I do know this is just a wrestling podcast. Ishaan and Rudez are doing their Montez lip thing that he's doing right now. I have a question for you. Actually, I got two separate questions for y'all. Non wrestling. But I'm gonna get these out the way because I do want your guys answers. Ishaan, give me your way too early NBA finals matchup. I'm going to go to State Warriors. Whoa, okay. Coming out of the West. Yes, sir. Yes, sir. Chef Curry, we doing it one more time. For the bank. For the deep.
And then I'm going the Milwaukee Bucks. I'm getting Dame Time versus Chef. I want to see Battle of the Point gods in the NBA. And I want to see if Dre Mod can slow down Giannis. This is what I need. He can't. He's a great defender. One of the better ones in the league. Give me, I'm going Milwaukee. Absolutely going Milwaukee. I think Giannis and Dame Time is going to be just incredible to watch all season.
I'm going to go Phoenix as much as I'm that person that says you can't bet against the champs until they lose. I would just love to see like Book and Katie against Giannis and Damian Lillard in the finals. Give me that for seven games. I would be all about it. Hey, the jury still out. I got to see that lineup, man. I got to see Bill and Booker playing together in the back court. I want to see who's defending the other point guard. I need to see who's running the offense.
I still got, it's a lot of talent, right? I mean, if you can assemble some talent, they got it, but I need to see it work together first. Rhodesia, I got a question for you. And you are the female voice of the podcast. So it would not have been good for me to ask E because then it may come across as we're toxic and all that. And we are absolutely not that. So what you're not going to ask me the same NBA question? No, I'm not going to ask you any question. Why is Jada Pickett such an evil person?
Oh, Lord. Did something happen that I miss? Oh, it releases an interview or she didn't release it. I think it was on Good Morning America. And she states that her and will have been broken up since 2000 separate team. I'm sorry, separated, divorced, but not divorced. They've been living separately. They have been completely separate. And if you have not seen the video footage, go find the footage.
She has this evil smile on her face that is just like, unless will has done something to her over and over and over and we don't know if he's done that or not. Correct. She didn't say it though, but it seems like every chance she gets, she just sticks that knife at him and digs it deeper and deeper. So if you haven't seen it, I guess I can't, I can't ask you, but that was the first question then I got an answer. Who is winning or who is your way too early NBA finals matchup?
Okay. So for sure, Milwaukee's coming out of the East and I was going to say Phoenix, but I want Devin Booker to come on home to Detroit. So I will want him to have some issues so he doesn't resign a contract. I don't know where he's at in his contract there at Phoenix, but I'll go with the Golden State Warriors too. So I'm going to go with Ditto of East side only because I want Devin Booker to come to Detroit. So you're going to go and say, yep, Golden State in Milwaukee. Over Denver.
Yeah. Yeah. Over, over the hair loaded Los Angeles Lakers. Yeah. And I was looking at the Lakers only because Matthew loved the Lakers, but he said this year he is definitely not about to go through that emotional roller coaster. I said good for him. I said good for you. Game one. He's one of those fans. He is like me with the Lions or whoever he says he ain't in until tip off happens and he's sitting there screaming and hollering and then he's depressed when they lose.
So real quick then, and this is just for us only Matt, who's worse, Matthew or Chris? Oh, Chris for sure. The world is every time somebody, anything goes wrong in the game, the world completely in foil, but that's what we, that's what we do. Right? That is why we're fans. We do what we do and we watch it when we watch and shout out to all the only AW fans. You guys are losers. You guys suck because you got blown out by NXT by what is it? 300,000 viewers. I think it was boy.
We'll get to that episode 73. This is TFW podcast. That's freaking wrestling. The usual suspects are all up in here right now. You've heard from us already. I am Matt. We have Eshaan. We have Rhodesia and that is of course where I want to start and we are going to start and I'm sure the majority of this podcast is going to be really about the Tuesday night wars and we don't even have to, it's up to you guys.
Cause we, we text a little bit during NXT just about kind of the show and things of that nature, but we haven't talked at all around which show we like better, why, anything like that. So we are getting raw information and details in front of the world right now. So however you guys want to do it, we can do it.
I want to, for me personally, I kind of want to take a different approach to today's show because seeing both of those shows back to back kind of really opened my eyes to a couple of things that I want to get your guys thoughts on and we can have some good discussion on it. Let's start with the first one. We talked about the Raidens already. We're not going to spend a lot of time on the Raidens. Raidens are what they are. But shout out to NXT.
We know they loaded that show up with legends, with main roster talent and it worked. They received, like I said, I think it was what? 921,000 viewers for NXT. AW on a separate night did 609,000 viewers. NXT won the demo and the views. Is there anything you guys want to talk about with the Raidens before we kind of just even put that to the side and get into our thoughts on both shows and what we watched and all that kind of stuff? Murder she rode. Murder she rode.
You know, I'm actually kind of surprised. I thought about it right before I saw the Raidens. I'm like, you know what? Why can't NXT hit that mill? And I thought to myself, would it be disappointing that they didn't considering everybody they brought to the show, the Undertaker bail, right? Like, you know, man, would it be kind of a loss if they didn't hit a mill? But it got close and it haven't gotten as close in a while. So definitely win. But yeah, we knew that slaughter was coming.
Nothing else to add to that. It was not a surprise. I actually took their approach that I'm surprised they still drew in 600,000 on a night that they're usually not on. And I know, man, I you talk, you and I talked for a hot second about the difference between it that NXT still blew him out the water. But still for me, I was surprised that means they got two third of their normal, a little bit more than two third of their normal viewership on a different day.
And I think that really, really does matter. But there's really no point in belaboring this topic. I think everyone knew that this would happen, right? As far as as far as ratings. No, I think some of your AEW fans did not see that. And if I think I said it a week ago, if it was on Wednesday, you can probably flip those numbers around. And AEW will win because it's their normal time slot. You're always gonna lose something when you go on a different day.
But the way they loaded that show up, I think NXT, WWE. It was funny too, because I put up a poll on X a couple hours before the show started. I just said, what show are you watching? And I'll be damned if these results didn't almost mirror the ratings. So I gave four options. I said NXT only, AEW only, NXT first, and then AEW on DVR or AEW first, then NXT on DVR. The number one answer by far was NXT only at 45%. Second answer was NXT first, then AEW on DVR at 25%.
So by that math, 70% of people that took this poll was watching NXT somehow some way Tuesday night. So that leaves you with only 30%. The next answer was AEW only was at 18%. And then AEW first and NXT on DVR was 12%. If you break that down and look at the ratings, that's almost a carbon copy of those results. So NXT, either through our Twitter follower base, is the hot new hotness right now. This would have not happened a year ago. Damn sure it wouldn't happen two years ago.
Let me ask you, why did you decide to watch NXT first? Because I was seeing something different on NXT, right? It was something different. They were putting on a spectacle. You saw you had John Cena for the first time ever going on NXT. I didn't even hear the sneak peek for Undertaker. That was a total surprise for me. I missed that. Paul Heyman is going down there. Cody Rhodes is making an announcement.
And I'm invested in a lot of the characters and storylines and I want to see how they go to interact with that main roster talent. I was interested because I was interested in the characters and I was interested in the surprise guests. I knew on AEW I was going to get more of the same, which is really great matches. I knew that. But I wasn't getting anything out of the ordinary, anything different that would make me say, hey, you know what?
Let me watch this instead of seeing something different and new and actually hotter. I think there was a comment, I don't know if it's true or not, but you know, your boy Uncle Dave, you know how much Matt loves Dave Meltzer. That's his road dog. He loves him.
And he said that, you know, and it's funny because, you know, our fans, we always say someone's a shill or someone's on the payroll and, you know, Dave's supposed to be on the AEW payroll and he came out and said that, you know, AEW is cold and that Edge wasn't seeing a pump for them. And I think it's some truth to that. I just don't think that, I don't want to say it's cold right now, but it's definitely not a hot product like WWE.
And I think that NXT itself is what I've been talking to you guys about it for, you know, weeks now. There's a lot of synergy with that show. They're putting on some really great TV right now. They are. And I mean, AEW is, their ticket sales are ice cold. And I think part of that is they need to change their ticket strategy. They do in terms of pricing, in terms of how they promote. But I'll also, there's a couple of things I think they can do differently for their TV product too.
And we will absolutely get to that in this discussion, just between the similarities or the complete contrast of NXT slash WWE TV and AEW television. It is an alternative. So we don't want it to be a carbon copy. Nobody can outdo WWE doing WWE. It's like nobody can outdo NJPW more than NJPW. But it's interesting with AEW, like what is their thing outside of just great wrestling? And that's massive. That's huge.
Because you know, you're going to tune in for a wrestling product and you get great wrestling. That may be all you need or want, but I think numbers are showing a little bit differently, particularly the ticket sales. It was another night last night that they didn't hit 4,000. And I think they were in that same building previously and they had higher attendance than Adam Copeland's first match. Like that tells you a little something is off right now with just the excitement level.
And we'll get to something else too that I noticed. E, you put it in the group text yesterday, just saying, hey, would you rather have a small arena or a small building when the wrestling with a small lively crowd or a big building with a smaller lively crowd? And that is what we saw on both shows yesterday, that exact situation.
And boy, was there a stark contrast was it did not feel like three years ago, but in reverse, every single thing that happened, everybody that came out, blow the roof off the joint. I'm seeing more and more folks like not even cheering on their phones, texting and yeah, they bought a ticket to be there, but it's like, damn, where is the investment at? It really, and that goes back to being hot.
WB's crowds have been hot for months, but it's interesting when you watch and you see, like, damn, it just flipped where now WB's crowd is hot and they're engaged and AW, they're there, but they're not there the way they used to. So where these are going to go.
Hey, Rodisha, right before you go, I know your wheel is like, we got to get you guys, you're not watching this on YouTube, you got to watch this on YouTube so you can see like the wheel is turning in Rodisha so she can see her thinking about all the things that she's hearing and putting it together in her head. You got to watch it. But let me ask you a question as you go into your topics and statements. Do you think AW has lost a big part of the audience or maybe a part of the audience?
Is that directed to me or Matt? Or Aja? No, I don't think so. I think that the majority of AW fans are still AW fans. The better question in my mind will probably be how many of AW fans were also like your NXT fans that kind of now that we have something that was on the main stage, I can get behind. So how many of those people were still WWE fans in essence?
And now we are here where we have H doing something really well, but we really loved NXT back in the black and gold days kind of happening again on main event two as well on Raw and SmackDown. So as far as the questions that you asked me and Nisha I would say my brains was turning or my wheels was turning because I was a little confused on what you said about how small crowd or loud crowd, big building, small crowd, small building. I was a little confused there, but I get it now.
For NXT and AEW, I knew I was going to watch NXT first. So I think for me, again, I guess this is elephant in the room, which show did we like better? I don't know if I should say that now or later, but I knew I was gonna watch NXT first. Now I will say also watching NXT first, I felt bad not watching Dynamite first. I think WWE by no stretch of imagination, they know how to build excitement for a show.
We got to see it on Raw and SmackDown for weeks about them or for a couple of weeks of them coming down to NXT. They know how to do that. They do that. They're the machine. They do that better than anybody. So for me, I think all the excitement was over there on NXT. What else you suggest? Is that why you wanted to watch NXT first or was there another reason why?
Well, the more practical reason is that because we were watching TV on the same television and you were watching NXT first and we were in the same room together. And then plus us in our group chat, we were all watching NXT. I felt a little bit weird watching AEW first in a whole different room that I really don't know how to operate the television and then trying to go back and forth. But again, they still built excitement. My favorite wrestler of all times, Undertaker was gonna be on there.
So I couldn't also turn my back on seeing an Undertaker, however I would get him. So WWE, they know how to build excitement. They do. And then our beef under vents right before the H-Days because you have all these great people, all this great talent that we've seen once before. People get behind and rally behind and then you bring them up to main roster, they kind of just disintegrate. So that is purely no reason why. And then again, it could be something with the colors.
It could be something with the excitement there. But I don't wanna shoot the shot first and talk about or jump ahead and say why I like AEW a lot to Dynamite last night, but do we wanna go there now? I don't know, I don't wanna mess up your flow of the show. Well, I had a couple other questions for you guys. But you take it, that's it, take it wherever you wanna take it. No, no, cuz I don't wanna- I will say that I believe that from when I talked about on our Sunday show came to fruition.
NXT was the better show in the sense of excitement, the popping circumstances, the feeling good but the matches, I was more invested in AEW Dynamite. I felt like on a, oh my god, all these acronyms, WWE, I felt like it didn't really advance storylines. Now I would say that we did get an announcement of the men's tournament. We got an announcement of the Dusty Rhodes Classic coming back and I think we had a couple of matches for next week. But it was kind of like, it felt like a gimmick match.
It was like a crown jewel type of PLE for me. So nothing really happened. There was really no true investment to me. And quite frankly, I thought the Cody announcements felt really flat, like very flat. I don't know if I'm the only one who felt that way. They were very underwhelming for me for the announcements that Cody made. On Dynamite, hell, I think I saw probably one of my favorite matches between Jay White and Heyman Page. They smoked it. On just regular Dynamite.
So like I said, I thought match by match that Dynamite would be better and NXT would just be an overall better show, which they are. They're polished. Their production is incredible. Second to none. I always find it interesting when people are comparing NXT and AEW brand because NXT is what a developmental brand. So you got these, you got Lola Vice and Danny, what's her name? Palmer. Palmer. Who killed, they killed him.
You got them wrestling against like season 10 year versus season 10 year veterans. I mean, it's just very, very interesting that we compare the matches the same way. Not talking about you particularly, Radeeja, but just in the wrestle fandom, right? This is a developmental show. But I don't think we probably do. I think we are now because the playing field has been much more level. Becky's been down there for weeks before that.
I mean, we know they've been doing take a couple of main roster talent on NXT and have them go down for a little bit. But in this week's show in particular, they loaded that show up. Hell, they brought in LA Knight to be a guest referee. Anybody that was hot outside of Jey Uso, I mean, we can name a few. They basically handpicked anyone who they know can really draw. Raiden said, okay, we gotta get you on this show somehow, some way.
No, not just the talent, like Cody being there, LA Knight being there. I'm talking about, it's Asuka versus Roxanne, right? Jay White versus Hangman. You know what I mean? Those are two seasoned, Roxanne is still up and comer. You got the main roster talent having matches with quote unquote development talent, right? It's not LA Knight versus Cody. It's not John Cena versus, what's another big name, whoever. It's them working somebody that's a developmental talent.
And then that developmental talent rising to the occasion and making the good match. That's what I'm talking about. This is AEW's best is the best. This is NXT. This ain't WWE's best is the best at going against each other for two hours. No, this is like their main roster's talent giving a rub to younger wrestlers. And we're seeing them flourish on television. That's what I'm talking about. This is AEW through their best is the best in these matches.
They damn near had another pay-per-view like in two hours on Tuesday night. That's what I'm saying. I always went into AEW knowing that they were gonna have a better match for match and that NXT was gonna be more of a polished production, cuz that's all it really was. And we're getting into, I think that if, cuz I remember we were talking in chat, there's a lot of storyline advancement. If you actually watch the show to actually know what's going on, right? The chase you skit.
That wasn't just a skit. That was a storyline advancement. But Dusty Classic, I mean, I loved this classic back in the day. I loved it back when Dusty had it. I loved it. That's always been a big thing. So there's a lot of little things that when I showed they kind of, but this is what I asked. This is what I asked Matt last night. And I don't know if I just wasn't paying attention or if he just did answer me, but haven't we? Okay. Haven't we've had the Dusty Classics multiple times?
Not since Cody's been there. Yeah. Okay. Cody's been there for a year plus and then get rid of that for a little while though. So we go down to NXT for the first time ever and announce a thing that was named after his dad. That was a really cool moment that they brought it back. And the Dusty Classics were cool. I asked you the last one I didn't necessarily like. This is when they, you know. I mean, that was 2.0. It wasn't enough. What was it 2.0? I think it was before that though, wasn't it?
There was one before 2.0. I don't think so, man. Like I just, I just had to watch NXT from my brain. I'm just happy to be back. I was trying to find my NXT shirt. I was going to wear that. But I have a few of them. Takeover shirts. No, I found some takeover shirts. The show was that we went to, but I was just trying to find just the regular black and gold NXT. So E, who won the night for you then? Or yeah, because Rhodesia kind of gave her answer there, right?
It was kind of like a 50-50 type answer, but I understand completely what she means by that. What about you? It was, it's NXT. I think it's another brand that is flourishing, right? I think that NXT is now, we have so much great wrestling to watch right now. I don't think it's a show that you can say, ah, you know, I can skip that show this week. I think that's, it's become a show that you got to pay attention to.
Like at some, maybe if you're not watching on Tuesday, you got to watch it on Thursday or watch it on, so you got to catch it. Because I think that that show has become a much watched television, like the quality of the show and the presentation. That's why I asked you that question, Matt, about the audience, because I know you don't like them small studio crowds, but like they brought it last night. Like, the energy was really, really, really great.
And one of the things we noticed with Collision and some of the Dynamite shows is that because of the attendance, it doesn't always come across well on television. So like, I think in that instance last night, that's when that small engaged audience really, really worked well. But just to go back to it, I think NXT won just to make it another show. Because Dynamite is a good show. Like if you would love wrestling, you're going to get good matches. I mean, they had a loaded card. It was awesome.
But NXT has been that one that's, you know, 2.0 and Vince got rid of all Triple H's guys, brought up all of this development talent. People have never been on TV. You know, he brought Brian Breaker on the national television and the dude I think he will be in the business for like two months or something like that. Right? So we've gone through a lot of growing pains with NXT. So it's arrived.
And honestly, I think the company's investment in that brand being successful with Triple H, I don't think that's going anywhere anytime soon. Yeah, we know, you know, that there's some thought that they're really putting this push behind NXT just to get higher rights deals for the contract that comes up next year. I don't give a damn why. It's turning out to be fantastic television. And one and a half million people watched wrestling last night. Let's give a round of applause for that.
Let's give it like, let's give it up for that. You know, when you think about whatever you're into, whatever you are into, you got it on Tuesday night. You know, for me, it reminded me for sure of the Monday Night Wars. I didn't do any flipping though. I, you know, of course I watched NXT first and I immediately watched AEW after. And a lot of times what I'll do is I'll need like a buffer because there's some times where I have watched two separate shows on the same night. Hell, we just did it.
I just did it Saturday with Collision and... Payback 2. Payback 2. We watched Fastlane and I gave myself like a 45 minute buffer. I think it was like an hour. It was like a cleanser for me, a pallet cleanser. I was like, okay, now let me watch Collision. Because if I was to watch it immediately after, you can only watch so much wrestling and then see it for the excitement and the engagement that you need to see it for, especially when you're talking about two totally different brands.
You lose something on that second show. So I didn't need to do that last night because in NXT it's only two hours. It flew by. It felt like... Yeah, it did fly by. Yeah, I was able to really enjoy AEW right after that. I think that, I mean, for me, Ridiz, you kind of took my answer so I'm not going to go over it again. For those two hours, NXT had a hell of an exciting show. I probably enjoyed... I have a problem saying that because I don't know.
But I would say I probably enjoyed NXT more in those two hours because of the newness factor of seeing Cena down there, seeing Heyman down there, seeing those interactions. That's the kind of stuff that I really enjoy to see. Just like to see Heyman and Rock's daughter. Are you kidding me? How cool was that? It was like a 10 second shoot, but it was like, damn, that's great. That's awesome. He's trying to recruit her to the bloodline. That's the way to maximize your time.
Or when they were shaking Asuka's hand. To me, because I'm a huge Asuka fan, that had me pop. It was so long. And I loved it because it was just set up for Tiffany to be like, get out of here. So I really enjoyed that. I think to Radeeja's point, if you look at the legends that they brought in, there's nothing about them next week. Cody's gone. He's not coming back. Cena's gone. He's not coming back. Taker's gone. He's not coming back. Heyman's gone. He's not coming back. Asuka's gone.
She's not coming back. So yes, E to your point, they advanced Chase U. They advanced Trick and Mello in a really cool way. Real small advancement, but talking to Cena, that's their advancement. So yeah, they moved things along for NXT. But for the people they brought in for that particular show, it was just in a capsule. They're not gonna be on there next week or in two weeks from now.
Where AEW, I thought they really maximized their day because outside of the great matches, Swerven, Brian Killed, to your point Radeeja, Jay White and Hangman Killed, you had two title changes, both to help further the company and the storylines. We knew Phoenix wasn't supposed to win the title in the first place. So all right, put it back on Orange Cassidy. And how do you guys take Orange Cassidy's demeanor after he won the belt? Well, I actually didn't realize what I saw.
I heard that he won and it took a minute for me to register, like, oh shoot, well, okay. So what was the point of him dropping it? So I don't even know how to answer your question because I was just so in the moment of what just happened here. I actually fell asleep right before that match. Damn it. And I watched the show. I forgot about that match. So I actually, I think I woke up at a certain point and that had already passed. So I assumed what I woke up watching was where I need to finish.
So I went back to that one. So go back and watch it. He wins. He doesn't crack a smile. He has like this kind of like this obsessed look of the belt. So they hand him the belt and he's just looking at it. He walks out the ring, best friends are out there to congratulate him, hooks out there, and he kind of like dapped him up a little bit and that was it. He didn't, it was, it was, I was like, damn, is he going hill? Or is, is he, is he sad that he won it?
Cause he's like, damn, I got to go through what I went through. It's kind of hard to tell. It's kind of hard to tell. But there's something there. Like there is significantly something there. So you had that, you had the Oscar, Oscar nominated cinema presentation of Tony Storm Silent. Come on. Arguably of anybody in wrestling right now. Wait a minute though. Like the only thing, did they, did they replay that? Because there were two acts. It was in the commercial.
It was during, but it was a silent presentation. It was a silent movie. So how awesome was that? It was done on purpose during the commercial because there was no volume to it. So I was so mad. Yeah. Cause at first I'm like, no, y'all just didn't put a commercial while she's doing it. We were mad at first. It didn't say it was a silent. During timeless? Yeah. Like that was really, really cool. I was, I was Tony count's phone number. I knew I had it somewhere. I'm like, I got it.
You said it on Twitter, man. He's very active on Twitter. He'll respond. He'll respond. He was like, he's been on one. Anybody can get it. And my favorite, my favorite storyline outside the bloodline, but about prior to two months ago, um, come on, Adam Cole, he's holding off his surgery to still cut the grass and Roger Strong. Like, come on. Like how classic is this right now? But yes, I know I do think that AEW did more to get you to want to watch next week.
So, but like I said, man, it was everybody won last night. Everybody won. I do, I do have a question for you guys. And I kind of said my piece and I'll kind of just regurgitate it here when we were texting during NXT. What did you see? What stood out on both shows outside of one is in a smaller arena and not.
From a TV product perspective, did anything come out and like seeing that you watched them immediately after each other, did, was there anything that you saw and you were like, Oh man, I didn't realize they heavily lean into that. Or man, I didn't realize they do that on this show as much as they don't do it on this show. That's a fantastic question. In Dynamite, I was a bit fatigued watching it last night because we had just finished watching NXT.
So that's just what I liked was, and this is about to sound like I'm talking in circles. The show started off on AEW with Christian being in the production truck. That was very like WWE ish to me. I don't know if I'm the only one who felt that way, but evidently it works. It gets that excitement going on NXT. It's back down to like, it's okay to be quirky.
It's okay to be silly kind of, I don't want to say caricature yourself, but it's okay to be kind of a little over the top with some of the performances I should say as far as the talking on the mic and stuff. I don't know. That's a very, very hard question. I think that's probably where I'll just land it.
I'll just say that NXT allows you, which you've mentioned before, allows you to be a little bit more jovial and it's okay where AEW you really can't be jovial because there's a lot of these indie wrestlers who have something to prove with a chip on their shoulder. For me it was the production. I thought NXT did a great job on their developmental brand with their production. That yellow was just popping. The way they shot the crowd made it seem very intimate and lively.
The video packages, the overall structure of the show, the flow of it. It was just amazing. It seemed very professional, very polished, but NXT reminded me a lot of college football. It seems like you know it's young people, but it's very polished behind the scenes and how they present that show because it just flowed. Then when I squished off and watched Dynamite, it's almost like the resolution dropped on my TV to me. I see what you mean by that. The colors seem a little flatter.
The way it's shot, that was the biggest thing that I noticed for me, which is the production. It was a big drop off in the production to me. It kind of reminded me of back in the day when I used to watch WWF and WCW. WCW, their production was bad, but it didn't look as good as WWF did back in the day. That's the vibe I kind of had. I felt like I was watching back in the Monday Night Wars and it's Monday Night Show and Raw. But didn't y'all say that that's kind of what Tony's MO has been?
He's always wanted to be the new improved WCW, just down to how collision looks. Even some of the logos is really WCW. A lot of it is WCW inspired, which I'm good with. Being on Turner, slam dunk, easy to do that. I think what I saw completely last night, and I knew it already, but once again when I was able to take it and really, because I'm dissecting these shows, it's like a mofo. Both of them. I'm like, okay, I'm doubting. They are going against each other.
So they are putting, both of them are putting their best foot forward every second of these shows, even though I'm not watching it head to head. And what I really noticed was NXC is a TV show. Better or worse. AEW is a wrestling show. Better or worse. Now it leads to your point. They started with Christian in the truck, which I loved because they never do things like that. And that's the thread that is typically missing on Dynamite.
If you are here for watching wrestling, which at the end of the day, we all are there to watch wrestling. That's why we are watching a wrestling show. They give us wrestling in spades. But if you're there for a little bit more than that, there's a lot of times that AEW leaves you wanting more. Now on the opposite, we can say before the Triple H era, and even now a little bit on some of these shows, you get heavy promos and heavy story on WETV.
And you look at me like, damn, these two hours, there have been eight minutes of wrestling. No, I don't know. We got to find a happy medium. And when you watch like when we watch an NXT, they had so many segments to set up something else in the same show. That's a story thread. That's a story arc. That is what gets you invested in continuing to watch or maybe picking up the phone or sending the text out to somebody like, hey, check out what's going on on NXC right now.
And you'll get that with AEW, but it's more of, hey, check out this match. I've heard more people talk about, and this is straight up, I've heard more people talk about Roddy Strong and Toni Storm in the last three weeks than I have any other match outside of Kenny Omega and Will Lospreay this entire year. And why? Because it's entertainment. Yes. And that is what you get into these characters for is for the entertainment value.
You know, so like seeing, seeing it come out a couple of times, story arc through it, Cody, and now he's a GM, story arc. You see Cody like that's, that is a big piece of what is kind of missing from AEW. Now, do I want them to go through it and do that? I'm not saying that for sure, but I do want something to give me to point A to point B to give me to our two of the show or to the main event of the show.
Just don't hit me with the lower third graphic of these two people wrestling and you don't give me a video package of how we got here or anything like that. That's where from a TV product perspective, I think they could really help themselves, but it was, it was really apparent. Just kind of going immediately from NXT to WWE. I want to, I want to share a couple of messages. So shout out to Chris Bush. He is a damn near lifelong WWE fan.
Okay. He sent me a text today and just basically said like, man, like NXT was pretty good. He typically doesn't watch NXT too much. We got talking a little bit and then he said, I've watched Dynamite every Wednesday pretty faithfully for a year now and I'm not digging it anymore. Like to the, like to the point that I'm almost done. I'm like, oh, this is perfect. I said, Hey, give me two to three reasons why you're kind of feeling that way. And so we can bring it up on the show.
Here's what he said. And I'll kind of like summarize some of it. He said, when I started watching MJF was ending the feud with Warlow and Warlow was hot. Then he was gone and seeing punk and MJ moved to telling a great story. They claim were hot, then lost the titles. Feels like the crowd isn't into them anymore, which sucks. Then MJF disappeared for the money.
Then the brawl, then the punk termination, all the greatness that could have been gets lost and all that bullshit happening at the worst possible time. Then Cole MJF had me for a second, but like Adam Cole had a dead plan behind him for a promo. I couldn't even hear last week. I don't know, man. It's tough. He kind of talked about how much money it was. It could have been in the punk elite story that they didn't do it.
He said inconsistent appearances from people who I have no vested interest in. Will Ospreay, for example. I don't even really know a damn thing about the new women's champ. I don't know about NJPW and I never will, so stop opening the forbidden door. I caught it like 10 things. Too many titles. Then he said, let me stop. Laugh out loud. Then he gave some things he loves right now. He said Hill Christian, Prince and Swerve, Swerve and Hangman, Tony Storm's new gimmick, Renee, MJF.
Of course there's some things that he likes, but I thought that was really, really interesting because here's somebody who didn't watch AEW in his infancy. He doesn't watch NJPW. He is somebody who AEW should be wanting to add to their fan base. And through those things for him, they've alienated him. One more thing and I'll get you guys thoughts on both. Tyler, a guy over at gimmick infringement. Shout out to you, Tyler. I know he likes AEW more than WWE typically. I asked him the same thing.
He gave me a couple reasons why. He said, he gave me two. He said there's still an anything can happen vibe that I feel when I'm watching Dynamite. He said, I think they have the top promos in the game. Can't miss with MJF. You can't miss with Eddie Kingston. Can't miss with Samoa Joe, et cetera. I think they both have incredible points.
Give me your guys thoughts on a more AEW fan talking about why they appreciate AEW over WWE and then a more WWE fan that tells you why they appreciate that more over AEW. You want to go first, Yishun? Because I'm ready to go. I got a whole bunch of things over here. Go ahead. I was writing everything down. So to Chris Bush, five to six of your 10 items you dislike about it has something to do with either MJF or CM Punk. So here we are with that. Sheesh.
Okay. So for Chris Bush side of things about Dynamite, everything he said is absolutely correct. I think it was just bad timing and I think Punk had that black cloud over AEW for this last year, year and a half. I will ask him to just to hang on a little bit longer because of the reasons why you came into watching Dynamite. I think it's still there. Hey, we just found Warlow last week. So maybe something's going to change there. Yeah, no more Warlow, baby. We got him. He came out too.
Again this week with MJF on his wrist. Yep, he sure did. He sure did. So this might actually be kind of your, would you put the thing in the sand? Okay, now you can start all over again, Chris Bush. So and come back over to being a Dynamite fan. Tyler, anything can happen. That is 100% true for better or for worse. How we talked about NXT is a TV show for better or for worse. You can, titles can drop at any moment on AEW and you're like, whoa, what just happened there? And again, the top promos.
Well, yeah, because those people have that luxury of being able to go out there and speak however they want to, however they want to speak. They are not scripted. So those people that he mentioned, I think is at Eddie, Samoa Joe, some of these guys have been in the business for such a long time. They know what works and what doesn't work and how to feed into the crowd. I like Dynamite more than NXT and I, to E's point about why are we comparing it?
I guess naturally I'm comparing it because this is what the today show is all about. But I really do like Dynamite. I think there's just so much raw talent, so much raw, beautiful goodness. It just has to be polished and packaged better for me. But I love Dynamite. I think it's a lot of merit too. I think the thing is that Tyler mentions about AEW are very true. When you watch Raw, when you watch SmackDown, there are a lot of episodes that are kind of just there.
They're there just to kind of slowly push stories along to get to a POE or whatever it is. So you don't always get that surprise element when you watch SmackDown on Raw. But I think there's something to that. I think for a lot of the reasons why people love AEW, I think it alienates others. Because when we talk about the matches and the matches, the matches, there's a lot that goes on in those matches. They're sometimes chaotic to where if you're a wrestling fan, you get it.
Because you got to kind of be in on it a little bit to be a wrestling fan. But I think in AEW, they abuse that suspension of the belief that you got to have with wrestling more than you should. And I think that alienates a lot of the viewers to where you're just constantly just giving them high octane matches where they're not selling things or where everything's moving so quickly. It's kind of hard for you to digest. But really, as you said, you get numb to it.
So if you're getting banger after banger after banger after banger with no breather, at a certain point, you get kind of like numb by the good wrestling, right? Now you're just starting to stare at it. Your eyes are just glazing over because you're just seeing so much of it. Right to where as with NXT, WWE, SmackDown, they're layering it for you. They're slowing it down. They're kind of building you up to a certain thing. And then they kind of bring you down. It's more emotional roller coaster.
And to be quite honest, that's why I watch wrestling. Right? I can't, to be honest with you, when I was a kid, when I was watching this stuff at five or six years old, I could care less about work rate. I'm like a Hirakurana. Well, I know I didn't care about work weight. Ultimate War is one of my favorite wrestlers. Man, we didn't care about none of that. We cared about the storylines. We cared about the characters. We cared about the drama. That's what brought us into it.
So in the heart of most wrestling fans, that's what you really love and you want about wrestling. It's all about that. So when AEW makes it so much about the moves and the matches, I think it's just really, that's why I asked Rhodesia earlier. I'm like, hey, do you think they're losing fans? Because I hear all the time people saying that they don't watch NXT or it's not what it used to be or, you know, it's not as hot as it was. NXT or AEW? AEW. Excuse me if I say NXT. Okay. Got you.
I mean, I think if Dave Milster was an AEW guy, for him to say he thinks it's cold, that's saying something. And I think too, you know, the thing about, and this is, and of course, because it's our show, right? But this is our perspective. Somebody could have just started watching wrestling three years ago because of AEW. And that is their brand of wrestling that they would say, I think it is perfect every single week. So I do think that's part of it sometimes too.
Because what you said is kind of what, because we grew up on it. Even if you're a fan of sports. Right. Right. Right. Pittsburgh Steelers. If you are a Stiller fan, you know, I want a team that can stop the pass and the run on defense. And I want another, I want my team to be able to run it down your throat when we need to and go for an eight, nine minute drive. That is the fan base. That is what you do.
If you are a Golden State Warriors fan and you just started watching basketball six years ago, you are like, man, I want the running gun. I want the three pointers. I want, we on fast break. We on fast break. We pulling up to the three point line to shoot a three point. We ain't going to the hole. Because that is what you, that's your thing. So I do think that that's for sure part of it. But that's what makes this so awesome is there is no right or wrong way at the end of the day.
If it is entertaining to you, it works. I just think that there could be some things that like, I mean, what Bush said about, I'm not in the NJPW. Probably would never be in the NJPW. That's valid because for him now, he knows if I continue to watch AW, I don't want to watch Wrestle Kingdom. I don't want to go online to figure out who the IWGP champion is in, in New Japan. So that means that I know now from May to probably July 1st, I can check out on AW because that is forbidden door season.
That's valid. Now, how about if they were to show a lot of video packages on their TV about Will Ospreay, about Okada. Maybe Chris Bush would be like, you know what? I've never really seen them, but at least now I know who they are. I understand why I should like this person. Let me either go try to find this stuff now, or let me just take it as face value. When they give it to me on AW, AW just runs a lot of their business as if, yep, you know everything because you're an AW fan. Here you go.
Yup. Bingo. They assume everyone knows everybody and their history and story. I was just going to address that, Matt, as far as the, I don't care about these other people. I understand why you don't care. Maybe though, if AW did a better job in telling you how great these people are, you probably would care.
And that's like you said, because when I first got into AW Dynamite, that was the show that was out, when I first got into AW, there was a lot of NJPW people and independent people that I thought I knew fairly amount of the people that would come over and debut. But a lot of times I didn't know their songs or their catchphrases or even the embassy, whatever, the eyes of the open people. So for- I don't know if you have any signs. I didn't mean to. Relaxed. I was trying to go up. Relaxed.
Whatever. I'm just going to go back and check my hands here. But for a moment, I almost felt like, damn, I don't know who that person is. And why am I about to watch a show? Why am I going to be in an area where I really don't know these people? And I pride myself as being a huge wrestling fan. But when you know the person's songs, they're going to be like, go ace, go ace. I didn't know what that meant for a while. I didn't know what y'all was saying for a while.
So I could see how that could be alienating the people. And for some people, I don't have, you know how people say, I don't got time for no new friends? I don't have time for new wrestling fans or wrestlers. So I get it. But I think if AEW did a better job in presenting them, we can go be in one big person too next to Will Astray. I think Chris might feel a little bit different. But you know what? They're four years in, but it doesn't seem to be there's Tony style.
Yeah. He's going to slow down to tell those stories. So it is what it is. Yeah. And I think that same thing, now how many people you think knew who J. Cargill was before she signed? The WWE? Yeah. How much of their audience do you think knew who she was? And we're taking out children out of this, right? We're taking kids out of this. I'm talking about their fan base. You want to talk about kids? Old folks, whoever. Their fan base. So I know where you're going with this, but 5%.
Ooh, I get more than that. I say 5%. I'm going to say little kids don't know who Jade is, but when they saw her, they was like, whoa. Give me a quarter. Give me 25%. I'm going to say 5%. But by the end of this month, by the end of, by the time we get to Thanksgiving, how much of their audience is going to know her? 100%. And maybe not even because she's even in the ring. They're making such a big deal on social media. She's coming into the NXT looking the way she's looking.
Like, looking like a star. Like, she's hopping up on SmackDown looking like a star. If they don't know who she is, they're looking her up now. They want to know who she is. And those are some of the things that WWE does differently. They don't assume that their audience knows Jade. They're slowly introducing this character to their programming. And that's something we just don't get in AEW.
And honestly, let's just put it is, and this isn't, we haven't gotten that from those people in four years. I don't think it's gonna start anytime soon. And the cool thing is, at the end of the day, it doesn't need to because competition is fantastic. Yep. And we saw that this week. So shout out to AEW, shout out to NXT WWE. If anybody thinks that WWE no longer believes that AEW is a threat, we know now for sure they believe AEW is a threat. Absolutely, 100%.
So, load on NXT, presenting Jade the waiter, presenting him. And I've said it before, and I will say it again. Oh my God, 2024 is going to be incredible when it comes to free agent signings back and forth. We are in for a hell of a time. And I cannot wait. So these last couple years have been great being a wrestling fan. Now that it looks like Vince is completely removed from creative and Triple H is the head, he has his team.
We know AEW is gonna continue to grow and evolve because you have to or you're gonna die and we know that they're not dying anytime soon, if ever. We're in a really good space. We are in a really good space. So shout out to everybody that enjoyed this week with those two. Just enjoy wrestling. We had a lot of fun as wrestling fans this week on Twitter or XN and just watching the shows. I had another question that came through from our guy Brandon James on Twitter. Shout out to Brandon.
He sent us something about seeing punk. Now he actually sent this a couple days ago. Words come out now that right now WWE is not actively in talks with seeing punk for a return. Of course that can change, but it looks like my hope of seeing punk in Chicago for Survivor Series could be a no go now. We are getting war games though. Where's that round of applause at? So no, we're not doing that. Where's that round of applause? Okay. I'm sorry.
We're not getting war games, but it looks like there may not be punk, but I'm still holding out hope. Brandon asked us, he asked us a really, really good question. It was around punk so we can still go with it because come this time, you never know. He gave us four different scenarios. He said, what would we rather see out of these four scenarios? Number one, Guether wins the Royal Rumble and he takes on Seth Rollins at WrestleMania for the championship.
Number two, seeing punk wins the Rumble and takes on Seth Rollins at Mania. Number three, seeing punk versus Cody Rose in the main event, one on one. And then you have Rock against Roman for the undisputed championship. And then four, you got Cody and Roman at the Rumble. Rock gets involved. Cody wins. So then night one is Cody and punk at WrestleMania for the title. Night two is Rock versus Roman at WrestleMania. You can only have one of those scenarios. Which one y'all going with?
I'm going with the last one. Give me a Rock and Roman and then give me a- It's punk and Cody, wasn't it? Yeah, punk and Cody night one, Rock and Roman night two. Give me that. But you know what, Brandon? I got to make it a little sweeter. Give me Rock and Roman. Give me Rock and Roman on one of the nights, one or two. No, that got to be night two. That got to end the Mania weekend. If you can get Rock, that is a super match. That's one of those- I'm losing this, it's getting late night y'all.
That is one of those dream matches. Which one? This is Rock and Roman. I think both of those could be a dream match. Cody and punk and Rock and Roman are dream matches. Rock and Roman is the number one match that can be made anywhere in earth in a wrestling ring. This is why I kind of miss the WWE Network. Because when you had the network, you guys can pop in Cody versus punk and they'll give you- Does that not work with peacocks? Did you go on like the- You don't do that anymore.
You don't do that anymore. That's why I miss the network. But I think at some point they may have wrestled at some point. Maybe not anything big. Cody was a little doll back then, right? But what if we get a return in CM Punk? And actually that might be another conversation for another day. I kind of feel like maybe this all could be smoke and mirrors. But I feel like it's very unlikely that we're going to get Punk in WWE. Because I wouldn't want him in my company.
After he left the way he left last time, the way he left this company, uh-uh, brother, I need you to get some therapy. I need you to know that something- I need to know that you good before you come up with my rock and roll. You need to bring a certificate from therapy? Oh yeah. I need to make sure you good. But let's say he punk came back, everything was all good. He was in a great place. What if you get CM Punk and Cody fighting it out, right? And then they're both, they fall out of the ring.
They're still in the ring doing the apron. They're trying to fight back and forth. He's going to fall off. And somehow they both fall off at the same time. And they're showing the replays and they're both touching the floor at the same time. You ain't got a contest. So now both these guys have steak ass, the winners, right, of the warrior rumble. And we get a three way, with Punk, Cody and Seth for the world championship. Give me that. I'm down. I think Rediz just passed out from not liking it.
You can give me that. I'll take a triple threat. Hate triple threats. Hate, hate, hate triple threats. So Brandi James, thank you for such a would you rather type question. To answer the question, I'm going to go with number four, but because this is one third of my show, I'm going to change it a little bit because I don't like any of these options with CM Punk is involved. So I liked, I like Cody and Roman at the rumble. The rock causes it or it stops them interference.
However it goes, Cody wins the championship. Guether wins the rumble and then decides to go after Cody at Mania. And then you can still have rock and Roman at Mania. There you go. Look at the territory. Rock and Roman. All right. Anything that includes rock and Roman put me down for. I tell Rediz when Cody came out on NXT and just the way the crowd reacted to his music, I was like, there's going to be a lot of tears shed in that crowd whenever he does win the championship.
I'm assuming to say if it's at Mania this year, there's going to be a lot of tears around ringside I think, because that is a really, really cool moment for him. The longer it goes, the cooler the moment is going to be. And that's why I don't want him in the triple threat. It's not going to be the opposite. He's come a long way. He really has. So shout out to him. And my answer would be the same. Give me rock and Roman and then give me Punk and Cody. I like it. Book it. Book it, damn it.
No, no, don't book the Punk and Cody. Give it to me. Give it to me, y'all. All right, y'all. Time to wind out. What y'all got? I have something super duper light, like super duper light. We got to talk about Mr. Lexus King or what we used to know him as is Bill Pillman Jr. And whoo, did he get lined up? Bill Pillman Jr. I said Pullman. Bill Pillman. We knew him as who? Did I just make up his first name? Absolutely you did. Who did you get Bill from? I don't know. Who the fuck is Bill Pillman?
It's late Chicago too, y'all. What's that? Yo. I know Brian Pillman. So who was Pillman? I know Brian. Brian, Brian, Brian. Okay, Brian. Thank you. Absolutely not Brian Pillman Jr. Point is Mr. Lexus King, he got faded up at the barbecue. That's all I got to say. He got his teeth done too. Shout out to him. I didn't see the teeth. I saw that line up though. He a brother now. He went to the same male complaints that Brian Breaker went to. They both went to the same makeover spot.
I was like, hey, make us look like this person. I don't know who they pointed to. I think like Brian pointing to Dom from Fast and Furious. I don't know who Brian Pillman pointed to yet, but the boy was looking good, man. His hair was laid. He said he hates his daddy. I was like, all right, I guess we going to Hill. But I said it, three promo videos has made him more invested than I have been in the two and a half, three years he was in AEW. You know what?
That's one of the things about AEW that it's like a guy like Swerve, he's super creative. He's going to come up with some awesome things, right? You see Inanna with his twerking next to Swerve, all the creative. If you are a creative person, you are going to really thrive in that environment. But maybe like a guy like Brian Pillman, because you saw some flashes of him on the microphone, right?
Maybe now he has somebody he can bounce ideas off of, someone can write for him, so now he can recite those lines in his voice, somebody he can work with. I think he's going to really come through because he has a look. And obviously, like what you just said, that hairline, whatever he had going on, he had it on point. Either he went to the barbecue or he's dating his sister. But go ahead, continue. He may, maybe. You never know, man. But hey, I got one like and dislike on AEW real quick.
I love my boy, Powerhouse Hobbs, squashing the shit out of that Jericho. As it should have been. He was squashing her shit. I had to get up and wipe my TV screen down with wallpaper multiple times during that segment. He was spine busting their shit out of his ass. Every single one of it. You know what? That was also one of the times where, because we know like they run through their matches in WWE, so like the camera people know exactly what the finishes are and where it's going to be at.
And I don't want that in AEW, because you can feel the free flowing in matches. But that's one of the times where I wish the camera people would know what was coming, because it looked like Jericho told him, pin me, when he pinned him and he got the three count. But they were cutting to Don Callis in the middle of the pin. And then they shot back and it was a three count. I think it took away from the match was over. And a little small tidbit, but like that matters when he destroyed Jericho.
Like it should have been straight right in the middle of that camera shot that he just got destroyed. He is left laying. My man couldn't even talk. Renee went to go check on him. Jericho looked like a hard puppy, man. Every time he gave him this spine buster, I was like, get his ass. Every time. Every time I got up and said, get him. Every time. One thing I didn't like, what the frick are they doing with Max Caster? What are they doing? Like so number one. Stan MJF, right?
Yes. No, no, no, no, no. This ain't a Stan. Because he, it's creepy when he does it online. I'm not, she's been doing it for years and I don't get it. All right. Cause oh, you get it. Look, oh, you get it. Look, I know, I understand. I understand Anthony Bowen's situation, right? And I get that the jokes that he's telling is like, you know, that was a funny joke that men did, you know, back in the day, right? But not for four years. And it's really, really, really creepy.
So now that's, that's one thing going Twitter. So they decided to bring this creepy Twitter thing to television. This is where you talk about creative. You're giving the boys creative. They think it's a good idea because at certain point the claim were one of the hottest things in that company and maybe of all of us. Now they're presenting one of their guys as a big juicy creep and she's the creep.
This is not going to get Max Caster over unless he's coming out as, I don't know if he's coming out and saying, Hey, I am also gay. We're the first gay tag team. That's great. But guess what? It sounds like you want to break MJ up and that's not right. Exactly. Being a creep is not, it's not cool. And then you got Billy gun, you know, like, Hey dude, what's going on? And then Anthony Bowen, I guess it's supposed to be funny. Like here you do this. I mean, no legit. That's real time.
It's or let's let's play doubles advocate or this turns into them actually having his back against the bank, bank gang. And this actually elevates them in a better spot than where they are now. It sounds like Max really wants his back and he's going to force it. Forced me to take it from you saying like he told Max machine skate tools. I know about your back. Oh man. That's great. It's speaking of raw, really enjoy Drew's and Seth's interaction. That's beginning wrong.
Drew's up next for a title shot. You lose this and then he completely get out of seven. Turn to give it to me. Give it to me. All right. Well, that is a wrap. We ain't got no, no, no. We deep dive this whole Tuesday night wars thing. A W NXT W W. Both of you guys had a fantastic time listening to the show. Check us out on social X and Instagram. That's F and W YouTube. That's freaking wrestling. Give us a five star review. Leave us some comments. We'll do all that kind of good stuff.
We'll be back on Sunday to talk about who knows what I do. Roman range is back. Business is about to pick up ladies and germs. Business. Yeah. Poor Jimmy. Poor, poor, poor Jimmy. You eating that. We'll talk about it on Sunday. indicating ascending to the 33rd by Arru сч man and in the fact that their