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Great deals at all times, incredible reviews online from some of the best publications in the world, and 24/7 support in case you don't know what you're doing or how to use it. They got you covered. Shield your data from Snoops and Criminals. Protect yourself on public Wi-Fi. Secure every device you own. Add extra layers of security to your digital life with NordVPN.com/fightful. If you're abroad, listen to your favorites. I know a lot of wrestling fans have been traveling a lot more with big events. NordVPN.com/fightful will protect you. What's up, you guys? Welcome to Fightful. It is December 30, 2024. Probably our last Fightful Show of the Year. It's hard for me to believe that they'll do a post-the-Nexty show tomorrow night, but by God, the last WWE Raw on USA Network probably ever. Netflix has a 10-year deal with an option to extend it 10 more years. They ended a 31-plus year history. Well, not 31 years. They had a break for a while, but 31 years of history on the USA Network for WWE Raw. We're going to sit here and talk about it. Leave a thumbs up. Drop those fruit emojis. Drop the comments in the comments section. I am always coming over there the next day and talking with you guys. We've got a boo here. How are you doing, man? Fresh batch of wings. I know what you're doing. That's why we got started. I had to go smoke. I had to walk around. I had to talk to my dog and see if she was okay. Of course, I made some wings. I had to make some wings. Brother, you can't end the show like that and expect this show to start on time. When I saw the rundown, which we have on FightfulSelect.com, the best $5 in the business, we'll have a lot of writers. By the way, if you want to find out who wrote some of the dialogue in that, we got you on FightfulSelect. I saw the rundown of the show and I was just like, "All right. Okay, boy." They ended it with a bang. They ended it making you go, "I got to watch Monday Night Raw next week," and that's what you want to see. That's what you want to see. What I want to see, super chats, humper chats, get them in, which strive to be the most interactive pro wrestling review show with a couple of guys that have some sources in the game. Just send those super chats, send those humper chats here as well. You can go to humperchats.com because I know thousands of you are watching on Twitter, X, Twitch, Facebook. We had a wonderful gentleman who sent us a Twitch raid the other day, which was very cool during our post-AEW show. That is in our archives right now. We got a Kyle Fletcher interview dropping this week as well. We got a whole bunch of interviews that have dropped over the last couple of weeks, and we are stepping into some more of the produced videos as well. Some of them that you see around other channels and alike, I think it's time that Fightful steps up and start doing that. If you have experience in scripting and editing these, hit me up on Twitter or hit up our Fightful accounts. I'll be looking for somebody to do that. I'll also be doing some videos on stories behind events that I've covered, interviews that I've done. Sean, I got to stop you. Go ahead. You say you have an interview coming up, right? Yeah. The chat is asking you. The chat is asking you, and I'm asking you to say his full name, sir. Kyle Fletcher? That's not his full name. What's his full name, then? The protostar. Yeah, it is the protostar. And when you write protostar, you got to capitalize not just a P, but the S as well. It's protocapital S star. No spaces in between protocomp and star. I will update the title. Yes. You have to put it in the title of video, and interview with the protostar complex. I have to. It's our lovely friends over at Down Under The Ring who did that interview and just did a great job promoting the upcoming Grand Slam Show. But by God, we are here. We got Luis, our wonderful moderator helping us out. We got some super chats, humper chats. Fancher says got my Nord subscription so I can try to watch everything on Netflix. Can't wait to see how it goes. Thanks for being awesome. Best $5 a month, $54 a year in the game. Listen, lock in those Fightful Select prices at $54 a year. Jimmy hit me up last week and he goes, brother, we might have to subscribe or we might have to up the subscription price. And I fought him. I threatened to get physical with this man. I was like Jimmy, I will come up to Canada and beat the maple syrup out of your ass so fast. I said that to him. It's a real thing that if he debunks or says it didn't happen, he's lying. But I'm fighting for you guys, fighting for you guys. We will always keep it the most affordable wrestling news service on the planet. But Nord VPN legitimately, if you're like, oh man, I don't want cable just to watch SmackDown get Nord, get Netflix, change your virtual location. It'll save your life. It'll save your life. Dude, I've talked to people that have told me like, man, you know, I was worried about how I was going to be able to watch this and then I got Nord and I was able to watch this sports game that I couldn't because it was out of market or dah dah dah dah. It is a lifesaver when it comes to that. Denise's husband gave me the hack for like Sunday ticket. He's like, you know, all these things are in local markets. So just change your virtual location. It is, it is huge for sports. So look, Nord VPN, if you want to watch certain sports, man, it saves your life. I heard it saves babies out of burning buildings too. Kenny says, he boo with all the talk about politics. If you were a wrestler, what would it be the thing you politic for? Mine is no one kicks out of my finish. I think that's a good winnie boo because I mean, all Baron Corbin had for a long time was his finish. The end of days, yeah. I'm not sure. I am. There's politics in my in my shoe job and I tend to like, for me personally, right? I tend to like what I've learned about myself Sean is like when I'm around that stuff, I'm just like, man, I don't, I don't, I don't want to get into the drama, man, you know, I just want to do what I got to do. But wrestling is a totally different beast. So as long as I'm getting paid really good and I have job security, I think I'd be fine. Dude, I just want to be my bills, man. I mean, I have learned like in the wrestling media game and stuff like, I mean, listen, people have seen my social media conduct, especially in previous years. And there were a lot of times I was insecure about my spot. And then when I became very secure about it, I was like, man, the shit ain't really worth it. Like, absolutely. Plus, I gotta be honest, look, having spoken to numerous pro wrestlers, what you come to learn is that most of them, especially aggressive wrestlers at a certain level to get to a certain level in wrestling, you kind of have to be a sociopath. And you got to be like, slightly mentally ill. And I say all that to say, I can't put myself in the headspace of a pro wrestler, because I'm not that insane yet. I'm getting there. I think once like I'm hit like 37, 38, it's really going to kick in, you know, but I'm a little couple years away. But yeah, right now, I don't, I don't want to politics about anything. I just want to, you know, have a good time and pay my bills. See, when I've wrestled and done stuff, I've had to politic against doing more stuff. Mojo Raleigh wanted to bump for me. I was like, Mojo, what are we talking about? What are we doing here? I throw a headbutt at you. You know, sell it, you pounce me. That's the spot. I need to be taking bumps for me. What are we talking about here? Right. Ryan says off topic, but guess is them where Kevin Knight goes. Fightful select.com reported today that Kevin Knight, who should be on everybody's radar, I WGP junior heavyweight tag team champion. His contract is up this week. They are talking with him about renewing it. I believe he has interest in pursuing some things elsewhere. You know, I have long thought that you want a guy to fill that Cedric Alexander role in the hurt syndicate. Kevin Knight is a guy right there. But if I were NXT, I'd be after him too. He's so talented and he's young. All these major promotions should be tripping over themselves to at least kick the tires on Kevin Knight. If you're NXT, why wouldn't you go for him when you're made of Encina's and feature guys like Rich Holland and Sean Spears, no disrespect to Sean Spears. But it's a shallow pool of talent that's ready to produce at a high level on television. So of course, NXT should look into it. If you're a UW, look, AEW has a dearth of talent. There's so many people. It's so many people to push. It's kind of tough sometimes. And so with AEW, like talent acquisitions now need to be based on fit. And I do think there is a fit for him. And like you just said, hurt syndicate three man unit. There's not the young guy yet. Who's going to be the fourth man? It used to be Cedric Alexander. He's currently under contract and WWE. Who's going to be now? Well, boom, there's there's a guy right there you can bring. 27 years old, athletic as fuck, could work the AEW house style, could get over. He can talk a little bit too. People don't know what to say about him. He can talk a little bit. So all I know is whatever happens and my hope it gets paid. Actually, look, I'll say this on record. I spoke to Kevin yesterday, Sean. And okay. Yeah, yeah. And I kind of just picked his brain about the situation. And he seemed like he just kind of seemed like he was just going to put it in God's hands and hope that everything worked out well. And he got a nice deal. So the vibe I got speaking in was just that he's just, he's open to anything really. And he just wants a big opportunity somewhere where he could just get paid and do his thing. It's so funny because last year I had reported just before the New Year's that 2020 forward is going to be a big contract year. And I mean, four big contracts. There wasn't necessarily a lot of movement, but we knew Drew, Seth, Damian, Becky, you know, a lot of deals were coming up, Ricochet, whole lot of AEW deals had to get resigned. 2025, especially the beginning of the year is where a whole lot of people in the come up are coming up with their contracts. And I mentioned Kevin Knight, you also have established people like TJP, he's probably going to stay in New Japan. Fightful Select reported that today. Burpinder, who, you know, TNA and a lot of other companies looking to make more of an impact in India, he's still a young guy that I could see getting picked up somewhere and used a little bit more. But we've got New Japan contract news every day this week on Fightful Select, including some pretty damn big names that are coming up. So it's gonna be awesome. Fid says, who actually did the interview with Kyle Fletcher or the protostar Kyle Fletcher? The protostar, Kyle Fletcher. Come on, man. Come on. It's like a pit name slickback. It's the full name. He said, Nord code Fightful saved me from having to buy a WWE network sub for only a week while in New Zealand. That's what we're about, man. Or about. Fightful saves lives, dude. We do. We do. And listen, here's what I have to say, especially when it comes to Fightful Select. I understand not everybody can pay for wrestling news. I've been there. So what I suggest is steal money from someone, rob somebody. 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Steel money from another business is what I would encourage. Yeah, absolutely. Sean, anything new in the raw runtime, would hope it's three hours based on the card. So I'm doing the Twitter subscription gimmick, where it's like $3 a month that all goes towards a good cause, but I put some things that don't necessarily fit anywhere else. I had reported on select last week and updated it tonight. They still have not told talent how long this damn show is going to be. I don't think that's an accident. I feel like it's just going to end when it ends, Ibu. We saw tonight's segment, they had to get the hell off the air. They ain't got to do that anymore. They can go as long as they want. Now they are going to be on Ibu's standard time. Oh, hell yeah. Hell yeah. This is what you love to see. You're like, hey, Hunter, are we ending at 10? I mean, are we ending at 11? We are, we are ending at 11 or seven. It's like, cool. All right, sure. I am. All I know is this, Sean. If you noticed, there was a lot of limited commercials on tonight's episode of Raw. There were almost none the first hour. There was so few that I kind of was like, I can use a commercial here. Fuck, I got a P dude. So like, like a match would end and I'm like, all right, let's, let's leave. And they're like, and now folks, Rhea Ripley, and it just goes to a pre-tape. I'm like, fuck, come on. But like, there's segments where you're used to them using as the offer, where they play the raw theme and you got somebody backstage nodding to add. Oh, yeah. And you're like, all right, they're going to commercial. Like, I can go take a shit. No, you can't. You hear that weird, you hear that like weird AIS on the back and I was like, stepping to the eyes of the warrior and stepping up in the pain, stepping up in the mor again. Like a guy. No, listen, you know where the money is? Just being in a band and doing. Wow. Yeah. Oh, my God. Oh, get. I think I think we could. I'll do an album of 15 songs, sell them all for commercials. Dude. Oh, yeah. Just just. Hey, commercials. If you want to use that sound bite right there, that will do you just fine. I think we could show and I think we could produce better music for WWE than Def Rebel. Oh, yeah. Yeah. And that's just me farting into a fucking tuba. If they told me come up with like a judgment day theme that was better than this one, I could just be like, I don't know. Like, boom, boom, boom, boom. Where the judgment day. I used to try to acapella sing Shayna Baszler's old NXT theme and I got real good at it. Real good. Oh, yeah. That's like. And I could just see her walking out to it. And even if she heard it, she had been like, damn, this is good doing that weird, like triangle symbol thing that she did. Yeah, absolutely. It was the spades. She's the queen of spades. All right. Right. I'm sorry, Shayna. Don't get mad at me. Legion says any news on how ads will work on Netflix, fine with them being there, just hope they aren't during matches. I mean, that's what I'm hoping, especially seeing the match that we'll talk about shortly. Gable versus Otis without commercials greatly helped by just you being able to observe it and have it play out from beginning to end. Oh, yeah. We don't know yet. They've long planned for there to be commercials. I mean, the reality is, listen, I don't even know how much the Netflix Raw deal is, but like, come on, they have to do commercials because what they're not expecting. However, many million people to sign up for just WWE Raw. It's not going to be a loss leader. They're going to sell ads for that thing. I hope it's not during matches. This is a chance for them to greatly alter the formatting of this show. Yes. Because it, look, it's a format that we've been used to for years, and it just affects how you perceive certain things. I know almost like subliminally, Sean, I'm conditioned to not care about certain matches as much because it's like, this isn't going to be particular. Like, if I know for, especially with the fightful select rundowns that you provide, it's easy to understand the rhythms of a match. And if you say a match is two segments, and the entrance and start, and you do 90 seconds, right, right to a high spot, and then a commercial, it's like, all right, that was neat. We're going to come at a commercial, they're going to do some back and forth with three minutes, and it's going to end. And it's like, cool, but it's like, I know that's not going to be a great match. So how am I supposed to invest in that? You know what I mean? Here's how they tricked us this time, though. There were no commercials. So one segment was 15 minutes. So you got 15 minutes of the entrance and the nine-minute match, which we will talk about momentarily. Actually, let's go ahead and talk about it. Forget it. We don't have to do it in order. Chad Gable defeated Otis. What a kick-ass match. And listen, they absolutely dropped the ball with Otis. He was going to be hot after turning on Chad Gable and doing something physical, and they didn't do it. But this, I'm glad that it finally got paid off. Chad Gable gets the win. He needed the win because he's been doing a whole lot of nothing since then. Yeah, yeah, he needed to win this match. I noticed, Sean, I was looking through the social media reactions. The Zoomer side of the WWE fan base wasn't big into this, but the millennial side, which is us, Sean Rossab. I think it spoke to the 1989 WWF, I guess, pieces of our fandom, because I watched this, and I was just like, hell yeah, it's just like, it's so like Kurt Henning versus like any fat guy that they would throw him against, you know, it's just because- Otis good. Yeah, because Otis just kind of, look, is Otis freaking Bret Hart? No, not at all. Otis, he does very specific things, very good, and he gets tired after about three minutes, and then just kind of like pelvic thrusts his way through some reactions, which that's totally fine. We all do that sometimes. But like, in the case of Otis and Gable, he's just a never-ending force of joy. And because of that, the fan just want to support him. So when Chad is getting heat on him and they do the Otis chance and he starts jiggling his legs and shit and hulking up, it's just fun. When he rips the shirt off, it's fun. When he does it really bad warm of his, it just rocks. Everything about Otis just works. And so, like, to me, this is what I expected. Chad Gable is an excellent professional wrestler. Otis is a ton of fun, and they got to just kind of ride the crowd here. And they had a good 10-minute match. And I was a fan of this, Sean. I was a fan of this. The elements on the outside, like the women fighting that always gets the pop from the fans. Good bumps taken from the creeds when Otis was tossing them around. And Chad Gable got a necessary victory. I thought this was a good piece of business. I think Otis had solid matches in the past. Like, he's had solid singles matches with Champa way back in the day with Nakamura, I think, last year, maybe with Johnny a couple years ago with Obafemi earlier this year. This was a singles match that I was like, this was a good match. Like, not just a solid match. This was good. You got Chad Gable doing the Deadlift, Suplex, all that. You have Otis who conveys emotions so well. And as you mentioned, he's so lovable. So the audience hates seeing him suffer. They don't want to see him in peril. They want to root him towards victory. So this had heat thanks to that. And Otis gets great reactions in every place, but this building in particular, Sean, you have a full house in Houston, Texas. Man, Texas coming through. They're always terrific. Look, man, and I'm an East Coaster saying this, folks. This is an East Coaster saying this. But the days of the crowds being New York, L.A., and Chicago, I mean, look, you know, those crowds are still great. But to me, in my experience watching A.W.W.E. every time these places hit Dallas, Texas, San Antonio, you know, and so on and so forth, these crowds are tremendous. It doesn't matter the size of the venue or anything. So they all deserve big shows, in my opinion. One of them will be all in in Dallas, which you guys should buy a ticket to, to see Kenny Omega versus Kazoozco, but I just I just loved everything about this, the vibes, the atmosphere. I think that's what made for this being a fun show, a show that I got to point out, Sean, I lost track of which draws we covered that were taped and which weren't. But this show distinctly didn't, I just lose track, but this show distinctly did not feel taped. That's not me saying like it was like a fucking blow away show with every segment, but it just felt alive and present and alive. And a lot of that was the Houston crowd. So a little inside baseball that we had reported on FightfulSelect.com a while back. When WWE's deal with USA was up for Raw, it was actually up at like the start of October, but they had to bridge a gap until the Netflix deal. And USA came along and they hadn't even factored this money into their quarterlies and stuff. So they did that with their stockholders in mind. And they're like, all right, well, we're continuing our relationship with the USA network on SmackDown. Let's just keep it on USA. But it moved to two hours and it moved to two hours for a variety of reasons, because this is a bridge, a bridge between one era to another. They had European tours. They had the holiday break twice, two holiday breaks that they had to go on. And they were able to double tape a series of shows as a result of that. When you're taping a three hour show, you can't tape two shows. You're going to have the people there all day. I mean, listen, Tony Kahn would love to do that. He does that shit all the time. But WWE would tape basically, oh, let's see, like almost like a show and a half. And then you would see a lot more transition videos and backstage segments and a lot of things like that along the way. So the two hour Raw, I would be surprised if two hours is the time. I know a lot of talent went three hours as well, because they want that opportunity. But yeah, we'll find out more soon. Pete Dunn attacked our truth that that matches canceled. Thank God. Thank God. Holy shit, dude. I got told that matches happening in the morning, Sean. And then I was like, hope this guy's fucking wrong. And then I checked with him in four o'clock. I was like, are you sure? And he's like, yeah, I was like, okay. And then you then you posted it. And I was like, fuck. I saw it was one second. I was like, even at one second, I'm like, this is a waste of my time. I don't want to see this. What's up? But one segment on this show, again, because of the commercial free element could mean a lot of things. I am so done with this like, I'm not but you know what it feels like? It feels like when a WF in 2000, like would like, they would take certain good wrestlers, right? That like weren't top guys and they didn't have anything for them. And they're like, all right, this is just your thing now that we'll do on TV for like three minutes before we move on to the shit that matters. And like, with Malenko eventually, they were like, you want to just be obsessed with trying to fuck Lita. And it's like, what? But like, not obviously not an apples to apples comparison, but it feels like with Bush, they just decided, all right, he had like 90 matches with Sheamus, what are you doing now? And they're like, I don't know. What if we just, what if our truth just kept calling him Bush, and they're like, sure. This doesn't work for me. It never did. Pete Dunn is a good wrestler. I'm not saying Pete Dunn should be at the top of the cards, but I'd like to see him kill some time wrestling good people. He's a good wrestler, like I said. I'm sure hopefully when Netflix comes around that they can start doing that with him. What I don't want is this type of comedy. It just doesn't work for me. Our truth, Sean, I love him. I love Ron Killings. Ron Killings, if you're listening, I'm a big fan of you have always respected you. I think you're historically underrated. I think your teenage run was fucking awesome. But I'm just, I just had enough, Sean. I just, I just, I get it. I've seen it. It's been 30 years. Not 30, but it's been a long time. I'm ready to move on here. You know, I think that our truth is best served almost as like that cameo attraction. So to speak, by all means, when you've got like a holiday tour or live events, he should be on them and entertaining the audience. He should pop up at the Royal Rumble. He should pop up at like all those big things and think that he's a part of them as a result of the bit. But this is done. Yeah, I'm not much. That's a good, Sean. That's a good point. Like if he's a site gag that you see every six weeks, where it's just like, I don't know, like two guys brawled and then the camera pans around and then like he keeps panning and he just see our truth and he's just like, damn, or something. And he's like, ah, it's our truth. LOL. You know what I mean? That works. Or like, I don't know. It's the end of the transfer window, Sean, that they've been talking about in January, right? And then like a month after the fucking transfer window, our truth walks in with like a fucking folder and he's like, so this is why I think I should be on smack now. And they're like, oh, no, no, even funnier. This is why I should be on NXT. I think you're gonna die. And it's like, truth, the transfer window ended like a month ago. What are you doing, sir? That's a funny thing. You know what I mean? That's what works. And part of the funniness is like, oh, he's here. Not, oh, it's the weekly our truth, like comedy that we have before, so. Terry Allen, Jr. says, attention to detail. Marina Shafir was lying on the floor at ringside towards the end of the show. Maybe she forgot to go with the group. Did you notice? I did not notice that. I did not notice that. I try to notice a little as little about the death writer story as possible. I will say this. Somebody asked me on the Q&A show, they're like, okay, how would you end it? And I was like, well, I had always said before MJF turned babyface, the way to turn and babyface was basically to have him have to out mother fucker somebody that came in. And the whole AEW roster was like, well, we prefer our piece of shit over this new piece of shit. And I actually think, first off, Beth Phoenix should come in even the odds against Marina Shafir, if they're going to do this FTR, rated FTR thing, but I think that FTR and Beth should encourage Adam Copeland to get Christian to out mother fucker John Moxley and Christian's motivation would be, well, I can't cash this shit in until he doesn't have the title anyway, because Claudia and Pack and you aren't going to let me, they're stopping me at every turn, and then end this shit as soon as possible. End it as soon as possible. I'm so dumb with it. Yeah, I'm over it, dude. I also like, I think Adam Copeland is a legend in his own right, and I think John Moxley is a great wrestler. But there's a version, even though this is a proper few, but there's a version of those promos that might be like really agonizing. Like, could you man Edge being like, God, I am fighting for the soul of a U and Moxley. It's already heard about his pubes. Where do we go from here? John just being like, you see Adam, you're the problem, Adam. You're the, you're the guy I'm trying to get out of here, Adam. You represent what I don't want to be. What I don't want in my company. And it's like, no, you're the problem. And it's, I just, I don't, I can't, I can't. Well, New Day comes out. This internally was listed as Jey Uso's promo, which it did become, but oh boy, New Day got, they got such great heat. They, they're so good. They're so good. I, I'm just so happy to see this. A couple of characters who I'm emotionally invested in that, that have heat and Jey Uso comes out and New Day are like, you know, we know each other. We know each other really well. They're playing off of each other. Then the bloodline pops up on the screen and sets up Drew attacking Jey. How did you feel about this whole piece of business here? I think that what this told you is that they're going to do a New Day Uso's match. And I'm always down for New Day Uso's because they have tremendous chemistry. They're the best modern tag rivalry in history, the promotion. But now there's a new context. It's the new day that are bad guys. Ooh, what's going to happen here? Um, I wonder when they do that, I would have liked them to actually like say things, you know, I get like that they're getting heat, but I wanted to say things. It strikes me as this is going to take a while before we actually get to the match. So we don't, we're not in a rush to because typically in WWE, like if they get all the talking points of the narrative out, you're going to see the match immediately. I remember I was telling my friend about punk and, and the Seth and he was asking me like, Hey, back up paying man, all wise, all knowing wise, awesome, rich guy. When is punk and Seth happening? And I said, look, here's going to be your tell, even without any scoops, if they have their promo where they really said everything they had to say to each other. And then you get physicality in the week after the match is happening soon. If there's no physicality and they haven't had the promo where they really basically said what they had to say to each other, you're going to wait a while. And in the case of this new day, Jey Uso thing, you know that they're, they already set out the roadmap. There's going to be a couple more story beats. He's going to get with Jey, sorry, with Jimmy, then they're going to say all they had to say to each other. You're going to get a lot of like, you know, Xavier's going to say all his shit to him and like, we carried tag team wrestling and da, da, da, da, and then Jey's going to be like, you know, and all that shit. And then you'll get the match. But I was a fan of this just purely on the fact that these are all performers with cache with the audience. And the crowd has super written everything. So I'm into it. I'm into it when the fans are at it, but usually unless it's the awesome truth, which thankfully doesn't exist anymore. Backstage Adam Pierce makes the, makes the match for next week Drew McIntyre, Jey Uso. I noticed Ibu I was at the WWE Madison Square Garden Show. I didn't hear that you were there. You didn't rush to go there. Could that possibly be because one, you're a big time CM Punk hater. You didn't think that he could carry the show on his own. In case you don't know this, folks, I fucking hate CM Punk. Yeah. I will say I was there when I when I saw that he was working Kaiser, I was like, disgusting. You know, I gotta get away from this one. It was a little unusual being there. And it's like, Oh, well, Rey Mysterio isn't there. Obviously he's a ticket draw for a lot of people. Jey Uso was not there. Rhea Ripley was not there. Gosh, who else wasn't there? Drew was not there. I'm like, damn, that raw side was hurting. Raw side was hurting. But Raphael Garcia said, Drew said you're next. You are next. You're next. He says, Oh my God, we're getting Drew Goldberg at mania. Also, yes, Punk. Stone Cold quite famously took his ball. Oh, we'll be talking about that later on. God, we better not be getting Drew and Goldberg unless it's Drew absolutely obliterating Goldberg with like 74 straight claim. I have a bad feeling they're gonna do like Braun and Goldberg and like, all right, I guess as Goldberg shouldn't win, but he will because he's Goldberg and I don't know. I'm trying to think of like, what's what's an actual fun and inoffensive thing Goldberg could do? And I feel like Braun and Goldberg tagging at like a Saturday, it's made an event would be kind of sick. You know, they're both they're both Atlanta guys, you know what I mean, Rick Steiner's WCW dude, you know, that connection. But then who would they fight? That's the question. You know what? I got it. This is an amenia match and it's not a mean and worthy match, but I've decided as Saturday, it's made an event, you know what they should do Sean, eight town down under getting their fucking getting speed out of their shoes by Bronbreaker and Goldberg. Yeah, three minutes, barks, high fives. Like when when they booked Dolph Ziggler against Goldberg, I was like, yeah, yeah, sure. A guy that doesn't need protected bumps his ass off would do something fun. Yeah, sure. Joel Pearl of Fightful's, Fightful of Her Books in the weeds has long said, Goldberg's favorite thing is talking about how miserable it is for him to get into ring shape. Like he loves talking about the training camp that he goes through to get into. Yeah, I mean, I just it's a lot. It's like I got to do, you know, getting my body right. And look, it's a it's a big commitment, really just committing to working out. And look, I talked to Vince, you know, he wanted me to do the rumble. I said, Vince, I don't got enough time for that. That's why I kind of you saw me worth a shirt like that. That's every Goldberg interview. You know, that and like, look, Brett wants to be mad at me. I don't, you know, he gets into the Brett stuff. So I don't know if I've still got Goldberg heat, like his reps and stuff like me. But like I did the show with Riddle years ago, where Riddle started to talk trash about Goldberg, like that came from from Fightful. And I will say it was legitimately hilarious to see Matt Riddle on that watch along. And you're like, surely that's not how the interaction happened. Then the video emerges. And it happened. Yeah, I have a confession. I have a confession. I rewatch that video. Like, yeah, every three months. It's just so funny to me. He's just like, Goldberg, the thing is Goldberg does the old guy thing where like, see, when you like old guys, because they didn't come up in the internet age, they don't understand how to handle trolling. They think they do, but they can't. Fair. And so because of this, he's trying not to be triggered. And he's you could see his blood pressure rising. And so he's like, all right, bro, he's doing, I'm not triggering, but he starts going, I'm not your bro. I'm not your bro. And he's so really hard for him to understand that somebody isn't afraid of him and never would have been like, listen, you can think about what you want about Riddle for any variety of reasons. But I had long heard this story that like after that rumble, Vince had heard that Riddle had heat with Lesnar and Goldberg, because that was also the same weekend that I think Brock went up to him and said, Wayne, ever working together, stopped talking about me. And Riddle apparently was very similar to him. Like, yeah, we'll see. And just smile at him. What I understood Vince was like, you know, you got some heat with some pretty big guys. And Riddle was like, I don't give a shit. Like, what are they going to do to me? They're going to beat me up. I doubt it. And Vince was like flabbergasted by this until somebody else in the room had to be like, you do know his history, right? And at that moment, Vince said Triple H wrap up his affairs in NXT. We're getting this guy up to the main roster because just because he wasn't afraid of Goldberg and Lesnar, go figure. But I digress. Do you think we could get the Pauls and the Usos at Mania? That would be something that I think the WWE would love to do, honestly. The Paul brothers against the Usos. Yeah, they would love to do that. I mean, yeah, if there was an option, they'd totally go for it. I think Logan Paul's WrestleMania plans are basically whatever, whatever main event guys left out of the out of the big plans. They're like, all right, this, this is the guy that gets Logan Paul. Ryan says, Sean, any update on Kevin Owens contract? Is Royal Rumble's last WWE match? I have asked a number of times. I have not been given a solid answer, but it's hard for me to believe that they would have him in this prominent position if he weren't signed. I will say this, him re-signing last time was one of the all time great contract decisions for a pro wrestler. He got everything he could possibly want and then more. And that's without a world title run. He got Steve Austin out of retirement. He made event at WrestleMania with his best friend, winning the tag titles. And now he's running around. The biggest nostalgic geek in wrestling, and I say that with love, is running around with the fucking winged eagle belt right now. That is so cool. That is so cool. Did you hear the rumors, Sean, that they have a new WWE championship being prepared and made? I haven't heard the rumor. I've heard some scuttlebutt. Some scuttling of buts. That sounds like your phone is ringing. Your phone is going, adrenaline, Amazon. And you're like, hello. And it was like, this sounds like when I mentioned that Cody might be facing scene at Mania. And you said, this sounds like you know something. And then three and a half weeks later, another outlet reported it like it was a new thing. Oh, I love when that happens, you know. I love when that happens. Ryan also asked if there's any update on Becky. Yeah, she's taking time to raise the kid. Didn't you hear, Seth? Yes, yes. But I mean, I will repeat what I've always been told about Becky directly from Becky and WWE. She wanted to take time off. It was important to her. And they were respectful of her wanting that time off. And from what I understood, they weren't like pushy or anything and bringing her back. Yeah, I mean, they were also always under the impression that they would work together upon that return. And WWE likes to do this thing, like where they don't officially announce that Becky's coming that coming back, but then she'll pop up in a commercial. And then she'll be at the Netflix media day. And then when I asked, she'll be like, just supporting the team. Yeah, yeah. Those types of things, you know. Yeah, I, it's funny. I didn't even know about that, Sean, because I was asking someone like, so the Becky premiere thing, what was that about? And they're like, it's so coyly was like, Oh, Becky says she's just there to support the husband. And I'm like, get the fuck out of here, dude. Yeah, that's stupid. Come on. That's absolutely what I'm always told as well. I think Becky and Penta are your surprises for next week. It's it's who you have there to say, you got to watch this every week. You need to be here and watch this. The code of Kye defeated Zoey Stark. I saw you. Yes, it was. So we got the picture in picture commercial here, which was Zoey Stark slapping on like the half Nelson crossface. But Zoey Stark, very underrated in the ring. I saw that you're a fan of the chiropractor as well. Yeah, I didn't know that was a name. I was like, this cool, like, backcracker thingamajig, destroyer. That was neat. That was neat. This match was good. The work was tight. Everything was executed really, really well. The crowd is into it. And I got to say, look, Zoey Stark has always been a good wrestler. The problem with her is just been she's struggled to connect with the audience. But Belle de Belle, I mean, I think she's as good as a lot of these ladies in this division. It's just it's just about finding a way to connect with people at a higher level. But from a work standpoint, I was a big fan of this. I thought this was frankly my favorite Dakota Kye main roster match that I've watched in some time, maybe in general, I'd have to like go through cage match and scroll through and shit. But this is good stuff. I was a big fan of this match. And Vic says, thoughts on the women's icy tournament final not being a part of the Netflix premiere next week. And what he was. Yeah, black. He usually says, is it next week or the following? I believe it's the following week. I'll have our our moderator Louise follow up on that. But I don't mind it. And I'll tell you why I don't mind it. Because you need something to promote next week as well. You need. You got to stack these up. This is a thing that WWE's been really, really good at is applying some of these big matches to random episodes of raw. And my hope is that now that they're on Netflix, they don't want any episodes of raw being random episodes of raw. They want them to all be stacked, so to speak. This is something I've been harping on AEW for a long time. I was glad they limited it to 11 matches. It should be eight or nine. But show us that these episodes of raw and SmackDown matter. Show us that there there's something being competed for there. Yeah. And to that point, that's why this upcoming three hour Smackdown, that's that's happening this week. They got to start big with something. You got to you got to shoot some big angles, which I do expect them to. I do expect them to. At least like a like, we got to see Charlotte on that show or something like that, a major title switch. This might be the only week in a while that I don't get the rundown for SmackDown. So that should be interesting. Not for any particular reason. They just won't be around for it. But look, I'm thinking Sean's not getting the lineup this week. Why don't we hold on. Hold on. I've got the. Why don't we use this opportunity to, you know, bring Ricky stuff. We'll get one of these in the mail. Is that technology number one or three? It's number two. Okay. Well, it's it's the office apology. Okay. That this got sent one time to. I found that while moving. That was that looks like one of those cards you like. Let me not go. I mean, listen, I won't tell the story behind it, but I'll say this. It was actually very nice. They found out my wife had been in the ER and they send flowers, which was incredibly kind of the bad. Was it was was it Nick or Legental or Paul or everybody? I think it was probably Chris on behalf of the office and probably because Chris is in the office and he was like, Hey guys, Sean's wife is having a hard time here and he went like from Nick Paul. Yes, that's what it's the same handwriting. It is the same handwriting. Oh, that rocks on both of them. It absolutely is. But I mean, listen, he sort of gave like Nick Con the panel's like, you want to write this one to say this? And he's like, Nick's like, I don't got a fucking time loser. Just write the fucking message. I'll say one of these did emerge from a conversation in regards to Nick, but I maintain a healthy relationship with with W to be in their office because listen, I got I got to work with against alongside. Sometimes it's just the way it is. I know there's a lot of people think that it's like contentious. I'll tell you the funniest part is like when the worst accounts on Twitter are like, do you see how he acts? No wrestlers should do interviews with them. And I'm like, yeah, sure. That's that's going to get all the stuff they've tried to pack me up for in the back. This will be the one your tweet guy. It'll be you. They always think there's like something that's going to do you win or like stop the access or what it's finally going to happen. It's not happening. It's probably because what we do is we we practically give away their results. He moved. That's what happens because of bed online. 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We would greatly appreciate if you supported our wonderful sponsors. Somebody asked why I still had this. I actually just got sent maybe a month or two before I moved about three years ago and I was at that house for Christmas this week and it was in a box of things that need to move out of there. Still have that nice little token of gratitude there. You know what's popping me in the live chat, Sean? Everybody's saying what we do. I don't know if you noticed this. Once I'm telling you, you'll never notice. You'll never unsee this. Watch it. Watch it. Watch it. Watch it. Watch a Triple H interview or a scrum or anything. He loves saying, "Yeah, I mean, and that's the thing about what we do. You know, what we do as a business. We're a global brand. You know, we stream in different countries. That's the thing about what we do. You know, what we do, we put smiles. It's just go to." Oh, hold on. You know what? How about this one? The spark says, "Bros said thousands watching on X. Nice try, Diddy. Okay, cool. You want to bet me money right now? How about this? How about this? You gift a hundred fightful select subscriptions if I can prove you wrong right now." How about that? I don't think the sparks is going to take you up on that bet. I don't think you are going to take me up on that because guess what? I've got a little live one X tab right now and I hate to be the bearer of bad news friend, but Wow. We stream this to you. We stream this to about three or four different Twitter accounts. So occasionally, what will happen? I'll have, you know, a fan of another show or something like that. Try to minimize viewers or something what we do. YouTube is one of like 15 platforms that this show goes to. We go to Twitch. We go to Facebook. We are on Amazon, Spotify, Apple. We are on four or five different Twitter X accounts. We are not just sitting here trying to farm YouTube views and make that it. No, we are trying to maximize our reach and maximize return for our wonderful sponsors along the way. So I know that the YouTube viewership might say 6, 7, 8,000. You can go to the Twitter live viewership right there, which we have learned does very, very well for us, but yeah, guys, there was those Twitter followers do have some benefit. Do you have some benefit? We also had EO Sky dropping to Lyra Valcaria, which I didn't see coming and I'm glad. I'm very glad because you know why I'm glad Sean. Why's that? Because that means my mania dream match just along. What's that? Oh, it's for you, Ripley and EO Sky, which may or may not be scheduled for WrestleMania. I'm wanting Rhea Ripley and Bianca Belair. I want to heal Bianca Belair against Rhea Ripley so bad. The thing is, I think Bianca is going to be tied up with whatever this jade mystery is going to be, you know, so, you know, yeah, we'll see. We'll see what happens. Possibly. Ooh, Ryan says EO, generational, but Lyra taking two from her and one from Becky, she must have a huge believer in the back. Well, that's the thing, you boo. When Lyra started out and she was tethered to Becky, I was like, damn, is this too much? Are they pushing her too hard? I think it's ended up working because now they have given her enough credibility with her early wins, taken some of that away with her recent lack of booking to where when she won this very good match that had the crowd chaining. This is awesome. I did stand up and go, oh, holy shit, she won this match. You know what I love the most about this, Sean, is they knew that the plan was going to be Lyra going over, right? And it's very easy for WWE to go, oh, I guess we'll just have like PFC costy or something, right? But that would have just made the match worse and like, it wouldn't have made anybody look any better or more protected from that. Frankly, sometimes, some people just win. Sometimes people don't lose. It's a make or miss league, Sean. Sometimes, it's just not your night and the ball rims out and the other person went over. And in this case, you know, thought she had her and then Lyra used to leverage it and boom got her bridging pin. And you know, just wasn't able to get out of that. And I'll tell you what, Sean, when wrestling does these types of things, it's a sporting framework. And me as a viewer, I don't go, oh, this means you're weak. Oh, guess she's bad. Guess I like her less. It's not 1986. I don't think less of you for losing a fake fight. I know it's fake. You know, so I watched it. I'm like, ah, damn, Lyra had her again. Cool. You know, it happens. And I say, I'll have to say wrestling needs to embrace things like this more, just like us, brain, you know, like they didn't feel the need to protect. I got to say in general, Sean, fuck protection. Look, there's situations where it works, but it works not from a protected table, but from a, this is we could build another feud all this because of the person that came involved. But like, I think sometimes we overvalue this bullshit, you know, this stuff that just makes matches worse and in social intelligence. Sometimes people just beat other people. It can. Yes. I don't think less of people. EO Sky, I don't think less of you. You are literally the savior in my life. You are. I did not think that diesel was a little bitch when Brett Hart pinned him with a small package. I didn't think that as a result of that. Oh, you know, you were still the genius of the sky. I still appreciate you. I still look for your masters. I have mentioned this about a hundred times on this show. I subscribed to the Randy Savage method. Like when they would say, Oh, do you want a schmaz? Do you want interference? He'd be like, No, I'm good enough to stay over. Win him in the ring, lose him in the ring. Oh, yeah. Hell yeah. That's that's. And that's why he's a man. God damn it. And now we're looking at a situation where either Lyra or Dakota are going to be the the intercontinental champion. Like that that is awesome. I love that. I watched that match and all I thought was this is what this division can fucking be Sean. There's so many talented ladies in this division and I thought 2024 was like the worst main roster women's division year in a while. And it's really a shame because there's talent to make it not that way. Am I. Oh, you froze up a little bit. Am I back now? Yes, you're back. Now, Sean froze. No. Okay. Okay. My point is you're back. We need to get back to pushing the best. We need to get back to pushing the best wrestlers in this division. The other guy is sensational. Like enough of miscasting some of these people, man. We need to put the guys, the men and women that should start on the starting lineup. Everybody has a role to fill. And there's nothing wrong with filling a role based on what your personal strength is, right? Certain ladies can talk better than other ladies. So then you put them in talking roles on the show doing character based up. There's certain people that can fucking go. And if you can go, I want to watch you wrestle on the TV. I want to see you on the PLEs, not other like we need to situate people in the right positions and that the bottom line is Sean. You look at an eel. You look at a Lyra, right? And then you look at some of the women on NXT. Like Julia Stephanie, Zarya, so on and so forth. Maybe you got a potential Jordan Grace coming up. In a year, this women's division is going to be the most active has ever been in WWE history. Let's start getting the creative right for these ladies. I mean, if you look back at since, I mean, look back at the recent women's champions on that end of the show. It's Liv. Becky is no longer there for now. Rhea who held it for a year. Charlotte's been out a year. Rhonda Rousey, hopefully not coming back. And then you're going back and it's Charlotte Liv, Becky again, Bianca's long reign, Sasha. So like, a lot of the people that they have like really entrenched as top women just aren't there anymore, just aren't there. So they definitely need to enhance that more on the Raw side. Ke 775 says was Rhea and Liv's last man's standing match announcement last week on the stage. It was like on main event or something. They put it on main event. And I'm working to find that out. But says, do you think Becky shows up and costs Liv the title next week? I hope so. I hope so. I think, Sean, I think she will neutralize a Rock Hill interference. I like that more because I don't want interference between those two into this shit. Now, listen, they're going to brawl around the ring in the crowd. Rock Hill's going to get involved and fans are going to be like, son of a bitch. They're going to screw you again. And then that's when, whoa, whoa, whoa. And then she comes in and everyone's like, holy shit. And then like, you know, Pat McAfee is going to just start dancing on the table and shit. And then she man handle slams Rock Hill. Liv Morgan is shook. She turns around. She gets a fucking rip tide, like off the fucking stage of some shit. And then one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, Rhea Ripley's your new women's champion. I'm liking that. Trixie H. Drew Locke says they can keep the overly produced cinematic segments. That's how you do a pro wrestling angle to live. Oh, yeah. Oh, no, we really have a sink. This Wi-Fi is a kick in my ass right now, I think. Why is it the biggest cities in the world of the worst Wi-Fi? You couldn't even hear that. Andy says, well, Seth work goonter for the belt of mania. I believe he will. I believe he will. Cody Erickson says Matt Riddle would knock out Goldberg in 30 seconds. Yeah, probably would. Probably would. We got the tribal combat vignette. That's neat. Promoting next week's match. We have judgment day speaking with Raquel. Don't quite know what Finn Balor is up to, but he and judgment day do have a new theme song. Ibu, what did you think of it? Yeah, this song fucking sucked. I just thought it was terrible. Just like this is already a group. This is a group on the decline. This is a group that is so washed. And now they have like they took the only cool thing away from them. That alter bridge song was so good. And now they have generic AI trap music. So this is a stable that needs a mercy kill from the wide six. It is Dominique Wilkins with the Orlando Magic is what we're looking at right here. Like it is not a good time with judgment day. It's rough. It's over. They are not a playoff team anymore. This is not a team. Yeah, it's done, dude. Damian Priest in the war raiders. Big Heer Chris has RIP the other side and Corey David says Deaf Rebel has the aura that Ibeast was talking about. Like they're horrible at their job. They ruined the rumble with their music by hiring Jimmy Hart. The theme song is not good. It's hard to tough or it's hard to top alter bridge. It's very hard to top alter bridge. But this was real bad. And we have a backup Eboo. Do we have a backup backup hangman? Yeah, it's time for backup backup hangman. This is the alter ego backup hangman, which is just listen. Ultimately, you are who you are. And that is non face cam. The thing is, I didn't want to have to go into the emergency car. I was like, I was like lagging in the gear lagging. I was like, can I talk it over him? Because this is what would happen on my own, right? You'd be like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, why did you think of this? And I'd be like, I thought it was good. And then you'd just hear like 90 seconds of silence. And I'm like, Sean. Oh my God. People read the true colors. And this is this is the real Eboo. This is like, it's like you ever watch Men in Black and the guy from Monk is there. And you find out he's an alien. Sean, look at the lights. And they're like, it's Russell Pierce. Yes. Yes. The really is. But the worst thing about this wasn't even the theme song. It was that Finn Balor says, it's over when I say it's over. And I'm like, bro, please say it's over then. Like enough. It's like, let it go. Look, man, look, man, look, week two Netflix, fucking Falls count anywhere. Let's get this on the road, man. Let's let's move on, please. And then not only that, Sean, let's separate these two from a brand standpoint, move Damian Priest to fucking smack down or some shit. Yes. We got Steven saying, who do you want Rio to face at Mania? Well, Iboo wants EO Sky. I want Bianca Belair, but we'll see. I mean, that is a main event of WrestleMania to me at some point down the line. We got the Penta mask showing up and Ray and a partner will challenge new day next week. Very clearly, it's going to be Penta. Jonathan Corona says, I think Penta is going to get a big payday selling his mask in the WWE shop. Hell yeah, he is. And Jonathan Corona says, will we see Penta next week at Raw and LA? Sean, when did he sign my WWE if they're doing his teaser? I would assume in recent weeks, but it's got to be Penta. Anybody else is a disappointment at this? It's it's absolutely Penta. Do you remember, Sean? I predicted this a couple of weeks ago. Uh huh. Yeah, that was a good prediction prediction solid prediction. Penta is going to he's going to work really well in the WWE style. He's going to do exceptionally well. I hope that he does six straight package pile drivers only for Kobe Kingston to kick out just because I want to see as those people cry about it. But he's going to be great. He's he's going to be incredible. Any any thoughts on what we saw tonight between the promo and the teaser? I'm just looking forward to saying Penta get over in front of the WWE crowd because I think once he's fully said and over, it's going to be so funny to watch his matches because he's just going to Sarah on me out of his way through. And like I said, my dream match is to see Jey Uso, L.A. Knight and Penta in the ring together, whether it's wrestling or coming to promo because I just want to see the total brain rot that will be yeah. Oh yeah, for sure. So yeah, I'm ready for it. Ludwig Geyser is interrupted by Seamus. And listen, this is another situation where I love the ingredients involved, but I'm like, please move on. Yes. Yes. Please. They started this feud in late May. They had a match on June 3rd, August 5th, September 2nd, October 28th, and survivors next week, they're going to brawl backstage, Adam is going to be like, Hey, hey, I'm not for this. I'm not for this. We're going to end this next week. And it's official. And then you're going to see you're going to hear fucking back at the end cold and you're stepping to the eyes of a warrior at the bottom of the bay. And I'm like, next week on Raw, it's going to be Geyser and Seamus and you can have another three and a half star match. Or you're like, yeah, that was really good. You know what I mean? Fuck. Can we move on? Please? What are they going over at this point? God damn it. T. Sipper says the change in theme music for Judgment Day feels like it wasn't necessarily bad, but it doesn't fit the group. I agree. They were standing around very awkwardly there. What would fit them? Like, I'm traveling down the road and I'm certain we disaster that bullshit from NASCAR 98. That's what I want. That's what I want to have. They should come out to the Hail Mary by Tupac. Yeah. Couldn't baller be like, yeah. I won't deny it. You know, just JD McDonough sitting around, hold on. Let me pull it up. Let me find it. Got it. Got to switch the gimmick here where here he is. Here's how to hate JD McDonough looks. There we go. Oh my god. God damn it. What a fantastic dude. Like once like Carlito came in and like, I just, man, fuck, fuck me. Well, we had the main event segment and what a main event segment it was. Oh boy. Listen, I'm just going to offer this up to you. What? Mm hmm. There you go. Oh man. Oh man. You know what? Let me get mine out. You know, let's just, you know, sandalab. Yeah. Good shit. Absolutely. James Zimmerman says, is it, is it me or is punk just really whiny? Well, that's why. That's what Rollins is hoping that you feel like. Steven Radley says, need a cigarette after punk and Seth and I don't smoke and Fid McGossum, our great friend from down under the ring says, that's the punk Seth promo I've waited all year for. Get your super chats, get your humper chats in. This featured some stuff that like, I love like, there are so many people who are like, man, let the AEW stuff go and AEW shouldn't reference WWE. Man, go to hell. Go to hell. What the fuck up? They exist. We know they exist. The guys were there. Major things happened there that inform how these people feel about each other both in the fiction and in the reality. How, why would anybody ignore what happened to see a fucking AEW? He got it in two fights. Like, what the fuck that we know of different, right? Two, two publicly known fights. Both of which were the biggest stories of their respective years. And you have people who are like, you don't reference it. They don't want to hear about it. They're supposed to have a fuck up, right? So the fuck up. This was awesome. And of course, that Rollins is going to be like, yeah, you're going to go fuck up to another place, but you already got fired from the other one. Like, that's because that's what people think about with punk again in the fiction and in the reality. He's the guy who got fired from AEW. Why wouldn't you want to use that to build a fucking story? There was so much about this that I liked because it's easy to forget how good Seth Rollins is at cutting promos. And I have long thought that the Nick Howesman interview that he did that I witnessed firsthand was so smart because one, he knew it would get headlines. He was telling the truth. He does it. Okay, did not like CM Punk. I don't know what the relationship is now. Obviously amicable to some degree of which they can work, but there's a lot of things that Seth Rollins is saying that he's wanted to say for a long time. And it was so funny, Ibu. Like, the Stan accounts got ahold of me say like when they said, well, what was Rollins problem with punk? And I was like, well, you know, he didn't exactly make things easy for one of Rollins best friends by saying, Oh, we got to make Roman look strong. Like that made shit real tough for Roman going that direction. But like, they don't forget that. Sean, look at it. Look at it. Look at it this way, dude. 2014. Shield breaks up. Roman was cheered. He was here. CM Punk goes on on Cole Cabana show and he's like, yo, that dude is an industry plant guys. He's a fucking industry plant. Right. And then so people see that it's punk is basically pulling the curtain on WWE current creative. And people like, man, wow, they did punk dirty and man Roman is an industry plant. Roman goes back to his injury. And the report Sean and for those that weren't around the report coming out from people was Roman is scheduled for a big push. He's Vince's favorite. He's gonna win the rumble fans hear that. They hear punk's words like, and this is full. Fuck this guy. The rumble happens. And we saw what happened in the 2015 rumble. Rock couldn't even save him. That makes it hard for Roman Reigns. And it sets Roman on the path where he is struggling for the next couple of years, despite how hard he worked his ass off in the ring to get over. And so CM Punk's words had a lasting effect on the careers of a lot of these guys. The last match that punk had was the Royal Rumble. And when Daniel or Daniel Bryan wasn't gonna win it, people were cheering for Roman Reigns to win it. Yes. When Roman was going toe to toe a Batista, it was Roman that the people wanted. Yes. So like the tides turned and punk absolutely out of part in it. So Sir Franz, of course, he resents aspects of that from punk because the punk and that's what makes this so compelling. Here's the thing about it, Sean. Like I said, his weeks ago, they don't really have to write much. They can just draw from reality because guess what? The reality is more compelling than any store you could come, you can craft so good, put together. The reality of Seth Rollins and Punk is natural. It's there. It's been there for 10 fucking years. He was, he was CM Punk's unofficial understudy. Punk ushered him in with the shield. Seth and the shoe guys always presented the fact that punk basically takes credit for them because they're like, man, we worked our fucking ass off to get over it. He has nothing to do with this jackass. And again, look, punk made it hard for Seth and the guys who stayed in WWE. Because those are some of the worst creative years in the promotions history. And they have to kind of, their matches are getting ruined with the CM Punk chance. But realistically, they are not the problems. It's Vince McMahon. It's creative. It's everything else. But that's what informed a lot of what's happening here. It's the reality. And they brought it to the forefront. They just took the real situations, man, the fucking boot licking, the CM Punk chance, the Vince McMahon references, which were very cutting the way Punk used it. Because he's just like, look, man, I love this, by the way, what a perfect situation to segue Sean. I just tweeted just today, Stone Cold's famous bite this interview from 2002. And his words where he was like, I think creative fucking sucks. I don't like direction. I'm going, I don't like the directions old fucking companies going. You know, and he walked out and Vince McMahon famously said that Austin took his ball and went home. Yeah, that was the company spin. They did the WWE confidential videos about it. They did all their fucking P.I. couldn't believe it when I tuned in on a Saturday night. I'll never forget, came home early on a Saturday night and I was like, I'm going to watch confidential. And they just had this abrupt, this hastily produced, like video, pulling back everything. Yeah. And for like the kids who were not there, Stone Cold walked out of this company and everywhere you looked on WWE TV, they wanted you to know Austin left. It's his fault. He's a bad person. He's an asshole. He walked out on you. He walked out on us. He walked out on you, you guys who supported him all this time. Take his ball and went home became part of wrestling lexicon for walking out. And it basically put the power on the promotions hands rather than the talents hands and his stigmatized talents quitting their jobs for years to come because it turned into a thing where all your quitter, that reflects poorly on you, not the company. What in the reality is if you're pro worker, if you're pro the talent, you're pro the boys, if you're on that side of this of this ideological situation, then you should always be questioning what was it about the place of business that caused the talent to want to leave. And so CM Punk throwing that back into his face was incredible because he said, fuck that shit. That's this McMahon speak. And you know what, speaking of that fucking guy, I left this company because I hated him not to me. And you know what you did? He loved you. And you never backed me up in situations against that guy. You were putting these arrows in my fucking back and it took 10 years to pull them out. And you know what, I got them in my hand. I'm showed them down your fucking throat. That was incredible, incredible. Everything about how that was worded, presented, arranged, was tremendous. And even more tremendous, Sean, at no point did the promo allow you to go, man, that's getting cooked. Because guess what? Seth was fired right back. He fired right back. I thought I was watching anyway. But man, that man was like, that man was like, yeah, Steve Austin said it was one of the biggest mistakes he ever made. And like, Punk brought up Becky and Seth was basically like, walked out, her contract was up. She's raising a family right now, not that you know anything about that. It's like, damn, what a line there. But there was one specific thing that I just thought dug real deep because any like, even vague references to Colt Cabana is like an oh, yeah, damn. And that's what he did. He is like, you went and did a podcast with your buddy, then you joined the competition. And then after we won, you jumped over here and started waving our flag. Yeah. And I was like, damn, man, that was he's like, he's basically saying like, you're saying I'm an industry plant, you're Kevin Durant joining the Warriors. Like it just on so many levels, incredible points were made on both sides. Yes. And I'm watching this and all I could think Sean is wrestling is the fucking best because when you when you arrange and draw from the reality to create incredible fiction, and there's so much there that's compelling. What's happening on the surface, but the metaphiction, the stuff suddenly and beneath where it's like, man, this probably really does hit this guy harder. Man, this guy really does believe that. And because because it's the real situations. And that's where you draw money because it inspires you to talk about it, to dissect what they've been saying. And I desperately want to tune in to see this thing get blown off. And folks, this is going to get blown off next week, or at least it's going to finally come to a head. At the January six Netflix premiere, and what better way to end your era on USA than with one of the great live head to head promos of the year, selling a big time box office match for your your your your premiere on a new service. T Sipper said they were throwing hands without touching. It was that that is exactly like Eve who said it was like a boxing match. Cody says, punk, my goat emoji, that Seth been cooking him won't lie. I mean, that's that's been a refreshing thing is that like Rawlins doesn't seem vindictive. He just seems like, yeah, like Rawlins hasn't ever said like, yeah, it's sucked here. But he has said like, I'm a reason why it doesn't suck here anymore. Yeah. Jared says Seth won the promo battle for me. He got nice burns and showed the vulnerability of his character that he was hurt by his big bros behavior. I mean, yeah, this was a guy that Rawlins looked up to somewhat idolized and then acted in ways that he couldn't see himself doing. It was a don't meet your hero's situation or set. Sam Punk is a cancer on this company in this industry. And he said, cancers don't go away. You have to remove them. This CM Punk Sean on the Netflix live presser event kickoff thing that they did said that this is just a situation where like there's just two guys that can't be in the same place. And at the end of the day, Sean, this town ain't big enough for the both of them. What better stakes could there be than that? Personal animosity, real deep seated hatred that has been bestering for 10 years and a situation where something has got to give because they cannot continue to coexist with each other in the same ecosystem. What happens then when two sharks clash on what happens then when two lions fight in the jungle. There cannot be two lions. There was one. This is what I live for in my professional wrestling. This is a big ride. This is how you build the big fucking fights. The last super chat we have from Jay Miller says, you know, if Jose, the assistant will be Pinta's manager. I don't believe he is. I'm sure he would love to be though. Yeah. Jose's good at getting people talking. I'll say that. It's always funny when like Andrade shows up on WWE TV and he's just kind of like, I emoji or like, yes, you know, drag me to NXT. And he's like, Hmm, what's next for me? It's like, all right. It literally anybody that that speaks with an accent. And Jose's like, I got you buddy. I emoji. And he goes, who do you have for? Bronson Reed. Bronson Reed. He's like, somebody rolls their ours a little bit. And Jose, the assistant's like, Oh, he's like, like, you know, Jason? Yeah. All right, buddy. Well, he'll be all over Joaquin Wild when he leaves L.W.O. even though Andy says, who do you have for best on interviews? Rock peaked highest, but not around enough. Drew had the best one liners, but Cody is the best at selling a fight. I don't think you can leave hangman page out of that conversation with the way that he delivered promos this year, especially when he burned down a house. Right. I feel like that's that's a very important one. I would go with Drew or hangman. Honestly, that's that's who I would go go with. Fascinating because they're both very similar characters that it underwent similar characteristics this year. If you tell the people where they can find you, I know you've got a new discord. Hell yeah, man. Look, patreon's fucking on us. So we're gonna have to deal with that. But you can follow me at backup hangman. The same name on the blue sky social over there, but you can follow me at backup hangman. I do a ton of podcasts, including another raw review tomorrow where I won't actually review all the review. The review happened here over there. I'm going to just kind of fuck around. But we have a lot of fun on YouTube. I did just drop a discord folks. If you're not already in, man, you got to jump in this thing that it's awesome. You know what I mean? So follow the at the self made account is at self made pw. Follow self made pw. We're going to try to get the patreon back for only because we have some issues with that right now. But it should be back soon. And the second is I'll notify you guys. The link is in the bio that account. But for now, if you're not already following self made, follow us at self made pw on on Twitter. And we'll give you guys continual updates with the discord's awesome. And you join in. We hang out. We talk pro wrestling. My spaces are moving over there. We get to watch wrestling together. It's very interactive. You check chat with us. You recommend matches. We do all kinds of stuff. And it's not just the rest and discord. It could be whatever you want it to be. So I'm trying to make one of the great communities on the internet space, because pro wrestling is just the fucking best. And I do love you guys. This is the best. This is my way of giving back to the people the way that they've given me so much within this platform. So I appreciate them. I appreciate you Sean. I appreciate the Fightful Universe. I'm just in a good mood, man. I'm buzzing. I'm feeling good today. You know what I mean? These are the best nights, man. These are the best nights next next week's going to be a lot of fun. Absolutely. We have one more humper chat from Andy. It says, how do you rap punk Seth before mania? Hard to believe they won't be involved in some like double fumble elimination to some capacity. And then maybe you have another like a sort of a follow up match after that to bridge the gap. I don't think they're gonna face each other at mania. I think it'll be punk and Roman and then maybe Seth and Gunther. Maybe you have them both in an elimination chamber or something like that. But any thoughts on that Ibu? Yeah, something Gunther, you know, seems like seems like the likely direction, you know. Guys, thank you all so much. That's my prediction. Please subscribe to FightfulSelect.com. We've got new Japan contract news all week. We have a bunch of stuff like that $5 a month, $54 a year. You can now gift subscriptions, check out our wonderful sponsors at Nord and bet online. Next week is a big one, guys. The Raw and Netflix debut starting this Wednesday. I will be back in my studio over here a lot more. So if you're into that, bye God. 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