Uncle Bob can fix just about anything around the house, at least according to him. But when it comes to natural gas appliances, they should always be inspected by a qualified professional. Learn more at embergegas.com slash safety. Good evening. Welcome. I am Kate from Montreal. Joining me once again, after his adventure in Double or Nothing Land, John Clinchester. Welcome back to the show. Thanks for having me back. Yeah, it was quite the adventure out into Queens. I got very lucky with, well, I mean, let's be honest, all AWP previews are pretty damn good, but this one was extra special. Coming out of it, I was like, okay, yeah, that was definitely, that was one of their best. That was up there. Cage match does not lie. The rating continues to be very high. So yeah, great time out there. And thanks to John White for sending me out as press. It was a great time.
Awesome. Well, good to have you back here to discuss last night's episode of Collision. This was a live one, which are increasingly rare, so Collision was live last night. We are not, but welcome. For those of you who might not have heard the show before, if you're testing the post-waters, Collision course is normally available only to post-cafe members. This one is available for free. Next week's will be available for free as well, since we're doing the post-open house, which happens once a year, to sort of allow people to get a taste for what happens here. In the meantime, often we'll touch on some news off the top, but rather than that...
I think we're going to get right into it. Collision airing live from Huntsville, Alabama last night. And our usual commentary team of Tony Schiavone and Nigel McGuinness, who are interrupted right off the top by the entrance of Tommaso Ciampa. And Nigel informs us he's coming to join them on commentary. There's going to be a bit of that tonight. But Ciampa did indeed join them on commentary for the first couple of matches. And he had more to say for his own part later on.
But once again, we'll get to that. We go backstage to the conglomeration, including Kanosuke Takeshita, who appears to have joined their ranks. He thanks them for having his back, and he tells them things are not over with the Don Callis family. Yep, we got that. We figured that all out on our own. So yeah, I guess it isn't official, but he said that he appreciates them. Is he a member now?
I would say no, but I mean, who is really a member? I guess if you make the video, then that's a whole different story. I didn't notice if Ishii was still in the video this week, but it's a very fluid group. You can kind of come and go as you please to some extent. So maybe if he makes the video, he's certainly at least a part-time member.
That's sort of the sign that you are part of the ongoing sitcom, which is the conglomeration. We also hear from the Don Callis family, who says that they've seen enough conglomerating, and this much conglomerating makes them sick. This, of course, to set up our first match of the evening, which is the conglomeration, in this case, Kylo Reilly, Roderick Strong, and Orange Cassidy, putting their trio titles on the line against the Don Callis family in this iteration, Rocky Romero, Trent Barretta, and Lance Archer. On the commentary desk, there's sort of parallel dramas happening. on the show tonight with the commentary desk versus what's actually happening in the ring. Sometimes they come together. Other times, not so much. And we start off sort of going in tangents because Ciampa is already challenging Jericho to come out and find him if he was offended by what he did on Wednesday. Ciampa informs him, no, Jericho's not here.
Which usually is code for Jericho is very much there and is about to jump out of the audience at someone. Turns out, not so much. The match itself starts off with multiple backbreakers from Roderick. Cassidy comes in. He hits the lazy elbow as strong holds Rocky Romero over his leg. Cassidy manages to get the hands in the pockets despite Rocky's best attempts. He's a takeover, dropkick, kip-up, and then he does Rocky's signature camera pose, the sort of shimmy for the... Cassidy...
A little less shimmy, but still, you know, we got the idea. He made it his own. Of course, at that point, he gets isolated. He escapes and just goes to the outside. He runs away from Lance Archer, finally is able to tag in Kyle O'Reilly. And O'Reilly keeps Archer down with kicks and a leg sweep until Trent comes in. And at this point, O'Reilly's just taking care of everyone. He's finally tackled from on the outside by Archer, who slams Cassidy on the apron and throws Roderick Strong into the barricade. Lance doesn't need partners.
He's just a one-man record. He's doing fine against all three. The Heels celebrate as we go to add. We come back, and now it's Kyle who is trapped and has to fight his way out of the corner to tag in Roderick Strong. Roddy comes in, clears house with backbreakers, slam on Trent, a baseball slide on Archer, and then starts, of course, using Cassidy as a weapon. Our favorite conglomeration spot, for sure. Crowd always reacts to this one. An assisted DDT on Archer gets two before Rocky comes to the rescue. Archer flattens Strong and tags in Trent. Cassidy comes in, but Trent avoids him, and Rocky attacks while Cassidy is distracted, of course, calling back to the long history of...
of Orange Cassidy with the former best friends. As a delayed Gotts-style pile driver for two, which is saved in the end by Kyle O'Reilly, Trent fake hugs Cassidy and goes for a throw, but then ends up getting thrown himself. Cassidy... possibly tags in Roderick Strong. I think he was a little bit up in the air whether this happens, but he hits the orange punch. Strong lifts Trent on his shoulders. O'Reilly restrains Lance Archer with a guillotine hold, and Cassidy jumps off Trent Barretta's back. Remember, Trent is on Roderick's shoulders and hits the elbow on Rocky Romero for the win. Your trios champs retain.
Can we start the show? Yeah, of course. This is a perfectly solid match. I spent the first couple minutes of this match certainly paying attention to all the stuff that Ciampa was saying on commentary. But then I was also just like, wait a minute. I was like, what am I forgetting? Who is he feuding with here? He's talking about Jericho, but was there a Jericho connection between the... I was just like, wait, wait, what does he do? And then he stayed out for a couple more matches. So I was like, okay. And it became a theme of the night as we go along. But I just was distracted trying to figure out what the connection was here. But he was great on commentary. Yeah, he was very good. At different times, I'd say they did a lot of guest commentary.
Tonight, spoiler alert, upcoming news on that. But they did a lot. And sometimes I found it competed with what was going on in the ring. Other times it complimented it nicely. This one, I will say, I agree with you. I thought, I was sort of having, I think I was more interested in what Ciampa had to say because I think it was pretty much a given what the result of this match was going to be. Still a lot of fun. The conglomeration continued to be entertaining as champions. I also really liked...
the insert promos right before each team's entrance, just to give a little bit more context to why they're fighting sort of thing. They've kind of experimented with stuff like this before, but this felt new, and I think this was the only match they did it for tonight, but I like that. Just change it up a little bit and give a little bit more info going in. It seemed to be almost like an updated take on the cold open promos that they used to do at the beginning, and still sometimes do at the beginning, Collision. So yeah, I like that as an option. Collision, I do find, is a good place for them to try out new ideas, and they do. That's one of the reasons to watch, certainly.
Up next, we have the first of two women's matches, which I'm just going to point out there because I know that the presence of the women on Wednesday night was somewhat of a source of controversy. We have Tay-Jay. It's the way it's spelled. I'm going to have to get a shot caller or something. There's a few names that I'm never going to get right otherwise. Tay-Jay.
Ty Mello and Anna Jay versus Divine Dominion in their five-minute Eliminator Challenge. You last five minutes with the champs, you get a shot at the women's tag team belts. They have new matching gear for Ty Jay and a new voiceover for Divine Dominion before their music. I'm not sure if this is a permanent fixture or not. They did this at Double or Nothing, and it was... I was going to say off-putting. That's the wrong term. It was just like, what is happening? And I'm pretty sure they're doing it live.
Um, cause I feel like you could hear like a, like a mic sound. Um, it was kind of weird cause their music is really good. And I feel like it's like a, it feels like they're kind of rehearsing like a high school musical lines or something while they're doing it. It doesn't fit as well. I agree with you about it sounding live. If it wasn't live, then it's just mixed really weirdly. Um, but yeah, this, this did not do anything to me. I do like this old Jesus track that they use as a, as an intro. So that could be, could be more me. It's also just, it wasn't super quick either. Like it was a few lines of dialogue. So it's, uh, yeah, I don't know. As you said.
try experimenting with new things this may be one to sort of you know leave at the experimental stage let's let's just say that we tried not everything works Start off, Misdirection sends Divine Dominion into each other, but then TyJ are caught and slammed together that move the Divine Dominion love to do of smacking their opponents into each other. Megan clotheslines Anna repeatedly. She and Lena take turns attacking her in the corner. Anna escapes, but Megan takes out Ty to stop her from getting the tag. On the other hand, almost gets rolled up as she backs away from the corner. But no, we're back to Anna getting double teamed. She fights her way out, finally makes the tag to Ty, who hits running pump kicks to Lena from three different corners. Anna comes in, hits a blockbuster. They hit a two-woman DDT to Lena before Megan makes this.
save a pump kick suplex combination to anna gets a two count for divine dominion but uh ty then comes in to interrupt the divine intervention anna gets the queen slayer on she gets knocked off but still like does not break the hold entirely she applies it again and the clock runs out so no victory but they do last the five minutes just barely outlasting uh the uh zeta steel and viva van who had their shot at the uh at the pay-per-view This is like, again, TaiJ have just been reintroduced. Both were off air for a long time, particularly Tai. And what do we make of it? Obviously, it is announced later that they will get their title shot, not waiting until Forbidden Door for this one. Yeah, so my biggest issue with this, this match was, you know, it served its purpose and it was good in that sense. To me, though, I just need, I've said this on the show before, but I just need a little bit more. They didn't really have any story with TaiJ at all outside of they were the inaugural women's tag team. Okay, but like, why do they want the belts? You know, like, just give me a little bit more just to give us a little bit of...
you know, reason behind what they're, what they're doing, why they, why they got back together, that sort of thing. That's my biggest. I think also they might've been the inaugural tag team, but that just means that they tagged together a lot before there was a division. And that's true. Other people like Willow and Chris Statland are tagged a lot too. So yes, they do have history going back, but yeah, this, this very much feels like I said, we need something that's more than a, like, you know, more than just a squash type match, but less than a serious contender. And.
There's so little going on in this division that yes, it's nice to have an actual tag team, not an ad hoc pairing to take them on. I cannot foresee any... set of circumstances that results in Taiji winning these titles, but it was a fine match. Sure, give him a title shot. Why not? At least it keeps the belts sort of in the mix. And we all like having Divine Dominion on TV. So if the internet is anything to go by, they remain very popular. We then get a recap of what happened on Wednesday. Of course, the collapse of jet speed. They are no more. The jet and the speed have been separated. And I think we kind of knew that was... Oh, God.
religion cat. For those of you not watching on the video feed, one of my cats does like to put in appearances. I have to be careful because she has muted my mic before, which, you know, some people may think that that's a wise decision, but he's got to keep an eye on where her little paws go. Anyway, he's like super hogging the camera right now. She knows we're on the free feed. She's like, let me get in there. The people have tuned in to see me. But I guess we kind of suspected for quite a while that the jet speed breakup was closer than ever.
You think that they, well, we got a little bit of an update on what's happening with Bailey sort of later in the show. Could have been in that one. But what do you think? Are they going to be able to, I almost said, are they going to be able to fly separately? And I swear to God, I was about to come out of my boat that I realized I have to say, no, no pun intended. Like, no, I seriously did not intend the pun. But do you see the two of them going as far separately as they could together, if you kept them together? Yes, for the most part, yes. Knight, I think, is going to have a really good run as a heel. I think that's kind of set up pretty well.
Um, and, and he's kind of on the right path. Speedball definitely had, um, not the greatest Wednesday night this past week, um, for multiple reasons. Um, but, um, but he's an incredible talent and, you know, obviously they're coming to Montreal soon, uh, your backyard there. And that is obviously, so it's interesting to me that they're, they're running this TNT title match already when it kind of felt perfect for Montreal, but, but I don't know what else. Well, it's, it's perfect for Montreal to speedballs winning. Um, then again, I mean, we just, we just got through a pay-per-view in Vancouver where.
The Canadians went 0 for 6, or sorry, 1 in 5. Yes, Kyle O'Reilly was part of the trios winning team. Although, yeah, it sort of remained to be seen if that was even on purpose because of the injury to Gabe Kidd during the match. So Tony Khan is not above channeling his inner Vince McMahon when it comes to hometown matches. But I think certainly, yeah, if this match was happening in Montreal, I'd say it's a layup that Speedball wins. This very much seems like he's not. And I think it's too early to take the belt off of night.
Anyway, just, I don't, the main title scene has a lot of people in it right now. And you're already doing the Owen, so if he doesn't have a TNT title, I don't know, what are you doing with him? Yeah, yeah, he doesn't have much to do. What happens to speedball post this Wednesday is really the question, I guess, right? Yeah, yeah. Ciampa then enters the ring to say he had hoped Jericho would show up, but he's not there.
I'm fully expecting Jericho to come out at this point. But no, no. Subverting the rule. He says that everyone wants to know why he hates Jericho. And there was only one thing that the crowd was going to chant back at him.
bald. But Ciampa says, no, it's not one reason. He has a hundred, a thousand and four reasons why he hates Chris Jericho. And he pulls out the list as he cascades over the, over the, uh, the match. I have to think Tony Schiavone was having flashbacks here, but, um, and Ciampa does get started. He starts off by saying that Fozzie sucks, at which point the crowd seems a little bewildered. Like, oh shit, wait, is it Hugh or the baby bitch?
I'm editorializing. He says he hates Jericho's jackets. He hates the crappy cruises that he makes everyone go on. He hates his arm bars. And he hates the stupid full head of hair. Because he knew we were going to get there. And that's really the last one that he goes, you know, he could have gone to 2004, but he chooses to stop at five. He says that he has seen every iteration of Chris Jericho and knows he's scum, knows that he hasn't changed. Tell me what I'm lying to you. He said directly into the camera and was like...
There's no way that it was just a little deliberate, even if he didn't say the line. Anyway, moving on. He then leaves the ring where he gets harassed or harasses a fan who is in a Jericho shirt right by ringside. I thought, what do you make of this? I was kind of wondering, I guess eventually I'll be able to wrap my head around the fact that Jericho is a babyface because I'm still kind of reflexively reacting to him as a heel. But no, he has a babyface. Jabba is the heel.
Jericho versus the Baldies. Jericho has a very specific type of opponent that he likes. Yeah, this is, this is equal parts weird and dangerous to me because Champa was certain, I mean, before tonight or last night, Champa, you know, is loved. And even though he's a crazy heel, you know, he's still loved, he's still cheered for. Now he's kind of pushing this exact button that we were all kind of when Jericho came back, when he was the super genuine baby face and to, you know, kind of the nth degree and really like hammering home, I'm a, you know, I'm a face. So it's almost like they're kind of, I don't know, they're toying with a...
If they are looking to eventually turn Jericho back heel, great. But this feels to me like, I was like, yeah, I'm on Chamba's side here. Let's go. Like, let's take down this fraud. We're all waiting for that because it's Jericho. And this, the baby face run has seemed like, I don't know if you remember the episode of Family Guy where Stewie is trying to be good. And it's even more unnerving than Stewie being evil. That is very much the vibe I'm getting from Jericho. But I do think that having Chamba as a heel works better than having him as a baby face, even though we all love him. Just it's the character. So I'm not quite sure.
if this is where you want to go. I also, I don't want to see Chapel lose another feud. And I don't know that anyone else does either. Like, yes, you kind of wanted to see Mark Briscoe get his lick back, but yeah, I don't... I'm not sold on this one yet. Think of all of the huge... Sorry, go ahead. Go right ahead. I was just going to say, think of all the huge AEW stars that Jericho has really given the rub to and now are, you know, Sammy Guevara, like top of the card now. So, you know. Hey, look, the stretch with MJF was very entertaining for much of it. Yes, true. But yeah. What...
What I will say is that they clearly have something with Ciampa. I think that they should be cautious about possibly derailing that. And that's, whatever your feelings on Jericho, I'm just not sure about the mix of characters here. I did like this promo. I thought this was entertaining. I thought that, you know, it's reaching back for things that people will remember and sort of fit in. Beyond that, I'm a little tentative, shall we say.
Uncle Bob can fix just about anything around the house, at least according to him. But when it comes to natural gas appliances, they should always be inspected by a qualified professional. Learn more at embridgegas.com slash safety. Something I was not tentative about at all is we have Hazuki from Stardom in advance of her appearance at the Owen Hart tournament, facing Maya World, who has largely been featured on ROH. She's actually played quite a substantial role on ROH lately. She is known chiefly for being in one of the most viewed sort of enhancement talent tag teams on Collision, probably ever. But she's out here on her own without her partner, Haiyan.
for this match, which is one-on-one, but we are also, it's commentary night, joined by Persephone, who is very much playing her heel character. Persephone, and even going into what looked like it was supposed to be her match against Tekla, double or nothing, was very much presented as the babyface, but she was not playing a babyface, I found, on commentary here, almost to the point where it was a bit jarring, because she was even referring to the fact that she got misted by Julia Hart in her last match. It's like, hey, that's supposed to make you the babyface. Yeah, that was a little confusing. And I had to look it up when that was because I was like, first, when she first came out, I thought, oh, she's got a black eye because it kind of looked like a kind of like a shiner. But then commentary explained it was it was the mist. It was April 26. I believe that that happened. So we're talking over a month now. And then she's my cellar water, my cellar water. It takes the makeup right right off. I promise. Yeah. Yeah. I like when they tie things back. But this was just a little I was like, oh, that's a long time. And then she's talking about how she can't see peripherally on commentary. Yes. All right. All right. I'll allow it this time.
There's no way this doesn't play into the commentary on her match with Hazuki for the tournament. Yeah, she still can't see because of the toxic mist. Anytime in the ring, there's a quick jackknife pin attempt by Hazuki. Maya gets almost like a near fall of her own. She has the advantage for quite a while early on. She has a modified axe kick on the apron. She is sort of in the lead here until Hazuki is able to hit her with a headcissor takeover. And she is waving her arms, getting the crowd hyped up.
I didn't need this help. I was already very excited to see her. She's a brutal-looking running kick, and Persephone at this point is very much. She's staring Hazuki down. She recalls that they have met before. Maya hits a sunset bomb off the turnbuckle for a big pop and a long two-count. A huge forearm knocks Hazuki down. She rebounds with a big pump kick and a running kick. Hits a draping DDT for a two-count of her own. Maya hits an uppercut, and Hazuki then rolls to the outside. It's like, hey, that kind of rocked my shit. Like, she looked, not literally, but she did a good job of selling the impact of it.
Maya hits a slightly awkward tope. Hazuki hits a much cleaner one and gets in Persephone's face across the commentary desk. Hazuki goes for a Meteora and is caught. Maya hits a bridging suplex that gets another two count for her. She goes for a springboard moonsault but misses a running elbow and a lung blower from Hazuki and she hits the top rope senton to get the win.
This was, okay, so this was one of my two best matches of the night. I honestly, yeah, I guess probably most people would agree. I mean, there's a couple other contenders in there, but I believe this is the first time I've ever seen Hazuki wrestle. So this was an intro for me. And, you know, I'm assuming some of the AEW audience probably in a similar situation. Has she been on AEW before that I'm forgetting? I was trying to remember, and I kind of thought she had been, but then I realized I was confusing her with Azumi, who has been on there. Hazuki is a long time.
a longtime performer with Stardom. It kind of looked like she had left Stardom earlier in the year. It was a little fuzzy what was going on there. Guess not. She's here for the Owen, at least. If you want to get a sense of what she can do, on one of the New Japan in America shows, sort of towards the end of 2024, she had just a killer match with Mercedes Monet for the IWGP Women's Championship. And it was...
It was very impressive and can give you an idea of what she's capable of. This was a good introduction to her. You saw the kind of style she does. She's fast. She hits hard.
I think if you're not used to the Japanese women's style of wrestling, it's almost a little shocking because the movement, they are so fast. And like, this was, I would say this was not her going full steam ahead, but look, Elmaya did an excellent job here. And I think this was not, this was not structured as a squash. This was structured as like, okay, yes, clearly the attention is on Hazuki. We're setting up this rivalry with Persephone and we're going to get their match next week on Collision in the opening round slash quarterfinals of the ONR tournament.
It felt like you were very much supposed to notice that my world is a really good prospect. Yeah, Maya, they trust, they clearly have a lot of, they feel really good about Maya because she's been in a lot of big spots already in kind of a short time. And, I mean, having Persephone on commentary too for this match, I was enjoying hearing from her and, you know, her talking about wanting to go to Wembley and stuff like that. Again, this ties back to what I said before. Just give me a little bit more of the why. And that, like you're saying, you know, if she's supposed to be a heel and she's, you know, the heel face dynamic's a little off, but I mean, that's kind of collision in a nutshell. It's like not always quite where the rest of the product is, but that's okay. Entirely aligned, yeah. I just, look, she...
She plays a heel exceptionally well, and I think that's where she has been for a lot now. I think she's still somewhat of a new property for most AEW fans, and again, they were kind of clearly setting her up to face Takla. She's already faced Athena. They're more established as heels, so it may be her inclination to kind of heal it up a bit, but... It's a little odd. In this case, I think, Hazuki was very much coming off as the babyface, so when Persephone gets in the ring at the end, just towering over her, and they sort of face off, the dynamic between the two of them felt right, at least. Agreed.
We then get a very touching tribute to lover boy Dennis Condry, who passed away this week. Tony Schiavone had a lot to say about him with his tag team history, The Midnight Express, and got quite emotional himself. They got quite choked up. They had a lot of photographs that were supplied by Condry's former co-workers by his family, including, didn't have this one on my bingo card, they gave a big thank you to Jim Cornette, who apparently supplied a lot of the photographs for the tribute. Very classy, little few minutes.
It was kind of jarring to see Jim Cornette at first, and then when they kind of thanked him at the end, I was like, okay, that makes sense. But yeah, it was kind of like, Jim Cornette's on AEW, what is happening? Exactly, exactly. So just a very nice few minutes, and Giovanni's absolutely the right guy to deliver these, given his history in the business. Next up, we have Lee Moriarty.
In action. For those who aren't familiar, he has had a long run with the Ring of Honor Men's Pure Rules title, which is a specific kind of like, let's just basically say it comes down to putting the emphasis on more traditional grabs-based wrestling. He has had this title for over a year. He's had a lot of defenses, many of them. Really entertaining. One of his defenses was against Nigel McGuinness, who was talking him up very heavily here. Of course, aside from the title defense, he and Nigel also had an Iron Man match, which happened on ROH. I want to say it was Death Before Dishonor, I'm not entirely sure. But they had a great match there. So Nigel, at this point, is sort of declaring himself...
to be the number one contender for that belt, again, by virtue of his win over Josh Woods at Supercard of Honor, which, okay, Bruce, you were right. I was wrong. When we were reviewing that show, I thought, hey, he and Nigel and Lee seem to have faced each other a lot. They wouldn't just go back to that. They absolutely wouldn't go back to that. But that is not what we are talking about here. This is a rare appearance on AEW television for Lee Boyardi up against Tim Bosby, who actually gets a pretty good reaction from the crowd.
We have Shane Taylor on commentary. Lee is, of course, part of Shane Taylor Promotions. More on them in a bit. And this is just, it's a class, it is a masterclass in quick moves by Lee, who locks Bosby up and forces him to use a break, a cross-arm hold, a slam into the Border City stretch, and he taps his opponent out in, I think, maybe two minutes. So a very quick introduction to Lee Moriarty, or reintroduction. He has been on TV before, just not very often, not in a while, and not presented as the sort of...
force that he is. You got a video package about him at the beginning of this, which was longer than the match itself, reintroducing him, emphasizing what a strong champion he's been. Not much to talk about here, but... You know, glad to see him on TV. The Infantry, who are also part of Shane Taylor Promotions, get on like they are shit-talking the crowd before the Death Riders music hits because the Infantry, Sean Dean and Carly Bravo, are there to face the Death Riders. In this case, Jon Moxley and Pac. So you know if you come in and you're not usually on AEW TV, you're taking on Mox and Pac.
Your prospects, they're not good. Not so much. No, I should also say, Lee sort of separates himself from things here, but Shane Taylor does stay out, along with Christian Exo, who is sort of, she's a very new wrestler, but who's affiliated herself with them. No, Trisha Dora, who is usually part of that group as well. This group, I will say, aside from Lee being a Pure Rules champion, they have featured very, very heavily on ROH.
They're involved in everything. They held the trio's titles up until recently. Tershidora has been a contender for the women's title. And yeah, Christian is a new member. I remember just thinking last night, I'm looking at this, like, imagine if last night was your first exposure to the AEW women's division. There's a height requirement, I think.
Like, you had three women who were, like, six feet tall or slightly above. Like, Megan Bain was the small one, obviously, between her, Lena, and Christian, who I think is taller than either of them. Just an observation. Yes, where the Amazons wrestle. But in this case, it's Carly Bravo and Sean Dean who are wrestling. Mox and Bravo start off. They trade holds, and Mox takes him down with a shoulder tackle, which brings in Pac, who is working over Bravo's arm. He goes to run the ropes, but Christian XO trips him, at which point...
Even before I saw who was coming, I heard the crowd reaction because Marina Shafir jumps up onto the apron and just stares her down to a massive chant of, you fucked up. Crowds very much want to cheer for Marina. I noticed this, obviously the Deathriders sort of float between being babyfaces and heels, and whenever they are babyfaces, there's this sense that like, yeah, they really want to get behind Marina at this point. Let's just emphasize that for me, because all she does is she just stares Christian down and then stalks her up the ramp. It's like, this is how you take care of business. Mox grabs a chair, but while he's doing that, Shane Taylor gets up, punches him in the face while the infantry are occupying the ref and pack.
As a satellite DDT to pack by Carly Bravo on the outside, a combo move into a suplex on a pack by both members of the infantry, followed by the, yes, you heard it correctly, BBC. That would be the Bronco Buster captain. Of course. Yeah. As it's always been known. Yes, and they definitely, that is why they're making a big point of shouting out the name of the move. Okay.
It's about the British Broadcasting Corporation. It's a pun. Sean Dean gets back into a chokehold. Mac fights his way out. He sends Dean to the outside. Bravo, though, stops him from tagging Moxley in. There's a big suplex to Dean on the outside. And finally, Mox is able to get back in the match. He beats down Dean, hits the punches in the corner twice, and then his signature move bites his head. Dean and Bravo try to attack and are hit with a double DDT. There's a combo into a cutter by the infantry on Mox. This is pretty cool. And a combo neckbreaker on Pac.
Dean goes off the top rope, but lands right on Mox's knees. The Deathriders do their running clotheslines into the corner. And while the rep is trying to deal with the newly returned Christian, Marina jumps in and she gets one of the clotheslines in. And then Moxley hits the Deathrider to Sean Dean to get the win. This was a lot of fun. To your point, Marina getting involved was great. So far, like you said, Christian Exo is new, but I'm loving everything I'm seeing from her so far. I feel like she fits in very well. And she sticks out very well because she's very tall. I've seen her have a couple of matches on ROH. She's still very green, but she has the kind of personality, whereas if she continues to improve in the ring, she's not going to have a problem fitting in in the world of wrestling. That's great. Yeah, that's great. Sometimes it just takes a little catching up, right, the in-ring versus the personality. The only thing I would say is that one thing that kind of struck me as I was watching this was that...
oh, wow, we've got a lot of ROH talent on AEW as of late. The only thing is, they're mostly on AEW to lose. So, you know, in one sense, I'm glad to see them, and I like that they're getting airtime on, you know, national TV. At the same time, I'm like, well, yeah, but you're also having them lose. I don't know. I'm two minds about it. I don't know how to feel. I was glad at least they had Lee win. Like, they had Lee Briardi win, and, like, yes, it was against enhancement talent, but, like, at least they didn't bring them in just to lose. What I will say, in terms of Shane Taylor promotions, is...
This almost felt like they might be considering transitioning them from ROH onto Collision more regularly, which I think would be a good idea because it's a cohesive action. They have the characters down. They have their different iterations. You have Lee as sort of the young single star. You have the infantry as a tag team. You have Shane Taylor, who sometimes wrestles as part of a trio and then sometimes is just the boss. Then you have Christian and Trishadora, who, again, I'm sort of worried was not there.
like, who were members there, so featuring in the women's division, this is a fully cooked act. Like, they're not going to do more in Ring of Honor than they already have. They just dropped the trio, the six-man titles. So I would say, like, yeah, it's absolutely these, all of these people can handle themselves on TV, and, you know, you could, the tag-in trio's division could use more people, and Lee Moriarty, I think, is very much poised to become, like, one of the young stars of the company. Yeah, and they also had Shane Taylor on commentary for both these matches in the rotating commentary chair, and he was very good, and, you know, I feel like he kind of added that. Again, going back to my theme for today is, you know, just give me that a little extra why, and he was kind of giving that commentary, so I like that. So I thought, yeah, these two matches were, which I kind of see as sort of different halves of the same thing, but they were entertaining, they got the characters established, the audience was certainly quite engaged with the tag match, even though, again, Odecombe was not in doubt.
But yeah, I thought, good interaction. They've been on collision before on a semi-regular basis, but at this point, you've got the whole thing. They're not going to learn anything more on Ring of Honor. They're not going to become a more defined unit. Call them up, TK.
We go backstage where Brene is with the Triangle of Madness, and Takla says that she is bragging about her win at Double or Nothing, and she says, yeah, they have the Owen Hart tournament coming up, but the only competitor that she's afraid of is Skye. And they kind of get into it, Skye's saying, you know, if you think that I, we have another cat. Equals camera time. Yes, okay, this is Julia. She never comes up here, but she's decided that since we're on the free feed, kind of feline free for all going on here.
Sky says, you know, don't you, like, you know, if you don't think I'm going to take my chance, you're crazy. And they, like, tackle a response and say, oh, really, like, maybe you're just going to get injured again. The two of them are going off at each other. And Julia's sort of trying to intervene to keep the peace. And then everyone cracks up laughing, like, ah, ha, ha. You thought we were serious. And they are united at the end, although notably. Sky Blue does, at the very end, just take a wink at the camera, which can be interpreted different ways.
Yeah, they got me on this one. I was like, oh, OK, we're going to. They leaned all the way in. Yeah, well played. To me, this was an object lesson in how. Oh, God, she's walking directly over the keyboard like this. Oh, my God. OK, yes. Hello. Lift the tail, please. This was an object lesson to me in how to make the most out of every second you are on the screen.
I don't even know if this was a minute, but they got a lot established here. They had Tekla do her bragging thing, which we, of course, all love. Seriously, I'm having cat issues here. Okay, like just, all right, I'm lucky she walked over the keyboard again. Tecla got herself over, like playing to the, you know, the dumb bitches headline. They did the faux tension. They fooled us. Like, I think Sky got to show some fire. Julia sort of getting involved and the laughter afterwards sort of reaffirming the group is together and just that subtle little wink at the end. It's like, wow, you got a lot done here. Yeah, that was dense. It was dense. Yeah, you fit quite a bit in here because I think ultimately you're going to have to have one or both of these women break from Tecla. Not too soon, though. I'm enjoying it.
I like having him. I think Sky is probably the one who's more likely to take Tecla on. I do not think that this is the opportunity, though. I don't see her winning even her first round match of the Owen. Yeah, but I think that, to your point, this exact promo at least gave Sky Blue a little bit more going into that match, even though pretty much everyone is writing her off to lose. But, you know, at least it gives her a little bit more. It's just the wink alone. It's like, okay, there's something there.
This felt like they are honoring the collision course tradition of circling back to things. Exactly. We're going to hear more about this later. Also backstage, we have the conglomeration who are fresh off their win, their title retention. They are feeling good about things until Roderick pipes up that he didn't like what he's seeing. And we cut away. And just inside.
There is a rainbow umbrella spinning. And it turns away to reveal... Oh god, I can't. Leo Rush. Blackheart Leo Rush. Chattering away to himself. And Cassidy... All the conglomerations look pretty intimidated. And Cassidy just tells him, don't move. He can't see you if you don't move. And indeed... And indeed, Leo does sort of saunter by them, chatting away to himself, reiterating that everything is fine.
everything is not fine, but you know, I guess, I guess, well, he seems to be doing all right for himself. And I, as the collaboration look on and kind of discomfort and horror, Cassidy feels like, yeah, I don't know if any of that's true. Like, I don't know if it's true that he, he can't see you if you, if you don't move, but I just went with it in the moment. I've already seen people share this clip like a dozen times. Listen, this, I've already been in on Leo rush.
I did not expect a veiled Jurassic Park reference for being related to Leo Rush, but sure. I mean, that's fun. You know, now I'm like, you know, you're asking if Takeshi was in the conglomeration before. I don't want him to join really, but I do just so that he gets into the video and really makes it crazy. Like their intro video, just like some kind of like a weird poison in their happy. I don't know where they're going with this, but it is very difficult to dispute that this does have some legs.
You saw in the four-way, people reacted to him. As I said, I've seen this clip shared on different platforms probably a dozen times. Maybe by the same people, but that said, he does have some traction. And it's the first time that he's really been able to say that. I...
I hope that they don't go entirely comical. Like, I want to see him get some wins. I want to see them go with this a bit because Leo is, well, I guess kind of like Orange Cassidy. He has the skills to back it up. It's just sort of now you've got this very out there character. And look, he's on TV more than he's ever been. He's getting more of a reaction than he ever has. Okay. I think very difficult to argue that this isn't working.
Hello, hello, hello. Davey Portman here from Poison Rana. We cover NXT every Tuesday night on the post-wrestling feed in a show we call Up Next. But we do so much more. Follow Poison Rana Pod on YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts for our live Sunday show. Plus our Patreon with movie reviews, retro wrestling reviews, and more. Find out everything at poisonrana.ca. Next up, we have a tag match of...
Dogs versus guns. I just saw the graphic for this and I had to say like, wait, what? Like that sounds horrifying. No, it's the dogs versus the guns, Austin and Colton. But the name did kind of throw me, I have to say. At the beginning, of course, Finley grabs the mic to remind us that, hey, they attacked Kofa Christian as they were about to do their five second pose. They do a five second pose of their own, which they call guns down. But of course they are interrupted.
seems only fair, as the guns enter. And Jon Moxley joins the commentary desk as they're saying this is coming off what was his 201st win in AEW. If you're a regular watcher of Collision, then you know that mocks on commentary is a pretty regular feature, and it's often worth tuning into in and of itself. And yeah, I don't know if the adrenaline was still pumping for the mask, but even by his standards, he was in rare form. He's going over, he's complimenting the guys in the ring, he is talking about what moves they're doing in a very educated, helpful way, which is something he, a lot of the time, his character on...
uh on collision is just guy who's really into wrestling and that was how he was playing this of course he also did get into a little bit of fashion commentary talking about the pants of both teams and saying the you make some decisions but this is live tv and some decisions you can't take back oh boy um I'm not going to lie. This has made it a little difficult to concentrate on the match at first. So Colton gets the advantage over David Finley and the guns get a quick cover attempt. Clark Connors tags in to face Austin, but the guns continue to dominate sending Finley to the outside. They do their own pose in the center of the ring. So this is going to be like an everybody gets in on the game thing. As we go to an ad break, we come back and the dogs staple a Polaroid to Austin's head and they're choking him against the ropes to do a pose.
This is what the tag division does now. Austin escapes and tags in Colton, who takes out both of the dogs. He hits a side slam for a two count. This was actually the point where Box was talking about the pants. This is when that commentary... I just couldn't wait to describe that.
Connors attacks Colton while the ref isn't looking, and Colton gets double-teamed and thrown across the ring. It's a double-shoulder tackle for two. Colton avoids the dog's finisher, sending them into each other. Austin makes it to the apron finally for the hot tag. It's a big crossbody and a famous serve on Connors, but Finley makes the save. A battle of forearms with all four men that ends with the dog's throat-punching both guns. Finley shot-blocks Colton in his leg that he's just now recovered from the injury to. I could not have said that in a more awkward way. Sorry, guys. It's live. You can't.
take some of these things back. Lessons learned. Thanks, Max. Austin seems to be setting up Connors for a suplex when Finley cracks him in the head with the shillelagh, and Connors hits a spear for the win. The dogs attempt to continue the beatdown, but the other members of the Bankman gang, Juice Robinson and Ace Austin, come in to make the save. They run off, but Finley does leave his shillelagh in the ring.
This team is a little bit of a weird way because there's huge history between David Finley and Juice Robinson. They were a tag team. They won the New Japan World Tag League. They have quite a history together. But the way this happens, I almost kind of forgot that in the moment. But we shall see. When do you think of the match?
Yeah, I thought this was a good match. Moxley commentary was fantastic, as you mentioned. Even at one point was talking about how he loved the guns theme, which I gotta kick out of. Good song. Yeah, it is a good song. I will say, so, okay, two things. One, I don't love the guns losing here, but because they're kind of, you know, fresh off of, you know, injury return. But more so, I was thinking about the fact that the dogs are going to be fed to Cage and Copeland. You know, it's just kind of this continued theme where they're just not really, I mean, obviously they're building them up right now, but they're not going to beat.
Cajun Copeland, I don't think. So that's kind of just a little bit. Then I was thinking about it. I was like, they must be really excited to even be wrestling those two, you know, as kind of legends. So, you know, I was trying to take myself out of it and be like, they're probably like super hyped to be fed to them. That's fine. I saw someone shared on Blue Sky earlier this week. It was an image of Edge at age 33 attacking Fit Fidley, who was 52 at the time, juxtaposed with the photo from Wednesday of 52 year olds.
Adam Copeland being attacked by 33-year-old David Finley. The sad thing is they can't use this on air because they can't use the photo of Copeland and Fit Finley. It's just sad. It's sad because you're like, oh crap, you would have an even better story. They should find some way to just rope in the fact that Copeland attacked David's father, but hey, I don't know if you can. And you run the risk of sort of semi-baby facing Finley in that case. But yeah, I'm a lot thrilled with the dogs being...
Fed to be. The dogs being fed. Yeah, exactly. And it's just also it's like dogs defeat guns, which is a first for that one. Yeah, like this just felt a little off. But it also felt off because to me, you have a better story with the dogs and the Bang Bang Gang because of the history with Finley and Juice. And if you're talking about maybe a Jay White return, they have a huge history as well. Like basically.
David Finley, Juice Robinson, and Jay White were in the New Japan Dojo at the same time. They came up together. There is rich history here that they could mine, and that footage they can use. So I'm honestly more interested in what happens with the Dogs and the Bang Bang Gang than I am in just seeing the Dogs face, Cage and Copeland, which is clearly going to be a lost cause. But I'm glad that they continue to be on TV. I do wish both of these teams, you know, I wish everybody would win.
Draws for everyone. I would like to see more being given to both of these, particularly because I think you need to spice up that tag division. Although that might be happening in other ways, but you need to spice up that division generally. Do you think, all right, I'm going out on a limb here. Let's say, okay, so Juice and Ace made the save, right? So you got four on one side, two on the other. Let's say Gabe Kidd's ready to come back. That's four versus three. Let's say Jay White's ready to come back. Is there any chance that Jay comes back, but then aligns with the dogs and kind of takes ownership of that group?
Oh, I don't hate that at all. I mean, it would... It would at least give us a chance. Like, we haven't gotten to have heel Jay White yet because he's been sort of snakebitten, to recall the previous episode, collision course, by injuries so often that people are just happy to have him back so you can't execute the heel turn. I do think that if you have him turn on Juice in particular, who is very well liked, that you could accomplish that. And again, leads you to a sort of a dispute with Finlay down the road. I think you would have to find a way of explaining, like, in...
In story, in kayfabe, David Finley just attacked Jay White and beat him down and drove him out of New Japan. Well, he had lost him where he would leave New Japan. But Finley beat him down brutally on the way out. So you'd have to kind of work around that because they do respect New Japan storylines. But yeah, I wouldn't mind seeing that, though. They can find a way. And yeah, then we get Heal Jay White, which is what we all want desperately.
What else do we want? We want a new TBS champion. And with the very, very sad news that Willow Nightingale sustained an injury that's going to keep her out for a while, they are not holding the title in advance. They are not appointing an interim champion. They are going to have a six-woman Survival of the Fittest match, which I believe is going to take place on the July 1st episode of Dynamite. Now, you will have qualifying matches to get into the Survival of the Fittest, which means there's 12 women involved in this in total.
The six winners of the qualifier matches will go on to Survival of the Fittest. If you haven't seen one of these before, it's an elimination match. It's basically, you know, last one standing wins. And those of you who are members of the Post Wrestling Cafe may have heard Bruce Lord and I reviewing the last Ring of Honor pay-per-view supercard, which featured the first ever women's Survival of the Fittest match. And I will say they did a very good video package showing some of the old Survival of the Fittest matches from ROH. And I think they had about...
At the end, like three seconds of the women's match from Supercard, I do think they got all the good parts in. Just about. They didn't have the Yukosakazaki trash can spot. And other than that, yeah. Like, they will not be stretching it out that long, but I remember thinking, it's like, well, if you're going to do this match, putting it on a pay-per-view called Redemption might be a good idea. That's perfect. They will not, however. This will be done much before Redemption. I am glad that they're not putting it on, like, trying to force it into Forbidden Door, although I wouldn't mind seeing some participants from outside of EW. I mean, it's 12 people you're going to have, you know, between the qualifiers and the final one. You've got a fair number of people to get in here. And because of the overlap with the Owen, it seems like...
you're gonna have some people who are taken out of the equation like you could have someone like a sky blue who is likely to lose her opening round match uh but It seems like there's going to be certain people who are either in the Owen or in this tournament or trying to qualify for Survival of the Fittest, but not both. Who do you see going into this? Honestly, the first person that came to mind was Sky Blue. That wink means she knows that she's not going to be winning the tournament. She's going for the TBS title. That's the wink. I have a backup plan. She just learned about this Survival of the Fittest. Outside of that, there's so many good options. Honestly,
Man, I don't know. I can't even think of one in particular. Are there a couple that come to mind for you that kind of are at the top of the heap here? It is hard to predict. I think, yeah, there are some different people. I mean, do you want to put either of Divine Dominion in there? I'm not really sure. Athena, I think we're basically, she's probably going fairly deep in the Owen tournament. You also had this question about who the wild card at the Owen tournament is going to be facing Alex Windsor this week, and people have different theories on that.
either for that position or in the survival of the fittest. I think Red Velvet has a claim to being owed a position, and I just don't know how they would feel outside of storyline about putting her in the spotlight when she did just injure a fairly important person in their women's division. I'm not saying it's her fault, but a lot of companies are hesitant to be perceived as rewarding someone who had an opponent injured in one of their matches. That's a great storyline point, though. If they are comfortable with her, then she can use that and be like, you know, I took out Willow and I'm going to come for my title that I, you know, this was my design sort of thing. Yeah, exactly. Like, she didn't win the title against Willow, but she took Willow out of the equation. So story-wise, why shouldn't she be able to get a shot in there at either the Owen or the TBS title? You'd have sort of always the possibility of a return from Britt Baker, who has kind of been hovering over the division for a while. You possibly have the return of Ruby Soho. Haven't been hearing too much about where she is, but...
Silence in AEW often means a return is imminent. No one heard about Kyle Fletcher coming back either. We were all caught off guard by that one. I'm holding out hope for Camille. Yeah, I think, you know, like another Amazon, always got room for those. I think I'll be curious to see where they go with this. I honestly don't know who's winning. That's kind of like, I guess you always have a better picture when you see who's involved, but I don't know who's winning this. I do really hope that they nail this match and not do just the sort of silly, awkward storytelling they did in the Ring of Honor one. Like, none of that.
Please no. I'm hoping the other thing too is like, okay, this means hopefully more women's matches on TV. Tony, don't just use this as an excuse to, you know, fill the 930 slot and then be done with it. This should be, this should mean more women's matches. Yes. Six matches leading into this. So please.
And again, I would not mind seeing some people, although again, this is not a forbidden door type situation, but I would not mind in any way seeing people from CMLL or stardom involved, particularly in the qualifiers. It's got nothing to lose there. But I don't know. It's kind of like looking at the way the Owen is organized, it kind of seems like they want quite a bit more stardom involvement in AEW. No argument from me.
We then get a standby match. We're told that since the Lee Moriarty match didn't last as long as predicted, we have the Don Callis family, once again. This time, Brian Cage and Jake Doyle both freshly returned from injury. Doyle very recently showed up on Wednesday versus Tommy Mars and Jimmy Wilde. I don't... Okay. What I have here in my notes, Doyle crushes one of them and presses his foot into the back of his neck, does an overhead deadlift throw, tags in cage, because it's only fair to give him some time. Ragdoll, one of the guys who escapes to tag in Ragdoll number two. There's a tandem brainbuster and powerbomb for the quick win. That's it. The match took about as long as I just took describing it. I have to say, and I feel terrible about this, I usually try to pay attention to what the enhancement talent, what the indie guys are doing. I did not ever manage to work out which was Tommy Mars and which was Jimmy Watts.
Sorry, boys. That's okay. That's okay. Yeah. That's what happens. Yeah. I mean, it's interesting because I didn't know if they were going to go back to the murder machines with Cage and Archer, but with Doyle back, you feel like he... Doyle got Mark Davis'd. The same way that Davis was out injured and then Kyle Fletcher, his former tag team partner, rose to prominence. Davis and Doyle were a tag team for like two matches. And then...
uh Doyle got injured and Davis's star has so um like I uh if I'm Brian Cage I'm looking nervously at the idea of being the next tag partner in this series of dominoes but yeah yeah Cage and Doyle I mean that's it must have been like oh of course but yeah like that those two look great together it's a perfect uh combo Yeah, I think that Archer looked fine in his role with the other two, with Baretta and Rocky. I did like the murder machines. I think it's too bad that when Cage got injured, they were, it seems like they were sort of headed towards being the new challengers for the Hurt Syndicate, who were the tag champions at the time. They never got that. But yeah, I think I kind of like this pairing.
better in a way and this looked very much like okay we're gonna put jake doyle with brian cage and they're just gonna do the exact they're gonna run the exact same playbook as we're gonna do with doyle and davis and that's like that's it we'll figure out what to do with lance archer later don't broke yeah don't fix what's not broken you know exactly if it has a different part installed in it who amongst us has not sort of used a part that didn't come with the original packaging to save uh save something around the house i know i know you've done it Doyle gets into it with a fan on the way out who's holding a Where's Wardlow sign. And fan? I had not thought about that. I feel bad now. I feel shame. I feel like I should have thought more about Where's Wardlow. I have not. But while this is going on, Konosuke Takeshita's music hits. And it just looks like the refs and security are holding back the Don Callis family from attacking as Takeshita taunts them from the runway. There's...
It was. It was Mr. Takeshita's birthday this week, and credit to the fans who came there with this big, multi-panel, happy birthday, Take sign this week. I'm very glad that they got to pull that up. Takeshita is not necessarily a regular on Collision, so I'm glad that these people who are obviously big fans of his got to see him live. In this case, he is defending his newly won international title versus the Deathriders' Daniel Garcia. Now, once again, Jon Moxley's not left commentary. He's moved in there.
You'll understand why this is important later. Garcia traps Takeshta at first, but Takeshta gets out and pats him on the head with his really intense look. Garcia pushes him into the corner and smacks his chest. He ducks a big forearm and gets hit with a shoulder tackle right afterwards. The pump kick and a Takeshta line rocks Garcia. There's a throw punch and attempted to roll through into the sharpshooter by Daniel. He ducks another pump kick and goes to the floor for a little pep talk from Marina Shafir as Moxley is talking up his boy. He wants everyone to know that he has confidence in him, but he's also kind of yelling encouragement slash instructions slash.
Just random shouting at Garcia the entire time. Takeshi attacks him on the outside, beats him, he throws him back in the ring, but Garcia just rolls right out again. He grabs Takeshi's boot and drops him onto the ring skirt. Yep, crotches a man on the ring skirt. I can't say for certain. I'm given to understand that this would be quite painful. It's topped off by Garcia hitting a dragon screw over the skirt onto Takeshi's free leg. He gets back in the ring, he gets the ankle lock on, but Takeshi fights out, and okay.
moxley for some reason at this point he gets up and i i'm still not did you see like what was this like where did he go what did he what did he do like did he go to take a leak i know he didn't get involved in the match which is why you think normally when someone gets up from commentary that's where they're headed he did not but he handed his headset to marina who just jumps right in and says and i did try to get this quote exact i'm just waiting for daniel okay sorry i'm just waiting for daniel to put to keshta's toe in his butthole there's a dangling participle there. Sorry about the phrasing. I'm not even sure who's, like, whose butthole are we talking about here? Like, okay, I know whose toe it is, but I... All I know is, more Marina, please. More, more Marina. Yeah, like, yeah, when Moxie comes back, Shivani's like, you gave your headset to a crazy woman. Yeah, and he's like, what happened, huh? What? Yeah, exactly. And the thing is, like, that's it. She doesn't come back. She's just, she's, like, yelling. Like, okay, this was not the only line she said, but the rest of it was very toe-in-butthole-centric.
And she's going to talk and leave. He's like, no, no, no, wait, no, you can't do that to me. I need to know where this was going. Like, I love you, Mox. It's great. But like, no, bring her back. Bring her back. I need to know where she was headed with this. Always leave them wanting more. And Marina is clearly good at that.
So this was a whole moment. In the meantime, Takeshita goes for the driver on Garcia, but Daniel slips out, grabs the ankle again. Takeshita gets out of that, hits the wheelbarrow suplex, and goes for the blue thunder bomb, but it's turned into Tierra's takeover, and Garcia gets the STF on. Garcia tries for a pile driver, but Takeshita turns that into a back body drop, and Takeshita goes to punch him. I think this punch registered on the Richter scale. Garcia gets out of the way and this, like, the ring shook. Like, even Moxley seemed kind of surprised by it. Like, basically saying, like, I think there's a dent.
There's a short pile driver by Garcia, but Takeshita recovers and hits the running knee. And Max is very excited at this point. Like, he's just going on. He's talking about, like, this is just a bunch of belts. Like, he's just in. He wants to watch this big fight. Garcia catches the next attempt at the running knee and smacks Takeshita down. But Takeshita gets up, hits a blue thunder bomb for two. He goes for the running knee again, but his leg gives out all of that work that Garcia was doing. Applying ankle locks and submission holds has had its effect. Garcia hits a curb stomp and gets Takeshita on the turnbuckle.
twists his ankle, and sets up for an avalanche superplex, but Takeshita headbutts him, and Garcia recovers. It's a super arm drag, let's call it a super arm drag, and applies the dragon tamer. Takeshita struggles, finally gets to the ropes. He goes for raging fire, but it's countered into a jackknife pin attempt, which has been Garcia's friend, but Takeshita has read the book on Garcia. He knows this is coming, and reverses it into a sit-down pin attempt of his own. Garcia gets out, but...
As Takeshita recovers, he's able to hit the driver-wheelbarrow suplex combo, a big forearm, and raging fire for the win. So it took a lot to put Garcia down. No toes and buttholes. But before we get to the aftermath of this match... What do you think? Yeah, this was fantastic. This was most likely my match of the night. Yeah, I would put it slightly above the rest. But yeah, this was yet another excellent performance by Takeshi. Another where it had a certain kind of New Japan feel slash build to the culmination of the match. Which obviously him versus Okada, double or nothing, was certainly a New Japan kind of style match. And credit to Daniel Garcia here. He's in a tough spot, kind of that first defense versus Takeshi where it's all but guaranteed that Garcia is not winning this.
But he was an excellent partner for Takeshita, and they really did a great job here with the Near Falls and all that stuff. And then you've got all your extracurricular stuff with commentary and Moxa Marina, and that was fun. I would not change a single thing from this match, and that includes all of it. I would not change a word of the commentary. I would not change any move in the match. I thought looking strong in defeat is an AEW trope at this point, and it's how Takeshita kind of rose through the company, where he was taking a lot of high-profile losses, but that meant that he was fighting high-profile people and having really good matches.
Garcia has not looked this good to me in a while. Like I found like, oh yeah, this is why everyone was super excited when he re-signed with the company. And I think he has done well with the Deathriders, but it's almost more he's done better as a character than in Ring. This was a reminder of how well he can do in Ring. Yeah, this was terrific. This is my match of the night ahead of my world and Hazuki. But yeah, and the commentary just went to another level. But wait, there's more.
At the end of all this, oh, come the Don Callis family to attack Takeshita. As the Deathriders, they're not leaving, but they're going to hang around weighing their options. He's taunted by Nigel and goes to help, but then is attacked by the returning Shane Taylor promotions. And Yuda comes out to help, which is just okay. We love Yuda being a good guy. But of course he's out to help. I guess he wants to be on the right side of history now.
And to Takeshna's aid come the conglomeration, including Speedball Mike Bailey. So that may be a thing now. We shall see. You know, all of the wraiths and strays eventually find their way to conglomerate. throws Wheeler Yuta at Nigel, who, of course, we've already had it established that Lee and Nigel are headed for a showdown. The two of them have kind of a standoff. In the midst of this, Carly Bravo goes for Nigel, and Nigel nails him. So conglomerations with the Takeshita Speedball are in the ring. The Deathriders are sort of hovering. Boy, we said the seven-on-seven for Stadium Stampede was a lot.
This was a whole lot here. You're looking at 12th side if you want to do it that way. If you wanted to do a group match. This was quite the brawl. Yeah, this harkened back to some late 90s kind of insanity as Raw was going off the air. And I love this. And I'll go back and say, I think this whole show had a nice flow to it where there was kind of overlapping stories and segments bled into each other. And this to culminate it all is really, I was just like, I'm intrigued by all of this. I have no idea what they're going to do with this mess outside of obviously Nigel versus Lee.
Whatever else they've got planned for this, I'm in. But yeah, it does seem a little stadium stampede-ish, which we just had. But whatever they're planning, I'm in. Let me in. Yeah, I think that this was a really good way to...
suddenly bring together a whole lot of stories that you've been seeding throughout the show. I actually thought that this show was better constructed than Dynamite. The Dynamite, after a big pay-per-view, is often a little bit awkward, normally, because a lot of the people you most want to see are too banged up to fight. So, didn't have that problem here. So, you know, they had a couple of days, a couple of days more. But this just seemed very well thought out, both in terms of new stories being introduced and factions being somewhat realigned. So, yeah, I thought...
We talked about it. If someone says they don't have a lot of time, what are you telling them to watch from the show? Yeah, it's certainly the International Championship main event and then the women's match, Hazuki, My World. Yeah, those are the two, I think, standouts. Everything else was quality, but those two were the best overall. The whole show is worth watching and worth watching because it functions as one program with different storylines that come together. But yeah, if you're totally stretched for time, then those are definitely the two matches that you want to check out. But yeah, very fun show overall.
Before we head out, we do have some feedback from the post wrestling forum. Thank you for those of you who checked in there. Brandon Miller says, hello, longtime fan and listener. Very first time ever writing in. Hey, Brandon. Me and a friend attended tonight's show. The main show just wrapped up and we're waiting to see some more ROH matches before I make the one hour drive back home to Birmingham. You are very dedicated. I am either that or I'm just real lazy. You were something an hour away from me. It's like.
You wait for them to come to you, Kate, right? Yeah, exactly. And that is what I did. Collision was absolutely incredible and so fun live. The crowd really had fun and brought the energy. Yes, this was... Now, I want to say that they've been to Alabama before. The crowd seemed a little tamer.
But that was not the case tonight. They were very into this. And they didn't even get to hear all the commentary gems. I do hope that these people go back and listen to the hits that they missed because it is worth your while. There were a few times it took everyone a minute to get into a match, but once it hit, the crowd got it. Every match was great, but the tag match with Mox and Pack versus the infantry was absolutely the match of the night. The tribute to Dennis Condry was very heart-wrenching. Yes, indeed. It's always good to see wrestling's rich history in Alabama, especially here in Huntsville.
But touched on. Growing up in the 90s with a grandfather who was an NWA WCW lifer, I knew who Ric Flair and Bobby Eaton were before I knew what a Hulk Hogan was. I like that. This venue is very special because they did a lot of the early TNA and NWA weekly pay-per-views here, and I got to attend a lot of those. Last thing I'll talk about is Tim Bosby. He got a super good reaction from us. He's been wrestling a lot in the area for New South and Retinal Wrestling, so he's become a local favorite. Okay, at one point as well, Bosby's better champ broke out. Tonight was just awesome. Hope you guys are doing well. Take care. Thank you so much, Brennan. I did notice that the guy got a bit of a reaction. I had not seen him before. I'm interested now, so that's what you want if you're in an enhancement match. I'm going to remember his name.
Yeah, absolutely. It's funny how that works, you know, indie talent getting their big break on, you know, national TV, or worldwide TV, really. And, you know, having that, even getting squashed, it's like, you know, if you get a reaction from a crowd that recognizes you from local indie shows, incredible. I mean, that's icing on the cake, I feel like, for an indie. Oh, yeah. Yeah. And I will say, I did not realize about the history of this venue, so that was great to find out. And, yeah, I...
I like the fact that you have AEW doing, I guess, some of these venues where there is a long established history that aren't like, they're not the biggest in the market, but they appeal to, you know, the sickos. Brian in New Jersey writes, interesting show between the infusion of Shane Taylor promotions into things and the rotating chair on commentary. I liked Champa a lot tonight and Moxley is a pro by now, but I would have liked to have heard more from Shafir after her first line. Yeah. Yeah, I think that's it. As you said, always leave them wanting more. We all know this company has a massive roster, so it's nice when they use different parts of it we don't see every week. STP potentially getting another run on collision and positioned his heels over the Death Riders. The closing scene of the Death Riders and loosely connected babyfaces sharing the ring caught my eye, as well as the brief interaction between Lee Moriarty and Nigel McGinnis. I'd be all for Moriarty being on AEW TV more, though I'm not sure he's made for short squash matches.
I'll come back to that in a second. Takeshita versus Garcia was my match of the night with some very good selling from Takeshita and hot closing moments. Jake Doyle teaming with Brian Cage makes sense given Mark Davis success on his own and Cage's previous partner Lance Archer not being what he once was. The Dennis Condry segment was very nice and interesting for two reasons. The Midnight Express appearance in ROH was at a 2004 event in Philadelphia that I attended. Wow. It involved the Jimmy Rave era embassy and Ricky Morton. And Tony Schiavone credited the photographers responsible here, including Jim Cornette.
But for Marina Shafir, that would have been the most surprising thing on the show. I did want to go back to the thing about Lee Moriarty not being made for squash matches, because I do very much agree with that point. He's a very technical style, and a lot of his matches in ROH, if you go back and watch them, they're built around him just being able to, A, outlast, and B, outsmart his opponents. And yeah, you don't get that in a super short match, but we shall see. I am highly in favor of him, and as I said, STP in general.
doing more appearances. Kate, you know what I just realized? I think Tony Khan definitely listens to Collision Course because I'm realizing now a rotating co-host chair on the content desk, I think he's just stealing from you. I see you, Anthony. I see you.
Well, that is going to do it for us today. Thank you to everyone who listened live. And thank you to those of you who are taking the time to listen to us later on. John, let everyone else know what you do when you're not rotating in a chair here. Just rotating and rotating. Yeah, no. So I cover a couple of different shows for postwrestling.com. Kind of speaking of rotating, it rotates kind of every week. But this week, I believe I'll be covering Raw and Impact on Thursday. So, you know, check those out. You know, if you don't have time to watch, you can always check our recaps. We've got a nice crew writing up recaps every week. So go check it out, postwrestling.com.
And I will be back here next week with Wei Ting, making his return to Collision Course to start off the month of June. And as I said at the beginning of the show, that will be available on the free feed, as the show is normally Collision Course. Normally you have to pay to see this type of entertainment. But I will be back with Wei next Saturday, possibly with more cats. One never knows. And until that time, thank you so much once again for listening, and we'll see you here real soon.
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