant screen. Where, like there's microphone stands that would be suggestive that this could be karaoke, but no one's singing. We didn't ask. We ate a lot of delicious dim sum. And in the middle, facade walked in.
00:37:47
Speaker
Facade, who'd had a terrible match with Crowbar earlier in the day. Let's be clear, not Facade's fault. Definitely not Facade's fault. Crowbar is the one who definitely insisted it went 20 minutes. It was brutal. It was very long. It was very long. When I got the Crowbar text, I was delighted to know that you got to see him, because you just, you can't escape the man. Oh, and by the way, that's another fun side note of the meet and greet at the ECW Arena. Again, all the other wrestlers, they all have their little tables, right? And their little signs.
00:38:17
Speaker
crowbars just walking around, just like hoping someone will recognize him. And he had just wrestled the show right before, and still absolutely no one approached him. Yeah. While you were talking to Braun Strowman about Beef King, he came up and said, I like Beef King too. And Braun said, get the hell out of here. I'm talking to this guy. He likes Drag Race, OK? It's my kind of guy. He likes Beef King and Drag Race.
00:38:47
Speaker
So the final venue where we saw wrestling was
Memorable Matches and Events
00:38:50
Speaker
a bar in Fishtown, area Philly, called The Fire. This may have been the top experience of the weekend. So we went out to brunch with my dear friend Jen from college. Jen and I had a lot of fun in college and a lot of fun afterwards. We drank a lot together in our lives.
00:39:16
Speaker
And so we had some brunch, and I said, Jen, can I interest you in day drinking at the fire and watching people hit each other? And she's like, you've never steered me wrong, Chris. Let's do this. And so we went to the fire and watched Circle Six, Barroom Blitz, death matches, starting at one in the afternoon. That show is so good.
00:39:46
Speaker
not having to do it at night, even better. A little matinee, barroom brawl. Yeah, sign me up for that every single time. Yeah, we walked right into Rob Shit and his little guy, again, whose name I'm forgetting. Who is also in his band that played right afterwards. He's Rob Shit's little guy in all the sort ways. He's both his tag team partner and his drummer.
00:40:13
Speaker
Yeah. Because they had a clever name. It was shit city. Shit. I don't know. Because they had a tag team name that was both of their names combined. Yeah. And they wrestled the Cogar. Oh, sick, sick shit. Oh, shit. Yeah. Yeah. Sick shit. Sick shit.
00:40:33
Speaker
Um, but they wrestled the Kogars, which was, was delightful. Um, one of my favorite quotes happens right after this. So, um, we're at the bar having another round and, uh, we're standing near, uh, Jonathan Bowles who runs circle six and Rob shit comes out to him and he's like, Oh man, I lost my tooth. Well, it's like, Oh no, I'm sorry, buddy. He's like, ah, he opens mouth to show him. It wasn't much of a tooth anyway.
00:41:05
Speaker
Wasn't much of a tooth anyway. And that's right around. Easy come, easy go. That's right around when Slack showed up. Wasn't on the show. Wasn't on air on the show. Was trying to even hide, even though he was very openly there with the fans in attendance. When the camera went by, he kind of tried to hide a little bit. He was very injured. Like somebody tried to fist bump him and he's like, not with my left hand. I can't move it.
00:41:32
Speaker
Yeah, just Slack, again, he knows it's just a good time. We should have bought Slack a shot. Or an ice cream. We know from the XPW videos he loves ice cream. You essentially give him one of those old DQ coins where you could choose what kind of ice cream you want to be like. You can redeem this from us at any time for a shot or an ice cream. Your choice. Yeah. And we also saw...
00:42:02
Speaker
Lindsay Snow, who we also saw at Bloodsport. Very cool. She drank an incredible amount of alcohol in a very short period of time immediately before taking center stage. Where they are zep. Who also looked very quiet. I had only seen her in the cluster fuck. How many matches did there end up being on the, there were three? Three and then like abandoned between each?
00:42:32
Speaker
A band in between each, the first, well, no, actually, so there was a band before that was sort of like a lo-fi indie band. They were interesting than the Rob, yeah, the Kogars against Six Shit. That transitioned into Rob Shit's band, which was himself, his little guy on drums, and a guy who looked like Prince 1985 on bass.
00:42:58
Speaker
Tremendous-looking band. Just thumbs up. I have the three names of the bands, and I'm going to guess that this is the name of their band. So there is the Stiff Nights, Quirrell, and the one I assume is Rob Schitt's band, Tits Dick Ass. That sounds right. I think Squirrel or whatever was the one that we saw come in and we came in.
00:43:30
Speaker
How? God damn it. And then the main event, by the way, the main event had like AJ Gray was in it. Casanova. Casanova. Spider Web or Nate Web. Sorry, Nate Web. It all started cast for like this little and it was such a small room.
00:43:54
Speaker
Cause it was like the little backroom of this bar. It was so small. It's thrilling to be in the crowd because it's like you're constantly worried you're going to get running into it. Or that your drink is going to fall. And it doesn't. They're pros. They're pros. They know what they're doing.
00:44:09
Speaker
And if at any point you're like, I feel like I'm too far back and I can't see, almost immediately, someone's gonna get whipped, yeah, a woman's gonna whip through the crowd. Cause I came in, I think I'd gone get another beer and the Lindsay Snow Terrazette match. I'm like, I can't really see. And then literally they ended up like right in front of me. And I was like, tremendous. Yeah. It's like, it's like sleep no more. That's what I would tell anyone that's never been to this bar wrestling show. It's like sleep no more for the wrestling crowd.
00:44:40
Speaker
And my friend Jen was like, this is awesome. I'm not going to other wrestling shows, but if this happens again, I will join you.
00:44:49
Speaker
My wife said the same thing after she went to Circle Six. That was hands down the most fun she's ever had at any wrestling. It's just, it's a scene. Like you're put, it's not a wrestling show, it's a situation. You're in a situation. There's blood, you're in a tiny cramped bar. It's just, I don't know. It fills a hole of something I really needed. Yeah.
00:45:19
Speaker
and a great excuse for day drinking. Just fantastic. And then really just fits the vibe of Philadelphia really well. Like I, we were talking the entire time, like we really hope like AEW can do like a big arena pay-per-view weekend in Philly. Cause it's just such a good place for this type of weekend.
00:45:43
Speaker
So that was, that was the cherry on top of your mania weekend was circle six. I think so. I mean, to be fair, we saw that entire show. Whereas it's, it's hard to say if we had been there for the entirety of the skate park show, you know, I don't know. Could it have been as good? Maybe I don't, I don't think so though. I think, but those were, those were the two highlights. Yeah.
00:46:10
Speaker
And it really, it did make me feel like with the Circle Six shows, like I think I'm good on this weekend. I actually don't need to go get very cold and watch people from like a mile away for several hundred dollars. I just, I'm good. I've had my experience and I'm going to go watch, watch the rest of this on TV.
00:46:30
Speaker
I will say, so we should mention a little bit, I thought the ROH show was very, very good. If you haven't seen- It was the usual ROH pay-per-view over-deliver, but they promised so little, it's hard not to. It's true, it's true. But I thought Brisco against Eddie was fantastic and just absolutely the right moment in the right place when they brought up, again,
00:46:58
Speaker
ROH had started down the road. Mark is walking out with his brother in the first match on the first show. It actually kind of felt a little bit like, could we just end ROH here? Because I don't know how you go after Mark coming full circle and winning in the name of his brother with his entire family gathered around. It was an emotional moment.
00:47:27
Speaker
I also thought that the Johnny TV Dalton Castle match was one of the best comedy matches I've ever seen. Just truly like a perfect pairing between those two. And a real F you to the boys who just were fired with like, we can just throw anyone in this outfit. And if it's not you guys, it's actually even funnier. Yeah.
00:47:50
Speaker
I mean, that's kind of been a thing, though. Like, I feel like any time I've seen Dalton Castle where he's had mystery boys, that's always like Ta-Nehisi coming out as a boy. I definitely saw him at PWG where the boys were O'Reilly and Fish. Yeah, it's always great.
00:48:10
Speaker
What else? Kyle Fletcher and Lee Johnson was pretty fun. Oh, and Suzuki. So, so that we knew they didn't even, I think announced in advance at the, at the gun club and, um, Jay white, we're going to defend the six mans in like an open challenge and their opponents, Lance Archer. Um, mine's Archer's little guy from new Japan strong.
00:48:33
Speaker
Alex Zane, Alex Zane. Yeah, there you go. And that's the guy that you forget. He's awesome. I know I could see his face, but my brain, you know, the eclipse guy, we were recording on the day of the eclipse. Everyone's brains. And again, we were watching like we watched like 40 hours of wrestling that week before WrestleMania even started. Yeah. But yeah, and Suzuki Suzuki was their third guy. And so what a what a fun combo that was.
00:49:00
Speaker
It's interesting though, I was trying to track it down. Here are the people that we saw wrestle multiple times this weekend, I think can sort of explain maybe in certain ways what we saw. Dolph Ziggler twice, once against Speedball and once against Joey Janela. Speedball, we saw twice, against Ziggler and then against Rob Van Dam, which was its own interesting thing.
00:49:27
Speaker
John Hennigan was both Johnny Bloodsport and Johnny TV. We saw him in a hilarious match against Dalton Castle and against Josh Barnett. I honestly thought that was going to be really bad. I didn't think John Morrison doing like an worked MMA fight style was going to work, but it was not bad. I think we do need to at some point talk about
00:49:53
Speaker
how good Bloodsport has gotten from where they've started. It's the best GCW show of WrestleMania weekend. And I don't even think it's disputable. Like, I think it was Chris that when we were texting about it said like, they've just figured it out. They figured out who like what this show needs to be. And I don't know at the beginning, you know, Bloodsport one, two, three, whatever.
00:50:19
Speaker
It just, they were trying to do a worked MMA match and it was kind of boring. But they've, I don't know, like how would you describe that they've evolved it that has made it more palatable? I think it started with just, it was kind of boring. And then you started seeing like one match per blood sport that would actually be kind of good. And like, you'd be like, oh, why can't they all be like that match? And then I would say it was like about two years ago.
00:50:47
Speaker
It was the first year that it kind of all clicked. And like, they were just like, pretty much every match was good. They keep a lot of matches short, which is key and vital, right? Because they do get born otherwise, right? Like MMA fights aren't that long for, you know? So yeah, I think they just figured it out. And then like, I was thinking like, Oh, part of it's the people they're getting, but like they keep cycling people out. They're using people that were on some of those earlier shows.
00:51:17
Speaker
And it's just like, ah, there's not a dud in there. Yeah. Everyone seems to know how to work their style into a blood sport. Now it's not like they're trying to do one style. It's it's how do we meld? Like again, like even like Ziggler against speed ball was really interesting. Like Dolph Ziggler finished speed ball off with a zigzag in a blood sport match and it totally worked. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
00:51:46
Speaker
Suzuki used the gosh style pedal driver. Yeah, that was that was a little bit of suspension disbelief that you kind of give it for Suzuki. But yeah, that was the only that was the only real reach. Shayna basilar. She she shows up she did great. There was a women's tournament. That was great. Like and they let Masha be competitive against a WWE person. It wasn't
00:52:14
Speaker
Like the WWE person just came and killed Masha. Right. I don't think anyone would have agreed to that if that was sort of the stipulation. Certainly Shayna Baszler sold for her far more than Mike Tanaka did at Joey Janela's Spring Break. Did either of you guys see that much? Holy fuck.
00:52:38
Speaker
That honestly, one of the most fun matches of the weekend was that match to me.
00:52:48
Speaker
And, uh, who's Masha Ting? Rina. Rina. And Rina, right? Against, um, Masada Tanaka and, and Missouri Suzuki. And Suzuki seemed like he was kind of in on it and like, he was kind of like, Tanaka legitimately seemed like, I'll take their money, but I don't care for this. I don't care for men fighting women and just didn't sell a goddamn thing. And when I say he didn't, it's not like he sold poorly.
00:53:16
Speaker
Like he refused to even acknowledge and attempt to sell anything until the very end of the match. And then just beat the living shit out of either one of them when they were in the ring. It was kind of surreal. I was like, did one of them like actually get him in trouble or something? Did they tell his American wife about the Japanese one?
00:53:40
Speaker
So I don't know it was just like you would see the exchange of forearms and it would go back and forth three times and like Suzuki would just no sell the whole thing and then whoever he was against just hit them with the hardest forearm and they
00:53:57
Speaker
I mean, it's hard to tell if it was real or if they just sold the shit out of it, but they would go flying with the forearm and it just, I don't know, it brought back shades of that Suzuki Asuka match from forever ago. Suzuki's the best though, so he's awesome. Oh yeah.
00:54:20
Speaker
We saw him twice. We saw Lindsay Snow twice. Talked about her in Bloodsport. Somehow we saw Matt Riddle twice. I don't know. Yeah. Unclear. I don't really remember anything that he did. We also saw Matt Riddle have a bunch of fanboys take their shirts off and pay him money to slap them. That was strange. That was strange. The first guy to do it was wearing a Marty Skurl hat.
00:54:51
Speaker
Hell do you hate paying for this? Yeah, I think it's probable he also then purchased the Matt Riddle hat that's based on the Pornhub logo. Or the Only Hands logo, since those are all of his gear. Yeah, he's very, Matt Riddle's a very cool guy with fun references.
00:55:11
Speaker
Did you happen to see his interview where he did it, I think this last week, where they asked him, so why did you get fired from WWE? What were you on? He goes, I was doing cocaine at a strip club. He was a pretty honest interview. It was Larry King interviewing him. Things are going great for Matt Riddle though now. He gets to slap people. He gets to slap fat guys in Philadelphia, and that's really what everyone wants.
00:55:41
Speaker
It's like, what t-shirts were they wearing before he slapped them? It was like, well, it started with Marty Scurril. Then there was a David Starr, a Benoit. It was just like a specific clientele that want this. The one guy had a vintage Cosby show shirt from the 80s.
00:56:01
Speaker
So if you had to like in no particular order but like maybe if you had to list the five best matches like of the shows you saw that people should seek out which like well you can both do a top five or just collectively do five but like what are throw out a few like what are some of the the match
00:56:21
Speaker
I would say that to definitely check out some highlights of the skate park show new fear cities Instagram Has them the main event in particular it was a lot of fun So I would say that would make my list because I think I liked that match Better than any like I like the vibe of bar wrestling better I think I had more fun at bar wrestling, but I think that that was the best non wrestling ring
00:56:50
Speaker
then you match, actual match that we saw. I think you gotta see Eddie against Mark Briscoe. Yeah. I think that was great and just really perfectly pitched and just done so well. Like you just kind of, if you like, if you are the type of person who listens to the three of us talk about wrestling on this show, I'm pretty comfortable you're gonna like that match if you haven't seen it. So that's one.
00:57:20
Speaker
In terms of more under the radar stuff from some of the shows that we saw that weren't quite as heavily discussed, I think our friend Masato slash Mike Tanaka against Josh Alexander was pretty good. If you're looking for, to me, the interesting thing on the WrestleCon Super Show was seeing some of the ECW guys who can actually still work matches against guys who are good.
00:57:49
Speaker
So like that and, and speed ball against RVD were both, if you're looking for an ECW fix from the weekend, those are two matches that work. I would also toss out a, an honorable mention in terms of funny things from the weekend. Um, the FBI wrestled Los bariquas and Los bariquas had a lady team member. And so the FBI countered with of course.
00:58:14
Speaker
Deanna Parrazzo, who just makes perfect sense. I mean, the match was dog shit, but fucking terrible. Because like, they were like, okay, I hope they're letting the women like, do this entire match. And they basically did. But unfortunately, the the Puerto Rican lady was not very good at wrestling. So Deanna didn't have much to work
00:58:37
Speaker
I would also echo that at Bloodsport, I would check out the women's tournament matches, particularly the two Marina Shafir matches. I think the one with Janai Kai, I think I liked better. I think that was my favorite match at Bloodsport. But her in the finals against Lindsay Snow was also quite, quite good. And it was a good story.
00:59:04
Speaker
you can easily skip everything from the Battleground show. We really just went for Beastman, let's be clear. Yeah, I mean, the Battleground show, nothing, most of it wasn't offensively bad, particularly before the intermission, but nothing was like... Kind of just local indie wrestling. I mean, it was better than that, but like, it was just fine, right? There was just nothing special. It was like, it was, it was, it was the show you would get at the 2300 Arena on a weekend that it wasn't wrestling.
00:59:34
Speaker
But meaning that that's above a normal local wrestling show. But the problem with that promotion is so much fucking talking. The show starts 15 minutes late with an announcer just dribbling on. After the intermission, the owner comes out for a bunch of bullshit you don't care about. And it really slows the show down, whereas the actual wrestling is fine. It's pretty good, even.
00:59:59
Speaker
And you get Beastman. We got to see Beastman. And that's really, that was one of the other cherries on top of it. With Ba too. Beastman Ba is, that's quite a combo. Yeah. We could not get the rest of the crowd to chant Beastman Beastman husk husk husk with us, which was disappointing. We did get a couple husk chants going and we couldn't get the full thing. We got some husks, you know, you get what you can get. I would like to see the tape just to see if
01:00:28
Speaker
if it's awkward how loud we're yelling it or not. It just, it didn't happen as organically as it did in Chicago.
01:00:37
Speaker
Right. Yeah. Or, nor was the room small enough, like in Buntin, where just two of us could overpower everyone and convince them, you know? And like, to be clear, it's not like the people didn't, weren't in the basement, right? It was just more of an all these guys vibe. And like, you kind of get that mania. That's like the weird thing you get mania weekend is like, if you saw, if you just see that show, the 2300, another weekend, it's probably going to be a very similar crowd that goes to GCW, right?
01:01:06
Speaker
and like they're gonna be up for nonsense and they're gonna love they're gonna get into the beastman chant with us but this show it's like a bunch of like dads some with their kids some not they're there for mania
01:01:20
Speaker
And they're just like, whoa, wife's not around. Let me have a beer at 11 o'clock and watch some wrestling. And so they're kind of more of an all these guys, fans, and particularly those guys were going against Hornswoggle and Zack Ryder's little guy. What's his name again? Brian Myers. Brian Myers. He looks like Jimmy Lloyd. Not his current little guy, his old little guy. So I think there were a lot of people that were like, oh, who's WWE guys?
01:01:50
Speaker
But the majority of the room heard you guys and thought like, wow, Beastman's nephews really cheering for him. I mean, we did confirm though, he high fived facts, he fist bumped me. So you're the only one he's scared of, Gary.
01:02:06
Speaker
Yeah, that sucks. That sucks. I do like too many of his Instagram pictures and send him too many of my own pictures. But usually it's just selfies of me, not offensive. Just really tasteful like chest up head shots.
01:02:23
Speaker
doing makeup in the mirror. It's also weird that you don't send them on Instagram. You send them Polaroids in the actual physical mail. You've somehow found out his actual physical mail address. And then I actually sent a package with a Polaroid camera and some priests stamped envelopes and everything. It's like, now you send me something. You have no excuse. This is here.
01:02:53
Speaker
Should we talk about WrestleMania for like 10 minutes? I do think we should because honestly one of the best matches of the weekend that at least I think according to facts and I was I was picking up my kid from a thing so I yeah you guys tell me about it please
01:03:15
Speaker
I mean, I don't think there's much to, so I think we're talking about the very first match of night one, which was Becky against Maria Ripley. And I like, honestly, I would almost liken it to like, obviously much abbreviated. It wasn't as long as one, but it's almost like,
01:03:32
Speaker
The modern wwe women's style, which which is the best right? Like all my girls are wwe. They have the best women's talent They have the best women's matches kind of inarguable and um, but it was almost like the two of them doing again an abbreviated version of like an ajpw main event where like Rhea Ripley's just like masawa and it's just like i'm just gonna keep giving you giant moves Till you're dead
01:04:00
Speaker
And then when you're dead, I'll get the three count and like, obviously it built up to that, but like, that's what I loved so much about it is like the last like four minutes is just rear Ripley being masala. And yeah, a lot of working specific body parts between the two of them, but I think like them continually reiterating Becky Lynch is sick. Yeah.
01:04:25
Speaker
like she had strep throat it said like maybe I don't know if they said that earlier that day or the day before she had like 102 temperature and uh I couldn't do that shit it's cold outside um they're working I don't know how long it was but it was like honestly it was such a strong opening to the show
01:04:45
Speaker
that everything had a hard time keeping up to those women. Facts at one point said while we were watching, I would put this match up as better than nearly anything AEW. I didn't say nearly. I said literally anything. I said handily.
01:05:03
Speaker
I would say it was handily better than whatever the best. I don't even know what the best AEW women's match is, but certainly when you count story and everything, this was better than that by a fair margin. And honestly, I think the Bayley match from night two,
01:05:19
Speaker
was also really really good and honestly might have even from like a technical wrestling been a little bit better for me it's like i don't watch the show but even for me i knew there was no fucking way bailey wasn't winning that match whereas i feel like ria rippley and becky lynch like they are still the two biggest stars with apologies to bailey they are the two biggest stars either one could win them playing up becky being sick almost makes me feel like
01:05:47
Speaker
They're going for that like Jordan in the finals or or even Brett at WrestleMania 11 thing like um, and I think that that's what took it to that extra gear as well for me was like it's one of the few cards that You knew there was going to be a pretty clean finish or completely clean finish and it was completely clean But you really didn't know who was going to win Cody finished the story Which is nice Yeah, he did it
01:06:17
Speaker
It felt nice. It felt a little weird. I likened it to facts of like a little bit like a band you really liked on the way up and including up to seeing them in like arenas. And then they get like really gigantic and you're like, that's for other people now, I think. But I'm happy for them. My friend, our friend Jeff Everett, Rocketer Redd was in town and he brought his kid and he was like,
01:06:44
Speaker
Son, you can only go to one of these. Which one do you want? And he's like, we got to go Sunday. Cody's going to win. So I'm happy for the children that are getting this experience of seeing a baby face actually win at WrestleMania that they care about Mike. That's got to be something that helps create future wrestling fans. So good for them. It is very close to that Daniel Bryan 30 moment of just like ultra baby face like that.
01:07:11
Speaker
I mean, current people, people that haven't watched in years, this is the match that was bringing them back. So, I do wanna give it a little, I do wanna give it some props. Like I know we kinda goofed on some stuff last night, but like some good things that it did were just like some little story details. Like, you know, the reason that Roman lost is because he went to hit Rollins with a chair instead of just beat Cody.
01:07:40
Speaker
um also throughout the match like the bloodline started coming through and interfering and like soa and the rock are both barking orders at roman like panam i don't know that stuff is just like watching the bloodline break down and there are some good like storytelling elements throughout this match and and like a lot of people talk about how like
01:08:04
Speaker
um roman's just kind of another guy in the feud by the end because the rock is the final boss and but like i think the way they did it specifically with what you were talking about carrot leaves them a lot of interesting story uh opening of like the rock remaining the final boss and and now we get to see a roman redemption story and like actually be the big baby they said it's always like one one of those big what ifs like what if sina turned heel and with roman we got that and now it's interesting to see like now
Speculations and Future Storylines
01:08:34
Speaker
Cena is in a revisionist way kind of universally beloved, even from people that never loved him. And now it's be interesting to see because now Roman has had these people that never loved him for the first 10 years of his career or whatever. And then now for the last three years have been getting out of his palm. And then now presumably he'll take some time off. And then at some point come back as a baby face.
01:08:59
Speaker
Um, and, and maybe challenge the rocket SummerSlam mania next year, whatever. Yeah. It does seem like rock is saying he's staying and going to be not staying as like every week, but like he's available to do stuff, which I mean, I think is interesting. They've set up a lot of interesting directions with that. And a couple of big matches that now actually have a story, right? They're not just the rock coming back and we're going to have a match. It's.
01:09:26
Speaker
Oh, there's a story that's been told with Roman. There's a story that's been told with Cody, even with Seth. You've got some directions to do a real build to a match as opposed to just, wow, it's called the rocks here. You know, yeah. And I think the flip side too, of like Roman having such this long title reign and Walter having such a long title reign, mostly as a heel or completely as a heel. Um,
01:09:50
Speaker
is that they've kind of beaten in their relative divisions every single babyface and they're just, we were out of opponents, right? And now it's like you get to flip to a babyface world champion and a babyface IC champion. And now you have so many fresh pairings where it's like, Walter, challenging Cody, fuck yeah, I'm into that, right? I'm into that. If I can rock hard, I'm into that.
01:10:20
Speaker
So I think that's another kind of cool thing that they're going to have going for him. And apparently, Punishment Martinez has a title as well. Yeah, not. I don't know. We were talking about it. I was like, when my wife was heckling him at Ring of Honor, I just never pictured him as a future WWE champion. I mean, Mark Briscoe finally won the ROH World title.
01:10:49
Speaker
the day after, or two days after, punishment Martinez won the WWE World Heavyweight Championship. Finishing that story. Also, my favorite thing is that we've proven WWE going out of this way to prove a point that AEW, I think would have made here, which is that you just can't have CM Punk at a stadium show without him attacking someone for no particularly good provocation either.
01:11:20
Speaker
So and by the way, Drew McIntyre was talking at him and that and I did. I did have raw on in the background because because Garrett convinced me to do that. So I will say the big reveal at the end of raw was see him coming out in case you weren't aware that he was under contract. Well, you got to get him out once before this Wednesday, which by the time this comes out, everybody will have already seen whatever the fuck
01:11:48
Speaker
Well, that's wild like last night when we were watching night two and there was some conversation of like well Brian Alvarez said this and like is it really really but like I saw last night after we were talking about that like AEW it's on their official website and Instagram Like AEW is saying the young bucks are coming out showing this video talking about it. It's like with no Ambiguity like so it's a hundred percent happening. I don't understand why
01:12:18
Speaker
But I'm here for it. I'm gonna watch the shit out of it. I'm curious. I don't understand why they're doing it, but sure. Obviously, we're AEW fanboys. We're gonna keep watching. But aren't you a little excited to see what made Tony Khan fear for his life? Look, there's a bunch of people on the internet, in my Facebook feed, probably. Not that I have elected to, but that Facebook has feeds to me. I think mostly to make me angry.
01:12:49
Speaker
I get them. Yeah. Yeah. So they're going to be debating whether this was a good or a bad business decision by AEW. And I could give two shits about whether this is a good or a bad business decision.
01:13:01
Speaker
I frankly, I'm just curious. I'm here for the yucks. And so regardless of what happens, I'm here to be entertained. And AEW is going to try to entertain me. So go for it, guys. Well, my theory that I shared last night is what I hope. I don't think this is going to happen. But this is what my absolute love would be.
01:13:21
Speaker
would be if, for whatever reason, right, because Punk was talking about it last week, and he was saying, yeah, there's stuff under the thing with the box in the locker room and the biting. Everyone's under NDAs for that. He goes, but nothing that happened in London is under NDA from anybody, right? So I wonder if that's something that just happened, that all the lawyers cleared, like, OK, there's going to be no action. Punk's in WWE now.
01:13:49
Speaker
You don't need to sue them. He doesn't need to sue you. There's not gonna be any lawsuits. We're all good like You guys can just do whatever you want about it And so now 20 cons been wanting to release this since day one But just his lawyer said he couldn't because it's just like jungle boy coming out in the back Punk getting in his face and then jungle boy just absolutely potato him just just completely just destroying punk and
01:14:15
Speaker
Like the CM Punk and MMA fight. And then Punk looking for someone he thinks he can beat in a fight. And the only one backstage that fit that was Tony Khan. It seems like it would be so easy to make Tony fear for his life. Yeah. He seems like he's constantly in fear of his life, right? He is like a little bunny rabbit on cocaine. With a billion dollars in his pocket. And he has to walk through that neighborhood you guys walk through in Philly. Right.
01:14:45
Speaker
He's been there. He went when he was a small child. His dad took him. So he's been there. It's scary. And that's after a gentrified.
01:14:57
Speaker
The footage is gonna be like at the beginning of the movie Tommy Boy when Chris Farley is running down the sidewalk to go see his grades and he encounters a small man who is in his path and the man quickly ducks to the ground in the fetal position and cowers and makes like a sound.
01:15:16
Speaker
That's the video we're gonna get on Wednesday. It's really cool that Tony Khan's willing to put himself in that position to be seen as such. But I think he really is just like, I can't let CM Punk get the last word that he choked out Jack Barry backstage. I also imagine that's maybe why, because Tony Khan's not married, right? He's an early 40s billionaire that's not married. And it's like,
01:15:46
Speaker
Is it, is it maybe that like he thinks women, like he sees Lindsay Snow and he's a little turned on and he's like, Oh, but she scares me too. He saw, he saw Sherry and like China when he was younger and he's like, Oh, like I'm getting an erection, but I'm also fearing for my life.
01:16:07
Speaker
That's why Abaddon's there. She's real to him. Are they real? I will say it did strike me, and we'll look, well obviously we'll find out. By the time you hear this, you'll know exactly what's on here. But it did strike me funny that CM Punk was at Bloodsport, and presumably trying to convince someone to let him do it next year. And also to win, to win. The MMA redemption of him fighting. Amazing.
01:16:38
Speaker
As opposed to just getting like choked out by Josh Barnett, which is really what I can see him just like, yeah, talking to Josh Barnett about it and Barnett being like, I don't know. We have a pretty full card already. He's like, y'all, you know what? Like, uh, Tony Deppin needs to get his win back from a blood sport. How about that, Phil? Tony Deppin, you and Tony Deppin open to the card. I'll make you look strong, but Deppin's going to win in three and a half minutes.
01:17:09
Speaker
It's gotta be a realistic film. This is my life. Oh, fuck.
01:17:15
Speaker
Well, either way, there's a... Looks like we should probably wind down here, but there's nothing like a good WrestleMania weekend, and you guys really experience what the true magic of going to that weekend is, just seeing people, just running into people on the way to places. There's nothing like it. It's like you've entered another realm, you've walked through the doors of Narnia, and you're now in this magical land.
01:17:43
Speaker
and that's the real reason i i want there to be some massive aw stadium show in the united states because the problem with aw is that there isn't really an established pecking order of like which show is the big big show the way that like wrestlemania is clearly that and like because you got to feel like
01:18:03
Speaker
Like we're talking to hey, uh forbidden door is going to be coming to new york Is that going to be like a big wrestling venue, you know weekend with lots of indy? But you don't know because like that's why star cast was great because all in was like the first of its kind It was like the wrestlemania for indie wrestling, right? And then the first couple of aw shows were like that because there's your between few and far between it's like I really want
01:18:26
Speaker
to have a second weekend a year like this and that's all I need out of AEW is give me that second weekend and the fact that I'll actually want to go to the entirety of the big show and it won't be $400 to be in bro 37 of section 458 like is even better and let's please do it in a city
01:18:49
Speaker
that isn't likely to be cold at the time of the year that you're gonna do that. Just, yeah, yeah. Hey Tony, like you can make it whenever you want. Make it in the summer. Then you can do whatever city you want. All of America's fine. Maybe not Alaska. One state. You got 50 other choices. Canada, Mexico, that's all good.
01:19:12
Speaker
Not in a place where, again, I remember what the April weather is like, because it's my birthday. Sometimes it's nice, sometimes it snows. Didn't quite snow this weekend, but it was a... It was not pleasant. It wasn't super pleasant when we got out of there. And we were indoors for all of our shows. Except for the skate park.
Fashion Debates and Humorous Anecdotes
01:19:36
Speaker
Tony, let Fax wear his cargo shorts, okay? He could do it at a time when they've made it out of the box.
01:19:44
Speaker
cargo jorts, jorts. I'm so sorry. Yeah. He will hold up those cargo jorts with a replica AW title belt. If you ask him to very nicely, you know, what's the place that's got a nice weather, outdoor football stadium. It's wild. It's wonderful. West Virginia. Oh, hook up with the Appalachian people to something in the UW V WVU, whichever it's called.
01:20:14
Speaker
set up star cast at B dubs. Now you're talking. Conrad will be there anyway. He regularly, he regularly tours Buffalo Wild Wings. So yeah, he'll just be like, Oh, there's a wrestling show this weekend. He collects the shirts from them. Yeah. It's uh, it's like getting hard rock cafe shirts from around the globe. Wait, they're all right at Wild Wings t-shirts. Cause I, I now need a Buffalo Westford, Buffalo Wild Wings West Virginia t-shirt. But anyway,
Live Shows and Sign-off
01:20:44
Speaker
That's just something I got a lot of t-shirts to speak in guys. So, but that would be the t-shirt, the true prize. All right. Are we ready to get out of here? All right, everybody. Thanks for listening this week. Uh, thanks Chris and facts for going on an adventure. Um, I will have a couple live shows the next two weekends myself. So I'll have some stuff to that circle six is in Nashville on the 12th.
01:21:09
Speaker
And then the following weekend is Dynasty in St. Louis. And the weekend after that is OVW if I can find nine other guys to sit on that stage with me. But yeah, thanks for listening at Predeterm podcast on Instagram, at Gartet, at Jimmy Facts, at Chris Migs. I remember your names this time. Maybe this time you're at Jimmy Lloyd's IMDB page. We'll be back next week.
01:22:01
Speaker
Jimmy Boyd, Jimmy Lloyd's pouring up.