Mannie from pacoima
John and Wai, the two of you have each started your own f1 rival team. Who are each of you choosing as your 2 drivers?
Miguel from LA
Hi John and Wai,
Obviously AEW can and should do more with their women division. In my opinion, they have made improvements with the wrestlers they’ve signed and now we see women involved in multiple storylines.
AEW most always have the women wrestlers on at the 9:30 time slot. I have seen many people say this is a bad time slot. Do you guys know why is it a bad time slot?
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Hello! I wanted to ask you two on the 2-3 changes you would make to AEW’s presentation. This can be for PPVs or TV shows. For example, a change I would like to see is less segments on an episode of Dynamite so an angle can breathe.
Hey guys,
Before my son, Walter, was born we knew the sex and told our family. The only thing we kept until he was born was the name. (Took my wife some convincing)
John, did you find out the sex of your kids before they were born and tell others, or did you wait to be surprised?
Wai, have you found out yet or are you waiting to be surprised?
Roy from Rhode Island
Insomuch as you’re comfortable doing, could you discuss your relationship with your siblings?
How important have these relationships been to you?
How have changed as you’ve grown up?
In Wai’s case, how have you been able to maintain that relationship while being in different countries for so many years?
It seems like since Cody’s departure from AEW, we’re hearing more stories leaking out about strife and disagreements between Tony Khan and some talents.
I.e. Johnathan Gresham, Brian Cage, and a few other murmurs about others.
Do y’all think Cody’s backstage role could have also been, not necessarily linked to talent relations and apart from his role In AEW’s philanthropy, but as someone that helped contextualize booking choices to talent, making the creative more relatable?
If so, could it be one of those weird situations that affect the talent’s confidence in the promotion’s creative and the security they feel about their futures in AEW?
Alexander from Portland
With Vince McMahon out of WWE I’m really curious how the main roster is booked under Triple H creative, but one area I’m more curious about is the music. Vince has had a love affair with AC/DC and has constantly used music by Flo Rida, Kid Rock, and Nickelback amongst others (not to be a music snob, but music that is generally perceived as bad). Triple H, in NXT, has relied mostly on Poppy, but he’s used music by Billie Eilish and Slipknot. Do you think the music styles heard in the WWE will noticeably change with Triple H in creative control? Do you have a guess at what kind of music we might end up hearing as theme songs for Mania next year? If the main roster gets a (soft) reboot, what kind of theme songs could you see RAW and SmackDown having?
Thanks for all your work, cheers.
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Hey gents
I know it’s a very leading question and premature speculation but…….
if the wwe was to be up for sale, do you think the rock would potentially make an attempt to be part of any ownership group?
A lot of media conglomerates don’t need DJ to buy the company, but if the sale of wwe was more similar to the UFC’s sale, I could see him wanting to part of something like endeavour’s ownership structure.
From an optics level, I feel like investors would feel alleviated that his name is associated with the company, and I’m sure it’d help him have some security over his own brand as well.
thanks as always for taking the time, all the best.
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Dear John and beloved Wai,
Is it time to play the game?!
To be Limitless, revolutionary, stupendous?
Or will we have to settle for subtle alterations
And perhaps a new logo
The middle-aged booker finally inherited the Titan
And another round of wars has begun.
Will history repeat itself?
Or are we witnessing a true Revival?
Good health to everyone!
MJF seems to have dropped off the face of the earth. Weird considering he was the biggest thing a few weeks back. Without wanting to be be of those “everything’s a work” types, I really don’t buy that he can be on the outs with the company he has helped put on the map and would be mad to leave at this juncture…Is he injured or somesuch? …or is it now not as mad to think he could actually go to WWE now with HHH and Bruce (who has spoken out about being a huge fan of MJF’s) heading up TV and talent relations?… 
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Was just thinking about review a wai which you guys sadly mentioned could be on the chopping block before.
Maybe see what higher tier patreons think about this first, but instead of just giving each slot to a rotating upper tier patreon member each time, how about offering some slots to open tender on the forum and picking the suggestion you guys like the look of the most to make it less dreary for you having to sit through multi hour ppvs each time/mix things up because as you say the retro review ground is hardly untrodden these days?
You guys could specify for example “we want to cover a movie” or “an ECW from the late 90s” “a half hour episode of something non wrestling related” “an episode of a podcast” “a deep dive on the most interesting/most voted for wrestling personality” or somesuch. I’m sure the post community would have cool ideas for you guys to cherry pick from without being locked into one particular option. Might generate a bit more interaction/incentive for people to subscribe to patreon too. Winner could be offered the chance to guest on the episode as happens currently.
Just a thought as I love the show and would be gutted to see it dropped from the rotation.
Jez, currently in Riga, Latvia, originally from Gloucestershire, UK.
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Thomas from Vancouver here.
What do the two of you envision the ceiling being of AEW. The consensus is that for the foreseeable future they would not be able to rival WWE atleast from a financial perspective, but what is there real limit? Do you see them being able to pass WWE in tv ratings or live attendance? Do you see a future where AEW can rival WWE financially? If so, what would have to take place to make this a reality?
I demand to know why this podcast is not a part of the post network of shows? How did you let this one get away?!?
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Sorry, another one. Was just looking at the news about NXT UK being merged into NXT Europe or somesuch. How much of this is likely to be Brexit related? To say the least, relations have been “frosty” between the Uk and Europe under successive conservative governments.
As a British teacher who has had the experience of moving a few times within the EU since brexit, I can tell you it’s a lot more of a pain in the ass to get settled somewhere and have access to services than it once was (mainly because we’ve been making it difficult for them to do the same and it doesn’t look like the new PM we get next month will be much less belligerent). I was wondering if this was what seemed to be affecting operations at NXT UK. Bojo had been talking about our new “Australian points based immigration system” which I believe the Uk now has to fast track preferred trades which are well paid which I suspect doesn’t involve professional wrestlers.
Has Brexit made an endeavour such as NXT UK, which used to be a very accessible jumping of point for European wrestlers with free movement of people and workers, now a much more unfeasible proposition thanks to brexit and Bojo’s Tory brigade? Do we know any more about where else in Europe they may be based going forward?
Many thanks.
Just caught up with Dark side of the 90s - what a fascinating show! Have you guys had the chance to catch up on it yet? I’m not an MMA person at all but the 2 parter focussing on the UFC was really eye opening as a novice. Young Dana White blew my mind!
Imran from Huddersfield
First, congratulations on the birth of your son Wai, and welcome back!
Second, I wanted to say a huge thank you to John. I recently had the opportunity to interview a fairly prominent sports journalist for my podcast about a new book he had written. It’s not something I’ve ever done before and I quickly realised my main point of reference for such an interview was John Pollock, and his many interviews with authors promoting their books. So I found myself looking towards John and his style as a guide for the interview - and as a result I think it went pretty well!
So, a big thank you to John, and as a question connected to this - what are some tips, or things you aim for in general, when interviewing someone for a book, as opposed to other interviews.
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Hey John and Wai,
Lee from London here. Wai, congratulations to you and your wife on the birth of your son! I’ve got two young girls so welcome to the club.
Talking of being a father, I wanted to talk about Bluey. I heard John talk about this on a recent review of Raw. I couldn’t agree more John, Bluey is the greatest kids TV show of all time. It is utterly amazing - we get it on BBC and Disney+ over here. I would highly recommend it to anyone. I have three very quick Bluey related questions
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Has watching it actually made you a better Dad? I find myself wanting to do stupid games with the kids based on the show. Octopus is one of my favourites. The Dad (Bandit) is the best father of all time. THE GOAT.
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Do you have any favourite episodes? I love Dance Mode, Pass the Parcel, Camping, Unicorse and the best episode of kids TV I’ve ever seen - Sleepytime.
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Final one - have you been tempted to buy the album of songs from the 1st season/series? I’ve got it on vinyl and its brilliant.
Keep up the amazing work lads. Viva Bluey.
Hi guys, hope you are both well. Congratulations on the new addition Wai, wishing you all good health and happiness!
Question for john - after watching some of the crowd reactions and feedback from clash at the castle, and the disappointment of the crowd with drew not winning- it made me wonder, has there ever been examples of wrestlers calling an audible in the ring based on crowd reactions?
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Now that Dark Side of the Ring is taking a break, how interested are either of you on Vice’s new project with “Tales from the Territories”? From the looks of the trailers, it will be a roundtable-type of format for this show and I’m intrigued. And I was listening to Cornette’s podcast and he said he will showcase a lot of his Memphis wrestling archives on the show, which hasn’t been seen in a long time, will be featured. He also said there will be ten episodes featuring Memphis, AWA, Stampede, Championship Wrestling from Florida, Crockett Promotions, Mid-South, Portland, World Class, and Polynesian Pro Wrestling from Hawaii.
Anthony from Detroit
Good day!
The new regime in the WWE are the same people that were around when Vince was in charge. It’s not like a sports team that fires all of the coaches and brings new coaches in. What does that say about Vince’s management that he had HHH working for him with all of these great ideas that we love and he implemented a small amount of them. Do you think Vince didn’t listen or those that report to him didn’t feel that they could speak up when they disagreed with a Vince idea?
Thank you!