Speaker 1: Hey, this is Brian Alvarez and this is today's edition
Speaker 1: of the Wrestling Observer Daily podcast on the eight Side Network.
Speaker 2: Ready, when you're ready, let's.
Speaker 1: Get it all. How's it going everybody? Brian Alvarez here
Speaker 1: on Wrestling Observer Live. We are here every day Monday
Speaker 1: through Friday, New Pacific three Eastern, Sunday three Pacific six Eastern,
Speaker 1: Saturday mornings with a Jim Valley Toenday, and Pacific one Eastern.
Speaker 1: And it is a Thursday on this show, and you
Speaker 1: know that means we have a lot to talk about
Speaker 1: here today. A lot of business news. Got a new
Speaker 1: television deal for SmackDown announced this morning. They've been cutting folks.
Speaker 1: The main roster cuts have begun and apparently there will
Speaker 1: be NXT cuts to come as well. And we're gonna
Speaker 1: talk about all of this in detail after the break
Speaker 1: because there's a lot to talk about, both in terms
Speaker 1: of the TV deal and the cuts. And we got more.
Speaker 1: There's a WWE the essentially they've got a trading card company, Panini,
Speaker 1: and they claimed the Panini violated the terms of their
Speaker 1: agreement and so they were done with Paninia, and then
Speaker 1: Panini filed a lawsuit saying they were terminated with no
Speaker 1: notice whatsoever. So a lot of you know, not just television,
Speaker 1: but there's a lot of things going down with this merger,
Speaker 1: which we expected, and they did the cuts last week.
Speaker 1: One hundred people got cut, you know, office staff and
Speaker 1: the like, and I would bet that by the end
Speaker 1: of the day we'll probably have several dozen wrestlers, either
Speaker 1: main roster or not even just developmental, but people in
Speaker 1: the system. So we got a lot of talk about there.
Speaker 1: We got the NXT ratings, and of course we have
Speaker 1: got the aw Dynamite report, the Grand Slam show which
Speaker 1: was Wednesday night, which I thought was an excellent show
Speaker 1: with the exception of two injuries, and we've got something.
Speaker 1: You know, we got some updates on the injuries, but
Speaker 1: really not a lot from last night and the way
Speaker 1: it goes in aw you know, you got to figure
Speaker 1: out these injury situations by asking around because they're not
Speaker 1: going to announce anything publicly. So I'll tell you what
Speaker 1: we know there and plenty more. So a lot to
Speaker 1: get into here today, back in the Mole with more
Speaker 1: Observer Live, back in the show right now, Barez here
Speaker 1: Wrestling Observer Live, Mike Simber Vie also Wrestling Observer dot
Speaker 1: Com A lot to get into today. I'm ben a
Speaker 1: mitted the twitch chatsy along I last I should start
Speaker 1: a timer here, but let's start with this. WWE and
Speaker 1: NBC Universal reaching agreement for SmackDown to return to the
Speaker 1: USA network. TKA Group Holdings in NBC announced today they've
Speaker 1: agreed to a five year domestic media rights partnership for
Speaker 1: the show that will begin in October of twenty twenty four.
Speaker 1: The partnership also involves four specials a year to air
Speaker 1: on NBC in prime time. Although financial terms were not disclosed,
Speaker 1: the Wall Street Journal wrote people familiar with the pact
Speaker 1: valued it at roughly one point four billion, which is
Speaker 1: about a forty percent increase over the deal that WWE
Speaker 1: had with Fox. The deal comes out to an average
Speaker 1: of two hundred and eighty seven million dollars per year,
Speaker 1: a total of over one point four billion. Mark Shapiro
Speaker 1: told The Hollywood Reporter that the deal is expected to
Speaker 1: quote meet market expectations, which was about a forty to
Speaker 1: fifty per increase over what they were getting before. And
Speaker 1: and that's that now stock way down today. I actually
Speaker 1: haven't looked at in a couple hours, but it was
Speaker 1: way down.
Speaker 2: On this knee. It is down fifteen percent right now, eighty.
Speaker 1: Six five fifteen percent.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it started falling badly in overnight trading. It opened up,
Speaker 2: there was this news. It did not spike it and
Speaker 2: in fact it has continued to go down.
Speaker 1: Well, it's it's down, and then you know a lot
Speaker 1: of fans, oh man, they've been relegated to the USA network,
Speaker 1: and uh, I do have to say that.
Speaker 2: I want to say that relegation.
Speaker 1: The funniest thing about this is can you imagine getting
Speaker 1: a forty increase and the stock crashes. I mean, there's
Speaker 1: a lot to unpack here. Well, now, a couple of things,
Speaker 1: and I think that this is this is one of
Speaker 1: the reasons that this is why I believe that the
Speaker 1: stock is down on the news that they've got a
Speaker 1: forty percent increase for SmackDown. And we still don't know
Speaker 1: where Ron you know, nx T are gonna end up.
Speaker 1: I mean, Rock could end up on Fox, I don't know.
Speaker 2: But and their next day rights because what's the steal
Speaker 2: with Hulu's pretty much over.
Speaker 1: Yeah, we'll get to that as well. But here's here's
Speaker 1: the thing with this forty percent increase in the stock
Speaker 1: going down. I believe that the stock is down maybe
Speaker 1: because it was overvalued to a degree, but also because
Speaker 1: of the idea. And this is true that by moving
Speaker 1: from Fox to USA, even on the same day and everything,
Speaker 1: you're going to UH, you're gonna have significantly fewer people watching.
Speaker 2: It's an optical downgrade from those on the outside. You're
Speaker 2: going from network back to USA.
Speaker 1: And you know you will. I mean, we've seen it
Speaker 1: a million times. You put Friday Nights SmackDown on FS
Speaker 1: one in the same time slot and you know, they
Speaker 1: had shows it at eight hundred thousand. You know, the
Speaker 1: last few they put Roman Reigns on there and such
Speaker 1: and it did, you know, over a million. But still,
Speaker 1: I mean, same day, same time network to cable, you're
Speaker 1: losing a large percentage.
Speaker 2: Of two thirds of your audience.
Speaker 1: So I think that that's the main thing here. But
Speaker 1: you know what's interesting about this whole Fox thing. So
Speaker 1: I think that some people have short memories and what
Speaker 1: they believe is that you know, we're kind of in
Speaker 1: a and we're definitely in a boom period right now
Speaker 1: if you look at WWE business, and I mean, I
Speaker 1: think people are like, it's because they are on Fox.
Speaker 1: And what people are forgetting is that when SmackDown. Remember
Speaker 1: when SmackDown first went to Fox, they signed the deal. Well,
Speaker 1: if you guys recall, you know, Vince was all over
Speaker 1: the place going, well, let's just got to lay to
Speaker 1: amone period. We're on Fox, and uh, you know, the
Speaker 1: first show did like four million viewers, you know, the
Speaker 1: debut on Fox, and like Vince's.
Speaker 2: Are ah, but but they guaranteed Fox. So one eighteen
Speaker 2: forty nine, Well.
Speaker 1: Let's let's uh, let's look at what actually happened. It
Speaker 1: did not lead to a boom period. In fact, the
Speaker 1: Fox numbers were nothing special for a long time. It
Speaker 1: was only in the last eighteen months that things started
Speaker 1: to turn around and we started seeing increases year over year.
Speaker 1: Before that, there were decreases year over year over year
Speaker 1: over year. So it was not the fact that they
Speaker 1: were on Fox that we are where we are now.
Speaker 1: What happened was the shows improved dramatically. Various people and storylines,
Speaker 1: the bloodline, Sammy Zay, all of that started to like
Speaker 1: click with fans, and we sign increases on SmackDown, We
Speaker 1: signed increases on Raw and of late we've seen big
Speaker 1: increases on NXT. So it is not that they were
Speaker 1: on Fox that everything turned around. Is that everything turned
Speaker 1: around and they were on Fox. And obviously, because Fox
Speaker 1: is a much larger platform, you know, that benefited more
Speaker 1: than anything else from this increased interest. So yeah, obviously
Speaker 1: when they move to USA network, we ain't gonna see
Speaker 1: you know, two point four million people watching SmackDown anymore,
Speaker 1: and you know that could have ramifications. But you know,
Speaker 1: the other deal is this is a one point four
Speaker 1: billion dollar deal for a show. We don't know what
Speaker 1: Ro's gonna do. We don't know where Ro's going to
Speaker 1: end up. Whatever NXT is making, they're probably going to
Speaker 1: get a forty percent increase based on the numbers they've
Speaker 1: been doing of late. So I expect that there's going
Speaker 1: to be a uh, you know today's decline in the
Speaker 1: in the stock price, and then I would expect that
Speaker 1: somewhat shortly that's going to to return to normal levels.
Speaker 1: So anyway, that's a SmackDown deal. We still are waiting
Speaker 1: on Raw and NXT.
Speaker 2: Well, just back to what you were saying about the
Speaker 2: viewership and Fox and everything. You know, wrestling habits a
Speaker 2: lot of people didn't watch during COVID, but the habits
Speaker 2: for the most part, didn't change. The times didn't change
Speaker 2: wrestling when it came back, you know, when everything started
Speaker 2: to get regular again, Wrestling was well on the track
Speaker 2: to do that. And look, Fox and the storylines, it's
Speaker 2: like a hand in a glove here. Yes, the storylines
Speaker 2: are very important obviously for the product you're putting out there,
Speaker 2: but it was the visibility on Fox. It was what
Speaker 2: you were able to do on Fox, where they're going
Speaker 2: to miss that, they're going to miss that going to
Speaker 2: USA because you just don't have that visibility that you
Speaker 2: do on a network. And we'll see how things go.
Speaker 2: They got Obviously they made tons of money off of this.
Speaker 2: But also I don't think it should be discounted that
Speaker 2: the stock price was going down yesterday and it was
Speaker 2: down in overnight writing. And sure some of it was
Speaker 2: the speculation about this, but we're also now seeing Axios
Speaker 2: put out a story today that Vince McMahon is setting
Speaker 2: things up for his possible exit. We saw a large
Speaker 2: feature in the Los Angeles Times which went back a lot,
Speaker 2: and for people that already know the story, there was
Speaker 2: a lot of repetitive things in it. But what it
Speaker 2: did mention was that obviously Ignues Lahude stepped up and
Speaker 2: was one of the two people with Manjit Singh that
Speaker 2: said I disagree with this, and he's now on public
Speaker 2: recon for stating it when he didn't have to. And
Speaker 2: you had the former Council for the Securities in Exchange
Speaker 2: Commission that they quoted saying that you know, Vince is
Speaker 2: still in peril here, and by being in peril here
Speaker 2: with the sec and with the federal government, he puts
Speaker 2: t k AO and WWE in peril. So there is
Speaker 2: still a lot that we have to see how these
Speaker 2: investigations go. There's still a lot that needs to be seen.
Speaker 2: But as far as the stock price goes, I agree
Speaker 2: with you. I think it's going to rebound back. I
Speaker 2: think it's going to be in triple digits again very
Speaker 2: soon because the bottom line is the bottom line, and
Speaker 2: they did get forty percent more out of USA. We'll
Speaker 2: see how it goes when it comes to some of
Speaker 2: these other deals and what we're also going to see
Speaker 2: two when these deals are announced, if they happen to
Speaker 2: be with an Amazon or an Apple or something like that,
Speaker 2: where it tends to ends up being a streaming thing.
Speaker 2: We're going to see how the market responds to that.
Speaker 2: Because network and a major cable operation, you know, we
Speaker 2: see that. But look the PAC twelve in Apple got
Speaker 2: a lot of rolling eyes at it. There. There have
Speaker 2: been a lot of connections between a week and go
Speaker 2: to streaming. That again, the financial markets and some people
Speaker 2: have looked at and been very tentative about. So we're
Speaker 2: going to get a true feeling if they do go
Speaker 2: to a streaming service on what the market really thinks
Speaker 2: about that.
Speaker 1: That's I don't know where they're gonna get for raw,
Speaker 1: but I mean I don't think it's out of the
Speaker 1: realm of possibility. They could get one point eight billion
Speaker 1: for raw and NXT add that to one point four billion.
Speaker 1: You're talking a three point two billion dollar television neal
Speaker 1: over five years. I think everything is all right, but
Speaker 1: it's not all right for a lot of the talent,
Speaker 1: as we'll get to after the break Observer Live. Well,
Speaker 1: I made it a segment.
Speaker 2: I'm out me too. You know what I see this,
Speaker 2: I got it up right now, and you know what
Speaker 2: gone out of here.
Speaker 1: I got a lot of other stuff to talk about
Speaker 1: here done. I cannot deal with people saying NXT is valueless.
Speaker 1: Come as it was literally number one on cable this week.
Speaker 1: Now we have more to talk about. The cuts have begun.
Speaker 2: Unfortunately, we got.
Speaker 1: Main roster cuts, including Mustafa Ali who was scheduled to
Speaker 1: face Dominic Mysterio for the umst it All Atlantic Title,
Speaker 1: North American title. Well, he was gonna show up, He's
Speaker 1: gonna show up on Monday, but then he's he's got
Speaker 1: a championship match. He's already he had it not anymore.
Speaker 1: And also cut Aliyah, Rick Boogs, Elias, Riddick Moss, Top Dollars,
Speaker 1: Shelton Benjamin and Dolf Ziggler. And uh, you know, I
Speaker 1: don't like to see anybody get cut, but I can't
Speaker 1: remember the last time we saw a Leah or Riddick, Moss,
Speaker 1: or Elias or Shelton. Ziggler made like an appearance once
Speaker 1: or twice. A few months back, Boogs made an appearance
Speaker 1: or two man Elias. This guy, it's like Vince didn't
Speaker 1: want to do anything with the guy, and then Vince
Speaker 1: was out, and then Triple H didn't want to do
Speaker 1: anything with a guy, and then Vince came back. It
Speaker 1: was like this guy had no chance. So he's gone
Speaker 1: and then I guess we'll see what happens. But the
Speaker 1: word in WWE is that there's expected to be a
Speaker 1: number of cuts from NXT coming up later this afternoon. Now,
Speaker 1: maybe we're happened today, maybe it'll happen tomorrow. I don't know,
Speaker 1: but the belief is that like a lot of cuts
Speaker 1: are coming. Now, what does that mean? Does that mean
Speaker 1: they're gonna cut no? M dar Well, NXT cuts includes
Speaker 1: the people that are in developmental and we talked about
Speaker 1: this months ago, months and months ago. Their new deal,
Speaker 1: before there was ever a sale or anything, was every
Speaker 1: six months, its evaluation time every six months. And they're
Speaker 1: gonna look at everybody. And I don't know if it's
Speaker 1: like can this person main event wrestle meaning because that's ridiculous.
Speaker 1: But if you're not like moving along, if you're stagnant,
Speaker 1: you're out of here. And so I would not expect
Speaker 1: like big names to be cut sssarily, but they could.
Speaker 1: But my guess is that it will largely be people
Speaker 1: in the system. They've been there for a while. They
Speaker 1: don't appear to be showing a lot.
Speaker 2: But they can't bump, they can't roll, They can't do this,
Speaker 2: they can't do that.
Speaker 1: Well, not even that. It's like if you've been there
Speaker 1: for a long time and you still are exactly the
Speaker 1: same as where you were two years ago. I mean,
Speaker 1: you could be on the chopping block. Well, and there
Speaker 1: are people like.
Speaker 2: That, well yeah, I mean we talked about one in
Speaker 2: particular yesterday who was a tag team partner of somebody
Speaker 2: you think is going to be a big star one day,
Speaker 2: and she very well maybe, but she has been at
Speaker 2: the same level for a long time. I do, for
Speaker 2: humanity's sake, worry about people like that. But I also
Speaker 2: think about all of these nil people that they keep
Speaker 2: putting in and nil is not going anywhere because kids
Speaker 2: want money to just visit college campuses. So you're gonna
Speaker 2: see nil money continue on and ww's gonna throw it
Speaker 2: out there and they're gonna bring people in. And I
Speaker 2: think there are some people people where it's like, okay,
Speaker 2: you know, we got a little bit of a look
Speaker 2: at you. But if you don't have the aptitude for this,
Speaker 2: you know, I think you're quickened out of there. You know.
Speaker 2: With a lot of the people that have been there,
Speaker 2: I think it's a lot of people that we've seen
Speaker 2: on the main roster, same sort of way, where if
Speaker 2: you've been forgotten about, if creative has had nothing for you,
Speaker 2: if you've just been in the you know, stuck in
Speaker 2: the meyer for a while. Unfortunately, I would be very
Speaker 2: worried right now.
Speaker 1: And then we got more business news the Hulu deal
Speaker 1: could be coming to an end some WWE content and
Speaker 1: the service showing it will expire in the coming weeks.
Speaker 1: Hulu support was asked. They responded to a question on
Speaker 1: social media regarding this, stated, it's streaming rights with the
Speaker 1: WWE expire shortly, so a lot of deals coming do
Speaker 1: all at the same time, which is very beneficial for WWE.
Speaker 1: As they're you know, we're gonna know what is Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean it happens every time, dude, every time there's
Speaker 1: like a contract year, they happened to magically be up
Speaker 1: year over year. It's incredible, it's incredible the uh, whatever
Speaker 1: you want to call it. I don't want to say
Speaker 1: it's a coincidence. But it's not like they try to
Speaker 1: be down year over year. It's just like they're always
Speaker 1: trying to be up. Hey, and you know, they were
Speaker 1: down down down, down down, and then the last contract
Speaker 1: year was like what was it twenty eighteen or something
Speaker 1: like that, twenty seventeen when they were negotiating, they were
Speaker 1: up and then they signed, and then they went back
Speaker 1: down again and it was like down, down, down, and
Speaker 1: then you know, we're in a contract year and guess
Speaker 1: what they're up. So it's pretty impressive.
Speaker 2: Ever since they had to crawl back to USA after Spike.
Speaker 2: You know that was the last time, and I know
Speaker 2: there have been you can debate from business purposes, but
Speaker 2: from there it has just been working your way upwards.
Speaker 2: And they call it a contract year in sports, you
Speaker 2: know that last year somehow, some way. You know, the
Speaker 2: I who's been hitting two twenty and you know, striking
Speaker 2: out more times than he gets on base, all of
Speaker 2: a sudden is hitting three thirty and has got thirty
Speaker 2: home runs in thirty stolen bases. That's what WWE has
Speaker 2: been doing. It. They've been stealing it, you can say,
Speaker 2: but they've been doing what they need to do. And
Speaker 2: the NXD is interesting because NXT can always fall back
Speaker 2: and have a home on the WWE network. I don't
Speaker 2: think that is anywhere near the chance of happening, but
Speaker 2: it is interesting. If a say a Fox. Let's say
Speaker 2: they decide to switch it over. Disney Let's say buys
Speaker 2: the rights to Raw and wants to put it on FX.
Speaker 2: If they decide they don't want NXT, it'll be interesting
Speaker 2: to see. Do they offer it as a discount back
Speaker 2: to USA? Do you want to put that on an
Speaker 2: Apple as opposed to and get money there, as opposed
Speaker 2: to keeping it all for yourself and putting it on
Speaker 2: WWE network. I don't know where you go that same thing.
Speaker 1: When it can Well, here's the thing, here's the thing
Speaker 1: to me. Okay, Obviously for Ron SmackDown, you want the
Speaker 1: biggest visibility SmackDown. Obviously, if they could have gotten this
Speaker 1: deal to stay on Fox, I'd have been awesome. If
Speaker 1: they can get a deal for CBS, NBC, ABC for Raw, awesome.
Speaker 1: You want to expose it to the largest number of
Speaker 1: people possible. NXT you don't need to do that. So
Speaker 1: if if USA says, you know, we'll give you forty
Speaker 1: million a year for NXT, and then Amazon goes, hey,
Speaker 1: we'll give you eighty million a year, we want people to,
Speaker 1: you know, get into this Amazon streaming thing. Take the deal.
Speaker 1: It doesn't matter if people don't see these guys on NXT.
Speaker 1: For some of them, it probably better.
Speaker 2: That's that's true, and you can make that case for that.
Speaker 2: What's let me ask you this, because I you would
Speaker 2: be financial suicide and malpractice to your shareholders if you
Speaker 2: don't take the biggest deal. But I was so curious
Speaker 2: with a lot of people talking about Smack being the
Speaker 2: show that maybe gets picked up by an Apple or
Speaker 2: wherever and it goes to streaming. It's like, that's bad.
Speaker 2: Going to cable is to me bad because again, the
Speaker 2: network still has power. How Fox was able to promote
Speaker 2: that show with the NFL with college football. I mean,
Speaker 2: for Fox, they don't care. They're gonna put college football
Speaker 2: on Friday Night next year or whatever. They couldn't care less.
Speaker 2: But wwe misses that. And if you go to a
Speaker 2: streaming service, I mean again we've seen a lot of
Speaker 2: these numbers. They don't get anywhere near what cable gets,
Speaker 2: anywhere near what network gets.
Speaker 1: And that's a.
Speaker 2: Concern, And that's a concern when it comes to law
Speaker 2: or anybody, because here's the thing. Do you take a
Speaker 2: gazillion dollars to be on Amazon or do you take
Speaker 2: less money? You have to keep your visibility on you.
Speaker 1: You have to wait networks. If if if Fox says
Speaker 1: one point eight billion for SmackDown and an Amazon says
Speaker 1: one point eight billion for SmackDown, you're a maniac. If
Speaker 1: you go to Amazon. If Fox has one point eight
Speaker 1: billion for SmackDown and Amazon decides they're going to give
Speaker 1: you a three billion to go to Amazon, you go
Speaker 1: to Amazon, way to go to.
Speaker 2: Saudi Arabia, because you're just a slave to that dollar.
Speaker 2: But I think sometimes in the urge to get rich,
Speaker 2: you forget about how people are consuming, truly consuming this content,
Speaker 2: and you may be overrating your ability to lead them
Speaker 2: by the nose to a streaming service that they'll have
Speaker 2: to pay for because you can't even take them by
Speaker 2: the nose and get them from Fox to FS one
Speaker 2: when the change is there. So if it goes to
Speaker 2: somewhere else, this is all very fascinating, And again this
Speaker 2: may be again. Look, the money doesn't get smaller, I guess,
Speaker 2: so they're always going to continue to make big money.
Speaker 2: But it'll be interesting to see if, like percentage wise,
Speaker 2: this is the best they do for a long time
Speaker 2: because of all of these options, probably going to have
Speaker 2: to consolidate over the next couple of years.
Speaker 1: Well, you are the NXTEN numbers the show that is
Speaker 1: allegedly meaningless. According to some this show did eight hundred
Speaker 1: and twenty four thousand viewers on USA. It did a
Speaker 1: point two four in eighteen to forty nine. It was
Speaker 1: the number one show on cable and a year over
Speaker 1: year they're up nineteen point eight percent in audience and
Speaker 1: they're up sixty percent year over year in eighteen to
Speaker 1: forty nine. So obviously, you know the idea of moving
Speaker 1: people from the main roster down. You know, it's funny
Speaker 1: like they do it, and I hear people complain and
Speaker 1: we've been talking about having them do this for years,
Speaker 1: Like this is what you should do, because A you
Speaker 1: get more people watching the show, and b you know,
Speaker 1: it's great for a Tiffany Stratton having a live, long
Speaker 1: television match with a main roster star, or as was
Speaker 1: the case on this show, a couple of main roster stars.
Speaker 1: It was Becky and Lyra val Keira versus Tiffany and
Speaker 1: uh and uh James my favorite Keana James. Yes, but
Speaker 1: you know, uh talk about heat. The most watched thing
Speaker 1: on the show was Old Dirty Dom nine hundred and
Speaker 1: thirty thousand people. I believe for his match with Carmelo Hayes.
Speaker 2: That's because everybody see. That's the great trick about Dom
Speaker 2: on NXT. You have him there and people I want Ria.
Speaker 2: I bet Ria's going to be there. Then you don't
Speaker 2: get Ria. But you still gotta tune in next week
Speaker 2: even if it's just gonna be Dom, because Ria still
Speaker 2: might show up.
Speaker 1: Hey, you want to know how to you want how
Speaker 1: to get a million? Hell, somebody somebody mentioned this. They
Speaker 1: mentioned this comparison and it was apt. There was a
Speaker 1: match back in the day in w CW. I know
Speaker 1: he should not be named, but it was Chris ben
Speaker 1: wal versus David Flair. If you want the modern version
Speaker 1: of Chris Ben wal versus David Flair, it's Dominic Mysterio
Speaker 1: versus Elia Dragonov Oh my God, with MORBs of her
Speaker 1: live in the show. Brian Elver is here Wrestling Observer Live,
Speaker 1: Mike spber VB also Wrestling Observe dot Com. So the
Speaker 1: the update on the injuries last night. All I know
Speaker 1: is that Adam Cole went to the hospital and they
Speaker 1: did X rays on his ankle, and I don't know
Speaker 1: what they I don't know what's going on. So he
Speaker 1: ran down and jumped off the ramp and h and
Speaker 1: hurt his ankle, and you could see him like he's
Speaker 1: trying so hard down to sell it, but he can't
Speaker 1: even walk and he limps over, and they did all
Speaker 1: the spots and everything, and then he ended up getting
Speaker 1: in the ring at the end and got shoved by
Speaker 1: Simode Joe and almost his leg almost fell off, and
Speaker 1: then they had to take him in to see what's
Speaker 1: going on. So we're we're like a week and a
Speaker 1: half away from uh from this pay per view, So
Speaker 1: I don't know if he's gonna be able to work.
Speaker 1: I guess we'll find out.
Speaker 2: He'll be able to work. He may not be able
Speaker 2: to work a match, but he'll be able to work.
Speaker 1: Well, he can stand. But I'm talking to it's supposed
Speaker 1: it's supposed to be. They've already announced the tag title match,
Speaker 1: Like he's supposed to be wrestling in a tag title match.
Speaker 2: Well, here's the thing to probably take that bullet. He's
Speaker 2: going to do a two on one because he went
Speaker 2: and visited Adam Cole in the hospital, who's there next
Speaker 2: to Roderick Strong in the same move and they have
Speaker 2: the bed set up there and there there's poor Adam
Speaker 2: there with bad ankle health, that high high ankle health
Speaker 2: or whatever it is that that happened to him last night,
Speaker 2: and you can have him there that way. Don't try
Speaker 2: to take him off TV. He's going to be working.
Speaker 2: He's got to do something. Or maybe maybe you can
Speaker 2: have him laid out by filthy Tom Lawler because they
Speaker 2: still owe us that one too. He can come and
Speaker 2: beat him up in the hospital.
Speaker 1: All right. So we also have the mox Lee deal,
Speaker 1: which was he did a match with Phoenix and they
Speaker 1: just spot immediately where Phoenix did a running dive off
Speaker 1: the ramp and he landed on Moxley's head. And if
Speaker 1: you watch the show, like there's a lot of criticism
Speaker 1: about everything today. I'll talk a lot more about this
Speaker 1: on the Bryna Viny Show tonight when we have more time.
Speaker 1: But basically, if you watch the show, like, listen to
Speaker 1: the announcers, I mean they thought he was selling. They're like, oh, man,
Speaker 1: he's all glassy eye. That's the look of a man
Speaker 1: who's rocked. Well it turns out he was. So he
Speaker 1: kind of stumbles around a little bit and then he
Speaker 1: gets in the ring, and probably about a minute later,
Speaker 1: maybe two minutes later. I mean, he's just fine. He's
Speaker 1: seemingly fine, and he's just doing the match. So apparently
Speaker 1: he's doing the match, and like you know, the ref's watching,
Speaker 1: and it seems like he's fine. He's doing everything he
Speaker 1: normally does. He even did Luca and then you know, but
Speaker 1: I guess Moxley, you know, is a thing starts going.
Speaker 1: He starts realizing, man, I'm I'm not.
Speaker 2: Right here, probably having spells.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and so he called for not only the finish,
Speaker 1: not just like you know, let's go home, but he
Speaker 1: called for the finish with Phoenix going over, who wasn't
Speaker 1: supposed to go over, And uh, my understanding here is that,
Speaker 1: you know, he wanted Phoenix to hit the splash and
Speaker 1: and that would be the finish, but Phoenix was confused
Speaker 1: and thought he was gonna hit the splash and the
Speaker 1: pile driver. So Phoenix hits the pile driver, and uh,
Speaker 1: like you can watch the show, like Moxley's loudly telling
Speaker 1: the referee like this is it count? And for whatever reason,
Speaker 1: the ref holds up, No, it wasn't. It was Oh Knox, Yeah,
Speaker 1: it Rick Knox and so so Moxley looks right at
Speaker 1: this guy and you can't hear it, but you can
Speaker 1: see it, and you can read his lips. He goes
Speaker 1: few at the top of his lungs and then Phoenix
Speaker 1: has it him with another pile driver, and then uh,
Speaker 1: and then Knox counts the pin. Now, what Moxley told
Speaker 1: people was, you know, I didn't feel anything on the
Speaker 1: pile drivers. The pile drivers were safe. Other people watch
Speaker 1: him when we're like, I can't believe this guy took
Speaker 1: a pile driver, but one way or the other, they
Speaker 1: they took him in the back. I've had five hundred
Speaker 1: people aying that we called it a mild concussion. I'm
Speaker 1: not a doctor. What they told me was mild concussion.
Speaker 1: If you want to say there's no such thing, fine,
Speaker 1: I don't care, but don't yell at me. It wasn't
Speaker 1: my diagnosis.
Speaker 2: I'm reporting.
Speaker 1: I am reporting the wording that was used, which was
Speaker 1: a mild concussion.
Speaker 2: I have a traumatic Brian injury every day on this show.
Speaker 1: Why are you yelling at me? For the love of God,
Speaker 1: So that was the that was the story. But you know,
Speaker 1: we'll find out a concussion. I mean, he could be
Speaker 1: cleared Saturday. He could be cleared Wednesday. He could be
Speaker 1: cleared a month from now. I don't know. I'm just
Speaker 1: telling I'm just don't shoot the messenger. You ever heard
Speaker 1: that saying.
Speaker 2: Well, if this guy ever wanted off work, now would
Speaker 2: be the time to say, eh, you know what, he's
Speaker 2: getting his vacation.
Speaker 1: You know he will never get the vacation.
Speaker 2: This would be a fantabulous time to take a vacation.
Speaker 2: Put some pressure on your boy there. You know he
Speaker 2: could use it right now, get some rest, go do
Speaker 2: something nice. RJ City can fill in for a little bit,
Speaker 2: maybe Lexi if he doesn't get too many shoes thrown
Speaker 2: at her. But I honestly thought last night when that
Speaker 2: show was over with, that we were going to, I
Speaker 2: don't know, kind of be regaling it a little bit,
Speaker 2: because we talked about yesterday.
Speaker 1: What I'm about to if you give me some time,
Speaker 1: I got lots of regaling.
Speaker 2: Let's say, you know, I thought this was going to
Speaker 2: be a very important show to set up for this weekend,
Speaker 2: and they again, coming off the pay per view things
Speaker 2: have been okay, so wanted to continue that momentum, and
Speaker 2: then we had all this wwe stuff today, stealing all
Speaker 2: of its thunder.
Speaker 1: We had Eddie Kingson beating Claudio Cassanioli title versus title
Speaker 1: Ring of Honor World New Japan's strong open weight match
Speaker 1: was great. It was so great that when it was over,
Speaker 1: I thought, man, maybe this should have been the main event.
Speaker 1: But then we had the main event, and when it
Speaker 1: was over, I was fine with this not being the
Speaker 1: main event. But this match was great and the people
Speaker 1: were so behind Eddie here in New York going for
Speaker 1: this title, and they just beat the crap out of
Speaker 1: each other. They souplex each other, they chopped each other,
Speaker 1: they hit each other's moves, and then finally Eddie hits
Speaker 1: a series of backfists and for his main man Kwata
Speaker 1: heat power bombs Claudio and after all these years, he
Speaker 1: gets that title. And afterwards Claudio offered the handshake, Eddie
Speaker 1: shook his hand and Claudio gave him the belt and left.
Speaker 1: This was great, great, We had I gotta do this
Speaker 1: one tonight. I need hours. Roderick in the hospital. Roderick
Speaker 1: and the Kingdom deserve like every award in the Observer.
Speaker 1: I mean, they have turned their careers around. They are
Speaker 1: my favorite gimmick in all of aw right now, Tavid
Speaker 1: and Bennett and Roddy with his idiot glasses, his neck
Speaker 1: brace and that stupid bed. Ah love this adored.
Speaker 2: A couple more wins on TV as a tag team too.
Speaker 2: Let's not forget about all this is going on here.
Speaker 1: Oh my lord, they had rosary beads, drag or notes here. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So then we add Renee with Christian and Lucasaurus and
Speaker 1: uh so what's happening is they're doing that tag match
Speaker 1: at a rampage Grand Slam, and then all Christian is creep.
Speaker 1: He wants a three way Lucasaurus himself and Darby for
Speaker 1: the title on Saturday. And do we not all know
Speaker 1: where this is going? Sammy Gabard, Chris Jericho, oh man,
Speaker 1: thread on our board about this one. Bro, you know
Speaker 1: that it's okay I have like two botch spots in
Speaker 1: a match, but the match can still be good. Yes,
Speaker 1: there was a spot where Jericho slipped running the ropes,
Speaker 1: he hit the middle row, he bounced back, and they
Speaker 1: just kept going. I mean they had a match I
Speaker 1: did that with Craig once gat of course that wasn't
Speaker 1: Chris Jericho. But and then They had another spot where
Speaker 1: he goes with the Silver King dive and Sammy throws
Speaker 1: a kick and he misses him by like a full foot,
Speaker 1: and then he immediately kicked him again. But I thought
Speaker 1: the match was good. The crowd as soon as Jericho
Speaker 1: put on the walls there at the end, I mean,
Speaker 1: they were going crazy. Sammy hits a cutter off the top.
Speaker 1: This whole thing was built around Chris Jericho and Sean
Speaker 1: Michaels from like two thousand and eight. Sammy came out
Speaker 1: like an HBK tribute deal and then they did pretty
Speaker 1: much everything. They did pretty much the exact same finish,
Speaker 1: which was he tried the big thing off the ropes,
Speaker 1: Jericho hit the codebreakraut of mid air for the pin,
Speaker 1: and then Jericho offers a handshake and they did the
Speaker 1: same deal, which was Sammy kicked him in the you know,
Speaker 1: ying yang and left him for dead, and then out
Speaker 1: comes this absolutely despicable, grotesque monstrosity of a human, Don
Speaker 1: Kallas scarred up, and this place is just furious that
Speaker 1: Sammy is going with callous.
Speaker 2: It was awesome. Why doesn't somebody, you know do a
Speaker 2: remake of Rustlemania twenty and the dollar Trish bet that
Speaker 2: led to Christian turning on Jericho there and then kissing Trish.
Speaker 2: Now that was a great story.
Speaker 1: M Jeff arrives and he's doing this promo and all
Speaker 1: of a sudden, Cole gets a call right in the
Speaker 1: middle of it, and he tells M Jeff, I gotta go.
Speaker 1: I gotta go help Roddy right now, but I'll be back.
Speaker 1: And M Jeff goes, why are you leaving? And Cole
Speaker 1: goes off screen just here, You're not gonna die, Roddy.
Speaker 1: Ronnie's afraid he's gonna die, So Cole runs off. We
Speaker 1: talked about John Moxley and Phoenix for the title and uh,
Speaker 1: I'm sure, like you know, I don't know, man what
Speaker 1: I don't want to put it over because of what happened,
Speaker 1: But like, I don't think I've ever seen a match
Speaker 1: with a guy that got knocked out seconds in end
Speaker 1: up as good as this match. It was like, how
Speaker 1: did they do this?
Speaker 2: What about a guy who's gotten knocked out late? Who
Speaker 2: do you think has been the best at that?
Speaker 1: Well, at least you had the whole match before he
Speaker 1: got knocked out, like that Kurt Angle match where he
Speaker 1: got he took the pedigree on the table and the
Speaker 1: table broke and c he was knocked out. That match
Speaker 1: was a horror and he made it through this like
Speaker 1: if you didn't know what happened, you could watch this
Speaker 1: match and you know, go, holy smokes, this match was great.
Speaker 2: Well it wasn't like brock lesnar and uh that was
Speaker 2: at the very end, you know, because at the Veria
Speaker 2: and everybody knew it and it was scary. This was
Speaker 2: one where again because of how Maxley sells with that
Speaker 2: stumble and stuff like that, you really you really didn't
Speaker 2: know that he was that badly hurt. And again if
Speaker 2: if he was in touch with those pile drivers, I
Speaker 2: mean those Phoenix drivers looked like they absolutely killed him.
Speaker 1: So the Phoenix dregar here said, I had no idea
Speaker 1: it was hurt. I just cheered the whole time. Thought
Speaker 1: it was great. Say and Tony Storm made w title.
Speaker 1: This was a bullet club.
Speaker 2: But it was one of those.
Speaker 1: It was one of those bullet club matches and that
Speaker 1: they have every now and then where like the fans
Speaker 1: decide they love every bit of it, so they're doing
Speaker 1: every gimmick. They're doing the shoe for a near fall
Speaker 1: they're doing the spray, there's interference. Interference difference was Tony
Speaker 1: did not win and fans were sado hit the.
Speaker 2: Why would you do this?
Speaker 1: Exposed buckle say hit the rampage and pinder because I
Speaker 1: don't know if you've noticed this or not. But barring
Speaker 1: like injury where it's necessitated, if you win the title,
Speaker 1: you're holding it for a while. It doesn't matter if
Speaker 1: there's somebody that comes along. That's just what Tony does.
Speaker 2: And talking Tony, who again, compared to a lot of
Speaker 2: women you have. I know she's got a level of
Speaker 2: star power, but it just peaked when you were at Wembley.
Speaker 2: She cannot carry it. I don't know.
Speaker 1: It seems to be getting a little better every week.
Speaker 1: She's got the entrance now with the black and white.
Speaker 1: She's got the film.
Speaker 2: In the wall. No no, no, no no, I'm talking about
Speaker 2: Sorea already peaked. You already got what.
Speaker 1: You She got the title. She's got to hold it
Speaker 1: for a while. He's not gonna give her the title
Speaker 1: and take it right off of her. He's never done
Speaker 1: that ever, unless somebody was injured or whatever. And then
Speaker 1: a night event was MJFF and Samoa Joe. This MJFF brother.
Speaker 1: He doesn't do like crazy stuff, but every match is
Speaker 1: a very detailed story and and he he gets this
Speaker 1: stuff over. Like I don't know about everybody else, but
Speaker 1: when he did that promo and he goes, I swear
Speaker 1: on my life, I'm gonna choke out Samoa Joe in
Speaker 1: the middle of the ring in New York, it was like,
Speaker 1: y'all know, he's choking him out in the middle of
Speaker 1: the ring, right. I don't know how he's gonna do it,
Speaker 1: but that's what he's gonna do. And that's what he did.
Speaker 1: And so the whole match from start to finish was
Speaker 1: I gotta get on this guy's back and choke him
Speaker 1: out and he gets foiled, He gets foiled, he gets
Speaker 1: his neck worked over. They did a spot this stupid
Speaker 1: kangaroo kick. It's like he does a backflip off the
Speaker 1: top of road and he starts going like this, and
Speaker 1: this got a bigger pop than anything on the show
Speaker 1: outside of when Eddie Kingston actually won the title, and
Speaker 1: it may have been bigger. I may have to go back.
Speaker 1: They went crazy for the kang Guru kick.
Speaker 2: It's a very simple business. Brother.
Speaker 1: Yeah, when you do it right, and then they build everything.
Speaker 1: In the end, he gets the pile driver on the floor.
Speaker 1: You think it's over, but he kicks out, and then
Speaker 1: Cole comes out, and finally Max gets the wrist tape
Speaker 1: and he starts choking Joe because he's, you know, our scumbag,
Speaker 1: and he puts him in the choke and he chokes
Speaker 1: him unconscious and he wins. And then Joe goes after Cole,
Speaker 1: but MGF gets in front of his friend and Joe
Speaker 1: offers Max the handshake, and you think, man, we got handshakes.
Speaker 1: We have a derricha one all show like something's gonna happen.
Speaker 1: Joe shook his hand left. This show was great, and
Speaker 1: we got another one Friday. We'll get the lineup after
Speaker 1: the break ups.
Speaker 2: We're light.
Speaker 1: Remember when I used to like producer dom may as
Speaker 1: well go to the twitch chat while you're at it. Brother, Hey, listen,
Speaker 1: here's the lineup for a rampage Grand Slam. No spoilers,
Speaker 1: and as I mentioned before, actually I do know some
Speaker 1: of the finishes yere. But so we have the world
Speaker 1: six man titles on the line, Brian Cage, Bishop Kahan
Speaker 1: and toa Leona. We'll defend the titles against the Young
Speaker 1: Bucks and Hangman Page the Hung Bucks. We have got
Speaker 1: the aw Trios titles on the line. The Acclaimed and
Speaker 1: Daddy Ass will defend against Evil Uno, Alex Reynolds and
Speaker 1: John Silver.
Speaker 2: I thin you can call him mister Ass. Was ridiculous enough,
Speaker 2: but here we are.
Speaker 1: We have got pretty soon he's gonna be Granddaddy Ass.
Speaker 1: Granddaddy yes, it probably already is. Maybe on a World
Speaker 1: Tag Team Title Number one Contenders match. The winner of
Speaker 1: this match faces MJFF and Adam Cole. If Adam Cole
Speaker 1: can wrestle at Russell Dream, we have got Mike Bennett,
Speaker 1: Matt Tavin, Matt Hardy and Jeff Hardy, Vincent and Dutch
Speaker 1: and Trent Burretta and Chuck Taylor who will be facing
Speaker 1: MJFF and Adam Cole.
Speaker 2: I have a rant about this.
Speaker 1: Next week, Sting and Darby Ala will be facing Christian
Speaker 1: Cage and Lucasaurus Orange, Cassie Hook and Chris stat Lanter
Speaker 1: face met Monard, Angelo Parker and Ana j and Sky
Speaker 1: Blue faces Julia Hart. You know, sometimes w W will
Speaker 1: like take away a person's name of some sort, like
Speaker 1: you know, for a while he was just theory instead
Speaker 1: of Austin theory. Yes, sometimes sometimes I believe that Santana
Speaker 1: is a much better name than Mike Santana. It's no
Speaker 1: offense Mike, but I think that he was better off
Speaker 1: when he was just Santana. But he is now Mike
Speaker 1: Santana and he will be at action on the show.
Speaker 2: Would he be better off if he was Jewel's Santana?
Speaker 1: I have so much to talk about on the Brain
Speaker 1: and Video Show Tonight, a w don xt only for
Speaker 1: subscribers Wrestling Observer dot com or Video dot f W
Speaker 1: online dot com. So join us tonight, everybody, and we'll
Speaker 1: talk to you next time. Wrestling Observer. Lier you have
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