ASK-A-WAI: Questions Thread

Anthony from Melbourne

Two unrelated questions:

  1. John your idea to have the draft after Survivor Series has infuriated me even more than usual with the WWE product. It is a genius idea that just makes way too much sense for them to do. It would allow them to tease inter-promotional programmes and pay them off by being able to put the wrestlers on the same show, while also having a few self implosions that lead to programmes as well. Meanwhile, both brands wrestlers have incentive to fight for first-round draft picks.

This is even further compounded by the fact the draft is just before Survivor Series because wrestlers have barley been on their respective shows, so their loyalty to their brand or even the spectacle of first time matchups is diminished.

  1. I know the 24/7 championship is a complete joke but would it be so hard to make it a 2 count championship in lieu of 3?

It only makes it harder to suspend my disbelief when you have wrestlers rolled up for a 3 count constantly and then they have an actual in-ring match for the 24-7 title and all of a sudden the wrestlers can take wrestling moves and kick-out.

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Question: Trump in the WWE for a full 2021 as a manager: Who is the first program you want him pair with and who is he paired with? Does Vince allow him to be a heel or is he just playing his delusional babyface role?

Roy from Rhode Island

Hi John & Wai,

I really enjoyed Johnā€™s recent interview on Phil Chertokā€™s Fishbulb podcast, and felt it provided great historical context on his career, as well as interesting insight into the move youā€™ve both made to being entirely listener supported. My question is; what are the challenges and rewards of working so closely with someone you are also good friends with? Your friendship and rapport with each other is obvious when listening to your shows, but how do you balance your friendship with your professional relationship? Not looking for any dirty laundry, just curious how you guys have managed to maintain both sides for so many years so well.

To ensure this question ends on the most positive note possible: What aspect of their contributions to Post do you admire about the other most?

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Hey guys, Stu from Liverpool here, two quick questions:

  1. Do you know if theyā€™re looking to plan the Rumble matches any differently with the ongoing Covid situation? Iā€™m guessing, most likely, you wonā€™t see as many build-ups of 8+ people in the ring at once, but I could be wrong.

  2. Say the WWE listened to guys like us and settled on one overall heavyweight champion, one womenā€™s champion, one set of tag team champions, and a secondary title per main roster brand, how would you like to see them implement this?

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Anthony from Detroit

I enjoy all of your shows and the presenters you have. I especially enjoy shows when Nate Milton is on. Heā€™s full of knowledge and he always makes me laugh. Iā€™m interested to learn how guys met Nate.

Keep up the great work!!!

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Carl from Tockwith, UK

Listening to some old JR podcasts ā€œRoss Reportsā€ I heard a number of interviews with John with JR speaking very highly of him, mentioning that John would help JR with New Japan reporting etc.

I am interested how Johnā€™s relationship with JR started and would you be considered ā€œfriendsā€ or ā€œprofessionalā€?ā€¦.it was a cool link that I never realised existed!

Also do you both have other close ā€œfriendsā€ that us ā€œuneducated marksā€ would know? (or that you are prepared to divulge!)

All the best,

Carl

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Picture a COVID free world and an openness for AEW & NJPW to co-promote an event.

How possible would it be for an AEW NJPW supercard to draw 50000+ in Chicago, NYC, London or Toronto with an Okada or Ibushi vs Omega main event?

With the recent induction of Kenny Omega in the Wrestling Observer Hall of Fame, it got me thinking about an other inductee that was relatively young with years still ahead of him in Shinsuke Nakamura, who was part of the 2015 class.

Two questions 1) did John vote for him in 2015 and 2) given his lacklustre WWE run would John and Wai still consider Nakamura Hall of Fame worthy?

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Alexander from Portland

Which Kevin Nash match do you think best showed off his in-ring abilities? I got into wrestling in the 2000s and most of the matches Iā€™ve seen from Nash took place in TNA, where the fondest memory I have is an X-Division match where Nash pulled off one of the smoothest arm-drags Iā€™ve seen and the crowd popped big. Weā€™ve seen guys his size have great matches, but Nash isnā€™t known for that. Do you attribute that to his size or physical limitations, laziness, bad booking, or something different? Thanks!

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Question for John: Do you still listen to Last Stop Penn Station? Iā€™ve been listening since you mentioned it way back in itā€™s infancy, and itā€™s quickly become one of my fav. podcasts.

Ross from Stamford:

One area I think AEW is truly lacking in is theme music. A few guys like Cody and obviously Jericho have recognizable themes, but for the most part I find their songs to be super generic and boring, which does take away from the presentation. So my question is, if Jim Johnston or CFO$ is available, do you think it would be worth it for AEW to take a shot and bring them in?

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Phil from West Virginia

Thanks for really going into it last month with my ā€œproudest moment in your careersā€ question. Great to hear your responses.

Back to it hereā€¦what would be on your guysā€™ short lists for ā€œmatch of the yearā€? Also, is there a match or program that flew under the radar or didnt get the love you thought it may? Proud patron.

Brandon from Oshawa

What do you guys think is the end game for the Aaliyah & Murphy storyline? I originally was expecting that Murphy was actually fooling Aaliyah and that they would have a wedding and heā€™d be revealed to still be with Rollins. It looks like Rollins will be out now, but I still see a wedding coming. Do you guys think that is where this is headed? Does Murphy turn heel again and reveal he was cheating with someone else? Is it Aaliyah that cheats and turns heel?

Jesse Ć  MTL

What do you know about the history of Lucha Libre? To me, it looks like a case of convergent evolution, where two things with different origins evolve to resemble each other. I have a hard time imagining how Mexican wrestling evolved from the same mĆ©lange of strongman competitions, carnival sideshows, and catch-as-catch-can as American (and therefore Japanese) and European wrestling did. But then, itā€™s hard to imagine how George Hackenschmidt vs Frank Gotch evolved into Dexter Lumis vs Cameron Grimes in a Haunted House of Terror Match.
Do you know what influences caused Lucha Libre to diverge from its American counterpart?

Take Care

P.S. Iā€™ve finished reading six books since Sectober. Thanks for the inspiration, John.

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Hello my guys been a minute since we spoke. I just wanna tell you that I really appreciate you guys. You mean the world to me. If John never read that email I sent you two years ago and recognized who I was from the Sherdog radio/Jordan Breen shoe days I wouldnā€™t be here. I would of hung it up and just kept slinging packages for ups. Now Iā€™m just a guy with a dream a Christmas show dream but thatā€™s neither here or there anywhoo this is rewind a Wai I mean ask a Wai so here I go

Meanderings

I loved the Bruce lord appearances on the network and I was curious if he was a pro wrestler what would his finisher be called

The final sacrament

The Lordā€™s Prayer also is it just me or does Bruceā€™s avatar on twitter remind you of Garth brooks alter ego chris gains

-if Pac was a Republican would he be a Super Pac

-I was talking to Jordan Breen and he saw the Jericho pic of him flexing in the mirror. He said his chest looked like a face of a lovable but sad claymation monster. Something out of Wallace and Grommit. We laughed

John enjoy your time away be well your appreciated respected and feared. I hope your ok man I really do in these tough times strange things happen and whatever your going through because of your sabbatical know this we are with you for you and are you. We are Pollack strong. I love you guys no bullshit talk to you later

Brandon Frm NJ

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Hi guys. John please enjoy your well deserved time off. Everyone that listens will miss you, but the slate of guests lined up is excellent.

My question is in regards to the current state of wrestling journalism. What changes have you guys observed to your industry through your careers? Do you think wrestling journalism is seen as enthusiast press or as journalism with a voice outside of the industry?

When I look at issues like WWE in Saudi Arabia and independent contracting, it doesnā€™t seem like WWE even feels the need to comment until it the story receives mainstream press. Is there more you think the wrestling specific outlets can do to shed the ā€œdirt sheetā€ label?

Hey guys! Long time patron first-time Ask-A-Wai-er.

A friend and I are looking to start a podcast reviewing some of our favourite movies, and without asking you to give away too many of your own ā€˜trade secretsā€™ Iā€™m wondering if you would be willing to share a bit about your process for doing the Marvel and now Rocky movie reviews? What kind of research you do in advance, how you split up the work, anything that you learned along the way that could be helpful for rookies like us just starting out?

Thanks fellas!

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With the timing of the release of Avengers Endgame a year ago there was an initiative (I wanted to write idea instead of initiative but that would be too much) by some movie You Tubers called One Marvelous Scene. Basically they wrote 10 minute video essays about their favourite scene in the MCU.

To me Iā€™d agree that mine is probably the after party in Age of Ultron. But Lokiā€™s chilling speech in Germany with the old man standing up to him with an equally chilling reply in the original Avengers is very underrated.

The question for both of you is, what is your One Marvelous scene?

Wish I got this in a few days ago but with your review of TNA on January 4, 2010 you speculated a lot about what could have been if TNA went in the youthful direction; I have heard Paul Haman almost joined them and wanted to do just this. Apparently he wanted to get rid of all old talent except for one legend and build the company around Bryan Danielson. What do you know about this and do you think it could have worked?

On Jake Hagers recent interview on Talk is Jericho makes a quick remark that Cena did not want to drop the title to him, so Jericho did instead for his MITB cash-in. I am unsure if he said this as a joke or if it was serious. I always presumed the ā€œSuperman Cenaā€ era was Vinces booking?

Are there examples of Cena not wanting to sell or job for certain people? Like when he single-handily took out the entire Nexus comes to mind as some booking that did not make sense.

Carl from Tockwith, UK

I am just listening to a podcast regarding a Raw in 2000 when Mae Young was power bombed through a table, aged 77! Appreciating that neither of you have probably been put through a tableā€¦but how much do you think it would ā€œhurtā€, e.g. how gimmicked could they make a table to make it safe or so that it would not hurt?

All the best,

Carl