INTERVIEW CLASSIC: Ex-WWE Creative Team member John Piermarini: Deconstructing Total Divas premiere, working with McMahon on creative, more

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Wade Killer interviews one of pro Wrestling's newsmakers ten years ago. This month, I had a reality TV show producer and x WWWE creative team member on the show to deconstruct the premier episode of Total Divas. That's John Piermarini, who has experience working behind the scenes in WWWE with some of the people on that show and also worked for America's Got Talent on network television. You might still

be there. Actually. We also had more insight from him on working with fitstick Man on the creative process, including advice on how to present ideas to him. He also analyzed how to be changed from his perspective since he was there in the two thousand nine twenty ten period. He also reacted to the Restomania twenty nine by rate, looked ahead to WrestleMania thirty, and much more with live callers and email questions. This is the Wade Keller Pro Wrestling Podcast

Interview Classic for Friday, August eleventh, twenty twenty three. This interview originally live streamed on August second, twenty thirteen, again ten years ago this month. Here we go with this fascinating and full of insight interview which John pier Marine. Welcome to the p wtrche live tast I am Wade Keller, Editor and publisher of the Pro Wrestling Torch newsletter since nineteen eighty seven, still mailed up round the world worldwide once a week and also available in PDF and a'll

text formative VIP members at at the PW Torch VAP website. Also editor of the Pwtorch dot com websites nineteen ninety nine and the PW Torch apps since two thousand and nine, available on pretty much all smartphone app store devices and also host of the pw Torch webcast for over three and a half years in counting. We are here every single day, Monday through Friday. We're here Tuesday through Friday at five thirty Eastern for an hour or so, and Monday's in

the hour leading into Raw. This is Friday, so therefore it is Interview Friday and our guest today and just a couple of minutes, it's going to be John Piermarinio, returning guest of the program to talk about current events in WWE, including the Total Divas program and also the latest Sava swe We'll look ahead to Wrestle many A thirties line up, look back at the rest of many a twenty nine VIY rate with all the financial information that came out yesterday

in World Wrestling Entertainment's quarterly financial statements, plus look at SummerSlam, the push of Danielbrian to the top, and more. A lot has happened since John Piermarini was a writer on the creative team in ww E a few years ago, and we'll get his take on what he of things today. But first we hear a little background noise because we're gonna be joined briefly by a familiar

voice. Torch senior columnist Bruce Mitchell, who is live on location this weekend since yesterday and through the weekend at the annual mid Atlantic Wrestling fan Fest convention. Bruce, are you there? Yes, I am excellent. What's going on there at the convention? Who are some of the names? And to share a couple of stories with us. Let's say, just watched the sitting in the lobby watching magnun Ta catch up with mister wrestling number two. Magnam

Ta is probably one of the big highlights of this so far. They question an answer about the equipment match at Starcade in nineteen eighty five between Maguntia and Tully Blanchard and to see those two on the stage with their history. Of course, matt sis been put on a lot of w DVDs, including the WV Cage Match TV because it's such an intense match to say and well remembered.

But those two, you know, Magnantier was in a car crash and then his wrestling career, and to see how well he's doing and I don't mean physically, although he's doing well physically compared to what he's been in the path, but to see how how grunt, how he's accepted what's happened to him and did very responsible to what he's done with his family, what he's

done with his business, and how he how he handled himself. And the fact that these two Magnantia is married to Tully Blancher's ex wife and has raised two of Tully Glancher's children as as a stepfather. And so, you know, you never really know that such a personal thing, you never really know

how that goes. And clearly they've had a long path, a long difficult path, but they come to a place where, you know, the whole world's full of different types of families and all kinds of blended families, and they have clearly come to the other side and appreciate and respect each other. And both were talking about that and a pretty amazing thing to see. That was definitely the highlight you know so far, you know, and Tolly Glance

would do it. You know, it's not had had an easy life since he left the mainstream of wrestling doing well just what you know, lots of folks Tommy Richard, in a few minutes, it's gonna be the hall of Heroes banquet, Lawrence Anderson, one of the Anderson the one of the original Anderson brothers, were returning to this area for the first time in thirty years. Lock and All Express, Midnight Express, Jim Cornette left thatcher, Jerry

Jarrett here and then tonight. It's something I'm really excited about. You know, we helped with the Kickstarter campaign for the documentary Jim Crockert Promotions, The Glory Days, and I mean Michael Elliott, the director, the producer about it. I mean literally got it done at the at on midnight a week and a half ago to get so that they could be produced and ready for this for the thing. And you're writing a newsletter column exactly the deadline.

Yeah, and exactly and and and hopefully go as a results that I come up with. But you know the first time that Jim Crockett and David Crockette have talked on on record about Jim Crocker promotions, about their father, about the whole promotions, about everything that happened, including the end, and you

know, a premiere a movie. And I helped with this movie. So I'm really I really, I mean I really hope not just because of that's just it's a subject I think that deserves deserves but I you know, to see that tonight ought to be a bit, you know, ought to be a big thing. So it's a public screening, Bruce. So people who are listening to us live and in the air and live in the area, they can actually get out there still and and uh see maybe okay, I

would say maybe. I mean, it just depends you you got to got to buy a DVD or you have to do you have to be part of

the kickstarter program or isn't it okay? Alright like that, So and of looking on just lots of lots of different wrestlers from a lot of different times around and talking a lot of the writers and authors of some of the books to So yeah, definitely definitely did some contact with that, talking to people and and doing that the tomorrow tomorrow's some wrestling with Davy Richards and then he Edwards and there was a four day there was a four day training with Tom

Pritchard and Jeffy Riska involved with a lot of the wrestlers and just really interesting what Bruce, what city, what city is it in? And and is it and it's every the first weekend of August every year. I think it's gonna be that it's in Charlotte, North Carolina at the University Hilton. I should say that they owe Anderson here just you know, it's one of the fishs. You look around and go, hey they're so and so, Hey

is that who I think it is? And and see a lot of people like walking the street to Bella and seeing movie stars, except it's wrestlers in your as you're wrestling fan. Yeah, if you're wrestling fan and you know who the people are, so it's yeah, they definitely and then just a lot of people from a lot of errors of professional wrestling. So how many years has it been this convention been going on? Drews nine years? Yeah,

it's like the nine one in one more year. So our friend Jim Valley, who we had on the first time meeting him, flew all the way from from Washington State to be here and so he's you know, mostly to meet you and enjoined it. I don't know about that, but definitely liked this quality wality can so yeah, it's pretty cool. You know, a pretty cool deal on that's pretty that's we'll see so well, but yeah, I know I know I'm missing stuff, but I know I'm missing like

some of the some of the other highlights. But but you know, this is a banquet just a few minutes and I or I'd be doing more for this starting at six o'clock. And and that's always you know, you know, in different tables, everybody gets to sit with with somebody famous and talk to them and interact with them. And oh yeah, I should say, our friend J. J. Dillon say, oh great, I guess on

the show. We just got a really nice email, Bruce, from somebody who saw J. J. Dillon at that Medicine Score Garden show and I think maybe the first wrestling show I ever went to. And he remembered that card as well as JJ did, and uh just emailed how special it was to hear JJ tell that story and he wanted to thank you for asking a great question. Oh cool, Well, JJ was, you know, really appreciative of being on the show. And Scott Tell, who published the book,

thank us. They definitely got some worse. So I'm glad to hear that. People, you know, just an excellent book. So Russell Rustlers are like seagulls James J. Dillon's store, So I you know, I try not to recommend stuff that's not that's not really good, and if you're trying to, I do, I go out of my way not to exactly. Yeah, yeah, so interesting. Thank you for subscribing to the weight Keller Progress podcast and weight Keller Pro Wrestling post shows. Don't forget we got

a whole lineup of other shows called the PW Torch Daily Cast. It's free. Just search p w torch in your podcast stapp a different show on a different topic throughout the week, including shows dedicated to a E W n X, T M M, A Ring of Honor, and more. Just search PW Torch in your podcast stapp, or check out links to the latest shows at our main website, pwtorch dot com. Well, good for We've got John Vimrini on the line. We're gonna shift gears and talk current events about

WWE. But it's cool to have you on location at a one of the bigger, longer running wrestling conventions with a great gathering at names than I look forward to hearing your report on the Bruce which Alato show for. Well, you should wait till we have Spruce. Okay, go ahead, go ahead, Just want to figure about this play your point announce for still the Nain Wrestling with Midcarrch. I'm trying to think of thanks. Thanks for waiting for me to finish the plug in start that breaking news. Yeah, so as

I'm sure so we will. We will talk to you more about the convention on the Bruce Mitchel Audio Show for VIP members this weekend, and then you'll be hosting with Travis Bryant on Monday, this very show in the hour leading up to raw and so live cast listeners can also get a summary version of

what we talk about on the Bruce Mitchell Audio Show this weekend. Once you're done with the convention, so very cool and having the convention, will some seats or planet here the convention will find their way into the livecast on the interview Friday. So yeah, absolutely, especially with a documentary out, we're gonna want to you know, supplement that and augment it with some good guests.

Yeah. Excellent. Bruce Mitchell senior column us for Pro Wrestling, Torch Newsletter and twtorch dot Com and audio co host of Well the Star of the Bruce Mitchell Audio Show for VIP Members. He has been with The Torch since nineteen ninety. Bruce, thanks for joining us, and we'll talk to you over the weekend and also on Monday, you'll be hosting the live cast.

Good deal, fright? Thanks prettymu all right, and now we shift gears to uh mister John Pierre Marini, former WWE creative Team member in two thousand and nine and twenty ten. Is that right, John? Yep, that's right. And man, it's that felt like this yesterday and now it's starting to feel like a long time ago, isn't it. It's strange. Yeah, you know, I was just I was just going through a box that

I had in my garage. I had a buddy over and want to see if I had anything that I could give them, And I was looking through a box and I saw some notes from a production meeting. God, I don't even remember half of the stuff that I wrote down. So it's starting to as much as it feels like yesterday, I'm losing all the memories. Yeah. Yeah, Well, I mean, what are you up to these

days? We don't You're on the show a lot. We talk about wrestling, but anything to share about what current projects or jobs or different things you're doing post wrestling, Yeah, you know, I got a independent movie that I wrote that's going through the final stages of funding right how so hopefully beginning of the year we start with that. I think that we are going to

start casting here in the next month or so. Got a TV pilot that hopefully, again at the beginning of the year, I'll be able to start pitching around. So a couple of things, a couple of things around the turn. So hopefully they they both work out and uh, and it'll be good, very good, good good see things that are happening. Well, let's shift gears. You have On the show before, talked about reality show ideas spinoffs from uh for ww A to add to their programming and get fans

or the universe a different perspective on WWE. What what were your thoughts watching Total Divas this Sunday. You know, uh, typical reality show. I mean it's it's uh, it's a typical show that you would be you know, based around uh, you know, in the vein of Kardashians and and

all the all the rest. Yeah, you know, I think it's uh, it's about w w E Divas, But you know, I think that they're trying to push more so than their first life over the wrestling storyline, because Hollywood isn't a very big wrestling fan, so I think you're gonna tend to see more stories orchestrated around and share personal lives than you will around the river playing rink, John, we're getting a decent amount of background noise.

Not sure if there's anything you can do to correct it, because it's colorable, but but we're definitely hearing strange noise of the background that might get distracting. I held that. Let me try to switch that sure things, Sure Things. The from been all asking a question too, are you doing that the for the It's so hard for me when watching that show to imagine somebody watching it who's not a wrestling fan or very very casual fan, you know, kind of sort of a way who who John Seen is, but maybe

not anybody else that kind of thing. How about you from watching that show? Did that come across as and it maybe it's hard for you too, but did it come across with the show that would fit on E schedule? Where like I don't need to into rich housewife, you don't have to be in a rich housewife to enjoy watching them kind of in a voyeuristic way.

Was this a good reality show that that that was mainstream enough that you think it'll hold the pretty solid rating or good rating it did on Funday, you know, and that's where you know, I kind of bring back the you know there there probably won't be a lot of wrestling related storylines in it. I think that typically, you know, the female audience that watches reality shows, you could put anything on TV and they're gonna watch it, you know,

anyone that's been proven every reality show that's on there. It could be the absolute craziest thing and they're watching it. But I think that it has the opportunity to hold the rating. Again, I think that they're going to go away from the wrestling as much as they can while still kind of keeping it true to here's a story about you know, girls that work for WWE. But I think you're going to see a lot more storyline sort of produced

around you know, their personal life. Again, it's not it's not a coincidence that every girl on the show has a boyfriend, while you know, some divas are absent that that may not. So I think that kind of tells you where they're head at as far as where they're looking to go with the storylines. Was there anything about it that you felt, for a wrestling fan, broke the narrative unnecessarily, you know, bro bro because to me,

I mean, there's certain things that just came across as orchestrated. And that's obviously part of reality TV, probably more so than most reality TV fans want to be told they're realized, they'd kind of like, you know, ignorance is bliss. I don't need to know that scene with Stage and I'm kind of enjoying it. But you know, in Italia, finding out that you wasn't gonna be on WrestleMania, for instance, the weekend over WrestleMania, you know, for any WWW fan, they could tell that was you know,

pretty orchestrated. It might have been a re enactment of something six weeks earlier, but it was certainly white. I mean, John, you were there. Did anybody ever find out they were not going to be on WrestleMania's line up the weekend of WrestleMania? No? Absolutely not. I mean, and here's the thing too, is you know, especially with WrestleMania, there's so much build around almost every single match. I mean, there was a

writer assigned to every match on the card. So you knew leading up to WrestleMania for sure, WrestleMania at least that you know whether you'd be on the card or not. Now, what reality TV is is famous for is the re enactment. You know, there's been reality TV shows that I've worked on where they'll go back three four weeks in the past and kind of say, hey, you know, remember when this happened. We didn't quite you know,

get really a reaction out of that, or you weren't around. So we'd like to put you guys, you know, sit you down at lunch and and how do you guys talk about what's something that happened three weeks ago? So the thing with Natty, and it's a guess, but it's an educated guest, would be that that was something that they created for the show.

And again trying to come up with, uh, distinguishing who's who on the show, you know, and and like with the Bella's and uh, the what the other girls, the funk what are they called funkadactobacto, you know, doing the whole you know, go get me champagne. You know, we're gonna show that we're the veterans here, the rookies, and then you've got Natalia who's kind of on the outs. You know, that's that's all E right there, trying to give everybody a character and sort of a

place and on the show. So a lot of that stuff. Again, with any reality TV show, whether it's about wrestling or not, it's going to be very very, very very produced. It was one thing that I learned, uh, you know, with my days at MTV was that, you know, networks are very firm on look, we're not going to put anything on TV that we can't control, especially the outcome. So you know, they're not just gonna blindly follow around these girls ros and just kind of

hope something happens. They're going to make sure something happens, and if it doesn't or if it doesn't come out the way that they want, they're going to go back. And you know, with the Natalia, you know, being told that she won't be on WrestleMania, that's a great example of going back and going all right, we need something for her in relation to WrestleMania because she doesn't have a match, she doesn't have a story now, is

there? And don't laugh when I asked this question because it might sound naive and I know that, but is there any regard for integrity on reality TV? Tow in the reenactments not completely change how they want the first time? How much it's sense of we want things to feel real and be real and have some integrity to what we're portraying is really happening. Or are some of the quote reality stars these regular ordinary people being filmed in a documentary type way.

Are some of them literally being like just acting out scenes that are where they sit down and say, all right, you're gonna be really mad at me, and I'm going to be really mad at you, and we're going to uh fake it, and then when they all cut, everybody shakes hamps like actors. It's both, I mean it really it really depends on what the uh the principle or I don't know, I guess the reality stars John, we just lost your mic almost John? Yeah? Can you hear me?

Now? You're back? Yep, Okay, you know it's it's so it's both, you know, they want to keep to the integrity of what it is that they're trying to produce, but also too they h you could you could have you know, the Bellas kind of sit there and say, hey, we want to we want to orchestrate this sort of feud or story with you know, Natalia or another girl on there, so you know, they can get together and and produce that themselves and then put it on screen,

you know, and that's probably the smart way to do it. I mean, you have an opportunity to be seen and make something out of yourself and make a celebrity out of yourself. A lot of people tease they have that. I invite you to email the show with feedback or questions or comments. That email address is Wade Keller Podcast at pwtorch dot com. That's Wade Keller Podcast at pwtorch dot com. Also welcome your feedback on Twitter. You can follow us on Twitter at pwtorch and follow me at the Wade Keller.

That's at Pwtorch and at the Wade Keller. And so when they call it unscripted television, there aren't there's necessarily scripts, but there's an orchestration and a production and a pre planning that that actually shares a lot in common in that sense with professional wrestling. Wrestling is more orchestrated than reality TV. Most of the time because reality TV will film just incidental things that happen and feature them

on the show. But reality TV has a lot of production, a lot of orchestration, and basically an I on ratings in an ion conflict, and an I on plotlines, and they will do what it takes to orchestrate. Yeah. They You know, it's similar again to w where Vince Vince knows what the wrestling fan base wants, and I know that that's sort of a joke at this point, but you know, he knows what they what they

want, so he's gonna orchestrate a show around that. Television networks know what their audience wants out of a reality TV show, and they're going to orchestrate their show after that, and they're going to produce whatever they feel the audience

is going to want to see. And to be perfectly honest, I don't think that they want to see the wrestling aspect of the show, which I know that there's been a lot of discussion about did they did they book Daniel Bryan versus John Cena for SummerSlam for the show, And I think that there's two ways of looking at that, and one of them is, yeah, they might have because you know, Vince will try anyway to get eyeballs on his product. So if he can get the the outside audience to kind of

see what he has his show, he'll do that. But then on the other end, I don't think E cares that much about John Cena versus Daniel Bryant, So I don't think that that's E's intention. So, you know, it definitely could be Vince pushing for that and going, hey, we have the Bellas. Okay, well, we know Sena and Brian are are are dating these girls. I know that they'll be on there. Maybe that's

the match that we do. But on the other hand, you know, I don't think Vince can go to E and say this is what we plan on doing, because I don't think that they would care what their wrestler or their Summer Slam main event is. Looking at the John Cena dating one of the Bellas and Daniel Bryan dating one of the Bellas. John Cena, hustle,

loyalty, respect, We've got kids who follow him. He's, you know, a role model, as much of a role model as Top baby Face has been in a very long time, especially you know, having gone through the attitude era. Probably going back to Bob Backland, Sena is the one who was most conscious of that, probably more so than Olk Coogan. Doesn't do you think it hurts his image at all that he's on their dating one of the Bellows who are caddy and territorial and kind of nasty. Is

there any kind of conflict in the narrative there? It's not like John Cena's playing somebody other than John Cena. John Cena sells his wrestling character two fans who know that it's orchestrated as this is who I am. I do stand for these things. Does that cause any issues? Do you think? Yeah? You know, I think I think slightly. I think that he's still going to play the same role on television. I'm sure he's going to be

very cautious of the way he's portrayed in that show. And I think he did a good job of sticking to the John Cena character in the first episode. But you know, I do see you know, I've always been you know, Cafe is non existent anymore. But you know, even with the Twitter thing that I've discussed with you on the show before, as I always spelt, if you're gonna be your character on Twitter. You should play your character on Twitter. Otherwise, you know, use your personal name and do

as you wish on there. But I think it takes away from the fun of the product and and uh, sort of allowing yourself to be put in that world of going you know what, Listen. I know it's scripted, i know it's choreographed, but I'm going to allow myself to believe what's happening. And that's that's the fun of watching it. H And I think you take away some of that when you have John Cena, the character dating. Yeah, I can't remember what bella he dates, but one of the bellas

that that are healed, uh, and that do act like that. But you know, also too, I think it could add to the appeal of John, where you know, he sees the best in somebody and you know, maybe in the end they might think he's gonna get screwed over, but good old John Cina, you know, he just wants to think that there's

good in everybody, right yep. And would you feel from your experience behind the sceness not that you were there when there was a reality show on eve but is it is it the type of thing that writers would bring up and John Cina would bring up to Vince Kmahn, Hey, you know, should we be trying to coordinate what we see on the show to the product or would Vince look at him like your crazy? He is for women who like the Housewives shows, and this is for you know, a very wide range

of age groups who watched ww programming, but predominantly men. Yeah, I think both. I think I think more so Vince than than the writers would bring the show to the table in regards of you know, hey, I have I have an opportunity here too, especially maybe even Stephanie. I have an opportunity here to pick up that female audience on our show. Let's take advantage of that. And I don't know, maybe they will, maybe they

won't. Maybe Vince is opposed to you never know what's Vince. I mean, there's time that you would feel he's going to be completely for something and he's not. But he usually is when it comes to something, and then on this occasion he's not, and vice versa. So my guests would be that he would want to try to jump all over that and bring this story onto w w ETV, and I guess we'd probably find that out you know, fairly soon now that the first episode has aired, I don't know.

I don't recall that didn't air this week after Raw or did it, dare Initially they actually had a They did the live airing and then a replay that night one and then another airing Raw after Raw on Monday as a one time only and collectively did about three and a half million viewers. So there's a lot of people, including now because of the Monday that replay, a lot of WWE fans who watched that program. So it becomes the world's collided.

It's not like a completely separate you know, separate h They're not traveling on separate planes. They introduced the raw ims to that reality show, right, So I think that going forward, if if it was going to happen, I think it's going to happen, uh fairless zoona if not, you know this coming week, yeah, yep. Yeah. So it's it's it's interesting watching it as a you know, from from my position as a wrestling fan. I'm trying to put myself in the seat of somebody who had never seen

the product before. Would this be interesting to them or or not? And I'm still not sure However, I do know on our pwtorch dot com poll we put up among the people who went out of their way to watch that show and we're interested in it, and the half the people who vote it said, I had no interest in it. I didn't watch it, so

they're not even counted in the ratings. But among Torch readers, and I think this is promising for the show, about half of them, a little under half said yeah, it's interested in it, and those who watched it, by a twenty to one margin said they liked it enough that they're going to watch it again. And I could have easily seen it flipped around. I mean, I don't think that was a given that, you know, people who are interested would watch the first show and want to see it again.

So I'm predicting this won't be an XFL type situation where they got week one ratings that are promising and then they just bomb afterwards. I'm kind of thinking they might. I think wrestling fans are interested in seeing this, and it's an interesting look behind the scenes at WrestleMania, and just getting a chance to see John Cena in a different role I think is of interesting, and obviously it's about women, and that's going to be interesting to a lot of

the audience that wishes there were more of the diva's on TV. So I think it has a chance to actually work on a number of levels with a number of different audiences. I agree. I think I think it can't too because I think they're pulling different audiences. I think they're pulling uh, maybe not the majority of wrestling fans, but those that are interested in something in this vein as well as you know, the reality TV junkies. I believe

that they they're on after the Kardashians. Yep, though you know that's a great legion for them. So I think it has a chance. You know, I guess we'll see reality TV is it definitely not a sure thing. There's been lots of shows that weren't expected to be hits that were, and and shows that we're expected to be in work, So we'll see how it turns out. Let's let's shift gears. I do want to get the phone

number out if you're just joining us. John Piermarini is our guest. He is a been a guest on number of times in the past on the PW Towards Live Test and He is an x WWE creative team member uh in two thousand and nine and two thousand and ten for nearly two years, and he is kind enough to join us on a summer regular basis and give his insights, observations, and anecdotes from behind the scenes. We I want to shift gears to current day happenings in a couple of minutes, but I also want

to go to calls because weve got some people on hold. So if you want to join people who are in line to call and ask questions and comment, the number to call is six four six seven two one ninety two eight. That is six four six seven two one nine eight two eight. Quick plug that we did launch our YouTube page this week. We are now an official channel on YouTube, and that means we are featuring some exclusive video clips

while they're flight shows with audio. Essentially at this point, we're kind of in a soft launch stage of it, but we've got some VIP exclusive snippets that if you're not a VAP member, you would not would not have heard before, including a great story from Dan Madigan, who was on the show.

An XT creative team member from the early two thousands, told some anecdotes about innssect Man's quirks, including the fact that ten years ago vinsect Man did not know what a burrito was and did not think anybody else would know what a barrito was when it was brought up at a creative meeting that they incorporated burrito into a storyline with Eddie Guerrero and Big Show, which was just amazing.

And you have to hear Dan adding and tell the story. He did a great job relaying what happened when that was said, in the tone and the circumstances, So check that out. You can get to our channel at YouTube dot com slash pwtorch, YouTube dot com slash pwtorch, and I invite you and encourage you and ask of you to subscribe to our channel. We're on the cusp of getting to one thousand subscribers after just a few days, and once we get to one thousand subscribers, that unlock some new features for

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It is free and there will be no spam associated with it. It is upwtorch dot com slash email. That's pwtorch dot com slash email. Major breaking news plus the daily top five in your inbox is the free service we offer. The top story tomorrow might be Kurt Angel arrested again for DUI. Full details right now at pwtorch dot com if you want to get details on that and see the monk shot. We got some people on hold, John, so why don't we shift to some phone calls and then after that we're going

to talk Restomania twenty nine by rate was Rock worth it? And also Restomania thirty What can possibly be done to get over a million buys? Again? Since they barely roll over a million buys with Rock, Sina and Lesner, Triple H, an Undertaker and another streak match, can they do anything to get over a million buys for Wrestomania thirty and we'll also talk about SummerSlam Hype with John. In twenty twelve, NXT transitioned into the developmental system and ultimately

the brand you see today. On the Torch VIP podcast NXT Eight Years Back, we'll be taking a weekly look at this page in NXT's early history. Join Kelly Wells and me Tom Stout from PWT Talks NXT every Saturday as we go eight years back to the day to track NXT's rising talents and why they did or didn't work out exclusively for p W tort VIP members. Let's first, though, go to phone calls and begin with area code eight six two. It's ex two. Please stay your name and where you're from? Kiss

from North New Jersey, Kylin. What have you got for us? Okay? I have two questions. Number number one, John, is there a particular idea that you know this WWE is using today that that you pissed when you were on the Creative t that you were told we don't do that kind of thing anymore. And number two times question what was that way? I said, Yeah, go ahead, right to question two and we'll tackle both

of them at once. And and question number two, how do you feel the newly re restructured creative se has hast help the brother in terms of we're starting to see more actual ring ring ring work in some of the shows and ving Villetta being used again and different things like that. Sure. Great, kind of appreciate the topics, Yeah, John, And I'll put a spin

on Kyland's first question two. Not only your ideas, but you know, is you see anything that you suggest that was turned down when you were there? But are you seeing the product? Are you seeing things being pitched and accepted by Vince McMahon now that had you pitched them just a few years ago, twenty twenty ten, that he would have said, no, we don't do that. So a little bit of a different spin on Kylan's question too.

Yeah, you know, I think there's a I think there's a change in philosophy as a whole there, But you know, I don't think that there's a lot being done differently as far as pitching, I think that's still the same. One thing that I do think uh is different is uh foupfold one. I think that when I was there, you know, we were we were on the decline. But you know, Vince was still happy in

certain regards for things. And I think that you know, you've seen his frustration since then with the news, you know, with Creative and Brian Gawortz and and all that with with the ratings and the buy rates and then you know, getting frustrated with him and sending him home. So I think he's

more accepting of things now. I also think that with Triple H more involved, because you know, as we talked about, he was just sort of taking that role when I was there, and I think now he's more entrenched and probably sitting right there with Vince and helping make decisions and probably running the show when Vince is not. So I think that, you know, he also has a little bit of a different philosophy than Vince does on what kind of product he wants to put out there. But you know, another thing

too is that Vince has always been receptive to ideas. You know, he wants to hear everything that you have to pitch, as long as it's well thought out. And you know, I remember times when we had a meeting and he kind of grew frustrated with Creative and started saying, look, we need different ideas, we need fresh ideas we need to do things different. And you know, I remember one guy pitch why don't we and that guy's

still there. He pitched, why don't we bring managers back? And he was open to it, and you know, the only concern that Vince had was I want managers that want to get the talent over and not themselves over. But if we could find that, then yeah, let's let's incorporate managers again. And I think that that was a philosophy that I'm getting here that maybe Byan didn't want to do, so it didn't go through because everything had

to kind of go through Brian before it got to Vince. You know, I used to pitch, you know, we're doing Sina versus Batista three or four months in a row with no reason given given to why we're we're continuing with the feud. I mean, I think Sina was champion, or Sina won the title, and then Sina defended at three times against Batsa, but

he was defeating him every time. And I remember going, you know, and the buy rates were going down each month that we were doing that, and I remember saying, we're not even giving them a reason to want to see Batista to have another shot. You know, why don't we switch it up and have different guys in that role? You know, we build up a guy, have them you know, uh go against Sina, and yeah, obviously we can't always have those guys win, and there's gonna be you

know, the audience that goes. Man, you know, Miss isn't gonna beat Sina. But if every once in a while we had a guy that we believed in that we could have, say Miss defeats Sina and win the WWW title. Now people start going, oh, man, I gotta start tuning into it. I know it's a you know, Wade Barrett that has a title shot, But man, Miss beats Sina, you know, six

months ago, So who knows what can happen? And I think a lot of a lot of the stuff that he liked, including that one, because I remember him just saying right after that, he said, why aren't we doing that? Then let's start doing it. But then it never happened. And you know, I could go and I could pitch it and put it together and we give it to Brian and then it just disappears, and the

same thing happens again and again. So I think a lot of it probably has to do with that filter being gone and Vince probably hearing more ideas or at least whoever it is that's in Brian's position now being more receptive to the outside ideas and then taking them to Vince, Because you could pitch to Vince and then like in this case, say with the managers and putting other guys in the main event, you could pitch that to Vents and he'll like it.

He'll go great, but he's gonna forget that you said it. So if you don't bring it to him again in a scripted form for the next show, he doesn't even remember that you said it, So if it never gets back to him again, it's not going to happen. So you could go and say, great, let's put you know, let's put Hayman with Curtis Axel uh okay, But then if Brian gets that and doesn't want to do it, it's not going to happen, even though Vince might have been

receptive to it. That's a right. It's good advice for new creative team members to be more persistent and not not just take it personally when he ignores them afterwards. Persistence can help. Yeah, you know, too. And here's the thing too. You know, we had guys on creative that would pitch ideas on a weekly basis in the production meetings right to Vince, and he would hate nine out of ten of them. But if he liked that

one, that's all that mattered, you know. So if you're if you're, if you're oh for eight, he's still gonna be He's still going to be looked for your idea. He might roll your eyes when you raise your hand and pitch something, but as soon as you give him something that he likes, you know, you you've reset the you've set the clock, so to say, and now you're on his good side and you know you have

a few swings and misses to go. But uh, you know again, you know a lot of people always, you know, tweet me or ask me, know what advice can you give to try to get a job there, And that's sort of you can't really give advice to that. But you know, for people that are new that are there, it's very intimidating, especially to pitch to Vince, because you don't want to say something that he's gonna hate. My advice would be have something well thought out and he'll be

receptive. And just because the guy in the position above you doesn't like your idea doesn't mean the vincil. There's been plenty of times that Brian hated something that I pitched, but I felt strongly about it, so I pitched it in front of vents and Brian rolls his eyes and it and it takes place. And how about the length of matches, That's something Colin brought up. We're seeing longer match It's part of that, you know, due to robbing

three hours. Part of it is they're just happened to be workers being pushed now. Wrestlers are you know, superstars? Is their call being pushed now? Who can go longer and have better matches? Daniel Bryan and the Shield are just among many of them. Who who who are like that? What

was that like with vincect Man in terms of match length? I doubt that was something the creative team had a lot to say so win, But do you sense that a philosophy has changed or Vince's kind of utilizes people to their strengths and right now he's got time to fill and wrestlers who can fill it. I think I think you answered it with that you know, we had guys that could work long matches. You know, when I was there, we had Batista, and we had Sean and Jericho, we had Triple HH,

we had Sena. You know, we had good workers there and uh and those people were given that opportunity to do two three segments and then we had the other guys that he didn't feel warranted that much time inside the ring. And I think now he knows he has to fill three hours. And I think that you know, why put out And you think he's smart enough to know why put out these longer man matches with the guys that can work. If we're not utilizing them, you know, why just throw out a

match? If we're not going to push Daniel Bryan and Dean Ambrose, why are we going to put them on TV for forty five minutes in the match. So I think he's starting to go more towards all right, well, we need to fill time on TV. The best way for us to do it is in the ring. With that said, let's put let's push the people that can actually do something inside the ring. And I think that that's another reason why you see guys like RVD comeback, you know, and I

think that's another reason why you see a push of Christians. I think that he can he can give Vince what he needs, and that's blocks of time filled on his television show. You can support us on Patreon and get these shows with ads and plugs removed, the weight Killer prosing podcast, weight Killer Processing post shows, and the PW Torch daily cast throughout the week with ads and plugs removed, plus a few bonus VP shows throughout the month for just

four dollars and ninety nine cents a month. Check it out. Peach areon dot com slash PW Torch v i P. That's Patreon dot com slash PW torch vi IP and you can also upgrade two other tiers and receive even more benefits through Patreon. All right, let's jump to another phone call and uh go next to eighty five six eight five six. Thanks for holding. Please state your name and where you're from. Oh many, this is welcome Jersey. Hey, Well thanks for Colin. What have you got for John?

Hey? Oh? I was just well, who's a question actually about hoping Kurt Angle? I went online to Dan saw he's, you know, arrested again. Do you think they're gonna actually take this serious in CNA, or are you just gonna trying to brush it under gum sixty saying she was upset about the who x sixty Twitter controversy for the kids. You don't think she's trying of being a hypo crip with Kurt Angle getting arrested with US two or three times now for d WI, Yeah, I mean, it's it's a

point. I mean, if Dixie's going to say, you know, think about the children when people say nasty things on you know, the hashtag asked Dixie thing that in fact put out there that turned into fiasco. You know, you do have to think, well, what about the kids who were you know, out you know, being driven home from Grandma's house last night when Kurt decided to once again get behind the wheel under the influence as he was arrested for last night. I mean, yeah, it's a legitimate question.

I don't know will what Dixey Carter's gonna do. Kurt Angle is a big part of TNA, and Dixie tries to be loyal the people even when they have problems. We've seen that in the past. Part of it depends on how, you know, what Kurt Angle says he's going to do about

it in the future. At this point, you know, it might be time if TNA values him and they decide to keep him around, to get him some sort of a chaperone, so those late nights, if he's that valuable, get somebody who's in charge of the car keys, assuming he even keeps his driver's license after this, John, how how do you think physic man would handle it? A repeat d d U Y offender leaving a show or at least the night of a show getting arrested. For you, why

if that happened multiple times? Where do you think that's some mad would come down on that. You know, as much as it's a it's a business

decision, I think it's also a personal one. And I think Vince uh Us, you know, everyone that works for him as an extension of his family, and I think that in Kurt Angle's case, I think, you know, just to kind of give a perspective on why I'm answering it this way, I think if it was somebody that had done it the first time that he sat down and they said, look I made a mistake, I think you know it would be it would be brushed under the rug if I

think if he felt he had to make a statement, I think that he would then make a statement with that person. But I think in Kurt Angle's case, I mean, I don't think that this is it is stupidity, but I think that this is deeper rooted than that with Kurt Angle, and I think that he would notice that, and I think that he would want to approach this from uh not Vince rict Mahn, your boss, but vincrict

Man, your your friend. And I think that he would want to sit down with Kurt and see what needed to be done to fix this problem as apposed to go on, Okay, what's the first thing I can do to punish this guy? Yeah, it is. It's I think you're right. You have to do it on an individual basis and understand their history, the chances of it reoccurring you of course, and enter business into it. Is this a pr nightmare waiting to happen? That has to factor in whether it's

fair or not it does. And then one on one, is this person you know apologetic? Will they are? They? Without prompting and in a mature way saying I know how I can make sure this doesn't happen again? And or are they blowing it off and blaming the cop, you know, I mean, it's just yeah, I think all that plays into it. That's why I don't think you can have it just a flat policy where you'd say, standing back, I know what Dick pe will do. I think

a lot of it depends on that. My hunches. Dixie won't fire Kurt over this unless Kurt is just you know, says some awful things in response. I think she'll try to work through it. But you know it to

see how what happens with the legal situation with Kurt. I mean, this is, you know, a multiple time DUI offender isn't necessarily going to have a choice in the matter either, you know, what happens to him, So we'll see, it's gonna be tough for him to travel around if he doesn't have a driver's license and know, I mean, he's gonna have to have someone pick him up, take him to all the locations personal appearances.

I mean, it's gonna it's gonna be tough, absolutely, you know, But if they value Kurt, and that is the only solution they if that's the only way that they can see keeping them around, is that they make sure that it doesn't happen again, then you got to pay somebody you know to drive him around. I mean, you don't want to do it with your whole team, But I mean and and I'm not saying Kurt as a person deserves special treatment. I'm just being realistic. He's Kurt Angle right.

Olympic gold medalists may have enter Immerston storylines, a great worker still with a history and TNA, And then I'm just saying TNA might be willing to spend some money on somebody else. And in fact, I think it would be fair, honestly to tell Kurt we are going to have a driver everywhere you go when you're on the clock with us. You know, what you do at home on your time, that's that's up to you. But if you

get arrested again, you know we will be done with you. But when you're with us, we don't want on it on our We don't want to answer to somebody getting killed because you got behind the wheel while you were coming or going from one of our shows. So therefore, for you to stay employed, we need you to take out of your paycheck the money it takes for us to have a driver for you you know, and I think that'd be a fair compromise. I agree, Yeah, all right, very good.

Our phone number here is six four six seven two one nine eight two eight. This is at PW torch Livecast. You can find us at pwtorch livecast dot com and that includes the live airings of the show at five thirty Eastern Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday every single week and also live the hour before ROW on Mondays and also live a half hour after WWE and TNA pay per views on Sundays. We have been here for three and a half

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MMA Torch podcast at blog talk Radio. And most of all, visit our main website mmatorch dot com. We'll have coverage. We have live coverage of all MMA events that our broadcasts, nash and columns and news and roundtable features and a lot of good stuff. We're proud of the work we do covering MMA, so check us out MMA torch dot com. Let's now move to er code eight O five. You're on What's Ax WWE writer John Piermarini eight O five. Please state your name and where you're from. You know.

Five. The switchboard is being pokey, but I will tell you when I see a red light come on and the switchboard gets unjammed, we'll be able to listen to you. I'll give it a couple more seconds here as I wait, still churning John while I wait for the switchboard to refresh itself. Any thoughts on Wrestle Media twenty nine doing barely above one million buys in the tally that WWE released yesterday. That surprised you that it's down? Uh,

you know a couple hundred thousand plus from Wrestle Media twenty eight. I don't know if it surprises me. Uh, you know, I think that, you know, the one thing that I think WW does is they do too many things, too many times, and I think that there's not a sense of I guess, urgency or to want to tune into something. I know, you know, the Rock coming back, that's great, you know, but I think also two you can look, you know, I've seen it

last year. There's not really a lot of builds around this year as far as the story to make me care about being the same match that I spent sixty dollars on last week, and then you look at the card and you go, you know, nothing really like jumps out as like, oh my god, I need to see this. So I don't know if they were expecting it to match. I mean, I think in Vince's ice is always expecting to beat the previous year. But you know, I think that it

could have done just as well if they told the proper story. And I think that they had the story. I just think that they waited till eight weeks before Wrestling Mania to tell it, you know, because they had the story was Seena saying, this year sucked ever since I lost to the Rock, and now I have a chance to to sort of rewrite all of that and make all of that disappear. But he really didn't have that bad of

a year. But I think that would have been a great story if, for you know, the eight months leading to to WrestleMania, you have John Sena have the worst year of his career, and and then now you can tell the story of I'm remotivated. This is you know, this is it though, this is my last chance. If I don't beat the Rock, you know, I'm I can't be one of the greatest of all time, and that's why I got into this, or that's why everybody gets into this. And I think you tell more of a story of you know, I

want to see the matter, see what's gonna happen. Either he's gonna win the ww title after a year, you know, that's that's Scena fans not not. Everyone's gonna want to be excited about John seen Is winning the title. But then on the other hand, you know, you have the fans that go, man, maybe this is it for Scena, I'm gonna tune

in. I just don't think it telling story was told leading up to that match, and I don't think that there was a very compelling card below it to get people who didn't want to see at a second time to really care to tune into WrestleMania. But you know, it's WrestleMania, and you're going to get close to a million bias no matter what. Searching for more great pro wrestling talk, then join me Jason Powell host him to three weekly Pro

Wrestling Boom podcast. Each week, he'll hear the latest news and analysis for me and my team at Pro Wrestling dot Net, along with other pro wrestling media members. Plus the Pro Wrestling Boom podcast features long form interviews with notable names in the pro wrestling industry. Subscribe an I tune in, Stitcher, Downcast, and all your favorite secondary apps, or visit us directly at pwboom dot com. Once again, that's pwboom dot com. Does this incriminate a

little bit? Triple H and Orcmpunk brock Lessner's first WrestleMania and many many years because he showed up a month after US so many of last year, Uh, Triple H against brock Lessner and then Undertaker against cm Punk. Those two, I mean, those are the big three matches on that show. They share credit and blame. You give him credit for breaking a million buys, but it dropped and that it was a different, you know, different opponents

Undertaker and uh Brock. You know, Triple H maybe wasn't the best opponents brock Lessner as as a guy who maybe some fans have moved on from any any thoughts on those two undercard matches. Yeah, I mean, if you're looking for someone, yeah, you're never gonna blame the person that that you

felt was the right person for something. So you know, maybe maybe the blame is put on CM Punk, you know, man, you know Undertaker usually Jaws, that we put him with Punk, and you know, I knew that wouldn't work, and I told you, And they're going to ignore the fact that, you know, they didn't make a compelling story for Sina Rock. And I think that I think that Lessner had a lot of appeal coming back to WWE, but I think that they just immediately turned him into

the wrestler brock Lessener and not the UFC fighter brock Lessener. And I mean, I think what the month after they brought Lessner back, he lost to John Cena. So I mean, you tore down this monster and and really your investment, you know, you bring in this guy, I think I can't remember the timeline is off, but I know at one point didn't triple h you know, talk him down, almost tearing apart in any accomplishments that

he had in UFC. You know, So you stripped this guy down, and then you expect him to be this this paper view juggernaut that he could be and he has proven to be, but you strip all that away and then you wonder why nobody cares to see him. And another thing too is you know the the UFC star brock Lessner was bigger than the w w E superstar brock Lessener. Now, I know that there was that appeal of him, this fake wrestler come into UFC and fight, and I know that that's

why people tuned in. But I think after a while that he wasn't a WWE guy anymore. He was just this monster that after he'd win a match, he's getting the guy's face, he'd spit in the camera. I mean like literally, this guy wasn't human. And I think that that's what his appeal was in UFC. After the w w E star war off, I think they needed to bring that into WWE, and instead they turned him back

into the same brock Lessener that was there before. And you know that's again I may be wrong here, but I don't think he was a huge draw as a WWE superstar before he went to to USC, and they turned him back into that guy. That's absolutely one of the issues with brock all along

is how do you how do you market him? You know, do you try to integrate him and put him back back in the mainstream with WWE and or do you use him in that way and kind of not draw attention to the fact that he's something different, or do you try to keep him quote schell and and selective and they've kind of been, you know, sort of in between. It depends on the week you tune in or the program that

he's been in. And and also does he wrestle you know, how does he incorporate the USC style but also do what he was great at as a WWE performer before that. And Yeah, I mean it's I think it's disappointing. I think if you would have said two years ago, brock Lessner is going to be in one of the top two or three matches at WrestleMania, back when it just seemed like, you know, he was he would heavier

champion. Who's gonna believe that would happen? If you would have said three years ago, they're gonna do that, and the Rock is going to be on the show again, this is before WrestleMania twenty eight Rock came came in

or twenty seven. I guess you'd have to go to So if it's before that and you said Brock and Rock are both gonna be on Mania, I think you'd be disappointed if if it barely did one million especially with Brock's first So I think no, wait, I think that WWE is content with thinking Rock is a major star and and brock Lessner is a huge MMA star slash pay per view box office star, and I think that they feel like that's all they need. Okay, let's bring the Rock in. He could sit

in a chair in the middle of the ring and it doesn't matter. He's gonna draw. I think that they think that the appeal of brock Lessner, he could come in. We can have him lose to Sina, we can have him, you know, we do whatever he wants to do. He could walk around backstage and crack jokes. Those people will still want to see brock Lessner. And that's that's not true, you know. I think that

people what appealed to the fans for the Rock. I think that they wanted to see that when he came back, and I don't know if they necessarily did. And I think with Brock, they wanted to see that UFC star come back into you into WWE, and they didn't, and I think that they lost their appeal. All right, let's stop, go back to the full night, because I believe we did. Uh the switchboard seemed to work itself out. Let me try again up butture did so eight oh five.

Sorry about that. Please stay your name and where you're from? Eight o five. You are live on the show. Eight zero five. All of that, all of that trouble, and now you've gone away, all right, eight o five. We'll hang up on you. If I see your number, come back on. We'll try you one more time. Let's now

go to A four two three next I do want to know? Note that we'll be going off the livecast in a couple of minutes and doing a VIP after show for a few minutes and talking about Summer Slam and looking ahead to Rusomnia thirty with John. If you have a question that you want to ask and we don't get to it on the live show where you just can't call in, you can send us an email right now at Pwtorch Livecast at gmail dot com. PW Torch Livecast at gmail dot com. That is the email

you can send to for any show. So if you want to send an email for Monday show with Bruce Mitchell and Travis Bryant, or next Tuesday with Jason and Me, or next Wednesday with Pat McNeil, and his guest or next Thursday with James Caldwell and his co host. You can always send ahead, just put the name of the host or the show on the subject line so the host knows to grab it. Also, we have book next week's guest. It is a return appearance, the second appearance ever of Hardcore Bob

Holly. He'll be on the show next week. He was a great guest. A little over a month ago we had him on to talk about his book, which I really recommend, just the chapter on Brawl for All and what if he asked, go that was is enough? And Bob at one point in the book just run over a list of wrestlers during his time and why they why they got fired, or why they didn't get a push,

like behind the scenes reasons it was. It was pretty interesting, interesting insight from somebody kind of on the outside of the cool kids circle looking in, but was there for a really long time and except for one match against the man we've been talking about, brock Lesner never got that headline world title match on pay per view during his whole tenure. Interesting perspective from from a non

WWE published book. It did not get filtered through WWE. He's not in wrestling now, doesn't aspire to be, and he's a great guest for that reason. So he'll be on again next week. If you did not hear that original interview, I encourage you to go to the archives at PW sporchlivecats dot com and and look it up. Or if you're a VIP member, he was a do our drop making you and click on people you torch live test interviews and look it up even quicker that way. But I'm looking forward

to having him on a second time. He'd promised you'd come on again. We promised we'd invite him again, and next week is when that happens. So I hope you can join us then if you can start sending your questions in now, and I encourage you in the meantime to buy his book and read it and ask some questions related to his book. I think when you read it like I did, you'll have a lot of a lot of questions

coming out of the book that you'll want him to expand on. So excited to when out set All right, let's go now to Eric code four two three has promised four two three please state your name and where you're from Hey, wait and see Hey, and thanks for Colin. What have you got for us? Hey? So I understood a few weeks ago that it was the USA network decision to have the McMahon's own TV. So much. Is there any way we can write usay to tell to get them off of TV?

John John talked to talk to me about any and two, about Vince's and Stephanie interplay for that matter, but especially Vincent Stephanie and their desire to be on television and how much your experience was that USA Network got involved in it. I honestly, you know, unless they're really good at convincing otherwise, they don't have a desire to be on TV as much as you think that they do. I mean, I remember Vince used to refuse to be

put on TV. There was a time when he wasn't on for probably about a year, and we would pitch ideas to try to bring them back. Nope, nope, don't want to be on TV. Find a way to do something without me. I don't want to be on. Don't want to be on. Stephanie was the same way, and he would always say, if there's if there's a reason why I need to be on TV. You

can put me on until then I don't want to be on TV. And uh but you know, I you can see that the trend of ratings when McMahon's go on, USA Network notices death and you know, if they if they come and they say, hey, we want the McMahons on, give us a story with the McMahons and a power struggle or you know whatever,

it is just a request. That's what they're going to give them. So, you know, unless there's another idea that they could throw at USA, which you know, that's that's the bad part is those other alternative stories aren't pitched. You know, there's USA doesn't call and go, hey, you know, let's get the McMahon's back on. Let's do a power struggle. Uh. They don't come back and go, hey, you know what instead

of doing that again, why don't we try this? Why don't we do this with Sena or this with this guy or you know, whatever it may be. It's just nobody, nobody has that other idea to do. So you're you're you're gonna be stuck with what USA Network wants and until you can give them an alternative option, that's what you're gonna get. But you can't blame the McMahon's. I mean, you know, aside from Triple H. I'm sure he loves being on TV and being a focal point of the show.

But I mean, who wouldn't in his position. Vince and Stephanie do not actively try to find ways to get on TV. If anything, is the exact opposite. Interesting. Yeah, thanks for downloading today's show. Take it to the next level with a VIP membership. Get shows like this the Wait Killer Prosing podcast, Wait Killer Prosing post show, and the Pwtorch daily casts on our Pwtorch VIP podcast feed with ads and plugs removed from the shows

for a streamlined listening experience. And also hear the VP exclusive shows that I host with Rich Fan and Todd Martin, Everything with Rich Fan and The Fix with Todd Martin signature VIP series that you're missing out without a VIP membership. So go VIP here in twenty twenty two and enjoy all the benefits, all the bonus content and the ad free listening experience. Pwtorch dot com slash go vi ip. Yeah, you think that they're useful on TV at this point?

To Senior opinion. M Yeah, I mean, you know, I think that they are, but I feel like again going back doing too many things too many times. I mean, how many times are we going to see the family feud with the power struggle between the McMahons. I think that

they need to find a way to freshen it up, you know. I mean, I remember I pitched a story one time, uh that I know that got vetoed and I don't know the exact person who vetoed it, but the story was good, but they didn't want to be portrayed in that light. Was you know, Stephanie may be cheating on Triple H, and she may have somebody else who may kind of be taking his spot. And you know, the while you go through this six week story of who who might

it be? You know, you're you're you're tuning in to see, at any time can this guy get revealed? And and and once that person is what does that mean? I mean, Triple H has kids with Stephanie, what could happen? I'm not saying that that's the best idea, but it's an alternative to something that is the same thing that they do with the McMahons. Every single time they're put on TV. So I think they're an asset, but I think you need to find different ways to utilize them. Yeah.

Yeah, And part of it too is just I don't know how self aware Stephanie is of how she comes across on TV. And I think that's part of even what Ian's getting at too. And if Vincent Man as as the leader of the company, do you really want the leader of the company, the guy who you're essentially paying money to to support the product, to come across like he does where you just don't know one program to the other, whether he's representing you know, himself at his company in a positive way

or he's this erratic, heelish, ugly person at times. I agree, And you know a lot of things too. Is you know, again, going back to the John Cena fan base, I think those kids are young enough to want to believe what's going on. And maybe you know, when Vincent Mann says something and like this guy walks around like he owns the joint, you know, you want to cheer for Sina, but I think as a kid, you you might want to you might question, oh, is

this guy really what he says? He is? He comes out on TV and hugs and kisses babies, and but yeah, Vince a man says, he walks around like he's an arrogant prick, you know. So I think that I think that there's times that they go out there and they say things off the cuff that I think even seconds after they say it, they go, I wonder, I wonder if that was the right thing to do.

Well, I'm here, so let's just continue it, you know, let's talk about how we want to see Sina versus Brian and then they just poof, you know, disappear out of nowhere. God, that would make my

life easier. I don't understand the logic behind that. From a character standpoint, you know, or a storytelling standpoint, you would want the hottest guy in your company and the face of your company to just disappear, and then what would you have, you know, because he never built to anything with Vince being irritated with Sina before that, and on top that, wouldn't it make sense that if if Vince Wickman is that concerned and he wants what's that

guy's name the GM to be sort of his puppet and put the right guys in the position don't you think Vince would go on screen and hand pick a guy like he did with The Rock as a corporate champion, go out there and go, look, this is the guy you should have put in the match. And maybe we should put that guy in the match. So why don't you book him versus Daniel Bryan in a in a lumberjack match. I'll

choose the lumberjacks. And on top of that, it's you know, it's no DQ and this and that where you know he's going to stack the deck against Daniel Bryan to put his guy in there. And I just think that, you know, I'm not a big fan of burying a guy to get a guy over. I don't know the appeal in in trying to run down Daniel Bryan and and and go hey, let me let me get on your level to talk to you here and bend over. I don't know how that's getting slaty over. Yeah, exactly, I agree with that a lot.

All right, let's let's take maybe one one more call, maybe two before we wrap up the three portions. Joe John, can you stick around for ten to two more minutes? Uh? And uh, do some BF you after show? After we take another call. I'm good till about four o'clock my time, so whatever you need. So it sounds good. Great, all right, so let's let's jump in and give Ato five another chance. Eight O five are you uh? Let's switchboards turning there? It is eight'll

five? Are you there this time? Hey? Wait, that was me that called the first time. Yep. What's your mil from California? Great? Yeah, Michael, what have you got for John? Today? Can Don talked about Dolph Ziegler and his lack of director right now and how it seems like they didn't really have a story for him when he turned and face John, did you catch that? I don't know the question though, Michael. Michael, go ahead and ask the question again because I didn't quite get

it either. Yeah. Can John talk about how the w W turns dollh Ziggler's face and they don't don't seem to have a direction for him before they turn the place? Yeah, yep, yeah, yeah, I got you there? Sorry about that, Yeah, I mean it's it's not surprising. I honestly don't know if if w W WE H or or a couple of people in the decision making process or that high on Ziggler, and I think I felt, or I think that they felt like, you know what he's

good for as better suited as a baby face. And because here's the way you got to think of it, too, When a guy doesn't have a story, it's it's not by mistake, it's because they didn't come up with a story for him. They had, whether it's del Rio or whether it's Lessner or Punk or whoever else. If they're focused on giving the stories too, and they're gonna think of those guys first, and then they're not worried about Ziggler because it's not hard to watch the show and see who they're getting

behind or who they care about. I think Ziggler right now is just a face out there doing this thing along with the miss along with the fifteen other guys that they have doing stuff. And I don't think that they said, oh shoot, we turned them face without a story. I think they said, let's turn him face. He's better utilized that way, and now let's

get back to focusing on the guys that we want to focus on. So you know, when you see this happen, it's not because they last second they said, man, we should turn him face and then when raw had the production meeting, they went, oh, no, what do we do with them? I think it was let's turn him face, He'll do what he does, and now let's focus on everybody. Yes, I think he's more of just a forgotten guy. Now, all right, very good.

I appreciate it. Yeah, I also those guys. I just don't think you should turn somebody and waste that turn unless you're ready to really seize that more. And that's one of the things I said on this show and multiple times when people called up and said Dell's being cheered, turn up. Del's being cheered, turn up. And I'm like, if vinciment Man isn't excited about him as him as a baby face, don't waste his turn just because fans are cheering him. If it's gonna get lost in the mix. And

that's what I feel's happened here. It just it got lost in the mix. Because when you turn somebody and it doesn't work, and then you turn them back, it just starts watering itself down. I think a turn should spark business and spark interest in the character. And what dal felt. Granted, the concussion hurt, but I think it actually diminished interest in him. So well, you know, let me add something to wait, as you know, wasting a turn, as I agree with you one hundred and ten

percent, So let me just say that first. Yeah, yeah, I don't think that. I don't think in their eyes the turn was wasted because the turn was for del Rio. The focus was on del Rio. There was a lot of times when you know, there was a tough decision to go all right, look we have Orton taken on. Let's say Daniel Bryant. Okay, well, we don't want Daniel Bryan to lose. But who

are we getting over here? Okay, we're getting over Orton. Then we need to focus on what we're trying to do in this in this math, in this story, in this scenario. And I remember that was that was big with d X versus h D Bossi and Cody Rose when they had that story, And I mean, I thought this was going to be the opportunity that we could really push uh Dbasi and Rose and get them over on DX.

But they had more plans for DX. So what felt like you're building these two guys and you kind of cut the legs out from under them. It wasn't seen that way, it was it doesn't matter. We're focusing on Dx right now. So I think with the del Rio story, it was we're not wasting a Dolf Ziggler turn. We're turning del Rio purposely, and we're using Ziggler because not that zigglers on the outs, but we're not worried about him right now. We're worried about del Rio. We need to turn

them heal. This is how we're going to do it. So everyone's looking at it, you know, from a from all the Dolf Ziggler fan perspective is it was wasted, but it wasn't because it was used to push or get over or further a story or a character of someone that they did want to utilize exactly. And I think there is impatience among fans where they see something not happening right away and they think, oh, the guys get buried. Even like the Shield, you know, people are like, oh my

god, the Shield are so hot. Now they're cooled down, and it's like, you know, Vince rotates people in and out, and I think Vince thinks that, and he's right a lot of the time that he can get somebody hot again when he decides to Yeah. You know, he's been right and he's been wrong. He's been right on Mark Henry multiple times, but he's been wrong too, And I think I think Jack Swagger was a perfect example of this. Yeah, yep, need an extra dose of positivity

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vi IP. The place to go is pwtorch dot com flash go b I P. You can get a ton of information there and don't forget Subscribe for free to the YouTube channel pwtorch dot com slash YouTube and sign up for emailwtorch dot com slash email. All right seven seven oh, thanks for holding. Please state your name and where you're from. I waited serious, Hey, Larry, goodar from you. What have you got for us? Hey? Excellent? Yeah, John, and I knew you've covered this. Hey,

John, I think you, Larry hold on this sect. I think John, we're getting a lot of wind on your mic at the moment. If you can block that a little bit, that help or maybe it's with you, Larry, either way, go go ahead, all right, no problem, no, no, I'm in I'm inside cooking dinner. But what is

it? I know what got covered last time you were on the live cast, So I apologize if it's kind of just retrenning old ground, But you shared your thoughts on kind of how unsuccessful the miss Face turn has been, and I guess I'm wondering. You know, now there's been a few months, you know, and they shouldn't just flippingly turning back or anything like that. It's kind of like what Wade was talking about. You don't want to see them and you John, you don't want to flip people back too early.

But is it really just a matter of like the advice you would give would be just kind of keep your head down and wait for them to, you know, maybe turn and embraise the character that he can fully get behind. Or would you actually have some recommendations on how he could best make this space role work. That's a good question, and everybody's philosophy is different, and uh, you know, with me, is I would try to go again? You don't want to waste the turn, You don't want to go

back and forth. But you know, let's let's make the best of the situation that we're in here and let's try to find a way to kind of get you going into baby face. The problem is is that, you know, Miss being a baby face is not the problem. It's that Miss is playing the typical baby face role where a guy turns baby face and Vince just assumes they all have to be the same guy. And I think Miss could have worked essentially as the same character, but sort of changing his target to

the heels. You know, I think it would have worked both ways, because, especially today, and this has been talked about a lot, a lot of heels are are the are the fan favorites as far as other television shows, you know, Tony Soprano, Dexter, Breaking Bad, the bad guys are the good guys. And I think that you can act like a

heel as long as you're going after somebody that they hate more. So, you know, and I've told him this so many times, you know that I think he'd be a great baby face if they did it the right way. And I think it would have had to have been so I think wait, I think even we had something at one point where you would ask, if you did turn John Cena, who could be the guy that could eventually take his spot and I said, you know, it's done right. It

could have been the Miss, but he was. He was so hot as a as a heel when he was clicking, and I think that he could be the same way as as a baby face. I would just what I would suggest is go back to the way that you were as a heel, but let's start going after heels as opposed to baby faces. And I think it would work. And part of me's just wondering with Miss if he's just too old to be that character anymore too. I mean, I go through

Tuesday. I think what made it him seem like he'd get over the face was how the attitude and the personality he exuded as a heel. But I'm just wandering getting into his thirties now if he's just not kind of it's just it just doesn't click with the audience and that type of character has to mature into something entirely different, because I just don't know if I'm not I'm not

confident anymore because he's been so awful this year. I'm not confident anymore that he has it in him to be kind of that cool baby face that just two years ago we thought he could be. Yeah, you know, and he could be one hundred percent right in that. And they do have a vehicle for him to turn heel, and they do have a vehicle for him

to be a completely different heel. And that's with Rick Flair. You know, he could he could turn into a cowardly heel that you know, he doesn't have to be the cool heel, but he could be the guy that you you could hate because he could get over on your baby faces being a coward but finding a way to get over on them. And uh. And I think that as beloved as Rick Flair is, I think there's the guy right there that they could use to help help turn Miss if they wanted to.

But I still think, you know, I think right now where Miss is at, I think he's got a little bit more time where he could still kind of revert back to the old Miss get a baby face and it could work. But I do agree with you. I mean, the time is definitely running out for him to play, you know, the character that he played as mister Money in the Bank and on the way to ww title yeah, or just cool you know, the cool kid from you know in

quotes, but the cool kid from reality television in real world. You know, at some point he's kind of got to grow up and figure out who is he as a as a you know, full fledged adult character instead of kind of the the you know, obnoxious, smartass, youthful character. Yeah, Larry, Yeah, Well I was wondering if I give one more question the Diva show. Yep, thanks. You know, one thing I thought was interesting, I'll just clarify not that not that it necessarily needs to be

said, but I watched it on YouTube. I don't really plan on like keeping up on the show, but I did want to check out the first episode. Obviously, you take it with a grain of salt because it's reality TV, so, you know, because this could have been staged or whatnot.

But I know one thing that was interesting was with the that new Diva Eva Marie, where they had an issue where the new head of talent relations told there to get her hair dyed blonde, and she ended up going to the salon not feeling the blonde color and going like a deep dark red,

like she called a Rhianna red. And then they had her talk with the head of talent relations and she goes, well, I'll let you get away with it this time, but next time, you definitely have to do what we say, you know, otherwise, you know, you have to tow the line. She literally said the phrase toe the line and do what we say, And to me, I kind of thought, you know, staged

or not. It just seems sort of weird that, you know, even though she's new and maybe she's just young and just wanted to do what she wanted to do. But it seems she explained herself even though she's you know, new, doesn't really have a character, but it seems like she said, this is more natural, this is something that feels more natural to do

and fit with my personality. And I'm kind of wondering, you know, shouldn't WW be kind of embracing that to some to some extent that that, uh, you know, to let a character be more of themselves and not do something that would not fit that character. Larry, you're aren't you? Yes? Yeah, okay, I'm gonna I'm gonna have have John answered that question the VP after shows, because our time with him is limited and I do want to give vpers some exclusive content, so I appreciate the question.

We're going to play ourselves out of the live cast here and move into the VP after show. We're gonna also John forecast Russomania thirty a little bit and look at what maybe are the biggest chances to draw a million plus buys at Russemania thirty. So on the other side of the music Vipers will join us

for continuation of this discussion. Thanks John. Anytime you're watching ww E Raw or SmackDown or aw Dynamite in particular, send us an email if you've got thoughts on the show or a topic you want us to address or a question for us. Wade Kellor Podcast at pwtorch dot com. Wade Keller Podcast at pewtorch dot com. If there's anything else going on in pro wrestling that you want us to address on our main podcast during our mail base segments, that

same email applies Wade Keller Podcast at pwtorch dot com. We invite that interaction. Let us know what you think of what we're saying, and let us know what you want us to talk about and ask us specific questions. Wade Keller Podcast at pwtorch dot com. All right, we're now in the v IP. You have to show a portion of the program. Yeah, interesting question for Larry John I do you want to tackle that right away? The question is should they embrace it or do we even think that that moment was

genuine? Is it kind of a two part question. I got that from Larry and also just should Vincent man wants people to be themselves and play themselves? Is it really is he? I think what I got from the second part of the question was is it are they pushing too hard to make somebody something that they're not comfortable being? Okay, So the first part is just from the genuine Was that a real moment? Yeah? I'll put it this way. If you watch a reality TV show, there's always very specific characters.

There's a bad boy, there's a bad girl. There's you know, the dumb one or the naive one, or the one that you know is not part of the group. You'll start seeing those characters develop. On the show. They needed the bad girl. She was the one. Was it

a genuine moment? Absolutely? My guest is I don't want to say absolutely, my guest is not okay, But what I think happened is that that could have been an actual discussion where they wanted to turn her hair blonde and she said, here's the way I feel about that, and then they said, you know what, now that I think about it, why don't you go get your hair red. We'll take a look at it. If it looks good, we'll allow you to keep it. If it doesn't, you're

going blonde. And that was the deal that they made. But because it's television, you're going to present it in a way that causes drama to get people to want to tune in, and that was that was a hook for one of the segments of the show. So I think it's possible that that, you know, it went down, but not the way that it was

shown on television. I don't think that. I think that happened the way that it was shown on TV. In the world of w w E, she would have showed up with the red hair, and I don't think it would have been the head of talent relations decision to go I'm gonna I'm gonna say that this is okay because what probably would have actually happened is all right. I mean, if if that's the way you feel about it, you know, let's go talk to Vince or Stephanie and let's see what they think.

And if they say yes, then you're good. If they don't you're going blonde. I don't think that she would have walked up and said, oh man, you know what, you changed my mind. She could have changed her mind, but I don't think it happened the way that it did. And then the other part of the question is, you know why in

that case, why wouldn't Vince embrace that. Vince does at times embrace that, But I think that there's times too where uh, and if happened in any genre of life, if you're completely vinced of something that will work, and someone's rice telling you I don't think I can do it. If you believe that they can, you're gonna tell them. I'm telling you this is gonna work. Follow my lead on this. I've seen him do it and

trust me, it's gonna work. And then I've also seen other times where he goes, man, I'm telling you, I don't think blonde is gonna work. Well, I don't think that you can walk up to Vincent Mann or anybody w W as an authority figure and go it's not gonna work. What else can I do? You have to walk up and you have to go Blonde's not gonna work. But I'll tell you what will work. Vince red hair. You know you have Rihanna, you have this person, you

have that person. Look at what you're trying to establish me as is this spicy, sexy, hot girl. Well I can stand out with red hair. I can't stand out looking like Kelly Kelly or Summer May or whoever it may be. And you can convince Vince to go, Man, you know what, I never even thought about red hair. And that's a great idea. Yeah, let's do it. So you know, people are quick to

rush to judgment. But it works both ways. There's times that he but again, he could have had it in his head where he no, I'm telling you, you are the blonde bombshell. I've been waiting ten years to have this girl. You fit the mold, You're gonna be it. Trust me, it's gonna work out. And then those times when he goes great, loves the idea. Let's try it, oh John, with our just a few minutes left with you, Let's let's look ahead to Rust of Mandy

A thirty for a minute. Does anything on the horizon look like the most likely matches are obvious main event matches for WrestleMania thirty, And do you think that the by rate news this week, not that it was a different than estimates, but you know, locked in at barely above a million, does that make Vince more willing to take a chance or more more willing to go after Rock who has said, you know, he's open to coming back, and maybe he's being coy and it's already a done deal, but you know,

I'm open to coming back. But if LA trust me, at twenty nine was my last match, I'm happy with it. How does rustle Menia thirty look to you? And how do you think Vince is looking at it? Yeah? I think Vince is looking at it as you know. Again, I don't know if it meant in his expectations for what he was trying to accomplish with WrestleMania twenty nine, but I think that this is always gonna want to beat what he already did, so I think he looked at this

as a challenge. I think he's gonna pull out all the stops for WrestleMania thirty. I think that, you know, I think that he feels the best way to get over that hump again and beat WrestleMania twenty nine. I'm sorry, twenty eight would be with the Rocks involvement. So so I do believe that, you know, whether whether Rock is worth it or not,

I think Vince sees him as his best hope. So I think that Rock will be back, you know, and I think that it could even be something where maybe their initial plans where Rock versus Brock or whoever it may have been Rock Scene of three, I don't know, And you know, they couldn't look back and they go, Okay, well, Rock SCENEA three, it's losing its steam. Brock isn't really the draw that we thought he was going to be. You know. Maybe they go back and they go,

look, it's WrestleMania thirty. It's a great excuse to do Rock versus Stone Cold again. How big would that be? You know, I'm talking in terms of what Vince's thinking. So I think that if Rock comes back, they're they're gonna find the absolute biggest opponent for him. But I don't think

it's gonna be Sena. It could be Undertaker, you know, and maybe by the time WrestleMania thirty comes around or Royal Rumble, maybe Rock will see somebody that they go, I'm telling you, this guy's ready put him against me. But I think he's gonna do everything he can. I wouldn't be surprised if he goes to TNA and get permission to bring Hogan back, not to work a match, but to be part of the festivities. I wouldn't

be surprised to see Batista, Jericho, all the big names pack. I also wouldn't be surprised that he doesn't try to get a big celebrity to come and participate in a match. I don't really know who that could be right now, and again, by the time WrestleMania thirty comes around, it could be anybody. But I mean, like even right now, you know, I would think in terms of maybe getting like a Rod's going to say, trying to get a shark, you know, shark Nader hues right now,

see if you can put a guy in a tank against the shark. Not I'm being you know, uh, facetious there. But you know, I don't know. I don't know what he's gonna do because you know, a lot of things too is WrestleMania has planned out almost a year in advance, but things can change. I mean, he could have saw that by rate and said no, no, no, no no. Rock versus Rock isn't working, Triple H versus Curtis Axel isn't working. We're going to change this

whole thing. And you know, there was the I know that the I read something where I don't know who said it. I think maybe Shawn Michaels had said it where he kind of revealed WrestleMania twenty six was originally you know, uh Undertaker versus jamac and Tyre and uh Triple HS versus miss And and Sean versus Shamus, and and that that was what the plan was, and that was changed. Gosh, I think just right before Royal Rumble, so

it could change. And I don't know what they have planned, but I'm telling you this is going to pull out all the stops for this one. We have Dan Maddigan last week, excreative team member in the early two thousands about Vincent man Quirks. I know we've talked to you too about them before.

He brought up the the idea of no yawning, and then Dan brought up, you know, lions in the jungle yawn you know, but Vince he's as a sign of weakness, and also that he didn't know what a burrito was, even though he pack wraps every day for lunch with ketchup on him and didn't think anyone else knew what a brito was any I know we've asked you and you probably told the story before, but anything jump out as the most interesting anecdote about Vince being in a bubble and kind of almost comically

being out of touch with something or having a weird quirk. Man, I don't remember anything I would have told you, so if I repeat myself, I apologize. But yeah, number one, that's funny. He doesn't know what a burrito is, yet he eats one for lunch every day. Expect it's brought up. He goes, what, what what is a burrito? And they're like, it's what you know? It's this thing you who would know that? Who else would know what that was? Nobody knows what that

is? It was like anyway, Yeah, that's that's what's great. And that's also a weakness for this though. You know, if he doesn't think, if he doesn't know something, then nobody else knows it. Just just like I think I've explained before, if he doesn't remember something happening, nobody else is going to remember it happening. So we're good. To go. You know. Uh, I think at one point he was asked, you know, Vice, do you do you even know what the highest rated show

on television is? And his answer was, of course, of course I do it Steinfeld. He still thought that Science Feld was the highest rated show on TV in two thousand and nine. In two thousand and ten, Man and he thought it was called Steinfeld. So you know, I bet you if we could have you know, got Kramer on there, he would have thought that was a big snag. Although I would have might be, h, yeah, it might be, but I would have loved Da Kramer on

there. But yeah, yeah, I can't think of anything else off the top of my head. I'm sure if I was given more time, I could probably think of something. But that wasn't stuck with me because it kind of showed just how out of touch he is outside of his bubble. Yes, absolutely, I mean there's just I do think Vince Wokman has ever been

inside a target? Ooh, oh, you know another story that you reminded me of by saying that, Yeah, I don't know where they're located, but I remember like one of the favorite places for the writers to go when we were going from city to city one because it was always openly. But man, they thought it was the greatest place to eat in the world. I thought it was all right, but Steak and Shake. I don't know

if you know what that place is. But at one point Vince was in the limo and they were hungry, so they pull over to get food and they walk in a Steak and Shake and Vince wats to order a steak and they goes, you know, we apologize, we don't we don't sell steaks. Now, forgive me. I don't know the menu by heart, but it's pretty much a burger joint. And he probably spent ten minutes talking with the cashier about how they could call the place Steak and Shake yet not have

a steak for him. So then he asked if they could make him one, and they couldn't make him one. So, uh, just just sort of being so out of touch with I guess reality in a script. Yeah, but I don't know. That's one of the great things about this well, it makes it entertaining to talk about him. I mean, they're just as driven, as madly driven and single minded as he is. There's a price that is paid for that, and you know, what is your hunch.

By the way, getting back to that question of whether he's ever been inside a target, I would probably say, uh, I would if I was putting money on it, I would say, he knows what a target is, but I don't think he's ever been in one. Yeah. Yeah, give yourself a reason to look forward to. Go into the mailbox each week with a Pwtorch Newsletter paper copy. Subscription details at pwtorch dot com slash

paper Copy. It's twelve pages every week packed with my TV reports, along with exclusive features such as my cover story on the top story of the week, our pay per view roundtable reviews from the Torch staff, exclusive feature length columns from Greg Parks, Rich Fan, Shan Radikin, Alan Coonahan and Zach Haydorn, Torch Talk transcripts, the latest news, and more. Pwtorch dot Com slash paper Copy take a break from screen time and settle in every week

with a megados of wrestling news and analysis. With a Pro Wrestling Torch Newsletter paper copy edition. In the year twenty twenty two, you can get a full year of home delivery for just ninety nine dollars, or try us for an eight week trial subscription pwtorch dot com slash paper copy, John, have you gotta go go? We just got an email from from Dewey who says that you're one of his favorite guests and he just got home and he wanted to sneak in a question. Do you have a minute answered or do you

gotta run? Yeah? Absolutely? Okay? Cool from Dewey from Cincinnati. I just got home and saw that you were interviewing one of my favorite guests, and I totally missed it, but I thought maybe there was still time to sneak in a question for the VIP after show. So barely, but yes, Dewey, John, I believe you were in w w E around the time or right after Paul Hamer is having problems working with Stephanie and other

people and left the company. That did that predate you? Yeah, I think that was That was a December of the year before I came in. I think okay, But he says now that he's back in the company, do you think he's been given an opportunity to get given put on the creative side? Also, do you know if Dutch men Tell is working with creative

at all? Because he Dutch worked H. T and A was on A T and A creative team in the mid two thousand and Finally, do think when Stephanie and Triple HS come int power they would ever decide to go back to just having a small group of two to four people booking the program and writing the shows as was done the nineties. I hope you get this in time. Thanks for coming back on the show. Okay, can you go?

Can you go through the questions one by one? Yeah? So, Paul Hayman, do you think that what's your hunch or have you heard if he has any kind of creative input out perhaps outside of his own storylines. I don't. I don't think so. I don't. I don't even know if he wants to. I think that he's happy just kind of. I know he's really involved with the stories that he's involved with, though, so I know, I know Paul is super involved in telling his stories, and

I'm sure Hayman is a big part of that. But I don't think that Hayman sits in on any meetings and and look again it's speculation. I'm sure that there's you know, guys that walk up to him and ask him for advice. I mean, they'd be idiots. Not sure. Yeah, So I think he helps in that regard, and I think that, you know, I'm sure if I was a writer there, I would definitely utilize him and go to him and go, hey, you know I was, I was thinking of this, what do you think of this? Or how can

we do this? I think that he'd probably be involved in that aspect, but I don't think he's going to production meetings, and I don't think that he's going to any writers meetings and giving his input. I don't think that. For the same question regarding Dutch Mantell, I don't think he's doing it, but I'd be pretty confident in saying that he's probably floating some ideas through creative for his current storyline. Yep. And then his last question was do

you think Triple H and Stephanie when they take over for Vince? And, as I noted earlier this week, I think on a on a Keller hotline when somebody is talking about this, Vincent Mann might be running the company when Triple H and Stephanie are in their sixties. So let's keep that in mind. I mean, he's not necessarily going anywhere quickly, although you know, he'll face down his hours as as his energy, uh, you know,

reserves require But but that's a whole other topic. But if they were to take over sometime in the near future, do you think that they would go back to that more small inner circle writing team instead of having the multist multi layered structure that they have now. I guess it depends on how they want their company to be viewed. And I still feel like Triple H and Stephanie, especially Stephanie, want to be an entertainment company and not just a wrestling

company. So I think that a lot of the reason for having writers and bringing in you know, everyone always questions, man, why do they bring in these soap opera writers if you know and they don't even laugh. I think the answer to that is that they can say they have that person on staff. I think they like saying they have a writing team. I think they like saying that they their head writer is a guy who used to write on this and this and that. And I think that, you know,

certain people mark out for certain things. And I think that as much as they want to say that, they hate bringing in quote unquote wrestling fans as writers because they don't want those people to to whether it's mark out or whether it's just have only one way of thinking. I think they they're the same way. I mean, I think that they felt like Freddy Prince Junior was a huge asset on the writing team just because his name was Freddie Prince Junior.

And they can tell people they had Freddie Prince Junior. I don't think from again, from the time that I came in right after he left, and then he came in probably my last few months there, and from what I saw, I didn't I didn't see anything that would make me go, my god, it's a good thing we got Freddie Prince Junior on board.

Yeah. Well, you can imagine just like the sales team, you know, selling or USA Network for that instance, in their sales team selling raw and you know, some corporation going why would I want to advertise in pro wrestling? It teams, so, you know, and then all the negative adjectives or thoughts that come to mind, and they're like, oh no, no, this is different. This is sports entertainment. And we've got you

know on the writing team includes heck, Freddie Prince Junior. I'm sure you've heard of him, and uh, and this writer from a soap opera and another guy who actually was wrote an episode of Friends, and that that, from just a sales standpoint, strategically might make somebody who's hesitant to associate with

wrestling, uh, suddenly look at it differently. But if you go, well we're different, and they go, yeah, well who writes the show, Well this guy called Dutch Mantell and this other guy called Paul heyman, it's you know, there is some value in just having somebody there just for their resume. And I think too, I think a lot of that has to do with I think they want to pay to be able to say that, and I think that that's why a lot of times, you know,

they may roll their eyes when when writers have a suggestion. I think that they still want to book and run the company the way that they want to do it. And if you disagree, or if you have a philosophy difference in theirs, they don't really care, you know, they just want to be able to say, look, just sit here, you're you're like you said, you're part of the sales pitch. And I'm sure that there's some people that they appreciate. I think is the best word their opinion more than

others. But I think for the most part is look, we got Sandled, we need you to come up with some of these ideas, but we're going to lead you to how we want you to do it and then going back to your thing. But I think they look at it as we got Freddie Prince Junior here, and he's more important to us as someone we could say, hey, Freddie Prince Junior is here, but in order to keep him happy, yeah, we got to listen to him a little bit more.

I mean, I remember, as great as some people are going to think this idea is, and hey, I'd love to see it, but at the time when it was pitched, it made zero sense to do it. But I think it was like our first, our first three hour raw in a long time, and it was okay, guys, we need a theme. We need to find something to do for three hours. And there was all these ideas, you know, crazy ideas gett't tossed around. One being you know, let's do King of the Ring. One was, you

know, let's do these battle Royals. One was whatever it may be, and he had pitched let's do Daniel Bryan versus CM punk in an Iron Man match, and again people are sitting there going, oh man, I'd love to see that. But again, that's a great match, but it needs to be done at the proper time and for the right reason, and to just throw it out there when Punk wasn't being utilized, I think he was still on SmackDown. Daniel Bryan was, I think, just right out of

NXT. And you know, if I were to pitch that, I think that I would have been sat down and given wrestling one on one lesson, and instead it was oh god, yeah, you know, as great as that might be. Oh man, Yeah, let's consider that, but what do you think of this instead? And I think it was just more so make this guy happy so he sticks her out. Yeah, yep, now

that that makes a lot of sense. John, Thank you so much for your time again and you're insight analysis what's going on today in some cool behind the scenes stories as always from your days there. It's always fun. Great. Thank you so much. Wait, great, John. Thanks to all the VFP members for joining us so you can follow men on Twitter at John as himself on Twitter, and we thank all of you as always for your support of the VP show. Just to cover business, this VIP after show

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