AEW - APRIL 2024

[JohnnyJ]

I’m just happy he’s finally in the right place around good management, friendly faces and people who treat his medical issues seriously and far far away from that dastardly jungle boy.

[Just Dave]

10 minutes ago, sabremike said:

Your anti-YB gimmick is the worst gimmick since Vince Champ's.

Idk who that is. And it isn't a gimmick. I genuinely think it's funny that they caught a beatdown from the world's worst MMA fighter with a man advantage, and that every company they're a part of is made worse by their mere presence. If that bugs you, I'm sorry. That doesn't make them less lame.

[Death From Above]

I immediately think less of people that take anything Punk says at face value. We have like 2 decades of obvious examples that it's a dumb idea.

[tbarrie]

1 hour ago, Technico Support said:

I know “it’s wrestling and wrestling is different from real life job environments,” such a lousy argument that excuses all manner of bullshit, but seriously…in what world should anyone be forced to work with a coworker who talked shit and physically assaulted them because “think of the money!”

But wrestling is different from an office job, in that wrestling is physically dangerous and the performers need to be able to trust each other to ensure one another's safety.

...wait, which side was I on?

[John from Cincinnati]

6 minutes ago, Death From Above said:

I immediately think less of people that take anything Punk says at face value. We have like 2 decades of obvious examples that it's a dumb idea.

Shit, just last week he was on TV saying he isn’t terminally online. So many lies! 

[sabremike]

13 minutes ago, Just Dave said:

Idk who that is. And it isn't a gimmick. I genuinely think it's funny that they caught a beatdown from the world's worst MMA fighter with a man advantage, and that every company they're a part of is made worse by their mere presence. If that bugs you, I'm sorry. That doesn't make them less lame.

Now have you ever heard about this thing called the Mangrate...?

[Just Dave]

5 minutes ago, sabremike said:

Now have you ever heard about this thing called the Mangrate...?

I have no idea what that has to do with anything, but I just googled it, and now I'm gonna order one, so thanks for that...

[SirSmUgly]

1 hour ago, Death From Above said:

I immediately think less of people that take anything Punk says at face value. We have like 2 decades of obvious examples that it's a dumb idea.

Punk is an obvious hypocrite and a clown, but he's not wrong about Tony Khan basically being a son of a billionaire who is playing a giant game of EWR except with real people, and that being a likely issue. 

Tony K. has been paying less attention to Fulham, and they somehow found a decent striker to replace Mitra and are going to easily stay up for a second straight year. He's a billionaire's failson playing with a bunch of money that he didn't earn through managerial competence. And I'm not saying that to yuck anyone's yum, truly. I am happy for people who like the product (and for workers to have more places to make good money). But it's very hard to hear what Punk has to say about that and not take what he says at face value, even if it's beneficial to him to say it and he's deluded about his own agency in any of the backstage troubles.

And trust me, you can look back through my posts and see that I have little regard for Punk as a worker or a person, so it's not that I am a gullible Punk fan. But what he's saying about that is not exactly some sort of isolated viewpoint!

That can be true and Punk can be deluded about how toxic he is as a human being or how cruel he's been to Colt Cabana. 

[Octopus]

Ok, I watched most of the interview earlier. I don’t think I’ll finish it, so I’ll ramble on what I saw.

I’ll start by admitting I have a bias against Ariel Helwani. Maybe I’m wrong on this, but because of this I won’t really focus on his contributions too negatively. What did it for me was the confrontational interview with Tony Khan (which as a journalist is totally fine if that’s your style of interview) but then following it with a HHH interview that was take and didn’t have any questions of the very newsworthy Vince McMahon who was in the midst of being kicked out or returning to the WWE. The term WWE shill was used by someone earlier and him getting WWE celebrity in the crowd treatment during a WWE PLE during all that where Michael Cole coyly referenced the TK interview was enough to show he shouldn’t be taken seriously.

 

Oh hey, CM Punk. Neat.

 

He’s a very interesting and complex individual. Taking into account that this is clearly his perspective and what he believes, I found this to be a very compelling watch. His AEW run has made me appreciate him a little more as a performer and also as the type of person that would be great in a tv drama. His contradictions and self righteousness really round out his character. It’s like loving Bruiser Brody because of the mystique of anything could happen and he could savagely wreck anyone. CM Punk can be defending a friend or being a prick and in both scenarios it is believable. It’s not that it’s tough being a Punk fan now, but that it likely always was. As he gets older he’s now the crabby or tell it like it is Gen Xer that doesn’t care but is also the center of attention that is surrounded by Millennials and Zers. Fighting the system but kind of likes and needs the machine at the same time. He’s fascinating for sure. Waxing poetically, so if I go too far or hurt feeling I’ll take it back do to lack of spine.

Going off of memory on this. I was watching while pretending to work. And by pretending, I was just on my phone:

 

The comments on Collision were neat. He did not think it was a good idea. Even wishing he’d be let go before that. There was a feeling that he was trying to establish that he wasn’t really in charge of the show both not wanting to do it and being dragged to resolve issues (more on that later) but he regularly would say “my show” and even catching him selves a few times with saying it. Selfishly, even though he didn’t think the separation would have worked, I wish it did because Punk, Danielson, Starks, and FTR as the main regulars would have really been my favorite show.

Jungle Boy was painted in a bad light. Because we all know it was single-handedly his fault, I won’t give too much of my thoughts. Bringing up the first Glass argument involved Jack swearing at Tony Schiavone beforehand. I don’t know if we’d ever get it, but a perspective from Schiavone on everything would be great podcasting. Punk downplays the ALL IN altercation but then mentions that he choked him. It’s hard to imply that you were the calm and rational one when you mockingly end with that. This is one of the times he says he quit. He continued to do the match out of respect for Jerry Lynn, Samoa Joe, and the ref I forget. After the match Jungle Boy was put in timeout and CM Punk wasn’t asked to leave. Then the head security guard awkwardly hinted at it and Punk retells it like “What would make you job easier, pal.” Saying that, I never had Nado’s but it would have been funny to eat with the Punk gang afterwards.

Punk states he didn’t do anything g to threaten Tony Khan after Ariel brought up the “feared for my life” line from TK. Whether it is an over-exaggeration or legitimate concern, it is safe to assume that if he is willing to choke someone and then in front of people quit before the match with the largest audience of the company and you’d preform in front of, I doubt it wasn’t more intense than implied. 

I find the CaNt TaLk AbOuT aLl OuT bUt I hAvE nOtHiNg To HiDe to be disingenuous. It’s played off too fake like neither of them see what the big deal was and that the NDA is silly and he doesn’t have to hide his actions. 

I will say this is the first time I heard a good point from him on the Hangman promo. Punk says they went over everything beforehand and were having a lovely time, then BAM you got shot on. I still feel it is ironic that you made your career on moments like that, and even hinted at his “WHO CHOSE YOU! SAY HIS NAME, I SARE YOU” line at Drew was adlibbed, yet it happens at you and it nearly tanks an entire company. BUT, yeah, if you go over your promo together and then that happens I’d be pissed too. It likely wasn’t as Leave It To Beaver beforehand, but still. It is silly to hear Punk say that because everyone was so loud he couldn’t hear it at first, it reminded me of when comics roast each other and one is too prideful to admit they got bested. Afterwards he says Page said he did it for the Colt. 

For the Colt stuff and the drama stuff and the stuff stuff, I think everyone looks bad. It comes off too cliquey. 

That was the moment everything became terrible for Punk. He talks about how Tony didn’t do anything. Even with the Jungle Boy stuff, at one point he says TK said “What do you want me to do?” I’m not going to go too hard on the specifics of that quote because it’s likely a which person are you going to believe if we got both sides of the story. SAYING THAT, based off of this and interviews from Marko, Joey Janela, Punk not being picked up form the airport, a female wrestler I forget the name of, other stuff, Matt Hardy (listing all this stuff I’m rolling my eyes at myself) it is safe to assume AEW is maybe poorly structured (whatever I mean and can tangibly point to?) and has/had bad communication/ HR/ Talent Relations. That’s fair of a young company that grew very quickly (I’ve seen someone say that once so I’m going to pretend I know what I’m talking about). 

I don’t know if Punk would have worked out long term in AEW. Even without the Hangman situation derailing perfect job. It could have been something else that would have set him off. A non-confrontational authority couldn’t fix it. In the past, an over-structured environment caused him unhappiness (and he quit, but that is also due to company dysfunction and a lawsuit, etc, so I won’t go too far into that). I’m sadly expecting his current run in WWE to end eventually in drama after the honeymoon period. What will he do when Seth or Roman zing him hard enough in an unplanned promo moment? Will he feel comfortable to demand HHH and the company lawyer to make him apologize? I do feel (let me rest my tentacles in my psychiatric armchair) that a part of the drama that unfolded in AEW is a bit of How dare they do that to me of all people? Punk hold himself up throughout by implying that because TK didn’t side with him or do what he felt was best they must not “care about making money” which is a tad self righteous.

I do find it interesting that he says there were more positives than negatives. Which I agree with. The Punk run in AEW was very special. The MJF feud was one of the best in wrestling and I loved his Kingston match. 

I have a bit of a conspiracy: WWE tries to create narratives and repetitive talking points about their competition. Early WCW jabs involved the wrestlers being old or McMahon going on about how they don’t know how to treat or book talent like The Giant or Ric Flair. With AEW it was originally about Blood and Guts, which AEW brilliantly turned into an alternative positive. HHH on a few occasions even tried to push people calling themselves EVP’s as a joke. I feel the current talking point is that AEW is only dream matches and no stories. Then dunk in the attendance. I feel the lack of story complaint is very overstated, but was extremely successful at getting the desired narrative across to be regularly repeated. No Stories is the “Sleepy Joe” of wrestling. I suspect it when I heard it from Becky Lynch and then Punk here. Getting the message across.

The line about guaranteed contracts maybe being bad was fucking stupid for how worker’s rights he’s implied. I’m chalking it up to him trying to bash the young AEW guys while also dunking on their poor attendance and not thinking through his point rationally against his general personal ideologies:

 

 

The backstage at WWE story was funny. Punk getting help from Liv Morgan to find his EarPod was great. The Betrayal line was good. It looks bad doing that, but at the same time I believe you had Adam Cole and maybe others derpin around before working for the company. I wouldn’t be surprised if Bayley, Naomi, and Tamina were also backstage to be buds with Mercedes. I get it but eh to everyone involved.

I was a tad confused on Punk talking about almost coming to WWE earlier. He said it almost happened and then said when he took the Fix deal that he didn’t want to do WWE? But then called it a maybe back door to get in? Or that because the handshake deal fell apart he didn’t want to ease back into a WWE Deal? Either way, it would have been wild to see what would’ve happened in that multiverse.

I didn’t get to the stuff about Colt Cabana trying to talk with him. So I won’t comment unless a clip gets posted. But, eh. 

 

All in all, good stuff. I find Phil Brooks to be an interesting person. I don’t blindly trust the things he says and likely might even assume the other side is closer to right in a few cases. And in some, maybe he’s right. I could see myself and my mental health maybe getting just as paranoid in a similar situation. I’m more of a passive aggressive Minnesotan than a in your face Chicagoan, so it’s probably be different, but pre-meds and self actualization I’ve been known to explode on a piece of shit coworker. Call me Davey Tough Stuff.

 

[odessasteps]

1 minute ago, SirSmUgly said:

Punk is an obvious hypocrite and a clown, but he's not wrong about Tony Khan basically being a son of a billionaire who is playing a giant game of EWR except with real people, and that being a likely issue. 

Tony K. has been paying less attention to Fulham, and they somehow found a decent striker to replace Mitra and are going to easily stay up for a second straight year. He's a billionaire's failson playing with a bunch of money that he didn't earn through managerial competence. And I'm not saying that to yuck anyone's yum, truly. I am happy for people who like the product (and for workers to have more places to make good money). But it's very hard to hear what Punk has to say about that and not take what he says at face value, even if it's beneficial to him to say it and he's deluded about his own agency in any of the backstage troubles.

And trust me, you can look back through my posts and see that I have little regard for Punk as a worker or a person, so it's not that I am a gullible Punk fan. But what he's saying about that is not exactly some sort of isolated viewpoint!

That can be true and Punk can be deluded about how toxic he is as a human being or how cruel he's been to Colt Cabana. 

He is probably more worried about raising ticket prices and installing that rooftop pool at Craven Cottage. 
 

imagine if you told fans they’d long for the days of the Michael Jackson statue. 

[Go2Sleep]

1 hour ago, Just Dave said:

Preston Vance changing his SIM card like Stringer Bell…

Vance is one of Brodie's boys, he's set for life. I support the Wire reference, though.

Was Dasha the one that said "by submission" on Collision? That'd be a shitty way to go out.

[The Natural]

I wake up.

Sees the AEW April 2024 thread is five pages when it was only created yesterday.

Oh, shit as to why with CM Punk interview on AEW and there's AEW releases.

Edited April 2 by The Natural

[Curt McGirt]

Hire Trevor Murdoch and team him with Drake. 

[ExcellenceofAirPollution]

Yeah, I could definitely do without pages of Punk talk in an AEW thread in 2024.  Doesn't he have his own thread somewhere?

Anyway, I'd been meaning to post something about something for a while so here it goes....

I made a post a little while back about how I wasn't into the AEW women's division at all lately and I'd like to see more multi-women tags rather than the one longish single match per show they'd been doing, both because they're more likely to hold my attention and because it's a good way to get more people on television and get multiple stories going

Since then there's been a few tags on television and a four way, all of which held my attention!  They actually broke my recent habit of skipping thru the women's matches.   And I'm enjoying the way they're setting things up in the Mercedes division with the different possible directions there.  It really didn't take much to get me invested again.....

Whether anyone from AEW saw that post or it was just a coincidence (I'm sure I wasn't the only one making that critique), the change has been noted and appreciated!

[southofheavy]

I'm tired of CM Punk. He talks too goddamn much. 

[MoeCristyV.1.6]

Needed a Drew Mcdonald run in to kick him in the face. 

[The Natural]

"I thought I was doing a responsible thing. I didn’t punch anybody, I just choked somebody a little bit."

[Casey]

9 hours ago, Death From Above said:

I immediately think less of people that take anything Punk says at face value. We have like 2 decades of obvious examples that it's a dumb idea.

Damn, I thought you liked me. 

[Godfrey]

I liked the interview. Nothing earth shattering, Punk always has an angle on the truth and knows how to get under people’s skins but there were some fun insights and it was nice to hear things from the horse’s mouth. I wish he’d touched on Mox more since that’s my personal ax to grind

[Just Dave]

30 minutes ago, Godfrey said:

I liked the interview. Nothing earth shattering, Punk always has an angle on the truth and knows how to get under people’s skins but there were some fun insights and it was nice to hear things from the horse’s mouth. I wish he’d touched on Mox more since that’s my personal ax to grind

Could you clarify this a bit for me? I'm not seeking out conflict, I promise. I'm just not sure what you mean.

[AxB]

6 hours ago, MoeCristyV.1.6 said:

Needed a Drew Mcdonald run in to kick him in the face. 

Drew McDonald's been dead for 9 years. Did you mean Drew McIntyre/ Galloway?

[Dolfan in NYC]

Moving releases stuff to it's own thread.  Standby. 

---

....and done. For AEW releases talk go here:

Now back to everyone insulting each other over a guy who hasn't worked in the company for a year. (Also, btw, I'm sick right now, so be fucking civil or I might cough and hit the mute button on you.  Or you know, worse.)

[Just Dave]

Just to break up all the Punk talk;

I went back and watched the HOB/Elite trios title match from Revolution last year. A few thoughts;

For guys who (allegedly) don't want to be there, Black and Matthews are in top form here. The pace is breathtaking and all the strikes are snug. Matthews takes a couple bumps that make me question his sanity. 

No one wanting to tag in against Brody King popped me. I wish they'd have played that up a bit more moving forward. He's a truly one of a kind animal. 

It occurs to me that The House of Black look exactly like the kind of people Papa Buck was hoping his precious sons would avoid by keeping them out of public school. The pagans took the church kids behind the movie theatre and whipped that ass.

I still think the Jacksons are incapable of telling a story that involves anything other than sprinting from spot to spot. There were several times down the final stretch of this match where I thought the Elite guys were gonna inexplicably go over a stronger, more credible unit. You know, because they can. 

I've come around on Kenny as a worker. He held things together for his team. It's a shame he didn't get stateside full time five years before he did, but I have no doubt that WWE would've made him do a bunch of stupid shit. He's still kind of a dork, and his pretentious view of what wrestling is and isn't bugs me, but when he's between the ropes he's pretty special. I wish he'd cut down on the tap dancing and the full body "fighting spirit" shaking and stuff, but in big matches like these he's still pretty dope.

It feels like AEW TV is getting ready to feature House of Black again. I'm hopeful Malakai gets a singles title and the two other guys get some accolades, too. Buddy Matthews has "Owen Cup Winner" written all over him, and I'd love for Brody to find his way into a big singles program too. I'd also love for them to hold the tag titles and defend them Freebird style. 

[Technico Support]

Listening to Meltzer this morning, two thoughts:

So much of the Punk shit just panders to the Cornette Cultist narrative that Khan is a mark who just financed a company to hang with the boys and have good matches, a dumb money mark working with daddy's money, blah blah blah.  Now I'm not saying he's the opposite or a shrewd businessman who is 100% strategic, but the truth is far more likely to be somewhere in the middle.  But the Cornette types just salivate over this shit so Punk is feeding raw meat to the base.  I've never seen a more self-hating lot than wrestling fans and people from the old days of the business.  God forbid someone who actually likes wrestling run a wrestling company.  We're so much better when wrestling is run by con men with nothing but contempt for fans, or rapists, or a soulless corporation that enables both, right?

Alvarez going back to describe the opening of the original scrum, how Punk went after Hausman first, then after Alvarez, both off of bad information, was wild.  I'll never forget a reddit thread I read at the time where a poster described his girlfirend, who was in therapy, watching the scrum.  She told him she couldn't watch it because they were, in her opinion, watching a man with psychological problems having an episode right there in front of the world.  Thinking back on Punk going in on Hausman like YOU'RE COLT'S FRIEND, AREN'T YOU???  And Hausman like, "uh, no, we met once I think."  And then Punk pivoting to Alvarez and yelling at him about a story he never wrote or something he never said.  The whole thing just showed a guy going after imagined or perceived enemies based on bad information and it was kinda sad.

Anyway, I hope to not write any more about Punk today.  Thanks.

 

Edited April 2 by Technico Support

[Godfrey]

1 hour ago, Just Dave said:

Could you clarify this a bit for me? I'm not seeking out conflict, I promise. I'm just not sure what you mean.

The Mox bit? I’m fascinated by the Rocky 3 angle and I’ve heard Jon’s version of it so I was hoping to get CM’s as well