Embrodak

Wrestling is one of the few industries where nepo kids seem to be better than average, not worse, imo. Would be funny if Bron’s cousin ends up being clumsy and boring, but goddamn would an Actually Good Steiners 2.0 vs Actually Seasoned And Competent Creed Brothers match rock. lol @ Punk going to Saudi Arabia. I have zero investment in his public self-presentation, simply enjoy his work, but for those that do, this has to sting.

Say what you will, I don’t think anybody predicted R-Truth being a significant facet of Cena’s last run. Whether it was an audible or a genuine “we tricked the dirtsheets” swerve, it’s kinda fun!

Bron Breakker has to be the most natural talent since Brock Lesnar.

Starks as a big fish in the smaller NXT pond makes more sense, honestly. You can't immediately sell masks and toys of him the way you can Penta, and NXT is somewhere he can be on TV every/almost every week and establish himself as a bigger deal in the eyes of the WWE fans before moving up to the main roster. AJ Styles was a main eventer in TNA for nearly a decade and had just come off the most critically acclaimed run of his career in Japan, him you can start right on the main roster. Ricky Starks not so much.

Ricky Starks is very close to *the* guy, close enough that he was hanging around backstage at Wrestlemania when he finished the story. He might not be big enough or unique enough to be a world champ, but I could see him easily being in that Nakamura/Dolph Ziggler tier where he's always credible to be a secondary champ and always credible *enough* to be called up for an isolated world title shot at a PPV here and there. Thinking back on Roman's reign, I'm not sure there is anybody as perfectly designed to lose to Roman at Fastlane, if that makes sense.

Hook has an aura, but his training has been woefully inadequate thus far.

I don’t know that I have ever seen a PLE with less buzz. WWE should be kissing Aussies’ feet for such a big turnout given how heatless the whole thing really was. How locking in Becky vs Rhea and Drew vs Rollins had no heat I don’t know, but chamber matches as a concept are just totally washed imo. Logan Paul breaking the seal of getting heat by writing shit talk on the chamber wall is probably this show’s historical contribution, tbh. How that only happened near the end of the Chamber as a saleable concept is beyond me, it’s brilliant.

I have to give WWE credit for somehow booking the biggest possible Women’s Match they can possibly present right now, one that is genuinely compelling in a “dream match” way, while still booking the other women’s title match well and interestingly. On paper: Cody vs Roman II w/ Rock fuckery Rhea vs Becky Drew vs Seth Bayley vs Iyo Gunther vs Jey Uso Logan Paul vs Kevin Owens …is one of the stronger suite of title matches I can think of for a WrestleMania. Plus a Judgment Day tag match and teases of LA Knight vs AJ Styles, Sami and Orton both having something to do, Bron Brekker probably wrecking some fools in the Andre Battle Royale, maybe New Day vs Imperium, Dom getting his shit wrecked by somebody (maybe Bron here instead?), Austin Theory and Grayson Waller fucking around somehow… this is a potentially GOAT WrestleMania, if somebody can find some of the Pat Patterson mojo and come up with some killer finishes. WWE has put on some lackluster PPVs for how hot they are, but this is practically can’t miss if they’re at all competent.

MJF was fine as champ until he turned face, at which point he basically became the Youngest Buck in terms of the style and nature of his work, just absolutely insufferable winking, nodding bullshit. The company was in a secular decline/stagnation/whatever before he won the title, and to the extent that his reign hurt the company, I think it’s because A) he and Tony allowed the top title to become a barely-present prop in a midcard comedy tag team, and B ) their plans got scrambled like 6 times. He was clearly supposed to win it from Punk, then that didn’t happen. He was clearly supposed to resume feuding with Punk when Punk came back from his injury/suspension, then that didn’t happen. He was supposed to have a one off storyline with Adam Cole, that got weirdly over. That was supposed to bubble for a while, then Adam got hurt. Then MJF got hurt. Bad decisions and bad luck all around.

Yeah, well, Rock has a lot of “Trump mocking disabled reporter” stuff in his past if he has any political ambition, is all I’m saying.

The Rock has an immense amount of cancellable material from his original WWF/E run. I guess he’s proved that there is an immense amount of money and attention to be mined from people who genuinely do not care about such things, but this “Rock smacking people around verbally” playlist WWE posted just months ago features him doing an extended ableism at Booker T.

Shielding military personnel from their own code of justice is insane and a wildly consequential act, even if it was done for entirely cynical business-type reasons. One wonders how many other companies have kiboshed reports of abuse and ill-treatment by military personnel, sexual or non-, in order to stay in the good graces of their military benefactors and farm good publicity from them. It’s not hard to imagine a lot of situations with similar logics playing out all over the place.

I would say the AEW/NJPW partnership has been kinda predatory, tbh, but given it doesn’t seem like NJPW would be doing much better without it, I wouldn’t say that that statement has much real meaning.

Cody in WWE is like Omega in NJPW, there’s just a certain magic that only adheres in that context. Predictions that he was going to be a midcarder in WWE just didn’t take into account how badly the ‘E needed a John Cena type of babyface.

That tope into tilt-a-whirl slam by Big Bill is the kind of crazy impressive yet totally safe shit that Darby should pivot to. He is small enough that people could do insane yet controlled stuff to him on a regular basis; he does not need to court death and paralysis on the reg.

Gimme that sweet sweet heel Rock, that’s all I wanted.

The Rock wants to be the goddamn President, it’s probably fruitless to try and think through whatever shit he thinks he’s doing here, tbh.

That’s possible, but I suspected the WM main event was a precondition of the Rock joining the board once this all went down. Whether that was a Rock requirement or a TKO requirement I could not say.

Latest Meltzer stuff suggests the WM main event was included as part of the deal to join the board, though which side insisted on that I do not know. Certainly seems like Dwayne is the favored party to rebuild the creative if Levesque goes down with Vince.

In lighter discussion, I was thinking that part of why Rhea is so good right now is she is simultaneously the most dominant, marketable, and possibly over person in her division *and* having a great run as a manager/valet. Her versus Becky at WM is absolutely as hype to me as, say, Punk vs Seth would have been, plus she’ll be doing distractions, reactions, and cheating in the corner for either a Dom match or a Priest/Balor tag title defense.

I don’t wish anything on Cash Wheeler in particular absent actual context, but pointless and arbitrary road rage is genuinely one of the only things I have a fear of. Everybody fucks up driving at least once in a while, and that turning into something violent or even deadly freaks me out.

Florida filing an official charge against Cash Wheeler. I assume he’ll prob plead down for community service and probation or something like that.

The future POTUS has to show China that he’s serious about putting bullies in their place by pinning the Tribal Chief in the middle of the ring.

I could see Heyman out of the loop on something like that just because he’s not the kind of guy you give blackmailable info to, even if you’re close to him.

I don’t believe Meltzer when he says that, but I could believe that Rock coming onto the TKO board and getting the rights to his nickname were last-minute concessions they came up with to sweeten the pot to make this happen ASAP.