BrianB

If Conrad can somehow find the time, I think there's a decent chance he'd (foolishly) attempt a Russo podcast.

I'd agree with that core assessment, The Thread Killa. At the same time, what's wrong with holding Bischoff's feet to the fire on the creative, if he's saying he's effectively got an equal voice to Russo? If Vince McMahon ever did a podcast and Vince just tried to bury JJ Dillion for Papa Shango the Ultimate Warrior vomiting ooze angle without admitting he didn't veto it and let it go ahead, I think it'd be fair to push hard on that response. I get that's not 100% analogous but it's feels generally close enough, and the same is true for when Bischoff tries to push too much onto Kevin Sullivan. Besides that it's early in this show's run, so it's not quite like Bruce's show where the audience already knows the 2-3 go to pivot moves and knows beforehand how Conrad will react practically every time. As for Meltzer, I think taking "shots" has just become part of the schtick for all of Conrad's podcasts, probably for some metric and social media reasons. It might frustrate people, including me when it's the same old shit again and again, but it seemingly works in terms of increasing subscriptions, shirts, downloads, etc. I agree with you that Bischoff definitely does seem like he's thought about more about his Meltzer criticisms than Tony or Bruce, and he's got more of an axe to grind on certain topics. FWIW, if they cover it, Bischoff will probably get some points in on some contract figure numbers between 1996 and 2000 since Keller and Meltzer didn't always get those right apparently from the WCW payroll numbers that came out in connection with the racial discrimination lawsuits. (Shouts to Bix and Chris Harrington for putting all that out there and organizing it, btw) I'm guessing Eric got more sauced as BATB 2000 went along because he heard the "stiff" critiques of the first two shows, and it's a common "loosen up" move people go to. Plus, having brews feels like one of Eric's go to moves for trying to connect with people--it pops up almost every time he talks about meeting with somebody new to him in wrestling and wanting to connect. I haven't heard anything personally, but I'm guessing some people who have interviewed Bischoff for long periods of time probably have some amusing stories on that front.

Yeah, I still enjoy this show, though it's certainly not for everyone and it is kind of show dependent. I think it's fair to wonder how much this board's favorite The Lapsed Fan has influenced WHW, given the recent crossover (Conrad appearing on their latest ep and announcing they'll be at Starrcast). While Tony and Conrad's humor direction feels natural for the both of them, there's a kind of kinship to the two that hard to overlook (and fits with how JP enjoys Tony's pod more than Bruce's). It's been more noticeable, imo, in particular since WHW ditched the Prichard type format and steered even more into entertainment and jokes while still keeping informative things in there. And I don't know the numbers WHW does, but it does seem like they've pivoted more towards maintaining and monetizing a passionate core audience, which is also in line with TLF.

Thanks for sharing, The Thread Killer. I'm personally a fan of that type of "dark" humor so I still listen to WHW, but that's a good contrast to how Conrad sometimes comes off when criticism is thrown his way. Like others, I think I'm moving into zone of listening to STWWBP when the topic seems good for the show. The formula is getting clearer in a way where you can see the strings, and I'm finding it less interesting while the rest of my podcast backlog builds up. It's pretty pathetic, considering what's the payoff to this alleged story exactly? No rematch, being willing to let Davey go but not Owen after they fuck his brother over, and Shawn not wanting to do the job at WM14 for Austin, as even Bruce admitted on their show when he confirmed the Taker taped fists and Shawn's antics stories. FWIW, I think Conrad has bitched about how Bruce's different gigs have changed their recording schedules, so he was more tired rather than bored during the Bulldog episode because of when they were recording it. I can buy that. I'll throw a conspiracy theory out there. I wouldn't be surprised if somebody mentioned defamation to Bruce and/or Conrad around the recent Meltzer stuff, and so they're more cognizant of that. I don't think the Boss Man stuff was quite to that level, but it was a bit let's entertain fake news, and it seemed like they were aware of the lines not to cross on the Bulldog episode, and Bruce's lame defense was kind of about as combative as he could be while still staying in bounds.

I agree to a point, but then you went too far. You must not buy into the fact/opinion distinction. Because that's a clear and important difference between Okada/Omega is the best match of all time and "Bret never seriously negotiated with me in 1996." I haven't heard anything as far as Bret responding, but Meltzer definitely went hard at Bischoff's new angle. Nitro/Thunder and the repeated return to the separate nWo brand well after it was clear that was a bad idea, I'm guessing will be a future focal point of this podcast. edit: The continued returns to concerts and "events" will be another one when they hit 1999. Road/Hog Wild should be fun too. Eric's long-winded defense will be great once it's followed up with the obvious dagger question: "so what advertiser's did you score from doing these shows and how much did they pay you?"

When is RAW's TV negotiation rights deal period? And when does it end? I think all of that plays into this booking. On the one hand, you can see Ronda winning the title and being like Austin post-wm14 with Steph. On the other hand, I can see WWE being WWE and how Steph does not historically look like the loser in the same 3-1 ratio that Vince did. Even her being retconned into a puppet master or something makes me suspicious about how this will play out long-term. My hunch, without more info, is that you're right and they'll try to position Rousey like Austin was for WM15.

That's my guess, because they've completed taken the pedal off him, and now everybody is on Seth's jock.

Is Seth the one not selling in your mind, or are you referring to wrestlers in developmental when you say that? Are you watching the TV? Seth is definitely selling. It's not the kind of selling I'm crazy about, but he's gotten a lot better than the nadir of that HHH WM match where he does lots of flips, flying, and knee based offense and then momentarily grabs his leg afterwards. He's still spot monkeying a lot though.

What numbers does FOX currently do on Fridays between 7 and 10?

It would've been worse if it happened when they were still negotiating, wouldn't it?

Dave has stressed that they're not getting paid. Is that a meaningful enough professional ethics distinction--direct vs. indirect profiting? I seem to recall something like this subject coming up when Ariel Helwani was signed up to cover the UFC on FS1 and there was chatter about whether that was proper or not.

I don't care about it, but if Meltzer is showing up for all the Starrcast stuff, I'm surprised journalism ethics and other arguments aren't being raised against it. Personally, I think all the Conrad related podcasts going after Dave is largely a work (there's probably a few times guys actually get upset at the reporting, but for the most part it's playing things up and looking to get shots in). This event seems like one of the clearest indications that despite all the negative chatter on boards, Dave looks at it as a work too, and may mostly care about how it helps his numbers.

Lately, between 2-6 probably. I probably spend more time listening to or researching/reading about things. When a binge interest hits and I've got more spare time, I'll watch considerably more, more like 14-24.

I noticed that moment as well. I'm guessing it's a case of Conrad not feeling like it's worth correcting Bruce on the original source that went into Dave's comments. Bruce just seems to check out at spots in these recent episodes and then repeats a lot of what he remembers hearing or just goes to canned material. But you might be right that Conrad is also leaning into "it's entertainment" and not caring about accuracy and confronting Bruce as much as previously. If that's the case, I hope he puts his efforts on that front heavily into the Bischoff podcast because that Bret episode was a fucking whopper. The other possibility, which briefly came out on a WHW episode (Tony saying Conrad encouraged him to take shots at Meltzer to help their social media numbers, except for that one time they made a diss track for it afterwards), is that Conrad encourages Bruce to go after Meltzer to some degree, and since he knows it's schtick he automatically shifts to "move on" mode.

I could be wrong, but I believe Dave has also said marketing people have told him that the persona gimmick is a way to boost social media numbers. I mean...given what twitter is and looking at Dave's follower count vs. any other wrestling media's follower counts, I'm not sure that's wrong. If Dave tried to replicate his current newsletter voice on twitter, I don't think he'd get as much attention or as many eyeballs. I'd prefer if he did that though. But I'm sure what you wrote is part of the equation too. Dave's sometimes talked about how he's confident about verbally dunking on people, but would occasionally get nervous before having some people from the wrestling business on his show, e.g. Bobby Heenan. Twitter is just another format for that, and people more people to dunk on, if you feel like doing it.

I'm guessing from what Dave's said about twitter, he agrees with you that it's not journalism. That's why he'll act like a twat on twitter. It's as much self-promotion as anything else. He's acting like wrestlers might in shoot interviews. He'll tell facts and correct stories. But he'll also rustle people, state things in a way where he puts himself over, and encourage people to have strong reactions to what he says. Does it work? Who knows. He's got the numbers. If they have gone up, maybe there are alternate causes (e.g. I do think the wrestling podcasting boom has probably helped the observer.) edit: it might help his social media numbers though, let's face it...hot takers get more traction on social media, and I wonder if that helps him get higher ad rates for f4w.com

Whatever irritation twitter Dave feels over the Prichard trolls or die-hards ragging on him, he probably waves away when he looks at his subscriber numbers. The overall wrestling audience might be more niche than ever, but Prichard and other Conrad shows are organizing and generating a whole audience of people that are interested in pro-wrestling history and finding out the behind the scenes stories...in other words, they're growing the hardcore, possibly a lapsed hardcore audience, that will subscribe to the wrestling observer to look thru the back issues.

This is true, and unavoidable. But there's a difference between people like Dave, who will go out of way to dispute and refute Bruno's alleged MSG sell-out record right after his death, and people that will put their own personal opinions on the same or a higher tier than the truth. I highly doubt that if somebody Bruce knew well and talked to frequently died, that Bruce would bother to correct people exaggerating facts about that person. If anything, he's the kind of guy that would enjoy embellishing.

I don't think Bruce's credibility is the dirt worst, but it's not generally speaking above Meltzer's (not that Meltzer isn't without errors, but if somebody bothered to compile everything they've said and put it side by side, Bruce would be wrong more frequently.). He strikes me as about like anybody who was involved with events and sometimes a decisionmaker. That's what makes his Vince McMahon perspective so interesting, but it also makes a number of his biases more clear (e.g. he's likely to slam the creative when he was on the outs of that, e.g. Russo although a lot of that era was bad, but it's really night and day). I'd agree with parv that Bruce isn't on the list of guys you immediately ignore. That list of guys where when they make a claim, you immediately default to wanting 2 independent sources to confirm or seriously entertain their claims. I would say, in general, I trust people like Cornette to be reliable fact-wise, since Cornette took meticulous notes. That's fair. It's also a big difference between the Torch and the Observer where facts/reporting are clearly delineated from analysis/opinion. I was pretty late to the game on reading actual wrestling observer newsletter (well into college), so I was definitely surprised and taken aback at the formatting and presentation from the most prestigious wrestling journalist, especially on how the sourcing can be hard to tell. But the more I've learned about pro-wrestling and its history, the more I can see Dave's approach and why he took it. He's had longer longevity at the top of the pro-wrestling journalism field than anybody else. And not too many of the more traditional journalism type newsletters were/have been able to sustain long runs as newsbreakers.

Anybody viewed the RFvideo release with Prichard and Patterson?

Yeah, if that false information was "Bruno was a Nazi youth who wanted his Mom shot!"Twitter Dave is a character he's embraced, he's said as much, and this one thing was just a weird ill timed thing to immediately tweet upon Bruno, his friend, passing away. If you're gonna embrace Twitter to engage morons because you've been told it's what you do, it's gonna bite you in the ass occasionally. Number one, no one cares. It doesn't matter if 187 or 188 is real. It's a mythology and it doesn't effect anyone or anything to let it be. And anyone going crazy on Twitter calling Dave terrible things over this ? They're assholes who are over reacting on purpose because Twitter is a sewer. But people just pointing out that it was an ill timed tweet has gotten a response of crazy hostility and escalation of weird anger from some people. I know Dave was full of emotion and then finished the obit he's already had written. ( Not a criticism, that's how it's done) and just tweeted an ill timed and honestly strange tweet. Shit, if we all want to redirect our feelings of anger and frustration, there's no better than the New York Times obit of Bruno which is condescending and awful. I don't think it's that strange. Bruno's sell-out record at MSG is an important fact as it relates directly to his drawing power and long-lasting connection to a particular area and fanbase. That's a huge part of his legacy, and often one of the first things people bring up when evaluating his stature. I'm not sure how ill-timed it was either, Dave might've been abrupt with covering it, but he did just churn out a huge piece contextualizing Bruno's life, legacy, and Dave's relationship with him. Unless somebody only looked at that one tweet, they would be aware that Dave had published that big piece and how they could access it. Not surprising, though. It's been around with wrestling coverage for forever. For whatever reason, a lot of news people, because they don't like wrestling and think it's silly or sleazy, they then feel the need to incorporate that point of view into their writing. And their editors don't give them enough shit so that they don't cover the subject in a way where any reader can tell the writer thinks the topic is beneath them.

I didn't personally have an issue with Dave's correction. I can see being annoyed at it because Dave didn't contextualize his comments in a broader way as opposed to simply engaging with the narrower topic. But 1) twitter isn't exactly the best medium for that, even somebody can make a thread (and Dave's writing isn't exactly naturally concise), 2) Dave's twitter persona with it's goal of driving traffic/follows and potentially subs for the observer doesn't mesh with that, and 3) as a journalist or historian, accuracy about something should always trump romanticizing something or using artistic license that speaks to some supposed larger truth, despite you knowing it's false.

It depends on the subject matter and time frame for what Tony can remember and talk about. The Bunkhouse Stampede 1988, for instance, he remembered quite a bit. I'm guessing you'd enjoy that show. Generally speaking, it seems like Tony recalls a lot from the JCP days and some from the early Jim Herd era after he came back. But I'd agree that I'm expecting WHW to mostly become a watch-along and humor show, since Conrad has his mortgage business, STW, the weekly network show, and is launching 83 weeks too. Kind of a shame, but it'll probably make for good listening every once in awhile. Tony is a way better personality than most wrestling industry podcasters.

I'd highly suspect both Bruce and Tony have told Conrad what they prefer doing, and so he just tees them up. That's most obvious with Bruce, but it's been that way sometimes for Tony too. I'll be curious though if the dynamic on WHW shifts as Conrad gets more and more overworked with all his gigs. In my head, Tony's show is the one most likely to suffer, unless Tony keeps bothering to prepare and/or bring the lols.

Some of it seemed a bit muddy, as Johnny pointed out. Plus, I assume the logic is that if people want to lie on camera about what they're directly involved in, then here's the footage of them saying it. That's not quite as easy with the Beckett stuff, and I kinda agree with Simmons about how that'd basically be an extra 6 minutes.