In this WrestleTalk News, a WWE producer quits following WrestleMania, have two new members
of Edge’s faction leaked and what happened with Cody after Raw went off the air, plus
Oli will be here reviewing last night’s Raw.
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[SUPPORT WRESTLETALK]
WrestleMania weekend is in the books, Cody returned, Veer came, Ezekiel is not fooling
anyone.
And all in all it was a great weekend of sports entertainment fun.
Post-WrestleMania WWE usually has a bit of a freshen up, be that bringing new characters
to the fore, reworking gimmicks or calling people up out of NXT.
But this year there is a backstage shakeup that perhaps they didn’t see coming as Mike
Johnson at PWInsider reported that producer Pat Buck resigned from WWE following the event.
Buck had an important role over the weekend - heading up producing the Night 2 main event
between Roman Reigns and Brock Lesnar, as well as Night 1’s match between Ronda Rousey
and Charlotte Flair.
Buck took to Twitter to confirm his exit with a statement saying: “As a producer/agent,
I feel that I have accomplished everything I wanted to do within WWE in the last three
years.
My endless gratitude beams from working with so many wonderful talents, especially the
ultra talented Women's Division.”
Buck made it clear that he would return to and expand his training schools: WrestlePro
in New Jersey and the Create-A-Pro Wrestling Academies in New Jersey and Long Island which
he co-owns with Brian Myers.
You’ve probably noticed that Edge is doing this whole spooky suited faction thing, like
a pair of magicians at a conference, which WWE have been scouting for names for on Twitter.
According to AEW’s Brody King it should be Wish.com House of Black.
But regardless of whatever the Edge-lords end up being called currently there’s plenty
of speculation of who else will be joining the group.
One person who already dresses appropriately and Fightful Select are suggesting has been
pitched is Rhea Ripley who teased some dissention with tag partner Liv Morgan on Raw.
Fightful did some digging and turned up one other name that was pitched, former NXT Champion
Tomasso Ciampa.
Obviously who is pitched and who eventually ends up in the faction are different things
as no word has come down on if the idea was approved by WWE higher ups.
The biggest thing from Raw this week, as Oli will tell you was Cody Rhodes addressing the
crowd after his return at WrestleMania - a return which didn’t try to hammer Cody back
into an old WWE gimmick… or any facepaint.
The lack of facepaint can be explained by Cody telling Ariel Helwani that he told Vince
and WWE: “I said I never want to ever see Stardust
ever again and I never want to see, hear it or talk about it and it was a handshake and
that was all I needed.”
On Raw Cody made a short emotional address to the crowd which according to Sean Ross
Sapp wasn’t scripted - Wrestling observer said the only idea was “for it to be memorable
promo.”
But post show fans were treated to more Rhodes who wrestled a dark match against Kevin Owens,
which Cody won but not before KO pulled out a Young Bucks pose to taunt his opponent - pretty
much the only AEW reference around Cody of the night.
Cody then addressed the fans to send them home happy, but what happened on the show
you idiot, you’ve talked about this all in the wrong order.
I have, so hot tag to Oli to sort it out.
Now it’s time for my review of WrestleMania 38 Episode 3, Monday Night Raw… in about
5 minutes.
The Raw After Mania opened with on a follow-up to the biggest thing that happened over the
weekend: no, not Vince McMahon taking the stunner.
Or Logan Paul doing the three amigos.
Or Pat McAfee’s entrance.
Or Johnny Knoxville and his five star match.
I miss the celebrities, where are they?
What do you mean they’re just here once a year?
Why should I care about all these guys they beat?
Instead, Raw opened on Cody Cody Cody Rhodes, with the platform he was supposed to raise
up from rather hilariously not being quite tall enough, so you saw his head already at
the bottom of the screen before his entrance.
Like a potato.
He got a huge reaction, fascinatingly full of ‘You Deserve Its’ and ‘Welcome Back’
- with not a single AEW chant.
Cody didn’t reference AEW either.
He just said there’s been rumours about his life over the last two months, that returning
to WWE was the easiest decision he’s ever made, and that his aim is to win the WWE Championship
- whatever that’s called now - because his dad never got it.
Seth Rollins interrupted, seemingly to continue their feud, but instead he appeared to endorse
Cody, and his mission to honour their shared father figure, and they shook hands.
Cody and Seth secretly running Ring of Honor confirmed.
This is one of the greatest works of all time!
I think it’s fair to say this is the only real thing of substantial note that happened
on this show.
Next up came a championship contender’s match of new tag champs Naomi and Sasha Banks
against Rhea Ripley and Liv Morgan.
The action was decent, but I don’t believe in any of this divisions teams.
They’re just singles stars thrown together.
Which became even more frustrating when Ripley appeared to break up with Liv after they lost,
but were back together again by the end of the night because they’d been granted a
title shot next week.
After losing the championship contender’s match.
What are the rules?
In WWE’s commitment to having a confusing episode layout, Kevin Owens then entered,
looking like, for a moment, his next feud was with Liv Morgan.
Instead it’s against someone probably even more surprising.
After complaining he lost to Stone Cold because of a bad back.
KO was interrupted by a wrestler from 2010’s forgotten midcard.
Like someone eliminated in the first few weeks of NXT series 3.
An obscure superstar that Tempest wouldn’t even get in QuizzleMania.
He wore generic trunks.
He had generic music.
He had a generic face and look.
He even had a generic name, Ezekiel.
Wait, it can’t be… oh no, he was bald!
That’s the one characteristic that stops those two looking exactly the same.
And then Owens leaned in and said: “Elias, is that you?”
No, according to Elias.
It’s Elias’ younger brother, Ezekiel.
This gimmick, if done right, could have MizDow levels of potential.
Up next, Veer finally came - laying out the Mysterios after Miz had just squashed Dominic.
It was all over very quickly.
Hey, you try edging for six months and then trying to perform.
Veer had the intensity of movement of early Rusev, but this felt very lower-midcard.
Bianca Belair revealed she had an actual black eye during her victory promo - presumably
off Becky’s rolling thunder boot on Saturday, which makes their match feel even more awesome.
The content of the promo was pretty forgettable though, and didn’t set up any new challengers
or storylines - which made this whole episode feel very insubstantial considering that Roman
Reigns did the same in the main event.
Showing that WWE really does just care about moments rather than all the build and context
that should make them, Bron Breakker then beat Dolph Ziggler - on Raw - to regain the
NXT Championship - just two days after losing to Ziggler in a title match at NXT: Stand
and Deliver.
The match was pretty average, and even the much smarter than normal crowd didn’t give
this the kind of reaction pre-NXT 2.0 call-ups or segments have had in the past.
This had all the drama of Jack Swagger winning the mid-00s ECW title on a match in the middle
of the show, which is to say, polite applause.
It’s even more frustrating when there’s such an obvious easy fix.
Have Rick and Scott Steiner in Bronn’s corner to counteract Roode in the Dolph’s.
You can then add extra layers of conflict, give the crowd easy nostalgia pops, and properly
give Breakker the legacy rub.
Bobby Lashley is back to being a one-dimensional smiling babyface, as MVP turned on him next,
siding with Omos.
At least that gives Omos someone who can cover the talking side of things for him.
If they get someone to wrestle for him too, he’s the complete package.
Speaking of break ups…
Queen Zelina and Carmella vs Shayna Baszler and Natalya never got started, because Vega
and Carmella broke up.
Which led to Carmella and Corey Graves getting off with each other.
In one of the many WrestleMania recaps, WWE somehow edited around Vince taking the stunner
so it didn’t look awful.
Whose sandwich did Finn Balor s*** in backstage?
Because Austin Theory pinned him in the following six man tag with RKBro and the Usos.
Finn’s third loss in three days - and he wasn’t even on the two night WrestleMania.
Theory’s character seems to be getting more serious, and this is surely setting up an
eventual US title win for him.
Thankfully, I’m really into Edge’s new character - who welcomed out his newest member
of the House of Purple, Damien Priest.
Interestingly, Edge didn’t know Priest would join him.
Damien had just felt lost, and Edge’s promos spoke to him.
AJ Styles came out - successfully avoiding sharp edges of the entrance stage - to brawl,
but numbers won out and the heels stood tall.
Adam Pearce restarted Alpha Academy vs the Street Profits as a Texas Tornado match, meaning
everyone is legal for fast paced action from the start!
Instead, it make it a bit clunky, with Otis standing awkwardly in the corner most of the
time waiting for his cues.
Montez Ford won with a Frog Splash on Gable through a table.
And then, after being built up for the whole night, we finally got to hear from our Super
Duper Everything Champion Roman Reigns, who said: watch SmackDown.
There was no angle.
No new challenger.
No new championship belt.
Just Paul Heyman running down all the Bloodline’s accomplishments like the biggest grossing
SummerSlam, Survivor Series and Royal Rumbles, a 43% increase in Peacock subscriptions.
The leading star in WWE’s first billion dollar revenue year.
I love wrestling promos that are actually Q1 investor calls.
What did you think of the Raw after Mania?
Let me know in the comments.
WrestleMania 38 was incredibly fun all weekend.
Yet this episode of Raw showed why no-one was excited for Mania.
The weekly TV isn’t good enough.
There were newsworthy bits, like Cody’s first promo, Veer finally getting here, Zelina
and Carmella breaking up and Bron Breakker winning the NXT championship - which I actually
forgot until I was scrolling through the results just now - but none of it had substance.
And this should’ve been the hot new season start, setting up new feuds, storylines and
characters.
By Raw after Mania standards, this was a near total waste and a bucket of cold water over
my WrestleMania hype at 35%.
Now go watch how Adam Blampied would’ve booked
WrestleMania 38…