James F'n X

A truly pedestrian, creatively bankrupt show. There were teases of enjoyable things in the women's Rumble, but none of them involve people currently on the roster (Nikki ASH/Molly, the Logan/Liv reunion, Mickie James looking like the best worker in the division despite not being in the company) and all it boiled down to is Ronda going over. And the men's Rumble had nothing enjoyable outside of the two celebrities and a lot of people that should probably look at asking for their release based on this match (or not being in it, looking at you, Finn!). Roman/Seth was good, Becky/Doudrop was as good as an empty arena match could be because nobody in that crowd cared about it, and the mixed tag was alright, but nothing that couldn't have been on Raw. Brock/Lashley was pretty bad before the extracurriculars. Just, ugh. Why would anyone other than the most diehard of WWE fan have any hope for the future after seeing this shit?

I'm pretty sure I was at this show as well. Incredible match.

Probably Michaels/Jericho from WM19.

Liger vs. Rey is really, really hard. Outside of short runs in WCW, we never got to see Liger work matches week after week, for better or worse. The dips in Rey's career (post-unmasking in WCW, various points in his WWE career) have been pretty low at times, but I think things would look different if Rey was wrestling 1-2 matches a month on broadcast instead of working the same guy for 5-8 matches in a 4 week period. That's going to stifle anyone in terms of bringing the best to their work.

10:27, got thrown off a bit by two possible answers that fit the word length for one clue (only one is clearly correct, but if you start with the other answer...)

Artemis Spencer came up through ECCW at the same time as El Phantasmo and just as Kyle O'Reilly was being lured to St. Louis by Davey Richards and Tony Kozina. Fantastic worker that I'm kinda shocked hasn't ended up with Impact since that would lessen visa issues somewhat? (Looking at you, Mike Bailey and Nicole Matthews!)

Looks like KOTR. The Raw match Owen has a black singlet.

'Fun' fact: I was on a cruise as the world started shifting to lockdown in 2020. Masks weren't allowed on the cruise ship. I wonder what the protocols are now.

I think KUSHIDA's getting walking papers soon, honestly, and it's probably for the best for him.

I feel like that one is for the monsterfuckers of all attractions.

I always enjoyed the look of Hammerstein Ballroom when WWF and ECW did shows there. As for sets, I was a sucker for the WCW Saturday Night smoky door from the mid 90's.

Pretty easy one this time, 7:27 was my time. Thanks for making these!

Goddamn this is the platonic ideal of an S-tier vs. C-tier fight. Not really a starmaking performance, but both men come out looking better for it.

Owen Hart, Arn Anderson, Sting, Dustin Rhodes, Steven Regal, the Hollywood Blondes, Razor Ramon. Honestly, I like Jean-Paul Levesque as I started watching wrestling too and was jazzed when he showed up in WWF after being gone a bit in WCW. EDIT: I almost forgot, for some reason I thought Sgt. Craig Pittman was the shit. No idea why.

I'm so glad I'm not invested in baseball anymore. After what the Mariners front office did during the offseason to kill any goodwill the team could have possibly gotten from the Dorktown documentary... I hope they get no hit again in May. If you're gonna be bad, be historically bad.

Nah, C-levels and EVPs love jets and mansions way more than raising an overstressed labor force's budget. Can't get investors if you're spending money on the riffraff. This whole situation sucks on so many levels. Using budget cuts as an excuse as you bring in two new announcers who couldn't have come cheap (especially when one of those let go is probably the second best announcer in the company!), the paths which led most of the cutting block to this point (IIconics, Tucker, Kalisto all part of perfectly acceptable midcard tag teams which I'm guessing did modest merch numbers only for those teams to be split up because Vince 'saw something' in one member, and all of them going nowhere, Otis, Lince, and Metalik included; Blake getting caught up in Jaxson Ryker's bootlicking and yet Ryker still has a job?; Mickie and Joe just wanting to work and not getting used or cleared by a company that only wants older talent if they made them)... it's all shitty. I wish the best for those released and for the brain worms to eat Vince from the inside out faster.

Vince is nothing if not subtle.

What venue is that? It looks really unique and cool. Remember when you could actually identify arenas in WWE/F programming?

Happy Black History Month, everyone!

It's Cena. This was the year Cena was begging for a WM match, lost in the Rumble, 'used his position' to get into Elimination Chamber, lost again, and then called out Taker and got ghosted.

Can't wait for Moose Britchell to start his weekly columns in a few weeks.

I was in the building for this one and man, Seattle crowds are the best when they want to be. Between this and booing Elias and KO for 3 minutes straight after the SuperSonics comment. I remember seeing Danielson and Adam Pearce have a banger of a match in the middle of nowhere north of Vancouver in front of maybe 70 people. Dude goes balls to the wall no matter the crowd.

They really have done just about every other story at this point with MitB. The only things left are 'face calls their shot at Wrestlemania and sticks to it' and 'briefcase turns the heel face' (though you can argue the Dolph cash-in on ADR was close to that). It's pretty clear that Vince's mood swings won't allow him to have the trust needed in anyone to pull off the first scenario, and WWE so rarely books heel/heel that the second is irrelevant.

Hope Vic and Wade get the full-time gig for NXT. Always enjoyed Wade on commentary and Vic's one of the best PBP guys they have.

No New Day pod today or After The Bell on Thursday - has WWE ceased their podcast group?