Episode 504: Revenge Of The Taker REMIX

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1:05Welcome to something I wrestle with. Welcome to Rema Will. Greetings. Greetings. Greetings. Well, you know, that's not a real rip. No, you know what I mean? There's no box of gimmicks. Burmer in you and no. No deal in rumor in you and it ends with you there. I was there. Try some of mine. I don't give a shit. Welcome to something I wrestle with. I wrestle with something I wrestle with. I wrestle with something I wrestle with. Dinging Bruce Pritchard. Hey, hey, it's Conrad Thompson and you're listening to something to wrestle with. First Pritchard, Bruce what's going on, man? How are you? I'm cold. How are you? It's just some time, isn't it? It's not cold down here. Where in the end? It's cold up here. It's like cold. I wake up. It's like 49 degrees and I had the air conditioner on when I went to bed last night.

2:05I get up this morning and 60 degrees, which is nice, but it's cold. I'm cold. I'll tell you what was not cold. That Puerto Rico crowd. My goodness, Bruce. We got the end thing. We don't talk about current stuff, but I just want to give you your flowers. I thought the show over the weekend backlash was absolutely fantastic. Man, that crowd was something else. How about that pop for Carlito? What a fun show. It's Muikali Entertainment. It was. And hey, we're hoping for a fun show today. Of course, we're coming to you a little later. As you might imagine, Bruce has been busier than a one-on-paper hanger, but hey, better late than never. It's like this. Yeah, it would be tough. Let's just talk about it. Today, we're coming off of one of the worst WrestleMania's in history. WrestleMania 13. We'll be talking about the fallout from that show as we build. Is that the worst WrestleMania ever? Well, it got fewer buys than uncensored. So just, you know, maybe not the best WrestleMania.

3:06I think everybody agrees 14 really turned that whole thing around. I love a couple of matches on 13. My favorite match of all time is on 13. He thought 13 was one of the better WrestleMania's. I don't know. You know, it's kind of after 39 of them. It kind of hard to choose what is good and what isn't. And I still, you know, will still say that it holds true to WrestleMania 17. It's probably the best of all time. But yeah, it's hard to tell. Yeah, I guess some good ones. I guess some bad ones. Got some in between. But after, you know, when you do that many of them at that for a while, I think it's all in the eye of the beholder. Sure. Well, the, the eyes of the holders that were holding the rest of the observer said this was not the best one. And then consider your source. Of course, in my opinion, one of the greatest matches of all time is on that card.

4:06Someone called Steve Austin and Brett Hart. But either way, we've got a lot of moving parts for this WrestleMania. You and I have talked about, you know, what was supposed to happen, what might have happened, what you would have liked to have happened. Now we know what did happen. And we're going to just, you know, play it as, as it comes. John Michaels has, has, has forfeited his title. He lost his smile. And we had to come up with a new plan. So we did the final four pay-per-view instead of determining a true number one contender after the controversy from the 97 Royal Rumble. Now we're going to crown a champion in this Brett Hart. He loses it. The very next line on RAW to Sid. And we set up Sid versus the Undertaker. And we set up Brett versus Austin. It becomes a submission match because we want to probably be inclusive of our new special guest referee, Ken Shamrock. But on the heels of that, now we've done a double turn. Don't post Steve Austin, who was clearly a heel is now a baby face.

5:06And Brett Hart, who's one of the most beloved World Champions in history, is now a heel. Is that still all these years later? Maybe the best example of a double turn? That's a damn good one. That's for sure because, you know, and Steve, I mean, it wasn't all in one night, man. That's where people get lost on translation. Steve, when Steve came back from his injury and really got the stone cold gimmick rolling. Steve had just this ground swell of support that the audience wanted Steve to be their guy so bad. And we waited and waited and waited and they had already turned Steve. But it was, if anything, it was really the turning of Brett Hart and the solidifying of the crybaby Brett at that point. Because it was, you know, I think Brett felt both personally and character wise that well, the audience just turned on him.

6:15Or this, you know, foul mouth, loud mouth, you know, Texan that should be jeered, not cheered. And, you know, Brett, that kind of confused Brett. Again, the character and the human being a little bit, but, you know, I don't know that stone cold could have turned without Brett Hart. And Brett did a magnificent job of helping to make, you know, stone cold Steve Austin. Both guys, I think that those were some of the greatest matches ever Brett and Steve. And it takes two to tango there and holy cow, man, that's, you say that's memorable, good stuff. So listen, we know Steve being a baby face is going to work out. He's going to become one of the, if not the biggest March seller of all time. I mean, what a role he's going to be on from that perspective.

7:16But I'm curious, was that something that Brett was nervous about or concerned about? The March money, perhaps disappearing. And here's this beloved figure. And I know that you guys have this idea or maybe I wish you talk about that. Did you have the idea of he's going to be a heel here? There's going to be a baby face thrust of the world. That wouldn't slow down his international March. Or was that even the plan going in? No, that's really not the discussion at that point. I don't know that Brett's merchandise was so significant that you looked at. Oh, my God, if we lose this, you know, you're looking what's best for business overall. And I think that is what was best for business overall. You know, Steve's March at that point is already exploded. So there's no problem there. That it seemed like for the year prior, you know, WrestleMania is not really going to be normally. It feels like WrestleMania when you go back in time.

8:16It's the the end of a year long bill. This is the culmination. This is the blow off. This is the end of this mega feud. But man, we're having to switch gears awfully fast here. I mean, undertaker and said have like a three or four week build is all Austin and Brett had certainly been getting started. Before survivor series will go back to the fall of the prior year. We're also now injecting in Shamrock in there. Did it feel like a different WrestleMania or was it business as usual? You just had a funky situation with the title. Yeah, we had a funky situation and it was. I don't know that it was necessarily what we wanted across the board. So you're changing things up and you're trying to make things work. And not having as much time as I think ordinarily we would have loved to have had. So yeah, man, you're kind of changing things up and you're hoping that they work.

9:17Different people look at WrestleMania in different ways. Some people look at it is the end. Some people look at it as the beginning. There's there's a lot of both try to have that variety where you're not just ending stories, but you're starting new ones. And that's that fine line that you have to walk to make sure that all right, you're going to build something up for the big climax. And we also have to build something up for the first one where you want to see a lot more of that going forward. It's a it's a catch 22. The night after WrestleMania 13 raw is a sell out. And we know that I shouldn't say we know a lot of fans myself included consider the night after WrestleMania 14 to be the first crazy Monday after WrestleMania. But here you are after a 2013 selling out there as well. How much of that is you know just timing how much of it is the change of the format if you're watching over on YouTube.

10:21Raw in this area started to be presented as raw is war. So we had sort of the two hour break up and just a totally different presentation. As I understand it, there was a new video package that was done by the hottie and the whole vibe and feel changed. Is that maybe where you sort of mark, hey, this is where business changed for us when we changed our approach to Monday night. Well, I think that we had changed the approach to raw prior to that may have been in the opening and everything, but it was it had already been changed. We had already started to make it a little bit edgier of a product. And you know, now you're, you know, you're all in and it was after WrestleMania as I said, which is kind of a new beginning for everything. So it looks like, all right, hey, there's a there's a new open, there's a new field, there's an energy overall and especially, you know, we're around the Chicago area, which has always been a great market for us.

11:23And you know, I just think things were things were hot in that regard. One of the other things that's going to get hot is the heart foundation in 1997, but before we get there, it looks like it's going to break up before it ever has an opportunity. So we have tag team champions, Owen Hart and British Bulldog are going to be resting against the headbangers the night after WrestleMania. And it's been building tension here for a little bit, but it finally boils over and they set up a European title match for the next week. And man, that was some fun stuff. I loved watching these guys do their thing. And then we get a 22 minute angle with Bret Hart coming out and continuing his heel turn. And this is probably one of the more important interviews of Brett's career. He's going to talk about how he's been this hero in Germany and Europe and South Africa and Canada. But then start running down Americans for liking guys and cheering guys like Shawn Michaels and Steve Austin.

12:26That's a mixed response at first, but eventually fans are with it. They start chanting Austin and he points out that Americans cheer people like Charles Manson and OJ Simpson and they glamorize criminals and tells American fans to kiss his ass. And this is a pretty big time heel turn and the most comparable one would maybe be the more shocking one of Hulk Hogan turning heel over in WCW. How important was this promo to submit this new direction for the Bret Hart character at this point? Well, I think that it helped allow Brett the opportunity to express why he felt the way he felt. And there's nothing that Brett said that wasn't true. Everything Brett said was true and it was I think is people look at our country a lot of times. That's what they see. You know, you look at it, you go, wait a minute, man. When did we become a country that we, you know, can bash our president?

13:28When did we become a country that we were no longer patriotic and we didn't, you know, get behind what the country was about at the time? And the country had lost its way. So I think that Brett could pick on that and look at that and point out things where you celebrate a man like Charles Manson. Who got people to murder innocent people from no reason other than to murder them. You have people like Oji Simpson that you're fascinated with for the reason that he allegedly killed his wife. And you make him a hero, you put him on a pedestal. And then you have a guy like Stone Cold Steve Austin, he's putting Steve Austin in that same category. And the audience is like, no, man, you know, that's no Steve is there. Steve's guy stands up for himself. Steve's guy that, you know, is a badass. And by the way, didn't quit Brett, you know, that kind of shit. And there were, there were just nuggets of truth all throughout Brett's promo that made people think about it and get angry about it.

14:35Because they said, well, yeah, I tuned in to see what's happening with the OJ tribe. Yeah, I tuned in to see what's happening with things that are atrocious going on in our country. And that was that intriguing time where the negative was the celebrity of it all. And we were making celebrity of just really horrible people in our culture and in our time. All right, folks, it's time for spring break and spring cleaning for a lot of us. That means cleaning out the garage, cleaning out the attic, cleaning out the junk drawer in the kitchen. But maybe my favorite is cleaning out the bathroom. I'm excited that I was able to throw out all of my old deodorant. I've been rocking Mando whole body deodorant for a while and I'm never switching back. Mando whole body deodorant is an absolute game changer from the founders of loomie. Your wife probably tried that. Mando whole body deodorant is helping men conquer their odor in a new way.

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17:41You know, like they say you need to love it to leave it, but it's clear that they're setting up some sort of a new match. And this is on the heels of the WrestleMania that a lot of people thought would have been a rematch from WrestleMania 12. Of course, we know it doesn't happen. But man, they're really going back and forth here, you know, Bret talking about Sean posing in girly magazines and then eventually said comes out. Bret's going to ease out of there, take a powder, but in the process, he's going to flip sit off. So we're getting a little edgy even right before WrestleMania. We saw this edgy or side of Bret Hart where he pushed down Vince McMahon and said frustrated isn't the goddamn word for it. You never heard that type of stuff on raw before. So we're getting a little edgy here. Or it seems like we're jumping right back in to Sean versus Brett. And I'm curious from your perspective, how frustrating was that that you wanted that match the night before, but it seems like we're going to try to set it up right after for maybe a less than WrestleMania pay for you.

18:45Well, I think that all any time that you have an idea and you have a plan that's laid out you have in your head already played out in your head. You know how you want every beat to happen where and when and something happens along the way for whatever reason that you can't do it. That's always frustrating. That's always frustrating to have to change up and go back to the drawing board when you're looking at here, here's what never happened. Here's what just couldn't happen for whatever reason doesn't matter the reason. It's a frustration. Yes, it definitely is because you're feeling like, you know, dammit, man, this you'll never know. Right. It's just never know. It's a fun time because we're seeing Brett all over the place. He's clearly got issues with Sid. He's got issues with Sean. It's got issues with Austin. And later in this same episode, we're going to see him attack Rocky, my via after a match with leaf Cassidy.

19:52First we know leaf Cassidy's house snow and what? Yeah, what what he ever do. Leave Cassidy use one of the rockers. The idea though is I guess we firmly cement that Brett is a bad guy when he has issues with Sean. And he has issues with with Austin. But when he's facing a guy like Rocky, my via who really has not connected with the audience. We're trying maybe to. Okay, clearly you need to cheer the rock here or cheer Rocky because look, he's against this bad guy. So that match almost feels like it's just as much to cement. Hey, please like Rocky as it is. Please hate Brett, right? Nah, I think it was more please hate Brett. And by this point, yeah, the Rocky, my via experiment was still taking place. And I, you know, Brett, from Brett's point of view, Brett wanted to work with rock.

20:56And Brett wanted to work with him and thought that he could get him to be that baby face on the other side. And fortunately, that never came to fruition. Somehow, some way the title is not really in the discussion for all that Brett and Sean and Austin and Sid are doing. Now we're headed towards Undertaker, Paul bear and mankind. That's going to really be what the main event program is all about for the world title. And Paul bearer is attempting to make up with the undertaker now that he's the champion. And mankind is begging Uncle Paul not to. And a week later, mankind even throws fire in the undertaker's face when he's going to attack Paul. Listen, clearly these guys just had magic together in 1996, but from your perspective, why was mankind the right perfect opponent or first opponent right now champion undertaker? Well, it was something new. And, you know, here, here you had a new champion, but you also had a brand new.

22:01I'm not saying monster, but, but yeah, you had a new monster and mankind. This was a brand new character and this was someone that, you know, was coming in and you bring them in on top and their top got right that was the idea with Mick. By bringing mankind in at the time, it was made sense. You know, you have a new champion and now you have a brand new challenger that before he even, you know, does one thing, you believe that he is a formidable challenger to the undertaker. We had multiple victories overtaker the prior year, so that makes sense. It does, but at the same time, it's like you're, you're looking at it and it's still new. It's fresh because you have a championship involved. So it's, you know, Mick's, you know, he was still, he was still in his honeymoon.

23:01My opinion, you still, he was still in his honeymoon. Well said. One thing I want to ask though is as they're getting paired together here undertaker and mankind. Did you already have the cane story in mind? No, 97. No. Okay. It was here where the beginning of of cane started to take root because we were looking at opponents for the undertaker as a champion. Right. You know, by the time we got there, things changed and everything, but you're still, you're looking at. Okay. You've switched bread undertakers your guy right now. Who's going to be that next opponent? We're really looking for a one off with. Okay. But you were looking for opponents. Again, new and different for the undertaker. So this is kind of where, you know, I started well, what if.

24:01Well, we saw plenty. And I mean plenty of mankind undertaker and boy, they were fantastic matches. The prior year, the boiler room brawl. Of course, where we saw the turn. And then, of course, the very alive match. I mean, the stakes just continually raised. Now the title is going to be on the line. But I don't think that was maybe the original plan because there was some preliminary promotional material out that showed Vader versus undertaker. The story at the time of the newsletters was that maybe Vader's knee wasn't doing all that great. They weren't sure that he would be reliable in that spot. And I find that interesting because you go back just the night before at WrestleMania. Undertaker and Vader are a tag team seemingly because. But we didn't have anything else for him to do. So we'll just make him a tag team here was Vader ever considered. And do you think this could have been. Maybe the second chance he never got. I mean, we know what was supposed to happen after Summerslam 96. In theory, there would have been a trilogy. We would have gotten another match at Survivor Series. And then blown it off at Royal Rumble with Sean.

25:01And when that doesn't happen. And now he doesn't get the nod here. It feels like it's kind of all downhill from Vader after. Well, also go back and look at Vader. This was also during the time that Vader had put on an awful lot of weight. And you know, people romanticize about Vader. When he was in Japan and we just go in and beat people up. I don't think anybody ever accused Vader being a great worker. It was a bully that liked to beat people up. And they let him get away with it. But you know, you go back and look at his Japan stuff. That's what he, you know, that's what he did. By the time he got to WWE, he was a shell of that of that guy, that character. A lot of them from the time that the incident with Paul Orndorf happened in WCW. Vader left. In Orndorf, you know, allegedly kicked his ass in flip-flops.

26:02Vader was not the Leon, the Leon white, the confidence of Leon white, all of that. That hit, that ship had sailed. In many ways, you know, I think we got damaged goods in that regard. Because you know, you didn't get the guy that you had seen for years. No, you got a guy that got his ass booked in the shower by, you know, somebody in flip-flops. It's no shame to get your ass booked by Paul Orndorf. No. Okay. But I think when you're supposed to be the tough guy in the bully, I think there was shame in that for him. And, you know, people romance, oh Vader, this, Vader, that didn't come as Vader when he came in. He was, he was a shell of that guy. And never could get his groove back. But by this time he had put weight on. His knees were bothering him. He was breaking down. And all of a sudden, he realized that, oh shit, you know, it's a little different thing when you've got guys as big as you.

27:07And they're hitting back. Um, it's really easy when you just go in and bombard people and they're not hitting you back. I'll send you get in there and you think Undertaker's going to take that? No. He was younger, stronger, faster and like, not going to sit here and just get pounded on. So it was different. And he didn't have this, this facade that had followed him around his career. Well, I'm a huge Vader fan, so I got to ask for clarification here. In your opinion, are you saying that your opinion on Vader or the office's opinion, the perception of Vader had changed on the heels of the orn door thing? I'm saying Vader change. I'm saying the human being changed. The human being changed. You know, it was, he wasn't, he didn't have the same swagger. He didn't, you know, he, there was the, there was the fairy tale that he's this big bad tough guy that, you know, couldn't be beat or beat up.

28:16And he did, he got beat up. So that changes the perception of people. Now people are looking at him going, yeah, that's the tough after all, is he? Well, that's, that's what I'm trying to drill down on because you're saying he changed, but you didn't know him before, did you? Or you just knew what you saw on tape, you know what you, you know what you, you had seen and you knew what other people, other people that did know him. Right. Yeah, you knew what you saw. And then you saw what you got. Right. Something changed. And the only thing that I know that changed was that. He got, I know he put on weight. Right. I know he was sloppy. I know he had bad hygiene. Yeah, Leo, we just. I know. No, you asked. You asked. So what changed? What changed was he didn't have the same swagger. He didn't have the same confidence. He put on a lot of weight so he couldn't be as athletic as he had been before.

29:22He couldn't do that shit anymore. One of them don't do that, Leon. No, he couldn't. And don't get me wrong because I really fucking likely on white. I likely on a lot. But it was that persona. Man, it's like you see something you watch it. In another environment. Oh my god, that would be so cool to have here. You bring it to this new environment where you think it'll fit in. It just doesn't fit. And Leon didn't fit. Was it the same guy? It's trying to be bad. Mark Merrill. It's not trying to be bad. It's trying to be bad. It was attractive. It's shit. Johnny be bad. Had charisma and personality and all this other stuff. You take Johnny be bad. Same human being. With that same charisma, you thought. And you brought him over here. You gave him, you know, unfortunately is real name and, you know,

30:23wild man gimmick that he thought that's that's how he saw himself. And we gave a shit. Because he didn't have the Johnny be bad persona behind anymore. It was easy to become Johnny be bad. It wasn't easy to be Mark Merrill on TV. And even the phrasing there, it's easy to hide behind Mark Merrill. Do you think? Oh, dude, dude. I hit behind brother love. Are you kidding me? Okay. Easy to go out and be brother love. Right. And I have to be Bruce. And I hit behind. Yes. You, when you have a gimmick like that, man. He's gonna hide behind that gimmick. And, but I became the gimmick. Mark, you know, it's Johnny be bad. Oh my god, entertaining this hell. Great. I don't know.

31:23Work was that great, but the charisma, the character, the way that he portrayed it, was great. It allowed him to step in, allowed him to step into a character. And that's what I mean. I was allowed to step into brother love and hide behind brother love. I could do things as brother love. I couldn't do his Bruce. Right. I had a confidence in brother love that I didn't have the same confidence in Bruce. I do. It's just different. Right. No, I get it because, you know, when you're putting your real self out there, you start the second guest thing. It's vulnerable. Yes. Yes, because you're not, I mean, you know, that's just human nature, right? Yeah. Yeah. But the gimmick is the gimmick. You can hide behind the gimmick. That's a, that's a good thing for a lot of performers. Do you think he felt more like Leon here in the WWE and less like waiter? I believe that Leon felt exposed. I think Leon felt exposed.

32:24Once the on door thing happened. Right. Like, uh oh. Maybe I'm not as tough as I wanted everybody to think. Now they know. Right. All my peers watched it happen. Those are the guys that I was trying to fool. Right. The audience never saw that. They sure, sure witnessed a change after the fact. They knew something was different. Something was wrong. He wasn't the same. They couldn't put their finger on it. They didn't know what had happened. It's like Rick Flare. Rick lost his confidence in the ECW. Rick wasn't the same person. Took a long time for Rick. Got that swagger back. But he did. All right, fellas. You already know what time it is. It's time to level up. Bluetooth just dropped something crazy. I'm talking next level championship belt. Gold played an energy. Bluetooth Gold is the newest innovation from the number once you will ED brand.

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34:28costs, damage to your car, do you why finds? Not to mention the damage to your social life. Plan a sober ride or pay the price. Drinking and driving costs more than your drinks. It could cost a life. Learn more at What'sTheDamage.org. Brought to you by Virginia DMV. I'm in Johnson and Farouk are now in an angle where Ahmed is going to challenge a new member of the nation of domination to a match. And if he wins, they have to disband. But Farouk is unable to get cleared so the match is scrapped. This is still fallout from the awesome story they've been telling that goes back. And all before the nation was even here. Farouk and Ahmed Johnson are just mortal enemies here. Where there are plans this early in 97 to break up the nation as we would see later on with the split that's going to come in the year. Or were you just taking it week by week and see how it went? No, actually early on, the idea for the nation was to give

35:31Ron Simmons a platform for Ron to break out and hopefully be in the face down the road. When, you know, obviously that didn't happen, it became okay, when Rock joined and Rock grabbed that microphone, then that became the platform for Rock to break out and be that leader and kind of kick Farouk to the curb. And, you know, I don't know that the plan was then as big for Ron to be that big baby face. I think it worked out. Yeah. Rocky Mavia, he did all right too, I guess, in hindsight. Yeah. I think so. He found his way. So the next day we're going to tape an episode of Monday Night Raw or Raw as well as it was. And there's going to be a fantastic wrestling match going on here with the Bulldog and Owen Hart over the European title. Now, remember, they're the tag champs, but they've not been clicking. And all of a sudden, Brett's going to interrupt this very good match.

36:33And we're going to have a conversation about how we shouldn't be fighting each other. We should be sticking together. This is how we reform the heart foundation angle. Was the Brett like that idea? How was Owen with that? How was Bulldog with that? Just this heart foundation tag team from way back when. It's in the ankle, nine heart and Brett Hart. It was an iconic classic WWE F tag team. But sometimes guys are ready to move on. And now it seems like we're going back to an old idea. But with a new twist. Now it's a heel faction, not just the tag team. How receptive was everyone to that idea? Very. It was family. So here was an opportunity of everybody. Brett wanted to work with Owen. He wanted to side by side with Owen. This was his opportunity. And this was family. And this was real. So you could feel it. People could go look and go, ah, yeah, you know, it is.

37:34It's family. He's married to Diana. Jim and Ellie. Everybody was family. It worked. So he had brothers and brother and laws all together and fighting together. Family fight. But by God, when one one member of the family is down, usually the other family members come to their aid. And this is a perfect example of that. A really great job again by Brett. You know, I think when you take a look at Brett's entire career, some of his best Mike work. It feels like 1997 was just his year. So the prior week when he's explaining, you know, how. I don't know. He's just not a fan of Americans. Now he's coming out this week and he's passing things up with a guy who's been his enemy for a long time, his own brother, Owen. And as he runs down their past, you can see Owen wiping away tears. Really a great segment. He's blaming the Americans for tearing their family apart. And really, we're the only two good wrestlers in our family, which was a nice little.

38:36Fab for everybody sitting at home. Just fantastic stuff here. It feels as if Brett. Has really embraced this because I understand from time to time. Maybe there's creative that Alan aren't totally on board with. It feels like Brett has fully invested in this because I think we're getting Brett at his best on the my sugary. You work because he was legitimately reuniting with his family. And be able to have them all together. And you know, look at the atmosphere. You know, shot in his buddies and all that. And. Now, you know, he had his family around him. Yeah. From the camera behind the camera and everything in between. So it was real to Brett. And all the best angles and all the best stories when they have that reality within. You know, there's that there's a string of reality that spread through everything they do.

39:36And that's the best kind. It's a fascinating time in the company because we're trying a lot of new attitude era stuff. We have the raw is more approach. We've got an edge of your Shawn Michaels. We got Brett cursing on TV throwing around the middle finger. Of course, we know what's happening with Stone Cold Steve Austin and Austin 316 or just the evolution of that character. But it feels like a step way forward. And then the hockey talkman comes out. I just got a little champion all the time. That's exactly right. And he's here to find the next great intercontinental champion. And he's going to begin his search with Jesse James. Oki hands him his family heirloom guitar. Obviously, and James responds with smashing it on the map. We're months away from the outlaws. We're going to still. Unfortunately, thinker and try a little bit. We've seen a rockabilly. Now we're trying this with the road dog Jesse James. This is.

40:38Listen, we're filling segments. We're going to check in boxes. But just seeing hockey top man on TV in this era, although he had white hot. He and a great character. It felt like. Something from a generation before compared to the new direction. Is that fair to say? Sure. Absolutely. Hey, is there a way we can put silver on camera on this thing? Yeah, so can you do the hockey top man dance real quick for me? Okay. Get off camera. Please get off camera. That was incorrect and get off camera. I'm sorry. I did that. Folks. I apologize. I should not have done that. That was. Conrad right now is writing apology letters to all of our listeners and all the folks that unfortunately had to see that. Do not whatever you do. Do not go look at that at something the rest of dot com. That's our YouTube channel. Oh my god. All the things you want to see today. You don't want to see Dave silver dancing.

41:38That's not wrong. He did it the wrong way. The thumbs have to go the different ways. You couldn't see his thumbs. Yes. And it's not all he did is go. Well, he's got those little T-Rex arms. That's not his fault. But I watched. What's the thing that he did in your. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I see him do that. He simulates motion there. He's not actually dancing. He's just simulating motion. He stands there and just like moves. It moves his arms. His arms and the whole rest of the body. Generals and moves. When you ask silver today. It's only his arms. But. Okay. That's the thing. So there's a lot of kids Shamrock footage. It's going to start airing on Monday Night Raw with footage from the UFC. And this is kind of cool. This is long before our 2023 news. And you're able to show UFC footage. But I guess at this era. And they're still a ship with no sale. They're losing cash left and right. But it does add. Some legitimacy to the character that kids Shamrock is going to be bringing in with him.

42:39Was the UFC easy to deal with, especially recall here back in 1997. The original owners. God, I can't remember his name. I was. Yes. Was. Was a friend. So, you know. He was. He was. He was fine. I came running on a contract. I can. Wanted to do this. Marwitz light. Ken. And Ken had done an awful lot in UFC. And they recognize that. They. You know, knew us. They were cool. And. We were able to work together. And we had our moments. Sometimes that. I would. I would get calls from Mr. Marwitz. I would. I would. He was. I would. Using that. Urnaffa lot. And. I'd go. What are you talking about? So you know, most of the time. But it would be things that.

43:39Yeah. I had. A relationship with a leg, a talk car off. And. I would always talk to Don. Fry. Those guys were still involved in the UFC, trying to steal him. I'm not trying to steal him now. I'm just saying when they're done, we've got a place to come to. Right. And that was it. Well, somebody who was excited to be on TV in this area is Mr. Pat Patterson. That's right. That's right. Goldust is wrestling Hunter Hurst Helmsley. And Pat Patterson, who's 57 here, is going to have a comeback fury when Triple H throws him down. And Meltzer would say, it was actually better than what Flair was doing at the same time on the other channel. China ends up attacking Patterson from behind and the two just stomped the hell out of him until Goldust makes the save. I'm sure the old vet that he was, Pat loved every minute of being involved in the physicality on the show. Absolutely.

44:43Improved and showed that, you know, as long as you work, you can, you're a great worker, you can always work. Tyler Reddick here from 2311 Racing, another checkered flag for the books. Time to celebrate with Jamba. Jump in at JambaCasino.com. Let's Jamba. No purchase necessary, BTW Group, Voidware Prohibited by Law, CCNC, 21 Plus, sponsored by Jamba Casino. Speaking of great workers, we're going to have a conversation now about you talking to a couple of great workers. This is directly from the observer. Based on several different versions of the same story, Vince McMahon and Bruce Pritchard had a meeting on the Tuesday before Mania with Kurt and Larry Henning. According to the version of the Hennings that we're telling on Nitro the next week or at Nitro the next week, McMahon and Pritchard were one hour late so they were just about ready to walk out when they came in. The sides were talking about a return to the WWF and the Hennings pulled out the letter, Pritchard wrote to Lloyds of London,

45:44which resulted in London not paying Henning his reported $350,000 lump sum disability deal. It was basically a deal where Henning was talking to the WWF about returning at the same time the WWF needed to get the legal situation straight down with Lloyds as to what their situation was and it wound up as the blow up, which ended with Henning walking out and agreeing to go to WCW. The meeting really didn't go positively for the WWF after although the idea at that point was made clear that two sides weren't going to be doing any business that was talking all week, potentially, Henning coming back. Henning claimed at Nitro that Pritchard backpedaled from the point they pulled out the letter with his signature and claimed he knew nothing about it. WCW was afraid it's late as Mania that he was going to stick with the WWF and of course WCW put Larry Henning on TV specifically to show Titan that they had hurt.

46:45So listen, there's a lot that's been discussed over the years. We've talked a little bit about the Mr. Perfect Hoki Hoki here at the end of 96 and once to leave and blah blah blah. What I had never heard was you were somehow in the middle of all this Lloyds of London stuff. You tell us about this? Yeah, it was in order to get Kurt cleared and you had to have a release from Lloyds of London. So Kurt was like, no, I got the release. Kurt never produced the release to ask Lloyds of London, which is exactly what we did. But when we asked Lloyds of London that opened up that, you know, wait a minute, we paid you all this money and now you're going to go back to do what you say you couldn't do, which is why we paid you the money. That's all it was. Right. And they were like, you, you killed our Lloyds of London deal. Kurt, you told me to ask them ourselves. And the best part about it was, is it's true.

47:46I really didn't know that they had sent a letter. I believe it was Linda's office and it's said, this was the interim time that I was the calculations had. Okay. So JJ Sprite literally, yes, I literally just stepped in and we'll sign this, sign this and I did. And but I knew about it. I knew about contacting Lloyds of London for the permission to say that yes, he is cleared and that he can do this because we had noticed from Lloyds of London that he could not. So that's all that was. And I think that Kurt was looking at it like all of a sudden, he was going to have to pay that money back because Lloyds of London was was now aware. You know, they weren't always aware of what was going on. You could collect and they go, okay, we pay them off and not know that the guy was back, you know, wrestling or play football or whatever else they may be an insured for. You know, the one guy, which I've always said,

48:49which always fascinated me, the one guy that probably legitimately could have been acclaimed with Lloyds of London and never cashed in was flair. Right. And just always fascinated me, but no, that's what that was all about. So help me understand, you know, we've heard a lot about Lloyds of London as wrestling fans all these years. Are you suggesting that guys would go back and wrestle on TV and the company wouldn't notice or say anything and they were just trying to ask forgiveness rather than permission? Well, it did. Okay. That's, I'm not suggesting. I'm saying that some guys did. Like, you've told us the fun little work around that animal somehow convinced them of. Well, if you're wrestling in a tag match, that's different. I can't wrestle a singles match. I'm too hurt. But if I do, if I do work a singles match, I still have a tag team partner. So that's okay.

49:53My goodness. You know, uh, hurt cashed in three times, I believe two or three times, at least twice. For definitely sure. I think maybe in three times. So I understand it. That 350 is not we're going to get it every year in perpetuity. You get it one time. I believe is the one time pay off. I'm not, I'm not going to say you for sure. I don't know. That feels really shortsighted. I mean, you could learn that in a year of wrestling like in the Strasius. All right, man. A lot of us right now, we've got longer days starting to get darker later, which I'm all for, but it does feel like it's a longer day. So I wind up coming home later. And that means for a lot of us, pay us dinner time and we did not properly plan. Well, factor makes healthy eating easy with fully prepared meals designed by dieticians and crafted by chefs. So you can eat well without the planning or the cooking. Here's what you're going to love about factor quality, functional ingredients like lean proteins and colorful veggies and whole

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51:56subscription is active. That's factor meals dot com slash wrestle 50 off. Well, we know he winds up leaving. The other thing I want to ask about was that your experience that Kurt always handled his business with his dad because we've heard that a few times that Larry Kurt would come together. No, it was one time. Okay, my knowledge anyway. Okay, you might have. And you know, and the sad thing is because you had a great relationship with Kurt. And you know, even after this had a good relationship with Kurt. It just, you know, it was sad that, you know, that it got nasty, you know, for a little while. And when I say got nasty that they had ill feelings on Larry man, you know, always got along with Larry. I thought he was a great guy too. And this was just a complete, you know, business disagreement where. Okay, I want to come back. I have to have the clearance from Lloyd.

53:02Asked for the clearance from Lloyd. Why would you ask for the clearance from Lloyd? Well, they should tell me that you couldn't get it that we needed that for it. And, you know, next. But this was the only time, this was the only time in my history that I ever dealt with Larry. Let's talk about Dr. Death Steve Williams. He's going to get arrested in Japan that he has marijuana, which is a big no-no over there. And it's reported that because of this arrest, you guys were pulling back a contract offer you had to bring him in. We know he does come in, but it takes a year later. He comes in in early 98. Was he supposed to come in in 97? We were definitely talking to Steve during this time. I don't know that there was ever an offer made that was pulled back, but I do know that we were talking to Steve during that time. And before anything did get official, this incident happened in Japan. So next. Let's talk about

54:08that. We know the the attitude for marijuana has changed as a whole from then to now. In the world? Yes, all over. But back in 1997 and maybe even now, I believe now marijuana is a little big deal over there, but it's not here at least domestically in America. And I'm curious from your perspective, what's it a big deal from the WWF? Or was it more of, hey, he's got a legal issue and that's bad press for us. He had a legal issue and it was potentially an international narcotics issue. Right. Not good. So yeah, not good. They'll will. I mean, that issue could have prevented him from going other word international. I see. I see. Yeah. So it's a function of if we bring him in, we might be handicapped because we couldn't do tours here or there because he had an international drug start. Honestly. Right. I'm just about, you know, like, especially Canada. Right. Wouldn't happen. Somehow, some way, Dale Wilkes is rumored to come in around this same time as well.

55:11Did you know at this point, you had this anti-American thing? I mean, I know that the bread had cut that one promo on raw, but this feels like almost immediate. Like once he says anything anti-American, oh, let's get the hatred in here. You had met him down in global, I believe. Tell us about how all that came together. Um, so I'd worked with Ellen in global and I'd always wanted to bring him in because once global had gone away, he wasn't, you know, shit, he left. He left right after I beat him in global. Um, no, he left in global. God, right after I got there, but we had been out a few times, talked a few times. I always enjoyed his work. Actually, I enjoyed his work when he was a state trooper, pervert. This guy was over in Japan. It was the same thing. The American audience hadn't really ever seen him. And with the exception of the global wrestling federation, I don't know

56:12that he had ever had any national exposure at all. Um, hell of a worker, I thought, good guy, and wanted to bring him in and we did. We had been talking to him and, and brought him up and then the whole Americana, uh, sentiment with Brett and that was just, it was easy. It was there. It was Taylor May. I think we're about a year away from Jim Cornett saying, I've had enough. It makes the observer here in 1997 that he's going to be managing again soon. He was replaced by Raymond Urgeo on the shotgun challenge tapes because he had a real bad flu and had no voice. So they even did an angle where he's offering a contract to the black jacks, but they rip it up. And even though Jim is maybe the most prolific promo in wrestling history, he's having to just sort of act it out rather than be vocal because he has no voice. The Meltzer would speculate what I expect to happen

57:13is Cornett will wind up managing a heel furnace and the fun. He will then feud with the black jacks and that makes doesn't sound like it's going to get either team over. Furnace and the fun at first we're going to be managed by Bob Backland, but Cornett is a lot better fit. Furnace and the fun and the black jacks are two of my great what-ifs from this era. What is what? Well, I love Bradshaw and Windham and I love the look and two big bad asses. It just felt like, man, this could be fun and I've seen some tremendous furnace and the fun matches. Unfortunately, not a lot of those in the WWF. For both of those just doomed from the start, they just weren't a good fit for this presentation. Furnace and LaFon are not. They just didn't. I don't know that they I think going to Japan and I'll say because I had never seen LaFon before he was in Japan, but I had seen Doug Furnace in Alabama. I knew Furnace could sell. I knew Furnace was a hell of a

58:18fucking world. Oh my god. Great worker. I think Japan kind of ruined him. He lost the art of selling and storytelling. I see. He just did spots and strong man stuff and didn't know how to sell it all. When that's not the fact, the fact is that one of the things that I always thought that Doug Furnace was so good at was the fact that he could sell believably and was one of those talent that you know you look at. Oh my god. There's a jacked up Ricky Morton motherfucker. Doug didn't have a whole lot of personality admittedly so, but I think that he made up with it for it in the ring. I was always a big fan of Doug Furnace. I just think that the tag team with LaFon in Japan, everybody went gag hour because they did all these spots, but it's not what we did. And

59:26unfortunately, I was showing tapes of Doug Furnace in Alabama where he sold and and was this working machine and he came up here and he was fresh out of Japan doing the Japan stuff. Well, listen, I understand that sometimes you go with what you think has brought you to the dance. And so maybe he thought, hey, Japan has more stature. I'll do what I did over there. Maybe that's why they wanted me. But the thing that always stood out to me about Furnace and LaFon is we have all these larger than life characters. We've got the legion of doom. We've got the undertaker. We've got mankind. We've got the headbangers. We got the blackjack. So and then it's like Furnace and LaFon. Okay, they're not the headbangers and they're not the the dead zombie and they're not the whatever gold at the androgynous. Now they're the wrestlers. And it felt as if because they're the wrestlers, maybe it was doomed from the start. Do you think

1:00:32his gimmick is he's just a good wrestler? Ever really works in the WWE? No, it doesn't, but I thought that if you could get him in the ring and you could he could show again Doug got away of working and I thought he drew the audience in. And I think that you know Doug could have gotten to that point. And LaFon, good looking guy man, swav freshman. It just was and they were so opposite. But yet I don't know, I thought it could work and obviously it didn't because they never connected with the audience. If you could have put Furnace, I know you said LaFon is a horse of a different color, but you obviously hold Doug Furnace in high regard. If you could have put him in another gimmick, was there another spot that you think could have worked that he could have embraced and maybe we could have got there or was it a matter of timing? He was a matter of timing.

1:01:36I really do. I think it was just a matter of timing. That's all it was. All right, lately I've realized that when my energy dips or I feel all is usually hydration related, not sleep, not coffee, but hydration. And drip drop has become my go to fix. drip drop is doctor develop proven fast hydration that helps your body and mind work better. Whether drip drop is doctor develop proven fast hydration that helps your body and mind work better, which is exactly what 2026 you needs. Think about this. Support for busy days or long workouts and everything in between drip drops got you covered. drip drop uses science based formulas for rapid hydration, so you feel fast results while you're getting three times the electrolytes of the leading sports drinks. drip drop is trusted by firefighters, medical professionals and over 90% of top college and pro sports teams, because it's engineered to hydrate you faster and more

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1:03:39use the promo code wrestle. That's drip drop.com and the promo code wrestle gets you 20% off. Stock up now at drip drop.com and use the promo code wrestle. Let's talk about your boy, Gerald Briscoe. We talked about how Pat Patterson was getting physically involved with triple H. Well, mankind is going to put the mandible claw on Gerald Briscoe. This is the year before we're going to know them as quote unquote stewges. They're probably both having a fun time as WRB officials getting involved in physical angle. No, no. Well, Gerald didn't like having anything in his mouth. All right, Sid is going to miss a raw taping due to a back injury and he's actually pulled from his scheduled match with Brett at the paper view. So that's what I wanted to talk about because the guy drops the title at WrestleMania and then all of a sudden can't work and this in the newsletter

1:04:40leads to a lot of speculation. Much like it did with Sean in an injury, but you guys always sort of holding your breath with Sid because it felt like of all the words you could use to describe him reliable would probably not be one of them. Yeah, unfortunately, because you look at Sid and if you were going to a little Jim Hurd thing, yeah, look at this guy, look at this guy. Sid had the tool. Sid had, he had the look. He's standing there. He looks like a great god and cut a hell of a promo and by God, he could talk people into the building. Sid knew how to do that and Sid looked apart. He could do nothing in the rain. People believed in it. But, you know, Sid could oftentimes be his own worst enemy and thinking that he knew better and that he understood a lot better and wanted to do things his way and if he didn't get things done

1:05:41his way, a lot of times he would go on and do something else. So that was just Sid's MO and got the reputation for softball season that all of a sudden he would have injuries that would pop up and he wouldn't hear from him. So, yeah, he wasn't all that reliable all the time. That's what I would say. The story on Sid that he supposedly has a herniated disk in his back caused by straining his back working out at the gym. The reason it was handled so clumsily on the April 7th Raw is they literally didn't know about it as the show was going and they didn't know if he was going to be there or not. Apparently, he left the message at the office over the weekend but nobody was there and since Raw was taped on the Sunday night, nobody knew and he didn't think to call the building to let anyone know he was hurt. He finally talked to Vince. I'll call anyone's home numbers that he had. Yeah, so you guys are just frustrated. This is just Sid being said. Apparently, yes. Billy Gunn is the next person to turn down the hockey top man on the programming.

1:06:45There's rumor and speculation that this was supposed to be disco and ferno. He had been recently released by WCW because he didn't want to lose the jackal and their Miss Jackie issue was. And Vince Russo has said that you talked to disco and you asked some questions to disco. You didn't like disco's answers and you shelved the idea. There's even an article that comes out in the magazine that basically says disco and fernos coming in. It doesn't happen. Do you remember having a conversation with Glenn Gilbert about coming in and it just didn't work? I don't remember not to say that I didn't but I don't remember that now. That could have been interesting. The disco and ferno appear for the attitude era. I mean, obviously we called it that but yeah, I mean, you know, think about it is as I like disco's gimmick. I thought he was entertaining himself. Yeah. It didn't work. He did. You know, he went out there to

1:07:47me. He was always entertaining. Always seemed to be bust in his ass. Like him or don't like him, you can't deny that he's entertaining. Right. And again, I've talked to him years since and all stuff and I had no bad feelings at all the disco. I always thought that this, you know, again, this guy's going out and doing disco and embracing it and by God, you know, he would go out there and he would get somebody over like nobody's business. So, chances are I may have talked to him. I just can't recall that conversation. It may not just have been, you know, that I remember K-Dub's conversation. I don't remember Glenn's conversation and I probably did

1:08:48have no idea. So, Sean comes out and does what's basically a shoot interview. Cause Brett is not here. He's on the South African tour. That's what would recap it and say that Sean said that he and Brett load each other in wrestling and in real life. He said Brett didn't just turn bad guy. He's always been a bad guy. The guy he used his parents his sister and his kids to get on TV so he could make money. He said if Brett could make a buck, he'd sell his mother. Six years ago when he got the Intercontinental title and Brett was the WWF champ, he was happy playing second fiddle to Brett but when it was Brett's turn to play second fiddle, he kicked and scratched every inch of the way. He said Brett took time off because he thought the WWF and Sean Michaels would collapse while he was gone but instead they had the best business that had it six years and the Asmic Man if this was true and McMahon agreed.

1:09:50Cause McMahon is in the ring when all this is happening. This is interesting because first of all that's as far as I understand it, not true. Gates and houses with Sean were not better than they'd been in six years but that's splitting hairs. We're telling stories here but this almost feels like it's not exactly but this might be the first seed of Mr. McMahon here. Is it not? I mean, it's not Vince but right. So Mr. McMahon was. But the idea that hey, he's kind of the boss. We haven't really acknowledged that. We saw a little bit of that right before WrestleMania. You know, I don't know the acknowledgement of the boss. We still think Vince acting is like my play right now here. You know what I mean? What do you think of this promo? For that's not just turned bad guy. He's always been a bad guy. What do you think of that? That was great promo. I did too. Yeah. I mean, it's again,

1:10:52when you can throw in sprinkle some truth into that, make people question it. It's got point there. That's kind. So as you'll recall, SIDS out. So Austin is inserted into SIDS spot for a match against mankind on raw and he tells gorilla monsoon he'll only do it. He gets a match with Fred Hart at the pay-per-view in monsoon degrees. Now we're doing that because it was supposed to be Brett versus SIDS at the point. I like points up now. Yes, please do. How long goes this? 1997. I bet you Steve Austin still got that same shirt. I saw it last week. I must want a treasure. I believe it. I made that up. But yeah, I mean, probably did though. Yeah. He's a saver, huh? Steve's been very smart with his money. I meant close. Not me, but he's very, I mean, what I mean by that, you know, Steve's got a beautiful place, man, and all this, but he always

1:11:56saved his money. He didn't do extravagant over the top things. So, you know, Steve, Steve wore his same t-shirt till it, uh, till it wears out. Now, the difference is Steve will wash it and keep it clean. Um, but yeah. The difference between him and who? You had somebody in mind when you said that. A lot of people. Okay. Come on, give us one name. I'm sure there are a lot of names. Oh, you got somebody you don't want to say right now. No. Okay. Well, listen, I guess what I wanted to talk about here is it feels as if when we think about Austin, like a lot of people think, man, once he had that match with Brett, he was off to the races, and he was, but that doesn't feel as if it was the original plan. It's supposed to be sitting, Brett, sits out, man, and we talk about this a lot of JR show that in real sports, in traditional sports,

1:12:57when an injury happens, it creates opportunity for the guy who gets to feel that spot. It closes another opens. It worked out wonderfully for stone cold here. My goodness. Um, let's talk about what else is happening here in April. ECW is having their very first pay-per-view barely legal from the ECW arena. Well, that'll be the pay-per-view you would have watched live or on tape. No. Neither one. Correct. Okay. Even when you're, you guys have a relationship and you're sending talent and all that, just no interest. I, I don't remember. So I really, I don't. If we had somebody on it, Howard would probably bring me a tape. Tell me about it. I watched your first pay-per-view they ever had. That's what I'm talking about. This is it. Yeah, this is it. This is the one with Lawler? No, no, that was the second one. Lawler, Tommy Dreamer,

1:14:00was hard for heaven. Lawler, yeah, but Lawler came out at the end of this one. This, now this is where funk won the title at the very end of this one. Hasn't Saboo were involved in this one? That's right. All right, is this one where I told Paul he exposed his business? What I think of whatever the very first one they ever had I did watch. This is it. And I told Paul, he called me afterwards and I said, well Paul, thank you, exposed your business tonight. He said, well, that's a good thing. I said, not in this case. Because up until this point, the ECW show was compilation show. Oh, I see what you're saying. And you never saw, you never saw matches. Right. You saw highlights. Right. And he said, well, that's a good thing. I said, no, this is a bad thing. I said, Jesus, because some of these say, look, I'd defy anybody to go back and watch it with an optimistic guy with a with a with reality glasses on. Okay. Not,

1:15:00oh, my God, no, watch it with reality glasses on. And tell me that that was a great show. Because it wasn't. It was terrible. It just it was a lot of guys just were exposed because people had never seen them before. I, you know, a lot of respects. I hadn't seen some of them before. Right. I'd seen the highlights. Highlights is great. And again, that's where I credit Paul Haven's genius. He was able to get the absolute most out of anybody he had. And in this situation, he allowed them to go out and work for 20 minutes when this should have been out there for eight. Hey, man. Can I brag about one of my favorite sponsors? I'm talking about Seoul. And I've absolutely loved their out of office THC gummies for a long, long time. But they've got something new now, mood gummies lately. I've been more mindful about how I want to feel when I'm socializing or winding down or just living life. Instead of defaulting to a drink and hoping for the best,

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1:18:06the moment, there's a soul mood gummy to match. Make today a good day. Get yourself some soul gummies. And right now Seoul is offering our audience 30% off your entire order. Try it. Go right now to get soul.com and use the promo code wrestle. That's g-e-t-s-o-u-l.com. And the promo code wrestle will get you 30% off. Let's run through the card. I appreciate that you pointed out that you know these guys couldn't work with it. So let's run through it. Lewis and Foley wrestled Balls Mahoney. They were both in the WWE. Chronos. Tell me how many matches that actually either one of them ever had more than seven or eight minutes. Saturn was in the WWE. The Dudley boys both in the WWE Rob Van Dam and Lance Storm both in the WWE. The Six Man Tag. Well that became Coy and Tye. They were all in the WWE Shane Douglas was in the WWE Taz and Sabu both in the WWE. But Terry Fawke came in before the Shane wasn't in after this.

1:19:11He wasn't in after now. He was. Terry Fawke, Sandman and Stevie Richards and Blue Manie and No, but they're all WWE. That's Terry Fawke. The point is almost everyone on the whole game. We hit we body CW. The fog. I just love. Hey, these guys. No, I didn't say these guys. I said this fucking goddamn paper. I said that some of them should not have had. He allowed them to go too long where it exposed some of these guys couldn't work. That kind of match. And they couldn't. Balls Mahoney and Louis and I love Louis to death. They couldn't work fucking a 20 minute match. Balls could work a three minute match. Was he entertaining? Sure. But come on, be honest. No, don't sit there and look at me. Oh, it was sure they were. See, Boston fucking did a stint and you see W2. A lot of people did. First you, you don't have to get hot about it. No, you get

1:20:15hot about it as you fucking. Yeah, shit. A lot of them fucking work. But you go back and watch it. You go back and fucking watch it and tell me if it was a good fucking paper view or not. It wasn't. Everyone was like just oh, so happy because ECW was on pay-per-view. It was a celebration of them being on pay-per-view. Yeah, hit pay-per-ray. Yeah, they got on pay-per-view. Somebody a lot of them on. Maybe they'll hang on, but think about it. Think about when Paul got TV and they said, oh, hey, man, we need to have matches on TV now. And how quickly did that last after that? How quickly did the company stay in business after they got full matches on and putting on a card? How long did that last? Not long. Not long at all. No. No, not at all. How long did that last when it couldn't use popular music anymore?

1:21:17I knew you were going to say that because that was... Didn't last long, did it? No. What's the time to use licensed music and you had to have a more television-friendly presentation? It wasn't the same. Yeah. They lost their way, for sure. Let's talk about the war at the time. It's not about WWF and ECW. It's about the WWF and WCW. And the Chicago Sun Times, back when newspapers were saying, did a real story about the Monday night wars and wrestling. Fish Off said, quote, Vince likes to cry about the deep pockets of Ted Turner and Time Warner. We're a publicly held company. I can tell you that they have more production staff, better production facilities, and a bigger marketing budget. The difference is they don't have the talent. We do because that's where we spend our money. And McMahon says, if Eric Bischoff says we spend more money in every area except talent, it's a blatant lie. And Bischoff says, we were

1:22:19profitable in 95 and 96. If Vince McMahon says differently, that's a blatant lie. And McMahon says, they're willing to overpay for performers who were no longer in their athletic prime. There's no way I could match the exorbitant guaranteed figure of a billionaire willing to throw away his money. Do you think it bothered Eric that Vince always said, it's about me versus Ted Turner? He never acknowledged Eric really. And that just pissed Eric off the time. But I don't think that Vince, at that time, I don't believe that Vince saw it as Eric. He saw his Ted. He didn't know Eric that at one time. He didn't know who Eric was. To him, it was Ted Turner. There's no beef with Eric. If you go to mainstream media, are they going to know

1:23:26Ted Turner or Bischoff? Who would you write about? Ted Turner. Goodness gracious. Half the crew here is in South Africa. The other half is in the States. They're doing a raw taping that's going to have matches from both locations. Was this a bit of a pain in the ass or we've got some of our show here, Domestic, some international, or did you like that presentation? hated it. I didn't think he'd like that. Absolutely hated it. Well, I don't think it's just you who hated it. Meltzer would say the sound mixing on the April 14th raw was worse than the darkest days of WCW. It's weird how raw was so state of the art to where commentary done live at the building and later in studio was mixed to where nobody even knew the difference. The difference in sound from the commentary done in South Africa by Jim Ross and Hawke. The sound from the studio where

1:24:28it was re-voice over it was noticeable and came off as clumsy and like an amateur production. And as I understand it, this is one of those shows that Vince is just furious about. Do you recall this? Which part? Just he did that for you? Yes. The idea that it didn't feel polished. It felt thrown together. Because it was. Yeah. I mean, it really was. And you're dealing with any time you're international and you don't have your truck. You don't have your people. You split your assets. And no matter how good your people are, it's you're still splitting your assets and you're still relying on an international team. It doesn't have the same standards and doesn't have a lot of times the same equipment that you have. So it comes off less than when you put them together

1:25:31where the differences are glaring. That's even worse. Is this one of the episodes? This particular episode of Raw where there's some from South Africa, some here in America. It's been said over the years. This is one of the episodes that led to Vince Russo having more power on the writing theme. Was that the way you recall this? No, it was after JJ Dylan left. And then we started sitting on the meetings. Oh, yeah. We had definitely. Yes. Had Vince sit in on meetings. Absolutely. I thought Vince offered good ideas too. It really did. Let's talk about Neville Meyer. He's going to be the highest ranking person in the history of Titan Sports, not named McMahon because he was the co CEO of the company along with Linda McMahon. And he resides in this era. And Meltzer would say we've never really heard much about him after he was hired. He was supposed to be in charge of taking the business to a quote unquote new level,

1:26:33but nothing changed drastically and his leaving doesn't even seem to have caused that much of a stir. They haven't spent a lot of time talking about Mr. Meyer. What do you tell us about Neville Meyer? Neville was South African. I wish I could remember the actor's name. It was an older actor that that he looked like. But so Neville was a guy that we would have meetings with a lot of people in the company. And Neville would sit in on these meetings. And he would just sit there, not say a word. And most times, whenever I go into a meeting, there's someone there I don't know, I walk over and introduce myself. Not everybody did that. And all he said was hello. I said, and you are. He says,

1:27:35Neville. Okay, nice to meet you, Neville. That was it. Not a lot of people introduce themselves to him. He would sit there, never sit a word, never was addressed, never was introduced, nothing. This went on for about three or four weeks. And I asked Vince, but probably the second way, because he said, what? Who is this guy? What's he doing? And Neville was the guy that would go into companies and prepare them for going public. That was his M.O. Neville was coming in to was coming in to observe and to watch, you know, all the aspects of our business, he sat in on every Vince meeting, he sat in Vince's office, you know, whenever he met with anybody. And then he was named CEO of the company.

1:28:36And then, you know, I think we got everything we needed out of Mr. Neville and he moved on. He was never long for this world anyway. There was a part of him kind of in the middle there that he, I think he thought that he was really in charge when, you know, he was there for other reasons. And I think he did a pretty good job in that regard preparing the company to go public. And he's one that lined up, Aggie, and lined up everybody to get us to go public. Well, he's out of here. And unfortunately, Chief J. Strongbo and George's Animal Steel are going to see their bookings cut way back here as well. And Meltzer would actually say that George doesn't have any bookings out the president. What was the,

1:29:38were they just getting old and they had a different view on wrestling and you wanted something new or why did Vince decide to move away from Chief J and George's Animal Steel? Well, we had an awful lot of producers and we were looking to go with, you know, some younger and different views. Plus, for both Jim and Jay, they couldn't do the kind of travel we were doing anymore. It was just wearing on them. They weren't the best of health and needed the rest. I'll say, after barely legal takes place, the ECW pay-per-view that you may be definitely didn't absolutely did watch. The Michinoku Pro wrestlers who wowed everyone, lined up taking a meeting at the WWFHEC quarters. And what do you know? Taka Michinoku, Shofanaki, Dick, to go. Here they come. And you see a photo if you're over on our YouTube, somethingrestual.com. Taka holding up his contract with Vince McMahon and there you are grinning like a possum. You saw something on that paper, Vee, you like Bruce. Tell this for me.

1:30:43Um, Conrad, who do you think paid for the whole group to come in and make that pay-per-view? The one you didn't watch? Yeah. So that would be you? Not me personally. Yeah, right. The company, WWFHEC. Yeah. And who do you think, yeah, now I give devil's do. All Hayman is the one who told me about Taka. Right. And we were looking at um, you know, they refer to him that on TV day, the devil. You just call Paul the devil's regular course of business. Sometimes, yeah. Yeah, so I was having a conversation with the devil and I got to see those. Oh, really multiple levels. Wow. That's a lot. No, I call Paul happy. I remember that. Happy Hayman. Yes, happy Hayman. Um, but uh, the Paul's one that's smart to be up about. Taka is a matter of fact, you know,

1:31:45Susticate wanted to meet with us. So everybody made it so that we were bringing him in and Paul used them blah, blah, blah, which again, it's fine. Yeah. We were helping Paul. We wanted Paul to succeed. Right. Um, Victor Kinyone's was also a big part of that, but it was Hayman who said, no, man, you don't want Susticate. Susticate was pushing himself. Oh, I said big time. And it was Hayman that said, he goes, no, you don't want Susticate. You want to talk it. And we took Taka. Susticate had a cup of coffee, but yeah, Taka's the guy who's going to have some staying power around these places. Susticate had cups coffee to go. Like dick to go. Yeah. Uh, let's, uh, let's talk about the paper review. Hey, before we do, we should remind everybody that this is the era where Vader is asked a question over and Kuwait about whether or not wrestling's real,

1:32:50and uh, it doesn't end well. We covered all of this in our Vader episode in great detail. So it feels silly to remember the largest fine ever levy. Is that what this was? It's a y'all. Yeah. Vader was fine. The largest fine we'd ever find anyone up to that point. Do you remember the amount? Yeah, it is. And it was $30,000. Oh, wow. And expenses. Oh, the expenses of the park that gets you. Well, well, expenses of staying over there and yeah, security and everything and getting them out and all that crud. Hey, man, it's warming up. We're all getting outside, reflecting on how great life is. I don't know after a long winter to go outside and feel the warmth and the sun on you. It's like, oh, man, life is good. But then occasionally the stress of the responsibility of taking care of everybody and everything and planning for the future can be

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1:34:53compare life insurance quotes from top companies and see how much you could save. That's policygenius.com slash wrestle. Well listen Bruce we've talked a little bit about wrestle mania 13 on this show and we know how important wrestle mania is and we know how important the real rumble is and we certainly know how important summer slam is but it in your house like this. This is still the era where there are two hour shows and we're not charging as much money and we're having them every month. Was it hard to get excited for these monthly paper reviews when Steven saying it's going to be less time and less money. Therefore, it just feels less important, right? No. Okay. No. Yeah, once you once you got into the groove of monthly events, you know, just was what it was. Breadheart is coming into this show with an injury that he aggravated while he was on the overseas tour and we know that's going to become an issue here in the spring and summer

1:36:00of 1997. This show was not well received by the critics. It gets 47.7% thumbs down in the reader poll. 34.9% thumbs up and 17.4% thumbs in the middle. There's only 6,477 paying fans. It's 87,414 dollars and that might not sound huge but it's a smaller building so it's a sell-out. So hey, if it's a sell-out, what else can you ask for? Up first, you can always do better than it. Yeah, I mean listen, you're going to eventually raise ticket prices. You're going to go from two hours to three hours for in your house, raise your paper review prices. We're going to get there. We're just not there yet. Opening up though, we get a 10-minute match with a LOD. You had to get done now with LOD and Owen and Davey? No. It gets three quarters of a star. Brad's going to come in and Meltzer would say that it's

1:37:05kind of a clumsy finish. He's a little late with his run-in. Reff had started a two-cout. He's coming down for three when Brad Kick talked for the DQ, which is what happened. The problem is the Reff had to wait several seconds to start his count, which looks stupid. It is what it is. timing can't be everything. The man's working on a tweak knee. Not maybe the best way to start the paper review. And then Doc would interview Owen and Bulldog and when Doc tells Owen that Austin has arrived, they react in disbelief like they think that they had done something to stop him from Ming schedule to appear. Next up, Saviour Vega and Rocky Mavia. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. You've never seen the Austin Idol interview? Well, he couldn't get to building on time and bog out. He had four flat tires and heels come out. Hey, just because he had four flat tires. Who ever said I had four flat tires that he? Yes. I never said I had four flat tires that he.

1:38:15Don't want to ever say he had four flat tires. I don't know what happened to Austin. I'm going to come to big gathering and laughing. You better call somebody. There's another something to wrestle with Bruce Pritchett. It's all love on YouTube right here in the color. I won't have to beat that beard right off of your face. Conrad Compass. I love it. Saviour Vega is going to wrestle with Rocky Mavia. Saviour Vega, of course, WWE Superstar, Paper View Superstar, stole the show this past weekend in Puerto Rico. I don't know what Rocky Mavia is up to these days, but Saviour is going to win by count out. So Mavia retains and we've got Farupe doing color and he's trying to explain the stipulations for the next paper viewer. It's going to be a three on one deal with Ahmed Johnson. His headset is not working right away, so it's not as smooth as maybe it could have been.

1:39:16Crush is going to be involved and he's going to throw a heart punch after the match. Vega and Crush are going to start arguing because Vega was mad about the count out. Farupe gets in the ring, calms him down. They all get the nation to attack Rocky Mavia until Ahmed Johnson shows up with the trusty two by four to make him save three quarters of a star. Hey man, we're trying. You see if you're watching on YouTube right there. Ahmed Johnson had been really over in 95 and 96. We're trying to get it going in 97. It's tough. And we're also trying to get this new guy made here in Rocky Mavia. None of this is really clicking, but Lord, it ain't for a lack of trying. Yeah, you know, it was the best, you know, the best thing that happened to Rock was the knee injury when he finally has that. But you know, during this time, you're trying hard, trying hard, and the audience is just farting all over him.

1:40:18Little difficult. It's interesting too that, you know, in this match, we see the nation just putting the beat down on Rocky. Just a few months from then, if you can't beat them, join them. There you go. Doc's in the back. He's going to interview Mark Merrow and Sabel Merrow said he's going to be back in the summer from his injury and it's going to be a wild summer. And in the background, Austin walks into the men's room. A ruckus breaks out and Owen and Bulldog run out of a minute later with pipes in their hands. Dave Hebner runs out of the bathroom saying, Owen and Bulldog just messed up Austin and Austin needs help. So we're shooting the paper view to feel a little bit more like a TV show. It feels a little Monday night raw here, and I kind of like it. Is this how they doing in the bathroom? Great question. Maybe he was taking a slam. Yeah, had to pull his pants up and run out or what? How many slams a day you taking things? I don't know. One slam, two slams, you a three slam a day guy? Oh god, no, I wish. One or two? I'd like to be at one. Oh, you're not even at one.

1:41:26It depends, Conrad. We're getting into bodily functions now. And you know, I mean with my collitis and everything, it's just so that's why I have to drink a lot of water. And I always knew you were full of shit, but I didn't know literally. Next up, Jesse James and Rockabilly, they're going to go six minutes and 56 seconds. Feltzer would say the place died when Billy Gunn came out as honky's mystery. Protégé, it was a huge letdown. The match had no heat at all. James won with a small package. Honky tried to hit James with his guitar after the match. James got out of the way. Quarter star. And this was just now. Well, Jay right there. Double James, Jesse James. It's so fascinating to think where these guys will be in a year. Here they are having a singles match on pay-per-view. Just not good and nobody cares a year later. Man, they are over like rover. And it's amazing. It's the same two guys. It was just it's all in the presentation. Isn't it Bruce? I think again, it also, yeah, it's in presentation. And it's also in confidence.

1:42:30No, put someone in that position and some people rise to the occasion. Some don't. They did. Next up, we see Kevin Kelly. He's going to interview Steve Austin. He seems to be just short of crying according to Dave Meltzer. Kelly asks for red face Austin while he's refusing medical help. He said he doesn't need any. Rillimon soon said he would boss the extra time by putting his match on last on the card. And then we see Lance Wright interviewing the heart foundation Bulldogs that he and Owen were celebrating their victory over the road warriors in the bathroom when Austin walked in and attacked them for no reason. And Brett said in reference to Austin the bottom line is look who's crying now. I like that because we've heard Brett over and over and over be accused of being a crybaby from Steve Austin. So that's kind of fun. Who in the hell was Lance Wright? That's what I wanted to ask you. We saw that guy pop up for a cup of coffee in ECW and he had just a handful of appearances here for you guys. I hand some backstage

1:43:36interviewer I suppose, but I don't know. Yeah. You don't remember that fellow at all. At all. Well, that's one. Well, next up, it's our world title match. Yes, this is supposed to be the main event, but no, it is not. It's entertaining. Just being got jumped and Rillmont soon is doing what only a true good gorilla commissioner would do. And that is to put his match on last in the evenings. So the scene may have time to recuperate in proper time. Come back later. Bye, God. Hey, let me ask you this. We we have seen the Undertaker as a champion once before. And it was under less than ideal circumstances after the whole. He's the one of the first guys to be Hulk Hogan, beats him for the world title. Hulk Hogan controversy. We'll talk about another time. But the point is this is his second bite of the apple. And now man, he is a made man. He is the Godfather of the locker room. He is a legend in the WWE just a handful of years later. But after all these

1:44:41years of service and really carrying the torch for the company, he's got the world title and it wasn't even the original plan. But he got it. And that was first pay for view after it's named after him in your house for avenge a taker. He's the champ. He's on the poster. He doesn't get to work the main event. Does he take it personally? Does he does he take it personally? It doesn't go on last. No. Thanks Bruce. Appreciate all the content. Well, see, only only people that don't really understand get upset about that. I'm not upset about it. I'm asking if he was upset about it. No. And I answer the question. And then you get pissed off. Oh, thanks for the content. Because you think that it's like a big deal if you don't go on last. I didn't say it was a big deal. I asked if it was a big deal to him. And he said no. But actually, like it should be a big deal because you probably think it's a big deal.

1:45:42It's not a big deal. I didn't say it was a big deal. I think it's a big deal though. Hey, uh, I got you something. Hang on. Let me. There it is. Okay. Well, see, now, now you're a little bit hurt a little bit. I don't know. You just like yelling. I wanted to yell something. I'm not yelling. I'm not yelling at all. Sitting here. I'm sitting my back. I'm hands up my pocket. I'm clean right. Let's get Amber in there and let her. Amber's gone. Amber's gone. Can't hear no more. No, can't hear. I'm here. All by myself. I'm here with all my friends. I'm alone. They even took my new dog. Oh, well, that new dog sucks. Hey, fuck you. That new dog. You got to work on that. Oh, no, beans are awesome, man. She's just a little shit. Bean, I thought the dog's name was. Guys, fucking don't get me started, man. I thought it was Fernham, man. Yeah, it was.

1:46:42Why isn't it now? Uh, you know what? I tapped out that. Who wins the bread in that household? Just saying, I don't even get a vote. Bean. What the fuck is a bean? Jesus, it can fuck you down. If being was the champ, being what he wrestled the man of it. If being was the champ, being what wrestled the man of it. It's part of the main event. Fernham's name. It's what go on that fucking main event. See, he can't even find a main event. Last. No, no, last. I know. I know. I know. Years and years, for how many years? How can they understand Bruno did it? Everyone's done it. Hey, everyone that's a star. You're a star. You're not. Mama did it. Yeah, you can go. My mom has done it. Yeah. She been all last. She's been in the middle too. Hey, my mom is dead. Oh, God. What's that was the undertaker and he didn't go on last. There you go. Best of mankind for 17 minutes and 26 seconds. It's really good.

1:47:44As you might imagine, largely due to the performance of mankind, taking some crazy bumps. Uh, he does get a picture of water from Vince McMahon's desk, breaks it over Undertaker's head, follows with a hard chair shot. It was pretty clear they were going for hard wedge use, but Undertaker didn't up getting, didn't end up getting cut. There's a big elbow off the middle rope onto the floor. The bandage comes off of Undertaker's face revealing the ugly scab from the fire angle. We got a couple of pile drivers. There's no raft. This is just great stuff. I mean, when these guys fall, you want to talk about pulling that all the stops, running into the ring steps, going headfirst through tables. I mean, is there anything mankind wouldn't do in this era? No, it's great. Absolutely awesome, man, both of them. In the chemistry that they had that could reignite and always feel good. It was a special,

1:48:46it was a special rivalry that Taker and mankind had that, again, I don't think it's been duplicated. Great. I mean, the header through the Spanish table, you got to go out of your way to see on this. So there's a big choke slam and then Undertaker finally wins with the tombstone, but after that, Undertaker is looking for some revenge with Paul Bear. And, uh, eventually, as you might imagine, they're going to try some more fire stuff. The idea is to throw fire at the Undertaker. They set it up a couple of times. The lighter doesn't work. They blow the spot. The flash paper does wind up going, but it goes in bare space, three and three quarters of a star. If you didn't have the fire piece of business here, this would have been one of their classic matches. It does feel like with that botch. It was a classic match. It wasn't a classic match,

1:49:47but that thing afterward, the lighter not cooperating, it takes away from the whole thing, is it not? It took away from the aftermath without it out. Yes, it certainly did. And it was, that was a sad state of affairs. And sometimes shit happens. I just hate it when it happens like that. I mean, it's crazy as it is. Undertaker is like, okay, we got to do something. I'll just set Paul Bear's face on fucking fire. And he does. Go out of the way to watch this one. This is kind of a forgotten, great match of theirs. Everybody always talks about Summer Slam and Vary to Live and all that. Go watch this one. And hey, since you're there, stick around for the main event. What goes on last? Steve Austin and Bret Hart go 21 minutes and nine seconds. Another fantastic match. Unfortunately, maybe not on par with their survivor series match, and really nothing can touch WrestleMania. But it's a great match. Three and three-quarter stars. But telling a great story, it ends with a DQ though. As you might imagine, Bulldog's going to come in, hit Austin with a chair. That's the DQ finish. But Austin's going

1:50:48to keep beating him to the punch with chair shots to the knee and putting the sharp shooter on. And he's going to hold it until Owen and Bulldog come knock him out of the ring. And Bret sell in the knee, big time. Three and three-quarters of a star. I don't think these guys are capable of having a bad match. Just the chemistry is unbelievable with these guys. I think you'd be hard for us to find Bret having a match with hardly a bad match with hardly anybody. Bret had that talent of if he couldn't get him in the first 10 minutes, he'll take another 10 just to make sure he does. Bret was a beautiful artist in the ring. Not just talking about, because listen, this is a popular thing to discuss online. The Mount Rushmore wrestling. Not in terms of drawing money, not in terms of character, merch sales, or tickets, or I'm talking about just as you like to say, and then that damn bell rang. What do you rate Bret all the time? Is he on the Mount Rushmore? He's got to be, right? I think of of in-ring work, yes. Yeah. Let's do some fan questions,

1:51:57Eric wants to know, who designed the set with just the in-your-house garage as the entry area? Do you have set designer's back then? Who would that have been? We did. We had an entire creative team who would create those, you know, back in the day, we didn't have the team like we have now, but it was creative services would draw it up and build it, and that was it. That was the extent of it. Friend of the show Ray LaDuke says, how would you teach up in commerce to execute a proper fireball? First of all, you've got to take the time, you've got to make sure that shit's dry. Second of all, you need to just have technique and finesse. I've been told that you don't throw a fireball, you present the fireball, is that it? That depends. I can throw it. Really? Can we eat a throw one on camera soon here on something the wrestle? Can Silva come up here? I throw that in the demonstrate. That would be great. I will volunteer that. Yes, just on it. Done, dude. All right, this sandpaper is face just so,

1:53:03and we can tell people I did it. Why did you grit your teeth when you said that? Because I was just, she makes me grit my teeth, and fuck it. All right, folks, real quick. I just want to brag about all the families we've been able to help save money right now at savewithconrad.com. I don't know if you noticed, but rates are at a four-year low. So if you've bought or refinanced a property in the last four years, you can get a better deal right now. Not only that, I want to talk to you if you're feeling the stress and maybe you're maxed out on your credit cards. Pany and Freddie have eliminated their minimum credit score. So even if you're behind right now on some of your credit card bills or a car payment, it doesn't mean that you don't qualify. In fact, just last month, Fanny and Freddie doubled down on that and expanded their debt to income ratios. What this means, at least in my 25-year career, this is the first time that Fanny and Freddie has a big knowledge. The American family is overwhelmed with that. We need to find a solution for them. They eliminated the minimum credit scores. They

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1:56:11Garrett wants to say the warm memorial arena in Rochester is a small building. Is it tougher to run a pay-per-view in those smaller arenas compared to say an MSG? It's sometimes it's easier because again everything's so compact and you're not running all over the place to do things but Rochester was an old building to it could be it had its own set of challenges. Ben says, do you remember what the plan would have been for Steve Austin on this show had said stuck around the Russell Bret Hart and what said of Bret have had the main event slot on the show? Well I think I don't know but I think that Steve was going to be involved in that Bret match regardless. Just coming off of the WrestleMania. Right. So even if it starts with Sid and Bret Austin there from a story standpoint. Yeah. So fine wants to know where does this rake in Bruce's top five in your house pay-per-views?

1:57:11Yep. Sure does. Just Chris says since you were stuck with its time because Vader was going to be champ according to the plan that would have been December of 96 is in your house. How did you get revenge of the taker in there so quickly when Bret and Sean was the original plan for the main event only a month prior? Who said that was the original plan only a month prior? See that's where you're reading too many dirt sheets there. Was that Stefan? It changed in February, right? You knew in February that you were going to have to go with taker. I knew Sean was awesome tomorrow. Yeah. Ruben has a fun one. We haven't done this in a while. What would it sound like if Jim Cornell sang Sonny's theme song? Did I sing Sonny's theme song? I have no idea. Mother fucker! Started with I know you want me. I know you want me bitch. I don't know what my hair is kitty.

1:58:13Wow. She had hairy ones? Oh you said Jim was singing it. Oh he was. Yeah. Okay next week Bruce's judgment day 2008 will be our time. I don't know ask me Bruce and shit. You want to next week? Yeah. Okay. We can do what you want to do Bruce. Fine. Fine. What do you want to talk about it? Well you know you pick it up. Hang on, hang on, hang on. I'm putting you on the spot now. I'm not even going to say next week because we were supposed to do this show last week so you and I are going to try to record this week's show. It's Wednesday morning as we're recording. Are we going to have a new show on Friday? Please. You can do ask me in there. Pretty please. Are you going to ask me shit? I will ask you shit. I mean I think you'd rather do a topic but well I will ask you shit. Will you think I'd rather do a topic? Because you're going to get 182 questions about bad money and shit like that. I won't answer. I know that. I'm going to have to filter through until we

1:59:18get to like what would it sound like if Jim Cornett saying Vader's theme song. Okay. By the way, I don't know what it is either. And Worthington, the director from Houston Wrestling, I talked to him yesterday. I was able to tell everybody who that is and once you guys talk to him. Ed Worthington was the director of Houston Wrestling in Houston, Texas for PHTV channel 39 in Houston and I worked with Ed many many years in Houston and he sent a note in. So now I guess to Conrad found Conrad and Conrad gave me his number because I had two numbers on him that were no good and I talked to him for about an hour and a half. That all kinds of stuff. Really? Yeah. Man, that's awesome. I have an off the beaten past question. I found myself bored with the family last night. We ate some dinner and trying to find something to watch

2:00:21and somebody said something about the duracy cannonball ruin and as I'm looking for that, I found a movie called Stroker A. Do you ever see that? Yeah, I can't say that. It's a Burt Reynolds movie where Lonnie Anderson places love interest and he is a NASCAR driver and he is being courted by a potential sponsor Ned Beatty who wants him to be the chicken man. So he takes an endorsement and wears all red and they want him to dress up like a chicken and cluck and call himself the fastest chicken in the sound. And this is a movie from 1983 and a handful of years after this, you too, have a guy dress up in all red and cluck. Any inspiration for the Red Rooster character from the Stroker Ace movie? Never heard of it. So I have no idea. All right. Ladies and gentlemen, that'll do it for us here on something to wrestle any last

2:01:27moments or words you want to share with us about 1997's Provincial of the Takeer. 97 was a interesting year. It's all I got to say. That's it. It's a very angry meme. Kiss me off. We've angered you. We've pissed you off and we're going to do more of that sooner rather than later because we're doing ask Bruce anything right here on something to wrestle with Bruce Pritchard. Rock on.