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Yep, but he didn’t get personal. I know that’s hard to hear as a phil mark, but even after phil went on twitter and acted like a pretentious film school student; “I’ve never seen a rocky movie,” Mox took the high road. But hey, maybe WWE will start selling cm punk licensed berets. So you can look like the auteur Phil thinks he is. Fwiw, I’d be real defensive if I were a punk mark too. Especially after the incredible moment Hangman Page just had. The “empty headed dumb fuck” just had the most cathartic moment in pro wrestling of the last 20 years. And he didn’t need Company Man’s ordination to do it. Despite what he (and his whiny emo fans) believe, cm Punk’s opinion does. Not. Matter. Go back and watch Phil collect a paycheck in Saudi Arabia. Take it to .5 speed so you can see the actual moment his soul leaves his body. Cry into your texting gloves. Have an ice cream bar. Adam Page is the toast of the town, and it is killing you and every other Phragile Philliam mark that it went this way. The voice of the voiceless is less relevant than ever. Cry.

I just* watched a Stadium show in America from the second biggest US company of all time and it was headlined by an honest to God death match. I love this shit. It felt like everything served the Beam on this show. Earlier matches weren't out and out wild spot fests. It built to a climax, as a whole,not just in individual matches. Ospreay had a match that I would show to his detractors because he was forced to work differently. The Bucks entrance had me in tears. Mone/Toni was great! The men's gauntlet was okay. I didn't believe anyone but MJF had a chance so I wasn't too invested. The women's gauntlet though was full of wrestlers I could see winning. And that match kind of exemplified the fun aspect of AEW. Everyone was a character, everyone was over and it was just enjoyable. The main...man. overbooked, sure, maybe. I think everything worked though and didn't feel too heavy handed. I'd love to drop a kite to 2010 me, watching IWA MS Prince of the Death matches and let him know that dude who lost the drunken Taipei deathmatxh is gonna headline one of the biggest non-WWE shows ever and basically be doing a similar thing. Great ppv but I hope they never do a 6 hour show again. *Over two sittings due to a misadventure last night.

Oh I think anything you look up about the script that played Julien won’t give anything away other than he was on the Shield. The short of it was he murdered his wife years after the show ended.

They were experiencing a ridiculous miscommunication as two mansplainers are prone to do. I thought Dave's emotions clouded his explanation. I knew what he was talking about immediately, but his explanation wasn't exactly clear. Alvarez needing an explanation and his inability to compute this pretty obvious situation was a bit mindboggling. I was without a ffwd option in that moment, and found the whole thing excruciating to listen to. I like the choice to cut into SNME, and loved the show, but running over-long shows will always feel like a mistake. As good as this show was so much of it will be forgotten very quickly. Especially with AEW's longstanding inability to create a proper set of videos (not 30 seconds and a million cuts) to follow-up on ANYTHING. I look forward to the day when they discover the power of a proper follow-up. Nonetheless, love this company - flaws included.

Season 1, Show 22: “Mask vs. Mask“ or We’ll create a world without friends where only the lonely will play! Let’s LUCHAAAAAAAAAAAAAA Recap: Sexy Star and Pentagón Jr. have beef after the results of last week’s trios tag tournament match. Havoc and Ivelisse have beef because they are terrible relationship partners for one another, but they’ll be trying to earn a result in this week’s trios tag tournament match. Outside of trios tags, what’s the deal with Hernandez, Konnan, and Puma? We’ll probably find out more about their relationships with one another tonight. Seedy backstage interstitial: Speaking of Prince Puma, he and Konnan have been called to Dario Cueto’s office because Dario wants Puma, as his Lucha Underground Champion, to be a part of the Trios Tag Championship tournament. His outward reason, which is reasonable, is to bring prestige to the Trios Tag titles. His inward reason, as I am guessing here, is to overload the young Puma with a bunch of challenges so that he’s ripe for the picking at the point where Dario can put a preferred challenger for the LU Championship in front of him. Dario tells Puma to find two partners to face the team he’s assembled. Konnan wants to know who is on that opposing team, and Dario mentions King Cuerno as the head of the team, but doesn’t give any information about who Cuerno is teaming with. Then, as Puma and Konnan leave to find a couple of tag partners, Dario casually mentions that Puma’s LU Championship will be on the line against Cuerno tonight. C’mon, Dario, we all knew the catch was coming. Konnan knew it, I knew it, even Puma looked like he was waiting for the other shoe to drop from behind that mask that he’s wearing. Dario looks very pleased with himself, though! Let’s open the action with a match in the Trios Tag Championship tournament! Son of Havoc, Ivelisse, and Angelico can barely stand one another, so let’s see how they do in a tag tournament that is built upon working well together to advance. Actually, they have a chance here because the opposing team is Drago, Aerostar, and Fenix. Drago and Aerostar aren’t on the best of terms, after all. Man, Dario is a terrible booker, and I mean “terrible” as “incites terror in his employees” and not as “Vince Russo trying to put together a three-hour Nitro.” Fenix and Angelico try to kick one another as I stop here to point out that Catrina, having gotten what she needed from Fenix, is nowhere to be seen with him. Catrina is the only person in the Temple as wily as Dario Cueto and in fact might be far cleverer and more devious than even he is. This match is sort of what it is. Vampiro makes a Bill “Superfoot” Wallace reference on commentary because Vampiro is actually delightful a lot of the time and I need to once again apologize to him for my faulty memory about his general color commentary performance. There is an insanely dopey double-stomp spot where Aerostar gets on Fenix’s shoulders to try and do a double-stomp that doesn’t really land. Put Fenix and Aerostar in the same ring, and of course they’ll do some overcomplicated spot that looks like absolute fucking shit. These fellas borderline on unwatchable for me when they’re on offense. Look, all I care about at this point is the relationships between the teams and the finish. Drago and Aerostar fight over a pinfall after that incredibly shitty assisted double-stomp spot; Fenix has to break them up. Ivelisse slaps Havoc in the face to tag in. Aerostar should be credited for doing a nice job as a base for Ivelisse’s offense. Everyone dives onto everyone else. I appreciate that everyone is working hard, even if I don’t really enjoy most of the moment-to-moment work. I do enjoy Ivelisse dropping off the apron as Havoc dives to make a tag. Ivelisse rolls out, but the other team can’t take control because Drago and Aerostar are disrespectfully slapping one another in the face. When Drago finally charges Havoc, Havoc dodges, kicks Drago in the head, and lands a Shooting Star Press for three. Ivelisse, who is making her way up the stairs toward the locker room and has her back turned to the ring, turns around with a stunned look on her face when she hears Melissa Santos announce her team as the winners. Havoc stands in the ring, drinking in the glory of victory, as members of the crowd near Ivelisse point at her and chant THAT’S WHAT YOU GET, which is fucking hilarious. These crowds are usually insufferable to me, so I have to give them credit for cracking me up. Ivelisse, of course, plays all this up, looking just like the typical person who broke up with someone and then became sick to their stomachs that the person they left got an immediate glow-up. Angelico makes me laugh too because he’s out on the floor, having been battered by Fenix, and he looks confused by Santos’s announcement having not seen what happened, before suddenly deciding to just go with it; he smirks and raises his arm in victory like he had anything to do with it. This odd trio team kills me. Dario Cueto purposely loading this tournament with a bunch of teams that are dysfunctional partly because it amuses him is brilliant in its petty evilness. That’s what I like the most about pro wrestling heelery: When heels are evil not necessarily to acquire something or even to cause wanton pain and destruction, but simply because they’re petty as fuck. Seedy backstage interstitial: Konnan interrupts Prince Puma’s pull-up routine to tell him that he’s corralled Hernandez to team with Puma. That’s when Johnny Mundo rolls up and informs Konnan that Puma went and recruited him as a tag partner. Konnan is aghast and once again warns Puma against trusting Mundo after Mundo leaves. Let’s see how this Hernandez/Puma/Mundo team rolls. It should be the favorites to win this tourney, maybe? I don’t know; there are still two-and-two-thirds teams left to reveal. Super Fly faces Sexy Star in our second match of the night, and of course, Striker notes that Dario Cueto booked this match because he’s not a fan of babyfaces being friends. See? Evil is petty! Before they can even wrestle, Dario pops out of his office and demands that these two show each other NO MERCY (DIG DIGGITY DOG). To encourage them to show each other no mercy, he makes this match an impromptu mask-versus-mask match, which is the sort of violation of lucha tradition that disgusts Striker, Vampiro, and myself. Masks are only put on the line in blood feuds, dammit! Dario is out here hotshotting random mask matches just like…wait…just like Vince Russo! Anyone who is trying to copy Vince Russo’s hotshot booking strategy just to ruin his wrestlers’ lives is the most evilest evil person to ever do evil. Vince McMahon Jr., eat your heart out! I have to say here (while Fly and Star work a couple holds) that Vampiro’s exhortations about Dario as a cultural interloper who is failing to understand or respect the Lucha culture are wonderfully done. This show is shaping up to be a perfect example of a show where I am not that into the matches themselves on their faces, but the storyline and character-driven developments threaded through each of them amplifies them and makes them more than what they would be if they were just a few matches thrown together so we could see some moves. Well, maybe it’s not the perfect example of that type of show – I’ll always consider WWF Survivor Series 1998 as the perfect example of that type of show – but it’s a great example of what that sort of show successfully looks like. I’ve mentioned Vince Russo a lot in terms of comparing his real-life booking to Dario’s kayfabe booking, but I’ll mention him here as a way to show how his shoot booking philosophy might actually translate into a consistently legitimately good wrestling show. LU is probably the most refined version of Russo’s core crude idea about what an ideal pro wrestling show should be (though LU actually does care about the wrestling and not only about the storyline, of course). This match is good in the sense that it advances the story even if the moves aren’t some super-amazing athletic sequence. This match is much more than the sum of its moves. After that initial cautious exchange, Fly suddenly and nastily boots Star right in the face, deciding to turn things up a bit so that he can save his mask and his honor. Star makes a comeback with a kick and a shitty sitout facebuster, so Fly slaps the shit out of her. I’m sure that Dario is happy to teach Star what he sees as a valuable lesson; don’t save someone from injury out of the silly idea of “friendship.” Of course, what makes Star such a good babyface is that she is stalwart in doing the right thing anyway. Fly sets Star up in the corner and slaps her, but he is languid about following up and eats a diving rana, a diving arm drag, and a top-rope crossbody to the floor. Poor Sexy Star is such a sub-mediocre worker. She barely gets off her feet to hit a Codebreaker that not even the cameraperson can really hide. Moves do still matter to some degree; if Star were even a solid worker, this match would be better because the illusion of close competition would be better maintained. Super Fly retakes control and hits a powerbomb, but he goes up for a moonsault and badly whiffs; Star quickly wraps Fly in a La Magistral and gets a quick three count to escape with her mask. After a commercial break, Super Fly must unmask! Fly makes up with Star as she apologetically consoles him. Fly gets on his knees and tells Star that she must take his mask as is tradition for the victor of a mask-versus-mask match. This is an excellent match and segment because it is teaching fans how mask-versus-mask matches work from a cultural standpoint. Star reluctantly takes Fly’s mask and they embrace…which is when Pentagón Jr. rushes the ring, shoves Star to the floor, and breaks the unmasked Super Fly’s arm anyway, just a week later than he planned to. What a fucking heel move! This was near-perfect professional wrestling even though it was full of imperfect moves. OK, so this is a one-on-one match for Prince Puma’s (w/Johnny Mundo and Hernandez) LU Championship. Puma wears a puma headdress on his way to the ring as a response to his opponent King Cuerno wearing the buck headdress. Striker and Vampiro spend time on commentary discussing whether or not Puma taking so many title matches will prevent him from being a long-term champion a la CM Punk, Bruno Sammartino, or Nick Bockwinkel. Boy, those three examples represent three distinct levels of worker, don’t they? Vampiro says that those three, while great historical champions (debatable for one of those names!) cannot compare to Puma, who is the future. I've typed this before, but I quite enjoy these little conversations between Striker and Vampiro that place LU within a wider history of pro wrestling. We find out King Cuerno’s trios partners for next week when Cuerno calls them out as backup: Brian Cage and Texano. OK, I take it back: Cuerno, Cage, and Texano are the favorites for this tournament, not only because of their kayfabe talent, but also because it’s clear that Dario Cueto is backing them. In a nice little pre-match taunt, Cuerno kneels and rubs the mat as if he were a tracker checking the ground for the trace of his prey. That’s a creative taunt! Cuerno lost a cage match to Mundo last time we saw him, but is getting this title shot, which would bother me more except that a) Dario is capricious and b) it’s not like Puma has exactly covered himself in glory as the champion. However, it does feel wrong to have these two in a title match. Maybe that’s part of the problem here; it feels like this should be Mundo vs. Cage and not Puma vs. Cuerno for the title based on the booking. Puma tries to dive onto Texano and Cage at ringside, but they catch him and launch him into the air for a Cuerno neckbreaker, which is a spot that gave me a real kick. Mundo and Hernandez try to intervene, so Texano backs them off by flicking his bullwhip. Meanwhile, Cuerno pantomimes slitting Puma’s throat like he’s Arthur Morgan killing a lassoed bighorn ram. Cuerno puts Puma back in the ring and alternates between taking out Puma’s wheels and continuing to damage his neck. Man, I wish Cuerno were the champ. Cuerno stalks Puma, kicks him, and then redirects the ref to Mundo and Hernandez while Cage and Texano beat the shit out of Puma from their position on the floor. Puma having the deck stacked so heavily against him makes his comebacks feel suitably earned, and he manages one that culminates in a kick to Cuerno’s head and a plancha to the floor. Mundo gets in the ring and then hits a wild fucking dive to Texano and Cage when the latter two come to check on Cuerno. I mean, he just crashed out. It was amazing! Hernandez and Cage face off before Cage helps Cuerno back into the ring. Notably, Hernandez doesn’t do that; he chooses to instead hype Puma to get up and re-enter the ring himself. Interesting. Puma tries a springboard move that Cuerno is supposed to counter into a press slam, but they botch it and keep moving right along with Cuerno losing control again and eating a spinning sitout powerbomb for two. Puma follows with a springboard 450, but misses; Cuerno hooks Puma from behind and scores two rolling Germans and shifts position to hit a vertical suplex for a two count of his own. Cuerno thinks he’s got Puma where he wants him and sets Puma up for a Thrill of the Hunt. This is the point at which things get all fuckety (in a good way). Cage gets on the apron on one side of the ring, and Hernandez does the same on the other side. The ref goes over to Cage and Hernandez claps Cuerno’s ears while Puma superkicks Cage off the apron on the other side. Puma returns to the wobbled Cuerno, knocks him down with a kick, and then yells at Hernandez for physically interfering. Puma follows up by hitting a 630 Senton and pinning Cuerno, but he is heated at Hernandez for interfering, and I get it considering that Puma seems to be unable to earn a big win without a bit of outside help. Puma does look like a weak champion, especially after winning his best-of-three series with Cage via a DQ where Cage destroyed him, a loss in which Cage destroyed him, and then a win in which Konnan had to intervene. Maybe that’s the long-term story bookers want to tell, though I don’t know that it’s the story I’d tell with a young new champion whom I wanted to push heavily. Anyway, it’s clear from this match that they’re going with Puma wanting to show that he’s a legit champion who can stand on his own two feet. While Puma and Hernandez have an animated discussion, Cage attacks them from behind, and all six men brawl with one another as the show ends. Man, it looks like every team in the tournament except for Ryck’s Crew and Cuerno/Cage/Texano have beef with one another in some way. Dario Cueto truly hates friendship, doesn’t he? If the in-ring were slightly better, this show would have gotten the full five, but as it was, it put on three matches that presented excellent character and story development. What a pleasure this show was to watch! 4.5 LU-CHA chants out of 5.

https://youtu.be/hm4FgA3nehs?si=ll2eS80vwGR9DQ1i SEC Football: Any Given Saturday

I'm pretty sure Caster counts for that because he didn't even get into the ring on Saturday and then the match ended.

I was thinking Max Caster. I can just see the bell ringing right in the middle of "Let's go, Max. You're the ......best wrestler alive" with a trail off at the end as the bell is ringing. Bonus points if he does the sad walkoff from Arrested Development.

I am enjoying Teddy's logic of "I dont work for them so I can't be suspended" Not sure that's how it works but sure Teddy

At first I was wondering what all the fuss was about with the Money Train, because it seemed like that heist wasn't going to be a big deal but as S3 has went on it's just spiraled and grew even bigger. I'm on S3E14 right now, so I'm sure by the time you read and respond to this I'll be well into S4 since I'm on a binge of the show right now lol. It's pretty good! Definitely more of a bingeable watch than something like the Wire, IMO. I'm avoiding even looking up what happen to the Julien actor in an effort to avoid spoilers for the show, because Google sucks now. But that's WILD what you said, holy shit. I was on Team Dutch and then he kinda goes half psycho and kills an animal so now I kind of don't like him. Claudette seems alright but everyone in this show gets their turn at being super shitty so I'm sure it's coming.

Teddy Bridgewater was suspended from his high school coaching job in Miami today. The reason why though... well, he was paying for things the high school wouldn't, like field maintenance, meals for the kids, ubers to and from school for practice, and other things to help the kids.

If it's legal where you are, a half a THC edible per day (5mg) is pretty nice.

Punk's in a gauntlet match? Fuck, I guess I have to watch RAW tonight. Great.

He literally did a podcast with Renee responding to things Punk was saying after he left for WWE.

AJPW Excite Series 2011 Muto and Otani vs. AKIRA and Masa Funaki https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ixIHwym5rZA&pp=0gcJCc0JAYcqIYzv 4 dudes who came from the NJPW dojo.

Season opens 10/7 with a tripleheader, beginning with Chicago visiting the champs at 5pm...

Just wanted to throw some more flowers at my guy Mox. After “brawl out,” and even after he left for WWE, Crying Man Punk couldn’t help himself. He went out and aired every grievance he’s ever had, because he’s a little bitch and can’t help himself. Mox had the chance to rebut. He could’ve gone out and been like “no, phil can’t fight, and he’s actually quite a bitch.” Mox is a better man than me. I’d have called Phil out publicly every week until he responded. Mox knew he was more of a man than Phragile Philliam and took the high road. Also: I’m trying out new Cbd gummies to manage stress. If I seem out of pocket… just put me back in the pocket. I feel fantastic, fwiw.

Agreed on all counts. I was thinking something similar earlier this year watching the Champion Carnival, specifically how the OWA, the Rainmaker and Miyahara's Shutdown Suplex Hold (and maybe the GTS when Punk does it) are the best-protected finishers of the past 20 years or so, unless I'm forgetting something.

I wish Naito ended up in AJPW. I don't think he would take a pay cut though. He probably may end up somewhere boring to me like AEW. NOAH would be alright too for Naito, but they moved on from being the old man pro-wrestling project CyberFight wanted them to be, so I dunno.

ALL IN TEXAS ROAD REPORT FEATURING ALPACAS Thursday: Start, Hill Country. go to court in San Antonio with two of my teenagers, then drive to Magnolia Texas, to drop them off with my oldest daughter and my granddaughter, who loves everyone but is always a bit concerned when I hold her. Drive back to Hill Country, get back around 8. Keep working. Friday: Wake up, try to work as much as possible (hardly at all), then load up the car with Lawful Wife, Lawful Jr., and Lawful baby, who's three and not really a baby but she's the youngest of 7 so she'll always be the baby. Drive to Maypearl, Texas, to the home of the Legendary Alpacas. Arrive 6 ish. Feed the alpacas, jump in the pool while they stare at us menacingly. Feed them again, attempt to get Lawful Baby to feed them and she just throws the feed at them. Order pizza, get down, try to get to bed at a reasonable hour, Lawful Baby declares she's staying up all night. Saturday: Wake up 6ish, get to small town grocery store right when it opens get supplies Lawful Wife will need while she and Lawful Baby fend off the alpaca-lypse. Lawful Jr. and I have VIP Challenger tickets, so we check into Globe Life 9:30. Lawful Wife makes a bountiful breakfast, we go off. Hour drive to Arlington, get to Globe Life, parking literally across the street (for $55!)! Head in, get our lanyards and our first stop is the merch table, with minimal wait time. Look into the stadium and they're testing out various entrance themes, entrance videos, etc. There's actually wrestlers in the ring, but couldn't make out who was who (mostly women wrestlers - kinda maybe Skye Blue but not sure that makes sense). After paying $50 for a Y'all In T-shirt for Lawful Jr., we're ushered downstairs for a chance to take pics with championship belts! Also, VIP Bathrooms! Thank god. After waiting in line (we also got some swag -- actually I have no idea what it was. I'm thinking a little flag that says AEW All In Texas? After waiting in line, Lawful Jr. is now the International champion and I'm the new TBS Champion? Anthony Bowens comes out jumps on a table and announces that Daddy Ass is under the weather and can't appear at All In, but guides us to sing "Scissor Me Daddy Ass" to make him feel better. Gates of Agony appear (in suits looking sharp!) and Lawful Jr. gets a photo op. MXM Collection come out next for a Q and A and I shit you not literally every question was about either Anime or some video game I've never heard of. Get off my lawn. We head up to our seats and figure out there's a Golden Chick in the building! Of course it's on another concourse and on the other side of the stadium so at least we got our steps in. They were only selling tenders so none of that delicious spicy dirty rice, but we good. I'm not going to do a breakdown of all the matches, you know they were all fantastic. Show appeared to be packed. Yes, they closed off the outfield on the hard cam side, but it sure looked like every other seat was filled. In my section we had a Timeless Toni Storm cosplayer (one of several we saw walking around). During the FTR / Outrunners, there was several murmurs going around until people collectively figured out they were dressed as Newports. A slight "we want Newports" chant went out, hope it made it to the broadcast. Pop of the night might have been when Baretta pie-faced Big Justice, but the crowd came around to cheer for Big Boom AJ for the finish. Overall, it was a somewhat nervous crowd -- there was a lot of tension in the Bucks / Ospreay / Swerve match. Like, there was a legitimate fear that the Bucks would win. I sensed a similar fear in the Toni / Mercedes match and the Main Event. But in the end everything was fine. I hugged Lawful Jr. after the main event. Didn't quite get teary eyed, but it was a little dusty. Not sure how many of these I have left with him before he goes off into the world, so I have to cherish every chance we get. After the show, drove home in a horrendous thunderstorm and lightning that went horizontally across the sky, lighting the whole world up for a second or two, which actually was helpful in trying to navigate back to the alpaca farm. Sunday: pack up, feed the alpacas again -- Lawful Baby was actually brave enough to do it this time! She named one Hayseed and another Brainy. I have no idea why. Then the four hour drive home which with breaks and lunch and everything in between was like 8 hours or it felt like it. 10/10 best show I've ever been to, would do again. If you've read this far, I know you're a good person. Please donate to this gofundme. https://www.gofundme.com/f/join-us-in-giving-naomi-lynn-a-proper-goodbye My wife's stepsister Naomi died tragically Saturday night. She was only 32 and had a 10 year old daughter. Her mom Melissa had just lost her mother 7 months before and Melissa's husband recently had a catastrophic stroke leaving him bedridden and Melissa as the sole full time caregiver. Naomi was the sweetest, kindest, best. Always first with the hugs. She was the same age as my big kids, and her and my oldest daughter were best friends. She was an angel with my little kids, and if life didn't get in the way, she would've loved Lawful Baby. And now she'll never got the chance to meet her. Life is terrifying. Hug your loved ones, hug your babies, never forget what's important.

This graphic kinda looks like the final entrant will be Heyman. Imagine you're LA Knight, you outlast Punk, Uso, Penta and Bron, then Lesnar's music hits and out comes Paul Heyman!

Good! I am glad that someone is doing that move on television. Uh huh. And so why didn't you link to the design or share a picture or something?

Basically leading up to this: https://www.cbr.com/blue-beetle-booster-gold-get-rich-schemes/ Actually, this isn't a big spoiler, but when I was watching the start of the movie I thought that the Justice Gang were just people Superman put up with and sort of foils to contrast against. But once it becomes obvious that they're his pals actually, it does really open the door to a bwahaha JL movie in a way that didn't seem possible before.

Nothings more annoying when the autocorrect is on for some reason and it turns the right words into wrong words. Even more annoying when there's lag due to ads like CBR boards.

A few small nitpicks that came to mind... Certainly things that can be overlooked. But I prefer when writers really try to not have the logic gaps like this in great TV shows.