Now your main events introducing the hosts are Wrestling with Freddy, Jeff Died, hand of Freddy Friends, Junior.
What's up?
Everybody?
Welcome to a brand new episode of Wrestling with Friends. Wrestling with Freddy, but it's friends today because I have my co host, greatest co host in the world, mister Jeff Dye. How are you today, sir?
Feeling good?
Buddy?
Are you feeling I'm feeling pretty good, looking strong, Thanks man, Let me flex right, bind bo, Sir.
A lot of times I might hear an idea in the moment that's awesome, and then the next day or I'll write something down late at night I'm like, this is the best movie idea ever. In the next morning I'll read it and be like, this is the worst piece of shit I've ever written. But I still think the Medieval's Jester is a wonderful idea. However, I also love Santina Morella, so you never you never know, you never know, But I think Medieval Times is a winner.
And then you wouldn't have to leave town as much. You could just work here.
Yeah, I could live at Medieval Times. Although Buena Park is not close from where I live. I don't want to say my exact address. But when I was going to Medieval Times, I was like, all right, i'll get there. I'll probably leave like I have to leave like an hour. You know, everything's like an hour in la. I put in those two hours and thirty five minutes, and I was like, all right, because I'm leaving now at three o'clock in the afternoon.
All right, so well you just relocate to Buyna Park bro this week, y'all, we're going to take things back. I did a show for A and E called w WE Rivalries, Yes, and it was a wonderful experience. I really enjoyed doing it, and I love getting to hang out with some of the old school and new school wrestlers and get their takes on things. And we thought we would do an episode dedicated to rivalries ladies and gentlemen.
So we're gonna give you I'm not saying they're the best, but I'm going to say they're the most well known. We're not going to have time to probably get to every single rivalry in the world, but here we go.
I have one on the list that didn't make it, which I'm surprised, but go ahead. Yeah, well then.
We should do that one second to make sure that we get it. I want to start with the one that I always thought was the funniest one, and that's why I think you'll like it too. As during the Attitude era, which I know you love, it's the Rock versus Stone Cold Steve Austin and the rivalry they I know you love these guys. I know you love this era. Some of the stuff they did to me was way beyond the line of reality, but somehow, as long as they're cool with me laughing at some of the stuff,
then it's then it all worked. And I feel like they would be because they were taking the piss, as the British would say, out of themselves for most of this.
I love the storyline, but I want to start with you because this is your younger than me, and this is your generation's golden era of wrestling and by far, by any marker, the most successful financial period in the history of wrestling, and there will never be well except they just sold for a bazillion dollars, it'll never happen again, so I'm already wrong.
Take it away, sir, I would say the Rock Versus or the Rock versus Stone Clost t Boston rivalry was like your two best friends fighting. You're like, god, I love Stone Colk and then the Rock goes go, God, I love the Rock. Like it was so most of these feuds, I can pick who I was rooting for and it would rile you up, you know, because you're like, gosh, I hate John c n R. Or I hate Sam Punk or whatever. When you have literally two of the most popular guys of that time, arguably ever, going back
and forth and the cut from a different cloth. You know, the Rock came from the Nation of Domination. That's like the All Black Stable. That's like we've had enough, we're angry, and we're we're gonna show you how good we are wrestling. And you've got this kind of like white trash Beard drinking Rattlesnake that flips everyone off, and it's always referencing Texas and it's just the two cool guys of both sides. I really, really, really loved every single time. I never
cared who won. I never cared who lost because I just liked both of them so much. Like you said, they did crazy things like with the beer, and there was like sometimes it looked like they became friends and then they get stone cold. I mean there was just so he gets stunned, But so I really really.
Till the greatest, the greatest cell ever of a stunner is the rock. Nobody ever sold it, that could ever again. When I met stone Cold, I've only met him once. Ever, he goes, who do you think took the stunner the best? And I go, I think Vince McMahon took it the best. He goes, well, I disagree with the young man. I think he's the worst that's ever taken it.
He goes, I would agree with that, and he goes, who's the Who's the worst that ever take it? And I go the rock and he goes, I'm gonna disagree with you again. We're off to a bad start. He goes, the rock took it the best. We agree, guy, you gotta trust your boy.
Man. I was the stone cold or like two peas in a pot.
I had it reversed because like when Vince got done, it looked like he died. And so that's the only reason I said that, because he almost did. And when a rocket stunn he's bouncing around and flopping around like a like a fish in the ring, which is funny, and that's why that's why everyone liked it. It was very, very good. I just remember being a teenager being like, oh gosh, he's making it look fake, and it's like I didn't I didn't have my wrestler.
Yeah, totally, But that's why I loved it, because it was so over dramatic.
That rivalry was really really, really, really incredible. I liked it very much.
There was more cursing on television during this rivalry, just in this rivalry than on any other network television show in the history of television combined. There is more son of a Bitch, I'll beat your ass, ye there is, There is more of There is more cursing than any NBC, CBS, ABC show combined. Now, the Sopranos, I have him beat, right, episodes of Boardwalk Empire what I had him beat. I don't know if they curse Game of Thrones. I never saw that, but I bet if they did, they might
be able to beat him. But that's cable and streaming services. There's no rules. This was on national TV, and you would hear people legit, just constant you son of a bitch, I'll beat your ass.
You're going down something bitch, like I heard that every word or every sentence came out of Stone Cold's mouth.
I know these matches have all been reviewed a million times, and so I'd like to talk more about, at least on my side, the content they were putting out. But I do remember one story that Brian Gowertz told me when I worked there that I'm sure he'd be fine with me sharing and if not, then I'll apologize, but it's nothing bad. He was the voice behind the Rock. Brian Gowertz, who was this? He was a sitcom writer from Hollywood who was just a huge wrestling fan, went
out there and a sitcom writer. Quickly became the best writer they had because he was a professional writer. He wasn't just a fan of wrestling. He knew how to construct stories, and so he gets there and he had to work his way up. It's not like he was the head writer right away. The Rock kind of made him, didn't kind of but made him. But he was the one writing all those great promos. The Rock says this.
The Rock says that, like he was the one writing all this great you know, take you down the Jabbroni Avenue to the You Suck Hotel, and you know all that pop pools. So they're working on this big promo before the Stone, before one of the Stone called Steve
Austin matches. I wish I could remember which one and give you better context, but they've been sitting there that you know, they couldn't find the words, and so they're now they're working together backstage and you know, just trying to make it perfect, and Stone Cold blocks up just he's trying to be funny, but in a dick way of being funny, walks Bay. He goes, I don't know
why you're working so hard. You're just losing the goddamn match anyway, and just walks out of the room and they're both like, bro, what they come on, man, We're
just trying to get our jobs done. So it was cool to know that these two guys were cool like that in order to pull off this type of a match, because there's other rivalries we'll get into where the guys are cool, but when you have two people that respect each other enough to oversell his finisher at the level he overseells it, which at thirteen you were god, makes
it look fake. But still he was trying to show respect for sure, and to see Stone Cold be able to praise Dwayne the Rock Johnson as he does to this day. Lets you know that both men were in it together, and that's when you get the best stuff both. You know, both guys were trying to do business. Brett Hart and Sean Michaels, which I want to get into next, could have lasted forever, but bad business was done, so it had to end. And that just makes these types
of rivalries that much more special. But to throwing the titles in the river and throwing each other in the river and all the shes so good, there's just said so much Cursey did. They were just like, Yo, you can say anything, but fuck. You can say any word on earth, you just can't say an F bob. And they're like, cool, let's go to town because yeah, I'm gonna want to watch that. Everybody wants to see people break the rules.
They're like, let them, let them, let them rip, We'll pay the fines. Who cares. This is a good TV. We're getting a lot of ratings with Stone Golden Rock.
I feel like there was an out that if something's caught on a camera mic, the fine was Nolan void? Really, if I believe there was a clause in that that if it was a camera mic, because that's out the defense was and these are things that are collectively burgained. I believe I believe that if it's caught on a camera mic, it's okay, because that's how professional sports franchises get out of that when, like you hear now, they try to bleep it when they can, and that's why
they put in that seven second delay. But I do believe there was something in there because like YO, we can't be held accountable for what you know, the fans are saying and things like that, and I believe WWE has used that clause before to get out of that. Sean Michaels versus Brett Hard, This to me should have been a three.
Hour episode of WWE Rivals, so.
This could have gone on forever. For me, it's the most talked about moment in professional wrestling, probably because it was real and it happened. Former guest of the show Ariel Helwani was actually there in the crowd when it happened, which is worthy of all my jealousy. But these two guys didn't like each other at all. And for those of you who aren't like the hardcore wrestling fans, but you tune in just for the sounds of Jeff's and my voice. This was real stuff. The guys hated one another,
they had been in a fight backstage. Shawn Michaels was not the good guy in this. He was the bad guy in this. And he's talked about this publicly, so it's not spilling salt on somebody's wounds, but he was. His ego is out of control. You know. There was drug abuse, all kinds of things like that, and it was, you know, leading to a specific type of behavior that Brett Hart just wasn't about. He's such an old school guy and he was all about respect and doing things
the right way. And Sean didn't care. He was going to be the guy. And that was the foundation that this real life rivalry was set upon. And then they have to go tell a story in the friggin ring. Jeff, where does this rate for you as far as as far as like rivalries in the in the whole list of all the rivalries.
It's obviously up there. It's obviously one of the best. It's undeniably the best, even if you don't like either of those wrestlers, because it was personal. You could tell it was personal as a viewer and also if you like, if you're the kind of kid, which I was occasionally like, oh this is real, Oh that was real, like that this is the rivalry for you. Because even back then, before like the internet was what it is today, you
knew there were somehow. I was aware that Shawn Michaels was hated in the locker room, and I know that Brett Hart was respected. But also Brett is a grump.
Bread is a pretty grumpy guy. Like Razor Ramone and him are going back and forth on a promo and Razor Ramone almost comes off like the more likable one, and Razor is the bad guy the self pro He was like I'm gonna chop you up with my mucheese mode like he's literally And then they go to Brett and Brett's like I've always worked hard, I've always and you're like, that's the good guy. There's no smile, there's no like an it like it's just we just were
understood that that's the good guy. He wears the pink in the black. He comes from this family's fundamental. He does the he does all the like the most technical work in the ring. It felt real and it was real at times and very personal. And then with the big obviously the big Montreal screwjob, which is still talked about because it was real. Yeah, it's up there. It's not my favorite. I was never a Shawn Michael's guy and I was never a Bret Hart guy. And it's
not that I didn't like them. I was a teenager. When you're a little boy, you don't want a roof for the guy coming out like I'm a sexy bully boy. I'm like, when is the Undertaker gonna come in here and choke slam? This dwinked? You know, So wasn't really my guys. But I also, as an adult, can recognize how dope both of those wrestlers were and also how cool you know now that I'm a grown man and more reasonable. Sean Michaels was one of the goats for sure.
Yeah, yeah, I think most people put him top.
Top Behaviorally, he was a mess.
I heard, yeah, but that's I mean, that's public knowledge now, So don't get don't get mad at us for saying things. And we're not poor and salt. We're just explaining the story. And for those of you who don't know what the screw job is. Again, I know we have some listeners that aren't wrestling fans. This was like the worst business you could do on someone. Imagine working for your boss, doing a great job. Your boss gives you a raise a few months into the race, says, hey, I can't
afford that raise anymore? Can we go back to your original salary? You'd already be insulted.
Oh yeah.
Then you get an offer from another company. You say, okay, well, then this offers better. Do you mind if I go there and your bosses? Now, that's okay? But when you leave? Are you cool? If the person who's going to take your office humiliates you in front of everybody, and you going like, yo, how many more things do I have to do? Man?
Also, don't worry, We're not going to do that. And then they just do that to surprise you. Yeah, and you're like, wait, wit what?
Yeah? You say I'm not comfortable with that, and they say okay. And then on your last day of work, you cool it just comes in and takes a shit on your desk and says, do something about it, bitch, and you just have to take it and get thrown out by security, and you're like, he shot on my desk. I wasn't the one doing it.
I thought we were going to do this. I was told we're not going to do this. They said, that's what that's that's what happened to Brett Hart. So put yourself in his shoes. You might be a little grumpy. Although he did have grumpiness before then, I'll give you that. His whole career, he seemed grumpy and talk about listen to him an inn of your interview. Now he's still pretty grumpy.
I still love him. I don't care. Sunglasses were cool, all right, dude. I want to make sure you get yours in here because it's a big list. So what's your rivalry that didn't make the list? Producer Alex? You should be ashamed of yourself.
No, don't say that about Producer Alex doing the lord's work. But my think my one of my favorite ones, or made me the most memorable. And this could just be my age, it could just be my interest in wrestling that is a little uniquer than others. Caine and Undertaker. When I always liked Kane, all right, sorry, I always
liked Undertaker. Everyone did he was one of the only characters that could still live on in kind of like this fantasy is like a dead wizard while all the other wrestlers are kind of going into an era where it's like just their names and like we don't really have a shtick, you know, like we're done with the whole cop thing and the Indian thing and the clown thing. Like Undertakers transcended it. He was still able to like
the cop me too. I loved all that stuff, but wrestling seemed to be going past that, like they started to do this other thing. Undertakers still lived on, you know, He's still lived on as far as like he was able to go into the next era as this character. So when they introduced an equally preposterous character that was Undertaker's twin brother back who thought he was always dead.
Orn't know if it was twin brother, but it was his brother who he was brother thought died in a fire that Undertaker started, and he it was like Undertaker's secret past, and Paul Hayman was really aware of it, you know, and the way he played all sides is so good. I just thought that River was so fun to watch every single week. I was I was invested and and Cain lived on to be one of the greatest wrestlers ever because of that start. So that was probably one of my favorites.
Yeah, I mean we did Caana and Taker on R. Yeah, yeah, it it meant a lot to that, not just to you, to a lot of people. It was just it was an old school story for the time in a new school world, and it made it stand out and it had I feel like that helped it resonate with the older generation that wasn't getting the cops and the irs,
text guys like all those kind of characters anymore. And they were sort of the last two attractions in wrestling, right, like where it's not the pro wrestler, it's the gimmick and the image they portray. We know, nobody can make fire come out of the turnbuckles, but this guy still does, even though we know it's a pyro guy underneath pressing a button.
But it's cool.
So they both held something special. But again, it was the story thing that made it work. Otherwise it's just two big guys as big he would say, meaty men slapping meat, and you have to care about the meat if you want to watch it. Slap people. And in order to do that, you have to have a story that means something. And the story back then was like you said, he had a brother that he thought was dead and here he comes. Oh shit. And the great thing about that rivalry was post rivalry, it turns in
to a tag team. Yeah, and they become the Brothers of Destruction, and so it goes from hate back to love. Right, so there had to be forgiveness in there somewhere. But when they became the Brothers of Destruction, I liked them even more. And I already liked both guys, but I was like, oh, the Brothers are Destruction. No, there's not a tag team, and the Demolition can't beat them. No way, there's not a tag team because they're not as tough.
The hardies can't beat them. They'll get snapped. Like nobody was gonna beat the Brothers of Destruction. I loved them as a tag team, so yeah, they you're right, they should have been on them.
They also looked cool like that, Like they looked like they're like a Halloween costume. Try to dress like a lot of wrestlers on Halloween. It's tough, but like when you see someone dressed up as Undertaker and or Caine. You go, I know exactly what they are. I know exactly what that is, and it's a full It's like a full thing. So I loved their look.
There are a ton for us to get to and trying to get a little more, a little bit into the later modern era before we run out of time. But I'm happy to do a different one if you don't want to, would you like to do cmpunk John Cena? Or do you want to jump into someone else that tickles your fancy a bit more? That one? All right?
I think this one is relevant because CM punk is arguably top man right on the microphone as as far as who as far as promos go, CM Punk okay, yeah, in the company at this time, whereas John Cena cut the same promo every week, it was here I am, I'm here for you, I'm here for the people. I'm here for the kids. You gotta work hard, you got
to do things the right way. And cmpunk got to be completely free in this and say what a lot of fans thought about the brand at that time, ignoring what the kids liked, right, and even said that in some of his promos, like why do you think you're on in the first segment because most kids are going to bed, like Triple H and crack jokes on that before cmpunk took a little bit of it as well.
But Cmpunk's ability to talk to not only Sina, but to Vince McMahon on the mic in a promo, face to face, and come out as the winner in every single promo, in my opinion, even when I disagreed with some of the takes he was having, he won every single promo. Now, granted, and I prefaced it was he got a lot more freedom because John Cena's locked into it was locked into a very specific promo at that time when he was putting guys over like young guys.
Now you've seen some different stuff where he's doing the CM punk promo on guys like Austin Theory, or he's doing the CM punk promo before that on Roman Reigns and saying the real stuff that the fans were saying. John cenas champion, as the g Rated Era Champion would
never do that. He would never do that. It would all just land all that, the real stuff would just fall off his broad shoulders and he would just do the company line every time, And I think that's why people responded so much to this, because the older fans hated everything's John stood for. Now they appreciate the sacrifice he made because they understand it was more of a sacrifice, I think. But then it was just pure hatred the science of Sina wins. We riot never had the balls
to riot, but you always brought your signs. And then Ciampunk, who was, as he said in his own words, I am the voice of the voiceless, and that resonated with everybody. Not to mention the fact that both guys could wrestle their ass off, even though they would say you can wrestle to John Cena, forget all that, dude. The dude could wrestle. And these guys tore the house down. And this was during the g era, and they made it look at least pg. Thirteen, if not ours. Sometimes what about you, dude?
Would you think, well, so, then you liked the rivalry, you liked these guys.
It's not It's not so much that I like because I'm not a John Cena guy. I just respect what his contribution was to the business and the sacrifice says he had to make. Everyone knows how I feel about cmpunk. I think he's awesome. He can wrestle and he can talk sick on the mic. He's older now it can't work the way he used to, but back then he was a man. But neither guy was a connective tissue guy. For me, I never got behind and rooted for anyone. But he's brought so much real shit to the table,
excuse my language. And that hadn't been done in that company, hadn't even been allowed to be done, and Cmpunk got to do it. And I think that's what made it so specialist because he was telling the truth a lot.
Yeah, I was not a big fan of either of these guys, I think. I so I still hold John Cena in contempt for that rapping gimmick like he was coming. It's just it was so cringey and weird. He was also like, if you look back on some of those pretty racist. He said a lot of like really racially insensitive things about Mexican and stuff, like when he was going when he was going to the ring about Eddie Garrera, Like he said a lot of like cringey, bad stuff.
Yo, you just popped a story in my head. There was this like underground story, and eventually I think photos or video came out of Juan Sina where he would have to wear a mask and John hated wearing masks, and I knew that, and I was the one that pitched Juan Sena to Vince, and Vince popped for it and made him do it tour in Mexico Swan Sena and just because he knew he would hate wrestling the mask, because John havin kind of like a prick to you what I first thot, I was like a Vince will
never say yes, but I'm just gonna put it over. It's like, ah, that's fucking great, We're doing it. And he had to be want seen it, but go ahead. I always deleted his wraps out of my mind because they were like not what I liked as far as rap went.
So I don't know what. The guy was so bad and cringey, and he was like trying to be edgy, but it always just come off terrible. Never was a John Cena guy. Even when he came around, he seemed I don't know if he does, but he seems kind of kurt. He seems very like like not like I like stuffy, even when as the good guy.
Kurt I think is a fair fair thingsation.
And then Punk. I was just never like a big punk guy because I kind of missed that generation of wrestling, like that was the the ruthless aggression era, was not your favorite. Well, I just wasn't watching, so it wasn't like big on punk people you see, we see them Punk, I missed it. I was too busy doing whatever was more important in my life at that time, trying to survive basically, So these two, like their rivalry was never
like a huge thing for me. I know that they're very important to a lot of people as far as like seeing as a classic good guy and seeing them Punk is a classic bad guy. But it still just kind of feels like Hogan versus you know, if it feels like we've got the classic good guy and then the classic kind of but bad guy. I don't know, I just didn't do much for me, but I do recognize that they were important to a lot of people.
I believe the term pipe bomb promo actually spawned from this rivalry based on the his well the promo that you should go watch on YouTube because I can't re enact it because Punk killed it. But I think that was the birth of that phrase. The pipe bomb promo. I got to see the second pipe bomb promo locally here in LA when mjf Ham on national television broke rule. I bet they got fined that night.
You know what's funny is I love the punk its credited for the first like pipe bomb, like on that kind of stuff. You know, now Mgf's doing a pipe bomb every week, every week.
Just if he does it too much though, then maybe it doesn't, you know, mean as much.
Well, didn't Dusty Rhodes do one a long time ago or not Dusty Dustin Rhodes. He came out dressed in some terrible costume and he just kept like, I'll send it to you guys. But I think he had like one where he was like for years, they made me wear a gold dress and he called me gold dust. They made me do this crap and you know how my family's been in wrestling this long and this this is the death. They put me in this crap and
make me come out here like it was. It was like a legit speaking to the back of the house. I always thought he loved gold that was his idea. I thought, maybe I'm tripping maybe that was part of it. Maybe that maybe just part of the gammick that he's pretending to not like it. I don't know.
Yeah, maybe it was that good. All right, you guys, we'll check it out. If you want to get into what our most favorite current rivalries have been, you can get it on Thursday's episode, so make sure you download that too. Thank you guys for your support. Jeff I love you brother, Love you buddy.
Thanks for having me on again.
Peace.
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