For Great Justice

Props to Tony, that was a slick trade back in the first round and still getting his guy. His best booking of the week, obviously distracting him from Dynamite. The Bucks needed to pile drive some sense into him.

Yoooo I just realized that Tony wearing the brace to the draft and the NFL and ESPN being in on the gag would be fucking amazing. Imagine them kayfabing the shit out of it and Mel Kiper is talking about the projectability of the young kid Perry. Quick off the edge, real lunch pail kind of guy but has some off the field issues that have scared some federations away. Oh shit even better if they do it Naked Gun style where TK himself gets up there in full neck brace to announce some random 6th round pick on day 3 and the Bucks jump his ass AGAIN and put him through a table while there’s like mascots and shit freaking out on stage.

I think it’s sort of all true The babyface owner/matchmaker getting beat up by heels is a trope as old as pro wrestling itself: Watts did it, Jarrett did it, Von Erich did it, Vince did it… Said babyface then gathers all the top good guys and walks tall over the heels in the big blowoff. So in that sense this doesn’t make TK Jacksonville Dixie or whatever. This is the usual TK deal of revisiting classic territory angles. That’s generally perfectly ok. My thing though, is that I don’t want to see Tony Khan walking tall like Bill Watts. Actually I don’t think anyone wants to see that.

Did y’all see that selling? Shad Khan gets pro wrestling more than Jungle Boy does. This was all stupid though. The show reeked of TK having his eye off the ball being stressed to hell all week about which Big Ten offensive lineman to take in the fifth round, then just showed up to work and said “fine, let’s do that” to all of the talent’s shitty ideas.

Don’t hate on the mean streets of IKEA

Sheamus/Drew is sort of like Sami/KO. It’s never a wrong answer. I think Drew might be a the peak of his powers more than any other wrestler in the game right now. I didn’t have a clue that his all around ceiling was this high.

I believe the title Cody has now has the WWE, WWE World Heavyweight and Universal lineage. It’s all of them.

Yeah I’m concerned about Gable as a heel. he’s such a natural Mighty Mouse babyface. If they are going full blown killer wrestling machine, maybe he needs a manager. Angle would work, and he himself hasn’t worked heel in a while so that would be fresh.

Yeah that Jey->Sami->Crowd tracking shot was unbelievable. The thing we’ll remember from this show for a long time.

My gosh, what are we even doing with this show We’re this close to blood baths, “Iron Man” and comments about scissors This ain’t it

What was handed over, they ask? Follow the blue key Silencio

I don’t think the crowd will turn on Cody for the same reason they didn’t turn on Bryan: they witnessed the struggle, the departure, rebuilding himself and climbing back to the top. It’s the same reason the crowd never turned on Austin or Foley. With Roman, Cena, and eventually even Hogan, there was never that initial struggle for the fans to build their support behind. They got turned on. I don’t think they have to worry about it with Cody.

Is it weird that I’m actually far more captivated by what’s next for Roman than I am Cody? He’s Thanos after he’s retired and is now living as a farmer. He has to now know that the Shield breakup a decade ago is at the root of all of this and he has to get right with that, somehow, or he’ll never truly be at peace even though he has conquered it all. How does that happen? I’m fascinated by how his next stage translates to wrestling. There’s like an Old Man Logan arc in there. They have to figure out how it translates to the ring.

This is a great callout and something they have really struggled with in similar spots in the past (Bryan getting Kane immediately comes to mind, but there are other examples).

Roman/Sami is the best one It’s kind of interesting. The title run and Bloodline stuff ran from 2020 to 2024. I’d argue that Roman and the group were at peak powers at Wargames 2022, which is almost exactly halfway through. So it almost really was a four year long tale of the rise and fall. A nice bell curve there.

That’s who I thought it was at first when we saw the glimpse of the tattooed arm under the ring (looking back it was obviously Solo). But yeah not in the current situation. Waters are too hot. In an ideal world they do it and throw AEW a bone of getting a Ricochet/Ospreay match or something

Here here, in all its glorious forms. How blessed are we that we get these big budget Hollywood summer action epics (WWE), prestige television (AEW) and Indy A24 type stuff (indies, puro, lucha) all at the same, widely accessible time like this. Like I mean shit between Mania, Dynamite and Rampage this week I got to watch Endgame and two episodes of Shogun. Shit rules.

If putting streamers through tables is the new Pete Rose bit, 1) I am game for it and 2) that goober MrBeast needs to be taking a stunner next year

Sorry, one last thought: it was also so cool and satisfying to see Drew and Bayley get their big moments in front of fans, finally, four years later, after carrying the company on their backs in 2020. The latter especially.

Hey man we gotta talk about the absolute geek of the millennium Seth Rollins though. Between the build up, the tag match last night, his own match, his big main event run-in being a comedy bit non-starter where he didn’t even get a move in. Holy moly. My man Seth is down bad.

Now THAT was more like it. What a giant heaping helping of sports entertaining. Hell yeah. This whole thing ruled. Snoop’s commentary. Speed in the suit. The cash in. And yeah that main event was the epic Avengers Movie spectacle it was supposed to be. WWE at its best right there. No one does this kind of stuff like they do.

Just watched. Man, I wasn’t feeling this one at all and I hate that. Last year’s Night 1 was one of the best, most entertaining wrestling shows I’ve ever watched. This was…not. Everything sans the IC match felt run of the mill. This was missing all the fun of stuff like the Jackass match. If last year was 14, this was 15. If last year was 17, this was 18. 15 is a good comp IMO. A miss of a show during an otherwise hot run. Philly curse?

They have to pull the trigger on Hobbs at some point….right? I mean it’s been several years now of this dude just oozing star and looking like the next big thing, yet tomorrow has not come.

It’s a shame they combined the Continental into a single belt, because the world needs the aesthetic of Okada walking out in a boss ass suit dripped out like Ultimo Dragon, while Matt and Nick channel their Cutler and stooge their ass off for him. I wasn’t sure about debuting him as a heel but I was dead wrong. This act rules, and then just imagine the (hopeful) Omega confrontation leading up to Wembley. Oh man.

If Chris is smart he’ll let Hook choke him out and then go on one of his excursions for 6-8 months. It’s time, you can tell by the crowd, and he’s usually pretty good about sensing when it’s time. I predict that happens.