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I love gold. The look of it, the taste of it, the smell of it. The dexter. Love gold so much, we even merged the two WWE Championships in an unfortunate schmelting accident. This is the SmackDown podcast here on the Russell Talk podcast channel. I'm your host, Tempest, alongside the lovely and beautiful Sat e Niangi. What time is it? Sat?

It is sat e time on sat e day. I haven't done that in weeks. I actually forgot I'd do that until you prompted me.

Thank you. That's what I'm here for. We are the House of the Black Mask. Who. Charged up?

I'm ready to go. Dude, it's been weeks. I've missed you. I've missed everyone else. It's always quite awkward to take time off and come back and then take time off again. But I'm here. I'm back. I've got a kitten. Now I just want to throw that out.

There's a new wrestle cat.

There's a new wrestle cat. Yes. His name is Tunde. His government name is Baba tunde Kazuchika kupanyangi.

You all better remember that. So we are here to talk about Friday Night SmackDown, the 1000 days of Roman Reigns, and his championship celebration, and more specifically, where that leaves the bloodline. Because on this show, there were a lot of video packages hyping up Roman Reigns 1000 days as Universal Champion. It was like the first five minutes of the show. And then throughout the show, they were showing off highlights of his biggest title matches, his biggest title defenses, all that. And throughout the show, you had backstage segments where Paul Heyman was talking to Solo SACOA, and he said, I'm going to go talk to Adam Pierce, make sure that the Usos are nowhere to be found tonight. And he goes and he talks to Adam Pierce, and Adam Pierce is like, it's okay. Travel is canceled. We've got security measures in place. There will be no usos. Everything's going to go to plan. That was just a lie.

Not even just a lie.

But why?

Okay, let's just say, all right, you don't want the Usos to be at a ceremony. Can they not wrestle?

They're wrestlers.

It's a bit bizarre. It's a bit right. Who's he to take orders from? A wrestler and his manager? Was he a crony?

It was hilarious. Like, they didn't have no security guys around the ring. Security guys for the Usos. To make their way through to get to the ring. Nothing. So the main event segment of this show started with Triple H coming out and going down to the ring and saying that there are figures in sport that are aligned with greatness. Mohammed Ali in boxing, michael Jordan in the NBA. And right now we are all getting to see greatness live as it happens. And people are going to be telling their kids and their grandkids about Roman Reigns. Hell of a little promo here, even though I think it's quite funny.

The funny thing is you don't watch Raw on Raw. He said we need a champion, one that doesn't occasionally turn up. Then he goes to SmackDown. You're witnessing greatness. What is ahhh is he an absentee champion or is he a champion? We tell our grandkids about make your decision. Triple H. You are hedging your bets sitting on the fence for too long. I don't like bosses that do that. Tell him to his face he had Roman in his face and he didn't tell him to his face that he thinks he's an absentee champion.

It's true. Instead, he gave him a new belt. And what a belt. They unveiled the new undisputed WWE Universal Championship, which doesn't make sense because there's a new world champion around, which means he's not undisputed.

It's been disputed.

It is a disputed WWE Universal champion. Ridiculousness. But it's the same belt again.

Someone said NK from wrestling says it looks deep fried.

I've heard so many people say what this belt looks like. I've heard it be called the mustard belt.

Mustard. I like that.

Yeah, I've heard it called the melted butter belt.

I like that too.

Like, okay, we've had red, we've had blue. Now we have gold yellow. It's a gold belt. It's a new big gold belt, sort of. He had e. You want big gold, we'll give you something big and gold. But if you like the design of the belt, more power to you. But my God, they're allergic to having a good belt design these days.

Like this century.

This century. I won't go this century. There were good belts.

The big Eagle belt was big Eagle belt.

I like the undisputed title belt. The intercontinental title, until recently, I think, had a pretty good track.

I like the title Gunta currently carries, at least not a big obnoxious w belt.

It's not, and I'm glad that it's not, but I don't know, it's not my favorite. Maybe it's just because I've got it's the same thing with the IWGP belt. I'd probably like it more if it wasn't like, in my view, a downgrade from the most previous one.

But at the same time, the old intercontinental title belt I know we're not meant to be talking about it is a nostalgia belt because it was an old design of a previous design. The whole point is to evolve. But the issue with WWE is their title evolution has been crap, I agree. But the internal title is better looking than the current WWE Universal Title wherever. But yeah, as you're saying, I'm cutting you off.

No, not at all. Their belt track record as of late hasn't been the best. Abysmal yes. That Roman Reigns is given his new belt. Here, we'll take the other two from you. You can have this new one. And I still don't know what that means for the lineages. I don't know what it means for any of those.

I'm so glad to breath bits of.

Admin there because I don't think they know. I've heard people say that they're combining the lineages of the two belts, which previously is not how this has worked, but whatever you need to tell yourself just to not have the lineage of the WWE Championship ended. Because I've been telling myself this all week. I don't want to get angry about really stupid things like this. I don't want to get invested in the lineage of a fake sports belt.

I'm with you on that, right?

It's not worth getting worked up. But that being said, if I'm going to watch this stupid show about this stupid fake sport, I want some things to matter. I want some things to be sacred. And I feel like that thing is sacred. And I feel like we're only having this discussion about lineages and such because the record setting title reign for Roman Reigns is the Universal Title, which is.

His own lineage, right?

If that belt, if he had won the WWE Championship first, right, and he then won the Universal Title second. So like the WWE Championship reign was the one that had hit 1000 days and counting and everything, then we probably would have just done away with the Universal title and combined them and okay, that belt is retired, but we can't say that because that would mean that his 1000 day title reign would stop. We can't have that, of course. But regardless, this is all regardless.

You know what? I've been thinking about it too. Yes, I have a real life. I have a job, I've got partner, got child, and I got kitten. But stuff like that still bites me in the buttocks. Because his thousand day Reigns is for the Universal Title as a separate lineage. So he has not surpassed Pedro Morales title reign. That is a lie. That is a bogus claim. And they want us not to look at the Internet and see the truth of it. And like you said, they would have ditched Universal Title if they didn't realize the four part they made the whole time. Which is quite awkward because I don't like the name. I'm a traditionalist. Is there a world title or not? Why is Universal I don't mean of the Universe. Do you want to be Champion of the Universe?

I mean, wouldn't you?

Fine, I'm Galaxy World Champion. I'm wrestle talks. Galaxy World Champion. There you go.

I remember Brian Danielson saying that on talking smack. It was good. But the point of this segment, however, is not the reveal of the big mustard belt, but rather what came after that, because immediately after the Usos came out, like we said, screw you, Adam Pierce, and your security, because that might as well not have existed. The Usos come down to the ring and this is where this segment actually really gets good. Triple H leaves. He's not needed for this. The Usos get in the ring and they're talking. Jimmy USO is the one who does most of the talking. But Roman tells Jay to super kick his brother because Jimmy super kicked him. So he says, super kick your brother. Make this right. And Jay's pacing and, you know, he's torn and everything, but he's not going to do it. He's not going to turn on his brother. All of this, everything has been about the Usos caring about each other more than Roman. Of course, there's conflict there and such, but this then turns into Jimmy saying that brothers don't manipulate. Brothers don't betray you. He starts talking to Solo, says, Solo, he's going to betray you.

He's going to manipulate you. He's going to cast you aside as soon as he's done with you. Jimmy Pi Faces Roman Reigns The bit that Roman had done to him at the pay per view and before on SmackDown and done to everybody whenever he starts getting worked up and throwing his power around. This was fascinating television because we continue down this way. We give the microphone to Solo and Solo because Roman's, like he can speak for himself. You don't need to speak for Solo. He gives the mic to Solo. He says, I acknowledge you my Tribal Chief, but those are my brothers. Goes across the ring, I believe. No, it was the Pie face thing that had people chanting Holy S word. So anytime you've got people hanging on a segment like this, that is a job well done, because we saw the same thing with the I don't give a damn, but what the Tribal Chief said segment last year. There are a lot of really good segments like that where you can tell people are totally, totally locked into what's going on in the ring in a promo segment, which is not what happens all the time, including earlier on the show, which we'll get to.

But with all three Usos now aligned on the same side of the ring, roman is stood there by himself alongside Paul Heyman, but by himself bloodline wise. And Jimmy starts talking about, it doesn't have to be this way, man. We could still be the ones. We could still be the bloodline. We could run this place like we've been doing. He offers a hug. He's just like, Listen, just chill out. Chill the f out. And Roman is starting to get all worked up and he's making it look like he's crying, and he hugs Jimmy, and they embrace, and the crowd's kind of like.

It'S not it was a pop.

There was a pop, but it wasn't like when Sammy and Jay hugged, they've united. This was kind of like, we don't like Roman, though, in the heel way. Like, we don't like this guy. He's bad news, or he's not going to turn face that easily. He's not going to turn about like that. And sure enough, Roman holds the mic up and he just says no. And he pulls away. And solo samoan spikes. Jimmy leaves him laying. Everybody goes crazy in the crowd. They leave, and the show goes off the air there with Solo and Roman and Paul Heyman walking up the ramp. No rakishi. No wild Samoans. So any talk of the extended Bloodline being present for this? Not the case. This was a WWE Bloodline segment, but very good television, I thought. It was fresh. It was interesting because we have new character dynamics now with the Usos and Roman Reigns opposing one another.

Civil war, baby.

A civil war. A bloodline civil war. It was very different from all of the other ones that we've seen, which, I mean, since WrestleMania has been the talk of the Bloodline crumbling, but we've not seen any of it until very recently. But now we actually do get to see the fallout of Jimmy USO's decision at Night of Champions. Now we see where Solo's allegiances lie, at least for now. And all of this, I thought, was very well done.

Set, I just wanted to add and towards the end, Paul Heyman, as is walking down a ramp with Solo and Roman Reigns. He says to tribal chief, what about Jay? What about Jay? And Roman goes, Jay will do what he's always done, which is fall in line.

Yes.

So Roman fully expects Jay to eventually turn on his brother as Solo has, and join him on the island of Relevancy. The whole thing was very, very well put together. I do think what was missing was the elders. We haven't had one. Besides, when the early days of the tribal chief, when you had Alphan Seeka come out and present Roman with delay, we haven't really seen a lot of the extended family members. It would be great because imagine the amount of times WWE pimps out the legends. Every six months is some sort of legend reunion.

You get you get your anniversary, teddy.

Bersey, Sergeant Slaughter, your IRS is wherever. It'll be nice for once if they did do a segment and they got members of the Ananawi family there. That would have been even better. That would have been even great. You see how the elders are reacting, because we hear, we hear from Paul Heyman or Solo himself or even Roman, how the elders are feeling. I want to see the elders. I want to hear them talk. I want to hear how they're feeling about the conflict going on amongst the family members. That would have been another great added wrinkle. Maybe it's coming soon because we don't know if this match is going to happen at Money in the bank or SummerSlam. You'd think it'll be Money in the bank because it will give Roman a rest from defending the tower again, and then he can have a big match at SummerSlam, possibly one of the Usos. Who knows? I don't know. But the whole segment was great. Like you said post WrestleMania, the whole Burla segment was like I want to say it was flatline, but it was like in ICU was in a coma. It was not dead.

It was on hold.

It's hard to get invested in this story when Roman Reigns isn't there. Because, you know, the story doesn't progress when Roman isn't there.

No. Yeah. And it's always like, oh, he's watching at home. Oh, he's not happy. It's more to do with Roman schedule being different from everyone else. But it goes to show you, when Roman Reigns is around, the Bloodline storyline goes up a notch, takes a whole giant leap, a whole giant step. I enjoyed the whole thing, and even down to the whole Solo turning on his brothers, it seemed too good to be true.

But I also gauge crowd reactions because.

Crowd reactions are crucial to if a wrestler is going to get pushed or not. Because you'd argue, I'm going to take this back to another storyline. There was another group called Evolution, right? So at that point, it was Randy Owen was kicked out. It was Batista, Rick Flair and Triple H, but they did a fake thing where Triple H and Batista had a falling out and they were going to fight each other. And then it was all done to suck Randy Orton. That's what we found in the end, to suck her him. So they beat him up by at a time when people believe in the batista saw the light and he was against Triple H, he got the biggest reaction he's ever got his entire career. Because up until then, you would argue that Batista was the least over member of Evolution at that point. But when they did the fake breakup, fans were invested in. But you're like, oh, Batista as a baby face. We're with it. So they were trying to gauge with Solo, I feel like if you left the promo for another, I don't know, 20 seconds, you may have got big Solo Chance because the crowd was trying to do Solo Chance because Solo don't get charted that much.

So it's kind of like, how do we chart him? Is it SACOA or is it solo?

What?

We chatting solo? Because when you chat for a Russell, like, what? We going with sico? No, solo. Right? Solo. Solo. Because the US has got chanted because Jimmy was in a talking. And as much as Jay gets the chant, j give it to jimmy, they're like, well, we like both of you, so OOH. But yeah, Solo, I feel like if this storyline is done well, he could walk out being the next big baby Face star. But it's kind of also kind of tricky because they want Roman Reigns to be a baby face. So there's all these nuggets you're seeing about usos can turn Baby Face, but what if all three brothers turn Hill and Roman in the end? That's what I'm also thinking as well. But overall, great segment.

It's another one of those fun segments where you do get to see this, a large development in this story and it does kind of reinvigorate your want to just be like, oh, what are they going to do next? Well, what's the next match going to be? Is Jay going to end up turning on Roman, decide with his brother, and then how long before Solo turns or what's going to happen? And that to me, has been the most fun aspect of the bloodline story over the last year. It's when are they going to turn on Sammy, how are they going to turn on Sammy? Is Sammy and Jay like, what happens with that dynamic? And then we see all these things and it leads to great segments and it's very fun. I really enjoy all that. And I think by far it was the highlight of this show because this was again, a very promo package, heavy episode of SmackDown, really highlighting Roman Reigns and his 1000 day plus reign at this point. But we will get into the rest of our SmackDown review here. Let us know what you think has let us know what you thought of the 1000 day celebration here at SmackDown Roman Reigns day.

In the comments down below, make sure.

To like, they should have done more like the staging and they should have bought, they should have wore suits or something. I mean, I've seen past celebrations. Vince McMahon had a celebration in 98. I remember the rock. This is your life. There wasn't enough balloons and there was enough pyros.

We did get Pyro, but I thought there wasn't enough. I thought there would have been confetti. Exactly.

Where's the golden confetti for the gold?

We'll get into the rest of the podcast starting now because we had our opening match here, which was the brawling Brutes versus Austin Theory, and pretty deadly. Now austin theory started this show. This was another weird pacing bit where they did the first opening promo package where they said, oh, 1000 days, it's incredible. And then they cut to the ring and Austin Theory's got a mic like, okay, and now we start. No, we've got another promo package to go to first. And they did that and then they went back to the ring. Who knows how long poor Austin Theory was stood there. But eventually we get the promo from Austin Theory, and it's a typical Austin Theory promo segment. Welcome to Austin Theory live and such, and he welcomes out. Pretty deadly. And they banter a little bit and then they bring out the brawling brutes to start this six man tag match. I thought this was a fun match. You had some good stuff. Like everybody brawled out to the floor. Ridge Holland took out the heels on the floor. And then Seamus kind of hit a diving ish closed line from the top rope to the floor.

And then Butch hit immune salt. All good stuff. They went to commercial. It was a good break. And then they went back and we had another very clever finish. And you mentioned that they did this in NXT as well, but I really like how Pretty Deadly are kind of carving out a little niche for themselves on SmackDown as just the tag team that has more creative than usual heel finishes. It's not just, oh, we distract the referee and one guy hits a low blow and then you roll him up and that's it, or whatever in this case you had. I can never get them separate in my mind.

Elton Prince is the blonde one. Kate Wilson is a brunette.

I promise you I will not remember.

This because I think of Elton Prince. I think of Elton John and Prince, so I have to remember that's. The blonde one, Kit, I think of a Kit Kat litter. Litter is brown, so Kit Wilson, brown hair.

You just got kittens on your mind. I do. Regardless, Kit Wilson in that case was the legal man, but he swaps out with Elton Prince and he puts the ring skirt over his head. So Ridge Holland thinks that he's the legal man as he's distracted with Seamus getting put into the post fast forward, things happen. And then Kit Harrington.

Wilson.

Kit Wilson hits a chop block on Ridge Holland, and then Elton John removes the thing and they hit spilt milk dude. And then they tag. In Austin theory. Who gets the pin? So very gracious of them to allow their new heel friend to get their pin for them. Good stuff. Fine opening tag match. I'm still not terribly into Austin Theory or his US title run. Somebody put on Twitter like, a few days ago, like, oh, nobody's talking about how Austin Theory has surpassed 200 days as US champion. It's because who cares? Could you name me a title defense from that whole thing other than Cena at WrestleMania? I guess he did it in the chamber, but I don't remember anything he did in the chamber. I remember what everybody else did. Regardless, it's just not been a very captivating reign. I'll be interested to see where we go next with that and such. But regardless, we move a solid, fun opening six man tag. I think all shows should open with six man tags because they're always fun backstage. We had one of the Paul heyman, any thoughts on that, by the way.

He said Elton John and Kit Harrington. I'm still not over that. That should be a bit that you go with alongside saying Walter say Kit Harrington.

If they're going to give them the most generic English names possible, I'm just going to go with it.

Go with it. I was going to say I love the new theme. That pretty deadly have. It's got vocals on it and it matches their personality. That's what has been missing when theme songs matches the wrestler. This is a generic theme number five. Five wrestlers used it. You're going to use it now. The theme fits them. I like the slow mo or the Joe mo? The Joe motion, as they have when they come out in the ring, they so charismatic. And I feel like it also highlights how dull and nondescript Austin theory is when you put a tag team that's so charismatic. They've only been on the main roster for a few weeks. I feel like they're already embedded into the main roster really, really well alongside Grayson Waller. I feel like these call ups, excluding Apollo Cruz, they've acclimated really well in a new space. And I look forward to the tag feuds. That Pretty Deadly can have all the other tag teams in a division. I'm hoping that after the imperium feud, that the Wild Sam Owens will have a feud of Pretty Deadly next because I can see the promo. Kevin Owens not pointed up with the BS of pretty deadly.

Two tasty snacks on. Snack down. Come on. That is a feud waiting to happen. Brawling Brutes. I feel like they're spinning their wheels. Unless they give him a great trio's feud, I'm starting to think maybe it is time they're all Freddie's guys have a separation, a permanent one. Butch can be Pete Dunn again. Ridge can be someone else's heavy, no offense, because Ridge, although he's improved as a wrestler in terms of a personality, he's the third liked member of the Brawling Brute. Because Pete dunn's. Pete Dunn. Seamus is a renaissance in his career. And Ridge the fridge is just known.

As Ridge to fridge.

Unless they give him a gimmick, these are an actual fridge.

Yeah. No, I agree. Seamus has they are chanting for him a lot like he was getting the we want Seamus chance during this match as he was about to make his hot tag, which is great for him. But again, I'm not going to bring this up every week, but he is lost without the character agency. That was him chasing the Intercontinental title. That was like something real, something believable, something that he wanted has been very public in saying that he wanted. And now he just doesn't really have that goal in front of him. He doesn't have that character motivation right now. And there's a million different things they could do with that. But I do think something needs to be done to freshen up the Brawling Brutes, because they are a good little package right now, but I'm ready to see Pete Dunn be Pete Dunn and get to wrestle long matches against whoever it's going to be.

But I often say, you know what the office thinks of you if they let a makeshift tag team beat you. I mean, pretty deadly. And Austin Freedom barely know each other, and they beat the brawling brutes quite easily. That says a lot about how the group stock has kind of fallen. So like you said, either they turn heel and become vicious brawling brutes again.

Or the new vicious brawling brutes, or.

They break up and go their separate ways. Because I feel like, like you say, they're just there now. I like their football jerseys they're wearing. But besides that, it's like, how many hill groups going to put their way? And they don't really have feuds. They just have matches and backsay segments, which in their mind, if they think is a feud, it's not a feud. It's just like, here's something for this week or for the next two weeks. And like you say, Seamus without going for the internal title. It's true. That what's next for him. I assumed the fact that him and Lashley within each other's orbit is going to turn into like a host feud between Lashley and Seamus for who's going to go after Austin Fury for the title. Because I do think Seamus may potentially win the United States title again, even though he won it. I know your faces make me because it's fine. But what do you do with Seamus if you don't win the United States title? That's the question, though, because as much as you're cheering for him, roman hasn't faced him yet, even though they alluded to Ro Rumble potentially being Seamus versus Roman.

Let's do that for SummerSlam. There we go. Answer the question, SummerSlam. Seamus is Roman cool. What's the next segment?

Sure. The next segment was one of the backstage deals where Paul Heyman talked to Sola Sakoa and then we had the OC versus Hit Row. Now, I was interested in seeing what was going to happen in this match because I was scrolling Twitter yesterday and just being like, god damn, they're going at it. They're being mean. I was waiting for a report to come out that Triple H had to call a talent meeting and be like, all right, guys, calm down. Enough of this. They were bringing up swerve and a whole deal. Very entertaining, Twitter television. But in this match, it was pretty straightforward. The OC beat hit row clean easily. They hit the magic killer on Ashante the adonis, and got the win. Not much to it. Top Dollar got in the ring afterwards and kind of knocked him out of the ring, only to be hit with a phenomenal forearm from AJ Styles. And that was it. Sure. Cool. Whatever. They did a backstage bit beforehand where AJ Styles was like, nah, I lost. Lost the pay per view. Oh, well, we move on as his birthday.

AJ Styles is 46 years old. Just say, Happy birthday, AJ. We love you, man. We've seen you grow up in the company, in the industry. Going back to what you said about Hit Row, Twitter and Mia Yim, just in case you guys don't have Twitter, that's what we're talking about. So I came in close. Halfway through what was happening, someone mentioned alluded TD. I said, who's TD? And Swerve. Swerve. Why are bringing swerve in? TD? I said, who's TD? And someone goes, oh, top dollar. So I legit typed in Top Dollar on Twitter to find out what the issue is. So Hit Row, as you guys know, Hit Row did a disk for the OC. And then Mia Yim, as you know, Mia Yim and Shot and Benjamin, they have a banter back and forth. So Mia Yim is a professional when it comes to clapping back, because she claps back a lot at her surrogate big brother Shorten Benjamin. So for her clapping back with ease. So Miriam made a comment because Bfab called Miriam Mid Chin playing her name me Chin. So she said, Paraphrasing, you and your little boys or wherever go about your business or whatever, and then Top Dollar put on a Meme, which is one of the characters from The Office.

I don't know his name. He's got no hair and he put thumbs down. And then Me and him goes, that's the same reaction the people have when you guys come out about Swerve.

Oh, snap.

Yes. So that burn that disc. No matter what you say afterwards, you can't come back from that. That's like a ko. So they brought Swerve, and of course, Top Dollar being Top Dollar, he didn't want to let that lie. He's saying, oh, you stole that tweet. Like, that guy stole everything from us. So he's alluding to the fact that Swerve stole probably aesthetic, is it the face mask he's wearing?

I think that's what he was getting at. He wears, like, the balaclava.

Yeah, the ski mask thing. And maybe it's that, but, yeah, he bringing Swerve into it because Swerve got nothing to do with it. But Miam came up with great quip to take him down. But now all of a sudden, Bfab saying, oh, Swerve used your husband being Keith Lee, like, he used us. And then me and him coast. If anyone was going to use anyone, what would they use? You, basically. As in, what would he use Hit Row to elevate themselves. So, again, Miam came in with the and that escalated on Twitter to the point where it became uncomfortable. And then I thought of the quote of a certain wrestler who said, you worked yourself into a shoot rubber, so it looked like it was a shoot. So if you don't have Twitter, that is my recap. I should have did it on Wrestle Talk News, but I didn't be great here. Thank you.

So we move on. But I thought that all was very interesting.

Never tweet bad things of me and yim should make you rethink your life.

Your life story made me like Mia Yem even more. Mia Yim came with the heat.

Yeah.

So we had Adam Pierce talking to Paul Heyman backstage and just lying to his face. And then we got the Grayson Waller effect. Now, the previous episode or the previous edition of the Grayson Waller Effect was hot garbage.

Who's in that one?

It was him and AJ.

Styles. Oh, he didn't like that one?

No. God, no. AJ. Styles comes on and he asks him like, a couple of, like, softball questions. Nothing questions, just like, oh, what would winning the world heavyweight championship mean to you? And he's like, oh, mean everything to me. I've been training real hard and blah, blah, blah. And Grayson Waller just says, like, oh, man, I can't wait. And also, I can't wait for the end of the match when the announcer says and new world heavyweight champion Seth Rollins.

He was right, though.

He was right. But AJ. Styles then stood up and it looked like something was going to happen. And then that was just the end of the segment. It was one mild ass zinger from Grayson Waller was the whole point of the segment. So they had a low bar to try and surpass here with this segment here. And I think they did that where his guest this time was Oscar, new Raw women's champion Oscar. And she comes out and she's talking exclusively in Japanese. Great.

Cool.

Yeah, very much so. And Grayson Waller was saying, like, ha, I couldn't have said it better myself except with an Australian accent and such. And it was pretty much just that for a little while. But he brings up money in the bank, which brings out EO Sky. Now, this was very interesting because I always love seeing these two on camera together because they just shout at each other in Japanese and it's entertaining on site every time is I find this very entertaining. I like this a lot. I don't like the people in the crowd giving them the what treatment, because I hate that chant. But especially I don't want to compare shows, but especially right after the excellence. That was the Kenoske Takeshta segment on Dynamite this week, where they just let the Japanese guy speak in Japanese and cut a promo and got he'll heat, and it got he'll heat here. They just they just gave him the what treatments.

Ignorant.

Yeah.

What chance is an ignorant chant? Are you dumb? Why are you saying what?

Not Steve Austin? Yeah, but anyway, this ended. It was the classic Money in the bank set up segment where all the people who are going to try and qualify come out one after another and say, no, I'm going to win money in the bank. No, I'm going to win money in the bank. So bailey came out and she was like, yeah, EO, she said that she or I is going to win money in the bank and cash in on oscar.

I like that.

Which clearly not what EO was saying. But bailey is great at what she does, and this happens. Then shots. He comes out and says, no person is better suited for money in the bank than her. She saw last year's match. You know that's not true. Lacey evans comes out next gun. You hat boo. It's gonna you hat boo hiss.

It's gonna you hat.

Can't believe it.

Is there a cobra in that hat as well?

I'm not going into a lacey evans right here. The next time they make a promo package for her, I will actively turn off the show. Regardless, she comes out. Then selena vega comes out and says, all of you are making the mistake of underestimating me just like RIA ripley did. And I always find that so funny because it's like RIA ripley beat you. I get that it was a more competitive match than she just had with natalia and whatever, but you lost. But whatever. This then led into oscar retreating up the ramp and bianca belair attacking her from behind. They had to do a pull apart brawl with security and referees and such. And this was solid enough stuff. They went to the back, and the next match was selena vega versus lacey evans. And our money in the bank qualifying match. In the middle of all of this, however, they said that this is when they hyped up baron corbin returning to NXT. I don't want to get into it. He attacked carmelo hayes. Poor carmelo hayes. And then backstage, cameron grimes says that baron corbin, next time I see him around on SmackDown, I'm going to take care of him.

And then we got our match between zelena vega and lacey evans, where during the commercial and all this backstage nonsense, lacey evans hit the women's right to take down zelena before the match.

You recapping. That shows how much of a pacing issue WWE have.

This wasn't a good week for their pacing.

To the point. I was like, is he skipping things? Wait, what? And I was like, wait, because I just watched it recently before we recorded this. I was like, that did happen. I thought it was the other way around. It makes more sense if it was after the match. But anyway karen grimes, what are they doing to you? So far, his main roster run has been okay, but he's got so much more charisma. There's more layers to him. The whole I'm a rah rah baby face. The next time he comes to matt, he really beat corbin.

Why did in second?

Why does he care what corbin is doing with his life? It will make more sense if he lost to corbin now. He's been embarrassed because he's a free agent. He can't get a hold of him. Right, but you've beaten the guy. Why do you care what he does with his spare time? They need to give Kyman Grimes much better character motivation. We've seen a wrestler, if you're a wrestling fan of watch Impact wrestling or TNA, whatever you want to call it, you know about Trevor Lee. You know how much of a great wrestler he is and how much he can be a vicious heel or if you watch NXT you can see can be a vicious or comedic heel of you. So towards the end became a whiny baby face. And it's kind of like the Dove Ziggler thing when it gave him a whiny baby face railroad when they did for the people. It's not going to work. They're going to turn against him. I don't want people to turn against him that early. I want him to be the best version of himself right now is not the best version of Cameron Grimes.

If that's your introduction to him, I'm sorry. He's much better than what you're seeing in terms of the women. If it was a couple of years ago in your Zelena versus Lacey Evans, you'd be like, Lacey is going to win this because she was golden child for Vince McMahon. A lot of times gone. There's a lot of power struggles in terms of power of who has the creative pen for this. Lacey Evans lost. She will not be in money in the bank. So I'm bringing up Lacey Evans because she was clearly was a project, a pet project for Vince McMahon or even Triple H at one point because her first feud was against Becky Lynch. You've mentioned it before. She's had many character development changes. She's had many different vignettes. The new vicious Lacey Evans. This Lacey Evans now does Cobra clutches and then now this Lacey Evans post draft, wears hats with a Cobra on it and she still can't catch a break and win. So Eva, you put Lacey in a tag team. So they need to find another female to put in a tag team. Someone that's going to understudy like in a boot camp of Lacey something because they invest time in her.

Because we are at that point where she's been on the main roster for quite a while. She's had many character changes. It'll come to the point where they might have to cut the losses soon if they cannot find a reason to have her on TV or win or anything. Zelena won continue the momentum of LWO.

I like that. Yeah. And this was a short match. Lacey Evans tried to get the Cobra clutch on. A number of points had it on, but Zelena Vega was able to fight out and hit the code red and get the win again, short match. But it led to a backstage segment immediately afterwards where Santos Escobar and the rest of the LWO are all together like, yeah, you did it, you did it. Yeah. And next week, I Santos Escobar, I'm going to qualify for money in the bank, too. I'm going to beat Mustafali. Can't you just see it? And Ray, mysterio pops his head in the middle and he's like, I can see it. Mr. And Mrs. Which makes it sound like they're married. They're not. But Mr. And Mrs. Money in the bank. Yeah. LWO I know.

He said yeah right before an La knight match. That made me laugh. But question.

Yes.

Santos and Mustafa Ali, two guys that need the victory. Right. Santos hasn't had a signature victory as a singles competitor since turning baby face. And Mustafar ali's. Mustafar Ali. There's some days where it looked like they're going to push him and there's some days when they don't.

Yeah. This is tough because now they've done it with a pair of men's qualifying matches. And it's interesting seeing what we've gotten next week because they announced a slew of money in the bank qualifying matches, one of which is like Butch versus Baron Corbin, which is curious. I don't know who's going to win that one. I've got my preference for sure. But it is interesting where they seem to be doing a lot of these qualifying matches where it really does feel like they could put all the people in the match and it would be a solid enough decision. And I guess that speaks to the state of their roster and how that's pretty good. Because I would like to see both Santos Escobar and Mustafa Ali in this ladder match. I would have liked to have seen both Montez Ford and La knight in this ladder match and we'll get to their qualifying match shortly. But it is interesting. I wonder what the final picture of the money in the bank ladder match. The final lineup is going to be.

You said it's going to be Butch versus Corbin easily. Butch is going to win for many reasons. Either Butch beats him clean or Cameron Graham's plays a part in Butch winning.

Yeah. Speak it into existence for me, brother. I would like that very much.

Bless you. Bless you. I'm going to speak into existence. I think that Butch is going to win and Corbin is going to be incredulous. Like, why did I lose? I don't understand this. But yeah, this money in bank looks healthy. There's a lot of speculation they might do a last chance battle royal, something like that for a final person to join the competitors. And there's money in the bank that's coming up because Montez Ford should be in it.

Absolutely.

I like Ricochet. Give Ricochet a chance. But I know what Ricochet does in ladder matches because I'm not saying that all rest with similar skill set. Let's not put them all of them together. Just pick one. I'm just saying that I know what Ricochet can do.

Ricochet can take cannot do it.

Maybe let Mustafa do it. It sounds bad because it sounds I'm generalizing.

Hey, you're a high flyer. Your high flyer is going to be one of you.

They can't be two of you at the same time. They can be multiple guys. But if the space is limited are obviously guys that don't often get in ladder matches. That's what I'm trying to get at.

No, I agree. It looks like it's going to be a pretty fun lineup one way or the other, but we will see as we move closer to the event. There's still a few weeks left and many qualifying matches left to go because we got our first one here for the men's money in the bank ladder match between Montez Ford and La Knight. Yeah. So there's been a lot of talk the last few weeks about La Knight and the reactions he has not, if WWE is to be believed, have been getting. Because last week, of course, he came out for his segment. And I made a real point of talking about this on the podcast last week because it was hilarious how badly they tuned down the cheers and up the booze. Like you could literally hear them go, yeah, like appalling stuff. I've hit the mic appalling stuff. And it was a big topic of discussion in the podcast and on the wrestle talk news and everything. And apparently backstage as well, because they've taken note. This was also, of course, when triple H was interrupted at the press conference for Knight of Champions, talking about whatever he was talking about and everybody could chant, La Knight.

So La Knight is getting a lot of fan support right now. And this was no different. There were signs in the crowd for La Knight. He was getting lots of chance at the start of the match. So much so that he stopped and kind of acknowledged them for a moment. And if he's doing that, that probably means he's not been told to ignore any of the cheers. You're supposed to be a heel. Damn it. I feel like we're making headway with this. The people are being heard. But this match was, again, fun. This was solid enough stuff. And it ended with both men going for their finishers. Montes Ford goes for the frog splash and he misses. And La Knight goes for the BFT and he misses as Montes Ford rolls him up the backwards, like, victory roll thing. And then La Knight rolls through that and grabs onto the middle rope in order to get the leverage and get the pin. So Montez Ford does not qualify for the money in the bank ladder match. La Knight. Yeah. Moves on to the money in the bank ladder match. Will he win? Who knows? Depends if Cody's involved.

Really? But so far, a good sign for La Knight.

Cautiously optimistic. Funny enough, when he had a feud of Bray Wyatt, that was my response. I was optimistic. The whole time I said that he's going to come out of throw a Lance millennial roses.

And I was right, sort of. He got over with the people, but he did nothing between now and that ended.

Again, that's not to do with him. Every time he's on screen, he monetizes those minutes.

I agree.

He's one of those people. You put him a crap feud, he monetizes the heck. He's great at capitalizing, that thing. It's kind of like you're going to team up with a clown and a mime. He'll find a way to make the clown and mime work in his skit. He made booge's work for that week or so as makeshift tag team. What I'm trying to get at is that La Knight, when given the opportunity, knocks out the park. I hope the old man and Triple H see what they have in La Knight because even his NXT run, he feuded Grayson Waller and lost all the matches when he was a baby face. So I'm a bit worried that Grayson Waller the guy that he cannot beat, they're going to have a similar feud again, you know what I'm saying? And he's going to lose again. I don't want him to lose because it's now and never to push La Knight. I had a late night and I'm trying to style it out, but you got for having a kitten and a baby, that's my life. Okay, so what I found interesting was the dynamic between La Knight and Montess Ford in that match.

I felt it called an audible disorder reaction that La Knight was having with a crowd. So La Knight wrestled more like a baby face in the match until the end. He kind of switched back to being a heel because Montess Ford had a more of a heel kind of snarl during the match. And then that was impressive because there's been rumors and chatter online and on forums and on websites that allegedly that Street Profits and Bianca may allegedly turn Hill down the line in the upcoming autumn or winter months.

That's fine.

So Montez Ford, because we've never seen Street Profits as a heel for me, before you break up a tag team, I'm like use up all the dynamic as Baby Face and heel. Once you've done both, then you can break them up. Street Profits been lovable baby faces. It will be great to see them as snarling heels of what they can do, especially Montez in this match. He was more aggressive. He looked at a crowded kind of like, yeah, this is the guy you're cheering for. Okay. So his demeanor wasn't like the happy go lucky Monte you usually see. You saw Montez with a bit of a chip on his shoulder and I thought that was fascinating, the fact that they altered the match cause of the crowd reaction. And I would like to see street profits as heels. And Bianca NXT Bianca, she was great as a heel.

Speaking of NXT Bianca, I believe this was a backstage segment that was done either for social media or WWE.com or whatnot, but she had a little bit more of an edge to her as well as she gets interviewed backstage about what happened on this show. And I saw a lot of people being like, oh, it looks like NXT Bianca is making a comeback here, which is what a lot of people have wanted. They've wanted a more heelish edge because of course, people were starting to boo Bianca after such a dominant baby face run. Now maybe we'll get that if any time is the time, now might be the time for me.

I was found. It was a miracle that actually made Bianca belair as a straight laced baby face work. Because what made people love Bianca was she was so arrogant. Est wasn't like I'm est because of confidence and ability. No, I'm est. I'm better than everyone. That's what got her over, because she knew she was incredible. But on the main rosters, the baby face is like she could have come across obnoxious. They had to knock off the arrogance and give her more of a humble edge. And she's been riding with it. She's been humbled by everything, which worked in the beginning to the point where people got title. Stop being a nice, happy go lucky baby face. Her having an edge, her losing the title is one of the best things that ever happened. Oh my gosh, taking the title off someone can actually add to the character WB, take notes. But yeah, so I too can't wait to see what Bianca does. Next. I assume is going to be money in the bank, it's going to be Oscar versus Bianca again, and possibly Oscar wins again. And that leads to Bianca's downward spiral into being bitter and angry and mean.

Can't wait to see it. But that does indeed wrap up our SmackDown review here on the Russell Talk podcast because all that was left on this show was Roman Reigns 1000 day Championship celebration, which we have already talked about. So we now have a few more weeks before money in the bank. And some very interesting things have happened on this show this week that will continue to build throughout the month of June until we get to the wonderful pay per view on July 1, Canada Day. Woo. So woo sat. We do not have our typical SmackDown podcast shoutouts today. Those make a return next week as we are in a new month. So that is all that we have here for us today.

That's all we have. I want to say thank you very much to everyone that watches our podcast since we've changed and we now become recorded. I know a lot of people miss the live shows, but I do appreciate everyone that watches the recorded ones and we enjoy your comments. I read every comments. I read everything I know everything. So I appreciate the nice comments and I also appreciate the negative ones. We all trying to improve and do better so we appreciate you guys, your voice are heard. So thank you so much for watching our show. I'm glad to be back angle. I'm super tired if you can tell that I'm super tired. I am super tired but I'm happy to be back alongside this lovely lovey man, one of the greatest, best voices in all of wrestling. It is a pleasure for me to do this podcast with you every single Saturday. That's the highlight of doing it leaving my house to come here and do the show with you. So thank you so much mate.

I appreciate you very much. I'm glad that you are back. I appreciate all of you for tuning into another edition of the SmackDown podcast. Before I get out of here real quick going to plug everything that we've got on Parts Funk known right now because we just had another edition of Survival series go live yesterday. Can you name every money in the bank winner? No, you can make sure to check that out over on Parts fund known right now as well as the uncut version at the $10 and above tier over on Patreon.com WrestleTalk as well as our brand new show on partsfund known no Holds Board where we played telestrations but with only wrestling prompts. It was a ton of fun. It was a really great first episode that I'm very happy with, so make sure that you check that out on Parts funknown and you can also see the next episode of that show one week's early access at the $5 tier on Patreon.com Russelltalk and the uncut version of Telestrations over on Patreon.com Russelltalk at the $10 and above tier. So make sure you check all of that out. We will be back with another episode of the Russell Talk podcast this coming Tuesday with our raw review.

Until then I have been tempest that.

Has been sat house of the Black Mask the house always wins dress next week same psy time, same Psy YouTube channel.

It's your birthday today. Happy frigging birthday to you. We will see you next week.

Jenna jam. Jim jam. Jenna. Am I Jam?