Opinion
10 Things I Want To See This WrestleMania Weekend
Is this your WrestleMania Weekend wish list?
WrestleMania Weekend is the craziest time of them all. What does your new favorite referee want to see from the weekend?
As all of us know, the biggest three days in wrestling are upon us: WrestleMania Weekend. Just about every notable promotion will be gathering in New York City to feature their own unique show or convention ahead of Sunday’s main event.
Unless you’re physically in New York this weekend, it’s going to be quite difficult to get eyes on every note-worthy indy wrestling show. For that reason, this list will primarily be focusing on the three big events: NXT TakeOver: New York, G1 Supercard, and WrestleMania 35.
Torch Passes
Pete Dunne has held his NXT UK Championship for about 23 months now. For the entirety of that reign fans have felt he deserves to be at the top of the main roster. He needs to drop the title in order to do that. Walter is a guy that more casual fans may be seeing for the first time. In what is sure to be a hellacious match, there is an opportunity for fans to invest in Walter, NXTUK, and the future of Pete Dunne.
Shayna Baszler has been a model heel champion for NXT but there’s going to be a void to fill if Ronda Rousey is indeed moving on. On the Raw after Mania, have Ronda introduce her and allow her to lay out whoever is Women’s Champion. As for TakeOver, Bianca Belair should win. If Belair transitions back into a full-blown heel, she could have great future feuds with Io Shirai, Candice LeRae, and Tegan Nox.
TIME BOMB
Hiromu Takahashi has been on the shelf with a neck injury since last summer and his return draws nearer with each day. I don’t know what his health is like so I don’t want him in a physical role. At G1 Supercard, EVIL and Sanada are in a winner-take-all tag team match against Villain Enterprises, The Briscoes, and the Guerillas of Destiny. If he can find a way to help LIJ pick up the win, Madison Square Garden will surely pop.
The Golden Star Wins Gold
Not only did Kota Ibushi lose his NEVER Openweight Championship too soon, but I feel that Tetsuya Naito’s Intercontinental Title reign has run its course. I’m not a fan of Naito treating his belts like they don’t mean anything and apparently neither is Ibushi. My ultimate hope is that Naito is the one that beats Jay White for the IWGP Heavyweight Championship. A logical story could be that Naito’s loss to Ibushi would teach him to cherish NJPW’s titles with more honor and wanting to prove it by finally getting his prominent title run with the top belt.
KO-Mania
As of right now, Sunday sadly wont be KO-Mania 3. The timing of Kevin Owens’ return from injury made it difficult to squeeze him into the card. If he turns up in the Andre the Giant Memorial Battle Royal, he needs to be the clear favorite. If Rey Mysterio, is unable to compete due to injury Owens should be first on the list to replace him (and win). I don’t want him added to Kofi’s match, however. That story has been told properly and should remain untouched.
Aleister Black Turns
Lately, Aleister Black and Ricochet have been working as a tag team. On the main roster that’s all they’ve appeared as so far. They’re competing for the NXT Tag Team Championships on Friday and the Smackdown Live Tag Team Championships on Sunday. I don’t expect them to win either match. After the second loss on Sunday, Black will be fed up. These are two guys that can compete as singles stars at the top of any card. They’re not tag team wrestlers. The only reason they started teaming with each other is because they were the two most popular NXT guys left without a storyline. Splitting them up will propel them into their first real story on the main roster. We would also get our first look at a heel Aleister Black.
Demon’s Debut Done Right
Fans of NXT have been waiting to see Finn’s Mania entrance as The Demon since his debut in 2014. We’re finally getting it on Sunday. Every time we saw it at an NXT TakeOver, the entrance was more unique than the last. We’ve seen superstars like Shawn Michaels and Alexa Bliss descend from pedestals they stood on. Imagine that concept except Finn is perched like a gargoyle and has demon wings that are capable of flapping. To top it off, he’s wearing a medieval crown to pay homage to his Prince Devitt and Demon King personas.
Another Game of Thrones Tribute
Two Manias ago, Seth Rollins was billed as “The Kingslayer”. Last year he wore neon blue eyes to the ring. Both of these are Game of Thrones references. With the final season premiere of GoT exactly a week after WrestleMania 35, it seems more appropriate than ever. Seth has promised to be the “Beastslayer” this time around so I wouldn’t mind something simple with a shield and sword.
Elias Steals The Show
For weeks Elias has been promoting his big performance at MetLife Stadium. Hopefully this doesn’t mean his typical routine of sitting on a stool in the middle of the ring. I want to see a performance that will make the Super Bowl Halftime Show look like an open mic night. If it turns into an interruption from John Cena, Lacey Evans, or whoever, so be it. Just make it so overly ostentatious that it will give someone a reason to crash it.
The Miz Takes Flight
If you’ve been watching Smackdown, you know that the Miz/Shane McMahon storyline is rooted in the approval of Miz’s father. But remember, the whole reason Miz’s dad was a fan of Shane was because Shane performed dangerous feats from high places. Mr. Miz loves cruiserweights, and high flying moves, etc. Right before Shane turned heel at Fastlane, The Miz had just cost them the match by uncharacteristically attempting a frog splash. Their match Sunday is Falls Count Anywhere. Have Miz win with a leg drop off a ladder onto a table.
The Main Event Gets 30 Minutes
The main event should be the longest match of the night. That wasn’t nearly the case last year (and for good reason). Last year’s main event was always destined to fail but it’s quite the opposite this time around. We’ve never seen women headline WrestleMania so the fans are going to let them shine. Each woman involved has excelled when asked to deliver in a high profile match. Well there’s nothing more high profile than this. Yes, it’s the first ever women’s main event but it’s also only the second women’s main card match out of twelve total. They deserve all the time in the world. If the plan is to put Charlotte over instead of Becky Lynch, at least the fans can go home knowing they witnessed a classic.
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Opinion
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Opinion
AJ’s Top 3 Favorite SummerSlams
AJ is back with his annual opinion article, and this time the SummerSlam buzz got him wondering about his personal Top 3.
It’s been a while since I have done any form of writing and SummerSlam is this Saturday. Of all the SummerSlams I’ve seen over the years; which ones are my favorites? While it’s not a revolutionary idea, I figured everyone loves to debate favorites of well, anything. Don’t worry though because this isn’t just going to be pure recency bias. I’ve watched the majority of them so with the ones I put on the list, it hit me more in some way shape or form whether it was story, a really good match or it just felt like a solid event.
At least this proves WWE is trending in a good direction for me, when it gets the ol’ brain juices flowing just because a show is around the corner!
#3: 2022 (Ol’ Brock Lesnar Has A Farm)
Starting off the show, we get Bianca looking for a rematch against Becky from last years SummerSlam and it was better than the 21 second affair that everyone claims was a squash. This time Bianca holds her own and beats the Man in a fairly decent match, good way to get the event started. Next up is the heat seeking missile, Logan Paul against the former heat seeking missile because, well he wasn’t cut out for it and wasn’t a guy in everyone’s eyes, The Miz. After they had their blow off at Mania with Logan coming out on top which… isn’t awful, I just don’t like Logan Paul because he has that dude bro aura and swagger to make him more hateable than any other person on the card. Which I suppose is his gimmick…so…kudos?
First Championship match is for the US Championship and it’s as expected that in Theory, he should never beat someone to the caliber of Bobby Lashley which is no surprise. Dominik and Rey still back when Dom wanted the good fight against the Judgement Day before joining them later. The former Colts players, which they hammered it dahn in this match up showed that the canal swimming, trash talkin’, podcastin’, current RAW Color Commentatin’ goofball we all love, Pat McAfee came out on top again Bum Ass Corbin.
Usos putting the Street Profits on lockdown in the penitentiary since I believe this was peak Bloodline with the belt collecting and running all of WWE. Liv beat Ronda Rousey which isn’t astonishing but it’s not something people had on their bingo cards for anything with WWE so it was a nice little shock factor. The most memorable part of the night is obviously the Main Event, Lesnar brings the tractor, Roman catching the Microphone and Brock stands on top of the vehicle. Damn good match that showed off what they do in the ring since Roman caught his stride as the main bad guy and Brock… liked people after all of this? That is still a weird statement in my head. Brock being a good guy people person. If Liv wasn’t on bingo cards for wrestling, that is not on bingo cards in any aspect of life really.
That is more of the event that had solid matches and story going for it. No weird double count out, multiple people involved, 5 tag matches on the card. Things made sense and weren’t convoluted, had shocking moments that were great to see like Liv actually getting a title defense and there were the results we all expected at the time like Theory losing in 4 minutes to Bobby Lashley.
#2: 2009 (Are You Ready for The Return?)
This event wasn’t that strong. It was strong with the star power involved in 2009 with guys like Rey Mysterio as Intercontinental Champion, Orton and Cena for the WWE Championship as it was becoming as stale as month old chips and CM Punk was facing Jeff Hardy before he ultimately returned to TNA at the beginning of 2010 after this PPV. For me, it’s not so much of the show itself, it was more of the memories because the Balai as our friends Chris Platt and Rey Cash like to call my brother and I, we were just coming back into wrestling and we were TNA Fans. We didn’t watch WWE that much really, it was just what came on after another channel had old ROH shows before they moved to three hours and swallowed the 8pm Eastern Slot. No, the reason why this has so many memories for me is three main reasons. First, Orton and Cena. They have had their rivalry since the beginning it seems, being each others foils like Hogan and Piper before them and there had to be a stipulation where if Randy was Counted Out or DQ’d, he’d lose the championship regardless. This was prime Viper Randy and the obvious joke we had of Super Cena where he very rarely lost, unless it was SummerSlam surprisingly enough.
Number two reason was CM Punk and Jeff Hardy. Hardys known for the Ladder and TLC matches in the past and this being the penultimate match for this feud and it was a banger of a match. If you didn’t know Punk before, it was a great introduction to his wrestling. I used to like Punk a lot because of this match because he could talk, wrestle… and not insanely personal with things in wrestling. In all seriousness, this was a great match. Ultimate risks, high reward for Punk grabbing the World Heavyweight Championship and he was given his next feud because of the final boss of SmackDown at that time. Thanks, Teddy Long.
The main and final reason though why this match gave me the memories flowing back is more of the fact that one of my closest and longest termed friends of 23 years, also loves wrestling. Back when we were younger, he’d do MoCap videos on YouTube with his figures. We’d have friends come over for parties at his house and we’d do the one thing WWE always told us not to do and that was try it at home. He was always stronger than me, I was always more charismatic. He had the power aspect and did things with brute force, I could talk my way out of trouble with parents if we did something wrong. There was always one thing that our respective mother’s always called us though… it’s on the tip of my tongue… oh right, ‘Degenerates’.
As soon as we were called that, we kind of parodied the DX line. I was limber enough to do the HBK pose and do a Superkick before it became the new DDT and he would just Spinebuster people and knew how to do the water spit. So what do you think was the main reason we even ordered this PPV for his 13th Birthday? I think the two guys we were pretending to be were set to return on a tank and toss out some glow sticks. The return of DX, Shawn Michaels coming back after Mania with Triple H to deal with the Legacy problem was an amazing return for them and made everything so much fun.
So we have the solid card and this one has a personal story… what’s my number one SummerSlam? Is it personal? Well yes but not going into that. Is it a good card? To me, it was a phenomenal card! Is it memorable? Seeing how wrestling fans still mention at least three matches to this day.
#1: 2005 (Octopus in the Washer, Lover’s Quarrel and Where the F%#$ is Vickie?)
Quite possibly some of the best matches I’ve seen and one that was just the most hilarious moments of overselling in wrestling history, I know why I love this SummerSlam but it’s also a really good card at the same time. Redacted beats Orlando Jordan in 25 seconds for the US Title and they made jokes about it like, he can make a coffee faster than he beat Orlando and stuff like that, it’s pretty funny. Angle getting sick of Eugene’s antics for his Gold Medal was also a great bit they had play up, the Year long feud of Randy Orton and Undertaker was still going on where Orton comes out on top this time around to get the win back from Mania, Jericho returning for the match with Cena in a whole promotional thing for each other’s groups, Fozzy for Jericho and the Chain Gang doing Bad, Bad Man for Cena leading up to a match for the WWE Championship. JBL won a 20 man battle royal on SmackDown to win the Championship…… Opportunity to face the newest member of SmackDown, Batista but the three main matches that a lot of people talk about to this day; Edge vs Matt Hardy, Rey vs Eddie for Dominik and Hogan vs HBK in the Main Event.
I have reasons to enjoy the Hardy/Edge match but it looked like a real fight, it really made us believe that Matt Hardy was going to kill Edge because real names were dropped during this tirade from Hardy. It wasn’t Edge and Lita, it was Adam and Amy. Matt was so dead set on beating the hell out of Edge that they made a situation into gold and it was a great moment for this match to happen, I believe it was also an Unsanctioned Match too which added the intensity until matt got concussed and knocked senseless that it looked like he couldn’t fight for anything but the build up was what made it seem like a marque match. It made it feel real, it made it feel awesome and it made it feel personal.
Eddie kept tormenting Rey Mysterio about Dominik not being Rey’s but Eddie’s for the summer. That’s all you heard from Eddie being the weasel he was is hanging out with Dominik, making the world believe it’s his son and what not (Let’s not do a fast forward to today where he has the mullet, mustache and everything like Eddie) but they settle this in a Ladder Match where the top of it is a document for the custody of Dominik and my god, this match is better than it should have been. I expect nothing else from Eddie because the man hated having a bad match, Dom got involved and stopped Eddie, Vickie was late and stopped Eddie. The whole match was good it was just very weird with the premise but was a great match. I wonder if Rey regrets his decision to win the match now…
Octopus in a Washing Machine… those five words have resonated with Shawn Michaels’ performance in this match, forever. It was supposed to be an amazing match up between Hogan and Michaels, Icon vs Icon it said and suddenly Hogan’s back gives out, can’t do a trilogy of matches so we can only do the one and then pull out of everything after. This match was set up to be a classic and instead turned into the most unbelievable sell fest ever. A Hogan big boot caused Shawn to tumble 3 or 4 times, getting crotched on the ropes had HBK bouncing higher than he should have, being tossed out of the ring made it look like Shawn never broke his back in 1998 from how much he flopped and flipped around like crazy. It’s bad… or maybe even good that a lot of current wrestlers watched this match that went, “I can sell like that, I want to be a wrestler” and did. So good or bad, I don’t know but for some reason this PPV has always had a place in my heart for how memorable it was.
Those are my top three SummerSlams so far but who knows, 2024 has potential to maybe bump something or at least get me to consider a shift. Should be fun to see how the show plays out! What are some of your favorite SummerSlams?
About Chairshot Radio Network
Launched in 2017, the Chairshot Radio Network presents you with the best in sports, entertainment, and sports entertainment. Wrestling and wrestling crossover podcasts + the most interesting content + the most engaging hosts = the most entertaining podcasts you’ll find!
MONDAY - Bandwagon Nerds (entertainment & popular culture)
TUESDAY - Musical Chairs (music) / Hockey Talk (NHL)
WEDNESDAY - The Greg DeMarco Show (wrestling)
THURSDAY - Keeping the news ridiculous... The Oddity / Chairshot NFL (NFL)
FRIDAY - DWI Podcast (Drunk Wrestling Intellect)
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CHAIRSHOT RADIO NETWORK PODCAST SPECIALS
Attitude Of Aggression Podcast & The Big Five Project (chronologically exploring WWE's PPV/PLE history)
TheChairshot.com PRESENTS...IMMEDIATE POST WWE PLE REACTIONS w/ DJ(Mindless), Tunney(DWI) & Friends
Patrick O'Dowd's 5X5
Classic POD is WAR
Chairshot Radio Network Your home for the hardest hitting podcasts... Sports, Entertainment and Sports Entertainment!
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Let us know what you think on social media @ChairshotMedia and always remember to use the hashtag #UseYourHead!
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