December 11, 2024 • 25 mins
What's up, everybody! In this episode I dive deep into some of the most dramatic moment in recent RAW history and cover the New Day's turmoil, including Xavier Woods' internal conflict, and the unexpected return of Big E. We'll also discuss CM Punk's rivalry with Seth Rollins and explore the future of Gunther's championship. Lets not forget about Kevin Owens doing the best work in his career!
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Sammy Zain comes out Jayus, so it comes out.
Speaker 2 (00:02):
Everybody comes out to break this fight up, which led
to some storyline down the road, which is good, and
got to our main event, which was Seth Rowlins versus
Sammy Sayin in a really fun match that made sense.
There was story behind it, it just wasn't a booked match.
It was really cool. I like the way WW does that.
I wish AW could do more of that because they
give great matches, but not always with a story.
Speaker 3 (00:27):
And now you're made it introducing the hosts Wrestling Within,
Freddy Jeff Died and for Ready Friends tun What's up?
Speaker 1 (00:40):
Everybody?
Speaker 2 (00:40):
Welcome to an episode of Wrestling with Freddy Jeff's on
assignment on today. We're going to get into the New
Day and all the drama, the breakup, the throwing away
of one of your founding members, the disrespect and the pain.
We're also going to get into see Him Punk and
Seth Rowlins because see Him Punk doesn't have time for
Seth Rollins anymore, because Seth Rollins doesn't have any gold.
(01:04):
We'll get into Gunther. Who's next for Gunther? Could it
be Finn Balor? He's pissing them off? Enough that I'd
sure as hell fight him. We'll get into whatever else
we have time for on today is wrestling with Fredie.
Let's start the show, all right, you guys. We're gonna
start not with CMPO, but with the New Day. Xavier
(01:24):
Woods was one of our first guests ever on the show.
Might have been our first guest, actually first or second.
He was in studio with us when we recorded right
here where I am right now, just sitting to my left,
and we shared a microphone. We're microphone sharers because back
then I didn't even have two mics. Sad Sad Days,
(01:45):
Season one, Very Sad Days. You guys should feel bad
for me. His storyline, as is currently constructed, Let's back
up a little bit. Carrie and Cross has been planning
seeds in people's heads before having to deal with the
Wyatt six. Maybe that's why they're trying to punish him,
because he's a seed planter. He planted the seed in
Woods's brain that everybody's got gold in the New Day
(02:08):
except you.
Speaker 1 (02:08):
Why is that? Why are you always second?
Speaker 2 (02:11):
Banana? Are you not good enough? I think you are.
I think that WW universe thinks you are. It's a
stupid WW universe just call us fans. I hate that,
all this corporate terminology. But anyway, Woods bought into it
a little bit, and we've seen it start to degenerate
and rode away and rust the relationship of the New
(02:34):
Day and the trust of the New Day between he
and Kofi, and it's cost the matches.
Speaker 1 (02:41):
It's cost them.
Speaker 2 (02:41):
We thought it was going to cost them their friendship.
There was a lot of conflict, a lot of drama,
and all this right before the ten year anniversary of
the New Day. This faction was hated when they came out.
Everyone thought they were just jobbers and they would scream
New Day sucks. And they turned it into something so
special that it went from New Day Sucks to New
(03:03):
Day Rocks. And everybody's won. You have two world champions,
and you have a King of the Ring, and you
have I think they've won four hundred and twenty seven
tag team titles, which is the most of anybody by far.
That last part's not true, Well, the Foreigner twenty seven part.
I don't even know if I said Foreigner twenty seven.
But anyway, Adam Pierce, the general manager, who has no
(03:26):
control over his roster, the poor man has the hardest
job in wrestling, controlling all these monsters, all these crazy men,
all these crazy women, always breaking up fights far too late.
He introduces the ten year anniversary of the New Day
and outcomes Kofi Kingston and outcomes Xavier Woods, and they
make separate entrances because they're not tight. They're not bros
(03:48):
right now. And they get out there and the reminiscing
of the old times of the bootios and throwing pancakes
in the crowd and the unicorn horns that were very phallic,
all these things start to bring them back together a
little bit and they start, you know, seeing the light,
so to speak, a little bit. But there's still some
(04:10):
drama there, and they're missing one member, and all of
a sudden, from the back, Harry comes, as predicted, everyone
predicted it, Biggie, and the crowd goes crazy and he
comes out looking smooth and swelt in a suit, and
he walks out to the ring and he's concerned about
his brothers, he's concerned about his friends, his best friends.
(04:33):
He's concerned about the New Day, and he tries to
remind them what they've built and how they built it,
and to make sure that this doesn't go south again.
Even though he can't wrestle, He's going to represent the
New Day as their manager, and the crowd goes crazy.
I think this was Vancouver, Canada, and the crowd maybe not.
(04:54):
It might have been Washington, I don't remember. It's a
good crowd wherever you are, pet yourself on the back,
and we're excited. The TV audience at home is excited
because we've all wanted this, We've all wanted the return
of Biggie. And everyone's excited except Xavier Woods and Kofi Kingston,
(05:15):
and they take this different perspective of no, man, we
don't want you. Where have you been? You're just showing
up now? What the hell FU? And it's this total
swerve that I don't think anybody saw coming. I certainly didn't,
(05:35):
and I feel like I'm pretty keyed into how wrestling
storylines are worked. So I loved I loved getting tricked.
And they were pissed at Biggie and said, you're just
showing up now? Now, what about when we were having
problems earlier? What about when we were on the path
to this destructive place we're at now? Where were you then?
(05:58):
And they said some really mean things to be, and
Biggie took it. And let me say this, it was
the best acting that Biggie has ever put out there.
It's the best performance that he's put on camera period.
He was so vulnerable, and to see a big, huge
guy like that be vulnerable, it just it hurts. You know.
I don't know why it hurts us, because we want
(06:18):
our men to be so strong and impenetrable. And to show,
you know, emotional blood, so to speak, to show that
you've been wounded by the people you love takes a
lot of courage and a lot of guts. And I
respected his work a lot in this segment, and they
just insulted him time and time again. They even said,
let's be honest, Biggie, you're never getting cleared to wrestle,
(06:41):
and he just took that bullet right to the heart
and everything they said you could see it just it
hurt him and affected him. And he's talking off Mike
like this is how it's going to be after everything
we've done, it's going to be like this, and they
cold shouldered him.
Speaker 1 (06:55):
He got he got four cold shoulders and.
Speaker 2 (06:58):
Eventually he leaves the ring and we see Xavier Woods
and Kofee Kingston, who have been having beef and conflict
for the last month, at least do the predator handshake
that Carl Weather's rest in peace and Arnold Schwarzenegger did
in the movie where he's like, Dutch, your son of
a bitch, and they did the handshake of power. We
(07:20):
got a heal New Day, which is cool, but the
segment was so genuinely disappointing. Not in a bad way.
I mean this as a compliment, because of the way
they treated Big E and the destruction of the New
Day and the reformation of this new version of the
New Day all happened at once while I was still
(07:42):
feeling horrible for Big E. So Damnuel Kofe Kingston and
Damil Xavier Woods, even though you were a guest and
supporter of the show, it was a beautiful segment. I
loved it. I hope you guys dug it too. I
just thought it was really really good. They hadn't even
they didn't even have a lot of wrestling on money
Our I guess they never do. It's more the talking
show and SmackDown wrestles a little bit more.
Speaker 1 (08:04):
But man, what a segment. It was awesome.
Speaker 2 (08:13):
Transitioning too. You're all his favorite wrestler, Cmpunk. You chant
his name in every arena he goes to. He also
sing Seth Rolins songs, and it's good that you do both.
It's good that you have love for both because they
both happen to be. In this segment, Sampunk came out
and the crowd loved him, and he's growing the hair out.
It's getting long and shaggy. He's letting everybody know that
(08:34):
his path is to WrestleMania, and he cuts his It's
an average promo for Punk, which is still like an
eight nine or frigging ten because he's excellent on the mic,
but he's not giving us any real new information. He's
just giving us old information in a colorful way, in
a new way, and he's pointing to a sign that
doesn't exist, but he can see it. It was really
(08:56):
smart and he gets interrupted before he can go too
far by Seth Rollins. The only the only one who
can interrupt Seth and get cheers except maybe Drew McIntyre.
And Seth comes out and he's pissed. He hates seam Punk,
Damn screw you see them Punk. I hate I think
you suck. I wish you were never back here, your
(09:18):
piece of crap.
Speaker 1 (09:19):
All this stuff.
Speaker 2 (09:19):
That's how Seth Rollins feels, and some of the wrestlers
see them. Punk's not having it from Seth Rollins. He goes, hey, man,
six months ago was six months ago, and I was
interested in you because you had gold, but you have
no gold now, so you don't even exist on my radar.
And they talk about how much or Seth Rowllins talks
(09:40):
about how much he hates him, and it quickly turned
into the LLLL cool J Cannabis beef from back in
the late nineties early two thousands when Cannabis had that rapper.
Speaker 1 (09:49):
He's like, can I snatched the mic off your arm?
I can't wrap.
Speaker 2 (09:52):
Llll didn't like that, and they had beef and Cannabis said, Yo,
ninety nine percent of your fans are all women, and
Llo cool J came back with ninety nine one percent
of your fans don't exist, and everyone was like, oh shit,
I guess that rap beeve is over.
Speaker 1 (10:07):
That's what Sampunk did to Seth Rollins.
Speaker 2 (10:09):
He's like, Yo, you've been thinking about how much you
hate me for the last six months. I haven't thought
about you once and he completely dismissed him. He's done
this before, but it's always it's always a cool promo
and it's a cool disc to let somebody know that
they take up no space in your head. But it's
good to know how much space you take up in theirs.
I think if more celebrities dealt with trolls that way,
(10:32):
they wouldn't get their feelings hurt so much. But people
are so sensitive now that I think they actually do
think about those comments. I'm from an older generation, so
it doesn't it doesn't bother me. That's why I ask
for your mean comments as well as your nice ones
when we do reviews, because I don't care. But Sampunk
did not care about Seth Rollins, and that pissed Seth
Rollins off and they got in a fight, and guess
who had to come out again, Adam Pierce's security force
(10:54):
to split everything up. Why because he's a reckless general
manager who should not be put in the position he's in.
Because because he doesn't care about the safety of his wrestlers.
Speaker 1 (11:02):
I'm just kidding. That's why I said it's super dramatic.
Speaker 2 (11:05):
Anyway, Sammy's ain comes out Jay who so it comes out,
everybody comes out to break this fight up, which led
to some storyline down the road, which is good. And
it got to our main event, which was seth Rollins
versus Sammy's Ain in a really fun match that made sense.
There was a story behind it. It just wasn't a
booked match. It was really cool. I like the way
WW does that. I wish AW could do more of
(11:26):
that because they give great matches, but not always with
a story. Sometimes they'll use the tournament as an excuse,
which is cool. WW does tournaments too, but they do
it without the tournament aspect as well, just because it
would be an awesome match, and it's great to get
to see awesome matches. But I would love it if
there was a bit more, just even if it's a
week or if it's just a two hour storyline building
(11:47):
up to that is opposed to, hey, here's the match,
check it out. It's going to be great. They're always great,
you know what I mean when I say always. Maybe
not always, but most of them are great. I just
wish there was more story there. This was great story
that wasn't just in but it was told out of
ring as well, because jay Usi gets attacked and Samy's like, yo,
I do I know who did this? And I'm gonna
show him what's up, and that gave him a motivation,
(12:08):
more motivation to fight Seth later that night. Thought they
did it well anyway, constructive criticism and a compliment. So anyway,
moving on, Gunther Finn Balor. He wants the gold bad
and his character even though he's a bad guy right now.
If you if you were committed to him back in
(12:30):
the day when he first won the Universal Championship, the
dumbest name for a title ever. It was cut short
because of in the because in the match with Seth Rollins,
he like dislocated his shoulder or tore his labor him
or something. The left shoulder was toast and he had
to give up the title the very next day on
Monday night. Raw I think he got to present it
(12:50):
on Good Morning America and then right after that had
to had to drop the title, not drop the title,
had to give up the title, which was brutal, and
he hasn't been the sense, which is brutal. And you
can see how hungry and how desperately he wants this
title back and to have that gold around his waist
and he feels so deserving of it. The crowd I think,
(13:14):
even though he's a bad guy right now, secretly wants
him to have it as well. I don't think there's
any chance he wins the match against Gunther, but I
guess there's a chance.
Speaker 1 (13:26):
I just I don't.
Speaker 2 (13:28):
I don't see why you build up Gunther unless he's
going to have a long title run. So I don't
think it's Finds time yet, but it has to be
Fends time again soon one day, maybe when he's out.
Speaker 1 (13:40):
Of the judgment Dan.
Speaker 2 (13:41):
I know he has Tag Team Gold, but that's different.
It's just it's not at the same level. It's not
booked at the same level, it's not presented at the
same level, so I don't receive it as if it's
at the same level. It's still cool, but it's not
the heavyweight Championship. So he's trying to do everything he
can to piss off Gunther, and Gunther's like, you know what,
you pissed me off so much, I'm not gonna give
(14:02):
you what you want. I'm a Russell bitch ass Dominic
Mysterio instead, and Dominic's like, yo, don't call me a bitch.
Ass Man. What's up with that? Germans aren't supposed to
do that or Austrians. I think he's Austrian and he
has a match and he just annihilates for Dominic. Ben
Balor runs out and gives him like twenty seven coude
Gras stomps all over him. So that'll get us, that'll
(14:22):
get us to the match. Maybe it'll be a Saturday
Night special, what do they call it, Saturday Night's Man event.
Saturday Night Special sounds good too though, or maybe it'll
be the next pay per view, But that'll be our
next championship match, and that'll be fantastic. It'll be a
safe prediction to say my man coother's gonna win. Main event.
We talked about this a little bit already. I don't
(14:45):
want the show to go too long where we run
out of time and can't talk about anything else. But
we had seth Rawlins defeating Sammy z Ain in the
main event, and Drew mcatire McIntyre returned and attacked and
beat down Sammy's a at the end of the match.
So he's back, and I guess him and Samuel have
a storyline which would be nice and they can fight
(15:06):
over something that's not a bracelet, a toe ring, a belt,
a headband, or an Adida sports jacket, although those are
worth fighting for. Don't ever let anybody jack you for
your jacket. Yeah, so we'll move on. Wwe. Oh well, well,
before we get into that, hold on one second, let's
(15:26):
talk about Kevin Owens. Cody Roads came out cut a
promo talking about his match with Kevin Owens, standard Cody
Roads promo representing the company, representing the title, representing you
and me and all the people who believed in him.
The Kevin Owens segment, first of all, was built up
(15:46):
beautifully because instead of having him in studio where Michael
Cole planned on interviewing him, Kevin Owens refused to even
come in the arena and cut a little video on
his phone where he's like, I'm not even coming in.
I'm preemptively strikes since I get kicked out every single
time I kicked myself out. You want to have an
interview with me, you got to come out here in
the freezing cold in my rental car and interview me
Michael Cole, and Michael Cole doesn't want to do that.
(16:08):
Corey Graves doesn't want him to do that, but he's
gonna do it because he's a professional journalist, damn it.
He's Michael friggin Coal. And he goes out there into
Kevin's car and they have this I think it was
a three camera set up, one on the front and
one on each side for like a like a close up,
sort of a clean close up. The end of this segment,
(16:31):
I'm sure as being talked about is so worth everything
that happens. My daughter was watching this segment with me
while we were eating dinner. My son was watching anime.
He's big into anime right now. You guys see, he
has been for the last couple of years, which has
gotten me into anime. There's some good shit out there.
Even if you're an old cat like me, you see
some stuff that might bring you to tears straight up.
(16:58):
Kevin Owens cuts this promo and Michael Cole challenges him,
like a good journalist should.
Speaker 1 (17:03):
He doesn't softball these guys.
Speaker 2 (17:04):
He's throwing fastballs, baby, but Kevin Owens takes him deep
every single time and is blaming Cody for this, blaming
Cody for that. Michael was like, yo, you should look
in the mirror. He's like, oh, I'm looking in the mirror.
I'm looking in the mirror right now. You know what
I see. I see a handsome guy who's right, who's right,
My opinion's right, your opinion is wrong. And he's so awesome.
He was way better than what I just did. And
(17:25):
that's not what he said. My daughter starts laughing and
she goes, Dad, I think I like evil Kevin Owens
more than good guy Kevin Owens. I said me too.
I think everybody loves this Kevin Owens. He's so good
and his actions make him more evil than his promos
right his promos. He's going to allow frustration to take
(17:46):
over whether he's a good guy or a bad guy.
And through that frustration comes a lot of opportunity for subtle,
like comedic moments, which he had a dozen in this segment.
He's absolutely killing it. And none of this compares to
the tag at the end throws Michael out of his car.
He goes, get out of my rental card, leave my
rental car immediately, you're no longer allowed to interview me.
(18:07):
Go out on the cold and freeze your nuts off
as you walk back inside the arena, And Michael Cole's
like Oh fine, I freaking came out here for nothing.
He gets out of the car and he slams the
door and Kevin goes, Michael Michael Michae Gold turns around.
Speaker 1 (18:19):
He goes, oh, what did you want to apologize?
Speaker 2 (18:21):
And before he can finish the word apologize, Kevin just
rolls up the window and stares at him and doesn't
say a fucking word. It was so beautiful. It was
the funniest shit. We used to do that in high
school to buddies, like it was. I love Kevin Owens.
I think he's hysterical. I love when he's evil. He
(18:42):
was evil at the end of the show, so don't worry.
He wasn't just funny. But it was a great, great,
great segment. And I love Michael Cole when he eats shit.
Very few people eat shit better than Michael Cole. He
did it with Pat McAfee on a weekly basis when
Pat was there, and to see him do it with
someone the level of Kevin Owens is just you guys
get to see, you know, just masterful performances by both guys.
(19:04):
It's weird to talk so much about Michael Cole. He's
not even a wrestler. But he just did such a
great job with that. Anyway, Shinskan Nakamura, they do the
subtitle thing with him to help kind of get his
message through and get his message over. He talked about
being the new champ. He looks great. There was some
beef with La Night there.
Speaker 1 (19:23):
La Night came out.
Speaker 2 (19:24):
He's like, y'all, wrestle you right now, straight up in
a rematch, which makes you think, oh, we're gonna get
a title shot without a pay per view. This is
gonna be amazing. No wrong, Andrelee comes out, He's not
having it. The bloodline comes out. They're pissed off. They've
been pissed off the whole show. A Monday Night Raw,
they were pissed off. They're pissed off on Friday Night SmackDown.
(19:45):
They're just pissed off, letting people know they may have
lost the match, but they're still here. And chinsk is like,
all right, I'm just gonna dip out real quick and
let you guys have your moment. See y'all later, And
they didn't have beef with him, so they let it slide.
And then in our main event, we got Cody Rhods
versus Chad Gable It's wild how times have changed. Like
(20:06):
back in the day the champ Haul Cogan would wrestle
bums on free TV and you knew who was gonna
win right away. And even though you know who's gonna win,
most of the time, these days, when you get top
dudes wrestling each other, it's just a special It's just
a special match, and it happens every single week, and
(20:26):
that's just crazy to me. Like when I was a kid,
the free wrestling kind of sucked. It was the pay
per view match that costs so much freaking money. That
was where you got the good guy versus the bad guy.
And here's the match I really want to see instead
of the local guy versus the champion and the local
guy just getting one punch in and then getting beat
up the rest of the match. Chad Gable versus Cody
(20:48):
Rhodes was awesome. Chad Gable, his promos are ten times
better than they used to be. He hung in there
with Cody and the promo segment at the top of
the show, and he just did a great job in there. Man,
maybe I've slept on Chad. I don't know if I've
slept on him. I feel like I've given him love,
but shit, man, his matches are so good and just
(21:09):
so much fun to watch, and he's so smart in there,
and he makes you believe he can win even when
you know there's no way he can win.
Speaker 1 (21:15):
It's just weird. It's just weird how good he is.
Speaker 2 (21:18):
Anyway, I'm not gonna throw tons of flowers at these guys,
but they did a great job. Let's move on the
aaw Continental Classic Blue League match. The show opened with
Kyle Fletcher versus Shelton friggin Benjamin. That's how the show opened.
Speaker 1 (21:38):
Now. I said earlier in the show, I wish they would.
Speaker 2 (21:40):
Have more story behind their matches, and I do mean that,
but in a tournament, there's an excuse to have it.
Shelton Benjamin loses this match but looks great. They told
some story afterwards, which kind of saves it. Where MVPs
like I told you not to play with these kids, man, Like,
what's wrong with you? I would have rather seen Shelton
than Kyle down the road in the tournament, like as
(22:01):
the two finalists in the Blue League, and then the
winner of that would have the most points and go on.
They did it in the first because I just think
you're still trying to build up the Hurt syndicate and
build up Shelton, So I don't think he should have
taken a loss that quickly. But they kind of excused
it with the post thing with MVP, where he's like,
why are you playing with him? Meaning you didn't take
(22:22):
the match seriously and that's why you lost. So that's
how they're trying to protect him, which is cool, and
then they beat up a bunch of security guards.
Speaker 1 (22:28):
But I still wish that match would have been later on.
Speaker 2 (22:30):
I get the fact that AW is different from WWE
and likes to just give us straight fastballs as often
as they can, as quickly as they can figure out
which pitch is best the fastball, give them the fastball,
Which pitch is best the fastball, give them the fastball.
Speaker 1 (22:47):
They don't always have a fastball.
Speaker 2 (22:49):
Sometimes they throw you a curve and then here comes
the fastball again. I just prefer, like I said, I'm older,
I'm almost forty nine years old. I'll be forty nine
next year. I like stories anyway, the match itself, I
don't even know what to say. Dude, like Shelton Benjamin
was doing matches like this against sewn Michaels on Monday
Night RAW twenty years ago. He looks exactly the same,
(23:11):
and he's still giving amazing matches and people are still
sleeping on him. That's crazy to me, but I guess
that's where we're still at.
Speaker 1 (23:21):
He's amazing.
Speaker 2 (23:22):
Turn off my podcast right now, go on YouTube and
watch the Shawn Michael Shelton Benjamin thing. Just type it
into YouTube and you'll see one of the greatest matches
you've ever seen in your life. That's how good this
guy's been, and that's how long he's been this good.
It's just crazy to me. Yeah, I'm not going to
talk about the match and give you play by plays,
but you should for sure watch it. And that was
definitely the match of the night. They had other good
(23:45):
matches with Casignoli versus Brodie King where we got a
little meat chant going on. Shout out to everyone chanting meet,
but other than that, it was really focused on the
tournament and I again, there's no motive there, so I
and I'm not going to give you play by play.
He hit him with a left hand and then he
took a chop and hit them with another left hand.
I'm not going to do that a lot of chops though,
and I'm liking the chops more and more. And ww
(24:06):
he's liking the chops more and more. I see you
guys taking a little bit here and there. Anyway, you guys,
stay tuned for Thursdays on sanctioned show.
Speaker 1 (24:13):
Don't forget.
Speaker 2 (24:14):
We're else going to answer questions, lots and lots of
questions from the listeners, from you, the people of the Federation.
Speaker 1 (24:21):
Thank you guys for tuning in every week. Don't forget.
Speaker 2 (24:23):
You can always leave a review, and if you do,
whether it's good or bad, I'll read it on the air.
And I've done way more WWE since I read that
that one that was like, hey, man, more WWE. So see, man,
I can take criticism without crying, without shedding a tear.
And if you do cry, that's okay too, fellas, It's
okay to cry. It's why women live longer than men,
because we hold that shit in and died sixty five
(24:45):
instead of eighty five.
Speaker 1 (24:46):
So let it out once in a while, let it
out around the bros. Tune in Thursday. Thanks for listening. Peace.
Speaker 2 (24:56):
This has been a production of Iheartsmichael Toura podcast Network
For more podcast from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
Sammy Zain comes out Jayus, so it comes out.
Speaker 2 (00:02):
Everybody comes out to break this fight up, which led
to some storyline down the road, which is good, and
got to our main event, which was Seth Rowlins versus
Sammy Sayin in a really fun match that made sense.
There was story behind it, it just wasn't a booked match.
It was really cool. I like the way WW does that.
I wish AW could do more of that because they
give great matches, but not always with a story.
Speaker 3 (00:27):
And now you're made it introducing the hosts Wrestling Within,
Freddy Jeff Died and for Ready Friends tun What's up?
Speaker 1 (00:40):
Everybody?
Speaker 2 (00:40):
Welcome to an episode of Wrestling with Freddy Jeff's on
assignment on today. We're going to get into the New
Day and all the drama, the breakup, the throwing away
of one of your founding members, the disrespect and the pain.
We're also going to get into see Him Punk and
Seth Rowlins because see Him Punk doesn't have time for
Seth Rollins anymore, because Seth Rollins doesn't have any gold.
(01:04):
We'll get into Gunther. Who's next for Gunther? Could it
be Finn Balor? He's pissing them off? Enough that I'd
sure as hell fight him. We'll get into whatever else
we have time for on today is wrestling with Fredie.
Let's start the show, all right, you guys. We're gonna
start not with CMPO, but with the New Day. Xavier
(01:24):
Woods was one of our first guests ever on the show.
Might have been our first guest, actually first or second.
He was in studio with us when we recorded right
here where I am right now, just sitting to my left,
and we shared a microphone. We're microphone sharers because back
then I didn't even have two mics. Sad Sad Days,
(01:45):
Season one, Very Sad Days. You guys should feel bad
for me. His storyline, as is currently constructed, Let's back
up a little bit. Carrie and Cross has been planning
seeds in people's heads before having to deal with the
Wyatt six. Maybe that's why they're trying to punish him,
because he's a seed planter. He planted the seed in
Woods's brain that everybody's got gold in the New Day
(02:08):
except you.
Speaker 1 (02:08):
Why is that? Why are you always second?
Speaker 2 (02:11):
Banana? Are you not good enough? I think you are.
I think that WW universe thinks you are. It's a
stupid WW universe just call us fans. I hate that,
all this corporate terminology. But anyway, Woods bought into it
a little bit, and we've seen it start to degenerate
and rode away and rust the relationship of the New
(02:34):
Day and the trust of the New Day between he
and Kofi, and it's cost the matches.
Speaker 1 (02:41):
It's cost them.
Speaker 2 (02:41):
We thought it was going to cost them their friendship.
There was a lot of conflict, a lot of drama,
and all this right before the ten year anniversary of
the New Day. This faction was hated when they came out.
Everyone thought they were just jobbers and they would scream
New Day sucks. And they turned it into something so
special that it went from New Day Sucks to New
(03:03):
Day Rocks. And everybody's won. You have two world champions,
and you have a King of the Ring, and you
have I think they've won four hundred and twenty seven
tag team titles, which is the most of anybody by far.
That last part's not true, Well, the Foreigner twenty seven part.
I don't even know if I said Foreigner twenty seven.
But anyway, Adam Pierce, the general manager, who has no
(03:26):
control over his roster, the poor man has the hardest
job in wrestling, controlling all these monsters, all these crazy men,
all these crazy women, always breaking up fights far too late.
He introduces the ten year anniversary of the New Day
and outcomes Kofi Kingston and outcomes Xavier Woods, and they
make separate entrances because they're not tight. They're not bros
(03:48):
right now. And they get out there and the reminiscing
of the old times of the bootios and throwing pancakes
in the crowd and the unicorn horns that were very phallic,
all these things start to bring them back together a
little bit and they start, you know, seeing the light,
so to speak, a little bit. But there's still some
(04:10):
drama there, and they're missing one member, and all of
a sudden, from the back, Harry comes, as predicted, everyone
predicted it, Biggie, and the crowd goes crazy and he
comes out looking smooth and swelt in a suit, and
he walks out to the ring and he's concerned about
his brothers, he's concerned about his friends, his best friends.
(04:33):
He's concerned about the New Day, and he tries to
remind them what they've built and how they built it,
and to make sure that this doesn't go south again.
Even though he can't wrestle, He's going to represent the
New Day as their manager, and the crowd goes crazy.
I think this was Vancouver, Canada, and the crowd maybe not.
(04:54):
It might have been Washington, I don't remember. It's a
good crowd wherever you are, pet yourself on the back,
and we're excited. The TV audience at home is excited
because we've all wanted this, We've all wanted the return
of Biggie. And everyone's excited except Xavier Woods and Kofi Kingston,
(05:15):
and they take this different perspective of no, man, we
don't want you. Where have you been? You're just showing
up now? What the hell FU? And it's this total
swerve that I don't think anybody saw coming. I certainly didn't,
(05:35):
and I feel like I'm pretty keyed into how wrestling
storylines are worked. So I loved I loved getting tricked.
And they were pissed at Biggie and said, you're just
showing up now? Now, what about when we were having
problems earlier? What about when we were on the path
to this destructive place we're at now? Where were you then?
(05:58):
And they said some really mean things to be, and
Biggie took it. And let me say this, it was
the best acting that Biggie has ever put out there.
It's the best performance that he's put on camera period.
He was so vulnerable, and to see a big, huge
guy like that be vulnerable, it just it hurts. You know.
I don't know why it hurts us, because we want
(06:18):
our men to be so strong and impenetrable. And to show,
you know, emotional blood, so to speak, to show that
you've been wounded by the people you love takes a
lot of courage and a lot of guts. And I
respected his work a lot in this segment, and they
just insulted him time and time again. They even said,
let's be honest, Biggie, you're never getting cleared to wrestle,
(06:41):
and he just took that bullet right to the heart
and everything they said you could see it just it
hurt him and affected him. And he's talking off Mike
like this is how it's going to be after everything
we've done, it's going to be like this, and they
cold shouldered him.
Speaker 1 (06:55):
He got he got four cold shoulders and.
Speaker 2 (06:58):
Eventually he leaves the ring and we see Xavier Woods
and Kofee Kingston, who have been having beef and conflict
for the last month, at least do the predator handshake
that Carl Weather's rest in peace and Arnold Schwarzenegger did
in the movie where he's like, Dutch, your son of
a bitch, and they did the handshake of power. We
(07:20):
got a heal New Day, which is cool, but the
segment was so genuinely disappointing. Not in a bad way.
I mean this as a compliment, because of the way
they treated Big E and the destruction of the New
Day and the reformation of this new version of the
New Day all happened at once while I was still
(07:42):
feeling horrible for Big E. So Damnuel Kofe Kingston and
Damil Xavier Woods, even though you were a guest and
supporter of the show, it was a beautiful segment. I
loved it. I hope you guys dug it too. I
just thought it was really really good. They hadn't even
they didn't even have a lot of wrestling on money
Our I guess they never do. It's more the talking
show and SmackDown wrestles a little bit more.
Speaker 1 (08:04):
But man, what a segment. It was awesome.
Speaker 2 (08:13):
Transitioning too. You're all his favorite wrestler, Cmpunk. You chant
his name in every arena he goes to. He also
sing Seth Rolins songs, and it's good that you do both.
It's good that you have love for both because they
both happen to be. In this segment, Sampunk came out
and the crowd loved him, and he's growing the hair out.
It's getting long and shaggy. He's letting everybody know that
(08:34):
his path is to WrestleMania, and he cuts his It's
an average promo for Punk, which is still like an
eight nine or frigging ten because he's excellent on the mic,
but he's not giving us any real new information. He's
just giving us old information in a colorful way, in
a new way, and he's pointing to a sign that
doesn't exist, but he can see it. It was really
(08:56):
smart and he gets interrupted before he can go too
far by Seth Rollins. The only the only one who
can interrupt Seth and get cheers except maybe Drew McIntyre.
And Seth comes out and he's pissed. He hates seam Punk,
Damn screw you see them Punk. I hate I think
you suck. I wish you were never back here, your
(09:18):
piece of crap.
Speaker 1 (09:19):
All this stuff.
Speaker 2 (09:19):
That's how Seth Rollins feels, and some of the wrestlers
see them. Punk's not having it from Seth Rollins. He goes, hey, man,
six months ago was six months ago, and I was
interested in you because you had gold, but you have
no gold now, so you don't even exist on my radar.
And they talk about how much or Seth Rowllins talks
(09:40):
about how much he hates him, and it quickly turned
into the LLLL cool J Cannabis beef from back in
the late nineties early two thousands when Cannabis had that rapper.
Speaker 1 (09:49):
He's like, can I snatched the mic off your arm?
I can't wrap.
Speaker 2 (09:52):
Llll didn't like that, and they had beef and Cannabis said, Yo,
ninety nine percent of your fans are all women, and
Llo cool J came back with ninety nine one percent
of your fans don't exist, and everyone was like, oh shit,
I guess that rap beeve is over.
Speaker 1 (10:07):
That's what Sampunk did to Seth Rollins.
Speaker 2 (10:09):
He's like, Yo, you've been thinking about how much you
hate me for the last six months. I haven't thought
about you once and he completely dismissed him. He's done
this before, but it's always it's always a cool promo
and it's a cool disc to let somebody know that
they take up no space in your head. But it's
good to know how much space you take up in theirs.
I think if more celebrities dealt with trolls that way,
(10:32):
they wouldn't get their feelings hurt so much. But people
are so sensitive now that I think they actually do
think about those comments. I'm from an older generation, so
it doesn't it doesn't bother me. That's why I ask
for your mean comments as well as your nice ones
when we do reviews, because I don't care. But Sampunk
did not care about Seth Rollins, and that pissed Seth
Rollins off and they got in a fight, and guess
who had to come out again, Adam Pierce's security force
(10:54):
to split everything up. Why because he's a reckless general
manager who should not be put in the position he's in.
Because because he doesn't care about the safety of his wrestlers.
Speaker 1 (11:02):
I'm just kidding. That's why I said it's super dramatic.
Speaker 2 (11:05):
Anyway, Sammy's ain comes out Jay who so it comes out,
everybody comes out to break this fight up, which led
to some storyline down the road, which is good. And
it got to our main event, which was seth Rollins
versus Sammy's Ain in a really fun match that made sense.
There was a story behind it. It just wasn't a
booked match. It was really cool. I like the way
WW does that. I wish AW could do more of
(11:26):
that because they give great matches, but not always with
a story. Sometimes they'll use the tournament as an excuse,
which is cool. WW does tournaments too, but they do
it without the tournament aspect as well, just because it
would be an awesome match, and it's great to get
to see awesome matches. But I would love it if
there was a bit more, just even if it's a
week or if it's just a two hour storyline building
(11:47):
up to that is opposed to, hey, here's the match,
check it out. It's going to be great. They're always great,
you know what I mean when I say always. Maybe
not always, but most of them are great. I just
wish there was more story there. This was great story
that wasn't just in but it was told out of
ring as well, because jay Usi gets attacked and Samy's like, yo,
I do I know who did this? And I'm gonna
show him what's up, and that gave him a motivation,
(12:08):
more motivation to fight Seth later that night. Thought they
did it well anyway, constructive criticism and a compliment. So anyway,
moving on, Gunther Finn Balor. He wants the gold bad
and his character even though he's a bad guy right now.
If you if you were committed to him back in
(12:30):
the day when he first won the Universal Championship, the
dumbest name for a title ever. It was cut short
because of in the because in the match with Seth Rollins,
he like dislocated his shoulder or tore his labor him
or something. The left shoulder was toast and he had
to give up the title the very next day on
Monday night. Raw I think he got to present it
(12:50):
on Good Morning America and then right after that had
to had to drop the title, not drop the title,
had to give up the title, which was brutal, and
he hasn't been the sense, which is brutal. And you
can see how hungry and how desperately he wants this
title back and to have that gold around his waist
and he feels so deserving of it. The crowd I think,
(13:14):
even though he's a bad guy right now, secretly wants
him to have it as well. I don't think there's
any chance he wins the match against Gunther, but I
guess there's a chance.
Speaker 1 (13:26):
I just I don't.
Speaker 2 (13:28):
I don't see why you build up Gunther unless he's
going to have a long title run. So I don't
think it's Finds time yet, but it has to be
Fends time again soon one day, maybe when he's out.
Speaker 1 (13:40):
Of the judgment Dan.
Speaker 2 (13:41):
I know he has Tag Team Gold, but that's different.
It's just it's not at the same level. It's not
booked at the same level, it's not presented at the
same level, so I don't receive it as if it's
at the same level. It's still cool, but it's not
the heavyweight Championship. So he's trying to do everything he
can to piss off Gunther, and Gunther's like, you know what,
you pissed me off so much, I'm not gonna give
(14:02):
you what you want. I'm a Russell bitch ass Dominic
Mysterio instead, and Dominic's like, yo, don't call me a bitch.
Ass Man. What's up with that? Germans aren't supposed to
do that or Austrians. I think he's Austrian and he
has a match and he just annihilates for Dominic. Ben
Balor runs out and gives him like twenty seven coude
Gras stomps all over him. So that'll get us, that'll
(14:22):
get us to the match. Maybe it'll be a Saturday
Night special, what do they call it, Saturday Night's Man event.
Saturday Night Special sounds good too though, or maybe it'll
be the next pay per view, But that'll be our
next championship match, and that'll be fantastic. It'll be a
safe prediction to say my man coother's gonna win. Main event.
We talked about this a little bit already. I don't
(14:45):
want the show to go too long where we run
out of time and can't talk about anything else. But
we had seth Rawlins defeating Sammy z Ain in the
main event, and Drew mcatire McIntyre returned and attacked and
beat down Sammy's a at the end of the match.
So he's back, and I guess him and Samuel have
a storyline which would be nice and they can fight
(15:06):
over something that's not a bracelet, a toe ring, a belt,
a headband, or an Adida sports jacket, although those are
worth fighting for. Don't ever let anybody jack you for
your jacket. Yeah, so we'll move on. Wwe. Oh well, well,
before we get into that, hold on one second, let's
(15:26):
talk about Kevin Owens. Cody Roads came out cut a
promo talking about his match with Kevin Owens, standard Cody
Roads promo representing the company, representing the title, representing you
and me and all the people who believed in him.
The Kevin Owens segment, first of all, was built up
(15:46):
beautifully because instead of having him in studio where Michael
Cole planned on interviewing him, Kevin Owens refused to even
come in the arena and cut a little video on
his phone where he's like, I'm not even coming in.
I'm preemptively strikes since I get kicked out every single
time I kicked myself out. You want to have an
interview with me, you got to come out here in
the freezing cold in my rental car and interview me
Michael Cole, and Michael Cole doesn't want to do that.
(16:08):
Corey Graves doesn't want him to do that, but he's
gonna do it because he's a professional journalist, damn it.
He's Michael friggin Coal. And he goes out there into
Kevin's car and they have this I think it was
a three camera set up, one on the front and
one on each side for like a like a close up,
sort of a clean close up. The end of this segment,
(16:31):
I'm sure as being talked about is so worth everything
that happens. My daughter was watching this segment with me
while we were eating dinner. My son was watching anime.
He's big into anime right now. You guys see, he
has been for the last couple of years, which has
gotten me into anime. There's some good shit out there.
Even if you're an old cat like me, you see
some stuff that might bring you to tears straight up.
(16:58):
Kevin Owens cuts this promo and Michael Cole challenges him,
like a good journalist should.
Speaker 1 (17:03):
He doesn't softball these guys.
Speaker 2 (17:04):
He's throwing fastballs, baby, but Kevin Owens takes him deep
every single time and is blaming Cody for this, blaming
Cody for that. Michael was like, yo, you should look
in the mirror. He's like, oh, I'm looking in the mirror.
I'm looking in the mirror right now. You know what
I see. I see a handsome guy who's right, who's right,
My opinion's right, your opinion is wrong. And he's so awesome.
He was way better than what I just did. And
(17:25):
that's not what he said. My daughter starts laughing and
she goes, Dad, I think I like evil Kevin Owens
more than good guy Kevin Owens. I said me too.
I think everybody loves this Kevin Owens. He's so good
and his actions make him more evil than his promos
right his promos. He's going to allow frustration to take
(17:46):
over whether he's a good guy or a bad guy.
And through that frustration comes a lot of opportunity for subtle,
like comedic moments, which he had a dozen in this segment.
He's absolutely killing it. And none of this compares to
the tag at the end throws Michael out of his car.
He goes, get out of my rental card, leave my
rental car immediately, you're no longer allowed to interview me.
(18:07):
Go out on the cold and freeze your nuts off
as you walk back inside the arena, And Michael Cole's
like Oh fine, I freaking came out here for nothing.
He gets out of the car and he slams the
door and Kevin goes, Michael Michael Michae Gold turns around.
Speaker 1 (18:19):
He goes, oh, what did you want to apologize?
Speaker 2 (18:21):
And before he can finish the word apologize, Kevin just
rolls up the window and stares at him and doesn't
say a fucking word. It was so beautiful. It was
the funniest shit. We used to do that in high
school to buddies, like it was. I love Kevin Owens.
I think he's hysterical. I love when he's evil. He
(18:42):
was evil at the end of the show, so don't worry.
He wasn't just funny. But it was a great, great,
great segment. And I love Michael Cole when he eats shit.
Very few people eat shit better than Michael Cole. He
did it with Pat McAfee on a weekly basis when
Pat was there, and to see him do it with
someone the level of Kevin Owens is just you guys
get to see, you know, just masterful performances by both guys.
(19:04):
It's weird to talk so much about Michael Cole. He's
not even a wrestler. But he just did such a
great job with that. Anyway, Shinskan Nakamura, they do the
subtitle thing with him to help kind of get his
message through and get his message over. He talked about
being the new champ. He looks great. There was some
beef with La Night there.
Speaker 1 (19:23):
La Night came out.
Speaker 2 (19:24):
He's like, y'all, wrestle you right now, straight up in
a rematch, which makes you think, oh, we're gonna get
a title shot without a pay per view. This is
gonna be amazing. No wrong, Andrelee comes out, He's not
having it. The bloodline comes out. They're pissed off. They've
been pissed off the whole show. A Monday Night Raw,
they were pissed off. They're pissed off on Friday Night SmackDown.
(19:45):
They're just pissed off, letting people know they may have
lost the match, but they're still here. And chinsk is like,
all right, I'm just gonna dip out real quick and
let you guys have your moment. See y'all later, And
they didn't have beef with him, so they let it slide.
And then in our main event, we got Cody Rhods
versus Chad Gable It's wild how times have changed. Like
(20:06):
back in the day the champ Haul Cogan would wrestle
bums on free TV and you knew who was gonna
win right away. And even though you know who's gonna win,
most of the time, these days, when you get top
dudes wrestling each other, it's just a special It's just
a special match, and it happens every single week, and
(20:26):
that's just crazy to me. Like when I was a kid,
the free wrestling kind of sucked. It was the pay
per view match that costs so much freaking money. That
was where you got the good guy versus the bad guy.
And here's the match I really want to see instead
of the local guy versus the champion and the local
guy just getting one punch in and then getting beat
up the rest of the match. Chad Gable versus Cody
(20:48):
Rhodes was awesome. Chad Gable, his promos are ten times
better than they used to be. He hung in there
with Cody and the promo segment at the top of
the show, and he just did a great job in there. Man,
maybe I've slept on Chad. I don't know if I've
slept on him. I feel like I've given him love,
but shit, man, his matches are so good and just
(21:09):
so much fun to watch, and he's so smart in there,
and he makes you believe he can win even when
you know there's no way he can win.
Speaker 1 (21:15):
It's just weird. It's just weird how good he is.
Speaker 2 (21:18):
Anyway, I'm not gonna throw tons of flowers at these guys,
but they did a great job. Let's move on the
aaw Continental Classic Blue League match. The show opened with
Kyle Fletcher versus Shelton friggin Benjamin. That's how the show opened.
Speaker 1 (21:38):
Now. I said earlier in the show, I wish they would.
Speaker 2 (21:40):
Have more story behind their matches, and I do mean that,
but in a tournament, there's an excuse to have it.
Shelton Benjamin loses this match but looks great. They told
some story afterwards, which kind of saves it. Where MVPs
like I told you not to play with these kids, man, Like,
what's wrong with you? I would have rather seen Shelton
than Kyle down the road in the tournament, like as
(22:01):
the two finalists in the Blue League, and then the
winner of that would have the most points and go on.
They did it in the first because I just think
you're still trying to build up the Hurt syndicate and
build up Shelton, So I don't think he should have
taken a loss that quickly. But they kind of excused
it with the post thing with MVP, where he's like,
why are you playing with him? Meaning you didn't take
(22:22):
the match seriously and that's why you lost. So that's
how they're trying to protect him, which is cool, and
then they beat up a bunch of security guards.
Speaker 1 (22:28):
But I still wish that match would have been later on.
Speaker 2 (22:30):
I get the fact that AW is different from WWE
and likes to just give us straight fastballs as often
as they can, as quickly as they can figure out
which pitch is best the fastball, give them the fastball,
Which pitch is best the fastball, give them the fastball.
Speaker 1 (22:47):
They don't always have a fastball.
Speaker 2 (22:49):
Sometimes they throw you a curve and then here comes
the fastball again. I just prefer, like I said, I'm older,
I'm almost forty nine years old. I'll be forty nine
next year. I like stories anyway, the match itself, I
don't even know what to say. Dude, like Shelton Benjamin
was doing matches like this against sewn Michaels on Monday
Night RAW twenty years ago. He looks exactly the same,
(23:11):
and he's still giving amazing matches and people are still
sleeping on him. That's crazy to me, but I guess
that's where we're still at.
Speaker 1 (23:21):
He's amazing.
Speaker 2 (23:22):
Turn off my podcast right now, go on YouTube and
watch the Shawn Michael Shelton Benjamin thing. Just type it
into YouTube and you'll see one of the greatest matches
you've ever seen in your life. That's how good this
guy's been, and that's how long he's been this good.
It's just crazy to me. Yeah, I'm not going to
talk about the match and give you play by plays,
but you should for sure watch it. And that was
definitely the match of the night. They had other good
(23:45):
matches with Casignoli versus Brodie King where we got a
little meat chant going on. Shout out to everyone chanting meet,
but other than that, it was really focused on the
tournament and I again, there's no motive there, so I
and I'm not going to give you play by play.
He hit him with a left hand and then he
took a chop and hit them with another left hand.
I'm not going to do that a lot of chops though,
and I'm liking the chops more and more. And ww
(24:06):
he's liking the chops more and more. I see you
guys taking a little bit here and there. Anyway, you guys,
stay tuned for Thursdays on sanctioned show.
Speaker 1 (24:13):
Don't forget.
Speaker 2 (24:14):
We're else going to answer questions, lots and lots of
questions from the listeners, from you, the people of the Federation.
Speaker 1 (24:21):
Thank you guys for tuning in every week. Don't forget.
Speaker 2 (24:23):
You can always leave a review, and if you do,
whether it's good or bad, I'll read it on the air.
And I've done way more WWE since I read that
that one that was like, hey, man, more WWE. So see, man,
I can take criticism without crying, without shedding a tear.
And if you do cry, that's okay too, fellas, It's
okay to cry. It's why women live longer than men,
because we hold that shit in and died sixty five
(24:45):
instead of eighty five.
Speaker 1 (24:46):
So let it out once in a while, let it
out around the bros. Tune in Thursday. Thanks for listening. Peace.
Speaker 2 (24:56):
This has been a production of Iheartsmichael Toura podcast Network
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