Money In The Bank Review with Wade Keller - SAS CLASSIC

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He started in a small town in Texas.

Worked his ass off to become one of the most famous wrestlers of all time.

We're going to take care of business tonight, and that's the bottom line.

And now, he's dominating the world of on-demand audio, and he's doing it for the working man.

This is a damn good outlet for me to spew the bullshit off my brain.

Yeah!

This is the Steve Austin show, Unleash, Unleash.

All right, everybody.

Welcome to Steve Austin show.

I'm coming to you from the main streets of Los Angeles, California today.

I've been sitting here in my house at 316 gimmick street.

I have a special guest on the phone.

His name is Wade Keller, the pro wrestling torch.

This is a little bit different open than I normally do, but since it's my podcast, I do

whatever the fuck I want.

That's how we roll.

Wade Keller, welcome to the show.

What's happening?

It's going to be back week two.

I think we went a little more than 15 minutes last week.

You're killing me.

You're killing me.

And here's the thing.

Okay, Faith, Steve, you think we'll go 15 this week?

You know what?

I enjoy talking about the business of pro wrestling.

And we will dial it back into a 15 or 20 minute segment one of these days.

Let me go ahead and let the cat out of the bag on this end.

What you're about to hear is a 60 minute conversation of myself and Wade Keller talking about

money to bank, money not raw, Tuesday smack down.

We don't cover everything in its totality or its entirety.

Just some of our high points or our takeaways from we started going and it turned into a

one hour podcast.

So I figured, you know what?

I think Wade's going to say some words here.

So we'll do it on the front end of the podcast.

This is normally during the open to show where I sit here and kind of spend some

tales, talk about some bullshit.

And I will continue to do that.

But what's going on with you, Wade?

Well, sure.

I want to make an announcement in your privy to it, Steve, that I'll be joining the podcast

one family of podcasts next month.

And we'll have more details in the next couple of weeks, which I'll announce in your

show because I'm a weekly guest here on unleashed.

But I just wanted to give people a heads up that I'm excited about this.

And I hope that every single one of your listeners will subscribe to my podcast on podcast one.

It'll be called the Wade Keller Pro Wrestling podcast.

And we're going to talk about progress and I'm going to have some really cool.

I've got really cool ideas for the show and I'm very much looking forward to it.

And I'm not going to talk too much about it ahead of time, at least not this far out in terms of what we have planned.

But very excited.

And I've enjoyed working with you.

And I've really enjoyed working with everybody I podcast one in agreeing to be on summer regularly and now regularly with you.

So this is, it's a cool move.

And I, yeah, I don't know what to say other than I'm very excited to reach the podcast one audience and bring the brand of wrestling coverage and analysis that I've brought to

guesting on your show and have brought to my publication and website and podcast over at PW Torch all these years.

God dang.

So will how similar to what you're already doing will this be your venture with podcast one?

Yeah, it's going to be, it's going to be similar.

Again, some of the details I'll unveil when things get a little bit more locked down.

Right now I'm doing a lot of podcasts for VIP members and then a number of podcasts at PW Torch livecast.com.

And there will be a lot of familiarity to the format and the approach that I take with a podcast one show.

But there's also some things I want to do differently.

And it's given me a chance to kind of take a fresh look at how I, how I approach covering things and a lot of it just depends on how finalizing the schedule and a couple of other aspects of it.

But I mean, we're the conversations you and I have those are the types of conversations that I like to have with a wide wide array of gas.

And so we're going to have different, they'll be interviews, they'll be co hosts.

It's going to be really timely.

I mean, the key to the show for a lot of people is going to be the fast turnaround on instantly analyzing raw, instantly analyzing Smackdown and going in depth with the brand of coverage that I have, which is an independent voice.

You know, I, one of the assets that I have, one of the assets I don't have is having Russell, you know, I haven't worked in the industry, but that's also an asset.

I'm an independent voice. I have done this nearly 30 years now and have interviewed just about every major name in the wrestling industry with long form insider interviews had a lot of offer, record conversations, traveled the world watching wrestling.

And I have that independence to call it as I see it, but I do so in a way that I that with profound respect for the hard work, the risk and the effort that goes into putting on a wrestling show.

And I'm going to continue to have that same voice at the podcast one show.

I'm glad to hear you say that because I know like when you and I are talking about the matches or the guys or the gals or whatever, it is with respect.

And so we're not trying to take a shot at anybody.

We're just talking and our opinions of the business and your show specifically for you are like you and I are together.

We're never taking shots at anybody. And like you said, you're a guy who loves the business.

I was a guy who was in the business that still loves it and someone joined together.

It is from a respectful point where we, you know, have our opinions and thoughts of the presentation or the performance and as it pertains to guys, gals and storylines in general, it comes from a love of the business.

Oh, absolutely. I mean, this is not a job that I chose and then decided to learn about wrestling.

This is something that appealed to me long before it was a job and that I was incredibly passionate about.

And but, you know, I mean, I always say the number one, the number one thing that I'm serving when I do what I do is the listeners and the readers and the subscribers.

My obligation is truth and honesty with them in my approach to what I do.

But I don't think people would want to listen to me if there was a level of respect for the business and I'll and I love for it too, which comes across.

But sometimes loving and respecting the business means being critical of some people, some decisions and that people are making a power.

And that's obviously a big part of our voice at Pro Wrestling Torch and even when I'm on with you, it's making sure that there's not that I'm serving the listeners first and foremost.

And trying to really just go on a journey with them, try to figure out what's working what's not and why and understand the players who are making the decisions and evaluate what is working and what's not and why.

Hey, man, do you have a timetable or just a big picture as to when you might start your show?

It'll be next month within a few weeks outstanding. Hey, man, welcome to the podcast one family. I'm glad you're bored and I'm sure your listeners, well, hopefully all of my listeners will listen to your show.

And as you know, everything is as a different venture. So I've always enjoyed talking to you with all the guests that you're reaching out to look no further than yours truly.

If you ever get in the gym.

And I will save that comment and and and how you with it if I'm in a jam.

I'll tell you what is it's always fun talking to you and you're about to listen to myself and wait to talk about money in the bank money that wrong to just make down for the next hour.

But God dang wait, we've got to get us an official timekeeper. We need to fly in market and somebody give us to go home.

But there were so many things to cover when we picked the wrong day to try to go, well, me as my show about to go money to make it and money.

So it was a good time talking to you, but we'll see if we can dial it back. But I wish you all the luck in the world with your podcast one relationship.

Thank you, Steve. I'm very much looking forward to it. I see it as a great opportunity. And like I said, next week I'll be on with you.

And I probably at that point can lay out the format and the timing and all that in more detail.

Well, there you have it folks straight from the horse's mouth, Wade Keller, a pro wrestling torch bringing his talents to podcast one.

He ain't taking his talents down there to South Beach. They don't need him down there. You need him over podcast one. He's coming on board.

Wade, congratulations, continued success and much success on this platform. I'll tell you what, you're about to hear me talk to Wade Keller for about an hour.

So I'm not going to beat around the bush too much here. I had some bullshit stories. I was going to tell you about taking my illustrious wife Christian out to the club for dinner where I couldn't get a goddamn drink.

And the old people beside us were talking so loud we moved to another table where some other old people sat next to us.

And they was loud as shit and was eating all kinds of bread and butter. I'm going to save that story for you.

And when I talk about old people, I say it with respect because at 52 years of age, I am trying to turn myself into an old person in 20 years and join the people I will be talking about.

It's a whole different conversation. I will talk to you on the next podcast Thursday for sure so I can make sure I color the story out just like it happened with no limit on what I can say.

I got to have four little words to tell these kind of stories and a story about picking up the dog shit when a trip. I'm not even that's just another spoiler boy.

You've got so much to look forward to here on the Steve Austin show.

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Steve Austin unleashed.

All right, I just said to record button. I got Wade Keller pro wrestling torch on the other end of the line. He is still on vacation in Colorado fixing the head back to Minnesota tomorrow.

Wade, how are you? Enjoying yourself over there? You ready to get back in the groove and get back to many?

Yes, I am. I wouldn't call it a vacation. I'd call it a working road trip because we've been in a ton of hours.

Still keeping up on everything, doing all the shows, doing all the podcasts and still following wrestling.

It's been fun, but it's a different setting, but I'm ready for home.

Okay, let's get this thing going because last time we tried this, this was originally when Wade and I started talking.

It's going to be like a 15 or 20 minute segment.

We started talking last week and it just turned into a whole podcast.

So we could do this every week, but we got to keep it down to 15, 20, whatever it's going to turn out to be.

I don't really have any time limits, but Wade has his own stuff that he's doing.

So let's jump right in. We've got three days of wrestling as far as WWE related stuff to talk about.

Wade, I'm going to let you lead the charge. We still kind of finesse this thing and then and dial it in.

If you want to start off with money in the bank and go Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, how do you go?

Okay, talk to me about your perceived highlights or your takeaways from money in the bank.

Well, I thought money in the bank was the middle of the road show.

Maybe a slight thumbs up. I thought it was some assets that some good and some mediocre and some bad.

The top story coming out of it is, I mean, there's, I want to talk about Baron Corbin winning money in the bank and general all retaining and the way that he did.

But the finish of the women's money in the bank match created a shit storm in social media.

WWE hyped this match as this monumental landmark moment in women's wrestling and it's all, it's not all hype.

I mean, there's some true to it. Obviously, they've changed their approach to featuring women more in longer matches, no brown panties matches.

But it's not like nobody's ever promoted serious women's wrestling before.

But they built it up. They have this video and the women are talking about what it means to them.

And then they book a finish where James Ellsworth, a guy and not exactly, you know, a high end athlete as he's portrayed in WWE, unhooks the briefcase and essentially wins the match for Carmella and drops a briefcase into her arms.

People are freaking out about it. And, you know, immediately Dana Bride and Shane McMahon on social media said this will not stand or were going to investigate it at least.

And then last night, we kind of got to jump to Smackdown to tie it to tie this appropriately into where they ended up.

Daniel Bride, so we're going to redo the match. He took the briefcase back from Carmella and Ellsworth and they're going to redo the match next Tuesday.

So they're going to get a rating out of it. But I've been talking on the PW torch live cast earlier today. I did a show when we tried to sprint and I talked a lot about this.

Like, is it our fans reacting the way WWE wants or did that finish go a step too far where the heat is on the company and not on the heels?

I'm curious for your thoughts, Steve, on that finish in the way that they framed it.

Well, as far as needing a story to carry to the next week, well, you got your story. But, yeah, was it taken or like I said, where did the heat go?

First of all, Carmella met a great catch. When Ellsworth dropped the briefcase, met a great catch.

But when the kids started climbing up with all due respect to Ellsworth, I mean, he's doing what he was told.

I thought one of the women was going to push the ladder match and maybe he's going to split the top rope with just some type of epic, you know, like a nut shot or just take a bump nonetheless or something safe where he's just eliminated and he's not the one grabbing the briefcase.

That kid grabs a briefcase, Carmella allegedly wins and I'm like, you know, same thing as you said, hey, for trying to be an epic first ever, money in the bank match and then some guy climbs up the ladder and wins it.

You know, what if, you know, they had a money in the bank match with the guys and one of the guys had a female valet.

And during the course of the match, she climbs up and then drops the briefcase down to the guy.

You would never see that. You never have seen it. You never seen anything close to that. So all of a sudden for this to happen in that match, it really, it rubbed me the wrong way.

I just thought that there was a way better finish and I thought one of the women should have had the opportunity to earn by climbing and they were, they were having a pretty damn good match.

You could see some of the choreography. There are some of those letter climbs and everything. So it kind of followed the template.

And that's one of the tough things about these matches. The same was true with respect to the men's money in the bank match as far as following that blueprint.

And there are timing issues. They're hard matches to have and you can say, well, Steve, you know, what do you know about a letter match?

I know a lot about letter matches because I've seen a million of them and I was actually in one with Shane and Vince McMahon.

And when I was pitched that I would be in a letter match, I didn't like it at all. And we used step letters and I don't think anything, I think we used three foot letters and there were some six foot letters.

So there was nothing spectacular about my letter match, but their hard matches to work. These women put their bodies on the line.

Now they've got to do it on television on Tuesday to your point. It will give WWE a rating, but I just thought that there should have been a winner in this match and it should have been a woman who was competing in that match, not ill as worth.

And I think they could have gotten away with this finish if this was the third annual women's money in the bank.

Sure. I agree.

Yeah, yeah. It's the fact that it was a first one and they built it up someone. Now I think maybe in their mind they're thinking that made the heat all the greater.

We built it up as a sacred thing and then elsewhere spits on it. And I understand that approach. I think it's all worthy of discussion.

But I think, I mean, in a broader macro sense, there are times that the heat doesn't go on the heel. It goes on the company, especially in 2017 with how fans consume wrestling outside of the shows and how they, you know,

knowing how it works. I just, I feel like that was a step too far for the first ever match. And I think they actually paid a price for effectively building it up as such a landmark moment for women.

Okay, let's, let's, uh, we could go back and forth on this all time, you know, within the company and they're thinking, oh, man, well Austin and Keller are talking about it. So it got the desire to result that we wanted.

But again, I think a woman should have won that match fair and square climbed up the ladder and, you know, had that money in the bank opportunity to play whenever she wanted to.

On the side note, I thought some of Carmella's promos, the one on what she on Smackdown.

Yep. Okay, the promo she had in the ring on Smackdown. And then on Smack talk afterward, we're pretty damn good.

So I get the chance to see a little bit more of her character. Get to see her spinning her wheels and out there running her mouth. I thought she was effective with the promos.

And I got to know more about her and to see a little bit of her personality, which was a good thing.

But nonetheless, let's move on and talk. Go ahead and see if I'm going to interrupt you because if you were going to change subjects, I was going to interrupt you and say, I want to say what you just said, because as much as, you know, we were talking about the booking.

You're totally right. I'm just backing up what you said. I thought Carmella not only on, I thought she was stronger on Smackdown than talking smack, but she was really strong on on Smackdown.

And even Monday night, we had a report on PWTorch.com from a correspondent who attended the house show that was opposite of Ron outside of Indianapolis. And he said that she was great.

She was rotten along with elsewhere, flaunting the briefcase in front of the fans and it got a ton of heat. And I was like, I wish she had wanted nefariously, but not that way.

Because I think her with a briefcase is money. And I'm kind of hoping that that's under consideration for Tuesday that she wins in a way that takes advantage of the rules, but not in such a blatant way that it disrespects, you know, kind of the whole concept.

So yeah, I was impressed with her and I think it was a win for her this week, even if the storyline is being questioned.

So I'm glad you noticed that just like I did, because I thought she really shine. And now, like you said, to your point, it'd be great to see her with a briefcase.

Had she wanted in a fashion that was fitting. So now if they do this second one, and then she gets it is like, well, okay, but at least a spotlight is shine upon her. And we know that she has some talent.

And she's athletic. She's still green. She's still learning, but she has a future. And so anyway, moving on.

Man, I'll tell you what the next thing I want to talk about as far as money to bank was Naomi versus Lana for the Smackdown women's championship. I don't know how this match came to be.

In a nutshell, Lana said some mean things to Naomi and then ask for a title match. And Naomi said, I'm a fighting champion. Sure. And then Shane McManager.

I mean, I was, I don't want to overstate it and say I was appalled by it, but I thought it was just respecting of the title. And I thought it made Shane look bad. And I thought it made Naomi look bad, because I don't think somebody who has never wrestled on the main roster.

She is portrayed as somebody who just decided to get into wrestling recently. They're not, I mean, that's her, that's how they're presenting her. I don't believe it serves WWE or the fans or their ability to sell title matches as meeting something to have Shane agreed to it and Naomi offer it.

Title matches should be earned. I think Naomi should have said, you don't get a shot at a title till you earn it. I had to work hard to earn it. There's these women who are in a ladder match trying to earn a shot at it. You can earn it, but I'll fight you and I'll fight you on Sunday like that. That makes a lot more sense to me.

I'll fight you. Hey, you want to shot at me. I'll fight you no title on land because you didn't do anything to deserve it. But I said, I'm a fighting champion. I will fight you, but you don't deserve a shot at the title. So that is not on the line.

So then it's back on to Lana. Okay, yeah, I'll accept that because I want to go in there with the best of the best because you have the belt. And so let's tangle. But the title is not on the line.

So with putting words into Naomi's mouth that I'm a fighting champion to give reason for this match to happen. And thereby some logic.

I just Naomi deserves better that the title deserves better. Lana wasn't up for this task at hand at this point in her career.

I thought she had much more mystique as the valet, whatever the term is with Rusev going back to sixth, you know, before she didn't man, they kind of killed her gimmick off and reinvented her. And I just liked her the way she was. And so if she wants to be in ring, that's more power to her.

But just you and a lot of the stuff that I got on Twitter was a man before first match, you know, she did a lot better than I expected. Okay. And when I say that good for her, good for her. But as as a company who's striving for excellence in sports entertainment slash professional wrestling.

The best of the best to belong on a paper view, they're not paper views anymore, but the best of the best, whether you're a top tier worker or someone who is over with X factor, it factor or selling merch are drawn a crowd.

Those are the people that need to be featured on the paper views. And all of a sudden you have this person come from nowhere, get a title shot, be featured. Now come back two weeks later.

To be in another featured match, you know, on Smackdown, which is going to do a number or not, but I just thought man, you have to treat a title with higher regard and respect than that.

And put the people on the paper views or the events that are broadcast on the WWE network, the best of the best are on the shows. That's just the way I see it.

No, no, I agree and I think it's difficult in the again, we talk about money in the bank in the context for the women. If it was the third match and there were two straight up wins and this was the third one, I get it.

I think it would have worked better and not had the backlash that I think is more negative than positive. With this, I think Lana getting a title shot, I'm glad she didn't win the title.

But just getting a title shot, I think brings back some bad memories of Jenner Mahal. And I mean, Jenner's fine. I mean, like, but there was no journey and no story told to get fans to buy into him going from a guy losing on TV all the time to a contender.

They didn't tell that story. However, through whatever lens you watch wrestling, you need to have a story to believe in that makes it seem like Jenner Mahal belongs in a top spot and that you were along on that journey.

I remember watching Bret Hart go from pre limb guy to take the champion, I see champion to world champion and I bought him as a world champion because I was along for the right.

So Lana getting this shot, it's a slap in the face for a lot of reasons, but the timing couldn't be worse because fans are still reeling from the out of nowhere, gender push.

I'm just being into the gender push, money to bank, Jenner Mahal versus Randy Orton and Jenner Mahal retains interference.

You know, at rings, I don't know if there would be interference, but anyway, I thought Randy did a hell of a job in carrying gender.

And I've said people, I've said the word carrying before and people take it out of context or think, oh, what are you talking about?

Truly Randy Orton carrying gender to a pretty damn good match until, you know, everything started going towards the end and the finish happened like it did.

It was a big moment. I thought Randy might even go over in this match, but I thought gender stepped up this game and I thought it was a credit to ability of Randy Orton to carry him in this match.

What were your thoughts?

I totally agree. I thought that Randy brought the energy. He brought a sense of caring.

More so, I thought that maybe for sure, being in St. Louis and having more energized crowd helped.

I think having his dad and other legends at ringside was probably a motivator for Randy.

I don't know how much he cares or even is aware of people, you know, kind of Santa.

You know, Randy's not, doesn't seem all that motivated and he seems like he just kind of is in cruise control and Randy in cruise control is good.

But I don't think he's great in the sense that he's motivating people to go, I got to be a network subscriber.

I got to go to how show to see a Randy match.

This was a match that I thought was a motivated Randy and I agree.

I think he brought gender up to another level. I like the pacing of the match. I mean, I know Randy's known as the anti-dive guy.

But to me, this was a good example of a match that stayed for the most part in the ring, told a good story.

It just, it was structured well and executed well.

And yeah, I mean, it wasn't like a show stealer, but it was a good match.

I would still argue in 2017 when you've got AJ Styles and Shinsuke and Kevin Owens and Sami Zayn and the history of their quality of matches.

And you have a huge drop off in the 18 to 35 year old and 18 to 49 male demos between the first of the year and now

on Smackdown. It's like 47% of left since WrestleMania season and the first show of the year.

You got to start wondering, is a gender Randy Orton match that we can compliment, say it was good.

It was solid. It was one of gender's better matches and Randy was energized.

Is that enough to bring the fans who are choosing to watch other things back?

And I'm still not quite sure Randy and gender are the answer as main as the main event.

And I thought this was a good second third from the top match for a US title.

I'm still not sure that they're giving what the fans need to see in the main event stuff.

Well, I think they're playing with that St. Louis crowd. The fact that it was Randy's hometown and playing upon that storyline with respect to how the match was structured pacing.

Yes, everything was really good, really solid.

Gender, you know, he's got to start coming around a little bit, being a little bit more aggressive.

He was a little impensive out there that sometimes, you know, maybe just a little bit lost.

Randy Orton kept staying, of course. He was leading the match.

So, gender's got to be able to loosen up a little bit and take a breath of fresh air.

Lay it shit in and you really, you know, be able to be more in the moment.

It was almost like he was following a blueprint to a degree.

And I'm a fan of the kids so I'm wishing him well, but he just got to loosen up and look like this is actually.

You know, he's thinking about what he's doing and there's a thought process.

Hey, fuck, I'm going to do this now.

And he's just kind of still going through those motions and it comes across as going through the motion.

So, you know, again, I go a real good match carried by Randy Orton.

Could it have been better? Yeah, it could have been a lot better.

But the passable, yes.

And I think we're trying to capitalize on the fact that it was Randy's return back to his hometown.

Hey, let's jump into the men's money in the bank ladder match.

There was no women going to the top of the ladder, toss down a briefcase to one of the guys.

Your thoughts on this match? These matches are tough to work.

Let me jump right out. I asked you a question, but some of those climbs up the ladder.

Man, they're just really hard to watch because they were just waiting for that guy to come get them.

And at the beginning, when Marion Corbin jumped, Shinsuke Nakamura and Shinsuke's out for what?

2015, 20 minutes of the match and then comes back.

Wade, give me your take on this.

Yeah, I ultimately liked the match because they took fewer chances than I think.

Yep. They usually take money in the bank matches.

So, you know, like some people are just like, put all the spots in there you can.

Who cares how the rest of the field afterwards and if it cuts yours out of their career,

that's not how I watch wrestling. I want every chance that's taken to count.

And I understand it's a dangerous business.

I could not do what wrestlers do and I'm readily admit that.

But I think when they do take chances, there's always a chance something goes wrong.

But that's a reason to not take excessive chances and make every spot, every bump, every risk.

Make it count for something. I thought they dialed back in a way that worked in this case.

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Because I enjoyed everything about the match. I enjoyed it.

There was a couple of, kind of like, not real, holy shit bumps.

But I mean, a couple of major bumps. When you're putting your, I'm sitting here.

I've been through, you know, my share of matches.

But when I'm sitting there thinking, okay, yeah, it was a pretty safe match for the most part.

Man, anything could go wrong.

So, man, I just, I'm just, I live and die by each one of these crazy things that they do.

So, it was structured well, told a pretty damn good story.

I really, I really enjoyed it.

And I was, I was glad as, as you were that the guys just didn't go haywire with the danger factor.

But let's talk about the finish.

And, you know, finally, Nakamura comes back in, a little bit of a house of fire.

I really need to see, I really want to see more out of this guy.

Yeah.

Ultimately, let's talk about Baron Corbin so we can move on and brush across Monday Night Raw and Smackdown.

Baron Corbin clamps at the top and wins money in the bank.

Your thoughts on that?

Is he ready for this kind of push right here, right now?

I think everything with Baron Corbin since getting called up has been a little ahead of the ideal schedule.

But I think there are things he does so well that I'm not, I'm not all against him having this.

I like this parade around the ring on Tuesday night, taunting gender.

His body language is promos.

I believe that is, you know, I talk about Seth wrong as a heal.

I just imagine he was a guy who, when he showed up every year at the DMV,

people remembered him and they're like, oh, no, not this guy again.

And I believe that.

And I didn't want anything to contradict that image.

Baron is good about that.

Like, I buy that this is who he is.

He's not putting on a show.

He's not doing the gender snarl where you sort of think, oh, that's a pro wrestling thing.

And so I like him.

I like his act.

I think he's improved in the ring.

And I think he was the right guy to win this match.

So I like that performance wise, I would say it would have been good for him to study how to climb a ladder

before entering a ladder match.

Because there was one point in the match where he put one foot on a wrong

and then look completely confused about how to put a second foot on it.

Because of what you said.

He was waiting for somebody to attack him.

And I mean, you know, that could be someone else's fault, not Corbans.

But that's one of the things that just sort of.

But then when you're in that spot, though, hey, you just got to start climbing that match.

And you ain't got to sprint up that thing like you say and bolt running 100 meters.

But you got to get your ass out there because you got to protect yourself.

And if no one stops you, then you feel fuck around with the briefcase once you get up there.

But get up there in some type of fashion so that you don't look like a three-toed sloth.

So it's moments like that.

You're thinking, God dang, you either get us buying in.

These guys are killing themselves out there.

They're working their ass off to make me buy in.

And then someone does that slow crawl.

And I'm thinking, okay, well, fuck it.

You know, right when I was buying in, I got to buy back out because, you know, I'm not believing this shit now.

Here's the thing.

To your point of you like the kids look, not the snarl.

Seems to be well-suited where he is.

Now, wait, if you're going to start putting this guy in single situations or dare say he cash in at money in the bank and become the champion.

Boy, he's got a lot of pressure on him.

The pressure is not in carrying the briefcase.

He still needs to work on his singles matches, which don't jump off the page as something you've got to see every single week yet.

Because he's still pretty damn great.

And I'm a fan of the kids, so I'm saying this with respect.

I've been there.

But all of a sudden, you know, you put a spotlight on this kid.

He could potentially be the champion.

So if he does become the champion, you know,

it's like when they put that title on gender, you know,

just getting a title put on you does not necessarily make you.

It can be good for the resume, but it doesn't necessarily make you.

It actually, I think, causes fans to look at you with more scrutiny.

Absolutely.

It can expose you.

Yes, sir.

It can absolutely expose you.

So, you know, when people say, hey, man, you know,

gender, he was, he was doing favors.

And now I've said he's a world champion.

You know, so he's got to, you know, bring himself up to represent that belt and the best regard possible.

So anyway, interesting win for the kid.

We'll see what he does with this briefcase opportunity as the story unfolds.

But just from here on your side, you are interested in this story,

and you want to see how it proceeds forward.

Yeah, yeah.

I mean, I don't think everybody who wins money in the bank has to win the world title.

But I think at least we're on a journey with him right now.

You know, you're looking at him differently.

And the spotlights on him.

So this is a push.

It's like, it's like winning King of the Ring.

It's a push.

Yep.

That's what I think.

Yeah, money in the bank has become the 90s version of King of the Ring.

It's basically Vincent Mann sending a message to the fan base.

I got my eye on this guy.

I'm going to give him some opportunities.

And sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't.

You know, I mean, you know, Billy Gunn got that chance and it didn't translate to anything huge.

And you and Triple H, you know, when the timing is right, bright hearted,

it can lead to something.

I think I put money on him succeeding and being a money draw for years to come.

But he can't stop working at getting better.

Because I think the scrutiny is going to increase.

And fans are discerning now.

I mean, there is a big part of the fan base.

And I did that met statistical breakdown last week on PWTores.com, breaking down the demos.

A lot of fans tuned out after gender won that number one contendership match on SmackDown.

SmackDown was a head of year ago numbers.

And raw was way behind.

And there was a reason for that.

And now it's gone.

Now they lost that advantage they had over the ratings a year ago.

And it coincides with gender getting a push.

I think fans feel a sense of ownership.

And a sense of obligation for the promoters to push the people who deserve it the most.

That's why Ellsworth finished a lot of finish.

The gender push.

I think Baron Corbin's more equipped than any of them to not look bad in this situation.

But he's got to work hard to make sure that he doesn't take anything for granted.

Because the fans can make or break you.

And I think they're showing that vocally right now.

And it will be interesting from a stylistic standpoint of what Baron does in the ring.

Because a lot of guys doing this fly around stuff.

And it's almost like the, you know, everybody's working a lot faster than they used to.

Baron is not that guy.

So I mean, he needs to really step it up with a tone of violence or an offensive.

Not, he doesn't need a main moves.

I didn't.

But he needs to be able to dictate some type of style.

And what's refreshing, what could potentially be refreshing is this guy is not going to be working.

Like 75% of the rest of the roster.

And it's worked for Braun Strollman.

It's worked for Samoa Joe.

Roman Reigns even, you can say it's worked for him.

I'm not worried about Baron doing a different style because he's got the style.

No, look forward to it.

And that's my point.

Yeah.

That's one of, yeah.

It's like I like people who say, oh, he can't keep up with age.

It's like, he doesn't have to keep up with age.

No, he just needs to be a real good effective version of himself.

Yes.

And in his argument, I think both you and I agree on with Luke Harper.

It's like, don't you're not a Matt wrestler and you're not a dive guy.

You're a, you're a big man badass wrestler.

And that's where the focus of his style should be Baron Corbin wrestles his size.

And so I think it can work.

And I want that.

I don't want everybody doing, you know, whatever you want to call it.

Andy style cruiser weight style agent style style.

I don't want that.

I want diversity.

Braun Strollman is showing how effective that can be.

So Samoa Joe.

And like I said, so is Roman Reigns.

So Baron, I think gets it and wrestles his size in style.

And I like the size, the style mix up or the styles, the contrasting styles of a bigger guy.

Working his style versus a smaller guy.

So I, again, I endorse it even in the context.

I think it's a good spot.

I didn't have.

I had a little bit and it was a conversation piece on knock him or being knocked out early.

And then coming back late, you don't want him to have the rep of being favored.

Oh, we're protecting him from taking the latter spots that everybody else had to take.

But as a new character, I sort of see merit in framing the match.

So he gets a big pop when he despite the beat down and despite being in pain reenters the match.

And then has a spotlight memorable moment with AJ that then leads into the finish.

I see the positives of it.

I think there's, there was some risk even having him just sit out the match,

take, you know, take the proverbial napal everyone else is working hard.

And people paid to see him and they got cheated out of that.

But ultimately, I thought that it made sense.

In case you seem more special, not just being another guy in the mix for the whole length of the match.

How did you feel about that?

Well, I would like to see him in the match because I've seen a lot of this stuff in New Japan.

I've seen him, you know, work several matches.

I'd like to see more of the guys.

I'd like to see him in a setting with all the other guys doing doing the same shit

because he doesn't have to be the guy climbing up a ladder taking crazy bumps.

But I want to see him out there working and doing work.

And like you said, they set the stage for him to shine and do these big moves on everybody.

Yeah, that was great.

Me, I would prefer to see him in the match.

But it ended up like it did, Baron Corbin with the win.

Give me your highs or your takeaways from Raw and Smackdown.

Well, why don't we start even though it's out of order?

Why don't we start with Smackdown just because we're in the flow on money in the bank?

Yep.

You know, because Smackdown was a follow-up on that.

They didn't do a lot with Baron Corbin because he just, you know,

did a lap around the ring to Todd gender.

But I thought that was fine.

I didn't like that because I thought it mirrored what Carmella had done the day before

right after she won.

And so it was like, okay, Carmella prays around.

And again, I'm a fan of Carmella.

I like what she did with the promos.

Okay, they took the money and they took the briefcase from her.

But then I thought it was just kind of, you know, sameo, sameo.

Here comes Baron.

And here's the guy who's what, 6465 killer.

And he's going to stroll around a ring and taunt.

He's going to catch it.

I didn't buy it.

Yeah, I make a good argument.

Go ahead.

So we got Shinsuke's Ziggler again.

And they went about 17 minutes.

I thought it was a good match.

But Mike, I mean, you were a fan of Shinsuke.

People who've seen Shinsuke outside of WWE and his Sami Zayn match.

I mean, it's like, there's something there that just everyone is like,

I'm so excited for him to get to the main roster.

I'm not sure that going back and forth.

Even if he got 70% of the offense going back and forth with Dolph Ziggler,

who takes really good bombs to make Shinsuke look good,

got in, he looks crisp, he's a good worker.

But from a kind of kind of narrative context standpoint,

it makes Shinsuke, it brings him down to one notch above Dolph

by having to fight really hard for 17 minutes to beat him.

And it's not like they told the story of Dolph on a hot streak.

And now he's going to face his big test in Shinsuke.

It just was a match thrown out there to give Shinsuke 17 minutes to get himself over.

I thought it was good.

But I still get nervous about Shinsuke's seeming ordinary.

I think I made him seem ordinary because when you say,

yeah, I'm a fan of Shinsuke, but I'm also a fan of Dolph Ziggler.

But right now, due to the fact that as long as he's been there,

however, they pushed him, he'll maybe, you know,

gas pedal brake, gas pedal brake.

He goes out there with the King of Strong style.

And they start off with this kind of chain wrestling stuff.

But it's almost that, you know, somebody's got a snug,

something up.

Some of those reversals on the waist locks just,

this just transition moves.

Grab a headlock, sink it in, and then those,

they'll make that hand into like a nine-fages or kind of,

you don't got that headlock locked in.

It's almost like, it's not fake wrestling.

It's just that going through the motions kind of cliche wrestling.

It's like snug it up, grab you.

I got my, I got my hands locked in here.

Grab a hold.

Got them in.

And, and give me some physicality.

And we know Shinsuke can be physical as hell.

Cause he comes from a shoot background.

Doff can work his ass off.

He's a former amateur wrestler.

Fucking give me some real snugged up wrestling.

And, and on, on the other side of that,

don't sit there and make the snug up stuff look like it's so snug

because you're straining so hard, but you're barely squeezing.

It's a real fine line there, Wade.

And I don't know if you understand what I'm talking about,

but it's just that switcheroo stuff that it's just,

you're putting in some time.

They give you 17 minutes.

So you didn't need 17 minutes.

Go out there.

Hey, here's, cause I know the guys can wrestle.

They can do those switcheroo's.

Give me some fucking high spots.

I mean, baby, all of a sudden, Shinsuke, he'll explode.

One, two, three moves.

And slow face, and slow fashion.

He'll do the faces.

Okay.

But I want to see God dang him.

Bam, give me, give me some action.

Because if you, if you notice,

people got a sitting back on that match.

You know, if you say, was it a good match or a bad match?

It was a good match.

But it was just like the one on the paper you they had.

Does it make me clamber to see Shinsuke and action again?

He's got this mistake, but the mistake isn't really getting built.

It's kind of coming down.

And he hasn't, they haven't issued for him,

or he hasn't issued a mission statement.

And I think a new guy with his credentials and resume needs

to arrive and have a mission.

I mean, the wrestling I grew up with.

If a new guy arrived on the scene,

I mean, if he was a big deal,

he pretty much declared what he was there to do.

If it was a heal, it was to take the championship,

you know, back to, back to the Middle East,

or it was to take it to, you know, win it on behalf of Bobby Heenan

and they're going to celebrate it and part,

like, or if it's a babyface, you know,

whole Coke and showed up with a mission in the AWA

to take the championship from Nick Bachwinkle.

And it was just like, boom, that's his focus.

Shinsuke just sort of showed up,

and he's just kind of floating around.

Amelessly.

And I don't think the language barrier is an excuse.

Why is he here?

Tell us that he conquered Japan.

He was a legend there.

It was a big decision to leave home.

He could have come to WWE any time in the last 5-10 years.

He was that good.

He decided to leave his family,

come to WWE, improve against the best,

that he is the best, and put him on a mission

where his matches count.

And there's this aura about everything that he does

that's special.

Making him ordinary means he's just going to be ordinary.

And his ceiling should be higher than that.

So yeah, I just, I'm, I remain hopeful

and somewhat optimistic eventually we'll get there.

But 17 minutes with Dolph to just,

and like you said, what you described

is what I want to see if two baby faces wrestle.

Like, oh, we're kind of testing each other out.

And, you know, you wait for things to kind of get heated

where someone snaps and loses their temper a little bit.

But yeah, be snug, be tight, fight with the mission.

And you're not getting paid by the minute.

And Shinsuke looked like he was getting paid by the minute there.

I'm coming right back with Wade Keller.

Pro wrestling towards the pause for the call.

So the sponsor is to keep his shield on the air

twice a week for free.

Two cans of audio will pass for fucking nothing.

Come right back with Wade Keller.

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Steve Austin. Steve Austin. I'm Leech.

I'm Leech.

Okay, smack down what else jumped across at you.

What do you think of the General Hall Luccarper match?

Last thing I want to get.

I got a ton of respect for Dolph Ziegler and Shensuke.

Just these matchups away that they're telling them

to go out there and do these matches.

That's the part where the disconnect is for me.

I'm not shading those guys at all.

I think they fulfilled their mission.

I wanted to put that out there because I'm a big Dolph fan.

That's totally fair.

If there was in a different circumstance

and two guys went out and did a 17-minute match

in a different context, it's fine.

That's what they were told to do.

But it's snugging up.

It's snugging up.

It looks like you're fighting on performing and not filling time.

But that said, Dolph is always really good.

But it just wasn't the match that Shensuke needed right now.

I think that's my point.

That's a good point.

Yeah.

Harbor versus General.

Jinder in the main event.

I like a world champion being in the last match on a show

because I think if a world champion wrestles

it should be framed as a big deal.

It's like respect the office.

Not necessarily the office holder.

Even if he's a heel and even if fans haven't bought in.

Still, if a champion wrestles on TV,

I think you make a big deal out of it.

I needed more backstory though of why Luke Harper got this match

and what it meant to him.

We got nothing on this show that gave me any reason as a fan

to invest in Luke Harper as Jinder's opponent.

It came across as filler because of it.

And I think they sold the match short.

Man.

I'm just here in my notes.

I have that Baron Cormin comes out.

And he's the money in the bank thing.

I said that was redundant.

Yeah.

The match is okay.

Yeah.

To your point.

Yeah.

Why did you get the match?

You're talking about the world champion.

So how did it happen?

Yeah.

I'm glad it was an on title.

But still.

I mean, yeah.

It should be.

Yeah.

That was about it.

That was an on title match.

I miss.

I don't think they ever set the pedals on the line.

Okay.

Well, regardless.

I mean, if it wasn't on title match, why did it happen?

That is your world champion.

And these two guys have no back history.

Yeah.

Correct.

Yep.

Okay.

So I mean, that doesn't make sense right there.

Well, the reason they did it is because they wanted Randy

orn't to come out and beat up Jinder.

You know, so they worked backwards from that.

And they didn't do a good job making sense.

Yeah, but there needs to be more logic on the setup

of why those two were in a rain together.

I agree.

Because if that doesn't have any foundation, then, you know, yeah, I can see

that why you won't Randy to come out there.

But there has to be sound foundation for why these two were in a ring.

Find to begin with because of the world shape.

And as a heel, you've got the ability to be the biggest prick in the world.

Say, hey, why would I want a wrestler's guy?

Yeah.

You know, what did you do to hurt a shot at me?

Why would I want to wrestle him for a non-title match?

Because off Sunday commission comes out here and says, oh, you're going to wrestle this match.

I need more than that.

I do too.

I think they book backwards.

They're like, how do we get Randy and J-

How do we let Randy show that he's he's worked up and fired up over what happened with his dad

and in the way that he lost Sunday night?

Well, well, we haven't beat up Jinder.

Well, how do we have him beat up Jinder?

Well, we can do a promo.

I haven't do a match against two.

Well, Harper's not doing anything.

And that's where it ended.

It's like, no, that's just the beginning.

Give us, you know, in plan a couple of weeks ahead ideally and have Luke Harper kill somebody

and destroy somebody in the ring and have seen it mango.

You know what?

I've been impressed by Luke Harper lately.

I want to see what he can do against the champion.

He hasn't heard a title shot, but I want to see if he maybe should be in that conversation.

Luke, you got an opportunity to lifetime next week against Jinder non-title and build it up.

You know, give me some backstory.

And this didn't happen.

But then again, I mean, if it was going to be UFC, he'd be fighting, you know, a highly ranked fighter,

top 10 ranked fighter, to show why or if he deserves that shot.

So again, Jinder shouldn't be the target there.

It should be a high-ranking guy based on wins and losses, which don't seem to matter anymore.

But that should be as if he gets a shot if he beats this guy.

I don't know.

It's all about numbers and matchups as far as, you know, ratings.

But then to me, there's just none of logic there.

Give me another highlight.

Take away.

Well, Danny Bryan, that's the other topic.

He promised to address money in the bank controversy with the women.

He heard it throughout the show.

They weaved into the show.

The women making their case.

Why, you know, hey, they're it and they did a really good job, by the way,

saying there is no rule that says somebody in a noticube match,

somebody not a popular match can't unhook the briefcase and handed to somebody.

I mean, they JBL said it Sunday night.

It got reiterated on Smackdown on Tuesday night.

I mean, and Daniel Bryan then walks out and says I've been talking to Shane and other officials.

And they told me I have to stick to the rule book.

So I'm thinking, okay, Daniel Bryan, he's, you know, likes to follow rules.

He might not like it.

And then he just arbitrarily decides, I don't, I'm going to take the briefcase.

I actually, I mean, ultimately, that's what fans wanted Daniel Bryan to do.

But I thought they made too strong of a case that Bryan had no authority to do that.

And I wish that that was addressed better because what it came across as is

we're going to go overboard in making you think Bryan's doing something you don't want

to get the pop when he does what you do want.

Right.

But I thought he was actually too convincing about him not having the authority to do it.

So I had some mixed feelings about that.

And then he didn't until later on talking Smack,

Ben James Ellsworth from the match.

And I think that should have been in the promo on Smackdown.

I agree with that.

That was my biggest singer.

Hey, man.

And that would have got the biggest pop right there.

And you by the way are banned from ringsad right there.

Yeah.

Yep.

It almost looked like what nevermind.

I just wondered if he forgot to.

Because I just seem to step off to me.

Or someone hit the music too soon.

Yeah.

Oh, okay.

I guess I'm not going to do it.

But yeah, it felt anti-climactic.

I did like on talking Smack James Ellsworth told Carmella.

Don't worry.

Don't worry.

I've got a plan.

And then Daniel Bryan said, well, I don't know what that plan is.

But if it involves you being at ringside, you won't be your band.

I wish that was in the segment on Smackdown.

I agree because I don't know how many people I was talking to Smack.

And they're going to put that in the package next week to set, you know,

the logistics behind that.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Otherwise, I don't think there was much else.

I mean, we had the Kevin Owens Chad Gable thing.

I mean, it was fine.

I didn't understand what gave, I'm biggest AJ Styles fan in the world.

But it would give him the authority to make a Kevin Owens match with Chad Gable.

I agree.

I agree.

I could just explain to me the logic here so I can buy into it.

I know.

That's the thing.

I didn't know that all of a sudden, the commissioner, whatever you call him,

or GM had just said, okay, hey, AJ, handless force, go make this match

because he proved that this kid was allegedly just moved to wherever they were at.

I was just like, come on, man.

Come on, man.

You got AJ Styles, the best worker in the company.

And he's going out there.

And KO, who I love, is a Gable kid who's got some potential.

And all of a sudden, AJ's out there making this match.

And all of a sudden, for you know what, there's a suplex on KO, the match starts.

And you've got your champion out there looking not in the best light

because he's not being treated like a champion.

Because as a universal champion, he was a AJ, what authority do you have, you know,

regardless of whether this kid is from here or not, which he wasn't.

But to make a match with me, so give me what gives him the lead way to do that way.

Well, see, and I think it's an easy fix because there isn't.

I mean, there's no way to fix it or make sense of it as they did it.

But AJ could have come out and said, I know someone from Dayton, Ohio.

He's a new, you know, little tongue and cheek. He's a new resident.

But I don't think you'll, I, you're a fighting champion, Kevin Owens.

You're not going to not fight somebody on a technicality, right?

And Kevin Owens can look like a crap.

I've got, I'm cornered, you know, I, I, I can't back out of this.

And, uh, and then you do that.

And then, or you, or even at the very end, they do everything the same way they did it.

And then at the end, Kevin Owens, all Kevin Owens had to do is just say,

I don't care. I can beat this guy whether he lives here or not.

Bring it on. Ring the bell. Have him.

I mean, it is just Chad Gable. And I have high hopes for him.

But at this stage, Kevin Owens should not be scared to fight Chad Gable.

So in the end, have Kevin Owens roll his eyes, throw his hands up and go.

Fine, I'll pretend he lives here. Let's fight.

It's okay for a heal to accept a challenge.

But at least then logic wise, he has accepted the match.

It's not forced upon him because aging sets up.

You know what? Hey kid, you know what? You don't have a chance against me.

I know you're not from here. This is BS.

Styles has no authority, but because hey, we're here in this shit hole.

I'll go ahead and wrestle you.

And then you go out there and, and you, you take over on the kid.

This is the old, this is just like, uh, damn near flare versus loli years ago.

Man, false, you make this kid and then you fucking crush him.

And so then you get over. The kid gets to shine.

And you don't look like a doofus because, and it wasn't on KO,

but that was a company that made him put him in that spot because of the storyline.

So yeah, you can accept the challenge.

Yeah, AJ can go out there and start a shit a little bit,

because it's not like within authority that type of thing of amen.

You're a fighting champion and all of a sudden KO agrees to it.

So it's just to some of the points you just made, but you can do it.

But just doing it in a little bit different fashion.

Yeah, I agree.

Okay, that's about all from Smackdown though.

I mean, there's, you know, okay.

So yeah, raw, I thought was a load.

It was a big show.

I thought it was a real memorable show.

With what they did in terms of Brock and Joe and Lesnar and Braun, especially.

They put a lot out there and then he had the, uh, the other big atopic from raw was the,

the reveal event so it casts.

We can start either place.

I like the, uh, he'll turn by the cash.

Yeah, let's talk about that because Kurt Angle says, you know,

this is months of planning.

Well, months of backstory, who knows how planned it was, but you know,

we had backstory to work with.

And end of the cast both were jumped apparently backstage.

And Kurt Angle wants to investigate and solve it.

It was a teaser led to improvement in the rating.

They went back up to where they were two weeks ago up from a real,

real low point last week.

And, uh, end of the cast walk out there.

And then court grades is the one who actually comes up with the incriminating security footage.

That was secretly taped of, of casts, uh,

faking that he was attacked from behind to throw the scent off of him.

And once he was caught, then he revealed, yeah, I've been messing with the end, though,

because I want to see how dumb you were.

And I want to see if you catch on and you didn't.

And, uh, but now I have no problem saying I'm sick and tired of you.

And, uh, I mean, obviously cut a better problem than I just did.

They're recapping it.

Yeah, I liked it.

I thought the emotion in that promo between Enzo and cast felt real too.

Like I felt like these were two guys who had a history who were actually breaking up.

And there was some emotion there.

Enzo showed it and was supposed to cast showed it.

I don't think he was supposed to.

But I thought it all added up to a really good segment.

Yeah, I enjoyed it.

The, uh, I didn't know about how court grades just happened to have from the announced position,

the footage, uh, that that line.

People like to tell them things.

That was his line a couple of weeks ago.

Yeah, but so, so I'm not going to sit there and argue that point.

But I thought it was really effective.

I thought the guys did a great job.

Uh, you know, didn't see it coming.

And, uh, big cast sometimes, do you think, uh,

Hey, man, it's got a lot of potential.

But then, uh, you know, can he live up to it?

He's, he really lived up to this.

And, you know, with the fact that he considered Enzo dead weight.

His guy that's holding him back from being a big star.

I really liked it.

And Enzo, like I said, it was, it was emotional.

And so now I want to see where they go from here.

And it will be interesting to see, you know, how big casts, you know,

shoulders, these responsibilities have been a single.

And, uh, turning heel.

And I'm excited about this opportunity for him.

And I'm excited to see what they do with Enzo.

But I, I thought it really came across as, as a great segment.

Because two years ago, cast an NXT look like a deer in headlights when he was on the microphone.

And so that's what I'm talking.

Yeah.

So this progress is encouraging.

And we talk about Baron Corbin moving forward and having a spotlight on him as money at the bankholder.

I thought there was a, I was very encouraged by a cast being able to show that edge in that.

I believed that he was a bad guy who, you know, was willing to just cash in a friend in order to advance his career.

I think that's a good heel.

I'm optimistic about him.

I mean, I don't know what the ceiling is.

But it's, again, we're on a journey to see what that is.

And that's what I love about watching wrestling.

Great matches are great.

Seeing wrestlers like Cass or Baron Corbin, under scrutiny, get a bigger push and rise to the occasion is also a lot of fun.

And I'm looking forward to it after this segment, especially.

And I was a mouthful of words.

I was, you know, for everything that Cass said, for everybody, you know, talking about how heavily scripted the promos are.

It came off as a shoot.

It didn't look like he was memorizing anything.

That's right.

It was words from the heart.

There was a lot of garbage there.

So I thought it came across well.

Well, I dug it.

What do you, what do you see anything at end?

So, like, where do you see him ending up?

I guess it's a better word.

I mean, he, he and Cass had a good chemistry and it worked.

There was a time to move on.

Does he become a heel manager?

Does he become a cruiserweight?

Does he become Scotty too hotty and just job on TV?

Like, I just don't know what his role is now.

No, I think that remains to be seen.

But I think the guy, so he's got so much charisma.

He's such a good talk on the microphone.

He certainly a valuable asset.

I just don't know what they do with him.

So yeah, that's a great question.

I don't know the answer to.

But I like the kids as far as on the horn.

I think he's one of the bright spots in the locker room.

So how that ends up playing up.

Your guess is as good as mine.

Yeah, I hope he's not just discarded.

You know, I mean, I hope that come up with something.

No, no, I don't think that's going to happen.

I mean, I wouldn't think that's going to happen by a long shot.

I'm curious.

So Roman comes out at the top of the show.

And I mean, this is like the Roman people taught on my podcast,

a week ago Monday, we had four people call who were in the building.

And two or three of them talked about the dark match with Roman.

And how he just seemed to be unchained.

Like, I get this act how I want, react to the crowd how I want.

And they like, I like that version of Roman.

When the red light wasn't on, there was something about him.

That was more authentic.

And I don't know if it was intentional or what,

but this seemed to be the most authentic response that we ever got to Roman.

He got to actually kind of smart off to the fans a little bit and react to their booze.

And snarl and be kind of dare I say, he'll wish.

But in a way that may be the people who are cheering him.

Don't see it as he'll wish.

They just see it as him standing up for his for his cause.

I don't know what was your take on on his approach.

It felt different.

I was well, I got on the network and I was watching some of his earlier heel stuff.

I just like him as a straight up heel.

So I did too.

Yeah.

That's my take.

Yeah.

It was interesting.

I don't know if they're testing those waters or they're just going all in with.

We're just going to let him be himself and he's going to be kind of like Brock.

Whoever the best match of his face or heel, that's who he'll face.

And we'll just ride that for a while.

Maybe they can make that work.

I'm just interested in seeing when the full thing happens.

Whereas like either he clicks and gets it all or the riding or the booking or the push all comes,

you know, right into the laser and he's got this perfect trajectory.

And he's got a good comp set of what's going on.

Everybody's on the same page as far as how we're going to what's the best way to book this guy.

And he lights up and really becomes a top top guy.

That's what I'm looking for.

I'm too.

And I mean, I he'd still be one of my top draft picks.

If I had just if if all wrestlers became free agents and I was a promoter with a billion dollars to spend.

I mean, Roman's absolutely top one, two, three draft pick.

He's that talented.

But you want to put him in a slot that isn't driving people away or reminding people of him being kind of the corporate chosen one.

That in their mind is what drove CM Punk, you know, out.

So it was just, yeah, just it's figuring that out.

Joe, though, I think they're figuring out.

I mean, Joe, I just I love what they've done with him.

And I thought this week was another really good week for him.

Yeah, I like Joe.

And I liked when he got the cocaine and clutch on Roman.

And then with the distraction.

So I'm looking forward to great balls of fire.

I guess what you allow me to whatever it is.

I'm looking forward to that match because I'm a big Joe fan.

And I want to see what kind of match him and brought decide to put together.

Oh, totally.

Yeah.

And then the bronze, the, the, the match later, it was a big match to give away with Joe and Reigns.

But I just think Vince has to be looking at this and going.

First of all, it's kind of a joke.

But I also think it's true.

People say, if you ever, if you make Reigns look good, Vince loves you, you know, it worked for AJ.

It's like, I think Joe is making Reigns look good.

And I think that is warming Vince to the idea that Joe is someone who he should be thinking about.

And the primary tier of guys that he's thinking about, who do I want him to face at WrestleMania next year?

Because Vince doesn't have a long list of guys he worries about a lot in that respect.

I think Joe might be adding himself to that list of guys that Vince is actually going to book the lineup around.

Well, man, it's like I've been saying for ever since he got brought into WWE and it went down to NXT and like God dang, bring the guy up.

He's one of the best workers that there is.

And so you get a guy out there in the vein of AJ.

Many people didn't think just as far as WWE that AJ was really going to have a chance to succeed.

They're, hey man, all of a sudden, you put that guy out there and just let him do his thing.

And he goes to the top because the cream rises to the top.

And AJ grabbed the proverbial grass ring when I don't really think they had it in the plans for him until that guy started lighting it up.

And so Joe's the same way.

He's just a true talent that could work his ass off.

You know, you can put a little bit more salt and pepper on his promos, just a frog's hair.

But there's nothing wrong with him.

I buy into him. He's legit.

I like him. He's a threat. He can work his ass off.

So no, I'm happy for Joe and happy with anything that they do with him or for him because I like him and he's legit.

We talked about what wasn't there in that Ziggler Nakamura match.

And granted, there's more, there was more of a build up to this in terms of grudge and the Mike work earlier in the show.

I love Joe's facial reactions in this match.

And I even just like reigns arm dragging out of the cocaine a clutch like it was with force.

It wasn't it didn't look like it was for show.

It looked like I'm trying to get out of this because I don't want to be in this.

Not I'm going to arm drag to make it look smooth.

I just like how tight and how intense the match was.

And so yeah, I just I'm very happy that Joe is getting like you said,

what he deserved the opportunity to prove he could do when given the chance.

And then Strowman returns. That was a big return.

You've been gone for for a while.

And I thought he looked good.

I the crowd popped for him.

I mean, I'm not quite sure what the reaction is going to be when they wrestle because I think the people who boot Roman like Strowman.

So it could be a weird crowd reaction.

But Strowman picking up or left off, I thought picking up where I left off the crowd blew the roof off the place form,

which was, you know, I think they're excited to have a guy back because I think that a lot of people are like me.

They see big things in this guy on a critical note.

Man, just too many of the arms up in the air, you know, whether your baby face or a heel, you know,

any exited ambulance arms up the air.

Yeah, there in the middle of doing something with Roman arms up in an air.

Grab the microphone and set something arms up in an air.

I mean, little too much of that.

You know, that's almost, you know, you could, I could take the middle fingers too far.

You could take the looking, you know, hogan waving the ear too much.

I just thought just coming back, you don't need to think.

You start looking like a cheerleader out there.

So you have to be careful with moments like that.

But the crowd was glad to see him back. He was very physical.

I'm looking forward to him getting back on track and we'll see where it goes again.

I think this guy has a big money player written all over him.

Just, you know, don't look like a cheerleader so much.

Did you catch the Elias Samson segment with Finn Balor?

Yeah, I liked it because, you know, I've only, and there's something guitar playing segments or a little, whatever.

But just the little bit that I've seen, I like him, but I don't know anything about him.

Yeah, I mean, it was in development for a while.

He did some indie work and I think in the Northeast before that.

I don't think people who watched NXT thought this is going to be the breakout star of the summer of 2017.

And I don't know that he will be, but I tell you what, if he has matches with Finn Balor, he's going to have a chance to show what he can do.

And I want Finn, I mean, I hope Finn Balor fans aren't panicking because I think he's kind of the odd man out right now in terms of established top guys.

But if Finn Balor can make Elias Samson look like a million bucks and help advance him, I think that'll help Balor.

And it can help Samson. I mean, he's got a presence to him. He's got a memorable character.

So I'm intrigued by it, you know what I mean, it's week one.

I'm intrigued by as well because I mean, I don't know anything about the guy.

I don't know how long he's been in the business, but he's got a good look.

The match I saw from him a week too, whenever it was ago, he's mechanically sounding the ring from what I saw.

So I don't know, there's something about him.

I like the name, the gimmick, so we'll see how it does.

And if Finn can light anybody up, he's a helicist worker.

So the only thing is those backstage segments with those interviewers are just so forced or set up stage.

And if they just make them a little bit more organic, the way the questions are posed.

And then the course that didn't get a chance to just that dead silence at the end because Samson makes the, you know, from behind attacks Finn.

But just those things could fit a little bit more natural and more like a shoot more like that person was really a part of the raw or smack down team.

It would make it a little bit more legit.

Well, I think it would help to just have some interviews, be just interviews.

Yeah, no kidding.

Yeah, I mean, it's okay for someone to interview somebody and not have someone get attacked, you know?

Like my analogy and I don't know if it worked or not that I tried earlier this week on my podcast was in the NFL not every handoff leads to a 50 yard run down the field.

So you got to have those those lot, the one yard losses, the three yard gains for the 50 yard breakout to be exciting.

And sometimes you just want to watch an interview and have an interview, be an interview so that on the rare occasion that somebody attacks somebody, it seems out of the ordinary and, you know, not normal.

And here, you know, you see Finn Balor getting interviewed and you're like, well, this is weird. This doesn't feel, oh, now I get it.

It's because he's going to be attacked.

Right. So yeah.

Final kind of big segment of the show is just Seth and Bray.

You know, I've talked a lot about Bray and Seth both.

Now they're feuding with one another.

Seth talked about his history with the authority again.

He talked about giving into the temptation and having, I guess, I don't know if it was exact words, but having an empty feeling when he had all the material positions.

And that it wasn't for him.

And fans started chanting you deserve it, which was odd.

You know, you deserve to cheat and get all these material possessions.

Like that's not really what we're going for here, folks.

But Seth waited and then he thanked him.

And then he said he thanked the fans for giving him a second chance and no material possession can make up for that.

And it was all kind of a set up to promote that he's on the cover of 2K 18, the latest video game.

And then Bray interrupted what is Seth finding his way Steve or is he still struggling to figure out what his voice as a baby face is going to be?

When people think Stone Cold Steve Austin, they know what your voice was and what you represented.

It was anti-vents.

They knew your character.

I still don't know that Seth referencing.

Well, I once gave in to temptation, but thanks are going to be a second chance now that I'm going to do things the right way.

I just feel like he should be past that now.

I agree with you 100%. I have him on notes.

I like Bray's promo.

So I mean, Seth always saying, you know, I had all the material possessions in the world and all this stuff and the second chance.

And this is our cover, you know, edges.

You know, and maybe this maybe this is Seth's voice that this is on what he is.

So I'm looking forward to seeing matchups with him and a ring with people that do his type of, you know, athletic based sequences in wrestling as a character.

You know, he's Seth Rollins no more, no less.

And that's just calling it like I see it.

I think you're seeing who and what Seth Rollins is when he gets in a ring.

That's who and what he is on the other side of that promo.

I like I like Bray's promo because you know, he laughed a little bit at the beginning.

He kept it not too long as far as the promo goes and he said, what you're going to pay the price.

You're going to make a sacrifice, whatever it was.

But I just took him as a little bit more serious here and I don't know.

I just like I like Bray's promo.

One thing that was good specifically is he talked about how Seth claims to be his own man.

And he said that now he was conforming to the authority, but he's still conforming.

He's just conforming to what the people want him to be.

Right.

The universe wants him to be.

I like that line because you want the heel to make an argument that as a viewer you think makes sense to the heel.

Now ultimately you want a strong enough baby face to counter that.

I don't know that Seth saying I'm not, I'm not a man.

I'm the man.

I don't know that that is a comeback saying I'm the man.

It's like Seth frickin Rollins.

What does freaking mean?

What is that?

It doesn't, it's, it's just abstract.

So I thought Bray was stronger here in, in cutting down Bray by saying you can wear the clothes of a good honest man.

But deep down, you're not that man.

It gave Seth something to prove otherwise, but I don't think he did a good job verbally countering that.

And I do think Bray kind of won this debate so to speak if you were to judge it as such.

Yeah.

So it was, it was an interesting setup.

Any final takeaways as we have reached the one hour mark.

No, no, we're just at 15 minutes deep.

We're just going to be a, we're just going to be a denial.

What a rib.

What a great job we did keeping it to 15 minutes this week.

This is the biggest rib in sports entertainment.

But it's always fun talking to you and we, we actually tried to keep it short.

But then again, we're trying to talk about a pay-per-view, a Monday Night Raw and a Tuesday's Smackdown.

So I mean, there was a lot to discuss.

And, and we only really kind of glossed over some of the highlights or the takeaways.

Well, here's, yeah, I mean, this was a bigger week than normal.

I mean, it was a, this was not the best week to try to trim it down to 15 with a pay-per-view, a very eventful Raw.

And then some pretty significant follow-up on Smackdown.

I don't think there's anything else that we miss that's, that's, I mean, the Bears, you know, Bowen Kurt.

No, we're not going to do that.

But the fact that we did go an hour and usually on a big pay-per-view at a television table,

and they'd be giving you the Go Home queue.

This is my show. It's a Steve Austin show.

I can do whatever the fuck I want. And people like it when we talk wrestling.

I got a chance to listen to 45 minutes of call-ins before I got to you.

But when we start shooting the shit, we're just shooting the shit.

Any thoughts or, wait, before we sign off, please tell people how they can find you on social media

and everything that you do for the pro-rusting industry and MMA.

Absolutely, yeah. MMATorch.com or running stories on Mayweather and Conor McGregor,

which you and I talked about last week at the end of the show.

So check it out, MMATorch.com, Daily News Updates, Live Event, Coverage Fight Previews.

The main thing that I do that's similar to this is podcasting.

And four days a week, I do a Post Raw show, a Post Smackdown show, midweek flagship.

We're talking about a Broadway of issues and then interview Thursday.

And you can find all those shows at PWTorchLiveCast.com.

That's PWTorchLiveCast.com.

I also write News Updates and we got a whole and cover runs back to on live and written format.

Well, the show's air, same thing with pay-per-views.

You can find my written reviews along with a whole array of great contributions from a great team of writers at PWTorch.com.

And then the fourth final thing is our membership. You can find out information on becoming a member

and having 15 plus podcasts per week.

Most of them that I'm part of with a VIP membership, full details, whole rundown, access to 30 years of archives of podcasts and newsletters.

It's fascinating to dive into the archives and read what we're writing at the time that maybe you first became a fan.

Full details on that at PWTorch.com slash go VIP.

That's PWTorch.com slash go VIP. We'd love to have you as a customer.

So if you like what I do here on Steve's show, I do a lot more of it throughout the week.

Good talking to you Wade.

Thank you Steve. Very much.

All right everybody, give me the go home.

Q's time to wrap up his podcast and ride off into the sunset.

But before I do, I want to thank Wade Keller, the pro wrestling torch for joining him on a podcast today.

I was originally going to air the phone calls that I took in the studio a couple of Saturdays ago from you guys.

I appreciate all the phone calls.

Me and Wade spun away out of control.

It was a damn good time. Spending some time talking about Monday Night Raw and Smackdown.

I love to talk about pro wrestling. I love what happens inside the squared circle.

I love the angles. I love the store lines. I love to see who's getting over it.

How they're getting over what they're doing, what they're saying, how they're working like pro wrestling.

So it's fun to talk about it.

I'm going to air the first session of phone calls coming next Thursday on the unleash show.

Wade will be down to 15 minutes slot and we're going to have fun and chop it up in short fashion.

I can talk to that guy all damn day.

Thank you Wade for being on the show.

Look forward to talking to you next week and more in the future.

Hey man, I got to give you guys something to watch.

And when I was watching on the WWE Network, it caught my eye.

I was Brock Lesnar and Samoa Joe, the pull apart and slow motion.

Man, it was a pretty damn epic pull apart.

Those things can be cluster folks if not executed in a proper fashion.

Both of these guys were hotter than hell.

That's super kick towards the end right there when Samoa Joe tagged Brock and Brock just had this look on his face like,

oh, motherfucker, I want to beat this shit out of you.

I tell you what, great execution on everybody's part.

I look forward to seeing these guys have a badass match.

Samoa Joe is one of my favorite workers in Jesus Christ.

Brock Lesnar got them. This is going to be a hell of a match.

I'm looking forward to it. Brock Lesnar's a bad sumbitch.

So I'm looking forward to that. Check that out.

If you're on the WWE Network, check out that segment where Randy Orton catches that RKO on Gender Mahal.

That was a great spot.

And I enjoyed Fan Dang on Tyler Breeze. That segment was damn good too.

I like the Mojo Raleigh interview. You can catch that on the highlight package as well.

And check out that Sami Zayn promo as well.

I like that fire in there.

And so there was a bunch of little segments that you can watch on WWE Network.

And this ain't no plug. That's some shit that I really enjoyed.

So it's fun talking about it.

Anyway, let me wrap his motherfucker up.

I got some T-shirts over pro us some T's dot com slash Steve Austin.

We about to start filming here in July.

We're going to come up some more and they're pretty badass.

In my opinion, best damn IPA on the planet is Broken School IPA.

And you can get Broken School IPA at Whole Foods and Total Wines if you live in California.

If you ain't in Cali, check inside the seller dot com and see if they ship to your state.

And you can find everything.

And Steve Austin related, including the cold steel, Broken School knife and the working man's knife at Broken School Ranch dot com.

You can also check out the commercial spots I shot for the Kawasaki Mule Pro FX R and the Kawasaki Mules on my website.

If you just go to home page and scroll down to the bottom, I had a lot of fun doing those.

The Kawasaki Pro FX Pro FX T Pro FX R and the Mules are badass.

I enjoy riding them.

I want to say one more time.

Thank you to all you people for calling into the studio the other day.

And I also want to say thank you to all the fine sponsors of the Steve Austin show because that's how I'm able to do this podcast for you twice a week for free.

And you can find all of my sponsors at podcast one dot com.

Just click on the killer deals button at the top of the page and then click on the Steve Austin show banner.

Hey folks, keep listening to 60 second AP news headlines coming up next.

And until then, my name is Steve Austin and I will catch you raps down the road.

Thanks for listening to Steve Austin Unleashed.

Catch new episodes every Thursday on the podcast one app or subscribe at Apple podcasts or podcast one dot com.

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