A restaurant's best dishes tell stories. Their flavors embed themselves in our memory like song lyrics or lines from a movie. So much so that a little slice of a restaurant's story can become part of our own. I'm Danny Chow, and this is Shift Meal, a new video podcast from The Ringer where we're sharing a bite and chopping it up with chefs and restaurant people during their off hours. All episodes of Shift Meal are out now on Ringer Food.
Cold open question of the week, Kaz. What up, shoes? Did you happen to see on Dynamite last night the segment where friend of the podcast Samoa Joe and Hook were walking backstage in their civvies? I did. This is a very visual question. So just for the sake of those people listening to this podcast. So Joe had on a Hawaiian shirt. Is that a... appropriate term to use now with just some sort of like light blue, dark blue, white kind of tribal pattern going on.
I'd usually call it a vacation shirt, but Hawaiian shirt works also. Somebody online said he looked like it was his first trip to Las Vegas. That sort of shirt. Uh-huh. Hook was wearing a camouflage hoodie. Hood pulled up. Looked like matching sweatpants. Hard to tell from the picture I took. Here's my question for you. I know recently you traveled out to the West Coast and you lost your luggage. That happened again.
You're going to Vegas for WrestleMania. They lose your bags, right? But you get a suitcase. It's just not yours. You either have to make it through the week with Samoa Joe's luggage or Hook's luggage. You don't know what they packed. Whose bag would you rather have? I'm going to give you a great inside baseball story.
The answer to this question is so very easily Samoa Joe for many reasons. For one thing, he's probably closer to your size. Yeah, like one, I'm much bigger than Hook. So that's one. But two... I'll never forget it, and I think the statute of limitations is up on this, so I can talk about it now. My first day of travel working for WWE as a writer.
Samoa Joe overpacked for, you know, we were on the West Coast, actually. And I guess he had overpacked and had too much stuff in his luggage before he hit the airport. He overpacked. Overpacked. Me and Joe have had, you know, before then, had like, you know, kind run into each other. But to say we were friends would be like a long, long stretch. Be a stretch.
But as he's unpacking his stuff and, you know, we're just getting ready to, you know, finish, you know, I'm about to head over to leaving the arena. Joe looks at me. He goes, yo. This is a very visual part of the show, so I'm going to be visual. You'll describe what I'm doing right now. As Joe was unpacking his stuff, he looked at me, he goes... So for the people listening at home...
Kaz did the two fingers to the eye back and forth. Are we making eye contact? Are we on the same page here? It's like the eye poke, except it's the shared experience back and forth hand thing. And then... transitions into um let's just call it the uh the the razor ramon toothpick in the mouth gesture except that's not it was you you you
Are you on the same page? Do we both partake? That's what we're getting at here. I was like, yeah. I was like, great. He's like, yo, I can't take all this back home. He's like, here you go. Slash it to me. And he was like, he didn't overpack his clothes. He overpacked his carry on. Let's just carry on. Yeah, he had a lot. They had a lot of carry ons with him, basically. And basically couldn't fit in his stuff. But he gave me the eye. And I was like, you know what? He's like, absolutely.
I absolutely do partake in this. And it's my first week. I'm still sort of getting comfortable with everybody around there. And there's just this weird, just sort of like, you know. just just heaviness around me that entire day because it's just it's very overwhelming and there's a lot in a short amount of time especially for a guy who's like a wrestling fan on top of a new job stress right
Yeah. And one of your all-time favorites goes, you. Yeah. Immediately, he had a lifelong friend. And I was immediately comfortable after that. I can only imagine. I know Joe. And the way he packs. I'd much rather have his luggage. Not even for the clothes. Just for the extras. You don't think... Just for the extracurriculars. What do you think you're getting in the hooks? I'm guessing... Well, I'm gonna make no assumptions here.
I'm not going to assume anything, but I know for a fact. Wouldn't that have been great if Samoa Joe had done the little eye contact gesture and been like you partake and you're like, hell yeah, man. And then he just gives you like a half full duffel bag of like meth, you know? Dude, that's not what I thought you meant. And then it would be the Breaking Bad sequel. Like the Kaz and Samoa Joe Breaking Bad sequel. Oh, I would watch the hell out of that.
cooking meth and producing wrestling. So you're going to be chilled out at WrestleMania all week despite wearing vacation shirts. And like some and some probably too big, you know, acid wash jeans or whatever the hell he's got on. I'll make it work, though, man. I'll make it work. I just I I'd rather make vacation wear work than like snug.
hoodies, which I assume would be on me if I had to take Hook's stuff. Joe's always good in my book. Teflon. Teflon to me. Although, you know, you get Hook's stuff, you could probably go... resell some of that pretty quickly on like one of those websites one of those like hot fashion websites and you could just go right out onto the Vegas Strip and buy yourself a whole new wardrobe I guess that kind of defeats the purpose of the question I'm just saying
Probably go to Etsy or something or one of those. The point is that just that Hook's, you know, baggy ass hoodie probably cost him like $900 or something. But anyway. That Hawaiian shirt is probably not cheap either, man. See the detail on that thing? I'm sure it's definitely a pretty penny. Well, I'm glad that we have a decisive answer here. uh we got a lot to talk about let's start the show
Welcome to the Masked Man Show with Kaz. How you doing, buddy? I'm good, Shoes. How about yourself, pal? Doing good. been a lot of news this week let me ask the question i've been dying to ask you face to face without asking it directly okay we've got three significant AEW female talents that have been in the conversation this week. Word came out that Mariah May may be in a contract year.
I don't know if steady listeners of the show might flash back to some rather out-of-pocket assumptions you've made along the way about her career. Oh, I didn't think those assumptions were out-of-pocket at all. Just surprising. And then also Soraya announced that she and AEW had mutually agreed to part ways. So I'm pretty sure she just re-signed with them like a couple months ago. It hasn't been that long. And then number three.
Britt Baker has removed AEW, apparently, from her Instagram bio. At least that's according to whatever thing I clicked on. Who knows the veracity of that. If you're WWE... You're in the talent acquisition department. What's the ceiling of those three? Or let's just say, I'll give you three categories, hire, don't hire, or above hire is... Superstar. Okay. Let's do basketball terms. Sign, veteran minimum, or max contract. Okay, I like that.
I think that's actually perfect. All three of those women are people that can help your women's division, no matter what wrestling company it is. AEW, WWE, TNA. You get all three of those women. You're doing good. I'll sign Soraya to a veteran's minimum. I'd max Mariah May. And... myself and Burt Baker have some tight negotiations that eventually come down to a fair mid-level contract between both of us.
Let me talk about the max contract a little bit. I don't think anybody would deny Mariah May's value. I think everybody online, when the contract year conversation started this week, everybody was just like, back up the Brinks truck, Tony. Let's get that thing done. But in basketball terms, is it a little bit early for the max contract? I mean, that's like extending somebody off of a strong rookie year. I guess most teams would do that if they have somebody who comes out that strong.
in a perfect world or is this like hey let's just go for like let's just do two for 20 and then we'll max out your max you out on your next deal do you think she's already a max contract performer you're a max contract performer if the market deems you such Yeah. So, you know, Tony could go, hey, you know, I don't think you're worth a max yet. Let's do a 220 and we'll work it out. And Mariah May could very easily be like.
Well, they think I'm a max contract person. True. And all of a sudden, now they got to match that. And bing, bang, boom, you're a max contract player. The Mariah May stuff is mega interesting. Because it feels like when you say someone's in the contract year, we're using it in sports terms. So you sort of get the assumption that... they are beginning the contract there. Like now the negotiations have started. And I sort of get the feeling that the negotiations were kind of already happening.
I just read the, you know, folks that listen to this show, I just pick up, I'll pick up on context clues, man. I pick up on context clues. I listen to a lot of interviews, you know, I listen to, you know. There were certain things that Mariah May was saying throughout her press conferences as champion and on other interviews on Busted Open that eventually led to this, you know.
rematch this renewal of the rivalry with Toni Storm. And the way it was worded and everything that she said, I was like, Something tells me that there's a finality to this. Something feels like. This doesn't just feel like, oh, we're just going to go highly with drama and make everything dramatic. Well, you can look back at her championship reign, such as it was. It was pretty one-dimensional. It was a holding pattern for... It was a little hollow.
Yeah. Yeah. And we talked about it at the time. And at some point it became clear the entire purpose, the entire function here is the rematch, is the trilogy, you know, is the Hollywood ending. Right. So that was conspicuous. There was also the announcement on the AEW side that Mina Shirakawa has officially signed with AEW, and a lot of people said, see?
That means Mariah's sticking around because they're close in real life or because, you know, this is just the AW is now going to lock up this crazy women's division. That's not how I read it. That's not how I read it. Usually when there's some question mark news that comes out and then there's a big public statement about look at this good news.
To me, that gives validation to the negative reading of the first news, which is to say, it makes more sense to me that you're announcing the Shurikawa signing. to put some good press out there because the bad press, i.e. the potential for Mirai Mei leaving, is what you're trying to distance from or distract from. Does that make sense?
this is feeling like a mass mac man show press box crossover dave because this is Yeah, like anybody, obviously, tons of wrestling fans listen to this show, but please go listen to the Press Box with Dave when you ever get a chance to because breaking down the way not just media use media, but...
important sports figures and news makers use media, your brain's immediately going to think that. My brain immediately thought that too, Dave. As soon as that came out, I was like, oh, there's some smoke here. Might be a little fire. You know what I mean? Might be a little fire. So it's interesting, man, especially, you know, fightful. Shout out Fightful. They do great work over there. We all know that certain media people or people with large followings.
have specific preferences to the media publications that they use and talk to. And it definitely... Yeah, different wrestlers have different contacts or whatever, yeah. It definitely felt strategic. in the way they announced that. Now, I don't know what's going on contract-wise with either of these women. I'm just telling you the tea leaves that I read when it comes to these sort of things. kind of get the feeling that there might be a big shift in talent. We've seen it over and over again.
With Fightful reports, it's not a specific commentary, and then they just get a lot of the news. That when they're reporting on something, it's already a done deal. It's like any media, right? Whenever you see something on the news, that's what you learned about wartime media. When you first watch an attack that's happening on TV...
It's probably already three or four times worse than what's already happening in real time. You know what I mean? Well, I mean, worse is subjective here, obviously. But yeah, I mean... Not worse, but I mean like it's progressed already. Like the news, like you're reporting like two weeks ago's news today.
Yes, exactly. There have been a lot of times where a lot of different outlets in the pro wrestling world have reported something. Oh, WWE has interest in Ethan Page, and then Ethan Page shows up on NXT that night. Right, right, right. by the time that it leaks out, it's leaking for a reason, or it's just already done. Right? This felt like one of those to me. I think...
I'm a little bit shocked. I think the biggest issue in this whole process for me was what seemed like a relatively comparatively short-term deal that Mariah May must have signed. Although... There's some reporting that she had already signed her deal with AEW prior to her last run in stardom, and they let her go off and do that. And so some of the time elapsed on that front.
There's also the option that this was just for whatever reason just a shorter term deal. That's what she asked for. That's what they were signing at the time. Everybody thinks they know exactly what you know, the contract signing policies are for these companies. But I'll tell you, man, in the business world, those things, the things that are set in stone change every day, right? It's just, it's like one month.
you know, you're, well, I see, we saw this with Netflix. It's like, there's various, like one year it's like, Oh, like every miniseries must be as eight episodes. You know, no conversation. And the next year, it's six episodes. And the next year, it's 10 episodes. Their dad is telling them something different, right? I mean, who knows what contract Mariah may sign. So she is a free agent.
or she is in a contract. If we're getting the reporting that she's in the contract year, my guess is she's already on the verge of being a free agent and take that one step further. Why is this being reported at all? Why would she be in a contract year? Why would she be getting close to free agency? If the report is not Mariah May low-key signed a five-year AEW deal last month.
then I'm reading it as Mariah Mays gone. I kind of get the same feeling. Like if I was a betting man, it reads to me, to me the... The match between her and Toni Storm, those last two matches, felt like a write-off to me. It felt like the writing off of a character. It felt like, you know, and obviously, I'm sure things could change. I'm sure Toni could come.
you know, and somebody else could come. And I'm sure, you know, the news of this and obviously it getting out, I'm sure it could make things accelerate on either side. whether it's a possible move or her staying in AEW. Like the response to this could be like, all right, Tony, Mariah, let's sit down. Let's figure out a way to make this, you know.
extremely lucrative because I can't afford to lose you. I can see it in a way where maybe the mind was already made up months ago and there was just no changing of the minds. Yeah, there's been a lot made of Mariah Mays. pre AEW social media presence or like, you know,
taking pictures outside WrestleManias and whatever else. Roman Reigns fandom and Shield fandom and all that type of stuff. I think that kind of would apply to just about anybody, so I'm not putting too much stock in that. However... I mean, as somebody who peruses wrestling Twitter for... while like I remember Mariah May just being on Twitter like as a wrestling fan you know what I mean before I was like oh shit like she could actually wrestle so it's like um yeah I mean I don't know
I just see these things a little differently than others get to see them sometimes. And I don't know. It's going to be very interesting because if she does... make a jump over to WWE. The timing of it, again, you got to be... It's got to get you wide-eyed, man. Especially given the things that... I remember she had an interview on Busted Open.
where she was talking about that press conference where like nobody had any questions for her yep and you know she went on i don't want to call it a rant and i don't even remember why i remember this so well but like i just remember i was just in my car and i said wow this is really interesting like the way she talked about how she wants to do professional wrestling
Go back and listen to that interview if you can. Shout out to the guys at Busted Open. They do great work over there. And she was champion at this time. So the way she was breaking down how she sees pro wrestling and how she wants to tell her stories, I was like... It kind of sounds like you want to be in WWE, right? And she was champion at this time. And she had her feuds with Thunder Rosa and had some other feuds for the women's championship that, in my opinion, probably.
wasn't as good as the stuff that you did with Tony. It's a high bar. In everyone else's defense, everything's not going to be that hot. You know, everything for Roman Reigns is not the bloodline. But that said, yeah, I mean, I just go back to that whole reign just feeling a little bit suspect. She was out there doing... more press than she was doing stuff in the ring. It was just an odd thing. And we've seen AEW before when someone's on the way out the door.
just sort of... What do they call it? Quiet quitting? Is that the term? It's like quiet firing. You know? It's just like, we're just gonna do the bare minimum here. We know what the fans want to see. We know we owe this to the performers. Obviously, Tony Storm had a lot invested in it. But man, and I agree, anything could change. I mean, I don't know. We don't know what phase it's in. But like, whatever the truth is today might not be the truth tomorrow. But I'll tell you what. If you were...
a basketball GM and you have a free agent, someone's coming up and you know you got to reassign them, what do you do? You play them. You let them star. You say, let's just let Kaz go off for 30 every night so he likes... the last thing in his mind is he likes playing for our team, right?
Or they could Jimmy Butler you and be like, you're becoming a malcontent and we know you're not happy here. That's clearly not happening here, but that's another option. But we know the option that you probably don't take is you just say malcontent aside. You just say, hey, Kaz.
you're going to ride the bench for a while and we've got this brand new starting power forward named Megan Bain who we're just going to give all of your playing time to. Yeah. Not exactly the best taste in your mouth if you're in a negotiation, right? They're doing great stuff with Megan Bane. But in the context of all this, it does feel like a little bit conspicuous. The amount of shine that she's getting in the absence of Mariah May. Anyway.
Something to think about. I think we can all say with great confidence that Mariah May will be debuting at WrestleMania and interfering in the Charlotte Flair Tiffany Stratton match. I was about to say, do you think she's going to come out right after Tiffany Stratton pins Charlotte? We were talking about, damn, what are we going to do with Tiffany Stratton post-Charlotte if she wins? It makes all the sense in the world for Charlotte to just win.
and give Tiffany the chase of Chase and Charlotte, now you got this Mariah May Wild card out there where it's like, yo, what if they pull a female Cody? Like, after, you know what I mean, Tiffany and Charlotte throw it down, you know?
They put Mariah May in the Cody elevator and rises her up out of WrestleMania. That would be great if every year they had the elevator set up and it was just like, who's in the elevator? The Cody elevator is active tonight. Who's coming up out of it? You'll never know. And then, you know, maybe that's her. But I can't say it doesn't intrigue me a lot. It doesn't intrigue me a lot. Obviously, we've seen what she's done in AEW.
You kind of get the feeling, especially given her entire package as a performer, that she's kind of made for WWE. She's kind of... one of those people. There are some people who are reigniting the comparisons between her and Tiffany Stratton this week amidst all this news. And I saw some people saying, well, you already have Tiffany Stratton. Why do you don't even need Mariah May? And that is utter nonsense. You don't think the WWE would prefer to have two Cody Rhodes is right now to CM punks.
Two Rhea Ripley's, two Bianca Belair's. Yeah, you take as many as you can get. There's been no day in the history of the modern WWE where if 18... clones of The Rock walked into the PC, WWE would say, nah, we'll just take one of you. No, no, no. We're good on you. Yeah. Like, no. And the other thing is, they actually don't have that much. We're all full of LeBron's here. They don't have that much in comment. Yeah.
Yeah, we're all full on LeBron's here. That's a great line. And also, they're not actually that similar. It's a lazy comparison. I thought that's where we ended the conversation. I thought that's where we ended the conversation last time.
It's just like, man, this is a really basic-ass comparison. It's lazy. Yeah. You see blonde, you see athleticism, and you're immediately like... Well, they're both wearing a lot of pink when the conversation started, but still, it's like, you know, Charlotte and... Charlotte and Tiffany are out there brawling through the crowd two weeks ago, both wearing literally like they look like they're in a tag team matching pink gear. It's just a thing, man.
I think that they've proven already to be very, very different characters. And it doesn't even matter. If you think that that's an elite talent, you go get it. You make it work. You don't say, oh, we don't need Luka, we've already got LeBron. No, you go out there and you get the best players in the world. Yeah, and as LeBron says, don't fit in, fit the fuck out.
right like we'll figure it out around you don't change what you're doing we'll we'll make it work and that's probably what was said to mariah may when she's probably having her contract negotiations like we like you don't change for sure according to news, is that this is her free agency year. But I will bet my bottom dollar we're way past that point on the timeline. I think the term contract year...
was used very generally. Not in the same sense we use as NFL players and NBA players and yada, yada, yada. I think the term contract year was used to just say... negotiations are happening right now. Not saying, hey, we're going to find out what's going to happen in a year and all that type of stuff. I'm almost positive her contract is up.
sooner rather than later. That's what I'm saying. I think just up in general might be more of the thing that we're talking about here. We'll see. Try to do a little bit more reporting, but... We don't do reporting. We wildly speculate on this show. We let the other guys do the reporting. It's true. If I know some shit, I might come in here and drop a little nugget, but I ain't doing no reporting. That's where you get messed up.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. You don't want the responsibility. It's a great burden to have to be the reporter. Wildly speculating on the show is the best perk of this job. Two guys who are very plugged in, wildly speculating about what's going on here. From that point of view only. That's the show.
Go, go, go, go to Sean Ross Sapp and Dave Meltzer with your gripes. All right. We don't report anything here. We just wildly speculate. Just from, yes, two guys, two plugged in guys who, you know, tend to know some stuff at times, wildly speculating. It feels like there's more going on than what people are assuming. Maybe. Yeah. Anyway. What else? Anything could happen at this time of the year. But going back to the original question, Soraya and Britt Baker. Okay.
Now, the Burt Baker stuff, I did not know. I did not know that she took AEW out of her profile. To me, I wouldn't have even mentioned it except for the context of the bigger question I was asking. And also, it does feel like... You know, with the signings, with the contract years, with the whatever else, it feels like, and just watching it on TV, it feels like AEW's women's roster is sort of in makeover mode right now. Not in a bad way, but it's just like, you know.
If you were going to quietly release Britt Baker, this feels like the time to do it. Now, I don't know. I have no idea whether or not that's the truth. This is just, you know, if the... If our last conversation was rampant speculation, this is just a drunk rant from a guy in a bar. Okay. I got nothing. I got nothing on Britt Baker. But it did feel conspicuous that that news broke, everything breaking at the same time. Well, I mean, damn, you know, contracts.
work in similar time frames too so maybe it's one part it's time to redo our women's division and give it a new facelift and maybe it's another part A lot of these contracts are coming up and some people were going to negotiate to keep and some people were just going to sort of let go. Soraya sort of let the people know that she was out of here. She's releasing a book.
She launched a podcast. She spoke at length about her disappointment about not having a match with Mercedes Monet, who very famously, you know... was wrestling Soraya when she caught the injury that kept her out of action for several years. And then she spoke about that at length. And the Soraya thing is interesting because...
you kind of feel like she'll always have a place in women's wrestling just because of fighting with my family and her, you know, her, her lineage and professional. Oh, she's got that rock connection. She got that rock connection. Exactly. Florence Pugh. Florence Pugh played her. The funny shit is when Fighting With My Family first came out, Soraya was more famous than Florence Pugh. That's true. And now yesterday.
Her name's on the back of a chair announcing she's in Avengers Doomsday. Again, reprising her role as one of the Thunderbolts and Black Widow and all that type of stuff. So that's a long-winded way of me saying... It's been a long time since... Yeah, like it's been a bit... Dude, I just finished writing a piece about Charlotte Flair. It took a long time. It'll probably pop up Friday on the website.
It took a long time to write for two reasons. One, because I ended up going down the rabbit hole of Ric Flair promos, which is just a great way to kill 10 days. But also because I started watching that sort of... pre-women's revolution NXT stuff when Soraya when Paige was the champ the early main roster stuff where there was a lot of Soraya and Mercedes aka obviously Sasha Banks um
there was some there was a lot of a lot of good stuff there um and just to think about how long soraya was on the shelf i don't know
I mean, one imagines that she could work in WWE since she proved that she could work in AEW, but I don't know, man. They got doctors that... didn't want her to work before so i don't know i don't know any of that stuff when i say work i mean like i i think there's a place for her there but like so much similar to what she did before she went to aew where she was either an authority figure or you don't think there's a wrestling future for her in WWE?
I think now there is. I'm just saying I don't know if there is a more of a... I don't think you get the same return on investment that you get on a Britt Baker or a Mariah Mays signing than you get on a Soraya signing because Soraya is sort of... She crawled... from the primordial ooze of...
We're changing from divas to wrestlers, right? I remember being in the crowd when she debuted on the roster at WrestleMania. I was the loudest dude there, man. Yeah, she kind of helped kick that door open as far as like... you know, going from what was to what is. So I think she'll always have a place in WWE if that's what they choose for her to do. And probably, you know.
She probably wanted to wrestle in WWE. It just wouldn't clear her. I don't want to. Oh, she 100% did. But would they clear her now? Because she's clearly, you know, been able to work. Who knows? That's, I think, the real question. I'll tell you this, though. I don't want to make too many assumptions about some of the Britt Baker rumors that we've heard, but just hypothetically, we use the basketball analogy. Okay.
Who's a basketball player with just a sort of checkered past? But you don't know if it's a real problem or not. Let's just say this. Checkered past as far as... If you're a basketball team right now... If you are, whatever, you're the New York Knicks. Okay. Let's just say you could sign a free, you don't win the championship, you're gearing up for next year, and you can choose between LeBron James or Ja Morant.
Who do you take? I'm still probably taking LeBron James, to be honest. Because you're guaranteed. the like same like next year he's gonna add a lot to the team yes right and and from team makeup like it's so so it's a two-part question it's like i think if you're building a team
and you want somebody who's going to be a part of your franchise for a while, and you don't have a point guard, yes, you want Ja Morant, right? Even given everything that he's probably been through already, but at the same time... LeBron James is almost so much of a steadying presence that, you know... This is what I'm saying, though. It's feasible that one would make the calculation that...
even though, sure, Britt Baker's got a much longer career ahead of her and obviously has a much higher upside, you know that you could get a fun WrestleMania feud out of Soraya, a.k.a. Paige. Or SummerSlam feud. And maybe that's enough upside that that's worth whatever. That's more upside than the potential risk or uncertainty, I'll say, of signing Britt Baker.
Does that make sense? It's time and time again. I'm just saying, WWE is a championship in the best to continue this tortured basketball analogy. WWE is on the short list of NBA championship contenders. maybe you just go with the sure thing, the sure thing to just hype, just to get one or two big shows that much bigger. And.
Don't worry about the upside, especially if you're in conversations with a max contract player like Mariah May. Anyway, it's interesting. It's interesting. There's a lot of... All this news coming out at the same time, it's all sort of connected. and uh isn't it yeah it always is um yeah it's weird it's just like is this just only female wrestler free agent season is that what we're doing right now
I mean, you never know, man. The way there's still a lot of names out there that haven't popped up in a while that Raw After Mania. WrestleMania, the week after Mania, that's SmackDown. There's still lots of opportunities for these big sort of moments to happen. I feel like now... Who are you talking about? Like the Alistair Black, Nero types? Yeah, all those guys. They're still floating around. So it's like, hey, man, what did shock me?
If Raw after Mania, we see some of these guys make a debut. But, you know, this time of the year, Royal Rumble time of the year, SummerSlam, you know, the summer of trying shit. Those are usually the times that you expect these big sort of shakeups to happen, these big sort of free agent moves. So I think the women is the talk this week, but who knows?
All these vignettes that we're seeing, I'm sure by this time next week or a couple weeks after, we'll be talking about Ray Phoenix, talking about Alistair Black, talking about any of these guys. People are always going to be moving around, and it's a really interesting time.
right now, especially with WrestleMania just around the corner. Oh, is WrestleMania coming up? I heard, yeah. I think it's in a couple weeks. We got AEW Dynasty, not this coming weekend, but the following one. They're doing a nice job of building to that. And then, yeah, we got WrestleMania right around the corner. It's going to be exciting stuff. Very exciting. Check the heat meter.
We also got NXT we got to talk about, by the way, as long as we're talking about women's wrestling. Stephanie Vaquer, shockingly, is still a champ champ in NXT. Just a hell of a... Hell of a performance, man. What contract are you giving Steph? Is that a max contract right there? She might have to be a max contract. Super max? Not super max. Super max is too much. I'm not a bit, I'm not a...
You got to have some chips under your belt. Some Wrestlemania, some finals under your belt. She's got two chips around her waist right now. Those are NBA cups, right? Like I'm talking about. Love NXT. Love the NXT Women's Division. But those are NBA cups. Let's be real. The Supermax deal, man, you can't get out of that. Those are reserved for the Steph Currys, the Giannases.
The LeBrons of the world, you know, in your prime, still Max guy. But she is definitely a Max player right now. Definitely Ricky Max extension worthy. You're not even taking a second to think about it. She's so good. She's so good. She's so good as a wrestler. She was already good as a wrestler when she came in. But the way that she's captivated...
the WWE Universe so quickly. Not so much that she just wins, but like, dog, I was in that crowd for NXT Roadblock at the theater. Nobody, including the Hardy Boys. got a bigger reaction than Stephanie Vakir. Like, she is, she's got that star, she got that it factor, man. Like, she looks just different enough and is just like... And her wrestling style is just unique enough that everything she does is sort of must-see.
you know like the presentation as well like sort of the mystique coming in to wwe after that like incredible match with mercedes monet in aw like the whole talk about her going to AEW then WWE like there was already sort of like a mystique about her and not only that like you sort of like more than surpass it in less than, like, half a year. You know what I mean? Like, there's only been, what, three double champs in NXT history, I want to say? Carmelo Hayes, Keith Lee, and her.
Right? Off the top of my head. I'm sure there's others. Don't... Don't erase Mandy Rhodes. Mandy Rhodes has been very, very chirpy online because she was the NXT Women's Champ and the NXT UK Champ, I believe, at the same time. Although, obviously, the... They were kind of absorbing one into the other. A little bit of a different deal. With the North American and the Cruiserweight title. So yeah, there's been some champ champs in the NXT before. But man, two title defenses, one night.
against two... I was sure she was going to lose a second. They swerved the hell out of me. Because why else would you put the lesser championship on second except to give her a reason to lose? Mm-hmm. But it happened. They tricked me. But it happened. They're getting good at it. Very good. That was a whole lot of fun. You think Trick is leading Darkstate? I mean, it would be a hell of a swerve if he isn't.
leading them. They seem to stop attacking every time he shows up. Would be interesting to see Trick lead a stable. Especially if he wins this NXT title back and seems like a guy like Obafemi. can't be beat by one person. You know what I mean? Like a straight up victory over Obafemi doesn't really happen. Like when he lost the North American title, it was...
not just Tony D'Angelo, but it was Tony D'Angelo and the family that got involved, right? And one would assume if the plan is to send Trick back, a heel Trick Williams back with the title, putting the stable against them with him may seem like a good way to do it. But also, hey, we could be getting swerved again, and it could be some other mysterious person that we don't know pulling the strings.
causing all these attacks and ruckuses. I will say this. Dark State had a backstage promo. And Saquon Sugars, who you know from the indies. just has one of those voices, one of those personalities where you just like, you hear him talk and you're like, Oh yeah, you're going to be way over. Like he's, he's already got so much going for him. So yeah, I hope that.
Dark State, I'm not going to stop making fun of it. Dark State's a totally fine faction name. They're fine. They are fine. But I hope that they're... not just on their own it would be it would be really fun if trick williams was leading this crew you know a nice like interesting thing for him to do anyway um What else? Anything else from NXT that you want to... Javon Evans? The ascent continues. How many years before Javon Evans over under Javon Evans main events WrestleMania?
three years. Three and a half. Two and a half years. Go. Gosh. If I was running WWE, he'd be main eventing WrestleMania in five years maximum. Maximum. But man, that kid is so good. He's so talented. He's not even 21 yet. And him not backing down from Obafemi makes him... look like such a badass makes him look like more than just like a talented kid it was like oh no like he's he he belongs he doesn't seem like a guy who's just like
visiting the main event scene. When you're in the main event scene around this time of the year, standing at the liver time, they must mean they got a lot planned for you. I agree. When he first started having kind of, you know... notable matches in NXT being put in a position, it felt early. It felt like more than anything, like maybe this is just a vote of confidence. But then he's just like seamlessly transitioned into being a legit top guy.
Or, you know, borderline top guy for them. And it's pretty crazy to watch, man. Well, speaking of people, you know, being a part of factions, last night on Dynamite, MJF accepted... MVPs offered to join the Hurt Business but then out came Bobby Lashley and Shelton Benjamin and Bobby Lashley tore up the business card and seemingly reverse the black people stable what are we doing i'm just kidding i'm just kidding um
Yeah, he didn't seem to win on it. And then later they talk backstage and, you know, he spoke some truth, right? I mean, MJF's not the most reliable guy, but this is just another, another, you know. like piece of the MJF reverse engineered origin story where it's like every time he tries to make a friend, it doesn't go his way. I don't know. What do you think? Is this just a long setup for a... MJF versus Bobby Lashley feud, or what are we doing here? I like it.
I like it. I like the chemistry between MVP and MJF. The way they converse with each other, the way they talk to each other, even though they've never really crossed paths on TV outside of a couple weeks ago. They did a great job of establishing a prior relationship before AWTV. And it comes off in the way they talk to each other, right? Like, in a way that... They are both honorable scumbags, right? Like MJF and MVP both address each other as honorable scumbags.
uh honor amongst thieves whatever the phrase you want to call it like they both are about the business of this industry and not so much about the other stuff. And if you're going to get MJF back with people he can trust, I'm glad that they mentioned the last time he trusted people didn't go well.
And establishing that this won't be a friendship. This won't be something where it's like, I trust these people. I want to do business. And I like being in the business of hurting people. And as great as...
the Hurt Syndicate have been. They're over as hell. They're probably, they got like this Road Warriors energy about them when they come to the ring with the titles and they're just like... I know these guys have no shot against them, but I'm going to sit and watch them play ping pong with human beings for a couple of minutes because it's going to be awesome to watch.
Establishing MJF with them kind of immediately makes MJF a dangerous person again when it comes to the world title picture. I don't know how they get there. The tension will make it interesting, but... Yeah, there's two things I didn't like about it. One is I just couldn't help but feel like I was supposed to understand the segment with more clarity than I did. It just felt like...
We've complained about this in AEW before. It just felt like we were watching the first walkthrough a little bit. They didn't just hit it. They didn't just hit the... the outro the way they should have so I walked away and it was just like like MJF sort of had to remove himself he was like the guy saying don't hold me back but he was like backing away you know from the fight
He sort of had to remove himself from the thing, and then Lashley and MVP didn't really have their next conversation set up. It was just a very... I mean, it did a good job of establishing Lashley as an unpredictable, scary person, even to the people around him. But I just felt like I should have understood it more. Two, they would be absolutely bonkers to break up the Hurt Syndicate this early.
And so I'm not sure that I even like the seeds of dissent element of it, right? The MVP and Lashley don't get along. I mean, you can have that tension, but we can't be moving towards a real significant piece of the storyline. where we're supposed to wonder whether or not the syndicate's going to break up because there's no way they're going to do it. And if they did, they'd be nuts. You know what I mean? So that's...
That's the part that gets me. But you said that you're not going to be friends. I mean, I can imagine them at least all going suit shopping together, right? I mean, this... I'm sure they probably use similar tailors in the various towns they go to, don't you think? They got to, man. The suits is right. In many ways, like... It's a pairing that sort of makes sense. It would immediately give credibility back to MJF. Absolutely. As a world championship threat.
selfishly speaking, kind of love if the next member of the Hurt Syndicate wasn't a black guy. There's a small part of me that's kind of like... I'm not mad at the next member of the Hurt Syndicate not being what everyone expects it to be, right? Like, as soon as they came back, oh, it was a ricochet. Oh, Mercedes. Oh, maybe you go get...
Queen Amanada, Cedric Alexander, like all these other people. It's like... I still want to see Cedric, just because of the history. And he's great. But yes, I agree. But honestly...
I don't know the type of balls they have as far as storytelling is concerned. But there's a great story to be told with MJF, a Jewish kid from New York, hanging out with a bunch of tough ass... athletically gifted black men and basically do they avoid doing the easy thing Do they avoid just turning these guys into MJF's muscle and then MJF becomes the mouthpiece and these are just three guys standing behind him?
You know what I mean? Do they avoid doing the easy thing? Do they go into the uncomfortable part of the dynamics of that relationship to make that some really good TV? And that's the interesting part about it. It was very, it's such, God, it's such an easy thing for wrestling fans to just, well, let's just put all the black guys together and call them something. Like, no.
It was interesting when Owen Hart was in the Nation of Domination. That's exactly what I was about to say. You know what I mean? It was interesting when that happened. It was like, okay, this is different. There's a great Chris Rock bit, a Dave Chappelle bit. back in the day when Dave Chappelle was like, if you ever see a bunch of black guys hanging around in a tough neighborhood, there's always that one white dude that's hanging out with them.
And that one white dude is the most dangerous white dude that you will ever come across because there's no telling what that white man has done to gain those black dudes respect. And... There's going to be somebody that he's going to talk to the police when they get pulled over. Classic Dave Chappelle bit. What's MJF going to do to get Bobby Lashley's respect? To get Shelton Benjamin's respect?
to get them to see him the way MVP sees them. That's the interesting part about it. That's why I'm like, you know what? I'm glad they're not going the easy, well, let's just throw another black guy into the group and just put them all together. Like, no, MJF's a top guy.
He's a guy that makes the Herb Syndicate, an already interesting group, more interesting because of that dynamic. And I want to see if they're going to go there and really talk about it and really discuss the dynamics of what that relationship could be. and see if they can have fun with it. As a guy who grew up around a lot of New York Jewish guys, I know MJF. I know those type of guys. You know what I'm saying? And it's not...
out of the blue for a guy like MJF to have a ton of black friends, right? So it'll be really interesting to see if they go there with that, which I think they will, but we'll see. We'll see. I just assume that you're speaking from inside knowledge here. No, no, no. Know nothing? I never speak from inside knowledge. I don't know nothing. Dave? Anything you hear here is what? Wild speculation. Wild speculation. That's all. I know nothing. What did you think about the Usos reuniting on Raw?
Jimmy, do you think that introducing Jimmy into this storyline, do you think that actually weaponizing, making use of the J keeps tripping and falling and botching stuff is one? Do you think this was the plan all along, or are they just retconning it? Or then two, do you think it's a good idea? I hate when this happens, right? Because I always tell people... If something's bad, you don't talk about it. You're just like, you're indifferent to it. Right?
And no matter what people say about, oh, Jay should win the Royal Rumble, or oh, he's not even a good wrestler, or oh, he's this, he's a yeet merchant, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Yeet merchant? A yeet merchant, a catchphrase merchant, whatever they call it. No, I love that. I just never heard that. That's great. Whenever people say that, I will always say, like, listen.
If you really didn't like Jey Uso, it's not that you don't like him. It's just that he makes you feel something, which is the job of a professional wrestler at the end of the day. The job of a professional wrestler is to make you feel something. And the WWE Universe, whether it be online, whether it be in person, they make you feel a way about Jey Uso one way or the other.
And if a lot of the talk was about self-doubt, about not being ready, about being overmatched, going up against a guy you lost a bunch of times to, and on top of that, the online discourse is about... Well, this guy's not even, I mean, gosh, he's not even that great of a wrestler. He's just this, this, that, and the third. And he had a little happy accident in the middle of a show, right?
Why wouldn't you use all this stuff? Why wouldn't you use all of it? Doesn't that go against what you just said? If it's bad, you don't mention it? No, I mean, if you're a fan. If it's bad, you don't mention it. The fact that everybody had a take on Jey Uso lets you know you are getting market research in real time. Use it. Make it real. if people are talking about jay uso can't do this that the third use that self-doubt about him
Let him slip on the spear. Let him do all this, that, and the third. And then when you start seeing, oh, oh, God, they're turning us into a storyline now that he missed the dive or whatever. Well, what did you expect me to do? You guys spent hours upon hours online talking about everything you like and dislike about Jey Uso. And now you're going to question or get upset that the people putting the stories together.
are using that free market research you're giving them to help ensure a world championship storyline in the biggest show that they have of the year. Oh, I'm sorry about that. I think it was perfect that Jimmy Uso. was the tag team partner. There was talk about like Joe Hendry being the tag team partner. I'm just like, that for what? That doesn't make any sense. Who would the hell else? I don't get that at all.
There's already enough people involved. Who the hell else would Jey Uso call? Who the hell else would Jey Uso call to be a stat team partner? I guess there are some people making the, you know, complaining that they just sort of... that reuniting the Usos was potentially such a huge moment, and then they sort of squandered it by just having it be a random surprise partner moment. But, you know, they're on their European tour. They were never separated.
jay was just doing their thing you know what i mean and whether it's the bloodline whether it's a survivor series matchup like when they cross paths with each other like it would make sense for them to still be in it and It wasn't squandered because after the match, Jimmy and Jay talking was the pivot, if you want to call it that. The most interesting thing that's happened in this feud so far.
That was the emotional pull that you're getting from that story. It's like the one person who knows you best is talking life into you. This is what he needs at this moment in time. to let people know that he's still capable of doing the impossible and Who doesn't love seeing the Usos together? They've got to be together all the time. I'm repeating someone else's complaint. That's not one of mine. I'm still...
Listen, I'm glad that they're acknowledging it too. And I think that including Jimmy could very well be a step in the right direction. I just don't know. really what the plan is to make this a more compelling match in general you know what i mean like well it's compelling to me now he can't now
We've actually, you know, they could make us buy that it will be a shock if he wins, I guess, if he keeps effing up enough, if he keeps falling down enough. By the way, what do you think when we're doing interviews at WrestleMania? picture yourself in the hotel conference room we're sitting there with the microphones and whatever else and we let's just say we're interviewing jake we have we interviewed jay with some frequency yes
You think it's a done deal that he does like a pratfall and falls out of his chair when he comes in just to sell the clumsiness bit? Oh, God. I really hope not. I really hope that. I can totally see him doing that. It'll be hilarious. If he messes up his yeet, that's when I'm like, okay, it's gone too far. If he's yeeting and he slips down the stairs or something like that, I'm like, all right, guys.
No, it's just silly. But the yeeting, the yeeting has, I sound so funny when I say that, the yeeting has never been the problem, right? Oh, I make a yeet till the cows come home. It's so funny. It's like if he were booked to, as like a money in the bank winner. If somehow he just was a surprise opponent for Gunther at WrestleMania, people would be so freaking excited for him to win. Of course. With the rumble and everything, I mean, I think...
I'm going to write about this too, but I don't know yet what I'm going to say. It is, it's just missing something, you know, like it's just a very, I think I said this on worldwide or a piece of this, but like going through is a very, you know, old school heel.
And this feels like a very old school feud in the sense that it's just like, you know, the plucky fan favorite baby face like has to dig down deep and overcome the odds and whatever else. But it's just there's not a lot of there there. You know, I.
I don't know what... Hopefully they're on their way to tell me a story that I'm really going to enjoy. Well, they are telling a story. Overconfidence versus underconfidence. You know, like the story of... the story of jay's been being told for the past four years like That's true. Calling himself main event Jey Uso. Which, like I said, a whole lot. But the main event thing has always been a little bit ironic. And there was a weird moment where everyone just pretended that it wasn't.
He's so over now. He's a real main eventer. He's not. He called the main event Jey Uso because his cousin dragged him into a compelling storyline. And Jey had a lot to do with it. You know what's going to be funny? You know what's going to happen? Jey Uso is going to win that world title. He's going to walk to the back or he's going to walk to the top of that ramp. And who's going to be waiting for him?
If you say the rock. Roman Reigns. Okay. The guy's not fighting for a title, not doing anything. Once he acknowledges that we're still, I'm still waiting for Roman to truly acknowledge Jay. And the day that happens... But shouldn't that be part of the story that they're telling instead of just having it be like a treat for WrestleMania? I mean, it just... i think it will i think it will but boy would it be hilarious if roman goes and acknowledges jay you know what i mean
And then just spears him off the fucking stage. And is like, I want your title now. That would be great. If you go right into Roman versus Jay, you're already... If Roman just shifts his attention to the World Heavyweight Championship... You do the triple threat on night one in this fantasy booking scenario and then you have that happen on night two? Night two, yes, yes, yes. And then you have Roman be like, all right, I want this now. That would be awesome. Okay, well.
So that's not going to happen, I feel like. So now you're just raising my expectations. So I blame you. The more that I dislike this feud, the more I'm blaming you. Now you're my target. I fully can see. Roman and Jay leading Netflix Raw with the World Heavyweight Championship, and then you slide Gunther over to SmackDown to chase whoever the world WWE champion is, whether that be Cody, whether that be Cena, that could be whoever. Yeah.
Roman and Jay. If Jay wins the World Heavyweight Championship, Roman and Reigns need to be that first feud. What if Roman helps him win? Someone helps him win. Nah, he can't. He can't help him win. Jay's got to get this on his own. Jay cannot have... any sort of malarkey happened where he doesn't. Well, not this version of him. Sure. No, no, no, no. But yep. I saw somebody theorizing online that Jay might be part of the rock stable.
Is the stable even a thing? Like, we haven't even... addressed it seeing it been talked about since the we don't know if the rock and in wwe like storyline continuity we don't know what the if the rock even still exists like it you're right we have no idea but If there is a bigger story to tell about The Rock trying to not just get Cody's belt, but to get all the belts under his control, you can start...
drawing lines between you know did cena let did cena let jay win the royal rumble were they working together a little bit i mean also you could draw lines in the other direction like all of these royal At the Royal Rumble and at the Elimination Chamber, Seth Rollins seems to be inadvertently helping The Rock's cause, right? Taking out Roman Reigns. eliminating CM Punk, stomping CM Punk so that he can get the win. I don't know. There's a lot of potential heels going on.
healing. There's a lot of potential conspiracies that might come to fruition. Naomi's a heel. The New Day's a heel. John Cena's a heel. Where's the good guys gone, man? I mentioned this in the group chat, and I guess we got to say it. Bianca Belair, not a heel, although being treated somewhat disrespectfully by the European crowds at times. Should we discuss? Is this the appropriate forum for this sort of conversation?
I've only got a couple of minutes left before we got to split, but I definitely want to address this. Bianca Belair has done nothing heelish in this entire ordeal. Yeah, through the majority of this European tour. And for some reason, every time Bianca Belair leaves the continental United States. Yeah, I think that's important. She gets booed. And I, for one... cannot understand why. And European crowds and overseas crowds are traditionally one of the most loud, vocal, engaged.
wrestling audiences anywhere. So they're not just booing just to boo. There is a specific reason why they do anything in unison. And the fact that Bianca kept getting booed... It makes me uncomfortable. I don't like it. Yeah, it makes me a little bit uncomfortable, too. Anybody who watches football or soccer sees the way crowds react to certain black talent.
You know what I mean? Black performers, black athletes. Guys on their own teams. On their own teams. And it's not just me being a... a karen or a pearl clutcher like oh my god he can't boom or whatever but it's like i can't ignore this this is what this is what the crowds have done traditionally You know, this is more than one occasion. It's weird. I get it. Maybe they're just big Rhea Ripley fans out there. But it does just seem sort of just uncomfortable and conspicuous. There's never been...
A bigger baby face than Bianca Belair. And specifically in this situation, she has done nothing wrong. Yeah, as much fun as we can speculate about a Bianca heel turn would be. This isn't even a situation where the crowd has been seen dying for her to turn heel for so long, so we're just going to boo her to try to actualize that. It just kind of feels like... I mean, really, I don't know. Hopefully, maybe a listener can explain. Somebody who was there, somebody who would, I mean...
Somebody talk to me. Tell me. If you were in the crowd. Tell me this isn't good old fashioned soccer fan. Soccer racism. Doing like cartoon monkey. imitations, like soccer racism. Tell me that's not what this is. I'm not saying that it is. I don't understand a lot of shit that goes on these European tours.
I don't know what they're chanting, what they're singing. Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe I'm wrong. If there's somebody that was in that crowd that listens to this show, you hit me up. You DM, you at me, you put me on game. Let me know what... why Bianca Belair gets booed specifically outside of the United States. I'm open. Yeah, I mean, for all we knew, she came out before the show went on the air and said, you people shut up. You know, like, I don't know. We don't know. I don't know, but...
It's weird. It's weird. Can't act like it's not. As long as we're talking about things that people are offended by, I think that counts as real offense. El Grande Americano? Should we be? There are people who are taking exception to this, although I'm not quite sure that they're real people. Are you offended by Chad Gable or whoever that is working a luchador gimmick, working a Mexican luchador gimmick in the year 2025?
No, because it's supposed to be... I don't think I'm the person who's allowed to be offended or not offended by this, but I thought we were all under the assumption that it's supposed to be silly and it's supposed to be a joke. it's a like yeah like we I wasn't offended. And I think there's some people that watch wrestling now, especially WWE, that watch stuff trying to be offended. I think you're right. It gets...
it gets to be a lot at some times. Unless Dominic Mysterio comes out and says, this is offensive to my culture. That's what I'm saying. It's not up to me to decide if it's offensive or not. I don't think there's anybody that's proclaimed offense that's saying it's actually like...
claims to be speaking for latino culture i mean it's just a fucking silly thing man i mean i don't know i'm not the person to be offended by either so i don't want to get too deep in it but i do need generally when someone calls something offensive my my reflex is to say okay, well, who's offended by it? You got to point at that person. You can't just say something's offensive. Someone has to be offended for it to be offended. I don't want to be offended on somebody else's behalf.
Yeah, is what I'm saying. Like being offended on someone else's behalf, that's a taxing job. And I got enough stuff to worry about to be offended by case in point, our last conversation. But I wasn't. I'm probably more offended by the use of artificial intelligence. Maybe as far as the artwork is concerned, there's definitely some six-fingered folks in that crowd.
You know, like, so maybe I'm more offended that, you know, folks and big businesses aren't using actual artists to create these sort of things anymore and just sort of... Oh, I thought you meant you were offended they were applying that Mexican people have six fingers. But yes, you're right. That's...
I don't know. No, I agree. I agree about the AIR. If it's offensive, you got to find a person who's truly offended by it. And I'm pretty sure... we're under the assumption that this is supposed to be a silly thing that we're all supposed to laugh at and not take seriously you know so that's that's why i was like offensive it's not supposed
supposed to be silly, but hey, man, I'll be wrong. I love any gimmick where the announcers are just like, we all know who that is under the mask. Oh, yeah. Like Elijah and Elias? That was one of my favorite Kevin Owens stuff, man. That was hilarious. That's always fun. The Patriot with Hulk Hogan. No, no. Mr. America. Mr. America. Sorry about that. Yeah. I always won. The Patriot Del Wilkes was a real dude.
Another white guy wearing a Lucha mask. You remember the Patriot? Remember his WWE run? Calling it the Gulf of America was a little stiff. That was a little aggressive. That was a little aggressive. That was one where you're like, I hope somebody fed Cole that line, despite the fact that he doesn't have somebody in his ear anymore. But yeah, I think that's just more evidence that we're not supposed to take this 2-2 seriously.
Although it's, I mean, I guess the problem, I mean, not the problem, but I guess the issue is even if this is just a bit and it's just supposed to be funny and everybody's like chuckling about it backstage and it doesn't really matter. The problem that you... The risk that you run in the world of pro wrestling is that it's going to work and work on such a level that it necessarily loses its irony. You know what I mean? This is already...
By the time we get to WrestleMania, we're probably going to have Chad Gable moreover than he's ever been by a lot because he's wearing this mask. And then at some point, the grande Americano has got to challenge for a world title or for some big title.
And it's like, it's not like Muhammad Hassan, that was an outlier, but there's some parallels there in the sense that it's like, that we started this was like, we started this as a kind of in-depth, thoughtful... meta character and then as soon as it becomes mainstream it devolves into being a one note gag right and maybe it is possible that
as silly as any people complaining about El Grande Americano so far are, it might turn out that they're right in the end. Because it might get so monotonous and... unthoughtful that it just becomes offensive. But who knows? I think we're going to be okay here. This feels like an okay one to me. There was a lot of talk that people said
There's folks offended by El Grande Americano that love El Generico. As somebody who loves El Generico, is that a fair assessment? I am more... I think I said this before. I am personally... more offended by the fact that this probably rules out El Generico ever being in WWE. That bothers me a lot more. But that's the wrestling nerd of me. If there was enough people that weren't offended by this, we would have been fantasy booking an El Generico WrestleMania match with El Grande Americano today.
I'm still holding out hope that I mean not holding out hope I still think there's a non-zero chance that El Generico was like the dude in Mexico but I am stuck in a weird world of fantasy booking
I'm still thinking WrestleMania is about three weeks away. There's no real clear-cut Sami Zayn plans. Where is Sami Zayn? We don't know. You think there's a world where Sami Zayn was... tired of the super serious, super melodramatic bloodline storyline and wanted to get back into his slapstick WrestleMania comedy bag like he did. with Jackass and Johnny Knoxville a few years ago when he absolutely stole the weekend with that match. I can't be thoroughly convinced that like, yo.
Maybe Sami Zayn was like, ah, man, Kevin Owens, Bloodline, I've done so much serious stuff over the past several years at WrestleMania. Let's just do some fun shit again. Show-ending question of the week. If Triple H came to you and he's like, here's your two choices. You're Sammy Zane. Here's your two choices. You versus Kevin Owens again in a ladder war, except we found bigger ladders. These ladders go all the way up.
All the way to the stop of the Legion Stadium. Yeah, Legion Stadium room. Or we can bring back El Generico and have you wrestle a two white guys playing Mexican guys Lucha versus Lucha or Lucha de Apuestas match. Oh, that's what it should be. Just do a Lucha de la Puesta's match. Somebody's got to lose their mask. And it's El Generico versus El Grande Americano. I'm tapped in. Tapped.
I think I would choose the comedy route over the how big of a ladder can you be pile driven off of. And you can pull off comedy in three weeks. Like, they've already... put this much, there's already a Sami Zayn, Chad Gable storyline that's been built. Last year, Sami Zayn and Chad Gable were attached at the hip heading into WrestleMania for this Intercontinental title match.
Have them have another match here. Put it on a pre-show. That's what they're doing with Drew and Damian Priest. It's just like addressing some drama from a year ago. We need a very good cooldown match, people. Whatever that cooldown match is going to be before we get to Cena, Cody, or that triple threat, or whatever it is. It's got to be a feel-good joint. El Generico. El Grande Americano. Lucha de la puestas match. Loser loses mask.
Let's make it happen. And then a bunch of actual luchadors come out and just be like, this is actually wildly offensive to me and my culture. Yeah, exactly. Stop this match right now. Rey Mysterio's got to come out and just be like, no, guys, no. Just no.
Just stop. Stop all of this. Halfway through the match. That could be really awesome. It would be awesome, too, if they were going to have that match as much as I'd love to see it live. They should do it as a... pre-tape do it as a cinematic style match but no I don't want extra special effects extra camera angles I just want them to film it in like the arena of Mexico and broadcast it in like grainy
footage over the Jumbotron at WrestleMania. That could be awesome. Anyway, I think we just booked the best possible WrestleMania match ever. So here's what we know for sure. There will be a Lucia de Puestas match between El Generico and El Grande Americano at WrestleMania. We know for sure that Mariah May will be debuting coming up to Cody Elevator. Is there anything else we know for sure about WrestleMania coming off of this crazy week?
I mean, clearly Stone Cold Steve Austin is going to wrestle too, right? Oh, Seth Rollins and Jey Uso are joining the Rock Stable. I think we can say that with confidence. Yeah. The day of wild speculation has commenced. Let the wild rumpus begin, as they say. Kaz, you want to get your plugs down the way out?
Yes, sir. A new episode of 7 p.m. in Brooklyn is out right now. Myself, Monica McNutt, Rudy Gay, Carmella Anthony, the Kid Mero. Check it out. Great stuff there. Catch me on Fanatic Sportsbooks. Wiley Mania tickets are on sale right now. huge announcement coming this week regarding Wale Mania. When I say huge, they'll get no huger than this, people. Get your tickets. Andre the Giant's going to be there?
Yes. Yes. Damn it. You ruined it. You ruined my announcement, Dave. But yes, big announcement coming up this week. Jeff Hardy, special guest of honor. Can't wait to honor him. But man. Get your tickets there. Live Masked Man Show pod. Biggest party of the weekend. It's going to be so much fun. And also, check out my podcast, Say Less with Kaz O'Kee and Rosie. Thank you, Kaz.
Um, you can find me here. You can find me on the press box. You can find me on worldwide on this very feed. You can find me on the ringer.com where I continue to be a writer. Once again, I wrote about John Cena. I wrote about Seth Rollins. I got a piece about Charlotte that'll be up Friday. Check out Oliver Lee Bateman's amazing piece on the natural disasters. We're going into the WWE Hall of Fame. Hell yeah. That's on TheRinger.com. We write about wrestling.
Thank you to our producer, Brian H. Waters. Thanks to our EP, Ben Cruz. Thank you all for listening. Finn Balor's going to be okay. We'll see you back here next week, Humanoids. Peace.