The Thread Killer

That’s true. Having said that, I honestly believe that Lemmy and Trips were legit friends. Triple H is in that Lemmy documentary from a few years back (which is excellent btw). One of Lemmy’s last interviews ever was a thing he did with Triple H and Corey Graves for the WWE Network, which didn’t get released until after Lemmy died unfortunately. Triple H gave one of the eulogies at Lemmy’s memorial, and he has even stayed in touch with Mickey and Phil, the surviving members of Motörhead. I do wish they would use more Motorhead music in WWE, but then again it’s not like I would notice it because I don’t watch that crap anymore.

Actually, after Eddie Kingston and Ortiz making the save for Dante Martin last night...maybe that could lead to those three teaming up? And it looks like Tony Nese and Josh Woods are forming a team, so that is another unit that just needs a third guy. Plus...you have to figure New Japan might send some guys for this deal, too. Plus apparently Cole Karter, Aria Davari and Slim J just formed a faction on AEW Dark? The possibilities for these titles are indeed endless, if this is booked properly.

I agree that Tony Khan is totally out of control with the titles and tournaments, and he must be stopped before every single wrestler has some kind of title. However...I do think AEW can sustain 6 Man Titles: - The Elite (Kenny & The Young Bucks) - The Undisputed Elite (Cole, O'Reilly & Fish) - The House of Black (Black, King & Mathews) - Blackpool Combat Club (Some combination of Moxley, Danielson, Castagnoli & Yuta) - Death Triangle (Penta, Fenix & PAC) - The Best Friends (Baretta, Taylor & Cassidy) - The Dark Order (Probably Uno, Reynolds & Silver?) - Jericho Appreciation Society (Garcia, Menard & Parker) - Jericho Appreciation Society II (Jericho, Hager and Guevara) - The Gunn Club - FTR & CM Punk (They have already said on the record that if these titles happen, they are going for them.) - The Nightmare Factory (Marhsall, Solo & Comoroto) - Eddie Kingston, Santana & Ortiz (Depending on what happens with Santana's injury & contract) - Lethal, Davari & Singh Plus... Until last night I would have said Team Taz (Stark, Hobbs & Hook...but I guess that's not happening now!) You've got teams like Butcher & Blade who just need a third guy like Archer or something. Sting, Darby and Somebody (could be the perfect chance for Sting to stay active but not see too much action.) Private Party and Somebody. Andrade, Rush and Somebody. There are a ton of possibilities. EDIT: @Blehschmidt just barely beat me to it!

Exactly!

Um excuse me but who are you doubt the awesome power of destrucity?

One of the few positives I can say is that at least WWE worked with Motörhead a lot, and Motörhead rules all your faces and Lemmy was and still is the fucking man. So at least they had that going for them.

At the time I pretty much thought it was crap. Now, it’s outdated crap.

This. I worked in a group home with kids aged 13-17 during that era, and they LOVED Limp Bizkit and all those other “Nu-Metal” bands. I had to hear that music pretty much constantly for a couple of years there. Posters, T-shirts, the whole deal. I still get an automatic facial twitch response when I hear that music to this day. And the majority of the older kids really didn’t care about or watch wrestling at all.

The only worry I have about Keith Lee when it comes to his age, is that the dude weighs 400 pounds, and he does dives and all sorts of high-risk maneuvers. It’s only a matter of time until his knees start to give out. I hope he gets a good long run on top before his body starts to give out on him, or conversely, I hope he changes his style up a bit and does more power based moves so he does not put himself in physical danger. I think he is smart enough to only bust out those crazy moves when it matters. Plus, the AEW schedule is pretty much tailor made for him. He only has to wrestle once or twice a week at most, that should help guarantee that his career will be longer than it would have been otherwise. It’s like that whole “bump card” theory I have heard Mick Foley and Edge talk about. You only have so many high risk manoeuvres in you before your body gives out or starts to break down. The trick is for those guys, to only bust them out when it means the most. Especially when you are a Keith Lee’s size.

I have never seen or heard Jim Cornette claim Keith Lee does not sound “black enough.” He has been very critical of Lee’s promos, because he claims that he finds his delivery very odd, and that he never gets fired up. Plus his cadence when he talks is somewhat strange, it’s almost sing-song like. His whole “greetings and salutations” deal is not what you would expect from any pro wrestler…black or white. I can only assume that is really the way he talks, which is fine. I have heard the exact same criticisms levied against Kenny Omega…his promos lack any emotion or urgency. I know not everybody can point at the camera and scream, not everybody is Eddie Kingston or MJF. I have heard people defending Keith Lee and say that his delivery is unique and sets him apart. And that’s true. I hope if he ever gets involved in a blood feud or heated angle that he does ramp up his emotion a notch. I remember having a similar discussion regarding Brian Pillman Jr., it’s all about conveying emotion.

Exactly. I distinctly remember Cody mentioning in an interview that he gave while he was still with AEW that he really liked Triple H and considered him a mentor and friend. And at the time he gave the interview, he was an EVP with the competition, there was no reason for him to lie and say that if it wasn’t true. Or at least, if he did not believe it to be true.

I just saw that reported, that’s hilarious that she would be on two shows, on the same night, announcing the plans for new titles. (Power came out on YouTube yesterday I think?) I am not sure it was planned that way, but it’s pretty funny still.

Surprisingly, the reason I know about him is because of Bruce Prichard and to a lesser degree, Jim Cornette. One of the few things that Bruce Prichard once said on his podcast that I actually believe, is that David Sahadi was the man primarily responsible for so many of those great video packages that we saw in the WWF over the years. Jim Cornette has always said that the production and video packages that WWF did were so much better than anybody else in the industry, and he also gave credit to David Sahadi. I don’t remember the actual episode, but I distinctly remember Bruce Prichard saying that when David Sahadi left WWE it was a huge loss and they’ve never been as good since. I guess Prichard and Cornette both ended up working with Sahadi in TNA. I remember them both praising his work there, as well.

David Sahadi, I believe.

Same. I enjoyed the episodes where Tony watched ECW for the first time. The Bruce Prichard and Arn watch-alongs were deadly boring. The Bischoff ones are hilarious, because they’re pretty much pointless. He goes off on tangents and they don’t even end up talking about what is happening on screen. I ended up canceling my subscription to the WWE Network so I stopped watching them. (We don’t have Peacock in Canada.) Cornette’s watch-alongs are outstanding, but he does individual matches not full shows.

Yeah, Brian Last had to really reign him in there. Cornette really has no clue how corporate culture works at all, and he is totally ignorant about labor laws and liability. Which is odd considering he used to run his own company…you’d have thought he would have picked up even a marginal clue regarding appropriate workplace conduct and accountability. But…nope. Remember his brilliant position on Becky Lynch taking maternity leave? It goes back to something I had discussed a long time ago, either in this thread or the thread about his podcast. Quite honestly, Jim Cornette is not really all that intelligent. It’s not just that I don’t agree with a lot of his opinions about politics, it’s that his basic understanding of social issues and current events are usually remarkably simplistic and he is incredibly ill-informed. When he actually attempts to expound upon his reasoning for some of his opinions, you can tell that he is just not the sharpest knife in the drawer. He has street smarts, and he has a razor sharp wit. But even he himself admits, he basically only has a high school education, and he spent his entire adult life on the road working at his career in professional wrestling. He has admitted he never voted, and never read or watched the news while he was working. He doesn’t read much, unless it is related to pro wrestling. He gets most of his news and information from Twitter and soundbites on CNN. Jim Cornette is pretty much a savant when it comes to pro wrestling history. It amazes me when he can accurately quote dates and matches from the distant past, with perfect clarity and accuracy. His analysis on Vince McMahon‘s impact on the wrestling industry in general, and where things might go from here was actually interesting and insightful. But his take on the things that let up to this situation are quite cringeworthy.

I have seen rumours on Twitter that if Dunn is out, Jeremy Borash would be the one to take his place? I don’t know if I put any stock in Twitter rumours, but that would certainly be something if true. As I said earlier, if Dunn and Pritchard actually go, I am prepared to believe they actually are making real changes and Vince is really gone.

While I’m not confident Trips taking over creative is going to make things significantly better, I don’t think it’s going to make it any worse either. At worst there will be no noticeable difference. Once again, this is all operating under the assumption that Vince is not secretly pulling the strings behind the scenes. Having said that, there was a very brief period of time when NXT was putting out a damn good product, and Triple H was in charge then. It is actually conceivable that this could be a good thing. I am choosing to remain open minded and wait to see what he does. I also know it’s not like the changes are going to be happening overnight. My question is, what exactly is Bruce Pritchard‘s job now? He is no longer in charge of talent relations, and now he is no longer in charge of creative either. Is he going over to Vince’s house to wash his car or something?

I’m mostly annoyed at Gresham because the news about him is overshadowing the Briscoes/FTR match. More people are talking about him walking out than they are talking about what might be one of the best matches of all time.

True. Mauro and Christian = good. PAC and Samoa Joe = bad. But I really like Good Brother @C.S. anyhow. You can dislike the opinion but still like the person rendering it here at PWO.

Gresham really did seem off, as soon as he came out. I actually commented on it at the time, I wondered where his normal ring gear was and why he was acting differently. I had no idea what was going on backstage at the time of course, but in retrospect it is now pretty clear what was happening. He was doing his James Storm imitation, basically.

My feelings exactly. The whole point of these podcasts is to talk about what was really happening behind the scenes, if you use them to try and work people, especially if it’s obvious, it pretty much defeats the entire purpose of the shows to begin with. It struck me as a ridiculously stupid idea.

As I mentioned earlier, I watched the show with a couple of friends who are lapsed fans, so I didn't do the usual PWO deal of posting along as I watched it. I also didn't see the pre-show. I know it was available on YouTube but it wasn't on FITE, so I didn't watch it...so I missed everything that happened there. I took the time to show my friends the first Briscoes/FTR match from Supercard of Honor in April, so see what they thought and get them prepped for the rematch. - I was surprised to see Gresham/Claudio go on first. The FITE feed was super glitchy during the first few minutes of this match, which didn't help. I was worried it was going to be an issue all night, but after a couple of minutes it wasn't, thankfully. I thought this match was just okay. I actually quite like Gresham, but I found the size difference between he and Claudio to be a bit distracting. I hate to say it, but I think Gresham needs to stick to fighting guys closer to his own size in order to have compelling and believable matches. There are smaller guys who can pull these kinds of matches off (Taz, PAC and even Low Ki spring to mind) but the size difference in this match really kind of took me out of it. Maybe it was more in the style of match they were trying to work...I don't know if you can have a believable 50/50 technical wrestling match with such a huge size difference. If there is that big a difference, I think the smaller guy should work more as an underdog from "underneath" as they say...and Gresham didn't seem to want to work that way. This match was shorter than I expected too. It was alright. I have no complaints regarding Claudio winning. So much of how this is going to work depends on if ROH get TV and how much they separate the two brands. I don't want to see all the ROH guys running around on AEW TV with these titles, defending them. That's just too many titles on TV. But we'll wait and see. - The 6 Man match did nothing for me. I am glad to see Castle and The Boys back in ROH and I hope they stay. This match was what it was...I don't know much about "The Righteous" and after seeing this match, to be honest I don't much care if I ever see them again. - I really liked Garcia vs. Yuta. Yuta especially is really growing on me. I loved the Pure Wrestling tournament ROH did during the pandemic, I like the concept and the rules so I enjoyed this. I'm not quite as enthused about Garcia as some other people seem to be, but this was a solid match. I also really enjoyed Regal on commentary both here and during the World Title match. This was good stuff. - As far as Dragon Lee vs. Rush? I'm just going to say it...Dragon Lee's tights make me very uncomfortable. He looks like a male stripper wearing a Batman mask and a speedo, and I don't care for it. This match was pretty good. I tend to not enjoy the lucha style stuff as a rule...I never "get" the psychology during a lucha match...if there is any. These guys beat the holy hell out of each other, but then you've got Rush kicking out on a one count, right before the finish. This probably went longer than it had to, and probably could have done without the multiple near falls...but as I said, lucha psychology is not like normal old school psychology. Having said all that, this was still an excellent match. I have heard elsewhere that at times Rush tends to suffer from a lack of effort and motivation, but he sure looked motivated here. It's impossible to find anything too negative to say about this match...except for Dragon Lee's tights, which get a -50 stars from me. - I didn't hate Martinez vs. Deeb. Serena Deeb can generally do no wrong in my eyes, I don't know that I have ever seen her have a truly bad match. I don't much care for Mercedes Martinez. I've never seen her as anything all that special. I remember her from NXT and I didn't see much there, and I don't see a whole lot now. Maybe I'm missing something, but I've never seen her in what I consider to be a great match. This was alright. There were some good sequences, but to me this match felt like it was stuck in second gear and never really kicked it up to the level where it was a great or even very good match. - I really liked Samoa Joe vs. Jay Lethal. This was the best match I've seen Joe have in a very long time. If he can still perform at this level, I think he's still got a great last run in him. After that last match against Kross he had in NXT, I wasn't sure he wasn't done. Sure, he is not the Samoa Joe from his great ROH years (or even his TNA years, I guess...who was really watching those?) but he still has something left in the tank, for sure. Jay Lethal deserves a lot of credit for this too. These guys had good chemistry. I enjoy the old "attack before the bell and have a big brawl before the match officially starts" angle, when it isn't overdone. I hadn't seen anybody do that in a while, and I think it paid off here. Great stuff. - What can you say about that Main Event? If you didn't like this match...maybe you don't like Pro Wrestling. I was worried these guys wouldn't be able to follow up on their first match, but they did it and then some. It's hard for me to find anything bad to say about this match. My friends both said it was the best Tag Team match they'd ever seen. I'm not 100% sure I would go that far...I have a soft spot for a few of the big Tag Matches from AJPW in the 90's, but this match is certainly in the conversation. I would say it would definitely make my Top 5 of all time great Tag Matches. My only quibble would be that I would have liked to see the Briscoes win, especially since they are staying in ROH. But as I said...there is nothing negative to say here. That finishing sequence with Mark going through the table and Dax hitting the elevated piledriver on Jay was just perfect. I love the fact that ROH is going to be spotlighting traditional style, old school Tag Team wresting. The fact this match was the Main Event says a lot...this is exactly what FTR wanted when they left WWE. They knew they'd never get to have these kinds of matches with this kind of spotlight if they stayed there. When you look at the run FTR is on right now...it's unreal. Everything they touch turns to a classic, they are operating on a whole different level. It's a blast to watch. Overall, this was a very good PPV. I'd say the Main Event made it a great PPV, if that match hadn't been on the show, I'd probably be less impressed but even still...there was nothing really bad on this show. It was super solid, with a Main Event which will probably go down in the books as an all time classic...how can you complain about that? -

By all accounts, Stephanie HATES Paul Heyman, stemming mostly from when he was Head Writer on Smackdown and she was Head of Creative. She actually suspended him for insubordination. I don’t know what her plans are going to be, but it’s probably a safe bet Paul Heyman does not figure into them, at least if she really has anything to say about it. At this point in his life, I get the impression Heyman is just happy to be collecting a big paycheck.

I watched it but I was with friends so I wasn’t able to post along as I watched it. I actually used the show as a chance to reintroduce a couple of old friends of mine to pro wrestling again. They had both stopped watching shortly after WCW went out of business. That was one hell of a show, and that Main Event was incredible. That may have been the greatest Tag Team match I’ve ever seen.