WWE Raw 3/2/26 Review | RAR

0:00When Ryan's when it's time to begin. It's on to rewind around with John Paulic and waiting the 18 that makes sense that these things we see in the ring every week on TV It's rewind around for Monday night the load of Tuesday morning from the false wrestling side is rewind around for Monday night on USA now on the John and wait He is waiting and that makes me John Paulic and here we are live to talk about raw from Monday night kicking off the month of March for all you Pisces out there and what does that mean way on the post wrestling cafe what a menu we have in store for everybody. So sit back folks and look at this. Look at what we are bringing the what other what other site can call together such unique events that tie in AWA Super Sunday with insurrection 2002 mixed in with a little daredevil born again season two all of that coming your way this month at post wrestling cafe.com

1:06It all begins this Thursday with rewind away we enter the 200s episode 201 insurrection 2002 as the raw branded UK pay-per-view brings you triple H versus the undertaker Steve Austin versus big show and Brock Lesnar and Sean Staziac versus the Hardies Very like what like Brock was probably a month or two months not even two months. Yeah, this is this is like six weeks after his call up. He is green as grass at this point in time. Yeah, but what really overshadows this whole event is the plane ride from hell which is the plane ride home afterwards and within 48 hours or so Kurt Henning is done Scott Hall is done. And quite frankly just revisiting the notes and such. You could have made a much longer list of people that probably could and should have been fired in relation to that. So we will talk a little bit about the plane ride from hell and actually go through this show that was part of the European tour.

2:16But I don't think anyone really remembers insurrection 2002 as opposed to the follow from the trip. Yeah, and again a show that is available on Netflix and I believe it's actually available on American Netflix as well. Okay. Yeah, do check that out if you have access to it. And then John and I will be back next week in that slot for an addition of talk. That is right. It's been several months since way and I have sat down just to talk where we go through our lives, our kids screaming at us. And what other challenges are coming our way. It's it's our way to avoid having to pay for therapy and instead using one another for such a device. I recommend it. Yes, it's an effective form of therapy. Just broadcast your innermost thoughts to a wide audience. That's right. That is going to be coming up later this month. Two rewindaways this month. Our other chapter will be 1983 AWAs Super Sunday that did not feature any dangerous plane rides.

3:22Instead Hulk Hogan challenging Nick Bachwinkel for the AWA championship. Verne Gaña back in the ring teaming up with Mad Dog, Vesha and Jesse Ventura on this card Jerry Lawler on this card. This is a fairly big show in 1983 AWA was pretty pretty hot at this point. This is about seven eight months before Hogan goes to the WWF and will will be diving into AW. I'm pretty sure this is our first AWA review that we have done. Maybe under rewind away. Yes, under rewind away. So yeah, that is coming up this month. And as we mentioned, Rich and WH will start covering daredevil born again season two that premieres at the end of the month. We'll have coverage of UFC 326 this Sunday with myself and Eric Marcott TNA sacrifice. We will do a review of that plus the new Japan Cup finals and book club covers beyond nitro by guy Evans looking at not just the fallout of WCW, which is a apropos.

4:27This month is 25 years since WCW went out of business goes through a lot of financials of WCW and as well TNA during the spike TV years from 2005 to 14. So that is what Neil Flanagan and I are tackling this month. All of this can be yours. Sign up at post wrestling cafe.com. If you have never subscribed before, you can jump on for a seven date free trial. Get a sample of things. It's like it's like going on a blind date and then maybe you want to come back for dinner. It's sort of like the phone call before going out on the date. Yeah, a one week phone call. No committal. Yeah, exactly. No commitment. No expectations. But there you have it everybody. And then we move on to raw Indianapolis, Indiana, the gain bridge field house and we are coming off of elimination chamber on Saturday night and 9,049 was the number of tickets distributed by Russell ticks.

5:29This was there. Well, the last show they ran here was Russell, Paloza, which did 14,242 so a far cry from a sellout, but 9,000 still for this show. The vision are the first ones out, whatever is left of the vision, which are eliminating each by the numbers on a weekly basis. And they want to address Seth Rollins, who Heyman claims stole credit for co founding the vision, who stole credit for co founding the shield and he stole the main event of WrestleMania from Logan Paul. He calls him Mr. Lynch and the next time Seth is in this ring, they're going to stomp his ass out. And that is a personal guarantee. So theory tries to cut a promo, the crowd chance you suck and theory responds, hey, wait, Seth Rollins isn't here. So you can't chant that. His new thing also seems to be pressures. No, he says, here's my theory.

6:31Oh, yeah, I said the promo, but did you hear him during his match? He's now being called the pressure. So he yells at Jimmy Uso on the pressure. And then you could just hear him after he's just that pressure pressure. Okay, we got it. We got it. He's trying a lot, you know, he's trying a lot of stuff. I don't know if anything is sticking right now, but he is certainly throwing a lot at the wall. Crowd certainly hates him. I would say like maybe a saving grace for him might be some sort of weaver you to appeal where like he sucks so much that the audience like just latches onto that. What if they shaved his head? Right. Yeah, but the crowd at this point does not take him seriously. That's not to say he can't in the future again. Like, there have been guys who have been able to make something like this work, but it'll probably take a big adjustment. He's deep in the Shawn Michaels and the rockers phase at the moment. So Paul states that or Logan Paul's promo is that he won't leave until Seth comes out, Adam pierces out, accuses them of injuring Jay Uso, which Paul Heyman denies.

7:35And Pierce says that Rollins is not medically cleared. He needs to meet with Rollins himself. And then we get one masked man after another. The first one comes out and gets chased away by security. Then another one gets chased by Logan Paul. Then a third one removes Austin theory. So Heyman is left alone in the ring when a fourth mask man walks down the aisle. And then a fifth one appears from behind Heyman revealed to be Seth who nails Heyman with a chair shot and stomp and takes out Heyman, which they later noted. This was the same building where Rollins turned on the shield with the chair shot from behind as well. And so tying all that together. And yes, we got a bloody. He got he got his face stomped in. So it was a bloody Paul Heyman who was taken to the back and presumably off for some time before he comes seeking revenge on Seth. I was definitely skeptical about Rollins being the reveal because I felt it was almost too obvious. But I think all of this decoy stuff that they've done has turned out to be really compelling.

8:43And I've enjoyed all the interactions leading up to this big spot here with the stomp, including like the call back to the shield chair shot, which for Rollins always works. He must have done that like, you know, six times by now. But each time I think it's very meaningful. And Rollins comes out of all of this feeling like a very hot like sting like type of babyface where he has he just comes out does this hasn't spoken yet. And I would keep that mystique about him as long as possible because I think this is a like a very compelling babyface Seth Rollins who feels like he's in the spotlight. In a way that I would even say like is bigger than in my opinion, what came out of the fake leg injury or whatever. Yeah, from from from earlier this summer. So I think they've landed the plane pretty well with him. Yes. And I think that this sets up probably Heyman coming back and whenever that is I feel we're not going to get the the WrestleMania direction until Heyman's back. And Heyman names the opponents or something. So that could be several several weeks depending on how long Heyman sells this.

9:48But he's taken to the back and put into an ambulance and theory and Logan are freaking out. They go to get into a car when Jimmy Usso pulls up and attacks both theory and Logan Paul. And then Jimmy walks over to the ambulance. LA Knight is driving the ambulance and just drives off with Heyman and we never the announcers don't like make a big deal out of this. We never hear about this again. The man is just common dear to ambulance and taken Paul Heyman. I guess to the desert like Darby Allen went. Well, maybe took him to the actual hospital perhaps. Oh, okay, maybe I'm a yeah, maybe I'm a faster driver. All right, let me take him. He was auditioning for the pit LA. So yeah, this is just yeah, sure. Well, I mean, listen, it gives something for Jusso and LA Knight who like, I mean, it kind of feel like they're there's somewhat forgotten about in in the midst of all this stuff. But that is obviously what, sorry, I meant to say Jimmy and we'll see Jimmy and J's direction a little bit later on in the show.

10:53I imagine this leads to LA Knight versus maybe Logan Paul or maybe Austin theory perhaps coming out of this as well. Like for TV. Perhaps yeah, yeah. Yeah, he's obviously they're going to keep him attached here to the vision in some form or fashion. Gunther against Dragon Lee is our first match and Gunther makes his way to the ring and gets jumped by Dragon Lee on the way to the ring. And they fight towards the ringside area and then Dragon Lee takes this insane back body drop into the time keepers area. His back was all marked up from this. And we come back from break Gunther has taken over and he hits Dragon Lee with like the hardest area you have seen in WWE. There's a hurricane run a counter by Lee and he tries to Gunther goes for the choke on the edge of the apron, but Lee avoids it and Gunther misses a boot in the corner. They start trading chops. Lee just has all this fire in his offense. He goes for Operation Dragon and is caught into a version of the Emerald

11:59Frozen and Corey Graves does cite Masala here. I was surprised Michael Cole didn't like a list off some of his favorites. I believe he needs the research given to him in advance. So I don't imagine. I'm sure he had plenty of stats off the top of his head about Masala. So we'll call just thought it was so obvious that he didn't need to point it out. Gunther just kills him with a pair of power bombs but lifts him up at the count of two hits him with an apron bomb and then drops him on the desk with a fourth power bomb. The announcers are telling the referee to just end the match and Gunther goes down or goes for another power bomb and Lee counters it hits a suicide dive and an Operation Dragon on the floor which Gunther just beats the count at nine. He goes for one more Operation Dragon and is caught in the sleeper and as he takes Dragon Lee down to the ground rips off his mask and Dragon Lee immediately submits at 14 minutes and 22 seconds.

13:01I thought this was one of the best WWE TV matches I have seen in ages. This match was awesome. This was this was easily easily better than anything on elimination chamber in my opinion. I just thought this match was amazing. It was fantastic. Yeah, as I think you you would expect out of Gunther certainly what I didn't expect was how much they gave Dragon Lee and how much they gave so much I love the finish like the teases they did both of them doing the count out teases. I mean, this was easily the best Dragon Lee has like in terms of an importance that was attached to his character like I thought he lost nothing from losing here. They made him look really, really competitive with Gunther. They took I think what a lot of us were expecting to be just a simple squash or to me I didn't even think they'd do the match. I thought like he don't go like the angle was it was it for Dragon Lee, but they turned this into like a several weeks long story of Dragon Lee actually getting one up on Gunther several times leading to a match where he was very competitive almost beating him.

14:02And coming out of it, does Gunther lose anything? No, like he he more than got his heat back with the way he held on to this choke and I love the finish as well. I think you know taking the mask off outside of just the insult to somebody. It's strategic in that it completely gets somebody off their guard and they are not able to defend as well as they probably would be able to because they're worried about their mask. I do think maybe it's worth mentioning that it is somewhat unfortunate that you know you take a big risk in doing these spots and making sure that you cover your face and unfortunately he didn't really get out his hands all the way there. And so you know that image is out there, but it's it's the risk that people take and ultimately like you know in now that he's in the WWE is it is it that much of a loss. I don't know, but it is it is a notable part about all this, but it shouldn't take anything away from the match itself, which was tremendous. It's going to get docks now. I wonder who his family is. Yeah. Yeah, I'm doing the doing the mask thing. It could also like if you think it like does set up something with Ray potentially like you could do something like coming out of this or this was as long as they were going to go with this because they really haven't tied Ray to any of this story either.

15:19So, but I love this match. I just thought it was excellent. It was to me. It was the highlight of raw. Kabuki warriors are backstage, Oscar's all pissed about the chamber loss and Kyrie just looking so meek and says last week you said I did good and Oscar just is like swatting her pushes her around and doesn't takes back the compliment and AJ Lee walks in and just stairs at Kyrie who's all frozen and just says. Blink twice if you need any help. I was enjoying the scene and then we just went for some laughs here. So that was that. I wonder if there if this like this Kyrie ask of stuff is coming to a head at all or if it's just you know something that we are just assuming is going to be the status quo for quite some time. In this particular scene, I felt like they were trying to elicit a bit more sympathy for Kyrie than usual. So, so we'll see if that might lead to anything for Mania between the two of them.

16:19Yeah, I mean Kyrie standing up for herself like that will get a big reaction for how long they've had her as the you know subservient to Oscar. It's always an angle you can go with. I just I really like these two together. I would hate to see them. I think they're stronger together than a part. I agree. There does come a time maybe when they want to pull the trigger there. AJ comes out and she wasn't sure she could still go but the fans knew she could and they remembered me when others wanted them to forget. She calls Becky the best of the best and beat her. So she proved she was still championship material and she's going to be a fighting champion and she issues an open challenge for anyone in the locker room. Later, we will see all the women jockeying for this title shot and we're going to get a gauntlet match next week to determine who her first challenger will be as. Is this title remains the other top women's title in a it on bra. I guess the other ones already spoken for and so it doesn't you know like what like just getting a bunch of learned dog challengers for.

17:22Stephanie yeah yeah so I mean you can argue it's a good thing that they have a secondary title for that reason and you could have argued that you know Becky holding it for the better part of like the past year has already made her made this title the a title in many ways. I feel they have I feel this is the big women's title. I think AJ to me like you know we continue to hear what she has to offer on the microphone and I do feel like she's still lacking a real confidence in her promo voice and to me like she's saying these words like you know like she's supposed to be confident but I just don't buy that confidence in there right now and I just don't really sense the authenticity. Instead it just kind of feels like she's reading something somebody else wrote for her that's supposed to sound confident so it's probably one of those things that'll just come with reps you know she really has not been doing this for 10 years and I know it there probably a lot of self doubt that that are within her that I do think come across in the performance so I mean I wouldn't even shy away against that I think what makes the character interesting might be the vulnerability so I would hope to see something maybe.

18:30Maybe more real to how she actually presents the next time she speaks the post wrestling cafe is your one stop shop for all of the coverage that post wrestling has to offer too big rewind a ways this month with wf insurrection from may of 2002 this UK only pay per view featured the raw brand going overseas and ending with the infamous plane ride from hell then we're going to take a look at a w a super Sunday from April of 1983 a new edition of talk can be yours. Plus MCU later book club and coverage of UFC 326 TNA sacrifice and of course Excel editions of rewind a raw dynamite and Smackdown with all the news of the day join now at post wrestling cafe dot com. They show a segment from earlier today where Chad Gable approaches a Penta and says that he wants the first I see title shot when Penta wins and Penta basically agrees to this and then lost Americano's confront Gable and ask how long he's going to keep up this charade and they are managed to squeak in a promo for Ray to Ray is here on March 14th and Gable doesn't have to wait until then he will face

19:41either rayo or bravo tonight and he is going to speak with Adam Pierce and that is the match we were going to get later with with rayo and Gable. The video with live Morgan addressing Stephanie Vaker she doesn't Stephanie doesn't know about lives struggles or making it to where she's at she says yes I am privileged I was signed at 20 while you were turned down I'm a star and I don't dwell on my past like you seem to. And Vaker you're a great champion and I'm going to give you the privilege of facing me at WrestleMania and you're going to learn everything you need to know. Yeah so maybe drawing some contrast to what I was just saying about AJ live on the other hand like sounds like somebody who has been through this and has never stopped and is only gaining more and more confidence in her voice over these past several months in years you could say she really sounds like I think somebody who's worthy of this media made event level spotlight right now and I thought this promo showed it really well I've been really impressed in how like despite Vaker's limitations with the language they've done such a great job at turning this into a program that feels personal and like fully fleshed out you know there's a personal grudge between these two and that one things the other has had this handed to them and live you know like she she's owning it here she feels like she deserves this because she's that good so I I think it's been a great few so far tonight they didn't even have to rely on dawn.

21:05She should have said you think you've had hardships I was called up to this main roster in something called the riot to squad with two teas. We used to mess up locker rooms okay that's all we had she's have a blue tongue I used to have a blue tongue yes so she had to overcome stuff to original El Grande Americano against rail they went 10 minutes here. These are just painful sometimes like Michael Cole is this man has never watched any of the any AAA but they've got to work in like these miniature like organic conversation so he's like Corey explain rate of raise to me and so Corey Graves has to explain all of it to him he's also calling a match where again gable is like this despicable heal in the game. It's like he's working this kind of as the heel but he is positioned as the baby face in this whole thing he's totally supposed to be the baby face here he had like a friendly interaction with Penta in the back.

22:15Like everything about this is supposed to let you think gable is the baby face yes it's it's so weird it's so backwards and like their assumption is that you know like maybe most people aren't watching AAA but they're trying to They're actively promoting it like it's actually so it doesn't compute it's completely and congruent and I think it's resulting in like really awkward reactions from this audience who at best are confused at worst just completely apathetic to this gable character. Well I mean in in another presentation like this is Chad gable and Pete done having a 10 match which is like amazing when you think about it and they had like a really nice match but it's gable gets the ankle lock which rail breaks the Sunset bomb rail lands on the feet and then it's big belly to belly off the buckle by gable and then we get all these distractions gable goes for rail and Bravo's masks and Kaiser that on this show between Dragon Lee this match and then the Penta spot with with the with the mask as well like this is a heavy heavy mask based edition of raw so we get Kaiser headbutting gable rail hits another headbutt and then hits a diving headbutt off the top

23:27Gable still kicks out of this runs rail into Bravo on the edge and wins with the chaos theory in 10 minutes and nine seconds. Yeah I mean the matches I think it's Pete done versus Chad gable so you think that you know there's going to be a level of just like good technical ability here which I thought they delivered in but it didn't have much heat and this is where I feel like the gimmicks really kind of held back you know the quality of the actual wrestling here I just don't think this original Americano has been well reintroduced and I don't think he's over at all as a baby face in my opinion again I think the heel face dynamics are all messed up and in fact I feel gable is a much better heel when he's under the mask whereas I'm like the Kaiser version there are just so many like more earned redeeming qualities about him that actually kind of make you respect him and want to cheer him here's a guy who like somehow picked up this language and is doing such a better job under this gimmick that you just kind of like want to cheer for him that much more but they're assuming that American viewers somehow feel the opposite which I just don't think

24:33computes and on an on Saturday's triple A he accuses Chad Gable of using AI Spanish it's great like AI is part of their program now as it should be yes. Kathy Kelly interviewed Natty who says Maxine I hope you have Netflix in your hospital room I'm sorry I allowed you to train in the dungeon and make you feel like you were good at this you're a bimbo pretending to be a killer and I've outlasted them all so why don't you go make a tick talk or a video blog hearts don't lie and the truth hurts you don't belong in my world and the big success here was she hit the time you didn't get cut off so that that is now how I grade these net these Netflix only provost do you hit the time tough scale it is live in recalar backstage and live suggests why don't you challenge AJ Lee for the icy title that'll get you to WrestleMania and recalls like yeah good idea

25:35baller walks in and he's at peace after the loss to see him punk Dominic says well now can be focused on me and baller says you've got to do this on your own tonight and Dom says I mean I want you guys out there to celebrate my win indicating he will do this on his own as the man said this was a serious face with his dude wipe shirt I thought there would have been a chance that we would have had the full on turn like at chamber but I mean I'm reminded that they have what like 47 days to go till WrestleMania so they seem very much on pace slow birding this until you know you really get that sort of maybe peak you know closer to the match itself which we're all assuming is going to be dominant thin yeah I think that that looks to be the direction here but we do have a lot of time a lot of time for Finn to contemplate and have deep thoughts about what this means Rusev comes he interrupts a highlight package of Oba Femi beating the Miz on smack down he's tired of hearing about Oba Oba

26:38and wants to challenge him right now so Oba comes out and challenges Rusev right there and they start going at it and Rusev lands a pair of headkicks Femi doesn't go down catches him with a choke slam and clotheslines Rusev to the floor and Colf said that's going to be embarrassing for Rusev is like no that's going to be next week when Oba steam rolls the sky but that will be our match next week Oba Femi defeating Rusev and it will be at least a real match for Oba I like this far more than what we've seen out of Oba Femi on Smackdown specifically over the past couple weeks like doing like a pro long comedy thing with Kit Wilson and then the Miz I mean this was fully reliant on I think their his physicality and it actually puts that into focus rather than Oba Femi kind of like you know being some sort of supporting actor to a comedy bit Bayley is hanging out with Lyra Valkyria and they're both like man what do we do every week and they they go over their last when they they lost the rumble they lost their qualifiers

27:41they didn't even get into the chamber Bayley's like I feel stuck Bayley the cameras running Lyra says I can't stand to see you miss another WrestleMania why don't you go challenge Bayley for sorry why don't you go challenge AJ Lee for the I see title and Bayley like none of this dawned on Bayley she's like that's a that's a great idea and then says well Lyra why don't you come to to go see Adam Pierce she's like really yeah let's go and they go to Adam Pierce's office which just happens to be they're right outside they take two steps towards his door like they're just hanging out outside Adam Pierce's office and this idea comes up and EO exits Adam Pierce's office and it turns out all of these women are trying to get the I see title match with AJ and my god I mean this is this is truly this is this is when like those talents will say you don't question what is given to you just try to make the best of whatever is given to you and that is what these two tried I suppose so yeah

28:45I didn't really have that much issue with with that much here I just I mean it was just their way of announcing essentially all the participants of this match coming up but you make some great points Jimmy Uso and Austin theory Austin theory the pressure starts informing Jimmy of what his nickname is Jimmy hit a suicide dive super kicks Austin and places him on the desk and Jimmy Jimmy actually tried to convince us that he was going to dive off the top turnbuckle to this guy on the desk I'm like okay sure so he gets at the top Logan appears so he jumps into the ring on Logan they double team Jimmy for the DQ in two and a half minutes and then the Uso's music plays and this has to be a record for Paul Lebec mystery attack angles where the guy is back way he's back three days later he's he didn't have a crutch that he didn't need clearly what what miracle did Jay absorb here that Jade Cargill was not aware of there's a lot easier rehabilitation process than having the

29:49four months so Jay's back he's on crutches and but then still fought off theory and Logan Paul so we are definitely getting a tag title program with these two and they laid out Austin with the one D Yeah if it wasn't obvious enough that like Joe Uso was not at all supposed to have been part of the chamber of conversation whatsoever they they didn't even really try here in trying to announce that you know he didn't even wait a week he's better it's like none of the Friday basically didn't happen it's just we've gotten back now but I mean they it did feel like at the end of this like that Logan Paul and Austin theory are going to be the attackers in this angle which does give a reason to do this title program Yeah I suppose so I just don't think there's any kind of intrigue behind this mystery like it felt like this was just this was all sewn up after yeah we'll see we'll see I mean it could be something you're not thinking about maybe Jay's gonna tell us he had a near death experience last Friday he's lucky

30:52he could have shown up at Roth and gotten involved physically yeah so so it's interesting because if this is going to be the direction for the Uso's opinion defending the tag titles against Logan and in theory well who's left for South Roland I think if these two are tied with the Uso's then the angle is Paul Heyman having to go after Seth with his hired gun of whatever it is if that is direction but the way this comes out like I just watching this program like it does not like Logan Paul is certainly unoption but it didn't feel like he's the like obstacle for Seth seven weeks from now like I just don't know if that really has the steam behind it but we will see how this goes out but I think the Heyman thing will tie it all together now this was you might have missed this it was so short as they're going to break and they show a modern like CM Punk today sitting at the top

31:53of the ramp in this Steve Austin shirt and the same like outfit from the pipe bomb and says I've got a lot to get off my chest and it's cutting back and forth from him the image of 2011 in Las Vegas and I guess the idea here was that you're gonna get another pipe bomb from CM Punk tonight I didn't catch it dude you would have mistaken this for a commercial but it was so short that that they showed this and it was just they had shot this clearly of CM Punk today it dressed up in the same outfit he had in 2011 on the ramp and I was like man are we going to get another freestyle from CM Punk I mean I thought that was the second version of the pipe bomb but anyway it seemed like they were really trying to hype like this big punk promo for later tonight Pierce gets off the phone with Nick Aldous and Dan House and pops up and he states he debuted to thunderous applause and cheers

32:54and he makes a bunch of demands including a Hall of Fame induction and he wants his face on all of the trucks the judgment day enter and Pierce introduces them all and Dan House and doesn't know JD's name and they tell him to beat it and Dan House and puts a curse on Dominic I think having fun and acknowledging the booze in his way by claiming that there was thunderous applause and cheers is is a great way of owning it and you know like essentially moving on you defused it so now like it's like it's like L.A. Night on Instagram with the slip did you see that oh no I what what what did I say I he just made a crack about it like he just said he was like yeah it happens but even when I fall I land on my feet and he just like laughed it off and I'm like that's good for you doesn't have to be a big deal but with Dan House and in particular like almost like kind of like having a like a lame you know introduction like a failed introduction you one can even say it kind of works for the character and I thought they played

33:56it off really well here and like him you know claiming that he wants a Hall of Fame induction as a result of that I think I think it worked well and you know I love the fact that they don't seem to be changing the character or like putting their hands on the character at all like he's kind of keeping everything that's quirky and weird about him including the teeth and I think they're putting that like WWE polish and that you're getting like an introduction to him like this felt like just a way to give you a sense of the personality and like what the gimmick is he puts curses on people he carries teeth and he's somewhat obnoxious in voice and that might not be enough alone to appeal to people but I think over time with segments like these and interactions with like Don I think he'll get over to this audience so just keep this guy away from the vision they've gotten their curse maybe they should true yes you're right Jackie Redmond brings out rear Ripley to talk about the WrestleMania match and she is with EO stating losing the tag title sucked because EO is not just she was her opponent she

34:58was my tag partner and she's my best friend and thanks EO for pulling me out of a dark situation and he says I'll be alright here on raw you go win the title at WrestleMania she says I'll do it for you EO you hold down raw because this Friday I'm going to see Jade face to face like this is this is the most romantic couple in pro wrestling they are seriously laying it on so thick and and please I know like two women can just be friends of course but this this is this feels just deliberate way more deliberate and so it was so thick here that I almost like I mean if you're watching as a wrestling fan you're sensing a turn coming between these two but that can't be the case for you know WrestleMania unless the idea is that put EO into the match somehow you know to make it a three way but I mean this just felt like especially you know lovey-dovey between these two so I wonder if they're doing something or if

36:01it might just be a reason for Jade to attack EO to get at Rhea perhaps Rhea I'm going to tell you a secret okay for tonight's direction okay if you're going to I watched the fucking heated rivalry okay and there's two guys and they they fuck and I think that you and EO you guys you walk out and fucking you look into her eyes and you you're mesmerized by her beauty and fucking you make everyone want to think that you're that you're more you know then then fucking you understand and then up fucking yeah you got it you got don't don't tell anybody okay I have the camera man doesn't know okay he doesn't know so you and EO doesn't know either okay EO doesn't know in fact I don't even know I've got to go get a drink amazing I can't wait for unreal to come

37:04back yeah I think it's the summer just for your impressions that's it that's all where unreal Paul so next week we have the gauntlet Lyra Valkyria Bailey Eosky Raquel Rodriguez Oscar and the obvious winner Ivy Nile winner gets the shot at Haley and Oba Femi against Rusev in Seattle and I don't believe I believe next week there it's a no Brock no Roman week I believe so Seattle you you get you get Rusev well like I imagine so I'm still thinking Brock and Oba and we're getting Oba versus Rusev next week I think the week after that let's get back but it's going to be interesting if they've got a like do you sell this ham and angle and Lesnar's got to continue this like on his own for a few weeks or something like two weeks seems like quick to have ham and come back from something so serious as this angle maybe he's seeing James I stand corrected you'll be you'll have a crutch Dominic and Penta for the icy title with Baller and JD at ringside so a

38:09Dominic has taken the edgeomatic and created the mullet automatic I'm not kidding for Uncle Edge for Uncle Edge and what kind of a mullet at times yeah I guess he had as much of a bullet as what this what this is like a southern Ontario mullet so he charges at Penta both end up in the timekeepers area and he ties Penta's mask to the bottom rope then he starts ripping at the mask of Penta knowing that this can be very successful on on raw it's a six one nine and then the frogs flash gets caught as Penta hits the sacrifice and a Penta driver which Dom kicks out of in this crowd reacts big to the near fall Dom then leads Penta into the corner nailing his shoulder into the post and he calls for the bell hammer and JD runs to get it baller stops JD stating Dominic wanted to do this on his own and he won't let JD hand the hammer to Dominic so Penta takes out both with a dive Penta docks a six one nine hits the Mexican destroyer and defeats Dominic for the icy title in 16 minutes and 25 seconds big pop

39:13for the finish and for where they're going with Dominic and baller this made all the sense to do this kind of a finish I really liked it with with baller stopping JD and continuing the the cracks in the judgment day from this and this is a good elevation I think for Penta to be at least attached to a belt and hopefully have something going into WrestleMania something you know mid card worthy I certainly hope so yeah I would have expected you know baller and Dom to go into WrestleMania with the championship but I I don't think it's a few that needs it especially if you know like it's the breakup of the judgment day is the result there instead I really hope Penta goes on like a similar sort of like open challengey type of like run not to say you have to do an open challenge but a run where he gets to showcase his abilities in the ring every single week like this really is the television championship right so I like certainly I hope he's more active in defending

40:15it than Dominic Mysterio was and I think that really would be a great way to like essentially guarantee Penta that airtime which I think the audience has been claiming for for a while can you imagine like the plight of you become the intercontinental champion on raw or you're on Smackdown not even giving us the instructions on how to order the pay-per-view on ESPN you're one of the observers being told how to order the pay-per-view on ESPN I mean yeah man there's a big dispense between it pays to be the older brother I guess I guess so man I guess so but oh quite the contrast they promote Drew McIntyre and Cody Rhodes on Smackdown for this Friday night and the angle that set it up on on Saturday and then the final segment Roman Reigns comes out first I think this entrance was about 20 minutes he comes out and he goes to speak when CM Punk cuts him off and out comes punk who says Roman I hope

41:17you're going to do a whole lot more than ask the fans to acknowledge you because we're not going to waste one of your dates for something that could be a tweet and Roman he will never refer to this man as punk it is just fill and he says it was such disgust every time he asks fill if his tweet that he sent out Saturday hurt his feelings. The tweet was Roman saying punk look tired and the crowd was tired too right yes and says that he has thin skin and punk says no I don't I don't get upset about tweets or what someone says about me on a podcast he's like you're right Roman I am tired and I'm glad I've got these bags under my eyes because for seven weeks I've got to carry your bullshit to WrestleMania he says this is the building where the shield debuted where I brought you to the dance and Reigns cuts him off saying you brought the other two not me

42:19and then oh my god it's Chris hero and he's just taking out Roman Reigns what an angle this would have been punk says I've already won because I've got into your head because you admitted you hate me Reigns says you're right I do hate you fill and says if you didn't have the title you'd be indifferent to me I wouldn't think about you and when we brought you back we brought you back to entertain the 30 to 40 year old virgins a wonderful painting of your upscale audience that you are attracting he said we brought you to sell some shirts maybe draw a house in Chicago but being a champion is above your pay grade it's too much responsibility and you're a liar a liar about being happy and being a team leader but then you bitch and moan backstage and they're so quick to come tell me

43:20every time you're not seeing punk you're a punk as bitch to me and he says once I'm done with you I'm going to put you on one of those Cena retirement tours and we're going to squeeze all the money we can out of you then we're going to send you to NXT to teach the next generation and then you can send them up and I'm going to smash all of them this is quite the long term he had more of a long term booking idea than Paul did for Cena last year I wish they tapped into this guy this guy has a whole like 15 years plotted out in his head in this promo could have used this instead of a moment got to create a moment because the house is a little soft and Toronto so punk stops him from Roman was Roman just drops all this shit on him and he's about to leave like I'm done punk's like whoa whoa whoa I need to come back here he says who is we I don't see anyone by you anymore it's you alone in your bus you alone in your room I took Paul Heyman away from you and says you have always been chasing me

44:25well I run things here on Netflix all right I told Ted to back out of this bid it's too rich for our blood Ted 83 billion we've got shareholders to think about he says you can hate me but you won't disrespect me and then I swear to God he said you're going to retire me you just made the list he did he said this and he said it without real like it's he went so quickly it felt like he said it and he realized what he said because there was like a slimmer of like a reaction from the crowd but it was just too fast to even pay attention to it but I think he knew exactly what he said when he said it but he says now at WrestleMania I'm going to bury you and then you're not going to be alone because when I bury you I'm going to bury you next to your father I was like Jesus Christ we just went there didn't we? so yes this will be a CM Punk taking on Roman Reigns

45:27in the spirit of Sika at WrestleMania yeah Sika and destroy that's our tagline oh very nice I'm quite the shiner here from the Fin match it looks like it I think in these promos like they've set a tone for like trying to you know dance between reality and fiction and I think they're balancing that relatively well you know punk they didn't go into any of the like the we're the A show like some of the stuff that really to me was kind of counterproductive for the last one but that was a really effective promo segment overall the fact that they haven't really continued with any of that beyond week one like maybe tells you that that was just maybe poorly thought out and maybe you know just happen to confuse people when maybe that was never the intent you know to try to tell I think it was very clear about that like here in this in this promo like they did not like like even the term bury him like nothing here was like like we're going to be so cute and talk about

46:29like inside stuff that some of these promos they can just veer towards and they go against the actual story and I didn't feel they so I'm inside stuff here like for instance you know referencing punk not choosing reigns as part of the shield which it was detailed in the Kolkobana podcast right but nothing I mean that is like like breaking the foundation of like this being it's true although I guess in k-fabe how did how did Roman get there who get you right you're well I choose Robin for the shield then if not for if not punk right right so it's like the company inserted Roman reigns into there well I picked the members of the shield what that this is this sort of like renegade group that's the impunk hired you know like that does it but whatever who care like it's one of those things where like if you think about it too hard it kind of defeats the purpose but it's it doesn't completely I don't think I'd like to deal at all you also had Roman you know saying they brought punk in to appeal to a demo and draw the house

47:31and of course this draws reference back to what he said the in the first interaction where they had to okay see him punk coming in even that I feel like I can buy in a k-fabe sense in the way that like a boxing champion may have some sway in who is on the undercard right so that all well and good I think there's started Roman well you are at home milking up all your vacation dates I was fighting big data plus panel but I will come back after the dash study that would be that would be better serve for us a network I guess we drew in Cody can adopt that one that's right I will say though the final line which is like the line everybody will be talking about coming out of the promo I understand the need to get this like really big heat line okay really getting personal and I think it'll pay off in that I mean you're already getting reins probably more offended that anybody has ever offended him you know during this trouble chief character but I will say it did feel relatively out of place for C and punks

48:32character to say something like that but he's he was a you're supposed to I think feel like what like it's a total asshole line to the degree that like for the Roman character to to just stand there and take this one like this guy well he's not going to say that he's he's not going to take it for much longer like he's there in shock basically that somebody would disrespect him this way so the story is though that punk is trying to get under this guy's skin so that he does crack like that is that was outlined in the promo like when you said you hated me I've already got you so like that's part of this is that this guy is just trying to make this guy break that is very fair you're going to that direction here by going for such a such a low hanging fruit type of line at the end here I think that's that sort of what he's drawing him into and I think like in the lead up again we're seven weeks out I think they will go to that place where where Roman does like get physical and by the

49:32end of it like you get some punks head like that there's a lot of ways you can go toward this that doesn't fully rely on referencing a podcast from 12 years ago no because Roman can talk about punks dog oh Jesus way what that's worse than this is the good yeah I guess yeah well you know you it's the WrestleMania main event it's all all references are fair game I guess how did you feel the segment when I didn't think this one it was as effective as the one they did a couple of weeks back but I guess it was the big segment on on raw and this does feel like a like a big match for WrestleMania not not as strong as the first week but I think still incredibly productive and just like making you like want to see this match you know I think they successfully elevated tensions between the two and this certainly feels like it's you know it's one of the big sort of like bright spots of this year's WrestleMania when I guess it's largely a card that we still

50:33don't really know including like the other end of the equation on Smackdown which we'll find out maybe this Friday I think we'll know it after Friday I think I think you want to have like you're like by this time next week I think you want to know at least all four of like your women's and men's like main title matches and yeah you know that we know three of them three of we know three and I think Friday will we'll settle the fourth so yeah I mean a strong segment to end the show with pumpkin reins and man that Gunther Dragon Lee match I would I would highly recommend that I'd also from AAA Saturday Dragon Lee also had this match with Jack Cartwheel that was awesome one of the better matches triple A has had since it started on on on Fox as well so two big matches for a dragon Lee I think Rollins is receiving create reactions upon this return and yeah the Hayman was a big thing on on the show too like that whole thing feels like it's it's headed towards something pretty hot with whatever Rollins you know WrestleMania destination is so I think all of that is available to the good shape

51:34I even think like Dan Denhausen was like I think I could you know like I want to say proper first segment here and we got the pen to title win of course yes Dan hausen is Adam Pierce's assistant maybe that's the direction yeah I don't know all right well we're going to sign off here on the free channel for the YouTube listeners again we have the whole menu for March available for those that want to join post wrestling cafe dot com and that includes our review of insurrection 2002 that is coming up this Thursday where we are going to be reviewing the UK only paper view from May 2002 the last event promoted under the letters WWF before they flip to WWE on the following Mondays raw as well significant for many reasons like for me maybe just of interest to like dive into like a raw branded show very shortly after the first

52:36brand extension yes yes we will compare the Smackdown House show that ran that same day and you can tell me way which show you would have preferred to attend okay so that's coming up this coming Thursday and then of course all of our regular shows as well the poison Rhonda crew they will be up Tuesday night after NXT and and then Sunday for Benjantay that's right they're back for Sunday for Benjantay and they're going back to the well as well for two nights of WrestleMania they have announced so if you are in Toronto the only place to be WrestleMania weekend in Toronto is at the well downtown Toronto poison Rhonda dot C.A. Those are going to be packed very soon I mean for WrestleMania so yeah poison Rhonda dot C. I think they've sold out every time they've they've done these things so I think there'll be no different for for many weekend which is a I don't think we can get them we wanted to know we. I was already told I'd been turned away at the door cetera that very clear regardless of the amount that turn out for it but uh yes you can catch all of that and post

53:38wrestling dot com for all the latest that is going on so goodbye to everybody on the YouTube channel d