*By Request*
“I was recently scrolling through your columns from 2023 and looking for the one you wrote about Kevin Nash’s comments on LA Knight, and I came across your column about the angriest you’ve ever been at pro wrestling, as well as your column about some ‘real emotion’ moments in history. Do you think you could write something about other emotions you’ve felt as a fan? Instead of angriest, it could be happiest, saddest, or other feelings. Thanks, man. Been reading your stuff since you were writing for WhatCulture.”
I’ve been writing pro wrestling columns since 2007, with multiple site stops along the way, so it’s always interesting to see when folks started their journeys with me. I have people that remember the first columns I ever wrote, and I continue to get messages from people who are just now discovering my work. No matter how many of my columns you’ve experienced, just know that I appreciate your time more than you could ever understand.
With that out of the way, let’s get to the request.
The column mentioned in the request was something I wrote in the aftermath of SummerSlam last year. I was angry about Jimmy Uso’s heel turn on his brother at the end of the show’s main event, but the angriest I had ever been as a wrestling fan was following a different SummerSlam… 2013, to be exact. Daniel Bryan and the “Yes Movement” gave us a maddening time as wrestling fans. Bryan was someone we loved so much, and we wanted nothing but the best for him, but Vince McMahon placed every possible roadblock in front of that happening.
Seeing DB defeat John Cena to become the WWE Champion at SummerSlam 2013 was exhilarating, but then watching Triple H and Randy Orton immediately take that title away from him was equally as rage-inducing.
The funny thing is… if you were to ask me to write that column today, I would go ahead and replace the end of SummerSlam 2013 with the end of SummerSlam 2023. Yes, I was angry in 2013, but when all was said and done, Daniel Bryan had his moment, reaching the top of the wrestling world at WrestleMania 30. The Usos, on the other hand, haven’t been the same since SummerSlam 2023.
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We’re not here to talk about that again, though.
Instead of looking at the angriest I’ve ever been as a wrestling fan, I’m going to be looking at other emotions and the moments where I experienced those emotions the most through my years of following the sport.
Simple enough. Let’s rock, but let’s do so in no particular order, shall we?
Sad: This one is easy. Eddie Guerrero’s death still hurts my heart, nearly 19 years (!!!) after it happened. I cried when I heard about his passing, and then cried a bunch more during his Raw and Smackdown tribute episodes. I’ve told the story in my columns before, but of all the celebrities I’ve ever met in my life, nobody was more humble and genuinely seemed to appreciate their fans more than Eddie. Losing one of my all-time favorite wrestlers was sad enough, but seeing him work so hard to turn his life around and fight his demons, only for his life to end in a Minneapolis, Minnesota hotel room at the age of 38 made it all the more upsetting. In a lot of ways, I’m still not fully over this one.
Annoyed: This is another one for me. We’ve seen many heels doing some sort of commentary on wrestling television through the years. They’re usually color commentators, but every so often, you’ll see a heel play-by-play guy play the heel role. From early-2010 until September 2012, Michael Cole was a heel play-by-play guy in WWE, and holy shit, it made watching (well, listening to, actually) the product almost impossible.
A heel character is a great part of the pro wrestling spectacle. If they do their job right, you’re supposed to hate their guts and want to see them get their ass kicked. Even when a heel is annoying as all hell, their job is still very important. The difference between heel Michael Cole and heel Wrestler #3901774 is that heel Wrestler #3901774 shows up, does their thing, and leaves. Maybe you’ll get another segment or two in one episode of a show involving heel Wrestler #3901774, but that’s it. Heel Michael Cole was overly obnoxious for an entire episode… segment after segment, match after match, hour after hour, week after week, month after month.
He’s on commentary, literally yelling over wrestler promos, constantly arguing with anyone sitting at the table with him, and on and on and on. That goes well beyond “man, I hope this heel gets their comeuppance at some point.”
On a semi-related note, Michael Cole’s renaissance over the last year or two really shows how fucking worthless Vince McMahon was at anything he did. When Vince’s stupid ass is screaming into the ears of his commentators, forcing them to regurgitate the same lame catchphrases over and over, shoehorning things that don’t belong, they often sound terrible. Without Vince, Cole sounds a lot more natural, and seems to be having the time of his life every week. Fuck Vince McMahon.
Disgusted: It was January 14th, 2001. The Conseco Fieldhouse in Indianapolis, Indiana was hosting a night of WCW pay-per-view action. In the night’s main event, Scott Steiner defended the WCW World Title in a Four Corners Match against Sid Vicious, Jeff Jarrett, and a mystery opponent that ended up being Road Warrior Animal.
Please don’t ask me any questions about Road Warrior Animal being the opponent, why he didn’t come out until the end of the match, and why he wasn’t even involved in the finish, making the entire thing completely pointless. The match featured no disqualifications, but they still needed to add a fourth man in the match so that he could help Steiner retain? This is 2001 WCW we’re talking about, so nothing made sense.
The reason I’m including this here is because of what happened to Sid during the match. If, for whatever reason, you don’t know what I’m talking about, Sid suffered one of the most gruesome injuries the sport has ever seen. He jumps off of the second turnbuckle, because he was absolutely known as one of the best aerial artists the sport has ever seen, but would proceed to break his left leg in half upon landing. It was a compound fracture, with his tibia and/or fibula breaking through the skin and causing him to stay flat on his back on the mat while his leg pointed in a direction it wasn’t supposed to be capable of doing.
I’ve seen a bunch of nasty shit in deathmatches and things of that nature, but I was prepared for things, you know? You’re not watching a deathmatch with the expectation of chain wrestling. Sid’s injury was something I was not prepared for, and I yelled out no less than ten expletives when I watched the pay-per-view live.
Proud: This one might not be a big thing to many of you, but it’s my column, and it means something to me. The proudest I can recall being is hearing that Uhaa Nation (now known as Apollo Crews) had signed a WWE contract.
If you’ve been reading my work for a long time, you probably remember when I wrote about Uhaa Nation all the way back when he was a member of the Dragon Gate roster and was creating quite the buzz for himself with his elite combination of size, speed, strength, and athletic ability.
He hit me up and was really appreciative of the column and the praise I gave him. We built up a bit of a friendship, and I was able to see him perform at a few independent shows. In the lead up to WrestleMania 31, there was a rumor floating around that he had signed with WWE. I knew I was going to be seeing him at another independent show, so I went up to him after the show and asked him flat out if the rumors were true. He basically had to keep it quiet, but he said that he would be moving to Orlando and reporting to the Performance Center immediately after WrestleMania. I was one of the first people outside of his family and those in the business to congratulate him.
Nine-plus years later, he’s still with the company, and he’s back on television on a regular basis again. He has one United States Title reign and one Intercontinental Title reign in the bag. The man even fell in love, got married, and has two beautiful children. He is one of the coolest, down-to-earth cats you’ll ever meet, and yes, I’m very proud of him and all he has accomplished.
Excited: Another simple one. Attending WrestleMania 24. It was the first major show I’ve seen live and in person, and fulfilled a longtime dream of mine, checking something off of my wrestling fan bucket list.
I used to tell people that every wrestling should do everything they can to attend at least one WrestleMania in their life. The spectacle is incredible on television, but it’s exponentially bigger when you’re there to experience it for yourself.
However, with WWE doing more and more huge stadium shows, and with AEW doing All In(nit) in back-to-back years, WrestleMania isn’t the only game in town anymore, so to speak. Whether it be WrestleMania, SummerSlam, All In(nit), Royal Rumble, or whatever, these shows are something everyone should witness in person at least once. If you can swing it financially, it’s worth the money, as well as worth the time.
I wanted to continue on with more emotions, but due to some unforeseen time constraints, I’ll have to wrap things up here. Like I do every week, I’m going to turn things over to you now. In your years of wrestling fandom, what moments would you say made you feel the deepest connection to the six emotions I’ve listed (angry, sad, annoyed, disgusted, proud, and excited)? You can give me an example for all six, or just pick and choose which ones you want. As always, feel free to hit me up in the comments section below, or on Twitter (@HustleTheSavage), and let me know what’s on your mind.
Now, let’s get to my Weekly Power Rankings, followed by closing things out with the list of songs I was listening to as I put this very column together.
Weekly Power Rankings
Athena vs Queen Aminata: Tony Khan should be arrested for war crimes because of what he’s doing to Athena. She is about to hit the 600-day mark as the RoH Women’s Champion, and is within striking distance of Samoa Joe’s 645-day reign as the RoH World Champion for the longest in company history, but most fans don’t know anything about it. Athena is doing all of this work on the Honor Club streaming app behind a paywall, and has barely made any appearances on AEW programming. It’s hard to truly present something as an all-time great if most fans haven’t seen it, so the tremendous work Athena has put in won’t be recognized anywhere near as much as it could, and should, be.
The Rascalz vs Je’Von Evans, Axiom & Nathan Frazer: If NXT had a trios division, we’d be looking at a Death Triangle vs The Elite situation here, with a lengthy feud over the Trios Championships. As a one-off (maybe), though, this was a great showcase of six fantastic, exciting, super athletic in-ring performers. Non-stop action from start to finish.
Mark Briscoe vs Roderick Strong: Plenty of physicality, plenty of blood (from one participant, at least), and a lot of drama over a potential title change. It was a pretty no-nonsense affair, but that’s not a complaint from me whatsoever.
Ilja Dragunov vs Bron Breakker: Time and time again, these two prove to have an insane amount of in-ring chemistry together. Dragunov is set to turn 31 in October, while Bron will turn 27 two weeks later, so we could see these guys feuding for years to come. Works for me.
Wheeler Yuta vs Lee Moriarty: Moriarty is one of the more underrated and underutilized talents in the business today, so I’m thrilled to see him actually receiving a push, even if it’s only in Ring Of Honor. He beat the best RoH Pure Champion (based on title reigns and days as champion) in company history, so we’ll see where things go from here.
Trick Williams vs Cedric Alexander: If Moriarty is in the running for the most underrated and underutilized wrestlers in the business, then Cedric Alexander damn sure is, as well. It seems like years since we’ve seen him unleashed like this, and I am very happy to see it happen for him. Now, we’ll just have to see if his good work can translate into any wins. Cedric hasn’t won a match on television since he and Shelton Benjamin defeated Chad Gable and Otis on the February 6th, 2023 episode of Raw.
Sami Zayn & Jey Uso vs Finn Balor & JD McDonagh: Nothing groundbreaking, but an exciting, crowd pleasing match that sets things up for a rematch involving the World Tag Team Titles at some point down the road. Sometimes, that’s all it takes for me.
Blood & Guts: Obviously, this is the type of match that you either love or hate, depending on the type of wrestling that you’re a fan of. I enjoyed it. It wasn’t my favorite violent spectacle that AEW has ever put on, but I enjoyed it nonetheless. I’m not going to rant about it too much here, but I will say the unprotected chair shot stuff is incredibly stupid, even with a “gimmicked” chair, but it’s Jack Perry, so it doesn’t really matter.
Smackdown Tag Team Gauntlet: Yes, it was pretty obvious The Bloodline would win. No, that isn’t always a bad thing. Everything made sense here, and it helped to set up multiple different matches in the future.
Komander vs The Beast Mortos: Mortos is too unique and too talented to barely get used. This was a great way to get him back out there, and he looked like an unstoppable monster in doing so. Unfortunately, because Tony Khan is Tony Khan, his momentum disappeared almost immediately. More on that in a bit.
Britt Baker vs Hikaru Shida: We’ve seen these two face each other in AEW a dozen times, going all the way back to the eighth episode of Dynamite, and it’s almost always a quality match, with this being no different. What will get remembered here is another woman’s involvement in the match, though…
Kamille: She has reportedly been signed to an AEW contract since February, but only made her official debut with the company this week. Her initial role looks like she’s going to be a “heater” type for Mercedes Moné in the TBS Champion’s feud with Britt Baker. Kamille looks like a million bucks. Her and Mercedes have the numbers advantage on ol’ Doc Smiley now. Britt needs some backup. Is there a big, badass woman that could come to her aid and even the odds? Ideally, it would be a big, badass woman that has some history being Britt’s friend and partner. You know what would be even better? If that big, badass woman that has history being Britt’s friend was a former AEW Women’s Champion and was itching to return to the ring because she has missed well over a year with an injury. I’m just saying.
Matt Taven & Mike Bennett vs Kyle O’Reilly & Tomohiro Ishii: Taven and Bennett don’t get anywhere near the amount of credit they deserve for the work they’ve done as a tag team. It’s most likely due to the majority of their work being in Ring Of Honor instead of somewhere with more eyeballs on the product. They work so well together, and they’ve been successful everywhere they’ve gone. I want to make sure they get the flowers they deserve while they’re still around to enjoy them.
Pac vs Lio Rush: Time and time again, Pac looks like someone just on the verge of being pushed as a major player in AEW, and then something will happen to wipe it all away. Maybe it’s an injury, or maybe it’s ineptitude in the writing and creative side of things, but it’s always something. Is it about to start up again? It might be.
Dustin Rhodes, Marshall Von Erich & Ross Von Erich: Congratulations to the brand new RoH Six-Man Tag Team Champions. Unless I’m missing some sort of independent success, I believe this is the first time Dustin has been a champion since he and his brother dropped the WWE Tag Team Titles to The Miz and Damien Sandow at Survivor Series 2014. He’s still wrestling at a high level, even at the age of 55, so this was pretty cool to see.
The Sphere: I’ve already done a column about a potential wrestling show taking place at The Sphere in Las Vegas, so I don’t need to say much here. I’m just excited that reports are saying “multiple” wrestling promotions have reached out about running a show there in the future. Just make it happen. Someone. Anyone. It needs to happen.
Willow Nightingale vs Deonna Purrazzo: Both women continue their streak of entertaining matches. Unfortunately, they just happen to be stuck behind other women in “bigger” storylines right now. That’s a good problem for AEW to have, but it’s not ideal for Willow and Deonna. Perhaps their time will come again sooner than later.
WrestleMania In London: Nick Khan and Paul Levesque met with the Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, about bringing the biggest event in pro wrestling there in the future. WrestleMania 41 will be in Las Vegas next year, and Indianapolis has been given a future WrestleMania, but various cities are trying to get WWE to bring the event to their neck of the woods, as well. Folks, if you thought the discourse between WWE and AEW nuts on social media was bad before, just wait until WrestleMania heads to London and we get to compare attendance numbers to AEW’s All In(nit) shows. If WrestleMania draws more fans, WWE dorks are going to be insufferable. If All In(nit) draws more fans, AEW geeks are going to be even more obnoxious. Fun!
Hologram vs The Beast Mortos: Hey, Mortos, you look great and picked up a big win on an RoH pay-per-view. How about having a reward of getting to wrestle on AEW television? You’ll have more people getting to watch you perform. Unfortunately, you’re going to lose the match, because Tony Khan doesn’t have a fucking idea about this stuff. Sorry, bro.
Red Velvet: She didn’t fall for Billie Starkz’s fake injury nonsense, and therefore, became the brand new RoH Women’s Television Champion. Kudos to her for that, and for receiving the biggest push of her career.
This Week’s Playlist: “Heroes” by Stratovarius… “Hostage” by Fit For An Autopsy… “Infested” by Bodysnatcher… “My Own Way” by Villain Of The Story… “I Am Not Okay” by As The Structure Fails… “Set Adrift On Memory Bliss” by PM Dawn… “You Know I’m A Ho” by Ice Cube & Master P… “We Be Clubbin (Remix)” by Ice Cube & DMX… “Splackavellie” by Pressha… “Out Of Sight (Yo)” by Rufus Blaq… “Big Shit Poppin’ (Do It)” by T.I… “Hurt” by T.I., Busta Rhymes & Alfamega… “All This Love” by DeBarge… “Make Her Feel Good” by Teairra Mari… “Do It To It” by Cherish & Sean Paul… “Black Dog” by Led Zeppelin… “Magic Carpet Ride” by Steppenwolf… “Jane” by Jefferson Starship… “White & Nerdy” by Weird Al Yankovic… “Trapped In The Drive-Thru” by Weird Al Yankovic… “A Complicated Song” by Weird Al Yankovic… “Albuquerque” by Weird Al Yankovic… “You Don’t Love Me Anymore” by Weird Al Yankovic… “Cirice” by Ghost… “Call Me Little Sunshine” by Ghost