Bonus Episode: WrestleMania 41 (Night 1) – Bloody Toothed Barbie

Bradley Palermo and Aaron Fink go late-night with this bonus Grapple City Rewind episode, breaking down all the chaos from WrestleMania 41 Night 1 in Las Vegas. We talk about Jey Uso making Gunther tap (?!), the New Day hitting a record 12th tag title run, Jade Cargill's clunky but strong win, and Tiffany Stratton stepping up big time against Charlotte Flair.

Plus, CM Punk, Seth Rollins, and Roman Reigns tear the house down in one of the best triple threats we’ve ever seen—complete with a wild Paul Heyman swerve. We also touch on the Hall of Fame, Sabu’s bloody GCW sendoff, indie crossovers, and why El Grande Americano is wrestling’s most ridiculous delight.

It's unfiltered, off-the-cuff, and full of hot takes. Come hang for a post-Mania rundown that pulls no punches.

(626) 657-SLAM

Email: Grapplecitypod@gmail.com

IG: @grapplecitypod

X: @grapplecitypod

TikTok: @grapplecitypod

Threads: @grapplecitypod

Music by Bradley Palermo & The Shadow Queens.

Created by Bradley Palermo & Aaron Fink.

Transcript

00:00.24
Bradley Palermo
Hello and welcome to Grapple City Rewind bonus edition. the Second time we did it. I'm Bradley Palermo as always with Aaron Fink. Aaron Fink.

00:13.05
Bradley Palermo
What's up, dude? We just watched WrestleMania 41 night one. That's why we're here.
 A
00:17.18
Aaron
We did. We did.

00:18.39
Bradley Palermo
We did. Yes, I feel bad keeping you up this late at night.

00:22.89
Aaron
I'm not that old, dude. I mean, come on. I did just have my birthday yesterday, but I'm only 36, okay?

00:27.45
Bradley Palermo
Happy birthday to Aaron. We talked about it a couple days ago. I should have talked to you about it yesterday. So happy early and belated both.

00:36.68
Aaron
Yeah, no worries. Thank you. This was a fun night. You know, i think overall, B, B plus for me? but If you had to give it a letter, what do you think you'd give it?

00:45.04
Bradley Palermo
Yeah.

00:48.38
Bradley Palermo
right, so a letter, I'm not sure. I think early on, we predicted we had predicted like all the matches. We kind of knew the outcome.

00:56.25
Aaron
Mm-hmm.

00:56.24
Bradley Palermo
It wasn't like so fantastic. I think the ending kind of was kind of awesome. I think WWE w kind of tickled their own balls a lot.

01:01.20
Aaron
Mm-hmm.

01:04.31
Bradley Palermo
like If you watch the afterwards thing, they're like, five-star match, right? Right, Dave? Right? You sure? Five star. Instant classic, right?

01:15.35
Aaron
They did.

01:15.55
Bradley Palermo
Podcasters.

01:16.16
Aaron
Yeah, they did say instant. Yeah, they did say they did call it an instant clap.

01:19.02
Bradley Palermo
Yeah.

01:20.04
Aaron
I mean, it was very good for sure.

01:21.53
Bradley Palermo
It was good.

01:21.72
Aaron
It was the best part of the event besides Jay winning.

01:24.07
Bradley Palermo
It was good, yeah. But it's like you don't...

01:27.15
Aaron
You're like, hey, look at how good this thing was. Let me point to it.

01:29.13
Bradley Palermo
You don't finish your concert with the last chord and you're like, rolling stone loves us. Remember to review. I mean, by the way, i remember to like rate review our podcast when you're done listening.

01:37.80
Aaron
yeah

01:42.65
Bradley Palermo
No, but it was good. It had its moments, right? But

01:45.34
Aaron
Yeah. it was an entertaining show. I mean, even with the matches that we discussed and were like, yeah, I don't know. I could kind of take it or leave it.

01:55.72
Aaron
I think they were all entertaining. I mean, even the ones that we predicted, i think we got most of them right. I think the one the one we were wrong about was Charlotte and Tiffany, which I was surprised about.

02:02.03
Bradley Palermo
right most

02:07.76
Aaron
and it was a good match, too. I mean, regardless of... how inconsistent the buildup was. i think that the match itself delivered. Dude, what do you think?

02:18.05
Bradley Palermo
yeah i was surprised and i appreciated it because i think we had predicted like you said every match up until then and then they kind of swerved us a little bit and i don't know where charlotte goes from here now that she's come back and not won for once and it was clean it was like a clean finish if i remember correctly and

02:36.96
Aaron
Yeah.

02:39.03
Bradley Palermo
Yeah, I mean, I think it it elevates Tiffany Stratton. And I think that that's honorable of of Charlotte to do that. I still think that she should creep closer to her father and championship wins with the 16, 17 thing. It doesn't have have to happen now. She's not, you know, she's not 50 years old. She has plenty of time to do that. And yeah, I thought it was fun.

02:58.98
Bradley Palermo
It was a great, great mix of like just power and athleticism athleticism, which I think like, Sometimes you get one or the other. I mean, Charlotte matches are always good, but it like really highlighted Tiffy with the fact that she is like pretty awesome.

03:08.90
Aaron
Yeah.

03:12.64
Bradley Palermo
And the entrance you know, Tiffany comes out like she's a fucking like in a Barbie box.

03:16.13
Aaron
With the bar in the Barbie thing.

03:18.45
Bradley Palermo
Yeah.

03:18.84
Aaron
Yeah, that was cool. She I did catch the a little bit of the press conference before we hopped on and she said she had always thought of doing something like that before she got to WWE.

03:19.95
Bradley Palermo
And. Oh,

03:30.91
Aaron
And then and then Hunter was like, hey, do you want to do something like this?

03:31.37
Bradley Palermo
cool. It's like a dream.

03:35.72
Aaron
And so, yeah, also also not about night one, but did you watch any of the the Hall of Fame last night?

03:43.30
Bradley Palermo
I didn't. You know, I'm really into whether I'm there or not, like all the indie matches and like all the ACW shit.

03:48.29
Aaron
yeah there was a there was so much

03:56.66
Aaron
i watched it this morning and so yeah i i wasn't it was i mean i really enjoyed it i thought

03:58.01
Bradley Palermo
Okay. Yeah. Let me know. How was it?

04:04.05
Aaron
I don't know, maybe maybe I'm getting emotional in my middle age, you know, but I really loved it. I thought everyone's speeches were great. It's just a night to, you know, honor the people that have done great things in the industry. And I just really loved how all the people who were inducted had such nice things to say about everyone.

04:25.77
Aaron
You know, the... I think for the natural disasters, the tag team that was inducted, earthquake had passed away, but Typhoon was still alive.

04:33.79
Aaron
And, you know, he was like,

04:34.55
Bradley Palermo
Yeah.

04:36.44
Aaron
He was my best friend and I miss him every day. And, you know, just, you know, I don't think they're trying to create create an artificial moment or something, but just there was a lot of emotion the whole night and and Triple H's speech was really good.

04:39.21
Bradley Palermo
Oh.

04:45.12
Bradley Palermo
Right.

04:50.25
Aaron
It was an hour long, though.

04:52.61
Bradley Palermo
Oh God. Right.

04:53.57
Aaron
He just went on and it was, there was literally not a point that i was bored or was like, all right, hurry it up. He just, he had a lot of people to thank. And it was essentially the whole point of his speech was just that, he didn't do, he didn't get to where he was alone.

05:08.72
Aaron
He was surrounded by lots of fantastic people who believed in him and helped him to get where he wanted to be.

05:08.97
Bradley Palermo
right

05:15.02
Bradley Palermo
I watched Sabu's final match last night, which was Joey Janela.

05:19.74
Aaron
Yeah.

05:19.86
Bradley Palermo
And I saw i saw Sabu's like photos during the day, you know, it's the punk rock museum.

05:20.26
Aaron
How's that?

05:26.32
Bradley Palermo
He took pictures with Fat Mike, Fat Mike smashes him over the head with a bag of espresso beans. So you had a nice little stuff.

05:35.18
Bradley Palermo
But then, you know, it's just like crazy stuff. Crazy shit. And we're talking about like ECW, like legend, legendary, like death match shit. Like it was barbed wire, no ropes.

05:46.99
Bradley Palermo
So he jumps, for we're barbed wire.

05:48.07
Aaron
So the ropes were barbed wire.

05:50.49
Bradley Palermo
And then outside of the ring, there was like a mat of barbed wire. Like, so he went, he went through it.

05:55.10
Aaron
Good Lord, he is 60 years old.

05:58.19
Bradley Palermo
And then I mean, there were so many times, and then eventually they they popped him, like, so many times with the barbed wire that his head looked like a murder scene.

06:09.04
Bradley Palermo
And I'm not kidding. Like, the pool of blood under his head was insane.

06:10.80
Aaron
Jeez.

06:14.00
Bradley Palermo
So the lights go out because clearly you need to do some work here. You have a 60-year-old or whatever, 60-something. What did you say his age was?

06:21.67
Aaron
No, he's 60 exactly. Born in 1964. Profusely.

06:23.81
Bradley Palermo
Oh, 60, exactly. Yep. So he's...

06:26.59
Bradley Palermo
bleeding like major pool of blood on his head like looks seriously and i've already seen crazy shit that night and the lights go out they come back on it's like inner sandman and the fucking sandman comes out and there's like two thousand plus people for gcw the fucking sandman if you don't if you guys don't know another ecw legend that's had dark side the ring shows about him and stuff he comes out he's got the fucking kendo stick

06:27.96
Aaron
profusely

06:50.08
Bradley Palermo
which is ECW, from my understanding, is kind of why WWE has the Kendo sticks and stuff in their matches and that whole thing.

06:56.33
Aaron
Mm-hmm.

06:58.62
Bradley Palermo
They were trying to buy some time, but I mean, that was like was legendary too. like A lot of the stuff that's indie that's around WrestleMania, that piggybacks on WrestleMania is is kind of legendary too. And like for for GCW now to have...

07:13.88
Bradley Palermo
have these like legends like ending their careers in the ring they have they're also getting wwe stars like they had natalia

07:21.67
Aaron
At Bloodsport.

07:22.83
Bradley Palermo
at blood sport they also had shana blazer uh i'm sorry shana baser how do you say her name basler a combination of the way the two ways i said it wrong but yeah

07:24.16
Aaron
Yep.

07:29.11
Aaron
Baszler? Shayna Baszler.

07:34.95
Aaron
Yeah, Shayna Baszler, Karrion Kross was there, Natalia Neinhart was there.

07:39.57
Bradley Palermo
No, it was so good. It's getting so big. I feel like WWE is probably going to buy it. And WWE just bought another organization that i've I've flown to Mexico to see.

07:50.68
Bradley Palermo
And I've seen a lot of cool stars there.

07:51.09
Aaron
Yeah.

07:53.86
Bradley Palermo
Triple A, which is... or we call it AAA. It's the big Mexican promotion. They have TripleMania, which is kind of like WrestleMania, but it happens in three nights in three different cities across different regions of Mexico. I've I've gone to it before and seen like Penteo Cerramero and QT Marshall and

08:14.31
Bradley Palermo
uh who's the chick that's married to Johnny Morrison I've seen Taya down there bleed more than you've ever seen anybody fucking bleed in your fucking life she was making a point so WWE goes oh I saw uh uh Iho Del Vakingo win the fucking championship down there and

08:17.100
Aaron
Taya Valkyrie. hmm.

08:31.33
Aaron
Dove Kinga.

08:33.99
Aaron
hmm.

08:36.25
Bradley Palermo
like camp He was there at the match tonight.

08:36.58
Aaron
Yeah. Yeah, at night one.

08:38.29
Bradley Palermo
so i can't but I can't believe all my like indie dreams are colliding with WWE.

08:39.18
Aaron
Yeah, they saw him in the crowd.

08:43.55
Bradley Palermo
This is kind of fucking exciting. i mean They have Evolve on on Tubi on Tuesday nights or Wednesday nights, rather, where they have all the indie artists or the indie...

08:50.10
Aaron
Mm-hmm. huh

08:54.26
Bradley Palermo
wrestlers, sorry, they're working themselves into a fucking frenzy, like just fucking doing all the shit they do in the indies.

09:02.88
Bradley Palermo
And now WWE is like buying stuff up. I think it's probably part of the competition to be like, you know, fuck AEW. We're going to like get in in on this before you can get it in on it.

09:11.84
Bradley Palermo
But, but they're doing a good job.

09:12.40
Aaron
Yeah, could be. I mean, certainly seems that way. All right.

09:15.74
Bradley Palermo
Yeah.

09:16.46
Aaron
So let's get back to the card of the night. So first match of the night is Jey Uso against Goofther. Jey Uso picked up the win, as we predicted.

09:26.51
Aaron
And... It was a better match than I thought it was going to be. What I particularly enjoyed about it was how at the end, Jay overcame Gunther by doing Gunther's own moves against him, including making Gunther tap out to the sleeper, which I was personally very surprised by.

09:45.64
Aaron
I didn't think that's how the match was going to end. So yeah.

09:48.50
Bradley Palermo
I can't believe that Gunther tapped out fucking clean. Like they buried his ass, huh?

09:54.64
Aaron
Well, I mean, they didn't. but I think he's so he's he's proven so much how good of a worker he is and how much he has the fans in the palm of his hand that like it's OK for this is you know, this is his third clean loss.

10:10.12
Aaron
But like that's a bigger deal for Jay than it is for Gunther, I think.

10:10.24
Bradley Palermo
Yeah.

10:13.79
Bradley Palermo
I mean, i think we agreed before that Jay has to win this match or had to win this match.

10:18.38
Aaron
Yeah. Yeah.

10:18.97
Bradley Palermo
And like, you know, he did and it was important. And Gunther is really good and he'll be fine.

10:26.26
Aaron
Yeah, for sure.

10:26.36
Bradley Palermo
But i was like, damn, you didn't just pin him.

10:27.92
Aaron
Really great match.

10:29.22
Bradley Palermo
The motherfucker said I quit.

10:29.98
Aaron
No, he made him submit. Yeah, that was crazy.

10:31.97
Bradley Palermo
Yeah.

10:33.06
Aaron
I was really surprised that he made Gunther tap out.

10:34.81
Bradley Palermo
was surprised.

10:35.90
Aaron
Like, damn, that was definitive as shit.

10:38.68
Bradley Palermo
Yes.

10:39.54
Aaron
And then the second match was pretty good. Like, even though it was something that we were like, eh, four, I enjoyed it New Day versus the Viking Raiders or the War Raiders.

10:49.19
Aaron
And... Yeah, it was. We called that one too New Day, did some shady heel stuff and then became the 12 time tag team champions, which I guess in I saw in the post show is a record there.

10:53.97
Bradley Palermo
Yeah.

11:03.23
Aaron
They've won the most tag team championships.

11:04.91
Bradley Palermo
down yeah i mean yeah i know i said i don't give a shit about this match i kind of didn't when it happened it's cool the new day one i think when the war raiders got crickets when they were up there as baby faces chanting war and nobody fucking did it they're like war war and everyone in the audience is just kind of like hey you want to drink a beer i don't know fucking

11:25.48
Aaron
But they were into the match. I mean, like they were invested in the match once it got going. You know, I was actually pretty impressed with the crowd overall for a giant football stadium with 60,000 people.

11:34.07
Bradley Palermo
Oh, yeah.

11:36.82
Aaron
I felt like I heard them the vast majority of the time. So props to the Vegas crowd.

11:40.75
Bradley Palermo
Yeah. I pay attention a little bit to the crowd more than I did before because we talk about it a lot on the show. And and I think that...

11:50.36
Bradley Palermo
yeah i mean the the crowd was like night one of the philly show last year was just yeah it was dead and it was cold out there and i don't blame them or whatever but like it was nothing going on like vegas has been nuts like since like smackdown on friday like they've been fucking nuts but i did think

11:56.61
Aaron
They were so quiet. Yeah. And it was so cold.

12:11.24
Bradley Palermo
I don't know. I mean, they tried with this match. They had George Kittle, which I think has a...

12:16.64
Aaron
yeah

12:17.57
Bradley Palermo
Someone who's related to him is dating Taylor Swift, right? His brother?

12:21.90
Aaron
No, that's the that's travis Travis Kelsey, Jason Kelsey is who you're thinking of.

12:25.91
Bradley Palermo
They're not all the same people.

12:27.56
Aaron
They're not.

12:27.60
Bradley Palermo
All right.

12:28.03
Aaron
they're they're all those those big brawny football players are not the same.

12:33.90
Bradley Palermo
Okay. I don't watch football or know anything about it.

12:36.25
Aaron
Neither do I.

12:36.38
Bradley Palermo
i would

12:37.10
Aaron
It's okay.

12:37.14
Bradley Palermo
I was like, who is George Kittle and is he fucking Taylor Swift was in my notes.

12:40.75
Aaron
No.

12:41.31
Bradley Palermo
on All right. New Jade cheated, though, to get that pin.

12:44.58
Aaron
They did, yeah.

12:44.97
Bradley Palermo
Moving Moving on to Naomi versus Jade Cargill. i think I think we kind of said that we thought Jade was going to get it. Yeah.

12:54.08
Aaron
We did, yeah.

12:55.00
Bradley Palermo
yeah i thought the match was...

12:57.39
Bradley Palermo
clunky, a little bit clunky. Yeah.

12:59.16
Aaron
At times, you know, Naomi does this thing where she just keeps having to adjust her outfit. And I've noticed it happens all the time. And I i wonder if it's just because maybe she had a wardrobe malfunction one time and she's like super nervous about it.

13:14.82
Bradley Palermo
Right.

13:14.94
Aaron
But it It kind of took me out of it a little bit that I just kept seeing her adjusting her outfit, you know, but I thought overall it was a pretty good match. There were some intense looking spots and it wasn't really surprising how it ended, but yeah,

13:29.06
Bradley Palermo
Right, with Jade on top.

13:30.78
Aaron
I thought it was good. You know, it was it didn't, it wasn't super long. It wasn't too short. i felt like it was, it delivered. It was Jade's first WrestleMania singles match. And, I can't forget. i i mean, I, sorry, I can't remember exactly what the stat was, but it's like the first non-title women's match at WrestleMania in like 10 10 plus years, which is pretty cool too.

13:50.98
Bradley Palermo
Oh, that's cool. I didn't even know. Yeah, I thought Jade was like a better worker than I remember her being.

13:52.67
Aaron
Yeah.

13:57.08
Aaron
Yeah.

13:57.86
Bradley Palermo
But like, I feel like she doesn't, I mean, she just looks so fucking good as far as like,

14:04.96
Aaron
physique. Yeah.

14:05.91
Bradley Palermo
physique. Yeah, like she looks better than any of the men or women have since, I don't know, put her up against Lex Luger in like 89, you know?

14:15.22
Aaron
Mm-hmm.

14:15.85
Bradley Palermo
Like she's truly amazing and i and I feel like they have a wellness policy so I don't think, you know, she's

14:16.08
Aaron
Mm-hmm.

14:20.96
Aaron
She can't be righted out. Yeah.

14:22.68
Bradley Palermo
I don't think she's righted, man.

14:23.98
Aaron
No, she, she's just a naturally gifted athlete.

14:24.08
Bradley Palermo
I mean, she looks really good.

14:27.12
Aaron
Yeah.

14:27.14
Bradley Palermo
And I think when you look really good, you don't always have, like you can get like fast forwarded a little bit through through the ranks. And I think she does work better than I've seen her ever before.

14:37.66
Aaron
Yeah, she's getting better. She's improving, which is all you can really ask for.

14:38.92
Bradley Palermo
and she and And I'm not saying that she, yeah, she's definitely like WrestleMania level, but I was kind of like, okay, there's still moments where I'm kind of like, don't know.

14:47.92
Aaron
i mean, dude, she's she's wrestled less than five years, I think.

14:48.41
Bradley Palermo
I don't know what's going on. There's some weird shit. Like, who's hit who here? Yeah. Yeah.

14:55.26
Aaron
So, I mean, if you think about it like that, yeah, yeah.

14:55.31
Bradley Palermo
But she is where she is. Yeah. No, it's cool.

14:58.31
Aaron
She's definitely, I mean, there's always people in the history of any sport, including wrestling that get thrust into the spotlight before they're comfortable with it or before they're experienced enough for it.

15:10.51
Bradley Palermo
Mm-hmm.

15:12.64
Aaron
But people tend to either sink to the bottom real fast or rise to the occasion. And I feel like she hasn't sunk.

15:18.65
Bradley Palermo
yeah

15:20.64
Aaron
She's rising to the occasion. So, you know, For me, it's just like anything else in life. If you're getting better, if you're you're improving over time, that's all you can really do.

15:29.16
Bradley Palermo
Let's go. Yeah, let's go. and We had Jacob Fatu versus Knight for the US Championship. And I know.

15:35.31
Aaron
Another good match. Crowd was really into this match.

15:38.66
Bradley Palermo
Yeah, I feel like we... We knew what was going to happen. We knew Jacob was going to was going to get that US championship, but man, it was it was good to see him do it.

15:42.85
Aaron
Mm-hmm.

15:46.74
Bradley Palermo
And I know I've said it before and we've talked about it before, but like he was in the Indies not that long ago. You could you could pay 40 bucks and be in the front row and fucking slap his back and he'll slap yours back.

15:53.46
Aaron
Yeah. Yeah.

15:58.21
Bradley Palermo
Yeah. Yeah. And now, like, a few months later, the dude just fucking won gold and at WrestleMania. He won it clean.

16:05.97
Aaron
And he won it clean. Solo didn't interfere, I don't think, right? I didn't see it.

16:10.33
Bradley Palermo
No, no, he won it clean from line from my room memory.

16:11.89
Aaron
Yeah.

16:13.90
Bradley Palermo
And, you know, and i'm just I'm just glad that he can join the ranks of Eddie Guerrero and Ric Flair and Lex Luger. And most importantly...

16:22.94
Bradley Palermo
Now he's on the same level as Matt fucking Riddle. The fuck, man? Yeah.

16:29.30
Aaron
The bro.

16:29.43
Bradley Palermo
Bro.

16:29.94
Aaron
Oh

16:29.91
Bradley Palermo
Who I also saw on GCW this week.

16:32.98
Aaron
boy. Of course.

16:34.59
Bradley Palermo
But no, Jacob Hatu is a badass. He's fucking 300 pounds and fucking flies to the air like a goddamn airplane and then lands in your ass like oh a goddamn anvil.

16:37.98
Aaron
He's the man.

16:44.30
Aaron
Yeah.

16:44.50
Bradley Palermo
Yes. Yes to everything happening with Jacob Hatu. And then we went to, Il Grande Americano versus Ray Phoenix, which I don't usually like comedy in my wrestling. Like I want to suspend my disbelief, but this was fucking great.

16:59.88
Bradley Palermo
You have the white guy who like supposedly went to Mexico and learned Lucha Libre. And he's like, he's coming back with his promo package and they they show the promo package.

17:10.39
Bradley Palermo
And it's like a guy with a Mexican accent speaking in English overdubbing El Grande Americano, Chad Gable.

17:13.93
Aaron
Yeah.

17:17.27
Aaron
ye

17:19.96
Bradley Palermo
overdubbing him in English. And so so you see Chad Gable's like mouth moving a lot, and then you just hear a guy with speaking English in a fucking different... This blows my mind. It's so fucking hilarious. And then he comes out to like the President's March played in Mariachi,

17:37.24
Bradley Palermo
what the fuck and change the filter on the thing to look like it's like some old like super eight like shit from mexico from the 70s and the match wasn't like anything to speak home about but it it did end the way we thought it would which was with americano on top and

17:56.45
Aaron
cheating to win, but we did I did think that maybe he would be unmasked this evening, and that was not true. He was not unmasked. He is still...

18:04.34
Bradley Palermo
so he will live to see another day

18:06.59
Aaron
Yeah, we will we're continuing this this ruse, if you will.

18:11.13
Bradley Palermo
Oh my god.

18:12.12
Aaron
But then we did get something that we already chatted about a little bit before, Tiffany Stratton against Charlotte Flair for the WWE wwe Women's Championship. You know, I did a little Twitter scrolling. I saw some people thought it was clunky. I didn't really see it. I just thought that it was, you know, there was maybe a little bit more of like,

18:30.56
Aaron
shoot style, a real life maybe you know animosity thrown in there occasionally. it kind of looked like Tiffany chipped a tooth. Did you see that at the end of the match?

18:39.17
Bradley Palermo
Her teeth looked fucked up. It looked like... I mean, there was some blood on her mouth, but I'm not sure like if anything was missing. But it definitely looked like something was going on with her mouth, which...

18:47.72
Aaron
Yeah, she had a bump on her forehead. So it was a very physical match. I mean, i i don't know. I thought it was good. it was it was not...

19:08.93
Aaron
I was surprised by the finish. I think we both were, you know, yeah.

19:11.80
Bradley Palermo
Yeah, which I appreciate. Yeah.

19:14.83
Aaron
I, you

19:14.92
Bradley Palermo
My friends. Okay.

19:16.76
Aaron
Well, you know, Charlotte got Tiffany in the figure four and we kind of thought that maybe that was going to be it for her, but she attacked Charlotte's surgically repaired knee.

19:27.46
Aaron
And, you know, it was kind of cool. they They both started messing with each other's legs because, you know, Charlotte had her knee worked on recently. I think she tore her ACL and Tiffany is just an aerial competitor. So, yeah.

19:41.02
Aaron
ultimately it was Tiffany that got that moonsault and, and got the win, but I enjoyed it. Honestly. I'm, I, I suspect that this won't be the last time that they wrestle and maybe Charlotte's around for, you know, a bit more time, bit more regular of a, of a competitor.

19:57.78
Aaron
so we'll see.

19:58.83
Bradley Palermo
Yeah, I thought it was a good match. I mean, if it was clunky or not, like, I just appreciated it and know the ending. And I thought buddy that stopped by that doesn't watch wrestling's take on it was... Because they're both in, like, pink, like, garter belts and shit.

20:15.45
Bradley Palermo
He's like, I can smell... I can smell them through the TV. They smell like cotton candy fruit stripper smell. Like I can smell this. And I thought, and thought it was funny. I was like, I can smell that now too.

20:30.10
Bradley Palermo
But all right. So then we, we, we got the main event Rollins versus Reigns versus CM Punk, which I don't really like the triple threat thing usually, but this was the best triple threat that I've ever seen in my fucking life.

20:42.10
Aaron
Yeah.

20:43.45
Bradley Palermo
You agree on that?

20:43.85
Aaron
Yeah. I think so. I mean, who eventually when we feel like it, we're going to start reviewing early 2000s pay-per-views from WWF and WWE.

20:54.24
Bradley Palermo
Yeah.

20:56.66
Aaron
And I suspect there will be some triple threats in there that we're going to like as well. But this is the best one that I can remember in many, many years.

21:05.38
Bradley Palermo
Yeah, I probably haven't seen as many of those as you, but I'm looking forward to seeing more. And this is the best one probably that I can recall seeing. But you know just real quick, like entrances, like Seth fucking comes out.

21:18.84
Bradley Palermo
It's all black. He's got a blowtorch, like the fire, all the shit from from like back in the day, but he's got a flamethrower.

21:22.08
Aaron
Flamethrower.

21:25.41
Bradley Palermo
And then the lights go out, Undertaker style. He comes back. He's in all white. Like, I mean, the guy goes from like hell to heaven and like... you know, a couple seconds. WWE always really good at doing fucking lot of with the lights off for not very much time.

21:40.49
Bradley Palermo
And I feel like they they could get The Undertaker like out from like under the ring and up appear or whatever.

21:40.96
Aaron
Yeah.

21:45.62
Bradley Palermo
I just really appreciate all of that production. Roman had a great entrance. All of his family are like on screens to like drop down. You know you got Yokozuna and Rikishi and everybody.

21:54.68
Aaron
Yeah.

21:57.54
Bradley Palermo
And punk, of course, is is big fanfare coming out.

22:00.19
Aaron
Getting, uh, yeah. Getting living color to play a cult of personality. That was pretty cool.

22:07.10
Aaron
i'm

22:13.13
Bradley Palermo
He, every time he moves to a different company, from my understanding, has them rerecord and get paid off that publishing you know again.

22:16.61
Aaron
he like He has them rerecord it so they can make money. Yeah.

22:22.35
Bradley Palermo
So

22:23.03
Aaron
Yeah, they don't have the master recording license. They must have the publishing and not the master.

22:26.26
Bradley Palermo
yeah, I know as a musician, I forget like what people know or what, but basically like, yeah.

22:27.70
Aaron
And that's why they were rerecord. Yeah, I was a minor in music industry. That's the only reason I know I used to want to do the contracts and stuff. Music supervision, you know?

22:38.75
Bradley Palermo
Yeah, like when you get your mechanical royalties off of somebody playing your song on like a radio or a casino or even if you yourself play it in a room, anytime it's broadcast publicly, you get paid for the mechanical royalty on that

22:45.33
Aaron
hmm.

22:53.14
Bradley Palermo
that performance being published in that venue at that time. So even if someone else owns the song or the copyright or whatever, you can, this is all like very quick layman's, but like you can just redo it and have a different version of the song done and you get paid.

23:07.12
Aaron
Yeah.

23:07.42
Bradley Palermo
No one does that. Punk actually lets the artist have the opportunity to do that. And it's a lot of fucking money, y'all. Like, if you're playing it like it's based on how many people are fucking that could fit in the room so when you're getting played every night for monday night raw at like 20 000 caps like it doesn't matter if you're there or if your recording is played like it's big money so that's so that's i that's a huge win for the music industry i love cm punk i think he's on the wrong side right side of politics all the time wish he would have won this match though

23:14.32
Aaron
Yeah, it's big time.

23:37.72
Aaron
Yeah, but you know just despite how it ended, man, was it it it was an entertaining match. They took their time. They had some fights on the outside. What I appreciated is that there was really only one time where I was thinking to myself, where's so-and-so?

23:54.52
Aaron
Because usually the problem with triple threat matches is that it's two guys

23:55.28
Bradley Palermo
Yeah. Mm-hmm.

24:01.04
Aaron
And then one of them goes away and then it's two you know two other guys. And then one of them goes away and then it's two other guys. It's rarely seamless between all three. And I feel like this match did that very well, especially the end with all the false finishes and the way that everyone was kind of like...

24:20.39
Aaron
that the that the insanity of the match and the ups and downs were continuing from one set of people to another. it was just really, really fun. i I think probably my favorite part was the see the sequence where...

24:33.70
Aaron
Punk hit Rollins with his finishing move, a GTS. And then Rollins kind of gets knocked back, but he's not on the ground. And then Roman hits Punk with the spear. And then Roman's, you know, position to be curb stomped. And then Rollins curb stomps him. And then they all dropped, know, they're all on the ground and no one's covering anyone.

24:53.62
Aaron
It was so fun.

24:53.65
Bradley Palermo
Dude, yeah, they somehow hit, however it worked out, they somehow all three hit each other's, they hit each, all three hit each other with the finishers, like, and then they're all down.

24:57.95
Aaron
All their finishers in like 10 seconds.

25:03.95
Aaron
Yeah. It's It's like a domino effect.

25:04.73
Bradley Palermo
It's like a, like a Mexican standoff in a, in a movie, but like somehow everyone shoots everybody. It was just crazy. And then, you know, Paul Heyman is left to the deciding factor with this chair.

25:15.65
Bradley Palermo
And then, you know, He turns on Roman by giving it to Punk. Low blows Punk. Turns on Punk by giving it to Roman. Low blows Roman. And then I think, Aaron, you called it. You said, I don't know. Maybe.

25:28.12
Bradley Palermo
i believe it's, you know, we got it on record that you were like, I don't know. It's going to be it's going to be Heyman. Maybe he fucking gives it to Seth. But you were also like, definitely not Seth.

25:38.04
Aaron
I definitely didn't think Seth was going to win. i will take the L on that. But what I was sure about is that Heyman was going to have a very big part to play in the finish, whatever it was.

25:48.33
Bradley Palermo
Right.

25:48.94
Aaron
So.

25:49.01
Bradley Palermo
You did get that. Somebody said, and I don't know, i think I think, I feel like it might have been mumbled by you, but you're like, at the very end of that conversation, like, I don't know maybe he fucking turns and gives it to Seth.

25:57.11
Aaron
Maybe I was like, I don't know, it could be Seth. Yeah.

26:00.66
Bradley Palermo
But like, he did.

26:02.66
Aaron
He did.

26:01.97
Bradley Palermo
and I don't know where this fucking goes, but I appreciate it because I feel like the the Triple H era is like not... super predictable and i was texting you after we predicted the first like whatever four or five matches like are we gonna predict this whole fucking thing and last year night one wasn't that good like i said and this year i feel like night one was good and wasn't predictable and did have things to talk about and so i'm stoked to see where hayman and rollins go with this shit this is exciting you know and

26:10.52
Aaron
Mm-hmm.

26:19.82
Aaron
Yeah.

26:28.32
Aaron
Yeah.

26:30.00
Aaron
Me too. I don't know what going to be, but it's fun.

26:32.09
Bradley Palermo
Yeah, and dude, I don't know, like before i before I left and like jetted over here to to talk about the whole thing on this podcast, I did see a minute of the press scrum and Jey Uso was fucked up.

26:45.61
Bradley Palermo
Did you see that?

26:45.98
Aaron
Yeah, I did. Yeah, he was he had a couple of drinkies.

26:47.87
Bradley Palermo
He was fucking maybe drunk, maybe stone, maybe crossfaded. It was, no, I think it was awesome.

26:54.62
Aaron
Let him celebrate. Yeah.

26:56.86
Bradley Palermo
I think he was like, they were like, what are you want to do? And he's like, oh is it the sunglasses on? He's like, yeet. I'm just like fucking, oh yeah, yeah, yeet.

27:06.04
Bradley Palermo
And then he starts talking and it's just mumbly. And I was like,

27:09.48
Aaron
Yeah.

27:10.46
Bradley Palermo
Looking at my friend, like, how long ago did he wrestle? And he's, like, looking at his watch. He's like, whoa, we're behind live.

27:13.56
Aaron
first match.

27:14.82
Bradley Palermo
So it's, like, been five hours. was like, oh, dude, this guy is fucked up.

27:16.75
Aaron
Yeah.

27:19.32
Bradley Palermo
and So he's so happy. he just fucking won the fucking World Heavyweight Championship.

27:24.49
Aaron
Yeah, dude.

27:24.79
Bradley Palermo
Like, fuck yeah, dude. So, um i don't know. We just want to jump in there for for our little 30-minute thing, and we will be back tomorrow around the same time, late night, after WrestleMania night two.

27:38.11
Bradley Palermo
This has been gra will ahug Grapple City Rewind bonus episode. And if you want to find us or talk to us or give any your opinions about

27:48.42
Bradley Palermo
Anything we said or anything we might say in the future, potentially, you can always find us.

27:53.36
Aaron
Or how you felt about WrestleMania.

27:55.36
Bradley Palermo
Exactly. Land us know how you felt or your predictions for tomorrow. We will play them and then respond. yeah You can find all of our contact information below in the description of this episode or, you know, grapplecitypod.com, at grapplecitypod on whatever social media.

28:18.44
Aaron
Nuggets.

28:22.49
Aaron
No, no, I'll let my predictions lie. I don't even remember what I said, to be honest, but I had i had a good time. Good first night of WrestleMania. And yeah, I'm excited to chat with you tomorrow and see if we were right and watch some Hall of Fame while you're working tomorrow, but maybe maybe watch some Hall of Fame.

28:30.61
Bradley Palermo
Fuck yeah.

28:39.55
Aaron
There were some good speeches and yeah.

28:41.24
Bradley Palermo
I find a way to watch it all, you know, in between everything else. So high fives all around. Good times. This has been a Grapple City Rewind bonus episode. See you tomorrow night. Late, y'all.

28:52.08
Aaron
Bye.