The Wrestling Podcast

Brandon Stroud of With Leather and Progressive Boink is back for another round on the show. Did you know he wrote a movie? Meet Me There is filming now, but he took some time out to talk wrestling and other things. A lot of other things, actually. We set out to preview Extreme Rules, the ACW Prom, and Chikara’s Tag World Grand Prix, but we took a lot of entertaining detours, including exploring Vegan poutine, Disney’s attempted sexifying of Merida from Brave, a long line of Don Henley and Eagles-related puns, religions in India, the career of Dan Marino, and an explanation of the Tom Jones classic “The Young New Mexican Puppeteer.” Oh yeah, and there was Avatar: The Last Airbender talk too, because of course there was. Wrestling-wise, we covered Austin Aries’ disgusting actions, why Triple H just won’t go away, what WWE is doing wrong with Brock Lesnar, why Antonio Cesaro is the opposite of boring, how Goldust helped Brandon grow as a person, the strap match, how Gabe Sapolsky is bad and should feel bad, and a treatise on Chris Jericho’s last two years with WWE.

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Rich Thomas of the International Object podcast and the Sad Salvation blog stops by the show this week. We start out by discussing why Ryback isn’t a villain and why alignment in WWE is a weird thing. Rich posits that true heels are the ones who keep us from seeing wrestling. We discuss the differences between anti-heroes in WWE today and the OG of that archetype, Steve Austin. The WWE’s weak mid-and-lower cards are brought up, and their difficulty telling stories is broached upon. Rich is pissed off at people who are offended by part-timers, who spend too much time worrying about drawing, and the death of metaphor in movie criticism as well as wrestling observation. Finally, he offers a theory on the origin of self-satisfactory crowd chanting.

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Luke Johnson of the Wrestlefeed Twitter account comes on the show this week. In addition to doing a preliminary rundown of the top of the Extreme Rules card, we go over his time as an indie wrestling manager. Did you know he managed Jeremy Wyatt once? We recount that, as well as review the indie scene in Nebraska, Iowa, and the Dakotas. WE get into his Wrestlefeed doings, including the origins, the motivations, perspective changes, and the explanation of the Dumbest Man in Wrestling appellation he gives for each show he reviews. We also go into his five favorite WWE PPVs of all-time.

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Danielle Matheson, both of here and of The Mandible Claw, is back, and we’re answering mailbag questions! We go through a bunch of your queries, including a lot of discussion about Chikara, especially Robert Newsome’s theories about what this season is all about. We also get into some culinary talk with our favorite condiments and non-alcoholic beverages. We cast an all-wrestler season of The Real World in Seattle, pick which wrestlers we’d like to do karaoke with, talk about transformative female wrestlers, and finish up on who the worst World Champion in this current century has been. Dani asks me what matches I’d time travel to go see, and I ask her what dinosaur she’d want to be.

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Dylan Hales of the Wrestling Culture Podcast is back on the show again, and this week, we unpack the 2012 TWB 100. After I go through a brief history of the list, Dylan marvels at how far it’s come in the last four years. We’re both impressed at the variance of wrestlers on the list, and how it’s not concentrated with WWE guys. We go through the top 5 in-depth, including a bit of debate over Daniel Bryan’s run in Team Hell No and how much of a damn CM Punk gave on RAW in the summer. Dylan wonders aloud if Dolph Ziggler got the benefit of a name reputation, while I pose the debate what’s better, Antonio Cesaro’s peak at the end of the year or Kane’s longevity throughout the year. El Generico is both celebrated and raked over the coals a little bit. WE also discuss “legacy” picks, dissect Brock Lesnar’s placement, laud the voters for Big Show’s placement, and discuss wrestlers we voted for who didn’t make the list as well.

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Jerome Cusson of PW Ponderings is on the show this evening to talk about WrestleCon. We kick off by talking about ROH, specifically Kevin Steen’s involvement in SCUM, the ceremonial Jay Briscoe title shot, and the appearance from Karl Anderson. With Chikara, we delve into the Ophidian/Amasis match as well as who Mike Quackenbush’s partner might be against Shard and Jigsaw. Then, it’s onto SHIMMER, where the subject of Vol. 53 as a launching point for them to do more outside of Berwyn comes up. We also discuss Madison Eagles and Serena Deeb coming back and Evie debuting. We talk CZW’s guest stars, Sami Callihan’s potential farewell tour, giving DJ Hyde and his direction a chance, and their progressivism towards women. Moving onto DGUSA and EVOLVE, we talk about the title tournament for EVOLVE and who should win. I also ask Jerry to sell me on Shingo, and we marvel at Uhaa Nation. WE talk a little bit about ACW’s competing show, as well as PWS bringing in Jushin Liger. Finally, we close talking a little bit about WrestleMania itself.

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Trey Irby comes on the show on short notice to talk about the John Cena heel turn tease, but we go into so much more. In addition to exploring whether it’d be viable for him to turn, with whom he’d work, and who would pick up the slack when he did turn, we talk about heels being the more interesting parties in WWE, the babyface dynamic obscuring what might have been a poignant moment for Alberto del Rio last night, crowds in the state of Pennsylvania, whether Johnny Curtis ever thought he’d be making his grand WWE re-debut at WrestleMania against Chris Jericho, and a bunch of other random nublets.

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Samantha Allen is back for another go-round on the podcast, and this time, the big topic of discussion is Monday Night RAW, specifically Undertaker and CM Punk. WE get into whether the angle was “okay” or not. There’s a bit of discussion about the history of Paul Bearer with Taker before getting into the other infusion of reality into WWE, John Cena retconning his divorce as being caused by The Rock, who is also discussed as being the same guy he was in 1998 while we as viewers have changed. We dabble in the tertiary titles, WWE Creative, and their social media push before getting into a huge dose of Chikara. Eddie Kingston is discussed, as his absence from Orlando’s show was explained via a tweet. We also get into the WrestleCon show, our shared distaste of Wink Vavasseur, and how the company produces so much content via social media and viral means. We finish up with a discussion on how death match wrestlers like Drake Younger, LuFisto, and Necro Butcher seem to be among the most well-adjusted outside the ring.

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Butch Rosser and Ken Borsuk make their long-awaited return to the show. Obviously, the first topic of discussion is Paul Bearer, who unexpectedly passed on last night. We discuss his legacy, his importance to the Undertaker, his Hall of Fame prospects, and basically his influence on our fandoms growing up. The subject of DDP Yoga arises. Although some have doubts about it, it is seemingly helping Scott Hall and Jake Roberts. That segues into a lengthy discussion about The Streak. We talk about CM Punk being the one to challenge for it this year. After a slight dalliance into discussing (mostly bashing) Randy Orton, we get into heavy hypothetical speak – will Punk be the one to end it, is it possible that Punk/Taker will go on last, can Punk win this year and set up a revenge scenario next year, should The Streak end at all? We arrive on Rock vs. John Cena, which causes an EPIC rant about how Cena’s “redemption” is bullshit by Ken. Finally, we make the mistake of discussing the weather with Butch, whose idea of a bad day is when it’s only partly sunny out.

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Greg Wyshynski of Puck Daddy and the Marek vs. Wyshynski Podcast stops by to talk about things in his area of expertise this week. We start off comparing Mystery Science Theater 3000 to ECW before getting into his bread and butter, the NHL. Greg recounts how he never thought the league would be stupid enough to lose another entire season over what amounted to quibbles relative to the last lockout. We talk about the Flyers and how they stumbled out of the gate, the surprise teams in the league, whether Thomas Vanek deserves to win the Hart Trophy if the Sabres miss the playoffs, and what team Greg thinks will win the Stanley Cup in this shortened season (and whether Dolph Ziggler will choose to cash in his Money in the Bank briefcase on them for the Cup). We get into some WrestleMania talk, including excitement levels for the show, whether it’ll work as an outdoor event, why Greg doesn’t dig Alberto del Rio as a good guy, and how the main event NEEDS to have CM Punk inserted in it. Finally, we finish up with some of Greg’s best wrestling memories, including the debut of Jake Roberts’ snake.

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