WWE RAW POST-SHOW (10/5): Keller & Maitland talk Roman-Knight face-to-face and Knight's inconsistency and Roman's narcissism, MITB build

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1:35 Now, PW Torch brings you the Wade Keller Pro Wrestling Post Show.

1:41 It's time to talk this week's WWE Monday Night Raw.

1:45 All right, Chris.

1:50 We had a, I thought a strong main event with Liv Morgan and Becky Lynch and it's video package or a couple of promos or vignettes to build it up. And then we had ended up where we kind of thought we were going to end up, which is the triple threat match. I thought Stephanie of a care came across a little hot headed by assuming Becky intentionally hit her when there wasn't really a, like a lot of reason to believe that. But ultimately wanting both in the ring.

2:18 if you can look past that made logical sense. And so now we're getting the match, uh, with essentially two baby faces against one heel. Uh, cause that's sort of his fancy way of doing things these days. So, um, good, good main event, non-finish, uh, the ending, the landing place we kind of thought we're going to end up with.

2:33 What'd you think?

2:35 I just would prefer that they actually just went there and had a few, that was a three-way feud and built up that way. Uh, one of the things, and obviously I'll, I'll plug our show later that as I've learned about recovering different wrestling is, uh, having long matches just for a long match sake and the match doesn't really matter. I feel that you set up this Becky lift feud, good video packages on both sides. You have this really strong match, but in reality it is only leading to a triple threat match that we all thought was going to happen anyway. And I would have preferred if you have, that's the end goal to have that match to have an actual three-way feud between the three competitors,

3:13 as opposed to this sort of random, the judgment day, cheat about a thousand times and then stephanie vaquera runs in on the referee does a double disqualification as soon as she stephanie puts her hands up uh you know again the match was good for the match on saturday will be good i just would i prefer a straight storyline if they were going to do.

3:33 A three-way yeah they ended up with a contrivance right i mean this just felt like a contrivance chris yeah.

3:41 And just sort of the random i'm so mad it's it's weird how so many people booked the shows for Adam Pearce because pretty much all the matches are determined by wrestlers who are either mad or scheduling for next week. And so it was like, if that's what you wanted to do, they were building up that dynamic between them anyway when Stephanie was feuding with Liv and Liv was the champion. Just make it a triple threat match. Find a better way to do it. You could have easily booked your way off of that from what happened in the the match where Stephanie won the title in Chile, but instead you have this convoluted thing that just, to me, just seems so contrived that just a better booking decision would have had an angle and have them interworking with

4:27 each other over the last several weeks. But maybe they just didn't have time for that. And this was like the quickest way to do it.

4:33 Yeah.

4:33 I think at some point it'd be good for WWE to just go back to a more straightforward way of doing things because there's so many tropes and contrivances that they're leaning on now to tell stories and i think viewers are kind of onto it and it just sort of feels by the time we get there it's just sort of predictable and tropey and then you end up in order to get there with you know the baby face acting or you know safety of care acting in an unreasonable way that makes you not really respect her as much for her decision making or her temper or her cognitive skills and so i don't know they just It does feel to sort of plug and play with some of the ways they get from point A to point B to point C. And I think that doesn't have...

5:19 It shows a lack of faith in the wrestlers to just sell a match that is booked based on merit and an authority figure making a logical decision. And then the wrestlers talk about facing each other. I think the feeling is, by default, that's boring. And I think it underestimates... How much mileage you can get out of having a more sports-like vibe to the presentation where fans are really rooting for one person to win, the other to lose, and a title that matters, and a sense of authority figures and a structure that is credible. And it's like they've given up on those, I think, without reason, and now we just get sort of tropey paths to get to where they're going instead of just saying, here's what

6:05 we're doing, and now we're going to build it up.

6:08 Yeah, during the match, I was thinking, so Judgment Day is cheating left and right. If they ended up winning, if Liv ended up winning because Judgment Day cheated, would that just have been the finish? Even though we all would have seen it, and we'd be like, well, I guess Liv won, so she's wrestling Stephanie Vecure for the title. Sorry, Becky.

6:26 I'm glad Stephanie Vecure, maybe she's on the team with the commissioner. She's trying to have some rules and law and order. But yeah, I just think it, One of my biggest pet peeves in wrestling is just the lack of storylines, which is great to say on a pay-per-view called Money in the Bank, which is one of the things I'm not a big fan of anymore in wrestling.

6:49 It is much easier for us to have some contrived match where someone wins and they can wrestle with a world champion than actually have a storyline reason for why someone wrestles the world champion.

7:02 And.

7:03 This is just another example of that, of where they're just like, let's just have a match. You know, the match will be good on paper because that's important, but it would be much more effective and get people into it more if you had a proper storyline.

7:17 Let's step back from how they got here and just talk about the match. Now, going into Saturday, you've got Becky Lynch and Vaquer. Who do you think the fans are most behind and kind of by what ratio? I mean, Liv is entertaining, but she's just playing the heel. So fans are kind of playing along and buying into the storyline.

7:35 They'll boo her and boo the shenanigans of the Judgment Day, which there's likely to be a lot. How do you think the care has looked and how has Becky come across since her return with, again, kind of as is WWE's 2026 approach, muddling people's emotions when it comes to who they're rooting for?

7:54 Yeah, with Becky, I was trying, I can't remember. How did she come back as a face? I don't even remember. But she just came back. She was a heel when she left. And then she just came back as a baby face now. And it's like, it's Becky Lynch. You remember her. Of course we do. We love her. Don't disregard what happened the last time you saw her on TV. Sorry, go ahead.

8:14 Oh, and it felt like it was going to be just based on facing Liv and then Vicar immediately entered the picture and it just muddled everything again.

8:21 Yeah.

8:22 I think Becky will be on paper the bigger star or the person that people will be cheering for the most. I do think that Stephanie will have her segment of the crowd that will be behind her, especially because she'll do probably the most spectacular moves, and a lot of times in matches now, the person that does that gets cheered, whether they're a heel or a face anyway. Liv, obviously, people do like her as an entertaining act, as you mentioned, but she is also a heel. The Judgment Day will be running in, cheating for her left and right, so that will also probably lead to them being booed. But I would say that the bulk of the fans, the fans of the person with the highest percentage of the fans rooting for them would be Becky.

9:05 Yeah, I think so too. And I don't think that is what they told the story that they wanted to tell, but I don't, I don't think they sat down and said, let's undercut Stephanie of a care's popularity. I think they said, we don't trust for care to be able to carry her end of a feud with live. So we'll let Becky come in and do the heavy lifting and Becky will just be Becky and we'll just let the.

9:29 Wade cut out there for a second, but he was talking about the dynamic between Stephanie and Becky and interjecting Becky in the match to do the heavy lifting. I think one of the things that's another wrestling trope that I don't like is people get very big into title changes, especially when the babyface wins. A lot of people get happy about that, whatever world title you have. But then when the baby face wins, you don't have any... I don't know if I'm even on anymore. I'm on now.

10:03 From that standpoint, I think it doesn't make Stephanie look bad from the fact that she wins the title, but she sort of is put in the background because Becky was a special guest referee, and then instead of going straight to a match with an opponent, she's sort of in the middle. between Liv and Becky, Stephanie is, and then sort of, you know, comes in and runs in this main event for no reason. So I was just talking there, Wade.

10:31 I appreciate it.

10:32 You cut out there for a minute.

10:35 I'm switching from my Wi-Fi to a hotspot. We'll see if I do a little bit better here. A little more reliably. We'll see what's going on. Thanks for carrying on. There's a latency when I click a button. on the switchboard for anything to happen. So I end up hitting it like four times and then we get it flashing on and off while I wait for everything to catch up.

10:55 It's weird.

10:57 Mark Paschetti says Wade just turned heel. Oh, that showed up a little faster. Maybe the hotspots working better. Anyway, yes. I heard 7-Eleven says the 947 came for Wade. No, no, the latency is back. It's still there. Yes, although if the latency... The latency. That should be a name of a faction, the latency. If the 946 came for me and they, I don't know, they used a machine gun and shot me to pieces, WWE would just act like it's a normal week next week. It's just, whatever, you know?

11:37 We'll get into that.

11:39 All right.

11:39 We've covered the closing segment in the women's match sufficiently, at least here for Blockade. We can revisit it as we go along with callers and chat comments and emails. But Let's pause and introduce ourselves and hope for a more reliable connection here as the show progresses. Did you know that you can enjoy commercial-free versions of all of your favorite Wade Keller podcasts and PWTorch daily casts on Spotify?

12:03 Just go to patreon.com, search PWTorch, and subscribe to a VIP membership tier. You get a seven-day free trial, by the way, to kick the tires a bit and see if you like the service. And then sync it with Spotify, and you can listen to commercial-free versions of our free shows, like the Wade Keller Post Shows, the Wade Keller Podcast Flagship, our Flashbacks, and also the PWTorch Daily Cast lineup. Again, all commercial-free, a nice streamlined listening experience. But with third-tier membership, you can also unlock all the VIP podcasts, including Everything with Rich and Wade, The Fix with Todd Martin that I host with Todd every week, the Wade Keller News Bulletin, Post Pay-Per-View Roundtables, and an array of other VIP-exclusive podcasts

12:40 with different hosts and different themes. Check out the lineup. Go to Patreon and search PWTorch and subscribe and sync it up with Spotify or stay within the Patreon ecosystem. Either way works. Go to Patreon and start your seven-day free trial. This is the Wade Keller Pro Wrestling Post Show for Monday, October 5th, 2026. I'm Wade Keller, host of the show, editor, publisher, and founder of the Pro Wrestling Torch Weekly newsletter and the website PWTorch.com. and also the host of various podcasts, such as the Wade Keller Post Shows and Wade Keller Podcast. Tomorrow, Jason Powell from ProWrestling.net is scheduled to join me as co-host on the flagship, our Blue Logo Show. If you are not subscribing to

13:26 that or haven't refreshed it in a while, be sure to do so to catch the flagship tomorrow. Again, that's Jason Powell from ProWrestling.net joining me. You can search Wade Keller in your podcast app to subscribe to that podcast for free. Or you can become a VIP member, pwtorchvipinfo.com. Gives you full details on how to become a VIP member. Chris, how am I holding up for you in terms of being able to hear me and see me?

13:57 I can hear you. See you fine.

13:59 Okay, good, good. I'm trying to figure out where the issue is. And mostly I just want, even if my experience is lagging, I don't want people watching and listening to to be disrupted. So I'll just act business as usual. So Chris Maitland is my guest co-host today. We're here to talk raw. Chris, welcome to the program. You are of the Wrestling Coast to Coast show. That is part of our PWTorch daily cast lineup. So everyone should search PWTorch in your podcast app and subscribe. If you're watching us on YouTube, those podcasts are podcast only. They're not part of the YouTube lineup here on our PWTorch channel.

14:35 So definitely subscribe. Search PWTorch.

14:38 Chris, welcome.

14:40 Thank you for having me.

14:42 Absolutely.

14:44 This is a point in the show where I plug what I do here at the torch. My name is Chris Maitland. As Wade says, I host Wrestling Goes to Coast with my good friend of over 25 years, Justin McClelland. We cover a different independent wrestling show every week, cover it kind of the same way a lot of the shows here are covered at the torch. What we like, what we don't like. As I like to mention, a lot of the pet peeves I see in independent wrestling exist on televised wrestling. There was one in this match I'll get to a little bit later. Last week, Justin and I covered Wrestling Open from Beyond Wrestling, which I said was one of the best episodic programs going on in wrestling that I see. I really am enjoying watching that.

15:24 And next week, we're covering Wrestling Revolver show that I was at this weekend in Dayton, which had the first scaffold match that I've ever seen live. And that was very frightening. But Justin and I cover a different show every week. It comes on the PWTorch Daily Cast app on Thursdays. And also for people that are in the VIP forum, we are taking requests. If you want Justin and I to review a match for VIP listeners, you can put it in the forum. There is a forum table there. And we will get to it. We're doing our first match. Justin wasn't able to make the show, the solo show last week, so we're going to do our first match this week. That was written in the forum.

16:05 So if you're in the VIP forum, go check it out and Suggest matches for Justin and I to take a look at.

16:15 That is awesome. I've switched to a third Wi-Fi option, my mesh system. So hopefully it holds up better. So I'm back for that. Let's just note that if you want to be a caller on the show, the link is in my TV report at PWTorch. Just go to the website, go to my TV report, and look for the link. You're all welcome to be a caller. You can also email us at wadekellerpostshow at gmail.com. Otherwise, we'll keep an eye on the chat, and everybody's welcome to contribute their thoughts on what we're saying or topic suggestions as we progress here. Up next, we're going to bring Arlay into the show. They attended the show live tonight, so we'll get an on-site report. Arlay, welcome.

17:00 Hey, Wade and Chris.

17:01 How are you? All right. How are you doing? Good. I'm okay.

17:06 I'm hoping that you can hear me. What do.

17:09 You want us to call you, by the way?

17:11 You can just go with Arlay, just to keep it simple.

17:14 Yeah, we can.

17:16 Arlay? Cool.

17:18 That works.

17:19 Yep. Cool.

17:22 That you think we didn't notice on TV.

17:26 Well, I can give you the most random thing that I remember from the show, which was Ethan Page cutting a promo. I don't know if it was on TV or not, but Ethan Page cutting a promo on Ray Phoenix. Was that on the show or not?

17:45 I don't think so, or I missed it.

17:47 Not on the commercial version?

17:49 I'm pretty sure it was mainly for the live crowd, but he was basically doing the general, you know, I'm a big man. Well, not big man, but I'm a full grown man. Ray Phoenix is a small man. Basically priming up the crowd to see Ray Phoenix beat him. Um, I think that that was something that, again, you wouldn't have seen if you weren't there. Um, but a lot of the show, I mean, it wasn't really too much stuff like during the breaks, um, or anything like that.

18:16 And I did get there a few minutes late because I was coming from class. So, or not a few minutes late, but I pretty much got there right when the show started.

18:24 Um, but yeah.

18:26 Um, if there's any specific questions I can answer that because I don't really know where to go.

18:33 For sure. Yeah, well, what I'm really curious about is the opening exchange with L.A. Knight and Roman Reigns. Give me a feeling of the vibe in the building.

18:43 L.A.

18:43 Knight typically lately has been very popular. He went face to face with Roman. He didn't blink. He didn't look intimidated. Roman gave, you know, threw a bunch of insults at him.

18:52 L.A.

18:53 Knight fired back with, I thought, some, you know, good lines if you're open to cheering L.A. Knight over Roman. Some a little cliche-ish, you know, the sort of meta stuff you were built with. by a corporation, but other stuff, uh, just landed storyline wise. And then he made fun of his teeth being super shiny and Reigns did hit one of his, you know, three main facial expressions, which is a eye twitching. What did you, what'd you make of the crowd reaction here? Was there an Evan flow? Was it 50, 50? Tell me about it.

19:22 Okay, as far as the crowd reaction, when L.A.

19:26 Night came out, the crowd was really loud, really like, you know, first when Roman was on the screen, the crowd really came up at first.

19:33 Then L.A.

19:34 Night's music hit, and the crowd got even louder. And then, you know, once Roman came out, the crowd got even louder again. So I think that they staggered that in a well way, except if you're LA Knight, you know, Roman's.

19:49 Kind of still overshadowing you in that way.

19:53 But as far as the exchange itself, you know, the stuff that Roman was saying, the crowd was really more on Roman's side with that.

20:05 And honestly, so was I. Because Between the two, if you're looking.

20:10 At this in isolation, Roman made a lot more sense than LA Knight did in the promo. I understand the story that they're trying to tell with LA Knight, and I've never really been able to say this.

20:23 In the chat, the limited characters you can.

20:26 Put in there, but the whole LA Knight thing, while I get that the crowd likes him, and I like him too, so I want to put that out there, the story that they have told has never made any sense, at least for this year. Because, you know, I know that they've kind of gone back and forth with, like, who's the babyface, who's the heel when it comes to Roman and other parts. But all the stuff that LA Knight has said ever since right after WrestleMania, the problem is.

20:58 Roman has won every single match this year he's had on his own by himself. Everything that LA Knight has said as far as Roman is going to destroy us all once the bloodline comes together, it's like LA Knight has been the instigator in this entire thing this whole year. But I don't really want to go into my thoughts because I could go into that all day. But as far as the crowd, the crowd was really more on Roman's side. Even when Roman, when LA Knight started with the manufactured industry plant stuff, like the crowd kind of booed him. I don't know if they came across on TV.

21:33 But I think that the crowd here in St. Louis was really more interested in what Roman had to say.

21:40 What was your take on it watching on Netflix?

21:46 Yeah, I never like the promo of someone saying that you're manufactured and you were chosen to be here, but you're in the main event too. Someone chose you. It wasn't like he won a contest where someone spinned a wheel and LA Knight got in the match. So generally, I'm not a huge fan of that. I think that Knight did okay, but he also didn't seem to have a point. I mean, I think it would have been better if he just said, you know, You're going to be up against me. I know they wrestled before once on Crown Jewel, but you've been ducking me all this time, and now we're going to get in the ring, blah, blah, blah.

22:26 It's just a simple matter of that, as opposed to getting into this meta, you're fake, you're phony. Because part of it to me is Roman Reigns on WWE TV, as Arlay said, is very successful. So I don't know why he wins, he's won all of his matches, especially now that he's sort of a babyface. So I don't know why you'd want to reiterate the fact that he's not as good as he says he is because he wins that much. And also, again, I assume LA Knight's not winning because if I was winning, I would be talking about how great you were because when I beat you, I'm even better. So I also think the dynamic is very weird because of what's going on at 9-4-6 and it sort of being something that they care about. But

23:08 then it's like, hey, we got a title match to go over, so we'll put that aside and worry about that next week.

23:16 Yeah, yeah. This is another version, Arlay, of let the fans pick them. You know, we're going to put two people out there, let them go at each other, have Joe Tessitore, after it's all done, go, oh, it's on, and really hard sell it. And, you know, it's sort of like, I think they believe that letting wrestlers kind of go at each other is sort of pseudo-unscripted. It feels like they're going places they're not supposed to go, the new work. the new way to kind of play fans for Marks. And I think they think that's the winning approach now is just let two baby faces go in there and tear each other apart. Mark Paschetti in the chat said, I thought Roman was full heel. Tonight he's 100% face. Bad storytelling and disregarding time-tested good versus bad.

24:03 Letting the crowd choose is dumb. 7-Eleven said, I don't want to hear Knight talk about how Roman is a plant. And more, I want to hear Knight expressing his confidence how confident he is facing Roman this time. 7-Eleven said, yeah, I kind of felt like LA Knight was rambling. So, you know, mixed feelings on this. 7-Eleven actually, yeah.

24:31 Oh, I was just going to say.

24:33 Jump in.

24:35 To me, the story would make more sense if Because, like I said, ever since WrestleMania, I mean, Roman has faced Punk, he's faced Jacob, where Jacob was the aggressor pretty much both times, and Roman beat him by himself both times.

24:51 You know, he beat Seth at SummerSlam by himself every match he's ever rematch he's had, and he beat Penta by himself, which he stated on the show, which I was glad to actually hear. But it would be better to me from a story since if LA Knight was basically saying, listen, in the past, we know what you've done.

25:10 You've relied on your family. I can see that you're not doing that now.

25:14 And you know what?

25:15 I'm glad that you're not because I am ready to finally find out if I can beat you one on one, man to man. That would make the story make more sense, and it would It wouldn't seem like someone whining about the past when the person isn't even doing the thing that you're claiming that they're doing.

25:37 Yeah, I want to face the best Roman and I want to see if I can beat Roman without help. I don't think it's whining and complaining to point out that Roman cheated to win last time or had help. But LA Knight should be up to date on what he's accusing Roman of being. Do you agree with that, Chris?

25:54 Exactly.

25:55 Yeah, I think that it's one of those things where it's like these people don't watch sports because it's very much to be focused on winning and beating the best opponent that you can. And again, as Arlay said, you can't have the mechanism of when we fought last time, you cheated, you had your family with you, your family's preoccupied with 9-4-6, so you're going to just be out against me and one-on-one, I'll prove to be the better man.

26:29 But instead, that is just not interesting enough because that's probably too old-school 80s wrestling. So we have to go through all this other stuff that just has never proven to be as effective. I mean, maybe you have a few times that people at the top of their head can say it worked out fairly well, but it just doesn't, overall, just doesn't get people into it. And I think that they should really steer clear from that.

26:58 Interesting comment from 7-Eleven, Arlay. He goes, it really sounds like two different people wrote the script for night between last week and this week.

27:06 Yeah.

27:07 Yeah. It does.

27:08 Yeah.

27:08 Yeah.

27:11 I thought that the, oh, by the way, JC Scooby just added this. TKO wants fans to pick like in UFC, you know, where it's like, just let them, let them yell at each other and let the fans choose. So I don't know. I mean, If that's what they want to do and it works, more power to them. I think, you know, to me it feels a little muddled. And you're asking fans to choose. I think we see a winning crowd reaction with Obafemi beating up clear-cut heels. We see, you know, pretty clear-cut babyface heel reactions is where the biggest pops of the night are. But they want the men's main event division to be different than the last year or so. So I don't know if it's happenstance and they'll move away from it or what, but I

27:59 think more importantly, most importantly, you want there to be consistency week to week and have LA Knight as a baby face, even if he's sharing the baby face role with Roman here. In effect, you want him to not be looking like he's got two different script writers who aren't paying attention to each other one week after another.

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29:21 Um the uh the i think what stood out to me for la night on a positive side is when roland was talking to him he didn't flinch he didn't blink he did not look like the moment was too big for him la night to me came across like he.

29:45 I'm sorry wait i couldn't hear you there was some issues on the on the highway here but don't worry i am using my bluetooth headphones can you repeat that part one more time.

29:54 Ah cool Did L.A. Knight feel like he felt he belonged? Because I felt he didn't flinch, he didn't blink, he just stared Roman down as Roman was talking to him.

30:06 He definitely seemed confident in what he was saying. His delivery was well. Like I said, I don't think that there's ever been an issue with L.A. Knight's delivery, his confidence, his posture in the ring or anything like that. I think that he's pretty much, ever since they brought him back as LA Knight, um, years ago. I think that that's always been the biggest strength is he does look like he can stand toe to toe with anybody and, and keep it going. Um, I, like I said, the issue is just more with the content of the comments.

30:46 Yup.

30:46 Yup.

30:47 Uh, very good. Uh, one comment from Derek Mitchell in the chat says, is it possible LA Knights telling Roman he can win the match without the bloodline? So 9-4-6 can interfere on Knight's behalf. I don't know if he's meaning that LA Knight's behind that or he would just benefit from it. But Chris, I'll throw to you first and then Arlie, you can jump right in when Chris is done. Do you think there's a 9-4-6 involvement that's going to affect the outcome of this match? What is LA Knight's awareness of it or reaction to it if it happens? Chris first.

31:22 If I was booking WWE, and I'm not for those of you scoring at home, I would definitely have 946 interfere in this match and cost Roman the title because of the different booking avenues you could go. They sort of hinted that in their videos that they very quickly send in during the show, which is a very good production team there. They got their 946. But one of the things that they said they have two left, and when they take them out, They're going to go for the big prize. And so they're already intimating that they're going to go after Roman. In a way, Roman seemed a bit not as interested in them or did not see them as the focus compared to being the champion.

32:05 So one of the ways that they can make Roman their focus is by taking the title away from him. And I think it would be something that would be really interesting. You could also have the storyline, as you mentioned, that did LA Knight know? Is he a part of it? Was it some sort of weird heel turn, which I don't think it should be, but you have a bit more intrigue there, and I think it would set up Survivor Series pretty well from that standpoint. So that would be my idea of what they should do. That would probably be the most interesting thing. I don't think they will do that, but I think that would be the most interesting thing.

32:41 I like your thoughts.

32:42 I was going to say very, very similar.

32:44 I think there should probably be some type of involvement if LA Knight were to win. I would want them to toss them, but at the same time, I don't really want LA Knight to be a part of it.

33:03 Just because there's.

33:06 So many like, this thing, a group that operates like a gang, which doesn't really seem to be L.A. style, but I could also see him, because like I said, if he's had paranoia this whole year of they're going to get me, the bloodline's eventually going to get me, well, it would make sense for him to kind of rent a gang for the weekend to take care of business and even if it's preemptive business and then, you know, whatever happens happens after that. Um, I just don't know where they would go with that, go from there. But I mean, if they did interfere, that would kind of be the way I.

33:44 Would see it.

33:48 Uh, Arlie, who got the most organic heel heat, just timeless. We want to see you lose and we are popping and cheering every time you're taking a bump or, uh, or get showing up. You had breaker and theory, uh, In the opening match, you had Raquel and Roxanne. In the next match, you had Ethan Page. And then you also had Dom and JD. And then you had Liv Morgan.

34:09 Those were the heels in the actual matches. Maybe there was something else on the show, too, that stood out. But yeah, tell me if there was a singular heel or heel act that got the most heat that fans were most into seeing get beat up.

34:23 Well, like I said, the Ethan Page thing stood out because he did cut that promo to really prime the crowd to boo him in his Rey Fenix match. But I mean, that was just a little, like I said, to the live crowd. As far as what I think overall, it was probably Dom and JD in that match because there were a lot of reactions to everything basically with Dom.

34:50 I would also say.

34:56 With the Bron Breaker and Austin Theory pairing they weren't really booing them specifically but there was.

35:03 A lot of boos for Logan Paul.

35:07 So but yeah I think it was the tag team match with Dom and JD that got the most organic reaction.

35:17 What did you think the fans were there for I know it's a weird question But were they there for a certain wrestler? Were they there to see wrestling? Were they there just because they wanted to be at the show and kind of participate in reacting to things? Did you get a sense? I don't know how many shows you've attended.

35:39 Let's see.

35:40 I've been to a few.

35:44 If I had to say what the people were really there for, I mean, again, you know, it's like it's Monday Night Raw.

35:50 Like, you know what Monday Night Raw is typically.

35:54 I think people wanted to see, obviously, Roman and what was going to happen with that.

35:59 I think a lot of people honestly wanted a little.

36:02 Bit more live follow-up to the 946 stuff.

36:07 But at the same time, I understand why they would not be in the arena. Because if that were real, what happened? No, they would not be there. Because either they would have been thrown out of the building when they came, or arrested, or.

36:23 would lay low, like they've been kind of saying on the show.

36:28 But as far as the rest, I mean, there weren't... I mean, I think for Raw, I think there were a lot of good TV matches that took place, and the people were reacting to pretty much every match on the show. A lot of people seemed into it, weren't really getting up too much during the matches. But I think that they also were there to see guys like Roman and Obafemi, who still continues to get giant reactions at the show. So I think they just want to see what those people are going to do and also be there for the action.

37:05 Tell me about Obafemi and where he ranks in terms of baby face reactions for live events that you've attended over the years. And I'm curious where that ranks in terms of what's most memorable about being at the show tonight.

37:19 Well, just as a range, even though I really would have liked to have attended shows in.

37:25 The 80s when I was younger, in my elementary school days.

37:31 I did not get to attend my first wrestling show until 1998 in that arena, watching Stone Cold Steve Austin at a lot of events. So the bar's pretty high for, you know, reactions to babyfaces.

37:44 But I.

37:46 Think that Obafemi is doing really well in comparison.

37:53 I think for this time frame right now, like... I think that his reactions are right up there with Roman right now. I think his reactions were over LA Knights. LA Knights was different because he had his full entrance, but Obafemi, you know, we got the shortened version of his entrance because he was doing the run-in.

38:20 But even then, I think people were chanting.

38:22 I think people just couldn't get on the same page as far as the, you know, how the chant normally goes and get in sync with it. But they were still really loud. It just wasn't all in sync with each other.

38:34 Did you pay attention to merch? Somebody, Rudog in the chat, I shouldn't just say somebody, Rudog in the chat said, I'm seeing more and more Oba shirts in the crowd. Was that noticeable?

38:44 Uh, there were some Oba shirts. I can tell you that I bought my child one. So, um, uh, it was either that or Penta. And I tried to, he actually didn't come to the show with me because he doesn't like the live events because of how loud they are.

39:01 Um, but I wanted to make sure he's seven.

39:06 He's been to a couple shows, but it's something about, especially like the pyro and stuff like that.

39:12 You know, we try to take the headphones with us sometimes. I don't like it either. Well, I can't... I won't lie.

39:17 There was one time where I was standing up or something and I wasn't looking directly at the ramp.

39:23 And one definitely caught me off guard. But he... But, yeah, I got him a... Obafemi shirt.

39:31 And I did see a lot of, there was a lot of pretty much everything because they had a lot of spread out merchandise. I can tell you, the merch did not sell out because they made sure to stock as much merchandise as they could at that show. Multiple merchandise stations, lots of variety pretty much at each merchandise station. Um, even still like Cena stuff, like they, like the, the wrist wristbands that Cena has and, uh, the, the old seat, I call it the Cena belt that they had back then. Um, and you know, lots of belts and I keep wondering who has the money to buy these, these WWE belts, but lots of people, apparently I'm just not one of them.

40:19 Yeah.

40:20 The belt thing for me has always been an interesting, uh, thing. Um, nice to look at, but you see people spend a lot of money for to carry around something that they didn't get. It's interesting phenomenon. Uh, I'm glad to hear I've been to shows where, uh, no AEW families have had issues where they've only had shirts for five or six people. And, um, you know, people will go to the, the, the, the, they either don't have enough stands when they go to the stand, they don't have shirts for their favorite wrestlers. Um, I know you mentioned that you got there a little bit late, but do you know if there were any matches before the taping? And can you say what happened after the show went off the air, when Stephanie Vecure

41:05 attacked Liv Morgan and Becky Lynch?

41:10 I'm glad you brought that up.

41:12 So I got in the arena probably around 6.50, so I did not see anything. I assumed that there was main event tapings beforehand, but I didn't see any of that. I got there pretty much just in time to get into my seat right when the show was about to start.

41:32 As far as after the show, I will say nothing happened.

41:35 Um, and people were expecting kind of like, you know, watching a Marvel movie and expecting the end credits or something. But, um, after the attack, they went off the air. People kind of stood around as Stephanie's music was playing and, um, all three went to the back and then eventually ring announcer got on there.

41:56 Thank you all for coming and have a great night.

42:00 Yeah, that's pretty good. I miss, uh, You're referencing the 90s. I remember going to a Raw in the 90s, and they used to have dark matches. I mean, TV, but different. They used to have dark matches after the show to get people to stay for the entire event. But now we're like, the TV portion is what you care about the most. The TV portion is over, so you might as well go home.

42:22 Well, a few years ago when we went, there was a dark match after the show. And it was also kind of the worst time to do a dark match because it was the taping where they did Raw two weeks in a row.

42:38 It was around some type of holiday break or something like that.

42:42 So they taped two Raws, and then they did a dark match after, and that was the first time that I took my son, which may be the reason why he does not really want to go as much as well, because he's like, we're here for quite a while. He's like, I'm ready to go. So, yeah, there was no dark match tonight. This is why WWE should do house shows.

43:03 It's easier. I have a soon-to-be 8-year-old, and she always asks to go to a show, and I'm like, you're not going to go to one of these TV shows. You're not going to like it. If they had a house show... in columbus ohio i would definitely take her but sitting around raw watching pyro and people talking in the ring probably isn't going to get her too.

43:20 Interested but you know i mean honestly it didn't really feel like there was that much talking in comparison to like you know some other shows tonight i mean there was i can i'll tell you after the opening segment um I can't remember if it, no, it wasn't after, it was after the tag match with Penta and Javon.

43:44 After that match, I kind of saw them setting.

43:48 Up a guitar.

43:51 And I'm pretty sure that that was for Joe Hendry. And like I said, I got to the building right around the time the show started. So that was my time to hurry up and go to the concessions and grab a couple things. And I think that there was like a Bloodline segment, you know, right after that. Maybe a recap of 946 or something like that, maybe.

44:11 And then.

44:12 Um, by the time I got back, I got to my seat right when they started the next match, uh, the, the Lola vice tag match. So, I mean, honestly, there was, it was like pretty much something happening as far as matches going. It wasn't that much like downtime, um, on the show. There was always something happening.

44:34 Um, Arlie, anything else you want to bring up from the show? We covered some of the chat room comments. Um, but yeah, anything else come to mind as we've talked through the show that you want to bring up?

44:47 Uh, not much.

44:50 Um, let me actually, I thought, was there a video segment that had the fans attention the most? So I'm kind of thinking it might be the Paul Heyman, uh, Bronson Reed one.

45:00 Again, thank you for bringing it up. Cause I, yeah. would not have thought about it.

45:04 I can tell you that that got a pretty good reaction in the crowd when he was telling him. And I do like the story that Heyman was saying how, you know, Hey, you may think that you've got this guy, but I've seen what this guy can do. And when he started saying, you know, okay, I hope that you can do what you say you're going to do. And you're going to have to hit a tsunami and another tsunami and tsunami. And when he kept going, like probably by the time he got to the 10th one, like everybody was like, reacting like, okay, this is, this is the Paul Heyman that we like to hear from where he just starts to lose control.

45:39 And then he brought it back in and he was like, and tsunami and tsunami.

45:45 Absolutely.

45:46 I thought that that was a pretty good Heyman promo myself.

45:49 Yeah.

45:49 It seemed like the crowd was reacting to it. That's what kind of prompted me to bring that up in general. Um, that's the segment I assume would have gotten the most reaction in the building. Uh, Chris, is there anything else that you want to bring up to Arlie?

46:00 Uh, no, I think, um, I think we've covered everything.

46:04 Great.

46:04 Arlie, thank you for calling in. Always appreciate it.

46:07 Yeah, I'll say.

46:07 Again, uh, I am a happy VIP member. Um, I have been off and on over the past few years. It was a time where I had to take a break and I sent an email to you, Wade, and explain my situation.

46:21 And I received a very nice email back.

46:24 And I will say that I will try to be a VIP member for as long as I can, because that was something that really like spoke to me and I really appreciate it. I, I, Appreciate it very much.

46:36 Thanks for bringing it up. And thanks for your support. And welcome back. And we'll hold you to it legally.

46:41 All right. Ruthlessly.

46:43 I said I'll try. I said I'll try. I'm in law school.

46:47 There was no... We will make sure that you are trying hard legally to the full extent of our powers.

46:53 All right.

46:54 Thanks, Arlay.

46:55 We'll see you in the chat again. And feel free to call in anytime.

46:57 Thank you.

46:58 You bet. Appreciate it. Just a reminder, you can reach us at wadekellerpostshow at gmail.com if you're interested in contributing to the flagship or wadekellerpostshow at gmail.com if you're interested in submitting a question or a topic or even a rant on the Wade Keller Pro Wrestling Post Shows. All right, pwtorchvipinfo.com.

47:20 Join.

47:20 You can be part of the PWTorch VIP Forum. It's a nice community of VIP members, actual real people, validated, verified people. and not vilified copyright Paul, old Paul Heyman. He doesn't do that anymore. Um, and, uh, we, uh, yeah, join the conversation. Got all kinds of sections in there. It's at Kate Orne, former PewDieTorch assistant editor, uh, co-host with me on the flagship, um, asked to have his old section in there to interact with, uh, with VIP members.

47:46 So that, that has been added and you'll be active in there. Uh, Chris, you've been in there. Um, it's been a fun, uh, a fun place to talk wrestling and non-wrestling topics. So, Go VIP, everybody. Lots more benefits. All our podcasts are commercial-free and a ton of VIP-exclusive podcasts. Unmatched archives going back about 40 years now. And an ad-free website, commercial-free podcasts. I already said that. All kinds of cool stuff. So, yeah, go VIP. Exclusive articles. Post-pay-per-view roundtables.

48:15 All right. Chris, let's... There's something I wanted to bring up before I went to Darrell.

48:22 Oh.

48:24 Nope, that wasn't it. And let me just think for a second. We covered LA Knight. I guess we'll talk about the Heyman thing briefly here because Arlay just talked about it so we can kind of follow up on that. Do you have speculation on where this is headed? As much as they're doing to build up Bronson Reed, he's not going to beat Obafemi, right?

48:49 No.

48:49 I don't think so.

48:51 Right.

48:52 So, yeah, where is this all going?

48:56 I don't know.

48:56 There still is this underlying Paul Heyman, the vision trying to make his children happy or trying to teach his children a lesson. I think just because of the nature of this pay-per-view where Austin Theory and Braun Breaker are both in the Money in the Bank match is kind of a way to sort of maybe keep them away from them. But I think away from Breaker, sorry, away from Femi and Reed. So I think that that's a way for them to continue this feud after the fact.

49:29 I see Opa Femi winning on the pay-per-view but potentially being attacked either on the show or on the Raw after that. to maybe lead to another match between him and Braun Breaker, because they never had a conclusive finish. So I think there's a way for them to. I don't know if they had know what to do with Obafemi until WrestleMania, so I think they need to string this Vision thing along a little bit longer, and I think the match will allow that to happen.

50:00 We have a Super Chat from Derek Mitchell. Derek, thank you so much, king of the Super Chats, here on the Wade Keller Pro Wrestling Post Show. So I guess Bron Breaker doesn't care who is the future WWE anymore as he hasn't mentioned it since their match at Saturday Night's Main Event and Bronson Reed returned and started a feud with Oba. Yeah, sometimes those things we find out, and I know you're not new to this, Derek, but I hate to break the news to you. Sometimes wrestlers care about things in the lead up to a match and then they oddly don't mention it again afterwards for quite a while because the match is over and they got your money. Are you bothered by that, Chris, or do you think their storyline supports to move on from

50:38 that or not focus on it?

50:41 Well, I think the money in the bank is the distraction. And the fact that Bronson Reed is also Obafemi's immediate distraction, which is one of the reasons why I mentioned that they're going to find a way to keep this going. I'm assuming Bron Breaker does not win money in the bank. And so when he doesn't win money in the bank and Obafemi beats Reed, they can go right back to this and probably that conversation can come up again.

51:07 All right, Rude Dog on the Paul Heyman thing says, Paul Heyman had a nicer suit on than usual. I didn't notice that, but, I mean, he's got money for a nice suit. Maybe he just has a new tailor. I don't know.

51:19 Am I also supposed to believe that he's just– that Paul Heyman flew to St. Louis and sat in a room by himself watching Obafemi, Powerbomb, Brock Lesnar on repeat? Like, just he's been there for hours? Like, that's– yeah.

51:35 It crossed my mind to write something about that in my written report at PWTorch.com tonight. I was like, nah, but you did. I mean, the thought crossed my mind. I'm like, what are we supposed to believe was really going on here? And because I know, I just, I like, I think there should be an explanation that feels realistic for everything that we see on a wrestling show. You know, I don't, I mean, it's kind of in a different category, but I don't get why WWE is just offering TV time to this group that tried to kill Jacob Batu or, or maim him with a vehicle. And they kind of treat it like it was a chair shot to the back or someone trips, somebody running the ropes. Like it's just, there's no scale, uh, logical scale to things. And then,

52:20 you know, just happy coincidences of wrestlers just showing up, um, with, with something interesting when the camera happens to be filming them backstage. It's just a lot of stuff I'd, I'd, I'd clean up that I think would pay dividends in terms of the whole thing, feeling more immersive, uh, This is kind of more comical and probably they'd actually own it rather than run from it or say, don't think too hard about it. I think they want us to think that Heyman is so obsessed with Obafemi right now.

52:46 The question is, is it a crush or is it a vendetta? Like, is he mad at Oba or is he enamored with Oba? And that, you know, we can say it's a red herring, but, you know, it's fun to imagine with this popularity of Obafemi, that Heyman ends up luring him to the dark side, um, in some form or fashion. I don't think it's believable. And I don't, and of course you wouldn't actually do that if you want what's best for business. But unlike most decisions like that, you'd be, you'd be giving up something massively huge because Obafemi is a once every 25 year baby face right now.

53:26 But if he did turn heel, the next best option would still be really good for business. It just would be a terrible mistake, you know? Um, in the sense of what you're giving up. And I think that what, that's what makes us a little bit more intriguing is Heyman just going, he's obviously enamored with all, but, but the question is, is he obsessed the way Bobby Hina was obsessed with taking Hogan down? Or is he just infatuated with the notion that maybe this is the guy, not Brunt's not Braun breaker anymore. And now that Lesnar's gone, who's going to be my next big ticket to money and, and being at the top of the industry. Chris, just kind of tell me, you know, freestyle, no particular question,

54:07 but what do you think about the story they're telling with Heyman and Oba? Do you like it, and where do you.

54:15 Think it's going? I think it depends. I think ultimately Oba Femi cannot be a heel at this point. He's way too popular, and I assume the goal is for him to get the big babyface win at WrestleMania to become the champion. Again, obviously, this is when babyfaces matter at that point. So I don't think anything derailing from that would be good. I think Heyman, you know, his position is obsession. Again, he was sitting in a room watching a three-second clip over and over and over again.

54:46 That is the height of delusion in a lot of ways. Obsession. But it could be based on the fact that he, you know, and he kind of mentioned this. He's like, you know, Brock Lesnar, I was so close to Brock Lesnar, and this guy beat Brock Lesnar. He is really the next big thing. And maybe if these Vision guys don't have it in them, you know, I can't talk to them into doing what's right, this may be the next meal ticket I grab onto. I think there's a good level of intrigue there, which, again, they need to string out Oba Femi and Jujutsu Kaisen storylines for the next six months or so, or at least, I don't know if he's supposed to win the Royal Rumble or not, but at least three months. And I think this is

55:32 just a dynamic for them to do that, but ultimately it should lead to Paul Heyman being a heel manager, managing someone against a babyface Oba Femi, maybe as champion in post-WrestleMania.

55:46 Comment in the chat, J.C. Scooby says, Bronson Reed should beat Oba. Why is J.C. Scooby wrong, or is he right?

55:55 J.C. Scooby might be part of Bronson Reed's family. He might be related to him. That may be the only reason why. And I like Bronson Reed. I don't want to make a knock of him because I think he's really progressed quite a bit, especially since he came back from his injury. But Obafemi, I mean, again, the goal is to put Obafemi in the greatest light. Obviously, there'll be a time when Obafemi will have to lose. That will come at some point, but he's still on the trajectory, and that's not the time for that.

56:27 Uh, another comment, uh, seven 11 says, what if Braun breaker and the rest of the vision attack over after the match and then over tax breaker during his money in the bank match. If the order of matches works out that way. Um, yeah, I mean, I could see that.

56:43 So that would, wouldn't that require all the family to lose? I mean, if he still wins against Reed, why would he attack breaker?

56:51 If they attack him after the match, it would just be mad.

56:54 Yeah.

56:54 Okay. Yeah. Yeah.

56:57 All right.

56:58 Uh, Chris Rucker says breaker just looked like a storm trooper tonight. Well, Bronson was Darth Vader. Um, yeah, I mean, it's tough. I mean, it's, it's a, they, they want Bronson Reed to be credible. They want Braun breaker to be credible. They don't care as much about Logan and Austin theory, obviously, which is fine in a faction. You kind of want to have tears, um, you know, top tier and lower, lower tier in terms of how that, how that plays out. And it works out fine. Um, But I don't know. I'm kind of replaying in my head if Breaker came across like a stormtrooper or if they were protecting him. What was the impression you were left with, Chris?

57:43 I know it's a Star Wars reference, not a big Star Wars fan. I will say the way that it was put together was obviously Reed was the more dominant of the two, which makes sense because Reed is the one that is facing Obafemi. Omafemi still almost beat them all up by himself until he got distracted, but Reed was able to get the upper hand more than Breaker.

58:04 That's because they're facing. Leaving the Star Wars connection aside, I do get the point, though. Breaker was definitely secondary to Reed at that point.

58:14 The Stormtroopers were the Star Wars equivalent of WWE security. People who charge out, run around corners, and get shot or blasted or lasered or whatever.

58:24 He wasn't that bad. He wasn't that bad.

58:27 No, no.

58:28 They are just indiscriminate, disposable soldiers. They're pawns on a chessboard. That is an overstatement. That said, one breaker went for the running spear. Oba moved and took over. And he needed help from Reed for most of his, anything that he got that had some offense to it. So yeah, but the focus was mostly trying to put Reed over And Breaker was more secondary, I think, by design, because you're building up Reed as Ova's opponent. Jay in Hartford, who, by the way, earlier says, go VIP. So thank you, Jay, for that. Um, then added, no, no, I love Bronson Reed, but no way should meet all about coming back from injury and getting this match is big enough for him now.

59:13 Yeah.

59:13 I'm, I'm, I'm curious Saturday, what we, what we learn about how WWE feels about Bronson Reed with the competing and much more important task of protecting Oba Femi, uh, And how much are they going to let Reid get fair and square offense in against Oba? Or is it just going to come almost exclusively or exclusively at the hands of interference and distractions? So, yeah, I don't know.

59:43 But that's why we watch the shows, because we get clues to where they're going. Darrell says Bronson feels like more of a star than Braun right now. Do you agree with that, Chris? I mean, maybe by design, as opposed to, you know, wait. Bronson Reed is better than Braun Breaker. Maybe it's just sort of by design, the way they're pushing him right now.

1:00:03 Yeah, because Reed is in a high-profile singles match, and Breaker is one of six people in a ladder match. So he's going to be kind of put to the side, at least until Saturday evening.

1:00:19 Hey, Steph, do you ever watch WWE and think it used to be better?

1:00:22 I don't know, Josh.

1:00:23 Sometimes I think it used to be a whole lot worse.

1:00:25 I mean, whether it's WrestleMania main event old dudes at the top, too many titles, or women's wrestling, we're here to answer the big question, is it worse or better now? Join me, Joshua White, and me, Stephanie Chase, for Worse or Better, part of the PWTorch daily cast lineup dropping on Monday nights.

1:00:44 Search PWTorch in your podcast app, such as Apple Podcasts or Spotify, to subscribe for free or get a commercial free version with the PWTorch VIP membership. Check out pwtorch.com slash govip for details on going VIP.

1:01:00 Worse or better, finally, something for wrestling fans to do on Monday nights.

1:01:06 JC Scooby doubling down. Reed should win. Make him even bigger. Oba losing won't hurt him. He's so over. This is, I think, a case, JC, where you can make a case in isolation that what you say might be true. It'd make Reed a bigger star. Oba would be just fine. He's super popular. It would build on some vulnerability for Oba.

1:01:25 Reed hasn't been defined down since his return and the tsunami as a whole is a move they protect. So with minimal shenanigans or no shenanigans, you could do that and your result might work, but you lose that sense of invulnerability and destiny and that Oba's unstoppable heading into a much bigger match than just another match on a Money in the Bank card in October. And that means, you know, obviously a WrestleMania match. So you want to keep Oba strong because you want to do huge business when Oba has a big WrestleMania match, whether it's against Roman Reigns or somebody else at that time. So, yeah, I mean, you can always hot shots. I don't, I won't call it a hot shot. That's not fair to your argument, but you can always go with a surprise upset,

1:02:16 which is what this would be in order to make a statement. But you lose something for later. Chris, how do you feel about that?

1:02:21 Yeah, I just think that Obafemi is on the trajectory. They already kind of messed it up when he won the King of the Ring and then he never actually defended the title. So I'm assuming the goal is for him to win the Royal Rumble and you really can't have anything disrupt that plan. I think Reed can remain strong.

1:02:41 A lot of it is how you book him after the fact and how the vision gets booked after the fact. But also I think in the vision, at least in the movie's long-term eyes, he's secondary to Braun Breaker anyway. He's older than Braun Breaker. He's not, he just had a couple, he's had a few long-term injuries over the last couple of years. So I just don't see WWE as of right now making him a top priority. He's a priority because obviously he's in the match and he's not going to be, he's not going to lose in 25 seconds. Please don't clip this if it does happen.

1:03:15 I never said that. But I just don't think he, even in the vision, he's as much of a priority as Braun Breaker is.

1:03:21 I think our system is set up where if you say clip this, it literally will clip it. So you're screwed. The AI program and our.

1:03:29 I said don't. They don't get the don't in there?

1:03:32 They're going to miss that. They're just going to hear clip it. So you're doomed. All right. It's like telling a human being, don't think of a pink elephant. And of course, everyone thinks of pink elephant. You tell, yeah, I clip it. It's going to be clipped.

1:03:45 All right. J.N.

1:03:47 Hartford says, Wade, you win. Love the Storm Trooper WWE security comparison. Crofton says, oh, thank God we're doing Star Wars references and not basketball. If I have to hear about another Knicks touchdown, my head would explode. Storm Troopers, I get.

1:04:05 Well, we can talk about basketball. For those of you on YouTube, I'm wearing the shirt of the New York Liberty WNBA team that had WNBA history. last week when they were the first number eight seed to defeat a number one seed in the first round, defeating the Minnesota Lynx, continuing the very lengthy tradition of New York teams, defeating Minnesota teams in playoffs.

1:04:28 Clip that, save it for the NBA finals when the Timberwolves are there. And if the Knicks have the best season possible, it will be losing in the finals to the Timberwolves, Chris.

1:04:40 We'll, we'll see. We, you know, the first preseason game was today. Um, So the season starts, I think, in three weeks. And I still have all my 25, 26 championship shirts. I can wear those forever.

1:04:54 Yes.

1:04:55 Poor Minnesota Lynx, too. Can't have nice things here.

1:05:00 All right.

1:05:02 Back to the show here. Some Logan Paul talk in the chat. Let's bring this up. Rude Dog says, it's weird how Logan Paul is just a guy these days. I know his injury set him back, but he was looking at main event level. And now he's looking like third on a totem pole for the vision, maybe fourth, um, or fifth. If you count Maxine, uh, standard deviation adds to it.

1:05:22 Yeah.

1:05:22 Logan's facial reaction at the end was preposterously goofy. Logan star power has diminished while injured, but remaining on TV as a non-threatening weekly fixture who over emotes. How are you feeling about, uh, Logan Paul these days, Chris?

1:05:35 I think they should have not had him on TV every week. I mean, with that kind of injury, um, It's like a six-month injury. And I think he's been on TV pretty much every week. And when you can't wrestle, especially you're in the sword storyline where someone is going to have to be the one to not get offense and kind of be in the way, he ends up looking really bad. And this one too, because he runs up on Obafemi, which is kind of dumb anyway, because Obafemi is going to... He destroys mere mortals and you have this big arm brace on and um it would be one thing if he came in occasionally he helped like the vision win matches by cheating he's done a few times but him there every week not being able

1:06:22 to wrestle i know there'll be the moment where he steps in the ring and he sheds off the arm the brace and like he's back to normal but it'll be diminished anyway because he's been on tv every.

1:06:31 Week yeah with logan i just think less is more when it comes to his facial expressions or i think Being over the top and cartoonish, it sort of feels like fantasy camp to be a wrestling heel more than reading the room and hitting the right tone. And I agree with you. Him being off TV and coming back would have more impact than what he's doing. But if he's going to be back, let's augment it so he doesn't just seem like kind of comedy relief and a cartoon figure because he's basically become kind of Grayson Waller circa 2000, Or 2024, 2025, whenever he was at his lowest point. Chris Rocker says, go Knicks. Crofton says, oh no.

1:07:18 This really took a turn he didn't want. Arlay, by the way, who attended live and called in earlier, said, I totally forgot that Penta also got a strong reaction in the building.

1:07:30 That match had one of my pet peeves that I have to bring from West and Coast to Coast was when that you have a match and they just start wrestling outside for a long period of time. And then eventually they end up back in the ring and the bell rings. Now you have a match. And it's like, well, shouldn't allow that.

1:07:48 Yeah. Super chat from the Pit Bull Blonin. Welcome to the chat. The Pit Bull goes, watch out, Wade. 946 coming after you. LOL. That was from earlier when I was having Wi-Fi problems. Now I'm up to like, What am I up to? I did a speed test after resetting things mid-show. I'm at 770 Mbps, so hopefully things have solidified after whatever glitch was going on before.

1:08:15 Yeah, it's gotten better the last 10 minutes or so.

1:08:18 Yeah, I went on a hotspot, reset the mesh system, and that seemed to clear up whatever was going on.

1:08:26 I don't know.

1:08:27 Who knows? Who understands technology and why it acts the way it does? But I'm glad it's been solid. That's nice, because now my post-show plans to move to a place with fiber optic has, uh, some, some really reliable fiber optic, uh, wifi is like, I don't have to move tomorrow. Um, I'm feeling better. All right. Uh, so anyway, let's bring Daryl into the show, uh, and see what he has to say about tonight's role. Daryl, welcome. Good to see you and hear from you again.

1:08:54 What's up? How y'all doing tonight? Good.

1:08:58 Now, if you, if, if, your microphone rustles your beard again, you got to shave the beard. No more just adjusting the microphone.

1:09:06 I do it. I do it. For you, Wade. For you. And your four and oh Vikings. So, yeah, I do it.

1:09:13 Yeah. That defense and special teams are amazing. And the offense wasn't awful. It's getting a little blown out of proportion.

1:09:20 Yeah.

1:09:21 We'll see. We'll see how it goes. But that defense is crazy good.

1:09:25 Amazing good defense. Yeah.

1:09:28 Yeah. Anyway, we had enough non-wrestling talk for our international listeners who don't care about any of this. Go ahead.

1:09:36 Oh, yeah. I just wanted to add another sport in there. Yeah.

1:09:41 We can talk about the Premier League if they want to talk about that, our English listeners. I can talk about that.

1:09:46 I'd rather talk 4-0 Vikings if we're going to do more sports. Without Justin Jefferson with a quarterback who's still learning the system.

1:09:55 They didn't beat the Dolphins, who may be the worst team in the NFL.

1:09:59 Yeah, they barely beat them. But they held them to four field goals, three field goals. And we gave up a touchdown at the end, which has a bunch of conspiracy theorists going mad and supposed to people who understand it was the best way to win the game. But anyway, I don't want to get in the weeds on it.

1:10:15 Yeah. Now they move us on, you know.

1:10:20 Hold up, hold on. JC Scooby says Vikings can't score touchdowns. We could have at the end of the game and we wisely prudently chose not to by sliding into the one yard line. So we could run out the clock. That would have been a touchdown. Um, it's a, it's an asterisk on the criticism. Um, we earned a, we earned a touchdown there and just voluntarily didn't take it.

1:10:38 And it was the smart move in it and nothing to do with the spread. Cause players aren't thinking about that on the field, except for a few who get caught and banned. Um, Yeah, go ahead.

1:10:50 Now, I was just talking about the vision and stuff. Paul Heyman, that promo that he cut, that was an amazing promo. And it was almost like a fire-up promo for Brunson Reed. And I'm liking what he's doing each week with Brunson Reed and Brian Breaker or whoever come up in his vicinity and stuff and how he's talking to him. And I agree with you guys. I would say he's becoming Bobby Heenan. And this is a long-term story.

1:11:17 So if the vision, like Oba said tonight, once he finished with Brunson, he's done with the vision.

1:11:25 Brunson, I meant.

1:11:26 This could set up for Paul Heyman. If the vision can't do it, then I might need to go get some bigger guns or.

1:11:32 Some higher guns.

1:11:33 And maybe this could set up a storyline for that heel turn that everybody thinking Cody going to go and join Heyman.

1:11:40 So, hey, I'm interested in seeing that. Hopefully the story play out in that way.

1:11:46 I think there's definitely a mechanism, as Darrell mentioned, that Paul Heyman is against Obafemi. The vision is not good enough to beat Obafemi in his eyes. So he brings in someone that could be a way to really debut someone, maybe even after Obafemi's first opponent, Paul Heyman's new client. Something better. client, you could have a lot of ways to go with that. That would be really interesting.

1:12:21 Go ahead, Daryl. Okay.

1:12:23 Now, I want to talk about the women's money in the bank real fast. They got a bunch of newer stars who they're trying to present as bigger stars and stuff like that. But I feel like it's lacking a little star power. than what the men's have. You have a few people in there that's drawing your attention. You got the Pintas, you got the CM Punk, you got the Kevin Owens mixed in with the Javon Evans and people like that. But in the women, you got a bunch of women who right now being not even mid-card level, but right at the cusp of mid-card and maybe, I can't even say maybe at the bottom or the top of the card.

1:13:06 So, and.

1:13:09 It's a scary match because you got a few people in there that, you know, you have to ring them in with some veterans and stuff like that. And this could hurt the women or whoever you want to get over in this match more than it could help whoever you're trying to get over. Do y'all see something like that?

1:13:28 And should they add it and mix it up a little bit? Because that goes into what they did with the women in the main event. Seemed like they don't put no more thought into the women at all or their stories.

1:13:40 I would think it's deliberate that they created a six woman money in the bank match where Roxanne Perez has like double the experience of anybody else in the match. I'm not a hundred percent sure if it's double or maybe it's three times.

1:13:53 I don't know.

1:13:53 I mean, um, that's still Ruka Lola vice JC Jane lash legend, Tiffany strength, certainly main roster wise. She's the most established Tiffany getting the biggest push of any of them, um, over the last year plus, but yeah. Um, I'm, I mean, I like it, but it's sort of separate from the points you're making, Darrell, in that it is like the next generation of women's talent getting pushed. Every one of them, to some degree or another, you could imagine having a good two-year run and being in a top spot, or a number of them could. And Lash Legend has been built up as sort of the powerhouse of the group.

1:14:37 And Sol Rook obviously has her signature style. It kind of silliness with Lola and Sol earlier. We didn't get into that. JC Jane, a lot of proponents for her or people impressed with her growth, even if they think there might be a cap on it. You know, Tiffany's Tiffany. So, yeah, Chris, to Darrell's point, what do you think of not having experienced women in there? And since we're on the topic, you know, it's coming up Saturday. What do you what do you think of the decision to have those six be in it?

1:15:05 I like the decision because I think the most important thing about Money in the Bank is who actually wins the match because that's the person that's going to be focused on being involved in different programs or potentially teasing a cash-in. And I think this actually gives WWE an opportunity to put six women of not all high prominence but also newer to the promotion or at least to WWE main roster together. put them together and see what happens in a stage where it's okay for that to happen.

1:15:38 I think people have been so concerned about pushing, oh, young wrestlers don't get a chance. There are not enough opportunities. This is a great opportunity to do that. One of the issues I have with Money in the Bank generally is that I really think that it's overdone, not just in WWE, but other promotions where people can cash in.

1:15:56 And I think really the most important thing is that someone wins Money in the Bank once I don't know who's going to win for the men, but like for me, I think JC Jane should win money in the bank because I think the money in the bank would fit her character the most of all the people in the ring. I think people forget that the first money in the bank was effective because edge was the money in the bank winner and his character at the time was perfect to be the person to have that. And I think for it to be really effective, you want to have, I guess they're not going to have both two heels win, but I think in this match, her character makes the most sense to win, and that's who I would go for if I was booking the show.

1:16:35 What about Roxanne Perez, and then that causes tension and strife within Judgment Day?

1:16:41 That would be interesting. I think it's hard for Roxanne, just because she's always been, she's kind of, among the women, she's tertiary. She's behind Liv Morgan and Raquel. Rodriguez, there's a good storyline that you could create there, but I would only do that if the goal was to have her either leave the Judgment Day or have Liv leave the Judgment Day. I don't think, if you're not planning to do that, then I don't know if that would make as much sense.

1:17:07 Yeah, I think it would be en route to a babyface turn where Roxanne would say, sorry, Liv, but I earned it and I cashed in and then she wins. And I mean, you could turn either of them, I guess, in that context, but yeah.

1:17:19 Yeah.

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1:18:01 VIP-exclusive podcasts that run throughout the week every week. Jarrell, any follow-up on that or any thoughts on what we had to say?

1:18:10 I would say this.

1:18:10 The reason why I said that is because when you think about the women's money in the bank, the majority of the time you're thinking of the women cashing in and losing. And it's not like on the men's side where most of the time when you win it, except you're a small few, you feel.

1:18:26 Like they're going to lose it.

1:18:28 And none of these names right now, I'm just saying, as of right now, as of today, 10, 05, 26, none of them feel like somebody that you will even put a show around with the title or anything at this moment.

1:18:46 You know what I'm saying? You would just wish that they had at least.

1:18:52 One person that felt like, okay, this person is on the record or ready to break out in a breakout moment. Right now, a lot of these people feel like the main person who's in this match who is the veteran and way overlooked her Tiffany Stratton, because on the main roster, she would have the most experience than anybody, but she's.

1:19:16 Burnt out after a year. After a year of strong.

1:19:19 Build and title runs and stuff like that, she's burnt out. Most of the people that's in this match feel like how they use them, they can burn out and wouldn't go over.

1:19:30 So that's why I brought that up.

1:19:33 Lots of comments in the chat on this match. Let me read a few of them. To round out the conversation here. First, Croft, I didn't see this. I don't know if he posted this before or after I made the comment, but I really hope Roxanne Perez wins and gets out of Judgment Day purgatory. Derek Mitchell says, we've seen for the last decade featuring the Four Horsewomen, Alexa Bliss, Asuka, Bianca, and Rhea. So it's nice to see new women stars parallel in this role as opposed to the older established stars.

1:20:02 Rude Dog says, I'm hoping for Liv Morgan to win and Roxanne to win Money in the Bank. That way Roxanne can cash in and become the baby face that she should be. Derek says, we've seen for the last decade. Oh, I already read that. I think he posted it twice. Maybe there was a typo he was fixing. I didn't notice.

1:20:19 And then Crofton says, have Roxanne win it and then have Liv try to convince her to give it to her instead, leading to the eventual Roxanne face turn and departure. The only problem is Money in the Bank is a heel gimmick. I think any chance you have to establish the money in the bank is not necessarily a heel gimmick by having a baby face win it within a faction and have a heel say, don't cash in, don't cash in against me. That would be wrong. That'd be disloyal.

1:20:42 Like you can actually have a storyline that makes it good for a baby face to have it. So anyway, yeah.

1:20:53 Yeah.

1:20:53 Go ahead, Chris.

1:20:54 Yeah. We've seen similar things are adjusted on our show. I wasn't close to close. We've had, I've seen a heel faction where the leader of the faction basically coerced his team members to give them the ticket or the briefcase or whatever so they could use it. I've seen that. I've seen it turn factions apart where one person, they disagree over who uses it. I've seen one at House of Glory where they actually convinced for someone to use it on a tag team title. You could choose any match, and then they lost the match and he turned on him.

1:21:34 So you could do a lot of different things with that. I think, but to go back to Darrell's point, this happened in two promotions. We're watching now House of Glory and Wrestling Revolver, where the person who won the Money in the Bank and won the title was someone who was not pushed on the show. Both of them had a mid-card heel and mid-card babyface and spent a lot of the last few months losing. And then randomly they would be involved in this multi-person match cash in at the end and win the championship or after someone was really beaten up. And it kind of devalues the title.

1:22:04 We felt in those promotions, it devalues the title to have someone who you would have never thought of as the champion suddenly being the world champion. To Darrell's point, whoever wins the Money in the Bank, both men and women, depending on their status right now, WWE has spent a lot of time building them up to be someone that people could think could be the champion. Someone put in the chat, they put up a 100% success rate in their little graphic there for the women. So when the woman, whoever, whichever woman wins and cashes it in, they have to make sure that she's at a certain status with the fans so they can buy her as the new champion.

1:22:39 By the way, quick comment, just because I want to not, I don't want to forget to say it. Dynamite's on Tuesday night, tomorrow, and not Wednesday night because of baseball playoffs. So I'll be hosting the AW Dynamite post-show live Tuesday night. And if you didn't know it was on Wednesday night because the AW didn't, Make that real clear because they had other things that were focused on last week. Just a note to you get to bounce back and forth like in the old Wednesday war era of between NXT and AEW. But I'll be hosting live tomorrow night if all goes as planned, as we always say. All right.

1:23:13 Drawback to.

1:23:15 OK, now to bring up something else. Tonight. Roman out there felt like a heel with L.A. Knight.

1:23:24 But he felt so dismissive of the angle that they're doing with 9-4-6.

1:23:31 I've been saying this for a while.

1:23:33 I don't like him in this angle because he just feel like he's just so off of it and don't care about it.

1:23:40 He didn't even really.

1:23:43 Care anything too much about Jacob. He made Jacob, well, he's just a soldier. He's just fire to fire.

1:23:48 A week later, he's like, hey, how's Jacob doing? You know, I mean, I assume he had daily updates. He just didn't get today's update. I think we're supposed to hopefully assume. But yeah, I mean, he's deplorably smug in my view as a character, but he's also super successful and cool and still, you know, gets to say the name of the city. So he gets to cheer that way. But the dismissiveness towards 946, it can be a separate issue than that. depending on where they're going with it. And if they sort of have a master plan, Chris, we certainly could have led with the seven, four, six storyline.

1:24:27 We've talked very little about it. Darrell's brought it up here. Kind of curious how you feel about the follow-up last week to it overall and structurally, you know, the idea that there's this wrestling, this, this governing body that of, of WWE with these authority figures and power structure that tries to keep wrestlers lined up to fight each other for titles and find out who the best wrestler is.

1:24:52 You have Adam Pearce just sort of somewhat flippantly, but you get a point at least for bringing it up going, let's do this legally. If you want revenge, let's do it in the ring. It felt sort of like a half-hearted acknowledgement to the way things were always done back in the day, which is a baby face going, you know, don't suspend them.

1:25:09 We want them in the ring.

1:25:10 And we skipped that part, which is Adam Pearce saying, Yeah, I mean, everything was sort of at 30% of the way it would have been done when everything was kind of more novel when it came to a hardcore, unlawful action by Heels and how they justified turning it into a match. So we had that aspect of it too.

1:25:30 And then you just have maybe the overriding issue more than the structure and logic of it, which is just how sinister they come across.

1:25:41 And.

1:25:42 Jada Parker and the demeanor, the way it's produced, the kind of ominous vibe and the credibility of the group that I think might be enough to more than make up for the kind of absurdity that they're allowed to commit felonies and still get videos on the show and get sanctioned for a match. So those are some of my talking points. Chris, take it away.

1:26:08 They get an accredited nine, four, six. It's very clear. Roman does not watch the show, but nine, four, six watches the show and they get straight into video editing. Like, so I give them a lot of credit. They're not just really mean, tough people, but they're really good with technology. So I appreciate that for them. I think Roman, that's why I said earlier, I think it really was helped for their character. If they do attack Roman, have him as a title because LA not, you know, he comes to the ring. He clearly has not watched the show.

1:26:37 didn't ask about, he, I guess, knew solo. I'll get to that later, but he is going to talk to Jimmy and Jay about the nine, four, six situation, but then LA nights music starts and he can't even, even though he has to walk to the ring and it takes him a while and all that kind of stuff. He doesn't, um, that's more important than anything else that happened.

1:26:58 He gets a match together with later with Pierce, but he has solo in the match solo who was kidnapped and, um, We haven't seen him in a while. Also, by the way, been at odds with his brothers for weeks before then. And odds with Roman because he actually, you know, when Roman wanted him to turn on LA Knight, he didn't.

1:27:20 He was now his opponent. Roman apparently has moved on from that. I actually think 946 for their end of it is holding up the bargain, but Roman's non-involvement involvement kind of hurts the seriousness of it because it's like, do you think this is important or... Do you not? And have those people act accordingly, which is why, again, I feel that it makes a lot of sense. Or the best booking plan would be that they cost him the title at Money in the Bank. And therefore, Roman has to focus on them because he lost the only thing he truly cares about, which is the World Heavyweight title.

1:27:56 Before I throw back to Darrell, Darrell, remember your thoughts and keep your emotions. I see you shaking your head, but a couple of chat comments just to add to what Chris is saying. Uh, Arlie says to be fair, Roman and Jacob aren't friends. It's more like Roman is happier to have him on his side. If you're being attacked several times by Jacob this year, you'd still want to ask how somebody doing, if they get hit by a car, um, by people who are your, your enemy and aiming for your cousins. But, uh, Crofton says maybe Roman only watches Netflix raw later and saw the edited version where they blacked out his cousin getting hit by a moving car. Uh, Derek, I believe Roman's dismissive attitude towards 9 for 6 will ultimately cost him his title

1:28:31 at Money in the Bank, which would perfectly set up a War Games match at Survivor Series.

1:28:38 Hey everyone, Greg parks here. You've probably heard me hosting wrestling night in America after pay-per-views and also co-hosting the Tuesday flagship with Wade Keller. I also host a VIP exclusive podcast every week called Greg parks out loud in this podcast. I delve into a single topic for around 20 minutes, perfect length for one of your daily commutes or while walking the dog. A couple of my recent episodes included a look at TNA as they moved to AMC and and WWE and AEW injuries for the year 2025.

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1:29:40 So, Darrell, back to you.

1:29:43 See, Chris, when he brought that up, I was trying to keep that out of my mind, but that's one of the three things that really irked my nerves tonight about all this. First of all, if Roman felt like this was very important, We want to set up a match for the Usos the Monday after Money in the Bank. You would have set it up for tonight or at Money in the Bank. It made me feel like you don't even care about it. You didn't come out there.

1:30:10 You didn't even show no emotion. Anytime else somebody so-called attacks your family, you get upset and things like that because you say you're protecting your whole family. So that logic didn't make any sense.

1:30:25 Going to Adam Pearce and doing all that.

1:30:27 Second, you bring Solo back, who got a pop when they showed him on the screen. You just made him feel like nothing.

1:30:36 Just had him come back and now he's another yes boy. And what you done did, how you done defamed Jacob Fatu, you.

1:30:43 Done did that to Solo just in this one little moment by just bringing him back in the hall. I'ma just have you guys handle this in the night after Money in the Bank and y'all gonna deal with him and finish them off like he ain't even gonna be there. Now lastly, If you 9-4-6, you threatening, you done ran roughshod over them, you say you taking them out one at a time, and you knew Roman was on the show for the first time in weeks, why wouldn't you show up on the show and show him something or just say something to him or direct.

1:31:15 Anything to him? You don't even do that.

1:31:17 So the logic of the whole storyline, once they add Roman in and his dismissiveness, just kills the whole logic of it because you have to play around with his dismissiveness Because you don't want to put him in it because how he's so dismissive of the whole thing.

1:31:32 And it kills the whole logic of the story that you're trying to tell.

1:31:35 Because if you're threatening and it's the person who you really want to go after since he sent the hit after you, why are you going to show up on the show when he's finally on the show?

1:31:43 That just, ah.

1:31:46 Chris, what do you make of it?

1:31:49 Well, I agree.

1:31:49 I think, you know, one of the things, and I don't know if they made this clear or not, did they actually say that 9-4-6 was like, banned from the arena. It also could make sense, again, as Wade mentioned, how do they get all these very quick and very nicely done video packages on the show and responsible for what's happening on the show? But it would have been helpful if they said, well, 9-4-6 is not here, and that's why they can't have a match this week at all.

1:32:18 Maybe Roman should have said, hey, I tried to get a match this week, but, you know, Dragon Lee and Rey Mysterio on the Judgment Day beat me to it, so... They ran out of time on the show, so couldn't do it this week, so we'll have to do it next week. That's why I think that 9-4-6, because they are supposed to be a very serious act, they have to show the lack of disrespect, the lack of respect from Roman, who doesn't see them as a threat, or is seeing them as secondary. It's something that they would not take lying down, and therefore they wouldn't wait until the next week's Raw, because that's what you're supposed to do.

1:32:54 They would show up at the pay-per-view. And then Roman could maybe have him replace Solo in the match. You could have dissension there or whatever. But I think that the 946 group's characters would not take Roman sort of not seeing them as important. They would not take that as something they would like. And they would see that as a sign of disrespect and make him.

1:33:17 For sure.

1:33:18 Make them respect him.

1:33:20 Are we sure 9... 946 are heels.

1:33:26 I don't know.

1:33:27 I think they're violent, but part of it, you know, again, they began as like Royce. He's was friends with Jacob and he was trying to help him out. Cause he's known him for a long time and Jacob refused. And so he, he sort of has this villain origin story. I mean, they do hit people on cars and light things on fire, light cars on fire and, and attack people.

1:33:48 So I guess that is heel ish.

1:33:50 But yeah i mean remember when when in the first run-in with their debut cole said look what the bloodline drove race keys to i mean i it seemed like the original framing unless cole was speaking off the cuff or confused and and that's possible because they haven't gone back to it but they might have been intentionally wanting ambiguity or um mixed emotions i guess from from fans and the storytelling but i don't know uh jc scooby says maybe whoops uh Oh, no, I meant to put up 7-11 says, I don't know anymore. Maybe we're all heels.

1:34:22 Arlay says they said in their promo that the original play was take them out one by one. And then Keith stopped Jade and said they play like them all. The new play is line them all up and knock them all out with one shot. A little detail there. I wasn't going to bring up from the chat also. Well, Arlay just said they said that 9-4-6 weren't there. They couldn't have a match tonight. Pierce said they'd be there next Monday. There was, oh, here it is. This is what I would bring up. Derek Mitchell said, it's possible Jacob is in 946. As Chris said, they have wonderful editors and could have edited the hit run last week on Jacob. They had it all planned out. And there's going to be some security footage from earlier in the

1:35:02 day where Jacob and Jada worked together and they worked out the bump and how he'd be just fine. Actually, I would, I'd be impressed if they had really, really worked that all out where it's just like all, orchestrated and planned out, and Jacob did it as a red herring to lower Roman's guard or something like that. As far as the fast editing goes of their videos, has anyone seen Brandon Cutler lately? Because maybe they hired him to do... I don't know if he's great at video editing, but just some lackier assistant. He was on.

1:35:35 An indie show a few weeks ago. I can't remember the promotion, so I guess I have seen him. Or I've seen his name.

1:35:42 Anyway.

1:35:42 Well, maybe he's a free agent. And 946 said, we need a lackey to do some quick editing. And Brandon's like, I'm here.

1:35:50 He knows Royce Keyes from his AEW days. Yeah, exactly.

1:35:53 Oh, that'd be what a twist that would be. All right, Darrell, back to you. I'm going to put on our YouTube thumbnail, be Brandon Cutler. Secretly. Secret agent with 9-4-6. All right.

1:36:09 Go ahead, Darrell.

1:36:10 That would definitely be aggregated.

1:36:16 Thank you for the laugh because, man, that just aggravated me tonight.

1:36:21 But moving on past that.

1:36:24 Well, real quick, Darrell, before you do standard deviation, it said both Roman and Knight directly teased 9-4-6 interference. So that means they won't interfere since they'd set it up as a surprise if they were going to do it as opposed to tease it directly.

1:36:34 Yeah.

1:36:37 Perhaps. Perhaps. Oh, Jay in Hartford says, Jimmy and Jay just sitting there all giddy was silly. No anger or concern until responding to Roman. None of them care about Jacob. Well, Jacob should end up with nine for six then if he lived. He probably is planning it with Brandon Cutler.

1:36:56 I don't know.

1:36:56 All right. Go ahead.

1:36:59 I say this L.A.

1:37:00 Knight did them a favor by The part in the beginning of his promo mentioning them and saying he's not focused on them right now because his main focus is on the title.

1:37:10 That was the biggest.

1:37:11 Thing anybody in the main event did for them to make them feel.

1:37:15 Like serious threats.

1:37:17 But outside of that, I want to talk about should Big Cass join the Judgment Day? He already got the black jeans. He fit the color scheme, so. Should he join them? And I guess they heard what you said, Wade, and I guess he's just going to be mad at Dragon Lee and tag Dragon Lee outside of the ring and stuff like that since he couldn't beat him in the ring. But Big Cass seems so lifeless. He could have came back with some type of character or something, built himself up in some way.

1:37:52 I know people don't want to break up the name.

1:37:53 Enzo, but it kind of, it kind of be like, he's missing that mouthpiece of an Enzo or something that gave him a little character because ever since they separated, he's, he's never had a character. He's been searching for a character ever since then.

1:38:10 He just bulges his eyes and gets red faced and leans in a little and yells. And that's not a character.

1:38:19 Yeah. No.

1:38:20 Yeah.

1:38:20 I agree.

1:38:21 I mean, It is in the realm of what you would have expected, one of the options of what would come out of last week. match is just being mad. And Wade Barrett said, yeah, what happened last week isn't sitting well with him, so he beats him up. I mean, it's fine, but it's not a major podcast talking point.

1:38:41 It is just one of the things that was likely to come out of last week's loss from him. Chris, do you want to add anything on Big Cass?

1:38:48 I mean, I've liked him in, I guess, TNA when he was W. Morris. He's kind of like this monster heel, which I don't know if he's going to be in WWE. He had his moments in AEW where I thought he was interesting, where they never really sustained it. But I think that, yeah, maybe having him as the heavy in a faction, Judgment Day or something else, would get the best use out of him.

1:39:12 Yeah, maybe having other people play off of. Darrell, what else?

1:39:18 I know y'all spoke about this earlier, but I just hate when they did that typical triple threat set up and stuff like that. I wish they could have done something more. I know y'all were saying they might not feel like Stephanie Valkyrie can carry a segment, but you can balance that off of how over she is with the crowd and can come up with some type of story that you can tell with her. and use her overness to make Leah feel more healed, or use her and Becky competing overness with each other to make it seem like a clash of titans type of thing, or something like that, make it feel special. I just think the triple threat, don't make it feel special. Don't make it highlight it even more. They could put it together.

1:40:06 You got two, three decent workers, but two good workers in Becky, and Stephanie in the ring, so it's going to be well wrestled and probably well put together, but I just wanted them to take some gumption and say, you know what, we're not going to do the same thing that we always do, and let's just go out here and just let one.

1:40:26 Of these women win, and.

1:40:28 Let's build a few you could have had a triple threat later down the road because, you know, you probably need something to go up because right now, after these two women right here, you have no more challenges for the title anyway.

1:40:41 So you could have stretched this out longer and made it longer. But I don't know.

1:40:45 That's the one thing that I didn't like on the whole show outside of the Roman stuff is that right there. And that just, that irked my nerves too.

1:40:56 Chris, you want to add it? JC Scooby says, booking is failing, Stephanie. uh vicar uh chris you want to add anything yeah i.

1:41:02 Agree with gerald i just think that they didn't maximize the talent of the wrestlers by having a storyline reason for them to have this match and just sort of like let's have a match and have a contrived reason to get to it and to get the most out of them again it would have taken a few more weeks than they probably put together you would have had a storyline reason for this triple threat match to take.

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1:42:03 all the VIP exclusives, including our post-pay-per-view roundtables, the Wade Keller news bulletins, everything with Rich and Wade, the fix that I host with Todd Martin, and a variety of other VIP exclusives. Just search PWTorch in your Apple Podcast app. Derek Mitchell has a super chat. Wade, I think you're the only one who might understand this. Sam Muschak would be rolling in his grave with his finish in St. Louis.

1:42:29 I knew it was going to be a triple threat and no clear cut winner. Yeah, we'd be on the same team on these triple threat matches, I think. Darrell, anything else?

1:42:42 That's it for me.

1:42:43 I would just say on that card, on the Money in the Bank card, did they even need this title match? I think the card is decent right now by how it is. And based off the card that you see, which would be the best, what would be the best two matches on the whole card?

1:42:58 And that's it for me. All right, great.

1:43:00 Thanks, Drell. Appreciate it. So we got Roman Knight, Oba and Bronson Reed, Vicar, Lynch, and Morgan, plus the two Money in the Bank matches. With two Money in the Bank matches, my prediction would have been they'd keep it to four matches. But now we have three. Pretty strong singles. I guess singles matches, right? More standard matches of triple threat, two one-on-one matches. In terms of the best match, I mean, it's weird. I think, you know, they're all really different.

1:43:34 Like the men's Money in the Bank, a bunch of veterans with, along with, I guess, Javon and Trick, but Braun's a veteran now, Braun Breaker. The women, bunch, you know, it's kind of up-and-comer, next-generation women. people vying for that. And then Roman and LA Knight, it's going to be a Roman match. It's an LA Knight match. It's there.

1:43:52 They are not filling in for each other's weaknesses style wise in the ring. So, but, but it's going to tell, you know, probably a good story. And then it just depends on to a degree how we feel about the match will be, will be determining great part on the finish. Does it feel like a cop out? Does it go very long before there's some sort of interference or angle?

1:44:10 And maybe that's why there's five matches. Cause some of them aren't going to go very long. Obafemi and Bronson Reed probably isn't going to be very long either. And then Vickera, Lynch, and Morgan is probably going to do the heavy lifting in terms of just the most traditional moves in a match. Like, because everything about the Money in the Bank is going to be about ladders and big bumps and a bunch of, you know, multi-person spots. So, I don't know. I mean, each of the matches feel significant and different. But best match-wise, I think it's sort of, what are you looking for? You're looking for the high stakes of Roman and Knight, the intrigue of Oba and Bronson, the...

1:44:46 just straightforward three good female workers going out there and in a title match, or are you more into what the, you know, what the men or women have to offer in the money in the bank with, uh, Javon, obviously probably being one of the athletic highlights. Uh, Chris, what do you think?

1:45:02 I think for me, best match goes into anticipation as what match am I anticipating the most. And for me, that would be Bronson Reed versus Obafemi because of just, um, it's probably going to be the shortest match of all the five. But kind of the action they have and also the storyline coming after it, to me, is the most intriguing. So if I had to vote for a best match or the match that I'm most interested in, that would be it.

1:45:30 Goodfella says, I like five matches on the card. Goodfella says, commercials will make it feel so much longer. Standard Aviation says, let's ban distraction finishes. These weekly matches feel so pointless. It'd be nice for a mortatorium on some of the tropes. That is for sure. 7-Eleven says, I like the unpredictability of the men's money in the bank. As far as Cass goes, a few comments on him from our last topic.

1:45:59 I'm not sure. This is Derek Mitchell. I'm not sure Big Cass would trade in his Timberlands for Doc Martens to join the Judgment Day.

1:46:05 Nice.

1:46:06 Arlay says, okay, with Cass, I have no issue. He comes in, gets a heel reaction, which is what we complained about not happening with others. He does get a heel reaction. I think the idea of the criticism, Arlay, is it's actually a compliment to Big Cass. People want him to move beyond being a good mid-card heel by having a more distinct, layered, nuanced persona beyond just bulging bug eyes and red face and being mad. I think the hope is, and certainly going back to... I was advocating for him to get a bigger, more substantial push in AEW's Big Bill. I... I think it's more of a compliment to him than a criticism. He is getting heel heat. That's why it's such a shame there isn't more to his character that you can imagine him moving

1:46:49 up the card instead of just trading wins with a mid-card babyface. I think that's where it's coming from. Bob Barker says, Big Cass had a match on Main Event against some guy I never heard of, but at least he won. So there we are. Going back to. Another topic, Crofton said, it did make me laugh how Roman went right into how Jacob shouldn't be giving orders to the Usos, and that isn't agreed upon hierarchy. Meanwhile, all caps, Jacob was hit by a moving car. That's the thing. Roman is just such a narcissist. He is a deplorably smug narcissist, and people still cheer for him.

1:47:33 And I don't think... Joe, who plays Roman, is not aware of that. I think probably secretly he's like, I can't believe people are still cheering me when I'm this deplorably smug narcissist. But he is, and fans do. I don't know. Any thoughts, Chris? Any of that?

1:47:52 Sorry, it's going to be a sports reference. Roman is a football coach who cares mostly about whether you run the play than if you score. If you could score, it's like you didn't run the play exactly as I called it. But if you run the play exactly as you called it and you get two yards in his mind because he's a coaching genius.

1:48:12 Yeah, I get that.

1:48:14 The players didn't execute what I called.

1:48:17 Yes. Croft, yeah, I mean. if you're a head coach, part of what gets you to that spot is being a control freak. And if something works that goes against what you're doing, I mean, your ego, it can seem like you're undercutting your authority, your ego, or it's an exception you don't want to let go by because everything else could unravel. even if that one deviation from the plan worked out. Crofton says, I really like LA Knight.

1:48:43 Roman has been delivering pretty great matches this year. I am looking forward to it, but I know I'll be disappointed with the finish.

1:48:50 Yeah.

1:48:50 I mean, at least prepare yourself for it. You know? Yeah.

1:48:54 Okay.

1:48:55 Chris, anything else jump out before we sign off here? I mean, we didn't talk about every segment or every match, but we, you know, talked about most everything. Anything else jump out?

1:49:04 No, I think it was pretty, pretty solid show and go Liberty.

1:49:09 Yes.

1:49:10 All right, cool. Uh, thanks everybody in the chat. Uh, appreciate it. We'll, uh, sign off there. Uh, I'll do a full rundown for VIP members of the show. Start to finish. So if there's anything I didn't touch on in the post show here, I always cover it in the Wade Keller hotline. You are obviously invited to go VIP.

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1:49:52 And then you at least are prepped on everything that happens. So that's one of the perks of VIP membership is just getting that kind of 20 minute, give or take a few minute primer and rundown of the show. Plus I also have more to say than I say here on the post show on topics that don't get brought up with the co-host and the, uh, in the chat and the callers. So go VIP, PW torch, VIP info.com tons of benefits. Go check out the latest updated list of those benefits on that page. PW torch, VIP info.com, uh, Liberty, Liberty, Liberty, Chris, you just, your t-shirt, you're rubbing it in. You're making me, uh, I, when, when did the, when did the wolves play the Knicks on the calendar? Do you know when the first day is?

1:50:30 I don't know.

1:50:31 I don't know. Well, you know, I, The thing with the Liberty is that, you know, I'm girl dad. I got both my girls are loving it. We all wore shirts yesterday. I don't think they play, um, more on their King day. Um, but I don't know when they play other than that. That's actually going to be a big game. I think that's on national TV though. I don't know if the wolves are, I mean, I know obviously the cat, uh, vibe is still there with Dante DiVincenzo's injury and Julius Randle on the Nets I don't know if the Knicks are the Wolves are as focused on the Knicks as they were the last two years.

1:51:08 Your game is January 18th at MSG Martin Luther King Jr. Day national game DiVincenzo has like a 5% chance to be back by then but he is talking about being back this season so we'll see yeah oh but they play oh they play preseason game Monday That's preseason. Yeah, but still, I mean, you know, it's kind of cool.

1:51:31 What did you think of Brunson on SNL? Did you see it?

1:51:34 I saw parts of it. It's funny. I said to my wife, there are other players who would be better. Like, Cat and Josh Hart would have been, like, funnier if you would just, like, watch the show. I thought he was all right, but it's, like, just not. I mean, in every sketch, he was Jalen Brunson. No matter what they were doing, it was like, that's Jalen Brunson, which there's a whole thing on Saturday Night Live and who the host is and how they... Some get integrated into the show better than others, but for me, he's only the fifth NBA player ever to host Saturday Night Live, so it just kind of shows how big the Knicks have and he has this season.

1:52:14 Yeah. He doesn't have a wide range of facial expressions, but He showed a little bit more than he does typically in a basketball game. It's really hard to read him. I thought he did a decent job. But, yeah, I think Cat would have been fun to have both Cat and Jalen on together, maybe play off each other a little bit. I don't know. What's their dynamic known as off court? Who's Jalen closest to on the team?

1:52:40 He's closest to him and Josh Hart have the Roommates podcast. He went to college with Josh Hart and Mikael Bridges. But he was at Cat's wedding, so. as several Knicks were. So I'll take that as a good sign. Yeah, I think there's an article in Athletic I haven't read yet, but I think Cat really gets along well with a lot of the team. I even listened to an interview with Mitchell Robinson on the Celtics about how Cat would work with him, giving him pointers on his free throws that he never used, but he said he could show you this season. And there was an injury in the Knicks Sixers game, Ariel Hockporty, who played for the Knicks last year, has unfortunately, potentially, an Achilles injury. He's on

1:53:25 the Sixers now. But Cat was one of the people that helped him off the court.

1:53:28 Oh, wow. Yeah. When Cat got traded, I mean, just people gushed about him as a person.

1:53:34 Yeah.

1:53:34 Just a beloved person behind the scenes. Nice to everybody.

1:53:37 Yeah. All right.

1:53:40 Cool.

1:53:41 Standard Aviation says, Roman wants all the benefits of being a babyface or retaining the safety net of technically playing a heel who wants the crowd to reject him.

1:53:48 Yeah.

1:53:49 That's, That's a theory. We'll end on that note other than a few closing words as we run the credits, so to speak. Thanks, Chris. Always fun talking wrestling with you and basketball too. And go Liberty.

1:54:03 The Jets do play the Vikings. I shouldn't have brought that up.

1:54:06 And when is that?

1:54:07 It's the second or third last week of the season.

1:54:10 Okay.

1:54:10 Well, hopefully the Vikes are still undefeated by then. The Jets will be the Jets, of course.

1:54:17 All right.

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