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Saturday, September 21 :Wrestling Junkies With PWI
what's going on everybody welcome back to the wrestling junkies podcast and mr. Cincinnati and as always I am joined by the podcast dad himself troops how are you my friend oh you know how I'm doing I'm not happy today but football seasons over so we're back to wrestling mode hope you're ready to talk wrestling with me buddy I am I just want you get a smile on your face you look like you just lost your elbow okay we're gonna have a catastrophe tonight because I left Elmo a daycare so it is I'm ready to talk some rest well never fear we have plenty of that ahead thank you as always every that may that is joining us tonight's a brand new weekend as always make sure you follow us at junkies pod on X for all things wrestling junkies podcast you'll find all of the links to our socials follow us on Facebook like us on Facebook also Instagram again like share subscribe troops what is that magic number even though even though the two of us look great today we do look rather snazzy but before we get to our merch plugs make sure you're also following our friends at main event underscore and that again great blogs live podcast short form content anything and everything professional wrestling that you could possibly want what up Alejandra always go get to see in the chat to my friend and rest in peace to Elmo it's he's not dead yet but not yeah you'll find them you'll you'll get them we got a backup don't worry about me we'll be alright and he has that shirt too yeah the yeah mr OTM hosted on the mark podcast also has this support independent wrestling t-shirt yes you do a favor head on over to our merch store wrestling junkies pod dot creator dot spring dot com get yourself a mug t-shirt tank beanie not hats but I'm going to save that one for our friends over at gorilla press apparel remember gorilla press apparel dot big cartel dot com use promo code WJP 2024 for 25% off-site wide I was talking to Will a little bit today and he's been in the lab working on some new designs so definitely going to have some cool stuff to support just in time for the holiday season so Nick Mysterio is mr OTM is that is that basically what you're trying to tell us without telling us he's a bad father okay anyway thank you for reacting God yeah not not your best not your best that's that's okay before we introduce our guests tonight just a couple of quick plugs this Friday September 20th the sensei Aaron Wade presents dojo rising at the TW arena it's an action-packed event with an unforgettable night of pro wrestling as some of the toughest competitors rise to the occasion $15 tickets so do not miss your chance to witness this epic night live bell time is at 8 p.m. grab those tickets be part of the action tomorrow I will be dropping a conversation that I had last week with the sensei about dojo rising cannot wait to share that with all of you and don't forget Marcus matters all I want three live live next week next Thursday at the H2O Wrestling Center in Williamstown New Jersey a highly anticipated event set to showcase the best independent wrestling Marcus matters again we've said on the show a bunch of times he is one of those names that is the future of this industry and if he's already booking shows like this already he's he's got a hell of a future get ahead of him Sam Holloway is gonna wrestle cruel yeah I saw that that's gonna be a lot of meat no bread no water no no not at all that was good I like that yeah I do think that it is time to introduce our guest I think that everybody's had enough of me talking and podcast that certainly has but tonight we are incredibly excited to be joining Kevin Macklevaney editor-in-chief and acting or archive manager excuse me a pro wrestling illustrated the season journalist who plays a pivotal role in shaping the landscape of professional wrestling coverage last week P.W.I. dropped the much anticipated annual P.W.I. 500 the top 500 wrestlers from around the world and is making waves and conversations as always and we are super proud to say that 13 of those wrestlers on that list were former guests on our show so let's dive into the impact of this list without further ado let's walk welcome Kevin Macklevaney to the stage Kevin thank you so much welcome to wrestling jockeys how are you good thanks for having me I'm sorry I missed the memo about the the uniform that I was trying to wear her tonight it's okay we'll send you a shirt no more that'll be for next time sounds good yeah but Kevin let's let's get right on into it we have a lot to cover here we know we're gonna talk a lot about the PWI 500 but we're gonna we're gonna take it back a little bit when we look at the world of professional wrestling here at the wrestling junkies we look at wrestlers they're superheroes supervillains that clash they all have origin stories you're in the industry as well so we're just gonna ask you Kevin tell us about some of your earliest memories of pro wrestling so my earliest memory of pro wrestling was WWF Superstars Sierra 1990 June around there would watch my Saturday morning cartoons every week on the local UHF station and the one week I did not this is back in the you know didn't have a remote necessarily on every TV and didn't get up quick enough to change his channel and I thought like this weird show that comes on after cartoons I guess I'm gonna watch it and I was very young and I was hooked just right almost right away went out you know rented every wrestling VHS tape at Blockbuster multiple times you know watched the current then current WWF product and then eventually someone told me you know there's other wrestling out there what and started watching WCW started reading various wrestling magazines including the one I edit now and yeah basically that taught me about even more wrestling and then I was going out and you know I'm too young to be doing tape training and stuff like this but I was going out and okay Kmart has like an off-brand wrestling tape that has people's matches before they were in the WCW I'm gonna check that out and of course that's territorial wrestling and I got an early exposure to that from the wrestling magazines and then you know from those tapes so that that's like the base level intro for me who were some of your favorites growing up oh well my favorite doesn't age so well now but my favorite was Hulk Hogan growing up yeah he's not not such a proud Hulkmaniac of these days okay he was he was him you know ultimate warrior as well sting sting was my favorite WCW guy this is you know surfer sting that era yeah say those are probably my my big three and I have big big fan of the rockers on the tag team side of things so love it love it so tell us about your introduction to journalism as a whole what led you this field yeah I mean I always as they said I was reading those wrestling magazines as a kid I was you know reading anything I could get my hands on books magazines I always wanted to work in writing it was just the question of what I wanted to write and you know what's a school study that got out of school my first real published clip was with the wrestler slash inside wrestling which is sister magazine to PWI and that was kind of a funny story because I was just you know working at Wawa which is our you know our regional chains lat convenience or slash deli shout out to Wawa and looking for a full-time job and you know submitting my work at various places I applied for a proofreading job at what turned out to be cap of publishing but it was it said if you know wrestling or interested in wrestling at the plus I get an email back like a daily after applying to this from Stu Sax and he says you know the position was filled I don't know why the position was still up but it had been filled but happy to keep you in mind for freelance writing if you're interested and then he asked how familiar I was at the magazines and you know that that was the beginning of it that was like just a few months out of college and certainly wasn't doing full-time writing at that point I mean I was a very occasional contributor throughout the years at some points I would contribute much more and then you know eventually became more and more involved at the magazine was on the 500 committee and then you know when Stu Sax was retiring he asked if I had any interest in potentially succeeding him and I came up and I had to interview with his boss I had to come up and you know present to the the entire company basically so it wasn't just me being anointed by Stu to take over for him but yeah that's that's the shortish version of it so and I may be going way out of order for these beautiful notes that Eric type but being on the 500 committee what is what is that process like like do you are you sitting there ranking all 500 like as your own ballot or how does that look or what does that look like it's a group effort so it starts out we certainly do a lot of research ahead of time and most of us will come in with a top 10 or top 20 of our own but it's not hey we're going to take all of these and then do a mathematical average of them now we're going to discuss and weigh the pros and cons and then some of us come in with an idea that this person or that person will rank very well and then after talking it through with the group like oh yeah maybe they don't hit the criteria as well as I thought they did so it really is I think any one of us could go and make a separate list and it would look different for this and I and I include myself in that even though I technically have the veto power and I can change it because of just solely by being the last person to edit everything if I made the list by myself it would look very different you know so it's just we have our committee members who have been you know some have been with the magazine longer than others but all of them are just incredibly sharp smart people with a great perspective on pro wrestling and yeah we get together and we we hash it out we usually do the top well say top 100 or so the first meeting and then we'll have a second meeting and then usually someone will go off and kind of work on the back half of the list separately for many years I was Dan Irphy and then he retired from PWI so it was no longer him so yeah even then the list is not okay this last person just looked at it and that's that it comes back in who did I miss what looks wrong what looks you know oh this person should be shifted up a little bit there's a lot of a lot of checking double-checking many cooks in the kitchen but that's why it is what it is and you know it's certain when I say many you know we're talking about still less than less than 10 fewer than 10 but like if you have a larger publication you have a Rolling Stone doing the top 500 albums they have a lot more people working on something and they have people they're just doing that so you know it can be a thankless thankless gig at times but it's also it's fun and it's and it's a responsibility at the same time so we do take it seriously while having a little bit of fun with it oh yeah I hope that answered the question that was a little secute it's the way he just went about that but that was all good yeah everything everything sounded great cool all right and and I know that you said that you know you're kind of that final check you know being editor in chief but you know even you know it's just looking at this useless was there still anything that was a pleasant surprise to you even you know as you finish this this list as far as anything that stands out to you in the preparation I think you know that's a good question is there anything that is a no I will say I thought Gunther was gonna be I don't know if it's a pleasant surprise I thought Gunther was gonna be ranked a little higher you know he had not won the World Heavyweight Championship as of the the end of this evaluation period so you know that happened while we were creating the issue is after the period that we evaluate for so it wouldn't have counted anyway but I something told me he would just be ranked pretty highly because he was top five last year and then somebody made a case for a couple of other wrestlers and one of them being Damien Priest and we looked at Damien Priest here and you know he I don't think too many people would have pegged him as being you know champion and a top star even a couple of years ago in WWE and it's not it's nothing against him it's just not how he was being slotted into things but then that very much changed with the judgment day and then it changed with him being sitting or money in the bank and then he cashes in and then he has a decent reign as champion and then you know after that he remains a pretty big star so that was deserving and it was surprised again I would not have called that a year ago and I don't want to say any heated arguments but have there been like some spirited debates on on any of the 500 that you've done where it's like there's the top five top 10 whatever have you had any of those examples and and like well how does that usually play out oh yeah for sure we we were back and forth pretty heavily on last year's list which was ended up with Seth Rollins and the number one position you know Roman reigns at number two and there was really a fierce debate back and forth about you know one of our criteria is activity and you have to be in there like doing the matches and Roman was already kind of won his part-time schedule not so much as this year but last year he was he was beginning his part-time role and there was a debate about okay yeah Roman is is a bigger deal as champion than Seth but Seth is the one who's out there being the champions champion he's going around defending it everywhere and we it really did get a little bit not heated because I mean we're not you know yeah there's no ill will between us but yeah you get really impassioned arguments by the way a fun fact with that it ended up with the former members of the Shield in the top three that was not intentional that was something we were yeah we had that sounds like like BS but it's true we got the top five into order and as we are working on number six I think it was Brian Solomon points out like oh my gosh look at number three and look at number two and look at the top three like wow okay yeah that is uh that it's all right that's what we're doing you know and yeah it felt good to us but yeah I mean I can't disagree with it from last year yeah all three of them did I mean you want to talk about a group that's really yeah I just defied their legacy right there that's yeah mr. says that go ahead so I want to ask you about people who are mentioned in you know as far as the people that make the list you know some of the notable opponents that they have throughout the year and I happen to come across this tree from there's his biggest achievement is having his name mentioned in so many memor any wrestlers bios because we've had memorable matches and moments somewhere around the globe so you know how do you feel that or how do you view that impact of wrestlers who are mentioned so often you know and how does that look for their future rankings down the line to you yeah so Doris is one who comes up a lot you know Kevin Blackwood is someone who came up a lot as well these are by and large wrestlers who get out in our world travelers they're wrestling all over the place they're putting in the work usually it's the reason they're getting booked all over the places that it's very like compelling exciting in-ring work Doris is awesome he's been killing it for a few years now and I mean he he was over in the US a few times he was here at the WrestleMania weekend actually worked on a show that I promoted over WrestleMania weekend but yeah I think it's up to them how far they can go I mean it's just really it can be a little bit difficult when you're going that independent route because you know if you're not really aiming toward a contract or if you're not settling into a contrast or maybe in some cases maybe not even being offered it's tough to say a contract it'll be hard like your ceiling is going to be only so high for the 500 list that doesn't mean you can't have a great career it doesn't mean you can't be an all-time great I mean as far as I'm concerned there've been you know at the end of the day like you're gonna have a lot of people from maybe their ceiling was ring of honor in its early days but you're still gonna look at them as an all-time great you know so that's that's not a knock but I do think generally what this does is when someone is out there having these great matches with all these different people it gets the attention in these different promotions and if that wrestler is willing yeah I think it's just a matter of time before the contracts come calling and then from there the television time the major championships that the superstardom so let's continue down that path of kind of the influence what feedback have you heard from wrestlers who you know maybe not obviously not like the top 10 top to top 15 top 100 but kind of a hey I made it at 425 have you heard feedback from those wrestlers and kind of how that's affected their careers yeah there's in general it's a pretty big deal when someone ranks for the first time and that's not me patting us on the back that's what wrestlers told us time and time and time again and you know the last couple years especially you'll see where people will be tweeting about it posting on Instagram on Facebook what have you so it's it's not exactly a secret it's kind of like like a level to making it is having this cash aid to be on this list that's existed for you know three and a half decades now so we've definitely heard that we don't usually get too much feedback on the actual number that's that's people like unless people if someone jumps a surprising amount or they're surprised how high they'll rank they'll comment on that but it won't be oh I'm for this like I why am I not free honey it's it happens but it's rare but in general yeah when you see people especially in that range and especially if it's their first or second time ranking they're very happy because it means they're getting some kind of momentum and they're being recognized sure and I want to get your thoughts this is a quote from Cody Rhodes I'm not a wrestler who pretends like the number doesn't matter that's how you can spotlight right away if they tweet nobody cares about their number on this list we all care you know I just want to get your reaction to that sentiment that Cody you know it's it's obviously you know coming from the number one on the list here but do you think that that's a lot that's a common thing running through the minds of people that do make this list it's I mean it's tough for me to say that for sure but I would kind of you know even if they're not expressing it I would defer to Cody here I mean he's the top star in the industry and then on top of that you have like he's been outspoken in the past like he thought he should have been number one multiple times before this and that was actually something that came up during his interview and was discussed it was Cody and Al Castle our senior writer who spoke with him but he's definitely like you know locked in on that and that was that was something that he wanted to achieve and then he finally achieved it and we can argue about whether it's overdue or not but I think very very well deserved this year and I think a lot of other people I want to say the new day might have discussed this on some kind of social media video or maybe it was you know the bump or something like that but they were talking a few years back about kind of like nobody cares about their number until they're very happy about the number like it's then then you put it over like oh I'm number one okay all right yeah yeah and yeah that's that's that's it's pretty cool it's you know again it's not it's not to be all and all one thing I I brought up in my column in the issue is you have Roman Reigns who I mean you can make an argument at this point certainly that Cody Rhodes is the bigger bigger draw bigger star you know how that bears out in terms of TV rings things like that that's that's a little bit trickier but certainly like on the road bringing the fans in consistently Cody Rhodes huge but certainly neck and neck with him Roman Reigns however Roman Reigns is not on the list Roman Reigns is not on the list because he didn't have enough matches this year so we have a minimum match requirement this is you know dating back to we had it situations where I think Brock Lesnar had like two matches one year but he was champion you know like that's it it feels wrong to slot someone like that ahead of people who are working all the time so there's a very relatively low bar to clear for this and Roman was taking deserve time at home you know and that's I think that's great that he did that and family is incredibly important so he made the right choice no doubt about it and it doesn't make him any less of a star but for the purposes of our list we're not saying he's less of a star we're just saying oh yes it's a technicality it would be like if you think about like in you know baseball season right now if someone misses the the trade deadline and they can't play in the playoffs it's not that they're not good enough to play in the playoffs it's just that they weren't playing for the team during the right part of the season this that makes sense yeah yeah totally acknowledged I saw that yes we got a lot of Roman fans so your role you you've covered a ton of memorable moments in wrestling history so far is there any particular interviews or events that you're just blown away like I got to do that man that's a tough one you know this was one I another writer was slotted to do it and couldn't last minute the first time Bianca Belair was on the cover and she was like on the way up and I think this is right before she won the championship at WrestleMania spoke with her and just how humbled she was by that by being on the cover of the magazine by being in the position she was in at WrestleMania even though she has you know every right to not be humble because she was killing it but she was kind of getting to talk to her at that moment and then she wins the championship she's on the cover of the magazine and then that's what we're putting out in the world that just popped into my head as something that I'm very like happy and grateful that I got to do you know there's plenty of other interviews that I've really enjoyed this isn't you know the same tier of like a historic event in wrestling but I spoke to Shazam Mackenzie earlier this year and Shazam Mackenzie has this incredible story of coming and betting on herself and being a native Australian who moves herself to the US gets incredibly able to obtain a work visa as an independent wrestler that never happens and just you know has been doing great the fact that she told her story with all its vulnerability with all you know like leaving a marriage behind leaving her home behind to come bet on herself and do this the fact that people will you know trust me with those stories that's that's huge and I'm happy to do that every single time so those really stick out in my mind just as much as some of these bigger interviews but there've been a lot of highlights awesome awesome let's talk about the future not just of or wrestling but the PWI 500 as a whole think it didn't interview last week with our friends in between two beards shout out to JPJ and Plugo and you had noted that you know it's your hope to see more diversity in the list Swerve made it to number two and you know it's the highest I think ranking that we've seen for an African-American since the rock I mean we're going back over 20 years you know what do you think that can be done to you know further help celebrate the diversity that we're seeing in pro wrestling and making sure that's also reflected in in the PWI 500 so I mean there's a couple of things there the one is I hear on on one hand where it might sound like okay like we've never had a black wrestler ranked number one in the 500 we have in the women's ranking Bianca Belair as an example awesome Kong years ago but for us to say oh well it's reflective of the industry and what's going on that year which is true we want it to accurately reflect the criteria and a lot of that does come down to how strongly people are pushed how well they're booked but I still get where sometimes it can kind of sound like you know when the president tweets and like we need to do something about this problem it's like when you're the president do something you know but but the other side of that is we don't want it to look like a situation where we're forcing it where we have the wrong person as number one you know same thing like any other milestone when we have a wrestler from you know like AEW existed and if it wasn't the right call for John Moxley to be number one we wouldn't have done it even though it's great news story to have John Moxley as number one and now anointing this new company but you got to make sure it's the right person you who ticks all the boxes specifically someone like Swear Strickland I think and almost any other year would have been number one but Cody Rhodes just like absolutely slayed every single criteria that we have so I think that's something that has to come kind of from the bookers themselves from the promoters you know that's part of it but you know there are ways that we can do better and we've specifically looked at that over the years the year before I started as editor there was a lot of backlash against the 500 for being like a very underverse list specifically a very whitelist and one of the people who was most critical of us is Righteous Reg and he of course has the BW 500 that he does which is his rank at the top five excuse me top 500 black wrestlers in the world so Reg is someone who I started talking to amidst all that and you know eventually it led to him being part of the committee and being you know contributing to the magazine writing a column which is awesome but what he did he put wrestlers on our radar who were just simply not before and I don't I think a lot of it was maybe it was just regions we weren't covering as well like there were wrestlers in certain like st. Louis we weren't covering st. Louis very well and there were wrestlers in st. Louis who black wrestlers winning championships should have been on the list were not it wasn't an intentional omission but it it ends up looking you know like not just a regional bias but it ends up looking like a racial bias so certainly we don't want that to happen we want the right people to be ranked and we want to have an inclusive list again based off of what is actually going on in the industry and we want to celebrate that and have a list that you know people can look and see this person looks like me they're doing well I can I could do the same thing I could do this in wrestling I could do this in another field I think that's amazing but it again it does come from you know promoters being willing to run with these wrestlers and I think that's a huge thing and I think we've seen more of that especially because there are so many people who are great and wrestlers of color who are just undeniable and that really does help so wrestling as as you know goes through ebbs and flows and I think right now we're a nice boom period where there is a ton of good wrestling how hard is it to balance mainstream and independent wrestling with this list yeah so I think one of the challenges for me is I I'd love to do and we're not going to do it because we have too many lists I'd love to do a list is just all independent wrestlers not not you know specifically to lift up independent wrestlers not to overlook anyone else but my it's my gut feeling that you know we should be looking at people who are out there working every single week and every single weekend and sometimes multiple matches and doing this incredible work and traveling all over the world in their own dime sometimes I think it's important not to say just because they aren't on television or they aren't consistently on television that there are inherently so much less than someone who's technically under contract but not really doing anything before I was editor that was actually that was kind of the tack that was taken certainly there were a lot of independent wrestlers but you had by default well this person's under WWE contract and yeah they lost all year but they're under WWE contract they're gonna be ranked above this independent wrestler unless it's like the top of the top independent wrestlers and even then like it's got to be someone who like I don't know a finalist in battle of Los Angeles and you know maybe had trying to think who would it like in 2019 like maybe like a full-impact pro or CCW championship or something just like an established longer term promotion but you know I think that's a limited way of looking at it you have to also give consideration to these true freelancers who are going all over the place and and doing great work and I think one really cool thing is that you do see this overlap now not just in terms of like the so-called extra work or things in Ring of Honor but you'll see people show up for free friends in TNA you'll see them show up in Japan show up in Mexico so I think the way the wrestling industry is functioning right now as this you know the the forbidden doors being wide opens to use the cliche now which I mean think about that that was not a cliche years ago now we're just this is how it is the fact that that swings open for unsigned wrestlers as well is pretty awesome. Do you see any changes to the criteria you know now we look at you know partnerships between promotions we're seeing a very fruitful NXT and TNA relationship and we're seeing the impact that's having on a Jordan Grace and a Joe Hendry and even a renaissance of sorts for Zachary Rent went to who left WWE you know not necessarily up his own accord and all the things that happened with that you know especially as you look towards 2025 and kind of thinking about the plans not just for the list of PWI you know what role does that play into the consideration of what you produce. Yeah I mean in terms of the criteria I think we're already seeing some effect slightly in the in the 500 but certainly it's gonna show up in the women's 250 because we have you know we have a Jordan Grace who is defending her championship in two companies you have the wrestlers who are on NXT but they're also showing up in TNA to challenge her there and that's going to have an impact in terms of the ranking as far as the criteria changing I mean the criteria kind of is what it is I we have discussions about shifts and like do we loosen the activity requirements things like that but then you have people who are wrestling 100 matches and to me you know you you want to recognize those people for doing what they're doing but yeah I think this interplay and people showing up in different places absolutely elevates those people and it makes them more likely to rank higher on future future lists so long as they keep doing this. I'm gonna go back to the theme of the show which is apparently evolution the the evolution of this list how have you seen it throughout the years that you've been there especially now with like the digital media era being so big and everybody wants now now now like how have you seen that kind of evolve throughout the years. Yeah so I mean we essentially this whole list is visible within like an hour of it being and I don't mean just mean visible in that you can go buy it because you can you can the digital edition comes out but it will be effectively like somebody will post it on a website within an hour and then everyone will be sharing it so it really becomes a situation of looking at you know how people consume all this because you know pushing the quality of the magazine like even just using it as something like arguments so I used to go and I would do this under the PWI account too and I would answer questions and explain why people are ranked certainly you know what why don't you buy the magazine because it's all you know and it doesn't have why is this person at this number versus this person you know it doesn't have every single situation but it does explain why the person had a great year is ranked in that spot or in certain cases if someone is ranked notably lower than the previous year it'll note this person was out injured for a long time or despite this they still did this and this so you know it's it's it's part of it's not just the list it's the issue it's shining a light on all these these great wrestlers I'm not sure that if I entirely answered your your question but it certainly like affects the way that we promote this and market this and it it it underlines the the need for the digital edition because as soon as people see who's number one they want to know the top 10 they want to know the top 25th yeah yeah and that kind of sorry Eric I'm a double downwardest question it kind of is now being complemented by the PWI podcast right so how did you guys start that and why did you think that was so important to get out there yeah so the podcast has been going since before I was editor that was so that was under Stu Sacks Dan Murphy started it later on brought Al Castle on Al Castle hosted solo for a while and then Brian Solomon joined him but the idea was you know we have this this magazine it comes out at this point it comes out around every six weeks is opposed every two months but when people are getting the magazine they're getting I would call it like a little time capsule it's it's some people are getting it and it's their news and they're not really dialed in other ways but we're not really breaking use for the most part what we'll have we'll have insight and we'll have looks into like the real thoughts of wrestlers and love analysis that you aren't getting before that but what you're not getting is like the in the moment reflections on the news of the week and that's what the PWI podcast goes and you know fills in for that and we have you know notably we have very highly tenured writers from the magazine who are hosting this you know we have them on there because effectively they're the face of the magazine and I won't necessarily agree with everything Al says or Brian says but I trust them to go out there and cover everything you know with responsibility and tact and to you know do us proud basically and Kevin as we kind of you know moved towards the end of our conversation here I just thought this was really cool that I found so it was a wrestler by the name of Dustin Wilson he was number 500 on the list about two years ago and he is going to be releasing a documentary that was produced over the last three years about his time at number 500 on the list so I do want to get your take on the significance of that 500 spot and its impact on people that do make the list and then you know what what motivation can be had after seeing this documentary coming out for wrestlers that are aspiring to make this list and you know take advantage of the opportunities that maybe come with with being included on such a such a list yeah so I I was actually interviewed for that for that documentary so I appear in it and I was able to get a sneak peek of it as well it's just it's very compelling stuff and he goes and he talks to other former 500 rank wrestlers about kind of about the significance of the position and it's usually the person who's number 500 you know a couple cases this wasn't necessarily what was going on but usually it's someone who not necessarily a gimmick but they have something kind of colorful about them they have something in some a lot of cases sort of silly but it's something that resonates it's not this person who's out there just doing something ludicrous that nobody cares about it someone who's who's gaining traction with that and Dustin Wilson big dust was out there as a manager slash wrestler and I mean he is in his role as a manager and this is not to take anything away from him as a 500 rank wrestler but I mean kind of reminds me of like a Bobby Heenan in some ways just really like contemptible but like he's very funny like you you can't help but laugh at what he's doing even if he's just being a total weasel to use the term but then you have situations where he's typically compelled to get into the ring he doesn't necessarily want to get into the ring yeah so you have someone like that at the number 500 spot and someone very special who I think deserved that that recognition last year was Andre Chase and Andre Chase on NXT just a very unique role and not necessarily you know he's been doing better and that as a tag team wrestler in recent years but excellent excellent wrestler but he was you know kind of like a silly position on the NXT roster and at the same time one that was like totally lovable and significant and this year it's a blue pain who is you know was this was wrestling as blue cane for a while which was a controversial thing on the independent circuit because it's essentially I mean it's just it's a it's a ripoff gimmick but it's also kind of a nod to the the ripoff shows of that populated the UK throughout the 1990s you know you had people just kind of wrestling as like Undertaker but it was definitely not the Undertaker or it would be someone named like Hawk Hogan or something like that you know he got a lot of traction from that he feuded with Matt Cardona had a match with him in GCW so the people who are in that position yeah there's I don't want to say too much about this documentary that that Dustin is is the star of but there is a line in there about something like if you don't want to be if you're not number 100 you want to be number 500 because that's people kind of flipped to the end of the list to see well who's on the other side of this who's that person and it's usually someone who has a fun little story with them of some kind good quote like that all right so now we get to the really really tough question and this is a question we have we ask every guest you are no different so when do you think Mr. Russell mania and neither of them are active so we don't have to worry about that Shawn Michaels or the Undertaker it's got to be the Undertaker the streak and I mean obviously it fell apart with the loss and and another loss and it didn't and maybe the way it could have but just so many years he was synonymous with it so I would have to go with Undertaker it's like Ted so I get 10 points right there whatever you you won't hear any argument for me like I say if as long as people can back it up you know we certainly we certainly take it to heart and we'll add it to the we'll add it to the tally but Kevin thank you so very much for joining us tonight before we wrap up here you know I know this is I think this might be the last issue of the year as far as the 500 but can you give us a glimpse into what we can expect in 2025 yeah so actually it's it's it's dated December because that the magazine convention but it's not the last one that will be released this year so we'll have digitally in next month while the women's 250 issue coming out that hits new stands in November and then we will also have just before the end of the year the issue that contains a tag team 100 so the women's issue that's coming up next has the awards ballot in it I love the awards issue even though you know that comes out just into the new year but one of the things I love the most about that is we get to declare winners and handoff flax but it's not us doing it it is legitimately a fan vote a reader vote so when people get worked up over it and like how do you like this magazine as a joke I literally just counted the votes I don't know what to tell you so but that's always a fun issue we have that coming out you know early in 2025 so it's right now you can go and you can subscribe we have bundles and all sorts of cool stuff where you can get the issues digitally as they come out and then get it shipped to your door as well and then you have that for your collection so cool things ahead yeah I already signed up for my $10 digital subscription basically won't take him out so yeah definitely looking forward to it but Kevin thank you so much again for for joining us and thank you to everybody that stopped by tonight we will be back tomorrow with a brand new episode got a little bit to talk about regards to NXT Monday night wrong touch on Smackdown a little bit into any W coverage but yeah make sure that you're following at junkies pod for all things Wrestling Jucky's podcast make sure you're following us on Instagram at Wrestling Jucky's pod like us on Facebook subscribe to our YouTube channel chutes hit them with that magic number please one to one person please totally yes tell one person that you think might enjoy our podcast share it with them we're live four days a week Monday through Thursday 6 30 p.m. Eastern again back with two more episodes this week that's gonna do it for us today Kevin just stick around for a quick second but that's gonna do it for us so for Kevin McAlvaney for the podcast and Mr. Cincinnati's been the Wrestling Jucky's podcast see you guys tomorrow night [Music] hey what's up guys this is Tybell when I look at and you are watching wrestling [BLANK_AUDIO]