Tired as the show has been in stretches for a while, it would be unfortunate for the show to end before we could get more episodes focused on the periods book-ending the Attitude Era.

The show is going on, but their remaining live dates are being touted as a farewell tour, make of that what you will. 

I liked the episode on Jerry Lawler. I found it interesting that Bruce saw the segments between Lawler and Heyman as what should have been for that horrible program he had with Piper. And of course his differing account from Lawler himself about what really happened when he quit. 

They explained that logistically, the live shows just aren't going to work. It's not unreasonable to think there will come a time when they decide they can't deliver with a weekly podcast, but for now, keeping that going isn't unrealistic the way continuing the live shows would be.

Didn't get much out of the Austin episode, mostly because they've covered pretty much every 1997 show at this point. Not a bad episode, but if you've heard those episodes, a lot of this felt like retread.

On 3/1/2019 at 9:14 PM, Johnny Sorrow said:

Apparently Bruce is only a consultant on creative so he's not leaving the show.

Apart from live appearances and just the actual show itself, I don't get the impression he does anywhere near the heavy lifting for the show Conrad does as far as research, apart from maybe re-watching whatever show they cover. 

It could actually be beneficial to his position in the company, to go over old ground and see how it could possibly fit in the framework of what's going on now. 

Gave up the Austin 97 edition after 20 minutes. Total rehash. I hope the podcast won't turn into the Network version... The Jerry Lawler episode was excellent though, especially the entire quitting over Stacy fiasco and the many times Lawler implemented little details to his angles that made it even better.

Half-way through the Mania XX podcast and it is so nothing. If that's what the podcast is gonna be now, might as well shut it down, really. Compare it to the PPV edition Bischoff has been doing lately... 

"We're telling a story" "They were telling a story" "It was about the story"

Ok. I think we got the point.

(no joke, no story, no funny stuff either)

6 hours ago, El-P said:

Half-way through the Mania XX podcast and it is so nothing. If that's what the podcast is gonna be now, might as well shut it down, really. Compare it to the PPV edition Bischoff has been doing lately... 

"We're telling a story" "They were telling a story" "It was about the story"

Ok. I think we got the point.

(no joke, no story, no funny stuff either)

This one jumped the shark for me months ago, probably coinciding with when they went big and became about merch, live events and dedicated this to hawking and trashing on Meltzer.  A real shame but its nice to have some room in the rotation.  Is the Bischoff show strong?  Never checked it out.

38 minutes ago, WingedEagle said:

Is the Bischoff show strong?  Never checked it out.

Myself and a couple of other posters have been discussing the differences between STW and the improving 83 Weeks here in the 83 Weeks thread. Check it out and see what you think?

2 hours ago, The Thread Killer said:

Myself and a couple of other posters have been discussing the differences between STW and the improving 83 Weeks here in the 83 Weeks thread. Check it out and see what you think?

Thanks, sounds like I need to check it out.  Will dive in with the latest ep and see if I can make any progress on prior ones.

Right. There have been a few exceptions here & there (Sid, Taker '04+, even Lawler to a degree) that have had a little bit of spark to them, but yeah. This show has been mostly lifeless for awhile now.

It's a shame, but the project itself may have run its course. You could tell Bruce was all about the live shows & the merch towards the end anyway.

But yeah. Scope out some 83 Weeks, man. It's an easy listen, it's informative, and Eric comes across as genuinely engaged.

There should be plenty of episode recommendations over in the 83 Weeks thread if you want to cherry pick to get started.

3 hours ago, WingedEagle said:

Thanks, sounds like I need to check it out.  Will dive in with the latest ep and see if I can make any progress on prior ones.

@WingedEagle just my suggestion, but you might want to start with the series of episodes they did this past winter reviewing several years of the Starrcade PPV's, there is some good stuff in there.

1 hour ago, The Thread Killer said:

@WingedEagle just my suggestion, but you might want to start with the series of episodes they did this past winter reviewing several years of the Starrcade PPV's, there is some good stuff in there.

Thanks, will give those a look as well as the AWA one as that seemed to be well reviewed.

The Starrcade series is the bee's fleas, for sure. And the AWA one is all about Eric's origin, which is fascinating and filled with fun stories.

Don't sleep on his two surrounding his signing & first year with WWE though.

Good stuff, will check them all out.  Thanks!

Ok, so the WM X podcast was much better than the XX I thought. Solid episode to cover what was an old favourite of mine back in the days. I guess if I consider my "complete mark" days, Owen winning is probably one of my favourite, legit mark out moment of that period.

13 hours ago, El-P said:

Ok, so the WM X podcast was much better than the XX I thought. Solid episode to cover what was an old favourite of mine back in the days. I guess if I consider my "complete mark" days, Owen winning is probably one of my favourite, legit mark out moment of that period.

Glad to hear this. It's not an exaggeration when I say I remember nothing about the Mania XX episode. I'll never cut it out entirely because I work mornings in a kitchen by myself and have 8+ hours to listen and music just doesn't help me get my work done. 

What did y'all think of how Bruce was telling the Burt Reynolds/Pam Seals/Barry Windham story? I totally buy that Burt—who was something of a fan but probably not enough to know where Barry was working—may have mentioned something about his girlfriend's ex being a wrestler to his agent, who then mentioned it to Titan. But...was Bruce just misremembering Barry being there, bullshitting as he's known to do, or correctly remembering a random Barry backstage visit that sounds incongruous to us? It's probably not the last one, but the Barry Windham/Pam Seals relationship isn't exactly super well known, so it would be a bit random to make up the story out of whole cloth, wouldn't it?

3 hours ago, Bix said:

But...was Bruce just misremembering Barry being there, bullshitting as he's known to do, or correctly remembering a random Barry backstage visit that sounds incongruous to us?

He wasn't in WCW at the time (he just showed up at Slamboree the following months for that one match), so maybe he was just visiting. That's my take, I don't see why Bruce would just bullshit about that kind of detail. The fact he said "I think Barry was doing the Blackjacks" shows he was confused about the Barry timeline, but it came off like trying to make sense of Barry being backstage at Mania X. Barry was at the first Mania, he wasn't doing anything at the time (still injured), so why not.

8 hours ago, El-P said:

He wasn't in WCW at the time (he just showed up at Slamboree the following months for that one match), so maybe he was just visiting. That's my take, I don't see why Bruce would just bullshit about that kind of detail. The fact he said "I think Barry was doing the Blackjacks" shows he was confused about the Barry timeline, but it came off like trying to make sense of Barry being backstage at Mania X. Barry was at the first Mania, he wasn't doing anything at the time (still injured), so why not.

My thinking too. Seems entirely plausible that a free agent with so many connections would be backstage at the big event.

Rotunda was there too, though in what turned out to be a non-working capacity as well. It's a shame the 10-man tag didn't happen, I can think of 2-3 matches that could have been shelved in favor of it. I don't find it hard to believe either, he left suddenly in 89 but I wouldn't think it was on bad terms with the company. 

The Little Richard story was fascinating. I heard Jennie Garth was a chore to deal with generally so not surprised about that either. 

2 hours ago, flyonthewall2983 said:

 I don't find it hard to believe either, he left suddenly in 89 but I wouldn't think it was on bad terms with the company. 

Yes, especially since he was hired back in 96 anyway.

2 hours ago, flyonthewall2983 said:

The Little Richard story was fascinating.

Agreed. Good stuff on that episode.

3 hours ago, flyonthewall2983 said:

I don't find it hard to believe either, he left suddenly in 89 but I wouldn't think it was on bad terms with the company. 

Was it over the indictment of Kendall and Blackjack Mulligan?  His 1989 run is such a blur to me.

My favorite thing from the Mania 10 show was Bruce telling us he was an asshole, idiotic dope dealing with Burt Reynolds and Little Richard.

12 hours ago, CarpetCrawler said:

Was it over the indictment of Kendall and Blackjack Mulligan?  His 1989 run is such a blur to me.

I think he said as much in shoot interviews, that family issues precluded him from working at the time. 

Still digging into the Wrestlemania X-7 show, but the rodeo story reminds me of something I cannot stand about Conrad: He fucking sucks at building off of a lot of Bruce's stories, unless it's low-hanging fruit like asking for a hypothetical Vince response. 

Bruce goes through the whole story about the politics of that rodeo and Conrad's response is to jump right into one of the ad spots. It's not like I need a big back and forth about this rodeo, but it reminded me of how often Conrad does this where he won't even give a one-sentence response to a story Bruce tells. It reminds me of an inexperienced journalist going in with a set of questions and being too naive or "focused" to see opportunities to ask other questions about things that emerge from a conversation/interview.