EVA

I’m not remembering many TNA singalongs besides making up their own lyrics to Abyss’s theme. Did they sing AJ’s song?

I feel like Full Sail Era NXT was pretty influential. I first really started noticing it with them singing along to Sami’s theme. So at least 2014-2015-ish.

I was as taken aback as anybody when they announced Wembley, but they’re looking like geniuses now—Instead of trying to orchestrate a whole tour of smaller events to reach all the potential fans over there, just plant a flag on one huge event and let Europe come to you. Wonder if this was a Jarrett scheme.

Cody finishing the story by cashing in MITB after Roman got a hard fought win over Brock Lesnar for the 18th time would be the most sicko shit. I need to see that now.

I feel like singing the same three notes over and over again is more over than Seth, himself, is.

The Raw roster looks really face heavy and better suited to accommodate a heel champion with a number of viable babyface challengers than vice versa. Which I think might actually be smart. Let a heel be the guy who has to eat shit for celebrating winning a 3rd place trophy. If they go face champ for any length of time, I’d expect a slew of heel turns over the next few months (Drew?) and JBL-style “jamming it down your throat” elevations of lower card heels to feed the champ. Or, fuck, another Miz run at the main event.

QB losing his job and then following the OC who recruited and coached him for years to his new gig is a tale as old as the transfer portal. Nobody needed to tamper for this to happen.

A nice bounce back episode after last week. OC/Bandido kind of underperformed my expectations, but a cold double babyface match is a tough nut to crack.

Tampering for Tyler Buchner lol

Yeah, I’m really not certain what problem this new world title is supposed to be a solution for? WWE’s business has been going gangbusters for the past year, even with one world champion who often isn’t around. In fact, I think Roman as the one and only God King and the ultimate antagonist was a big factor in the success of Sami and Cody’s stories over the past year. Why are we undermining and diluting that now?

I think what you might be forgetting here is that the TNT title was in a VERY strong place after Darby and Miro’s reigns. It already was a must-see attraction…until Sammy tanked it! It definitely SHOULD have been the start of building Sammy up as a top guy. That was clearly the intention. But you gotta deliver the goods, and Sammy didn’t. His first reign was a total snooze, and the second time around he was so bad that he turned himself heel despite feuding with the most hated personality in AEW. Putting him back with Jericho was a mercy, quite frankly. Being Jericho’s lieutenant is the only role he’s every succeeded in.

Lots of smoke swirling around Miami QB Tyler Van Dyke possibly transferring to Alabama right now. Word out of Bama’s spring camp is that the young replacements for Young (Milroe and Simpson) are progressing well, but neither are standing out as a star yet. I could definitely see Saban being in the market to bring a more experienced hand into the QB room. TVD is a tough read, though. Looked like a 1st round pick in 2021 playing for Rhett Lashley but was mostly terrible playing under Josh Gattis in 2022. No idea what Bama could even expect out of him.

I actually want to have a sidebar from the Pillars discussion and talk about title reigns/credibility for a moment: I fundamentally reject the notion that long title reigns are the primary way of building interest/credibility in a title. Or that there is even something innately credible or interesting about a long title reign. I think we can find plenty of examples throughout history of long reigns that didn’t do much for the belt or anyone involved. Hell, there’s one going on right now in AEW with Jade and the TBS title, which nobody has given a shit about in at least 6 months. Like, nobody would care about how many International title defenses OC had made if they weren’t MOTW/Y-caliber and often setup with unconventional angles that felt different from your standard midcard title stories. I’ll even take it a step further and maybe hit some toes in the process: Roman hitting 1,000 days as champ is a meaningless statistic that has no effect on anything. What has made that FEEL like a big deal right now is that, for the past 8 months, he’s had great protagonists with compelling stories (Sami and Cody obviously, but I’d throw in Drew for the Wales match, too) that fans desperately wanted to see win the title. What builds a title’s credibility is having strong challengers, compelling stories, and hot matches. And you can have all that with the title bouncing around a bunch. I definitely have my quibbles with some recent TNT title booking (namely QT’s involvement with Hobbs), but in general, I think this Clash of the Titans era of super heavyweights trading the belt back and forth (with a bit of Darby the giant slayer mixed in) has been great and revitalized interest in a belt that has been kinda dead since…well, Sammy’s reign.

I’m totally fine with them going with this story, and I even like it as a heat check for all four guys at this point in their career, but I just hope there’s an honest assessment of all of them when it’s over. Of course, MJF has proven himself as a legit top guy. And even though Darby didn’t cover himself in glory last night, he’s proven himself already, too. But Jungle Boy is still clearly a long way off from being able to stand on his own as a top singles guy. (Which is totally understandable given his age!) He really needs to keep being booked with veterans who can help him continue to develop good habits and find himself. He’s a great talent, but I honestly think that if you took his theme music away right now, he would be significantly less over. And Sammy…I actually really like him as a sleazeball undercard heel (he’s a perfect tag/stable guy), but he has flopped every time they’ve tried to elevate him. His babyface push was a total dud, and he doesn’t seem to be able to project enough Presence to work as a main event level heel. It’s probably getting close to time to cut bait on him. Again, he’s basically the same age as Jay White. Like, Sammy is annoying enough that you want to see him get punched, but you wouldn’t necessarily pay to see it. That’s no man’s land for a heel with uppercard aspirations.

Compare Jay/Komander last night to Sammy/Komander from 2 weeks ago. Jay is SO needed. He is on a different level from everybody besides MJF and Darby in AEW’s 30-and-under club, in terms of being a polished, world class TV performer. Vince really left AEW with a gift. Notice the precision and lack of wasted motion in what he’s doing. Notice how he sells himself into position for Komander’s stuff. Notice how he is ALWAYS in character and using his character to bring a sense of logic to how the match is progressing (“YOU LIKE TO BE ON THE ROPES, HUH?”). Notice how he builds to Komander’s stuff and gives it meaning, compared to Sammy and Komander doing a thousand high spots, none of which carried half the weight of Komander’s comeback last night. I mean, you can reference some NJPW threads here from the last several years and find me being critical of Jay’s main event tendencies—and if those come up down the line in AEW, I’m sure I’ll have plenty to say again—but I think he has the potential to be an elite US TV performer.

Just realized that Sammy is basically the same age as Jay White. Everybody develops at their own pace relative to circumstances, but…yikes, mate.

Yeah, what’s was that? Literally every little thing about this angle was fucked up.

I automatically assumed it would be round robin, and I’m shocked and disappointed that a certified ROHbot like TK went with…this monstrosity instead. My guess is that MJF will try to fuck over both guys next week, and then TK makes the 4-way anyway.

Jay White came across like the biggest star on this show. Jay/Komander was a weird one on paper, but he laid it out perfectly. I was way over him in New Japan, but I’m here for the King Switch Era in AEW.

I think I hated every single thing about the Pillars storyline tonight. Darby and Jack came off terrible in their promos. I’m certain they’ll work their way back around to the 4-way match, but the tournament definitely dampens my interest for the moment. And Sammy/Jack having a high spot exhibition when something nastier would’ve made more sense, given how “personal” this storyline is supposed to be…just a bad time all around.

Holy shit, how did they turn 24-year old up and comer Ben Carter into a middle-aged divorced dad? ”Nathan Frazer” 100% drives a Miata so his kids will think he’s cool, but they still make him drop them off around the corner from the mall.

Well, that is not a name I was expecting, but yeah, that checks out. Huh.

I’m certain I’m forgetting someone, but the closest I’m getting right now is Jalen Hurts in 2016. He was not technically the starter for the first game, but he was scripted to enter the game on the third series…and then he never left, despite not playing particularly well for his first few drives. It was clear that the coaches considered him the real QB1 and that the other guy starting was just theater.

I don’t think anyone has suggested that AEW should get $50 billion dollars on their next contract?