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Episode 86: It's Not My Fault Shane Mercers A Bad Throw (AEW's All Out, GCW/BLP 2 Cups Stuffed, AAW's Jim Lynam Memorial Tournament, Bizarro Lucha)
62 Plays6 years ago
This week the boys got to hangout All Out weekend in Chicago! They have stories from AAW (7:50), GCW (36:25), AEW's All Out (1:28:50), and Bizarro Lucha (1:46:50)!
This was a stacked weekend with stories ranging between awkward interactions with Disturbed's lead singer all the way to nearly watching a man bleed to death! This was a crazy weekend worthy of a 2 hour special!
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Transcript
Introduction and AEW Weekend Recap
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.
00:00:08
Speaker
who I assume is just as exhausted as I am, Derek Halpin. Yeah. I mean, we did on this particular AEW themed weekend get more sleep than last year. However, I still find myself pretty wiped out and it's a Wednesday as of this recording. So still recovering. Hopefully I'll be back to myself in the next couple of days.
Attending Wrestling Events Alone
00:00:34
Speaker
you're probably wiped out because you had a whole extra day of wrestling and travel. That's true. And typically when I do these events, it's usually me by myself and I don't go super hard. I mean, I go hard and like go into a lot of shit, but not where the, there's usually not as many white claws involved as there was on this particular weekend. That's what I was going to say is I think that's what it's a little bit different, yeah.
Weekend Wrestling Shows Preview
00:00:59
Speaker
A lot of white claws.
00:01:01
Speaker
Yeah, we're going to be covering a lot of stuff. We're going to be talking AAW, we're talking GCW, we're talking AEW, we're talking Bizarro Lucha out of Indianapolis, Indiana. This is going to be a pretty stacked episode. We did a lot of shit this weekend and goddamn, we saw some good fucking matches.
00:01:20
Speaker
We saw a lot of wrestling and we have a lot of stories to share with our listeners and I'm sure they want to hear what we have to say. And I'll put a timestamp down in the description as well that if you're looking to hear about a specific show, just look down at the timestamps in the description. You'll can find and jump exactly to where we talk about those things.
00:01:40
Speaker
That's very smart. Have we done that before? We've never done that ever. But I figured maybe there's somebody that we're going to open with something they don't give a shit about and they're going to leave. And I don't want them to leave. I want them to just look down and be like, I want to listen to them
Meeting Diamond Dallas Page - Memorable Moments
00:01:53
Speaker
talk about. They almost watched a guy died this weekend.
00:01:57
Speaker
See, if we had left timestamps on previous episodes, I don't know if people would have stuck around for some of the nonsense that we do at the beginning of these episodes. That's true, but I think some of them like it. Either way, we need to get into this. And you know what? Kids, live that gimmick every day and hit our goddamn music.
00:02:49
Speaker
So the kraken of the white claws continues well past all out. Hey, I have had a claw every single day. At least one claw every day since that weekend started. It's actually pretty incredible. You have not burned yourself out on the white claw just yet.
00:03:09
Speaker
No, and as we sit here, I am wearing, like right now, I look insane. I just woke up from a nap. So this is, I've never gone from sleeping straight into podcasting, kind of fun. But I'm also currently wearing Ally Cat's White Claw shirt, drinking a white claw, wearing a new Japan hoodie and a new Japan hat. I just as well have a goddamn foam finger on right now to show that I'm a goddamn mark.
00:03:38
Speaker
You are a fucking parfait of wrestling. How's that claw tasting? It's pretty good. I woke up a little parched, so the natural lime is hitting me just right. And as you can tell, my voice is still a little cracky, but it's coming back. I have a job where I talk on the phone all day. It's really hard talking on the phone when you don't have a voice.
00:04:01
Speaker
Oh, I bet you spent your entire weekend yelling at people and cheering things and guzzling alcoholic water. It's true. And you finally hopped in and got in on the alcoholic water. I believe we posted a video where you had, you almost got to see you drink the first one, but it exploded in my face and I think we decided to just cut the video there.
00:04:27
Speaker
I think you were a little surprised to arrive at my apartment this past Thursday. And I already had white claws ready for us. We talk about it along the podcast. That's because it's going to be a theme, at least for a little while. And I came prepared and I went and I bought a variety pack and was prepared to have my first claw as soon as you arrived at my apartment. And lo and behold, there they were. And we were creating quality content there from the get go.
00:04:55
Speaker
with that video. A lot of people like seeing that claw spurt all over your face. Hey I like seeing that claw spurt all over my face. I can tell you throughout the course of the weekend I pulled that video up at least 50 times at least and rewatch it because it's fucking funny. If you haven't seen it hop on our social media go check that shit out. If you want to see a white claw cracking go awry.
Wrestling Attire and White Claw Humor
00:05:24
Speaker
We talked about how all the Bullet Club shirts are gone, and where are all the Bullet Club shirts? I found them. When I landed in Chicago, they were all at O'Hare Airport. So you stepped off the plane before you got to my place. Who's the first person you ran into? First person I run into? I'm waiting for an Uber. Guess who else is waiting for an Uber? Diamond Dallas Page. DDP?
00:05:47
Speaker
The best part of a Wrestle trip is when you know every goddamn wrestler is in town that weekend. You knew you were going to see somebody at the airport, so it's fun on those weekends to really keep your eyes peeled. I say don't bother a wrestler at an airport. Me and DDP were standing right next to each other. I figured maybe he wants to know that he helped my dad. Turns out he wanted to know. He mentioned you told him your name, and he made a point to repeat your name multiple times.
00:06:17
Speaker
Yeah, that seems like, uh, I was pretty impressed with that. It seemed like that is a famous guy trick that makes you remember that person forever and be like, such a good dude. Cause yeah, he asked, he's like, Hey man, what's your name? And I told him, and you know, the first time I met him, I told him the wrong name or like spelled the name wrong when I was a child. I love that I can have this rapport with DDP now where I can speak to him like a human.
00:06:42
Speaker
because he helped your dad out. But I asked what my name was and throughout a five minute conversation used my name multiple times to me while talking and every time he said my name I was like, this is fucking crazy. You were in The Devil's Rejects. He was also in Radio Rumble. And he was in the deleted scene from the movie Rat Race. Are you shitting me? I didn't know that.
00:07:07
Speaker
I will put a link up on our social media in the next couple days so people can see this as proof. If you tell me that he shared a scene with Rowan Atkinson, I'm about to shit my fucking pants. Now, he shared a scene with Cuba Gooding Jr. OK, that's pretty good, but I'm a huge bean mark. And I think you know that. And I think anyone listening to this, smoke if you got him, watch Mr. Bean's holiday. You're not going to be disappointed.
00:07:37
Speaker
That guy's fucking everything up. You get into Chicago, you get to my apartment, we're cracking white claws, we're catching up, we're hanging out in my apartment. That night, night one of the AAW Gem Lyman Memorial Tournament.
00:07:53
Speaker
We had tickets for both nights. Ultimately, we only went to the first night. This is like your second trip to the Logan Square Auditorium ever, right? Third, because I went to a concert there once. Okay, fair enough, yes. But yeah, for wrestling, my second trip to Logan- First time since seeing Nido, essentially. Yeah, it's a really beautiful goddamn venue. Like, it's a good venue as just a regular venue. As a wrestling venue, you feel like you're making it a little worse just by being in there.
00:08:22
Speaker
That's so true. You feel like you're bringing that pro wrestling stank up in the building. And here's
Unique Wrestling Venues
00:08:29
Speaker
the thing. I've said it multiple times. I completely agree with you. I think it's a gorgeous venue. The one knock on the venue and it has more to do with me maybe more so than the venue is that because of the setup inside of Logan Square auditorium there is a balcony.
00:08:44
Speaker
that overlooks the whole thing. And that's where the quote unquote boys hang out during the show and they watch what's going on. And so for instance you're trying to just watch some goddamn good AAW action and then you look up to your left in the balcony and there's this Nick Gage in a blue t-shirt and a hat and a PBR.
00:09:07
Speaker
watching the show and hanging out and reacting to spots that are going on in the ring. And you could always tell if he was into it or not. It was like a silly shirt too. I don't know what it was. It was definitely a wrestling shirt, but I agree, 100% distracted that Nick Gage was up there. One, because I love him so much too, I just wanted to see like, do you like regular wrestling? I've never gotten to watch you watch wrestling.
00:09:36
Speaker
That's true. That's what I was thinking too, but it's not just Nick Gage. I've been there when Nick Gage is not in the balcony. You care what anyone up there thinks. You want to know what these people's coworkers.
00:09:50
Speaker
are reacting to. You want to get some insight into the business by how they react to the matches. And the one knock is that it does distract a little bit from what's going on in the ring because you want to see if, you know, their fellow workers are into the show as much as you are. And the greatest video of the weekend of a wrestler enjoying wrestling came from a video that Ethan Page did not know was being taken. Did you see this one on Twitter?
00:10:19
Speaker
Maybe. Oh, he was marking his little heart out in the back room of GCW for Effie and Nick Gage. He was actually jumping in the air and fist pumping with both fists just because it was such an exciting match. I will say that I did see pictures of Effie in the crowd at AEW enjoying the hell out of the show. And that made me very happy. I'm happy that we got to interact with a lot of these people all weekend.
00:10:48
Speaker
Well, we'll bring that up as we go along with this AAW show. Man, we got to see a few good matches on the show and there were some fun moments. What comes to mind first for you when you think back on Thursday night? The best, I guess I don't want to say the best, my favorite wrestling match of the AAW show was Ace Romero versus Willie Mack.
00:11:13
Speaker
Absolutely. It was maybe the most different thing on the card. You know, I feel like with modern, the way modern wrestling is, you're so used to high spots and little guys doing flippy shit. It's hard to get people into big guy versus big guy shit anymore. Crowd was hot for this one and they put on a damn good match and I became a fan of Willie Mac after this match. Was this your first Willie Mac experience?
00:11:38
Speaker
Maybe. I haven't kept tabs on every single person I've seen when I've gone to like an independent show. But I don't think I've seen him with you. And he's a lot of fun. I missed it. He's a guy that really surprises you when you finally start seeing him move around in the ring.
00:11:55
Speaker
He's one of those big guys that surprises you with a flip here and there. Were you surprised at how over AC Baby was? I was trying to think of the biggest pops of the weekend. Like, I mean, just overall. Like, if you, you know, do some math and change, you know, how many people were there versus how loud it was. I think Ace Romero got one of the biggest pops of the weekend at AW.
00:12:19
Speaker
Like I pointed out, he may not be a necessarily a hometown hero, but he's, he's definitely a favorite at AAW and the reaction. Every time they hear the outfield and their song, your love, you know, Ace Romero's coming to the ring and he's going to throw a motherfucker and Willie Mack and Ace Romero knocked each other around in a really fun fucking match.
00:12:39
Speaker
That was probably the best match of the night. I mean, it's hard to say, though, because, you know, there's actually like some lucha matches that were really memorable, like the one Laredo kid was in at one point. Shit, who had to drop out of the night, though? I remember Jake Atlas was supposed to take on Fatu. Correct. But Fatu wasn't there. So they ended up replacing him with Paco.
00:13:04
Speaker
Correct. But we did get to see Sammy Callahan versus Good Brother number three. Yes. I don't know what the story is behind Good Brother number three, but the Good Brother was Mance Warner.
00:13:23
Speaker
How excited were you for that to see him under the mask wrestling at AAW? Honestly, I popped at that show when we just saw Mance Warner drinking at the back of the building. I popped for Mance Warner. I want a shirt that just says that. I popped for Mance Warner.
00:13:41
Speaker
This was a. So this is a jump hit Armando Alejandro Estrada managing good brother number three a.k.a. Mance Warner against Sammy Callahan. Lots of spit lots of violence.
00:13:56
Speaker
I'm trying to think, what was, was that the Sammy Callahan match where there was like a, uh, there was a kendo stick brought into the picture and it was like jammed into somebody's mouth and being prodded in there. And you just started screaming and it ended with you saying, stop it. Like you were being pestered. Well, he stuffed that in man's Warner's mouth or good brother number three, if you, if you like, and then followed that by beating him over the head with it until it broke in half.
00:14:25
Speaker
And I know Mance is a tough son of a bitch, but I wanted him to quit. Sammy Callahan is a mean motherfucker. Just, that's his shtick, and he does it well. His shtick is effective heel that works Garrett. A little skanky too.
00:14:43
Speaker
it's he really does work you what the fuck is it Sammy Callahan is like your kryptonite he just seems so mean all the time I've met Sammy and enjoyed meeting Sammy but there's something about him in the ring that he didn't affect you seeing him before the show posing with that little kid who had like the Sammy Callahan shirt on you thought it was fucking adorable in my head I'm like he doesn't mean it
00:15:09
Speaker
This is for $20 for the $20.
MJF's Last AAW Match Highlights
00:15:11
Speaker
Yes. He doesn't love that boy. Um, for me, not necessarily match of the night, but the thing I'm going to take away from this, from this show was getting to see MJF have his last match at AAW against Colt Cabana and then playing up the whole father son angle once again.
00:15:33
Speaker
That was fun as hell. It was a, what? Like it had to have been a five minute match or something. That's what I remember with a lot of before and a lot of after. So really, the match wasn't really the biggest part of it as much as it was just a really fun comedy bit.
00:15:49
Speaker
I thought that there was some like I really enjoyed the spot where fucking Colt Cabana really did slap the ever loving shit out of him. And he seemed so shocked at it. And they gave they gave MJF a good send off. They did all you know they did the whole the whole match was based around the idea that if MJF beat Colt Cabana he would get a weekly allowance from his dad. And if Colt Cabana could beat MJF he was grounded from AAW for life.
00:16:17
Speaker
Well, ultimately, Colt Cabana was able to tap out fucking MJF middle of the ring. Crowd starts chanting nana, nana. Hey, hey, goodbye. And well, Colt Cabana had a bad bag packed for him already. That was hilarious. I loved that moment. The like, just get out of here. You know, like that whole like trying to get you. I'm not going anywhere. Little kid making an animal leave because he can't keep him kind of thing.
00:16:45
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. This was MJF jumping over Colt Cabana like free Willie to go on to bigger better things. Yep. They did. They did a whole thing with they piped in some airline announcement where last stop or last call for flights to AWW and
00:17:06
Speaker
Cole Cabana urged him to leave. They ultimately ended up hugging in the middle of the ring and then MJF tried to kick Cabana in the deck, caught it. And then his Cabana was getting MJF out of the ring.
00:17:19
Speaker
He kicked the middle rope right into MJF's tank, as you will. When the airline announcement came on, my first thought was, oh no, we must be over capacity and the fire marshals kicking us out. You got scared. I was like, I wasn't done with wrestling. But that wasn't the only, I mean, I assume we saw another
00:17:45
Speaker
Final indie match or I guess they did it the next night, but what would have been one of their last two? LAX were the tag team champions at AAW and they were scheduled to have a match against the besties in the world This is just the besties are the best. I just think it's the besties Why do I keep wanting to add words to their thing? I don't know. Maybe you're confused by Chuck and Trent Yeah, there's like best friends and there's besties which matters more. I
00:18:14
Speaker
I'm actually more into the best used gimmick. They have a better entrance music. I believe that you would say that. You know, there they seem to be a they seem to be a local act that, you know, they may be there from Chicago, but if not, they're from the region. And you've gotten to see them more than I have. And I have enjoyed them every time. But
00:18:34
Speaker
My allegiance will always lie with Chuck Taylor. I cannot somebody else's allegiance lies with Chuck Taylor now too. We'll get to that in a minute. But yes, it was supposed to be LAX defending the AAW tag titles against the besties, but there was a surprise team that joined the match here.
Unexpected Lucha Bros Appearance
00:18:51
Speaker
Tell these people who the surprise team was. I'm never going to be mad when the lucha bros hop into a match with LAX. God damn right. Triple threat elimination match for the AAW tag team championships.
00:19:04
Speaker
And I kind of, I think I said to you at the beginning, if they drop these belts tonight, we're seeing them pop up later. Yep, that ended up being the case. You and I were just nervous that somebody was gonna get hurt in this match. It didn't necessarily last long. It couldn't have been any more than 10 minutes. It's funny because I remember the first time I bought tickets to WrestleMania, you told me, now here comes the fun part, where you get to wait like four or five months hoping that no one gets hurt.
00:19:34
Speaker
And this is an actual bigger fear with indie wrestlers than it ever was with WWE wrestlers. It's true because the style is a lot more hard hitting. And I figured with this match, you know, they'd still did some top rope high flying shit. Don't get me wrong. But I was kind of thinking it was going to be a little toned down because the Lucha Bros had a pretty big match coming up, which I don't know if you heard a lot of people are calling the greatest ladder match of all time.
00:20:04
Speaker
wink wink. Uh, yeah, but lucha brothers made it out of there. Okay. LAX made it out of there. Okay. Lucha brothers with the first team eliminated and then LAX ends up getting beat by the besties and besties walk out with the tag titles and
00:20:21
Speaker
All of our predictions ultimately ended up coming true. And we'll talk about that in a minute. But yeah, AAW got new tag team champions there. And LAX out. We took my friend Aaron to this show. And this was our second wrestling show ever.
00:20:40
Speaker
Her first wrestling show, she went with me to Joey Janela, Lost in New York. She lived in New York, now she lives in Chicago. We're gonna be in town, so invited her to do this. And unfortunately, I think GCW is a hard first show to take someone to.
00:20:59
Speaker
I think that it sets an idea of what a wrestling show is going to be in someone's head. And it's not always, we had to explain like, no, this is going to be a little more serious.
00:21:12
Speaker
Not the, you know, like GCW, she got to see Orange Cassidy for the first time. She saw some brutal matches. She saw a fucking PZO versus Matt Riddle and Riddle's final indie match. You know, you're just seeing like kind of a really fun party. And this was a serious tournament that was in the memory of a man who helped start this company. So it's gonna be a little more serious. It's still super fun. I think she enjoyed it. I think, I don't know. Did you?
00:21:41
Speaker
I think it did run a little too late like there are when you when we looked at this card and realized like there's 14 fucking matches on this thing I've been up since four in the morning. This is gonna be a rough one What the show started at what time
AAW Show Experience and Late Night
00:21:56
Speaker
It ended up starting at eight, which isn't too bad, you know, that kind of started on punk rock time, but not too punk rock. It didn't go past an hour late, so I was happy with- What time did we get out, like 1130 or so? Maybe just a bit before, but yeah. So about eight to 11, 1130.
00:22:15
Speaker
Three and a half hour show. Good show. I'm still saying if you live in Chicago, you have no goddamn excuse not to get out to an AAW show. I mean, they have top-endy talent. And they move around. It's not just in the city. They move around in the suburbs quite a bit. So, I mean, Logan Square Auditorium is a great venue, but I've also been to Bourbon Street. Check them out if you haven't. If you're in Chicago, AAW.
00:22:41
Speaker
And if you're wondering, you know, because with every Andy, it works a little different and you're going to the building. You don't know where you should get. Should you get seats? Should you stand? Because some shows there's only like three rows of seats and you can see just as good standing. Honestly, if you're trying to save some money, I say go general admission for an AAW show. You can stand against the back wall. You actually get a better view. It's elevated enough that you can see over the people in chairs.
00:23:07
Speaker
I recommend standing room only. I mean, if you're not wearing heels, if you're not, if you're not against being on your feet for a few hours, watch show, I would agree. That's actually the way to go. General admission, standing room only, whatever you want to call it. That's pretty sweet deal. I think it's like 20 bucks.
00:23:25
Speaker
Yeah, for the talent that you're getting, if you do general admission, 20 bucks, you are absolutely, I mean, you're getting your money's worth if you pay for a front row ticket, if that's your thing. But if you're trying to save some money, general admission is not a bad way to go. You have an awesome view. I recommend standing against one of the side walls. It's a good venue, good crowd. Fucking, Chicago wrestling crowds really have won my heart, Derek. That's one thing I really enjoy going up to you for, is getting to be in the room with a Chicago crowd.
00:23:54
Speaker
Do you feel like the reputation of Chicago being damn good wrestling fans holds true? I think it does. But I'm not going to lie. I think Nashville fans are kind of up there. I get that GCW show here and then at the Ring of Honor shows they've done. I think a Nashville crowd can be really hot if you give them something to be hot for. Speaking of getting hot for stuff, so long fucking night at AAW. We go home.
00:24:21
Speaker
Back to my apartment, we crash. And I wake up. Did we have any claws when we got back? I don't think we did. It feels like there were always claws in hand at this weekend. Not after this. I had water. We ate some kind of bullshit food before we went to bed just to get something in our system. And then when I woke up to the sounds of you scuffling about in my apartment, I think it was like 9 AM. It was actually 8.45.
00:24:49
Speaker
Well, whatever. No, because you corrected me in the fucking episode about it. Whatever. Whatever fucking time it was. Point being, I opened my door and I'm immediately told, no, no, no, no. Go back in. And I'm in my home, mind you. This is where I pay to live. And this guy's, no, go back in your room. Give me 10 seconds. Ended up being about a minute, minute and a half. And we record the episode that we have last put out.
00:25:18
Speaker
the bonus zone scream-along of Garrett forcing me to watch a very dastardly death match that just took place in Japan like a week ago. And I was not happy with what I saw. Go, if you haven't, go back. Watch the bonus zone episode if you haven't already. Garrett, sell them on what my reactions are worth in this episode. I woke up a little before you and I thought to myself,
00:25:48
Speaker
What this man truly needs is to walk out of this room and the first things he has handed before 9am are a white claw and a microphone. And you had already said to me, you had absolutely no interest in seeing this match. You said this sounds fucking terrible, it sounds like it's gonna make me scream, you're gonna be uncomfortable.
00:26:10
Speaker
And, you know, for the good of the show, I thought you wouldn't be too terribly mad at you if I just surprised you with this, and also just had microphones go in so that they knew that you pushed out if you wouldn't watch this at 8 45 in the morning and drink a claw. First thing, you wouldn't have any fucking content to post. So why would you post it? You're going to post a five minute rejection clip? I was going to. Yeah, I was going to post that just so people would be like, listen to what life could have been like.
00:26:39
Speaker
I was more mad that you wouldn't let me drain the fucking snake as soon as I woke up because I had to pee so fucking hard and I'm getting a microphone trip. Look, go back and listen to the episode. We don't need to fucking review that here. You don't get that content for free. I mean, you do, but you got to go back on your own time and listen to the scream along. It's only like 20 or 30 minutes, right? Yeah, yeah, it's under a half hour.
00:27:03
Speaker
Anyways, you don't even have to watch the match along with us. Honestly, I would recommend it. The shit that's happening in the match is so brutal that just listening to Derek's reactions to what's happening as we describe as it's going to me, they were priceless.
00:27:20
Speaker
You've also seen the match a few times. Well, the first time I watched it through my fingers, it turns out when you're watching it with a buddy and cracking claws at 9 a.m., it's a little more fun. No, the reason it's easier is because you have seen it. When you don't know what's coming, it's traumatizing. I'm living proof of that. Had nothing to do with watching it with a buddy or a claw. Quit fucking lying. And also,
00:27:46
Speaker
You know what traumatize our listeners don't tell them to not watch the match. Go watch the match. Go listen to our review and watch the match. We had a full fun day on Friday basically of traveling and getting ready for the the meat of the weekend in getting out to O'Hare getting the rent a car which was by God that was that was a fun couple of hours a couple of hours.
00:28:14
Speaker
Yeah. Renting cars is goddamn awful. And you know what? It was a fine Toyota Corolla Avis, but you're in the late people working there fine. Get your goddamn computer systems fixed, asshole. Tell the story as we're walking up to the line of the people that decided to just jump in front of us really quick. Yeah, you ever hop in a line, you're getting ready to get in a line and you see some people who are questioning, do I want to be in this line or do I not want to be in this line? But they saw us coming. And they see you.
00:28:40
Speaker
And they thought, I definitely need to be in this line before him. It looks like he has a reservation. So they get in line ahead of us. It takes for goddamn ever. We get to the front. The lady at the counter is my goddamn hero. I love being shitty to people. They got up there and they couldn't decide what car they wanted and she made them leave.
00:29:01
Speaker
She told him to get the fuck out. She said there's a long line of people behind you that have reservations that know what they're here for. The system's been acting up. We got a long line, and you're coming up here going, I don't know what I want to do.
00:29:14
Speaker
I would like to think that we provided excellent, it sounded, honestly, we were like a dog show commentary for the line. We really gave good commentary to what was happening in that line to the people around us. Some probably hated us, some probably hated us. We were amused with each other. I don't know why you said it twice. That was your way of 50% didn't like us, the other 50% also didn't like us.
00:29:40
Speaker
But I will say I felt like you were, you know, telling, cause I had never rented a car before, but you had told me that a lot of times they get up, you get up there, they try to upsell you on shit. I think the woman who told the other people to get out of line that were ahead of us told him to get the hell out of there. And then she was so excited that she got to talk shit about them to us. And she saw that we had, right. And then we joined in and then we had a reservation. She didn't try to up. We were in and out of there in like five minutes.
00:30:06
Speaker
She actually gave us a better car for the same money. So it all worked out. Yeah. Worked out for everybody. We got to our hotel and we shared. There wasn't. Yeah. Go ahead. There was an issue. No there was an issue. There was a little bit of an issue with our hotel room. You remember what it was.
Post-Travel IHOP Adventure
00:30:23
Speaker
The fucking? No. Well, I mean, I mean, yeah, there was fucking happening next door quite frequently that we could hear through the paper thin walls. We didn't have enough claws in our hotel room. That was the problem. Well, the problem is we'd bought some claws and we drank too many of the claws and we wanted the visual of a stocked claw refrigerator. This is a pro wrestling weekend.
00:30:46
Speaker
So Garrett and I went and got some great grub at IHOP because we were both fucking starving and our waitress was fantastic. She was she was swerving us more than any wrestling angle.
00:31:21
Speaker
I don't know, man. She got, she got us on that first one. We walked through the door and she was like, Oh, we're actually closed right now. And you and I were both just kind of like, all right, guess onto the next one. She's like, no, no, no. I'm just kidding. You want to know what kind of wrestle weekend this was everybody. Derek ordered.
00:31:26
Speaker
I've ever seen in my life
00:31:36
Speaker
a hamburger. I say a hamburger, that makes it seem small. He ordered a burger because, you know, IHOP's famous for burgers now and he got a side of goddamn pancakes with his burger and that was the most wrestling weekend thing I've ever seen and I was proud of him.
00:31:52
Speaker
I had not eaten a meal since like my lunch the previous day. I was starving. So I got, I don't know what it's called. It's like the mega mighty burger, some shit. It was like a double cheeseburger, Supreme deluxe, extra, whatever from IHOP. And then when I was going through the list of sides, I saw you get pancakes as a side and I'm like, I'm not passing that up. I'm starving. Garrett, there's a chain here. You had like 15 things.
00:32:19
Speaker
I had a breakfast platter. Hey, why are you tickling the people's balls right now? Even me, I'm getting to the point where it's like, it is almost Friday night, maybe my favorite show of the entire weekend, and right now, you are just taunting me. We're getting so close to talking about it, and all I wanna do is talk about it.
00:32:39
Speaker
Oh, I know you do. But we can't just leave out the other stories. This is an adventure, Garrett. You get through the whole weekend and then come back and be like, oh, yeah, by the way, Friday morning, we had this. Oh, yeah, by the way, there. Yeah, you're right. If if there was a nude photo shoot before a pro wrestling extravaganza, the people should probably hear about a nude photo shoot.
00:33:01
Speaker
And that's exactly what happened. We went to Mariano's, we picked up a 24 pack of beers, we picked up another case of white claws, and we took it back to the hotel. We stocked that goddamn fridge every square inch was filled with booze.
00:33:17
Speaker
with alcoholic beverages. And then what did you do Garrett? What did you wanna do? What came to mind? At first I just wanted a picture with a fridge fully stocked to claws. I believe you actually suggested this.
00:33:32
Speaker
You suggested that there maybe needed to be a photo shoot that looked like the Shawn Michaels playgirl photo. I think your exact words were, I want to take a picture where I'm naked, but I have the white claw box over my junk. And I said, yeah, go ahead. Yeah. Well, let's do that. And I said, you can even do the Shawn Michaels pose where you're on like yourself. It was your idea. Let's be very, very clear about that. That is not how I remember this at all.
00:33:59
Speaker
Of course not, because as soon as we did it, you were ashamed. Well, I was only ashamed because you kept wanting to show everybody. I showed, I think, two people. Yeah, that's two too many, because you know what? If you want nude photos of me and some white claws, hey, there's no, it's tasteful nudity, by the way. Much like the death match wrestling experience, I think it's very selfish that you wanted to take those pictures and then have me be the only one dealing with them. By the way, those are deleted off of my phone. No!
00:34:29
Speaker
Oh! They are in a text exchange between you and me, so you can go redownload those any time you want. But I did not want anybody finding those on my phone. Oh, you were worried about people finding them in your phone. Yes. OK. See, now I think we can save those and eventually start a Patreon. And maybe that's a tier where if you give some. If you send $10, I will send you all of the Garrett Whiteclaw nude photo shoot pictures.
00:34:57
Speaker
This is a behind the scenes discussion and you're already accepting $10 for nudes. This is upsetting. The photographer has to get paid. That's true, I actually saw Effie posting about paying photographers.
Hotel Antics and GCW Show Excitement
00:35:12
Speaker
Yep. I don't think he meant you specifically in this situation. I feel like most people going to hang out and watch wrestling with their buddy probably didn't do what we did. Absolutely not. But you know what else they didn't do? You then needed to take a nap because your belly was full. And what did I want to do? I went down to the hotel pool and I took a nice 25 minute swim.
00:35:36
Speaker
I can't even tell you the last time I swam in general. And Derek, we're leaving to go to this place, and he goes, oh, I'm putting swim trunks in. There's going to be a pool. So fucking sick. You didn't believe me. Can you get me to the goddamn venue for GCW? We're 35 minutes in. No, we're telling stories. Shut up. Goddamn.
00:35:54
Speaker
So you take a nice little nap. I go have some white claws out on the patio outside the hotel. I eventually have to wake you up and you proceed to invite a couple of your Nashville brethren over to our hotel room. Not for another nude pictorial, thankfully.
00:36:11
Speaker
But we're getting ready for GCW Friday night. This is what you wanted to talk about, right? Yes, this is very much what I wanted to talk about. All right. I'm just going to be quiet for a couple of minutes and let you set the scene since this is what you want to get off your chest. Dude, oh, man. I was so pumped for this GCW show. We actually booked the hotel where it was, I mean, three minutes from where the GCW show was taking place.
00:36:37
Speaker
pull up to that place, it is fucking packed. I went ahead and got us the VIP tickets, so we actually got early entry into the building, which I didn't realize early entry into the building meant they actually do not let everyone else into the building for a while. So they let us in first so that we could actually go and you could buy your shit and actually kind of enjoy some one-on-one time with some of the wrestlers in there.
00:37:01
Speaker
right which the what's funny is the two people that we ended up talking to the longest were wrestlers that we wanted to talk to that weren't even part of the goddamn show that we're just there that's very very true we did get some nice uh some nice conversation time in with alley cat
00:37:21
Speaker
Which, believe it or not, most of the conversation was about white claws. Of course. And there's a connecting story to that later on in the episode, so stay tuned. You ended up being a hero later that weekend. Which was maybe one of my favorite stories of the weekend. Being able to contribute anything to pro wrestling is really a dream. Marcus Crane as well.
00:37:45
Speaker
Marcus Crane that was a an eye-opening experience. I had a I had questions for Marcus Crane and If you're wondering did these guys get super beat up and are they pretty beat up for a long time after these matches? Because you know just the day before I had shown Derek actually it was that morning I showed you that Marcus Crane match where he got the goddamn needle stuck through his face. Yeah, horrible. I felt bad about that
00:38:11
Speaker
And that night, later that night, after seeing that match, I had to meet the guy who I saw got brutalized. And it made it really fucking real, like talking to the guy and seeing how banged up he was. And I think he even told us, you know, he's like, I couldn't wait. He said I couldn't move yesterday. I like how proud you are of deathmatch wrestling now. Like, I'm a little ashamed of you. Why?
00:38:39
Speaker
I don't know. Did my wife scold me over somebody almost dying over the weekend? Yeah, fuck you. Don't act like I don't get it. Why am I being chastised? It's something that you have fully embraced that I'm still a little iffy on.
00:38:57
Speaker
It's exciting. You have to admit that there is an added element of danger when you're in the front row of a deathmatch wrestling show and it makes it very, very interactive. It's like being there for an action movie.
00:39:14
Speaker
Like, there's no barricade. There is glass coming at your face. This man is bleeding everywhere. I can't think of anything, like, it's fucking terrifying. It's punk rock as shit. I don't see what the problem is.
00:39:35
Speaker
Oh, who he's right next to, Bryce, the GCWAEW Ref, who did the Invisible Man match over the Spring Break weekend.
GCW Show Highlights - Wrestlers and Matches
00:39:45
Speaker
God damn. There was just a lot. Oh, but really, the thing that we have to mention, I didn't realize how many beers Derek had actually smashed.
00:39:53
Speaker
before we got there. Like I had seen him doing it, but I didn't really put together like, oh, he's had a handful of these. He's buzzed and ready to fucking go. We get into this venue. He looks over and sees Jerry Lawler with his jet black dyed hair sitting behind a table selling his wares. And Derek looks at me and goes, Garrett, it's Jerry fucking Lawler.
00:40:18
Speaker
Jerry Fucking Lawler. I decided that was going to be my shtick. One of the greatest angles in pro wrestling history. He's sitting at that fucking table right there. Jerry Fucking Lawler. Look at where we're at. We're in someone's high school annex that's halfway falling apart and you look over to your left and there's Jerry Fucking Lawler right there at a table.
00:40:41
Speaker
that guy who does that fuck you up a little pal driver a little bit it did fuck me I mean and and to be fair I agree with you how awesome it is to get in there early and all of these different people selling their wares are just hanging out there and you get first access to them
00:41:01
Speaker
I couldn't believe when we met Orange Cassidy, when I talked to him with Leah in Nashville, I don't remember him being as deep in his character as he was when we spoke to him. I don't know if it was just because it was so early in the night and we were some of the first people to get to talk to him. But throughout that entire conversation or not really conversation, just interaction, he did call me baby like six times like Elvis.
00:41:25
Speaker
And that never stopped being great. God damn, and even when we went to shake that motherfucker's hand, he gave me the limpest wet noodle handshake I've ever had in my entire life. And the level of detail that man goes into for his character is fucking art.
00:41:44
Speaker
So we all got a poster for being VIP right at ringside. I mean, we are front row center on this thing. We are right there. Describe the venue, Garrett. I mean, you described it well. It's a high school annex. Like as you first walk in to your left, there's a soccer field.
00:42:04
Speaker
or something of that nature. It looks like maybe there's a hockey rink. This is just a giant room made for sports. Correct. And we're talking like farming steel walls and everything. It's just a metal building.
00:42:20
Speaker
Yeah. Just a just a tin building and shout out to Lowell because we're standing there talking to Marcus Crane before the show starts. Lowell comes into the building and sees me and just yells my name at the top of his lungs to the point where it shook me because we were we were we had all of our fixation on Marcus Crane in that moment. And somebody knew who I was telling us like a sad story basically.
00:42:45
Speaker
He was telling us how bad he feels. I think at one point he even said to us, this is, Lowell did this right after Marcus Crane had finished this sentence. Yeah, I understand I ruined my life, but you know, what am I going to do? Derek! Derek! This fucking Canadian with long hair down his shoulders, wearing the jean jacket, screaming at Derek like Derek is the biggest celebrity there. But basically doing to Derek what Lowell did Derek did to Lowell last year.
00:43:15
Speaker
You act like I wasn't the biggest celebrity there, but I really was by the end of this show. Well, Marcus Crane had a look on his face like, who the fuck am I talking to here?
00:43:29
Speaker
You're listening to one of the voices of predetermined a pro wrestling hangout. This show man, I don't even know where to begin as far as the show goes because I saw one of the greatest wrestling matches I've ever seen live with that six man tag match.
00:43:49
Speaker
I saw somebody almost die. I saw somebody climb up onto one of the, what would you call it, the steel girders? One of the support beams for the roof. The thing is, three of the craziest fucking things that happened the entire night were all in the same match. Yeah. All within like 15 minutes of each other. And it felt like we had just gone through every emotion you possibly could in that fucking match.
00:44:16
Speaker
I remember even getting more out of the Jerry Lawler Mance Warner match than I thought I would, especially when it came to him busting a beer bottle on the ring post.
00:44:27
Speaker
So after seeing GCW live again and kind of, cause this was really got to be your first, you know, GCW show since the hardcore death match when we went to, what do you think? Do you, do you kind of see what I'm talking about now where this is just, to me it's so damn near a perfect indie promotion.
00:44:48
Speaker
Yeah, but here's the problem with that, because I don't mean this in a bad way, because I have nothing but good things to say about the show, because it was easily out of the whole weekend my favorite show we went to, out of the three that you and I went to. I'm sure out of the four you went to. GCW comes across a little bit like a bag of Chex Mix. Every show's a little bit different. You reach in, grab something, there's a little bit something that makes each show unique.
00:45:15
Speaker
Sometimes it's a little scarier, sometimes it's a little bit more fun, sometimes it's a little bit more straightforward. This was kind of a little bit of everything on this show, and I had so much fun at this GCW show, Garret. It's easily in the top two, three shows I've ever been to, anything related to pro wrestling. That makes me so goddamn happy to hear you say that.
00:45:50
Speaker
How much of that was because of me? Put me over for a minute. I have put you over so many times. Derek, I go to so many of these things by myself.
00:46:00
Speaker
and I'm sober alone talking to strangers when I attend all this, getting to sit next to my best friend who has had, I don't wanna say too many drinks, I'm gonna say enough drinks. I was not drunk, let's be clear, I was a little buzzed. No, you had enough that I would, let's say it made you awesome.
00:46:20
Speaker
You screamed at Jerry Lawler a lot, but you basically, you know how you can go to a show and somebody is trying to put themself over the whole show and it gets annoying? You weren't that guy. You actually enhanced the show. You spent the entire goddamn show. I don't know how this is possible. You called multiple spots. You were shouting at wrestlers to do things and they would just obey you.
00:46:46
Speaker
And we had this amazing section where we just kind of became buddies with everybody around us. Like we were collectively having a great time with everyone around us. And every time you called a spot, the wrestlers would hit that goddamn spot. And I didn't even believe you that you didn't have a part in the show.
00:47:06
Speaker
I think it started, I can't remember what match it was. You told Ethan Page to kick homicide in the face and he looked at you and did it. Yeah, it felt like the right thing to do. He was down in the corner. I felt like he deserved a boot in the face and Ethan Page delivered. And of the night, honestly, maybe the best straight pro wrestling match.
00:47:26
Speaker
Probably, and even though homicide ended up winning, Ethan Page, after the match was over, was over by us, and I yelled his name, Ethan! And he turned and looked at me with angry eyes, and I thought, oh man, maybe I'm in over my head here. And I made eye contact with Ethan Page, and I said, thanks for beating the shit out of Ricky Shane Page a couple months ago. And he looked at me for another second, and then he stuck out his fist, and we fist bumped, and all was good between me and Ethan Page. All ego.
00:47:55
Speaker
I that was a moment where when you said that he turned and looked straight at you and I did oh shit here we go but I didn't hear what you said all I saw was him stare at you for a prolonged time and then after a couple seconds he stuck out of fist and fist bump you right on camera
00:48:16
Speaker
I can't I can't get out of this without mentioning before that the first match was violence is forever Dom Guarini and Kevin Koo versus versus the filthy fucks Tom law Tom Lawler and Eric Stevens I'd never seen Eric Stevens before I was familiar with Tom Lawler But it was awesome getting to open it up with some guys I'm familiar with from sup because this show was actually put on in
00:48:41
Speaker
What do I say? Black Label Pro. Yeah, Black Label Pro out of northern Indiana, right? Yeah. And they're also Black Label Pro guys. And this was just I mean, they came out and everybody on this goddamn show gave it everything they could. That was really did turn out for this crowd. This was maybe my favorite thing about this show is nobody went out there and took their time on this show for granted.
00:49:07
Speaker
This felt like a GCW show where people realize this is a big Wrestle weekend, there's a lot of eyes on us, and it just felt like everybody cranked it up to 11.
00:49:19
Speaker
I mean, we're going to talk some more about the show, but we need to plug it now. If you're listening to the podcast at this point, two cups stuffed GCW. Go check it out. And seriously, the whole show. And no, no joke. Start to finish. You need to watch that. It's very rare that I'm telling you to watch an entire show, but even the match that I didn't do a bathroom break match on this one.
00:49:43
Speaker
And a lot of people left for a specific match. Do not miss anything on this. I promise you, even the match you think that's going to be a bathroom break, because maybe you don't know the guys in the ring, do not go to the bath. This is a great show start to finish. And actually right now, if you get on independentwrestling.tv, use your free trial if you haven't already. This show is on there right now since it's part of Black Label Pro.
00:50:10
Speaker
And we would be remiss if we didn't mention the fact that one of the cool things about this show is you'll get to see plenty of us, because we are ringside and we are interactive with so much of this show. You say we are interactive, but really, Derek was very, very interactive in this show. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Maybe, maybe you could have gotten away with that if it hadn't been for me, but I made sure you were just as much a part of this show as me.
00:50:36
Speaker
Okay, so this is a few matches in but let's go ahead and get to it Let's talk about it because it's what everyone's talking about from this
Chaos at GCW - Memorable Ladder Match
00:50:43
Speaker
weekend. They're not talking about Jericho Okay, they're not talking about who won the Jim Lyman Memorial Tournament. No, they are talking about the fact that me I
00:50:51
Speaker
And the Scottish guy to my left. I don't know his name. We got it. Okay. Talk about the Scottish guy because he didn't listen into this because I don't think we pitched the show to him. So he probably did not find this, but let's fucking talk about this guy. I don't know his name. He had a bright red shirt. He was very nice. He was very kind. Like everyone around us was great, but he was pounding a bucket of Mike's hard lemonades and he was just as into this show as I was.
00:51:15
Speaker
And that was the thing. It's like a Scottish guy. I was expecting like a strong beer. But this guy has a bucket of 10 fucking Mike's Hards. And honestly, that would give me so much diarrhea that I feel like that was manlier than anything. Smashing a bucket of 10 Mike's Hards.
00:51:34
Speaker
Joey Janela has a special match on this show where they have a fanny pack hanging from the ceiling and they're going to have a ladder match and determine who gets it, what, a special match at the next Joey Janela spring break show? Yeah, they can pick any match they want. Like it's their match of their choosing at the next spring break.
00:51:56
Speaker
Now, I don't know every guy that was in this match. That is irrelevant to me. I've actually got it in front of me if you want me to read them. Read off everyone in this match and let's get to the spot everyone wants to hear about. Okay, Jimmy Lloyd, Matthew Justice, Kobe Durst, Blake Christian, G Raver, Shane Mercer, Alex Zane, and Logan Stunt.
00:52:18
Speaker
So Shane Mercer, at one point in this match, picks up Logan Stunt above his head. Now mind you, there is a plethora of wrestlers on the other side of the ring away from us, feeding for Shane Mercer to throw Logan Stunt onto them. Literally every other goddamn wrestler in the match is waiting to catch this man. That spot was just sitting there. But remember, Garrett, as you said earlier, that was the spot caller.
00:52:45
Speaker
I was the spot caller and that was not what the spot called for.
00:52:49
Speaker
Me and the Scottish guy as Shane Mercer is touring Logan Stunt around the ring to see where is he gonna throw him? Probably on the wrestlers, but let's keep our options open. He gets to our side of the ring and me and the Scottish guy make eye contact with Shane Mercer and we gesture for bringing over here and we literally yell at him, bring that shit on. Do you wanna- You gave that Scottish guy a level of confidence that he should not have had for the size he was.
00:53:18
Speaker
I think that was all him, man. I think he and I were on a different wavelength than you. And I don't know what your body... He was eight mikes' hearts deep. That dude was ready to party. Well, I guess my point is, I don't remember what your body language was saying to my right. But in my mind, you were just kind of standing there with your arms crossed watching the show in amazement.
00:53:43
Speaker
I was enjoying that you and the Scottish guy were taunting Shane Mercer with your fingers like doing the like, come on. Yeah, we were saying bring it. And Shane Mercer looked at us and said, are you sure? And we were like, yes. And nodding. Well, then he teased throwing Logan Stunt onto the wrestlers and then he came immediately back and he chucked Logan Stunt so hard. But you know what?
00:54:13
Speaker
His aim was a little bit off because Logan stunt didn't wind up in my chest. He didn't wind up in the chest of the Scottish guy to my left. Oh no, no, no, no. Garrett, you took Logan stunt right to the sternum.
00:54:28
Speaker
I took Logan's stunt, full speed, from the ring, coming in hot. Dude, there was nowhere I could have held my arms that would have been capable of me catching this man. He came in so fucking hot and across body, straight across my shoulders and head.
00:54:49
Speaker
Was there a moment when... Here's the thing, I leaned into you a little bit to try to help absorb some of the blow. I don't know how much it helped. Was there a moment when he was mid-air that you were mad at me for making that happen? You thought, I'm gonna get hurt and it's Derek's fault.
00:55:05
Speaker
There was not time to be mad at you. And I went back and actually re-watched this entire show last night. And when he goes, he teased our side first about throwing him at us. Then he teased the other side. Then he teased the wrestlers. Then he teased the front. Then he goes back to the wrestlers. But you're being such a fucking piece of shit.
00:55:29
Speaker
All on camera. He basically went to like go back to the wrestlers. And after already teasing every side decided, fuck it, this guy's getting it. I don't think I like Shane Mercer. This dude's a fucking heel. But I like I'm standing there and I have no time to react to this. And I'm thinking there's a lot of big dudes around me. There's big guys behind us. If he's high enough, we can all catch him. But the problem is
00:55:58
Speaker
He's not high enough. He is basically coming down straight at my shoulders and head, cross-bodies me, sends me backwards through three rows of chairs. I'm pretty sure I actually broke a chair on the way down. You may have. I just know, from my perspective, and I've told this story multiple times to people over the weekend, but I haven't done it on the podcast yet, so I'm gonna try to tell the same story.
00:56:26
Speaker
As Logan Stunt was mid-air on the way down, I felt a little bad. Not for me, not for the Scottish guy, because we had brought whatever was coming on. When I saw that you were going to be dealing with it, too, I felt a little bad. Dealing with it, too, as well? I'm dealing with it. It's not my fault that Shane Mercer's a bad throw. OK?
00:56:55
Speaker
That is not my fault. That might be the title of the episode. It's not my fault. Shane Mercer's a bad throw. I'm just saying. Ladies and gentlemen, if you've ever seen Saving Private Ryan or basically any modern war movie, you know that there's always that scene where there's like an explosion and then you hear that distant ringing in your ear and things slow down.
00:57:19
Speaker
As Logan Stunt is hitting Garrett and me, and maybe one other person, and we fall back, everything slows down and it becomes that war scene in the movie. And Garrett tumbles, I'm guessing two or three rows back from where we receded. Chairs go sliding off in all directions.
00:57:38
Speaker
and there's a canopy of arms and bodies and limbs trying to either shield themselves or catch Logan stunt because now Logan stunt is now five to six rows back your body hits the ground and slides and I as I'm falling
00:57:57
Speaker
I look back over my right shoulder, because now at this point I'm thinking, fuck, it's possible that he landed on a beer bottle, that something happened, like he's hurt. But I look over my right shoulder as you, again, slow motion in my mind, you have the biggest smile on your face because you realized what just happened and you are okay.
00:58:23
Speaker
it's he was coming all I could like you like you said it really was happening in slow motion but I just remember basically the second it happened I'm on my back I'm slid back and the second I realized I was okay all I could think was fuck I bet that looked awesome
00:58:44
Speaker
I've never gotten to be part of a spot in a match before, but I just took a fucking chair bump from a stunt brother during a GCW show. That's like... Lee and Logan Stunt will always have that moment together. You can talk about that with him for years. That was fucking Disney World for me. That was like...
00:59:02
Speaker
Be a wrestler for a day. Take a crazy bump. And the thing is, it sent me through a chair and it didn't hurt. And it seemed like it hurt him more. I don't know how he got so far back after he hit me. I'm just surprised my glasses stayed on. Your glasses stayed on, your hat did not. But it was amazing because as soon as we fell, it felt like almost immediately
00:59:24
Speaker
as we were coming to our senses, there were already three referees, a handful of the other people watching the show helping us up, making sure that we were okay. Including the Invisible Man referee, who I'm a big mark for. So having that guy over the top of me, making sure I'm okay, I'm like, holy shit, I'm as famous as Invisible Stan right now. We have the same referee.
00:59:48
Speaker
So that was I wish that the pay per view that GCW had gotten a better angle on that moment happening because man, I wish I could play back the footage of Garrett taking Logan stunt to the chest. But that was just one of a couple different highlights from the show. We still have a couple other matches we have to talk about.
01:00:06
Speaker
Well, that's one highlight from the rest of the fucking match. That's crazy because this was just a fucking. So before this, it's hard to not mention that these guys had to go so hard to top the six man lucha match that had happened earlier in the night, that it just seemed like everybody went out there like I know a lot of people are seeing this. I have to kill myself tonight. Can we plug everyone in that lucha match? Do you have those those names up real quick?
01:00:35
Speaker
Yes, which what's fucking crazy is remember we had talked about this where I wasn't excited about the next Bola because I wasn't familiar with that many of the wrestlers. A bunch of the dudes from that six man are in Bola this year.
01:00:52
Speaker
And now you're a little bit excited about it? Well, now I'm like, well, I fucked up. Yeah, plug the names in that six minute match because that was one of the best wrestling matches I've ever seen live. They did so many amazing spots and so many spots that were just flat out false finishes, but for all the right reasons.
01:01:12
Speaker
And...
01:01:42
Speaker
go, hey man, are you okay? And he looks up at you with the most intense eyes and masked face and goes, no, I'm not fucking okay. And I'm not gonna lie, who, I don't remember, it may have been KTB, grabbed him and pulled his dick into the ring post so hard that there was no way that wasn't a shoot. Like I heard a ting from his balls hitting that bowl.
01:02:12
Speaker
Who are some of the other names in here? I know that, what, Toro was in there? It was Laredo Kid that we actually had watched the night before at AAW, Black Taurus, who looks like the fucking bassist of Lordy, if that means anything to you. Which, it does to us. We should do a whole episode on Lordy. It did, it looked like the Smash Squatch who had just broke, who left the band after like a decade this last week.
01:02:39
Speaker
Now he's wrestling for us. Turned out the guys we didn't really know were AAA wrestlers, which every time I see AAA wrestlers, I think there is no excuse that I have for not watching more of their promotion. But then Black Taurus, Gringo Loco, and KTB. Gringo Loco, over as absolute fuck in that building.
01:03:00
Speaker
This is another guy I've seen several times. I've seen him at Freelance. I've seen him at a couple shows at GCW up in Chicago. Gringo Loco over as hell. Seriously, this six man match was fucking awesome. What did the Scottish guy say about Gringo Loco? He said it looks like Ray Mysterio and Kevin Owens had a baby. Yes.
01:03:23
Speaker
Oh, man. All right. Get to the ladder match. Yeah, we were on the ladder. We had a video blow up from this match that we got to talk about what happened. So, man, this ladder match, I mean, everybody's doing crazy shit. You know, Alex Zane and Blake Christian are in the match, so just insane things are happening. I still stand by Alex Zane as the future of this business.
01:03:47
Speaker
I see Alex Zane because even listening back on commentary, the commentator said he had not heard of Alex Zane until the backyard wrestling show they did, which was the first time I had seen him as well. Then they said the next time they saw him was that Nashville show and then this. So in three shows, Alex Zane has easily become one of my favorite wrestlers. I would have bought a T-shirt from that guy night of I think I truly am calling it that dude's the future.
01:04:14
Speaker
But the spot that everybody's talking about, it gets to a ladder spot towards the end of this match. A ladder's already set up in the ring. Jimmy Lloyd pulls out another ladder with light tubes stretched across the top of it. They set him up side by side. G-Raver is climbing the opposite ladder without the light tubes. He gets up to- And he had just knocked himself silly from falling off a ladder like a couple minutes earlier. Dude, at this point,
01:04:42
Speaker
Jimmy or no who was it? It would have been Blake Christian and Alex Zane were knocked out at our feet having just crashed through a door. Like the guy that's my favorite wrestler at this point is pretending to be unconscious at my feet. So I'm like marking out for that pretty good. But then they set up a spot where a ladder is set up and they slid a ladder in sideways so it was balancing on the ropes like a table.
GCW's Intense and Bloody Matches
01:05:05
Speaker
Once again, Shane Mercer, biggest fucking heel in the building, he goes to like Gorilla Press, G-Raver, throws him onto this ladder, G-Raver bounces straight out, lands head first on the concrete. And after rewatching the match, dude, his head was bleeding after that hit to the ground. He was not bleeding previous to that. He knocked himself goddamn silly on that concrete. We heard the thud of G-Raver's head hitting the ground.
01:05:35
Speaker
I was already sets up for the the one where he almost dies and yeah, so I mean what 30 seconds to a minute later G ravers back in the ring Climbing this ladder to get to Jimmy Lloyd and where everything fucks up
01:05:51
Speaker
Is Jimmy Lloyd, I've seen this spot before. Actually at Lost in New York, they gave G. Raver a brain buster on top of a ladder to the ground. Like he took it on the top rung on the ladder and then went straight to the ground. I thought it was a fucked up spot then. They were trying to elevate that spot by giving him a brain buster onto light tubes. Too much.
01:06:14
Speaker
Too much shit. Like too much shit on a dangerous spot already. So you know how they have like the little safety rung that's like the flap that you push down to kind of steady the ladder? Yeah, it was like the fucking thing where you're supposed to send a paint can.
01:06:29
Speaker
where it says not a step. Not a step. Exactly. You know where it says not a step, guys? Let me tell you something. I have never tried to use it as a step, but I have now had a front row seat to a man trying to and don't fucking do it.
01:06:45
Speaker
So mind you there's a bundle of light tubes on top of this ladder. They tried to do the brain buster spot. Well it doesn't work. G raver steps on the thing that is not a step. He comes down like armpit first onto the light tubes.
01:07:02
Speaker
immediately those give out they bust he falls to the mat he's gushing blood out from under I mean gushing this is easily the most I've ever seen anyone bleed in front of me and it went from zero to sixty it went from being a man who had no blood under his pit a second earlier to having like a waterfall correct
01:07:24
Speaker
and they just everyone immediately just you know that he gets out of the ring everyone's saying go go go go go get him out of here get him out of here while we recorded the video another reason you should be following us on social media we're still getting likes on that video Garrett people are still g raver finally liked it like yesterday
01:07:41
Speaker
So this is where my wife yelled at me. There is currently a GoFundMe going, G. Raver requires surgery now. And he has nerve damage in his hands. And my wife goes, well, give him some goddamn money. She goes, this is basically your fault.
01:08:02
Speaker
I don't disagree. I think it is your fault. And I said, what do you mean? She goes, well, you made me watch him get a meat cleaver stuck in his back last weekend. And now he's all cut open here. She's like, you're encouraging this shit. And you were sitting front row. You owe him money for that surgery. You paid for VIP tickets, Garrett. You wanted this to happen.
01:08:20
Speaker
It's true, so I did throw G-raver some money. There is a GoFundMe right now. Go to GoFundMe, put in G-raver. Honestly, the dude deserves it. He is legitimately a very good wrestler who does some really fucked up shit for our entertainment. If you've ever enjoyed a G-raver match, let's help this guy get this goddamn surgery because
01:08:40
Speaker
Pro Wrestling pretty messed up. It was fun wrestling. I'm just happy we didn't watch him die in front of us. Correct. I mean, that was my biggest concern because I guess tell the story. Tell the story that Alex had from being outside when so we ever got out there. I don't know how true this is, but what we've been hearing is that he got outside
01:09:02
Speaker
and was basically bleeding out in the fucking parking lot. They're not saying that he cut an artery or anything, but it was a very bad cut and he was losing an insane amount of blood. They said that they called 911, what I'm hearing is that they called 911 and they were wanting his insurance information before they would send an ambulance. So from what I've heard, Janela ended up putting G Raver in the car and driving him to the hospital himself.
01:09:29
Speaker
which a good thing about GCW on the show, having rewatched it, they did give you updates on G Raver throughout the show and let you know he was gonna be okay. The problem is they didn't give us those updates. We didn't find out till we got back to the hotel later that night that G Raver ended up being okay. And who ended up winning this match, Garrett? What's funny is it had a Brock Lesnar ending. So the second he is leaving the match,
01:09:55
Speaker
Nate Webb, not on the show, comes and brings Logan Stunt back out with Marco Stunt to try and help him just win the match. Whole crowd starts chanting, fuck you, Marco. He looked very confused because that's never happened before.
01:10:10
Speaker
But then as he's climbing, Tony Deppin's music. We built this city on rock and roll, starts playing, crowd pops. We all knew Deppin was on the show, but he was never given a match. So he kind of has the Brock Lesnar spot in the ladder match where he just shows up at the very end, unzips a fanny pack. Stone colds a white claw at the top of the ladder and gets whatever match he wants at the next spring break, which makes sense because Deppin is one of their most over guys right now.
01:10:40
Speaker
But I didn't get why he wasn't in the entire match unless it was a, hey, G-ravers hurt, let's get somebody in there. But I don't see that being the case. It seemed like that was supposed to happen. Garrett, there's other things we could talk about. We got to fast forward to the main event because this was the thing that you were wearing a shirt for. Dude, I rewatch this match. This, it's weird to say this because we went to all out. This may have been my favorite match of the weekend.
01:11:09
Speaker
this match in particular? I think this specific match, I mean, we're skipping Orange Cassidy versus Gangrel to talk about this match. That's how it was a lot of fun. That's how good this match was to me. Effie versus Nick Gage for the GCW title. You and the guy to your right were convinced that Effie was walking out with the title on this night. It just made sense to me.
01:11:35
Speaker
How does this match start? Because, well, first of all, do not leave out the fact that Effie came out, and then Nick Gage came out. To Yellow Brick Road by Elton John. And Nick Gage grabbed my arm. Watching back on that video, you gave that guy a pat on the shoulder, and I could tell in that moment, you were a Nick Gage mark. MDK for life, man. MDK all fucking day.
01:12:04
Speaker
Um, Nick Gage in this match made Effie look like a badass. I think they went because a lot of people I think look at Effie as a comedy wrestler. I think they look at him and you know how he acts on Twitter and everything. I don't think a lot of people realize that this dude does death matches.
01:12:25
Speaker
And it's weird. And he can go. He's a guy who can wrestle. He's a handsome dude. He doesn't need to be, once again, like most deathmatch wrestlers, he's talented enough that he doesn't have to. But the fact that he's going for the GCW title and did it in like a legit deathmatch with Nick Gage where they're going, there's broken lights, there's broken glass. Man, Effie did not, I don't think he really did
01:12:52
Speaker
A lot of like playing up like the gay game. You know what I mean? Like trying to play that against Nick Gage. This looked like a match where he was trying to beat that guy's ass.
01:13:01
Speaker
Well I mean he definitely did rub the GCW title on it on his groin at one point. Very early in the match. We all figured like oh he's definitely not winning now because he committed the sin of touching the title. But tell him how the match started. Well the match starts with Nick Gage placing a bundle of light tubes on the ring on the ring apron and then walking around all the fans and as he's getting ready to get in the ring he goes over by the light tubes to get in and grab him and if he drop kicks the light tubes right into his face
01:13:31
Speaker
I mean, Nick Gage has immediately opened up. He's got cuts down his arm, his head's bleeding. Like, it was a fucking hot start. And, like, Effie has a look like, all right, let's do this. Because, like, he... No one comes more fired up out of the back curtain than Nick Gage. That dude comes fucking fired. Everybody's pushing him, and he's pushing back. Like, it's just a jacked, amped dude. Effie starts this thing hard, and they start beating the piss at each other.
01:14:02
Speaker
I had a lot of fun watching this one and like I said I thought Nick Gage made Effie look like a badass and they put on a hell of a match. This is another match where I got to call a spot as a chair somehow wound up in front of me right there between me and the ring and I took my foot and pushed the chair out a little bit further and then when Nick Gage and Effie made their way back to us I said hey Nick
01:14:24
Speaker
Here's one of my exact words. So Nick Gage had already passed us. He was a little ways away and you go, hey, Nick, you might need this. And he stops in his track and turns around and grabs the chair from in front of you and tosses it into the ring. And it does end up getting used in the actual finish for the match.
01:14:45
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely. I knew what was happening. Gage ends up putting the chairs back to back to where there's a very stiff, basically a post for him to land on. I don't remember if he gave him a German onto it, but either way, Effie got slammed really hard onto a blunt object. One, two, three. Nick Gage goes over. Crowd goes insane. And if you are doing the math on people
01:15:10
Speaker
her how loud it is in there. Nick Gage got just as big of a pop for retaining that title as Kenny Omega did for his entrance at all out.
01:15:21
Speaker
Absolutely true. And like you said, you thought that maybe it was Effie's time. You know, Effie's getting pretty popular and he's great. But just Nick Gage is still crazy over with people. I mean, it's gonna have to be a big fucking deal when somebody, they said in commentary, it's literally been years since somebody has defeated Nick Gage in a match at GCW.
01:15:47
Speaker
I don't know who it's going to be man, but I do know one thing and that's that GCW two cups stuffed was a fantastic freaking show. And if you're listening to this, make plans to watch this show, not only because it's awesome, but because you get to see us too.
01:16:04
Speaker
Yeah, and like I said, find either Supgraps code. I think it's Supgraps or just Sup. I think Black Label Pro, you can put in BLP or Black Label Pro.
Independent Wrestling Show Experiences
01:16:13
Speaker
Get 20 free days of independentwrestling.tv. 100% watch this show. This was, I mean, do you think that it was as good of a show as we felt it was? Or do you think it was just our experience that made it that good of a show?
01:16:27
Speaker
I mean, I'm sure our experience enhanced the show because we were so close to the action and we were involved in a lot of the stuff that happened, but I think it was a good show. I mean, you were the one that went back and rewatched it. You can answer this. I had just as good of a time watching it the second time as the first. I stand by this as the number one independent wrestling company.
01:16:48
Speaker
the US right now and I think they even said on commentary they're like look at a they said look at AEW look at PWG where do they get all their guys from now those guys they come to they watch GCW shows to see who's gonna be on their show next
01:17:06
Speaker
Put it to you this way, when we got back to the hotel room after the show, we were both, we could tell that we were exhausted, but it still took us like another hour to wind down. And mind you, at this point, it was like what, three in the morning? I was amped. I was so amped. I mean, like you said, I had a man thrown at me. We almost watched a man die. We saw some incredible pro wrestling. For the money, this was maybe the most worthwhile wrestling show.
01:17:34
Speaker
I mean, Front Row definitely enhanced it for us on this one, but I think it was a good wrestling show top to bottom, no matter how you look at it. So now it's Saturday. Don't think anything we skipped is because it's not worth watching. It's just because so much impressive shit happened that it's just hard to talk about everything. So now it's Saturday morning and I think we got up around like 10 30.
Comedic Cinematic Experience
01:18:03
Speaker
And you wanted to go see Hobbs and Shaw? We did. And we went to go see that. I thought it was very important that not only you see Hobbs and Shaw, but that you see it with me and a cargo pocket full of white claws.
01:18:19
Speaker
I had three, first of all, I downed a white claw as we were leaving the hotel, and then I had three more stuffed into my cargo pockets, plus I had a Cosmic Brownie in there too, just in case. And you me, Neil and Alex, went over to the, by the way, the AMC was right across the street, so that was super convenient.
01:18:43
Speaker
And we sat down and watched some Hobbs and Shaw for, and it was actually a lot longer than I thought it was. It was gonna be. Because I figured it would be like an hour or 10 or 20 in it. No. It ended up being like what, two hours? This is a two hour and 15 minute movie because it's very important and there's a lot of plot points. It's very important.
01:19:05
Speaker
It doesn't even need the other Fast and the Furious movies. So you've heard me talk about Hobbs and Shaw at this point. I need to know what did Derek think? Did Garrett oversell the movie? Did I undersell the movie? Yes. What did you think? Yes to which? Yes, I oversold it. It's definitely a customized movie for you. I got a text from Jeffy that said I did not oversell the movie and that he loved it a lot. Mm-hmm.
01:19:32
Speaker
Yeah, people are just being nice to me because I feel such a strong connection with this. Yes, you shook me right before the big final action sequence in the movie with The Rock. He held a helicopter with his arms. Yes. Have you ever stopped a helicopter from flying away with your muscles? No, but I did make a Logan stunt fly into your chest.
01:19:55
Speaker
Yeah, that was pretty impressive too. The only difference is Logan's stunt is fucking tiny. It's still sitting three rows deep. Of all the wrestlers I could have taken, he's the one that makes it seem the least cool, right? That's absolutely true, but I still made it happen. And goddamn, he still sent me flying. So just think if it had been like Gringo Loco, I would be dead right now.
01:20:19
Speaker
So yeah, Hobbs and Child was fine. It was everything I expected it to be. I had a good time watching it with you guys. I enjoyed pounding white claws and having nachos and starting our Saturday with a movie before we met up with Queen of the Ring. It was so good seeing her. I hadn't seen her since December and you hadn't seen her in damn near a year.
01:20:44
Speaker
It was a year, like the last time I saw her was when you guys were leaving my apartment after we laughed our asses off at the Jericho scaring the shit out of Don Callis spot from all in last
Tailgating and Event Tips
01:20:57
Speaker
year. So it had been a long time. And the first thing we did when she got to our hotel, what did we do? Cracked up with some more claws.
01:21:05
Speaker
This was a weird experience for me because this was the first time I had ever attended a big wrestling show not sober. I go to so much of this stuff and I want to be able to enjoy it in the most pure way possible. But this weekend man was just I've had a bad few weeks and this weekend was truly a weekend for me to cut loose. And holy shit.
01:21:32
Speaker
So we caught up for a little bit in the hotel, had some claws, and then we made a point to be like, well, we're definitely gonna wanna have some more claws while we're in the parking lot at Sears Center. So we loaded up some beers and some claws into a bag full of ice, and we put that bag into my Coors Lightbox that I had, thinking that this'll probably hold, because it shouldn't be leaking water. Surely the bag doesn't have holes in it. Oh, it had holes in it.
01:21:58
Speaker
And we had a lot of ice. So we had to make a pit stop at Walgreens. And the intent was to get a cooler. Well, guess what? They had apparently had coolers not that long ago. They didn't have any. So guess what I bought, Garrett? I bought a child's sandcastle bucket.
01:22:16
Speaker
with the little shovels still attached to the handle. And there were two options. There was pink and there was green. And Derek bought green because I quote, it was a little bit bigger. This was the same bucket, my friends. He wanted the green bucket. He was embarrassed to carry the pink bucket full of white gloves. That's absolutely not true. The pink bucket was square.
01:22:38
Speaker
That's bullshit. You're making this up. It was fucking squirt. You guys were clearly messed up because my first reaction, because the first bucket I saw was the pink bucket. And I thought, oh, I guess that'll do. And then I saw the green one. My concern was that the inside of the pink bucket was A, not going to hold as many white claws and B's. If it did, they were going to get caught on the inside of the pink bucket for the sand castle features that are supposed to be built in. So I grabbed the green. The fact that you think that it's because I didn't want to be seen with a pink bucket.
01:23:07
Speaker
But I was fine being seen with a sandcastle bucket with a fucking shovel attached to the handle. Clearly. We could have taken the shovel off, but that was never even discussed or considered as a possibility. I wanted it on there. I thought it was adorable.
01:23:23
Speaker
So, goddamn, we tailgated. We tailgated in the Sears Center parking lot. Met up with Neil and Alex again. It was me, you, Neil, Alex, queen of the ring, pounding claws, pounding Coors lights, talking about this show we're getting ready to go into. And there's some pictures of us tailgating. So, we get into this building.
01:23:46
Speaker
And you know, it's a long line, and I always, this is my tip for any line you join. You know, if you're going to a festival and you see an enormous line, before you make the decision to hop at the very back of that line, walk to the front, see what's happening at the end of the line, most times people form one giant line while everyone else realizes, oh, these people are just joining a line for no reason, they're fucking up, there's six open lanes.
01:24:14
Speaker
Just make sure you're not doing that. I've done this at every fucking music festival. Skip that line. It breaks off into six lines and everybody's just fucking up. They're making it last a lot longer than it needs to. Go to the front. Just go to the front. See what it is like before you do that. Because nine times out of ten people are doing a dumb thing and you can get in a lot quicker than you would.
01:24:37
Speaker
Well, I had to take a detour to go pee at like a Dave and Buster's knockoff across the street. And when I rejoined you guys, you were like, well, we're already at the front or at the end of the line. So I'm thinking, oh crap, they're going to get in before me. And I start following down the left side of the line. And within like a minute, I'm near the front of the line. And there you guys are. And we met up. We got inside. I think we kind of already decided we're not going to go deal with the merch stand, right?
01:25:04
Speaker
No, that was based off of last year I wasn't even gonna try and buy a t-shirt ended up not being as big of a problem this year But at this also walking in I had never like I said first big wrestling show I've ever attended not sober. It was a pretty difficult walking around There's just a lot to look at and I remember looking at you at one point and saying I just need to talk to Mansur right now Mansur will make everything better
01:25:31
Speaker
Now why, why, what was wrong at this point that you needed to talk to Mansur? There wasn't really necessarily anything wrong. I was just a little freaked out being in public, not sober. And I thought Mansur would talk me off a ledge and just make me feel more comfortable. How messed up were you? Pretty. Pretty. I'll tell you, like, not in a way- You didn't seem it. That's what's weirded me out is I felt like you were pretty normal.
01:25:58
Speaker
Oh no, I was great. The first two hours of that show were so fun. I sobered up and the show continued to be fun, but that part where I wasn't sober, I had never gotten to really watch wrestling live like that before, and that was a new experience for me, and that was fun as shit, and thanks for...
01:26:18
Speaker
The worst part about all that though, and this is a very important story for me to tell, for years, for years, I have made fun of the band Disturbed. I do not care for David Draymond, the lead singer of Disturbed. I once went to, I've seen them so many times, not wanting to. I had a buddy that liked that shit, so I'd go with him.
01:26:37
Speaker
We were upfront to see System of a Down once. They went on before System of a Down. I actually watched with my back to the stage. I was in the front row. Maybe that's a dick move on my part. He's kind of a dick. So I made the choice to go to this show wearing a Carly Rae Jepsen hoodie and a blues hat. I'm a walk-in target at this show right now. And as I'm walking to the bathroom, just trying to hope in that no one talks to me, I look over, make eye contact with David Draymond of Disturbed.
01:27:09
Speaker
And in that moment, we made eye contact. He looked down at my hoodie, back up at my eyes, down at my hoodie one more time, and back up at my eyes. I have spent so much time making fun of this man to my friends. And he finally got to look me dead in the eyes and judge me to my face. And that fucked me up.
01:27:35
Speaker
uh you kind of deserved it at that point i did deserve it and i'm in the bathroom i'm pissing thinking david draymond just fucking roasted you so hard without saying a word what would you have done if he looked you in the eyes and then pointed at your dick and said well i guess that explains that
01:27:54
Speaker
I would have been like, hey, fuck you, Draymond. But so I go to wash my hands. I'm still thinking about this interaction. I go to grab a paper towel the same time as another man. I turn and look. It's fucking Draymond again. We make eye contact one more time, this time much closer together.
01:28:13
Speaker
He looks at me in the eyes, looks down at my hoodie one more time, back up to my eyes, and walks out the building, and I just thought, fucking, game set match, David Draymond, you defeated me. You won this time. Without saying anything, without saying a single word. Without a word, he said everything, and he basically told me, see, you're a piece of shit too.
01:28:36
Speaker
So we had pretty good seats for the show. Well done. Well done. Well done on that.
AEW Show Highlights and Critiques
01:28:43
Speaker
It's finally here. Like it's all in is over. All Out has arrived and we are back in Chicago and there's a lot to be said about this show.
01:28:57
Speaker
I mean, honestly, we probably should have spent a whole episode talking about this thing. The buy in had one of my top favorite moments of the night. Actually, one of my top three pops of the night happened in the buy in. It would have been the reveal of Mercedes Martinez being an AEW now.
01:29:15
Speaker
She was the Joker card, right? Yeah, that was incredible to me. She, to me, is one of the ladies that it just never made sense why she wasn't signed. I think she did. Didn't they do like a ladies cruiserweight classic for WWE? I think so, yeah. Mercedes was in that, but she never got signed. Like, I've never seen her over at Impact. The only time- Are you talking about like the Mae Young classic? Or the Mae Young classic, I'm sorry, yes.
01:29:43
Speaker
ladies cruiserweight classic like i didn't remember i couldn't remember what they called that but yeah she was in the mayong classic and she's always been one of my favorite ladies to see out on the endies and i always felt when i was watching shana baseler that they were trying to get shana baseler to be as cool they wanted me to like her as much as i like mercedes and now that mercedes is there god i jumped out of my seat i lost my mind i'm so happy for her
01:30:09
Speaker
That was exciting. Who did it? Oh, God, who won the the women's battle royal? Nyla Rose. That's right. I couldn't remember who had won that match and then who had won the the women's match later in the night. But at this point, I'm still pretty.
01:30:29
Speaker
for a lack of better words, fucked up. And Private Party had a match with Angelico and Jack Evans. And Angelico and Jack Evans, two people, I've talked about it a bunch on here, loved them as a tag team. They did, for whatever reason, I fucking hated Angelico.
01:30:47
Speaker
I love him so much. He is a walking can of Monster Energy drink that just came in humping the air and he was too much. I love him as a wrestler. That dude needs to tone down the character and if that isn't a character, he needs to tone down his personality. You made this point two or three times throughout the match that he needs to tone it down. I wasn't quite sure what you meant because you were a little all over the place during this match.
01:31:18
Speaker
But I partied too hard. I partied just the right amount. What were your top pops of this show? I mean, there were some huge moments in the show. What are your top highlights? Because this is obviously a huge show very well received. I got to tell you, maybe my favorite moment of the show was Orange Cassidy coming out as the surprise savior for best friends against Dark Order.
01:31:48
Speaker
uh, dark order won their tag match through shenanigans against best friends and then began to beat them down after the match. Lights go out. They come back up orange Cassidy, hands in pockets, standing in the middle of the ring. That reaction from the crowd and that I'm calling it a debut, but whatever his debut got such a strong reaction from that crowd. It gave me goosebumps.
01:32:16
Speaker
If that answered your question, I think it answered your question. Are we going to see Orange Cassidy versus Kenny Omega at some point? I absolutely hope. I really hope that happens. Why would the two most over guys in the company not have a match together? Obviously, I thought that the the Cody Sean Spears match was a lot of fun.
01:32:37
Speaker
We kind of talked about this a little bit. Cody's matches are really good storytelling matches where there's a beginning, a middle, and end. I would be out of my mind if I didn't bring up the fact that that Arne Anderson Spinebuster spot was incredible. And shout out to Eli, because I'm sure he loved that more than anybody in the world.
01:32:58
Speaker
Big, big iron mark. That match was a lot of fun. That spine buster gave me goosebumps, dude. I mean, I know we saw DDP hit the diamond cutter last year. Arne Anderson hitting a spine buster. We may have seen the final Arne Anderson spine buster. We probably have. It's hard to imagine them finding another good spot for that. And it was picture perfect.
01:33:23
Speaker
I thought the match would be Cody and Sean. So it was a good match. I loved the tease that MJ. First of all, were you surprised that Cody had picked MJF to be the guy on the outside with him? I was surprised they chose to dress as Star Trek characters and that MJF agreed. I've already given just so you do this. So we're clear. I have already given MJF shit on Twitter for dressing up as a Star Trek character. Have you been blocked yet? No, I don't think so. Last I checked, I could still see his stuff.
01:33:53
Speaker
Cause I promise you it's going to be easier to get Jericho to unblock you than it would be to get MJF to unblock you. Cause there's never going to be a moment where he has a change of heart. Oh my God. Um, let's talk about that. Uh, notorious, uh, Kenny Omega Pac match that was the second match on the show and clean of the ring was not very happy.
01:34:20
Speaker
with what happened here. But I think a lot of people were that way. It's such a confusing match because it was. The match itself was great. I've actually talked to a lot of people since who love the finish that thought that was a good ending. I don't know. It was lying to you. It was a very good match. Honestly, match of the night, maybe like if you take out the latter match.
01:34:45
Speaker
I mean, it was the most athletic. There was top three, probably. There was some crazy shit in there. I mean, it was as good of a match as we all had hoped. We got the Kenny Omega Pac match. We were wanting just kind of an unusual ending.
01:35:00
Speaker
I guess we have to wait and see where this is going. I mean, we have a few more weeks before the weekly TV gets going, but just considering how much build they're putting around this Moxley Omega match that didn't happen at all out, but is now happening at full gear, it was a weird decision to have Pac not only win, but win by like choking Kenny out. It just kind of
01:35:28
Speaker
I mean the show recovered but there was a there was a little while there where it felt like it sucked the life out of the crowd there at Sears Center which sucked because it sucked the life out of the crowd for the next two matches which ended up being the triple threat which was fun as shit and then the Dark Order best friends match which I think a lot of people weren't super into already I just don't think Dark Order is doing it for a lot of people
01:35:52
Speaker
Yeah, it's not doing anything for me neither. I did enjoy the triple threat match. I and you got to hear me shriek because was Jimmy Havoc got thumbtacks poured into his mouth and then duct taped shut and then taped to a computer chair. And then he was dove upon from the from the turnbuckle.
01:36:19
Speaker
Yeah, turnbuckle to the outside by Darby Allen crashing through with thumbtacks stuffed in his mouth. I shrieked, no joke. It was a while. I thought it was a fun match. That was another match where they had intended to do some spot where a barrel, one of the cracker barrel barrels got used. And they did use several of those throughout the match.
01:36:45
Speaker
but I think that was supposed to be incorporated into the finish, and then Joey Janela's legs only hit the barrel off the top rope? Yeah, the barrel didn't break the way it was supposed to, and I think that it was supposed to be Jimmy Havoc's acid rainmaker through the barrel. I don't think it looked as badass as they wanted it to, because I know it seemed like that did not work for you.
01:37:12
Speaker
It didn't, my reaction, it just kind of was a whimper ending to a match that I thought should have had a much more violent climax. It was just kind of like a regular finisher that makes a guy fall onto a barrel and then he gets beat. Like again, and on top of that, I'm not happy watching Joey Janela who's insanely over be another guy who eats another pin. Um, but I, like I said, it was like, like the Kenny match. I thought it was a good match with a interesting finish.
01:37:41
Speaker
Well, how do you feel with AEW? It's almost to me like they're segregating parts of this roster. I mean, clearly they're looking at those three as kind of a midcard for them. This is only their second show, like a second official show. That's true. But it seems like- And as far as segregating the roster, that's every wrestling promotion ever. It's just weird. There's always tears to the roster.
01:38:06
Speaker
That's true, but it's weird that they've got this middle section that feels like the indie guys that go hard in a way that's going to hurt their bodies. And then they have the regular women's division and then they have the Joshi women's division. So it's like they have Japanese ladies doing strong style and then just regular women's wrestling.
01:38:28
Speaker
Where is that going to start clashing into each other?
01:38:45
Speaker
once they were under one roof together in AEW. And I think they're trying to get a feel for that. And like I said, they're not, they've only done a couple of shows. So it's really hard to say what they are just yet. There were moments, if I could offer a criticism, where it did feel at a couple moments like WWE light.
AEW vs WWE Comparisons
01:39:07
Speaker
Not the whole show, there was definitely, I mean, if you watch that ladder match between the Bucks and the Lucha Brothers, there was nothing about that that was something that WWE has done in 20 years. So, anyone who's saying, I think Baron Corbin had made some comments online about, I don't understand why we get so much criticism, I just saw the same shit we do. Some of that might be true.
01:39:34
Speaker
I also, like I said, there's two shows in. Do we really know what they are yet? They're still establishing themselves. And there were definitely elements of that show that I haven't seen WWE ever do or do at least do in a couple of decades. Obviously, I think match of the night was that ladder match. And I know you and Alex have seen that match in particular a million times. That's like a PWG classic, right?
01:40:03
Speaker
That's just like, yeah, that this is what made me feel bad to say I wasn't that wasn't like the match I was most looking forward to. Just because Alex and I, Queen of the Ring, we're both kind of spoiled as far as indie wrestling is concerned from where we both lived.
01:40:20
Speaker
We both got to see a lot of cool shit and that just felt like a match. I've seen these two teams fight a million times and I'll be goddamned if those two teams did not make me eat my words by the end of that show.
01:40:35
Speaker
You felt like you had seen, was that like the best one of the ones they had done that you'd seen? Yeah. How many times did I pop throughout that match? And I mean, even Alex leaned over to me and said, I'm not looking forward to Derek saying I told you so.
01:40:51
Speaker
I had picked that as match of the night for the record going into the show and I think you had picked the triple threat and she had prepped. Which one did she pick? Did she pick the Kenny match? She may have picked Kenny. It's hard for me to picture a scenario where she doesn't choose Kenny Omega. I mean she got the man tattooed on her body while we were there. That's true.
01:41:12
Speaker
Yeah, but it wasn't a scenario where I was going to rub it in anybody's face. I just thought that, like you guys had said, they had established, they had worked together so many times and they knew that they had to go hard in that spot. I feel like you could count on the Bucks and the Lucha Brothers to step it up in that spot. And I thought it was a safe bet and it ended up...
01:41:33
Speaker
I mean the Canadian destroyer threw the table off the top of the ladder is picture perfect I mean they landed that there towards the end there started to be some spots like we saw was it
01:41:47
Speaker
Nick or Matt that went through the table at the end that they missed one they basically did the same spot they did it was like Nick did it. Yeah, he missed the one of the tables and only crashed through one and he landed like in a really weird position that made you feel like he was hurt. But holy shit, man. I mean, this was just this was a 30 minute stunt show.
01:42:09
Speaker
This was a 30 minute stunt show of some of the best lucha style wrestling you're ever going to see. Like just dangerous, dangerous shit performed with such ease. Easily two of the best tag teams in the entire world. And I think we talked about this during the match.
01:42:27
Speaker
These two teams are so, I mean, honestly, they're gonna go down as iconic as working together. Getting to see these two work against each other, it's like, we talked about it like- It's like Rock Austin, Flair Steamboat, Lucha Brothers, Young Bucks. Yeah, you have to see these teams fight at least once. It's just, they have such great chemistry and are willing to go to such extremes for us that,
01:42:53
Speaker
God damn. I mean, there's nothing I can even say. By the end of that match, I was on my feet. I ate my words and then LAX debuted. Doesn't get any more perfect than that.
AEW Main Event Reflections
01:43:06
Speaker
What did you think of the main event?
01:43:11
Speaker
And the finish, or I guess not the finish, but the result. I was, I mean, we both went into it kind of assuming Jericho was going to go over. I don't think anyone thought Hangman was there yet. Love Hangman. Honestly, maybe top five people in the roster for me is Hangman. The match didn't go quite the way I wanted it to.
01:43:33
Speaker
but there was some cool shit. Like, there was one where we thought that Hangman had actually botched that shooting star off the apron, but I think from our angle we couldn't see that he didn't botch that. Jericho caught him in a code breaker. Yeah. That's fucking crazy. I mean, Chris Jericho is still the best.
01:43:52
Speaker
I loved Hangman coming out on the horse. I think it was going to be really, really hard for anyone to follow that ladder match. But I also want to make it clear, it's not like it was a bad match. Not by any means. I thought it was a main event style title match.
01:44:09
Speaker
It went the appropriate amount of time, and Jericho beat him clean. And that was the best the Judas Effect elbow has ever looked to this point. Cuz I'm not nuts about his new finisher, but I thought that was the best it's looked. And I think Jericho being the first AEW champion is the right move. Fast forward to the title, maybe being stolen a few days later, even more so.
01:44:35
Speaker
And we got to see the first female referee in a main event title
AEW Championship Belt Incident
01:44:40
Speaker
match. And it was the first ever AEW Championship, which is now recovered, but was stolen from a limousine at an outback steakhouse. Weirdest goddamn story that people think that people are saying is not a work because there's an actual police report.
01:44:59
Speaker
There's too many weird things about this that make it a perfect comedy bit, but you know what? Work me if you want. I'll go with it. This is real. I'm hearing rumors that the title was legitimately stolen, that the police recovered it almost immediately, and they had posted pictures of them recovering it, but then Tony Khan told them, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Don't release that information. We're gonna run with this. This is now an angle.
01:45:24
Speaker
I like that the Khan family has enough pull in Florida that they can say don't do that. Nope. Don't. No, no, that's that's fantastic. So all in came and went and much like with all out or all out. Sorry, I mean, I've probably been saying it the wrong way the whole time. All out came and went and much like. All in we came out to it raining and it's storming just like it had a year previously.
01:45:53
Speaker
this was and this was a fun weekend and what was the tell them the big announcement from the end of the show after Tony came out they will be back in Chicago at the Sears Center in November I don't know the exact date but they'll be doing a Wednesday night show of Wednesday night dynamite from basically I guess we've determined that the Sears Center is going to be AEW's Madison Square Garden
Future AEW Events Announcement
01:46:19
Speaker
And they will be back there in just a few months. So I'm going to try to make that show for sure. And, you know, they're going to be doing all out as a yearly show. This is going to be a Labor Day tradition. And honestly, getting a weekend with my friends, a bunch of pro wrestling. To me, this is a damn near perfect weekend. I had so much fun. This let me burn off some steam I truly needed.
01:46:45
Speaker
Thank you to everyone, like wrestlers and friends alike. This was a picture perfect weekend. I wouldn't have done it any other way. And I still have one goddamn show to talk about. Talk. So we said our goodbyes Sunday morning. You had another show to go to.
01:47:02
Speaker
pick the story up after I left you at the airport.
Garrett's Wrestling Debut
01:47:07
Speaker
So I ride with Alex and Neil to Indianapolis, Indiana to check out Bizarro Lucha because our good buddy Garrett was having his first match ever at Bizarro Lucha. His trainer, Kerry Awful, is one of the people that runs that promotion, I believe. And
01:47:27
Speaker
Honestly, great, great match. We got to watch him take face Nick Iggy from the carneys. It was really hard. We were holding that information in for quite a while, but they just weren't releasing anything. So we couldn't announce it. But getting to see him go and do his thing was awesome. He looked great. He looked great. I mean, it was a first wrestling match, but
01:47:48
Speaker
Holy shit, like it was so cool getting to, you know, see him in there for the first time. I can't wait to see him do it more. He looked great. It looked like the crowd was super behind him. It's the only time I've ever gone to see a wrestler and then afterwards was introduced to their literal entire family. That's pretty awesome. Now, does Neil and Alex go eat at Kuma's corner before the show?
01:48:10
Speaker
They did go eat at Kuma's. Did you? No, no. I did not eat food. Where did you go? I didn't eat anything. That whole thing. You didn't eat anything. All right. You were a little off that next morning. Gotcha. Tell your alley cat story here, because this is important. This would be a fun way to kind of close the show out. Yeah, we'll close the show with this. And I will say, we're going to have Garadon very, very soon. He's going to come on and just kind of tell us his experience of what it's like having your very first match.
01:48:37
Speaker
So he's going to be on in the next week or two for that. We'll figure something out. But I get into the venue. I'm talking to Garrett's wife, Kelly, which I feel like I should say that Garrett's wrestling name, he's what is it? H.R. Heater.
01:48:53
Speaker
HR heater. He's the heater. He's the he's the HR department of Bizarro Lucha, which the whole show ended up being fun as shit. They're on independent wrestling TV. Go check out this show. Really, really fun character. Some really funny spots. Cool as shit room. Definitely worth going to if you're an indie. But so I'm in the venue talking to Kelly Garrett's wife and I see Ali Cat running around looking frantic in a ring gear.
Ali Cat's Match Spot Humor
01:49:22
Speaker
And I'm talking to Kelly. I like I look over an alley cat is right next to me and she just goes, do you have a white claw? And already I'm like, what the fuck? And turns out she needed a white claw for a spot in her show and was running around looking for me in hopes that I would have one. And this really truly made my weekend that somebody knew you were going to be there.
01:49:48
Speaker
Yeah, we told her because I wanted to buy the shirt from her, but she didn't have a match at GCW. And I said, well, I'll be in Indianapolis. I'll just get it from you there. Right. So she I think she knew I was going to be there was running around looking for me. I had one white claw left from the weekend in my backpack. I ran down the street to get it, got back in time, gave it to Garrett. He ran it backstage to Ali Cat and it ended up being used in a scramble match.
01:50:13
Speaker
She was fighting an Amish man, who part of his deal is, when he comes to the ring, he basically walks around the crowd and shakes nearly every single person in the room's hand before he gets in the ring.
01:50:27
Speaker
hilarious bit. It takes so long, but it is a worthwhile bit of just a very polite wrestler that wants to greet every single human in the room. And you got to not only be involved in your first spot with the Logan stunt thing and be involved just because I was involved in so much stuff at GCW.
01:50:48
Speaker
You got to go into your first show a little bit messed up at AEW. And now you got to be involved because you hooked Ali Cat up with a white claw for her match. It was a very, very big weekend for you. And the Amish guy ended up pulling out the can of white claw and showing Ali Cat and distracting her and throwing it on the ground. And then she was on the ground batting the can of white claw around like she was a cat.
01:51:17
Speaker
Did she have the claw at least? Actually, what's funny is she struggled so hard to find that claw that I gave her that at the very beginning of the match, two people while she was in the ring handed her two full cases as a present. Oh, man. But then also got to watch Shotzi Blackheart wrestle. God, she fucking rules. She is. I mean, she's kind of blowing up these days, too.
01:51:44
Speaker
Yeah, she's fucking awesome. She's gonna be everywhere eventually.
Community Gratitude and Podcast Promotion
01:51:48
Speaker
Mike Quackenbush had a match, which I thought the last time I was ever gonna get to see him was at Spring Break two years ago. Got to see him again. One of the weirder things. I don't even know if they want me saying this, but I saw it with my eyes, so I feel like I can. Ruby Riot was there.
01:52:05
Speaker
Yeah Ruby said she was standing behind you wasn't she? She was standing behind the curtain and I saw her and she actually came out in a lucha mask to watch the whole show so no so that she wasn't like taking away from the show or being on camera or anything so it was funny just looking down and just seeing little Ruby Riot with that lucha mask on throughout the entire show. But she was covering from surgery right? Yeah I believe she had shoulder surgery so I think she's still out for quite a while and I believe she is from Indiana Indianapolis so
01:52:33
Speaker
It would make sense for her to be there. Well, hey, everybody, I don't know what the hell happened. Derek's audio dropped. I keep calling him back trying to get him back on here. He is not answering. I'm guessing his phone just died. That's fine. We ended this show. We had a great weekend. It was great to hang out with friends.
01:52:52
Speaker
and every show we saw this weekend was a banger. Go check out AEW. Go check out GCW. Check out AEW. Fucking Bizarro Lucha blew away any expectation I had. It was awesome getting to see our buddy Garrett do it. Super happy for him.
01:53:07
Speaker
Super happy for everyone at that. I want to make more trips up to Bizarro Lucha. But I know this episode has gone almost two hours. It's time to call this thing off. We'll be back next week. Check us out on social media. We're at Wrestle Hangout on Twitter. We're at Predetermined Podcast on Instagram. I am at Gartet on social media. Derek is at Halloween Help. And thank you so much, everybody, for listening. I really appreciate it. Go on iTunes. Leave us a five-star review. We'll talk about whatever you want. And...
01:53:36
Speaker
Hey, you know what? That's just a good weekend. This is a good weekend. It is about 10 o'clock at night, the night before this is released. I know it's going to take me a couple hours to edit. So I need to go do that. Hey, hit our goddamn music. Love you.