It Is Never Just Wrestling

[00:00:00]I had a conversation with my brother a little while ago about some mutual friends and he mentioned that he thought that someone's girlfriend was insane based on a conversation that they had probably a decade ago. When he said this, I was stun locked because I had never considered the idea that some people are either incapable or unwilling to consider that other people's capacity for change is the same as their own.

[00:00:22]that the weird sentiments that some people express sometimes are not always indicative of their innate characteristics as a person forever and always. I had to just kind of nod and say, "Yeah, I don't think that's fair, but hey, man, whatever." Because how do you introduce the idea of considering other people's existence as legitimate as your own to someone for potentially the first time? Do you think that they will be happy about being introduced to the idea? Will they feel enriched or will they feel burdened? I want to believe that there are fair people out there in the world. I want to believe that there are people who when they develop a perspective about someone that when the information changes, they update their previous views. It's difficult to assess what you believed and independently think that this is information that might be out ofd. It requires you to understand that all perspectives should be consistent to the character that holds them. And just because you thought something once doesn't mean that you'll think it forever. And I think that the ego naturally refuses to let you acknowledge that. This past week on Dynamite, a lot of things happened. There was a lot of discourse and takes that I thought sucked enough to talk about, but I didn't really have a vector with which to approach it. And while it would be easy to show up here and just vent about the things that I didn't like, I'm not terribly interested in doing that. What I'm interested in is the human element.

[00:01:37]The way thoughts and culture develop across the endless weeks, months, years, and decades of professional wrestling, and the ways that fans try to cope with them. I'm interested in confronting my own perspectives and opinions and acknowledging when my perspective is outdated or trying to at least discover why I think that way about someone. I just think that that is so much more interesting than here's some star ratings about this wrestling show.

[00:01:58]Because if there's one thing that I hold true in my life, it's that it is never just wrestling. Let's talk about it.

[00:02:08]Kenny Omega and Will Osprey are a fascinating combination of wrestlers because I think that the way that they're spoken about both individually and together are so much more intriguing to me than the actual wrestling matches between them. This is actually something that wrestling is really good for because wrestling can be anything and the appreciation of it is so interpretive. People will often simply see what they want to see based on their different biases and agendas. When it comes to Kenny Omega versus Will Osprey, the way that people speak about their first two matches and the upcoming third really portrays the intent behind the dynamic. Their first match in Japan is universally lauded and beloved as one of the modern-day classics. Their rematch in AW is generally considered too self-indulgent and goofy compared to the original. What portrays the dynamic is that both of these matches are fairly similar. One is in New Japan and one is in AW, so there's production differences. There's interference in the second match that plays into the finish, but a good 95% of the matches are exactly the same. Only Kenny Omega won in New Japan and Will Osprey won in AEW.

[00:03:08]You look at the way Kenny Omega matches are generally regarded and you'll find that the trend is clear. If Kenny Omega wins, then it's a great match. If he loses, then it's probably going to be considered less good. There's nothing wrong with liking someone and enjoying a match less when they lose. What I have a problem with is when people try to engage with things as if they are just unbiased and analytical observers, giving their totally rational and level-headed insight because caring about results in the fake sport is lame and might make you look like a dork.

[00:03:39]There's this deep shame in wrestling circles of looking corny and stupid that really compacts on itself the deeper you go. So, whenever someone does something that someone imagines their dad walking in and seeing them watch, they immediately get so weirdly hostile towards it and have to shout it down.

[00:03:55]Will Osprey and Kenny Omega had a segment on The Last Dynamite, and it was awful for a lot of reasons, but the big discourse that came from it was around one specific Will Osprey line where he said that him and Kenny Omega are the meeting of the real life Goku and Vegeta. People got so furious about this line and went into overdrive, just bickering and projecting over it in completely normal and regular ways. I already hated the sentiment of I hope that Kenny and Osprey's match is a Kenny creation and not an Osprey creation, as if those two things aren't incredibly similar. But this just put that front and center because nobody even talked about how bad Kenny Omega was in the segment. Just Will Osprey. I recognize that most of the people are reacting solely to an outofcontext clip and projecting. The vast majority of weird psychos who talk about wrestling don't actually watch wrestling. Whatever. The point is that for a lot of people, Will Osprey is someone that will never be appealing to them. So whenever he does something, it confirms the idea again and again. Whereas Kenny Omega skates despite being just as cringe as Will Osprey, but also being much worse at a lot of stuff. In the segment, Kenny and Osprey do a little back and forth. And then Kevin Knight comes out, and this is where Kenny actually gets involved because this is the Kenny lore part of the segment. You can tell when Kenny starts being able to tell his stories because it's a lot about his friends, old and new. So, if Kenny has a story going on, Don Callus is going to be a part of it in some capacity. Kenny talks to Kevin Knight about joining Don Callas and how he was impressed by Kevin, but since joining Callus, he has become lazy and doesn't seem hungry. And I was just mystified listening to this because I was watching Kenny just make up a story that makes Kevin Knight look significantly worse. And because Kenny Omega fans don't watch things that Kenny Omega isn't a part of and the rest of the world doesn't watch full shows, this just completely went under the radar as a burial of Kevin Knight because Kenny doesn't know how to tell stories or cut promos that fit within the rest of the show. What Kenny is trying to go for here is that Kevin Knight wants to be the best and greatest by any means necessary rather than doing it in a way that he can feel proud of in the future.

[00:06:00]And by joining Don Callas, yeah, maybe Kevin Knight will be able to reach some promised land, but it comes at the cost of you being able to look back on it happily. And you can really only appreciate that when you do it the right way. This is a great idea for a story beat that Kenny Omega reduces to, you don't have the same hunger, you are Don Callus's little [ __ ] As if Kevin Knight isn't out here trying to fight you and participated in a massive cage match just for a title shot and is now warding off a domestic terrorist. Nobody is pointing out how [ __ ] Kenny Omega is in this segment and how heavy-handed and bad his lore promos are because they are only fixated on Will Osprey and they fixated on him because they don't like him. Just a month ago, Kenny Omega was cutting promo after promo to build up to the Zack Saber Jr. match of Forbidden Door. and every promo without fail, he would mention that nobody knows or cares who Zack Saber Jr. is. Zack Saber Jr.

[00:06:54]has wrestled in AW many times before.

[00:06:57]And even if he hasn't, this is not an angle that is worth investing in. But it's one that Kenny fixated on and we just have to pretend it's cool because a man that's Kenny, [ __ ] that. [ __ ] Zach Saber Jr., sure, but [ __ ] Kenny. This is a [ __ ] idea from one of the shittiest brains in wrestling that people who are parasoially invested in just ignore because their scrimblo character is just saying stuff. Wait until he wrestles.

[00:07:22]And then he has a match that is 30 minutes long and is the third best match on the show. Nice [ __ ] goat, guys.

[00:07:28]You really sunk 10 years of your lives into this dumb [ __ ] Now, in people's defense, there are a lot of things going on with the Kenny Omega and Will Osprey story that does point to it being a quote Willil Osprey creation more than a Kenny Omega creation, but nobody's actually talking about those because nobody actually knows what to look for in wrestling besides me. Apparently, they just want to post. And something that prevents posting is actually watching and forming an opinion on something that you couldn't have had 5 minutes ago. When it comes to Will Osprey, he has always had a weird relationship with online sentiments and in-person sentiments. Outside of the UK, Osprey has always been enjoyed, but not universally beloved, which is only amplified by the internet because you know how culture works. It's one of those things that has always made it very hard to have an opinion on Osprey because I think that cultural noise really clouds the signal even if you don't want it to. If you hear from someone, Osprey is self-indulgent and [ __ ] and is unemotional, and then you watch an Osprey match, you're more than likely going to be influenced one way or the other by what you heard more than if you had watched it without any input.

[00:08:31]So, throughout the late 2010s, when Osprey was being flagged down as not good, I just saw someone who was a bit indulgent, but tried to do new things and was more focused on execution than he was cohesion. I didn't ever see a bad wrestler. I bring all this social and cultural input up to say that the reaction to this Goku and Vegeta line from Osprey was what finally connected the dots on why people are so weird about him. So, this Kenny Osprey buildup has some clear tales that betray that this is a Will Osprey story. The first being that every promo has been about how much it would mean to Will Osprey to wrestle Kenny Omega at All-In and not that the two would love to wrestle one another. I think that this is a funny little distinction. Kenny has been fixated on the world title. And because Osprey won the Owen, it means that he would face Osprey, but Kenny's story is that he wants the world title again.

[00:09:20]Osprey wants the title, sure, but it really matters to him to wrestle Kenny Omega. And all of that gushing is always coming from one side. Beyond that, John Moxley is involved because he is important to Osprey story, which centers Osprey's journey more than it does Kenny and his friends. If it was a Kenny story, Don Callas would be much more involved because Kenny only wants to feud with people who are with Don Callas. Kosuke Teesha and Kazucha Okata last year, Andrade earlier this year.

[00:09:48]Osprey in 2023. Kevin Knight right now.

[00:09:51]Everyone has their crutches that they rely upon. Roman Reigns has the bloodline story. Kenny Omega has Don Kalis lore. But the crutch that Will Osprey has is not as easily identifiable, but has definitely been noticed. In this segment with Kenny Omega, Will Osprey is at his worst.

[00:10:06]Partially because he is extremely comfortable and is just being himself, but he himself is not terribly likable or funny or charismatic. He should probably be less of himself. But the main reason that he's at his worst is because Will Osprey's most admirable and hateable feature is that he wants his big stories and rivalries to have the deep epic lore that he grew up hearing about. He wants to have these generational layered stories between wrestlers that he would have loved as a kid. and he's so eager to have them that he is out there giving eternal monologues, laying out every single beat of the story so [ __ ] clearly. He just keeps talking and talking and talking.

[00:10:42]This is what the story is. This is why it matters to me that we have this match. It's like he believes that if he explains it enough that people have no choice but to understand it and understand that it matters. I can't relate to that. I've never thought that in my life. It reminds me of a bit that Don Callas does now and then where he will deliver a two or three minute long promo that he clearly came up with because he saw the internet saying something doesn't make sense. So, he is passively aggressively delivering a promo that addresses them specifically.

[00:11:09]He did it with the split of the Continental and International Championships during the Continental Classic last year and then with the stagnation of Okata and Teesha's rivalry earlier this year. And it's extremely funny because it is clearly designed with contempt for people who don't understand the obvious. But instead of Don Callus's contempt, Will Osprey is putting his personal blog entry in his promos. And it's insane. All of this contributes to why people, whether they realize it or not, do not like Will Osprey, and why there is not as much investment in his stories as there should be for someone who has such an insane career as a wrestler over the past decade. Will Osprey has many wrestlers that he has a deeper connection with completely organically in a way that only professional wrestling can fulfill because of its nature. You think about the list of wrestlers that Osprey has a deeper connection with outside of England and the list is really expansive. Kazuch Okata got him into New Japan and he entered as a kind of junior Okata.

[00:12:03]Ricochet was the legacy junior in Japan as Osprey debuts and the two of them go viral for their wrestling style that breaks Osprey into global notoriety. Him and John Moxley had a rivalry going into the Tokyo Dome and are continuing their connection with the Death Riders now.

[00:12:17]Elf Fantasma was someone that Will Osprey pegged as the next Osprey and made it his mission to position ELP as the top four and junior as he left the division. Kota Ibushi is the unnaturally athletic vunderkind that shared a viral spot with Osprey. Shinko Takagi and Osprey had a classic and the best of the super juniors that connect them forever.

[00:12:36]These are organic connections that every wrestler has that give depth to wrestling beyond just one match in one place, one time. Will Osprey knows that these connections exist. He is extremely proud of these stories and because he wants to provide the kind of content that he loves, he takes it upon himself to iterate on these stories and put his pen to paper and make the subtext and interpretations canon. When he wrestles Kazuchi Okata in 2018, he goes for the rain maker pose, but instead says, "I'm my own [ __ ] man." Despite not doing the rain maker pose for 2 years, him and I keep revisiting the same spot that became famous. El Fantasma was his warm-up bout before Forbidden Door because of their connection. He made a video explaining the lore behind him and Robbie Eagles and why that match matters. And as admirable as this idea is, I think that what Will Osprey fails to realize is that most people want to iterate on the different beats themselves. These stories can be put into canon, of course, but what connects people to the content is when they realize the connection organically. It makes them feel like they are seeing a trend and whenever they dig deeper, they can see enough information to explain the story beats themselves. So everyone who individually gets to the finish line has their own words and their own slightly different interpretation to share which personalizes those experiences to that individual. Most people want to do the writing themselves. And when Will Osprey is out there monologuing about what the story is, it robs fans who are invested in the experience of writing their fanfiction.

[00:14:03]and it forces people who are not invested to endure a long promo about something that they don't care about when they just want to ignore the story and get the match over with. Speaking personally, I am much more on the side of Will Osprey than not. I think that doing an inring promo is a [ __ ] way to get across these beats, but that's for another time. I would much rather the story be clearly told by the storyteller rather than leaving interpretation to the viewer, but it's such a fine line between communicating the story effectively and Michael Cole screaming about the shield chair. Like, yeah, I get it. That's the reference, man. At the end of the day, Will Osprey is someone whose greatest crime is pretty benign. He loves professional wrestling in a cringe way, and the way that manifests only serves to remind people that they are also cringe and embarrassing. They can look for other reasons, but if you search through all of the discourse about how Osprey is self-indulgent and views wrestling like an action movie instead of human struggle or whatever else, the core of all of these arguments is that the people who hate Osprey hate the way that he wrestles. And the reason he wrestles that way is because he is just a mirror to what wrestling fans are. He is just unashamedly cringe in his love while other people want to hide behind their ego.

[00:15:17]Dream with me for a second. Imagine the hottest person you've ever seen in a field that has a clear connection to aesthetics. This gorgeous person has always underperformed despite checking every box. All praise of them stems to one or two peaks and very little else.

[00:15:31]And it's clear that this person just doesn't have it. They are missing something. And then suddenly 10 years into their prominent career, they are suddenly doing it at such a high level that it's honestly [ __ ] up. Who taught them how to do that [ __ ] This isn't fair. What I am describing is the career of Andrade Elidelo because what the [ __ ] happened, man? Andrade is someone that I very rarely respected because the conversations around him were always the same. He's gorgeous. He's athletic. He can wrestle. Why has nobody ever pushed him properly? I am a firm believer in the idea that if nowhere ever gives you the prominent push that it feels like you should get, then it has to eventually reflect on you as the wrestler. Nobody just gets under booked their entire careers. Someone will eventually give you a shot if you're like that. All sorts of caveats and asterisks here, but I think that there is pretty much no exceptions, much less Andrade. Andrade is someone that people have always claimed could wrestle at a high level, but really just stuck to that Gargano NXT match for years because between WWE and AEW, it was Andrade's only standout match. And if he's someone that has always struggled to connect with people outside of the wrestling, that is pretty damning that he isn't even able to produce with the wrestling part at a high level. After the Gargano match in NXT, Andrade completely flopped everywhere despite quote checking all the boxes. His first WWE run, I don't know a single thing that he did. His first AW run was considered underwhelming due to both poor stories and lack of ability to get momentum. His return to WWE, he actually did produce in the ring. He carried the summer of 2024 alongside Carmelo Hayes and injected life into the tag division alongside Ray Phoenix before leaving WWE again. And after returning to AEW, his initial run was completely fine and normal. He had some good matches and some basic stories. He was just a generic high-profile wrestler. And then suddenly he started being given extremely compelling stories, knocking those out of the park. And then a flip got switched where he has started essentially portraying a parody of TV wrestling. And what do you mean Andrade is doing that? Andrade Elidelo, the boring hot guy. I'm not going to recap the entire Andrade shift in story. It's incredibly good and I'm enjoying it a ton, but it's not really what I want to talk about here. What I do want to focus on is the idea of gimmicks in wrestling.

[00:18:00]specifically the original definition of gimmicks in actual props or bits that people build a relationship with.

[00:18:06]Andrade is someone that has never really connected with a gimmick outside of Zelina Vega as his manager. And I think that only really connected because she was with him as he had his NXT run that people liked. But since returning to AW, Andrade has slowly built up a roster of gimmicks, all of which are extremely solid and traditional. But when it's being done by a boring hot man, it becomes so compelling. Andrade lands some big spot to the outside and knocks his opponent down. He pops up and the crowd cheers. He sees a model who is a plant and takes a picture with her because he is hot and cool. This is a solid bit. It's versatile enough that it's able to be iterated on. It's great as a face and great as a heel. This is a solid fundamental technical gimmick.

[00:18:48]Another one that he has that is seemingly random. Andrade will take his pants off sometimes and the crowd shrieks because good lord that man is something else. But it's not like he does this in his big matches or against specific opponents. Sometimes he just does it. What the [ __ ] is that about? In Andrade's current run, which I would probably define as since his match with Darby Allen, but more specifically around the Orange Cassidy Dynamite match, Andrade has started getting integrated with bit after bit after bit.

[00:19:16]Against Orange Cassidy, he does his picture taking gimmick, but it's Leo Rush, and Andrade just seems baffled by him whenever they interact, creating some strange connection. Around this time is when he started using his how you know catchphrase to the point of parody. I love this catchphrase and people enjoying it because on paper it's so stupid and shitty, but because it was basically just a Twitter meme from his first AW run, whenever he uses it, it is acknowledging the fans so it has a period of undying appreciation. And I don't think it's a coincidence that he started doing it more when he was beginning to shift more towards being a face. On this past episode of Dynamite, he comes out wearing a how you know t-shirt and wrestles in it. And almost immediately, I identified that he is a genius who is wearing his own merch to promote it. But he also has created a pop for later in the match when he takes it off. Only when he takes off the shirt, he is wearing another shirt underneath it that says [ __ ] Don Callas, [ __ ] MJF from Forbidden Door, which was also set up by him wrestling in two other shirts. And then Andrade took that shirt off and the pop was crazy. He even got given MJF's dynamite diamond ring which ties into his feud with MJF and Don Callus that he is referencing with the second shirt bit. But also, if I can go on a slight tangent, the dynamite diamond ring is canonically a ring of power in AW. I don't know if people have noticed this. It is canon that it gives MJF an edge in his matches, being treated as a kill shot if he's able to use it. So, Kenny Omega was able to overcome MJF because Osprey stole the ring. And then when Don Callas family tries to jump Andrade after the match on Dynamite, Andrade puts it on and this group of thugs with the numbers advantage backs off like he has super strength now. What the [ __ ] is happening? We've given Andrade too much, man. Not just with the ring of power, but he is genuinely overloaded on gimmicks and bits, and they are all funny and cool. The only redeeming thing about Andrade Elidelo is that he was not funny or cool. He was just hot and that let people be compelled by him more than if he looked regular. If he's doing legitimately good TV bits and building connections with smart and funny wrestlers like Orange Cassidy, Leo Rush, and Darby Allen, then there is nothing that Andrade can't do. Nobody on earth is doing it like Andrade right now. He's not on the best run in the company, but in this isolated moment, he is one of the best fake wrestlers we have right now. Do not let Andrade figure out TV wrestling and then reunite with Roo. You will never hear the end of it from me and mine.

[00:21:50]Now, if you're paying attention, you'll notice that when I talk about wrestlers, I always mention conversations around them. It's true that wrestlers and their fans/haters are not always on the same wavelength. Sometimes narratives develop in ways that are unfair for individual wrestlers. But I think that while I am a proponent of having your own opinion on something, the social dynamics around wrestling are a part of the game. The way that people talk about LeBron James does not materialize on the stat sheet in a way that is worth investing time into discussing. Whereas wrestling conversations can directly influence booking and characters in ways that can completely change the way a career can go. So, while it can't be your only perspective, I think that it is a valuable thing to compare and contrast to the perspectives that you gather on your own. This mentality brings me to Mercedes Monet, a wrestler who is affected by this dynamic more than any I can think of. Mercedes Monet is a wrestler who has always had a very dedicated and very loud fan base, and for good reason. Mercedes is extremely talented in a way that a lot of her peers simply were not when she started becoming more prominent. The fan base that she initially wrestled in front of was saturated with obsessive stand figures who would latch on to this generational talent. But despite this generational talent that she had, she was never booked the way that she maybe could have been. Which, speaking as a fan of Tetssuya Nito, I can emphatically say that this treatment makes the fans all that much more feral. Because of the aggression of her fans, it inspired a dedicated cult of people who hated on her. less because they don't like her specifically, but because they don't like the way that her fans flooded conversations about her with their unique for wrestling brand of psychopathy. This combined with her career trajectory has basically cemented her as a powder keg for discourse for doing little more than existing, which makes her an innately interesting wrestler to talk about from a sociological standpoint. But the way that Mercedes is most affected that I find the most interesting is in regards to match quality. While match quality is open to interpretation, not everyone likes the same things. Not everybody is viewing neutrally blah blah blah blah blah. There is a truth that once you are invested in a wrestler both positively and negatively that you will see essentially what you want to see because you want to be proven right. When you enjoy a wrestler and want to see them have good matches, you will notice more than people who are watching passively.

[00:24:05]You are invested in these stories and these dynamics. You care about the results. This is the foundation of what makes wrestling good. But when it comes to match quality wrestlers, when someone gets the reputation of being a great match, I find that there's kind of a flattening effect where matches are always an exact level of quality as long as they fill a specific criteria that feeds you dopamine because it feels like you are being proven right more than you are actually interpreting the matches.

[00:24:31]For someone like Kenny Omega, that criteria is pretty much solely that he wins. If he has the exact same match and loses, people are less likely to call it a classic match. For someone like CM Punk, it's usually a reference to some older match. Mercedes Monet doesn't really have a set criteria. She is just a good match. And while her matches are all a base level of good, those differences that are interesting do end up getting flattened because another Mercedes banger from supporters reduce her great matches down to the level of her pretty good matches. Famously in some circles, Mercedes Monet has never gotten a five-star match from Davy Dave Meltzer, which honestly is crazy to be fair. But I also think that this dynamic is part of it. Mercedes is expected to have great matches, and a classic match kind of inherently has to introduce you to something new and special. And while Mercedes has plenty of these matches, probably more than any of her peers, honestly, the fact that she's expected to do so makes this much less remarkable. Even in my own experience when talking to friends and comparing the four horse women and their match quality, I always docked Mercedes because while she has on average the best matches, she has very little that stands out. She has always been to me a high floor, low ceiling type. But that neglects to mention that that floor is so much higher than a lot of people's ceilings. At AW Fribend Door, Mercedes Monet and Mya World had the best match of all time. And it's a match that has created one of the funniest terminally online psycho stories I've ever followed where David Dave Meltzer, who attended the show live, said that he felt like he couldn't properly process it in person and would have to watch it later at home in order to rate it. And it spent weeks not doing that, thus not rating the match, which [ __ ] rules. David Dave Meltzer gets shouted at by Mercedes fans whenever he rates one of her great matches 4.75, which on a side note probably has invariably contributed to David Dave Meltzer having weird feelings when he watches Mercedes and probably causes him to be a bit more critical than is fair. But like come on, man. So when he is live at Forbidden Door, sees a match and has an opinion on it and then receives tweets saying, "You better give it five or else # crew." Followed by a photo taken from a few seats behind him of him reading Twitter. He gets spooked that he didn't like it that much and just tries to not raid it and move on and go to Mexico. This is unstoppable force versus immovable object stuff happening through the lens of psycho fans of a wrestler and a wrestling journalist. Anyways, in the my world match, I was finally able to understand the things that I appreciated about Mercedes Monet. The role that she plays as the insurmountable obstacle, the unshakable frontr runner, is one that she had perfected in her matches long before she had the tenure that grants her living legend status. Every move that Mercedes makes in that match carries a gravity that communicates to your brain that my world has no chance, which makes the moments where she fights back feel miraculous. This attitude that Mercedes carries is one that only gets amplified in bigger positions, but it's also one that completely defines the way that she feels throughout all of her matches. The best matches for Mercedes Monet is when she is facing an underdog baby face on a big stage. But when she is wrestling on any level, that attitude has always transcended her booking status to always making it feel like a big deal when you beat her. at her lowest in WWE, which is not nearly as low as people will act, mind you, but let's just say her lowest was just a part of the roster. Someone who was giving it up on weekly TV to push someone like Alexa Bliss or Carmela or whatever. Even at her lowest, it never didn't feel like a big deal that someone beat her. As mad as you can be that Charlotte flat out won the rivalry with Sasha Banks in 2016, all of those pay-per-view matches she won felt like she had to go through a war. Ronda Rousey was on a big run, but Sasha was the best in ring wrestler that she was going to face. So, her winning that match felt like a big deal. Every single thing I understand about TV wrestling production told me that Willow Nightingale was beating Mercedes for the TBS Championship. And when the three counted, I still celebrated like Pat Bev because that [ __ ] still felt real. That is when I realized that my respect and admiration for Mercedes as a character and as a figure has always made it so that when I watch Mercedes, I cheer for the other person. Sometimes it's because I am bigger fans of them than her.

[00:28:53]Sometimes it's because she's winning too much. But regardless of who she's facing, it feels like the other person has to get it out of the mud against this insurmountable figure. I felt that way watching Charlotte [ __ ] Flair wrestle Sasha in 2016. Having no real experience with either of them, no baggage to weigh me down. Every single match, I am wanting someone to beat Mercedes because she feels like a mountain to climb. And because of that, over years, I just don't really like her that much. I have an endless amount of respect for her. The way that she has always pushed for the prominent placement of women and when she got given those chances, she lived up to the moment every single time. The way that she walked out of WWE when she felt the disrespect had gone too far. The fact that when she left WWE, she immediately went to stardom in New Japan rather than walking into almost assuredly better money with AW. The fact that when she did her belt collector gimmick and won titles from AW partners and indie promotions alike, when it came time, she traveled and gave almost all of the titles back. What are we even talking about? She doesn't have to do that.

[00:30:02]Like, okay, maybe you have to do it for CMLL or RevPro. Those are AW partners and you want to make good on those relationships. But what the [ __ ] do you mean she went to prime time wrestling in Poland to lose a title back to them? You see Mercedes Monaet giving Polish titles back and you don't respect that? If I have a Polish wrestling belt and they want it back, they can get it [ __ ] mailed to them with my [ __ ] on it. Get the [ __ ] out of my [ __ ] face. What do I look like going to Poland? That run where she lost those titles back is so unbelievably cool. Like it's real wrestler [ __ ] When John Moxley left WWE, it would have been so easy for him to just post up in AW after it had had been established. Every wrestler when they leave WWE has that fantasy that they're going to try and experience everything that they'd missed out on.

[00:30:48]Brian Danielson talking about doing aus matches and wanting to maybe do G1. When they actually leave, they find a big check and they post up there and that's fine. Why the [ __ ] is Brian Danielson going to go around doing aus matches or running the indies? He's had the living on the road making a name for yourself experience. He doesn't have to do it at 40. He should just wrestle in AW. Moxley didn't do that. He went to New Japan first. He did G1. It was a dog [ __ ] run, but he did it. When he was established in AW as a defining main character, he still made a point to go to GCW and run stories with Nick Gage. He was regularly a part of Josh Barnett's Blood Sport. He was doing indie dates in places like Revolver and Over-the-top Wrestling in 2023. John Moxley does not need to do this. He is genuinely, honestly, truly above that. Nobody is faulting him for not doing those things. So the fact that he [ __ ] did them, walked the walk that everybody else claims that they will, that's why he's the only real wrestler and everybody else is just pretending. If Mercedes Monet is doing [ __ ] that evokes possibly the most amount of respect I've ever given a wrestler, then it should stand to reason that I actually do like her. But I don't, or at least I don't right now.

[00:32:09]That respect manifests in never wanting her to win because nobody wants to see Goliath win. So, there's a real chance that I will only ever appreciate her beyond my capacity to enjoy her. But that's something that I think I have to come to terms with because it would be a shame if her entire career passes by and I waited until she was retired to finally realize that I still want to see her. The last thing I want to talk about is a bit too online, so it's borderline not talking about wrestling, but I'll make sure it connects. Don't worry, you know my body. Brian Alvarez is a radio host on Wrestling Observer Radio, most notably hosting with David Dave Meltzer, and he started getting some flack in the last week because he didn't like Dynamite. But the way he didn't like Dynamite invited a weird discourse. In a clip that went around, Brian Alvarez says, and I'm paraphrasing here, that AW should be bigger, but they make dumb choices, saying that while they are the second most successful wrestling company in history, the gap between WWE and them shouldn't be so vast. AW is running nothing matches, not explaining their stories to people. This is why they aren't beating WWE. There is a lot to unpack here. This should and probably will eventually be its own video. So, I'm going to try to run through this as fast as I possibly can. One of his points that really stuck out to me was asking why Mercedes Monet and Divine Dominion versus Willow Night and Gale My World and Hyen with Nothing on the Line was headlining the show. Ignoring the actual reason, when this was main eventing, I immediately recognized what was happening. Willow versus Mercedes is an existing rivalry and a potential all-in title match. So, you run a match between these two and a tag team behind them. Divine Dominion gets to benefit from the Mercedes aura. My world and Hyen get to benefit from Willow's aura.

[00:33:53]My world and Hyenne get to run with the world tag team champions and deepen that division while also giving both of the main singles wrestlers a trio with which to challenge world champion Techla who is the leader of a group called the triangle of madness. They are called the angry three people and before this match divine dominion had attacked Sisters of Sin and set up a match between the two teams eventually. They are creating layers of engagement and benefiting lower level members of the roster, thickening the stories of the tag division, improving the relationship between your Wembley title match, and you're getting character interactions like My World and Mercedes, Julia Hart and Willow, people who have interacted and have a dynamic. This is some of the most comprehensive and battle tested professional wrestling booking. So, that answers the nothing on the line part. As for where I was headlining, the show was in Boston and they gave that one to Mercedes Monet because that's what you do. This is more of a general Brian Alvarez thing that I've known about but never really touched on because it was never relevant. Brian Alvarez is one of the guys that has been hit the most by Vince McMahon not being in charge of weekly wrestling because he is the most vocal. But this is something that affects everybody. When Vince McMahon was in charge of WWE, the show was so bad that you literally just had to throw a dart and you were going to hit something [ __ ] And that completely warped people's abilities to process things in wrestling. They watch it so terrified that it will be [ __ ] that they get in front of it and just assume that everything is bad because that's what the show had trained them to do for 20 years. So now when the shows are significantly better, don't let people trick you. The worst booking decisions don't come close to 2010's WWE. Nobody really knows how to criticize things because they only seemed like they did because it was all bad. Brian Alvarez once said one of the most baffling things that actually gave up the game.

[00:35:41]When Mark Davis beat Will Osprey by referee stoppage and John Moxley took him away. The following collision. They played an amazing video promo that showed the conversation that happened afterwards. Building up the story between John Moxley and Will Osprey that is still going on. On the following Dynamite, they played a video promo continuing it. And Brian Alvarez said that he initially didn't even know that they had explained what had happened.

[00:36:04]And when he learned that it was played on Collision instead, he insisted that it shouldn't be on Collision because nobody watches it. That gives up the entire game, right? Brian Alvarez doesn't want the stories to be better or more compelling. He doesn't want to work more. So, he wants it to all be on the one show that he watches, even if that means it has to go slower or be worse.

[00:36:25]If you can't be bothered to watch the shows, why on earth should I look at you as any kind of authority on the shows that you're reviewing? His main point that a lot of people got stuck on was him saying that AW success is measured by how it does in relation and competition with WWE. Saying that the gap between them is so large because AW makes choices that don't contribute to success in the battle to beat the WWE.

[00:36:48]This is a point that was thankfully pointed out to be bad. When AW started, everybody on both sides of the partisan divide got so high on the idea of another wrestling ratings war that they immediately fell into the infinite discourse void where success was measured in relation to specific tangible benchmarks. Was AW beating WWE in total viewers? Were they beating them in the key demographics? Are they breaking a million viewers? basically anything except are they profitable to keep going, which is the only real success to be had in this evil, [ __ ] up, porn-filled world. This mindset of beat WWE or die trying has claimed many souls of a generation of wrestling fans.

[00:37:29]Their bodies are still posting from the trenches, but they died a true death many moons ago. Brian Alvarez has gotten absolutely nuked by his hatred of WWE, his understanding of WCW, and general at least surface desire for AW to do well and can now only think of things in relation to making sure that AEW Dynamite's ratings improve. And when they aren't doing those things that he would do, it means that they are not trying to be successful. How are you going to beat WWE this way? Take it from the only person who said this in 2019 before AW had a weekly show. Thinking this way is a nowhere road and you will lose your soul the same way that Brian Alvarez has lost his if you continue to think about wrestling in this way. If professional wrestling is not truly sports, then the social aspect cannot ever truly be disconnected. Top wrestlers are not just individual athletes. They are the amalgam of talent, booking and narrative. We all exist in the context of everything that came before us. And if that's the case, then it can never be just as simple as wrestling. All of this [ __ ] matters because it's all connected. All you need to do is start looking for it.