AJ Lee’s Return as ESPN debuts WrestlePalooza

Wrestling history unfolds as WWE's first-ever ESPN exclusive event takes center stage. Ben and Bash podcast delivers a breakdown of WrestlePalooza, marking the beginning of WWE's partnership with ESPN after moving from Peacock.

Subscribe to our channel and join us for our first-ever live stream of the event on Twitch as we experience this groundbreaking show together!

Transcript

Intro to WrestlePalooza on ESPN

Speaker 1 0:04

Welcome to the Ben and Bash podcast tag team talk .

Speaker 2 0:07

I'm Ben .

Speaker 1 0:07

I'm Bash . It's time to lace up your boots and hit the mat with the Ben and Bash podcast tag team talk .

Speaker 2 0:12

All right , here we are for another one . We're going to be doing the first ever WrestlePalooza WWE's . I don't know if it's the first event , but first official event with ESPN signed with them . I think they might have had some stuff back in the day , but yeah , it's the first contract , so they're no longer on Peacock Going to be on ESPN going forward for the next few years . Unless you're internationally , then you can watch it on Netflix still . But for us in the US we got to watch on ESPN , yeah , but for us in the US we got to watch all ESPN . But yeah , so let's get to it .

Cena vs Lesnar Match Predictions

Speaker 1 0:49

All right , For the first match on the card is John Cena versus Brock Lesnar , so for this one I'm not really sure . But also a side note there's only two championship matches on this card .

Speaker 2 1:07

I wonder if they're going to have like some appearances or something like that , though , or is it going to be like the ? Is it going to be like the WrestleMania type of thing , or is it going to be like a just a regular PLE type of thing ?

Speaker 2 1:17

just on ESPN , pat McAfee definitely coming out pretty sure Pat Mc is going to be there after what happened to Corey Graves on SmackDown , and it's in Indianapolis where he lives and he played there for the Colts for years . He's not from the thing , from Pittsburgh , I think , or Pennsylvania , somewhere out there .

Speaker 1 1:35

But yeah , for this one I think it could go either way , but it is his retirement tour , so I might say John Cena when , like , overcomes the arm .

Speaker 2 1:48

Yeah , you got John Cena , Yep . Well , there's no belt on the line now , so anything can happen now With that . I'm going to go with Brock to win . It's going to be hard to beat Brock man . I know John Cena is John Cena , but Brock is Brock , I mean . I mean , did you not see what they were talking about the other day , the SummerSlam ? What Brock did to him ? I ? Mean all of that officially started at Suplex City , but that's when people started talking about it .

Speaker 1 2:21

But that was like 10 years ago .

Speaker 2 2:23

You know okay .

Speaker 1 2:26

That was like 10 years ago .

Speaker 2 2:27

You know , you know you know , okay , that was like 10 years ago , yeah , and it doesn't matter , brock's still in tip-top shape . You know John Cena's been no more acting , brock's just been on his farm working getting stronger . So so Brock , you know he hadn't probably wrestled in a little while . He's been working out and still been in shape . John Cena's . I mean John Cena's in shape too , but he's been more acting and doing movie roles and stuff recently . So , like I said , I'm going to go with Brock on this one . Just , I don't know , it just looks like Brock's going to not to say he's going to destroy him like he did at SummerSlam that year , but but I'm not going to say it should be a good match , but maybe John Cena put up a better fight than he did at SummerSlam when he got super plays .

Speaker 1 3:12

What 16 , 17 times at . Real Ones Nah , he's going to win . Nah , I'm different when he's not . Nah , nah , nah .

Speaker 2 3:15

Brock Lesnar going to win that one . But yeah , I got Brock Lesnar winning that one .

Speaker 1 3:21

Okay , so I said Cena , you said Brock , I'm definitely going to win that one . Okay , but for our next match on the card it's the Usos versus the Vision , so for this one they're both .

The Usos vs The Vision

Speaker 2 3:34

I mean , we haven't seen much of Brown Breaker , bronson Reed , but we know the Usos , you know , but Usos haven't been attacking in a while either .

Speaker 1 3:44

Yeah .

Speaker 2 3:45

And they were last time we been attacking in a while either . Yeah , and they were last time we saw them on a major PLA . They were fighting each other , wasn't they ?

Speaker 1 3:50

yeah , but like the Miz , how did the Miz join ?

Speaker 2 3:54

war games . War games , that's right , war games . But but then at WrestleMania they arrested each other . Yeah , so it's , are they back together ? And then you see what's happening on Raw , with what Jay's been doing and Demi's kind of being like you know what are you doing ? So it's like are they going to be on the same foot ? You know , I mean , we know what the runs are , you know from the vision , we know what they're going to be doing . They're cohesive . Right now they're working together perfectly . Can we say the same thing about the Usos right now ? You know they may be one of the greatest tag teams of all time , but right now are they still that same tag team ?

Speaker 1 4:31

Yeah , you know , but yeah , so you're going to say the division . I'm saying the Usos because they're just one of the , if not the best tag teams ever .

Speaker 2 4:59

I am going to say , because here's the X-Factor in the match what is Eliac going to do ? Because him and Jay have been going at it the last couple weeks . Jay attacked him by spearing him , he attacked Jay by getting him a BTE .

Speaker 1 5:13

BTE . What is it ? Blood Forged Trauma , that's .

Speaker 2 5:16

BFT , bft , yeah , bft . And so now , what are they going to be doing ? You know so . So now , what are they going to be doing ? You know so . Is he going to interfere in the match and cost him that match ?

Speaker 1 5:26

Yeah .

Speaker 2 5:27

Or is it going to be a straight-up match ? You see what I'm saying . Like we know , seth's not going to get involved because he got his hands full with the match . We don't talk about it a little bit , yeah , but let's see Paul Hennig's back , mm-hmm .

Speaker 1 5:42

You know ?

Speaker 2 5:45

Yeah , so that's a hard one . So you say you picked the Usos . Yeah , I'm going to go ahead and pick the vision with that one .

Speaker 1 5:51

Mm-hmm .

Speaker 2 5:53

I mean , it's just too much going on with the Usos right now for them to—and then , who was Jay talking to the other day on the phone ? Who did he call the other day ? And Jay Walton . I'm saying who was that ? He got on the phone remember . Yeah , who was that ? Was that Roman ? Was it Paul ? Who was it ?

Speaker 1 6:07

It's probably Roman .

Speaker 2 6:09

You know Like who was it . You know Like who was it that he called .

Speaker 1 6:13

Yeah .

Speaker 2 6:16

So I don't know , man , I'm going to go with Division , though I mean , this is a tough one right here , but I'm going to go with Division on that one .

Speaker 1 6:24

Yeah , so her next match on the card is CM Punk and AJ Lee versus their finals in Becky Lynch and AJ Lee's return to the Division League

CM Punk & AJ Lee's Mixed Tag

Speaker 1 6:35

, or ?

Speaker 2 6:35

return match After 10 years . Yeah , first match in 10 years .

Speaker 1 6:40

I've never seen , like I've seen little bits of her match , but I've never seen her match you were . I've never seen like I've seen little bits of her much , but I've never seen a lot of her .

Speaker 2 6:44

Well , you were , you were one when she retired Originally .

Speaker 1 6:48

She retired .

Speaker 2 6:49

When she left WWE originally oh .

Speaker 1 6:51

I didn't know . She left then .

Speaker 2 6:52

Yeah , she didn't rest like that oh yeah she left when CM Punk left . Right after it he left to be working there with Dwayce and Punk and her , still for the same company . So she ended up leaving too . I'm not sure that's the main reason or I'm sure there's other reasons too . She left too , but that was one of the reasons I think she left too . But yeah , this is her first match back . Let's see if she has any ring rest , as they call it , because she won against .

Speaker 1 7:20

Seth Rollins and Becky . Lynch arguably the best couple in WWE history .

Speaker 2 7:25

Debatable . But yes , as of right now , yes , but we'll see after this match if that will be the case . Yeah , but yeah , go ahead with George , I'm not going to mind it .

Speaker 1 7:36

So I mean AJ Lee . I don't think she loses here , she definitely doesn't take the pin . So I'm probably going to say CM Punk and AJ Lee , especially with Becky Lynch and Seth Rollins , kind of not being on the same page on the round .

Speaker 2 7:52

Was that real , though ? Because she saw what happened . They kind of fake and then . So we don't know if they're fake or not . You can't really I mean you can't never say with Seth Rollins no , he faked the whole knee injury .

Speaker 1 8:03

No endemic . It might be a fake .

Speaker 2 8:05

Exactly that's what I'm saying . So Seth Rollins faked the whole knee injury and cashed in on CM Punk . Yeah , you know . So who do you have ?

Speaker 1 8:15

I have CM Punk and AJ Lee Because I don't think AJ Lee is losing in the return match .

Speaker 2 8:21

Yeah , I'm going to go the same way , only because , if you want CM Punk to challenge Seth and AJ to challenge Becky the way it's looking they can't lose their first match .

Speaker 1 8:40

Because how are CM Punk and AJ Lee just going to go back after a title that they just lost to both of the people ? And even if they were to lose , who takes the pin ?

Speaker 2 8:48

Exactly that's what I'm saying . So you have to look strong . To lose who takes the pin ? Exactly that's what I'm saying . So you have to look strong . So if they want to make aj uh a challenger for becky's championship , they have to have her win .

Speaker 2 8:58

If she has a win , she can't take a pin and cn punk can't take a pin from self or he's out of the picture . So they have to win . Yeah , you know , I mean now , granted , it looks , if you didn't know anybody , you would think becky was a world champion . I mean she's been . Was it Intercontinental Championship ? Is that what she is ? Intercontinental Champion . So I mean , or US , was it US ? Or ?

Speaker 1 9:19

no , it's Intercontinental and then .

Speaker 2 9:22

Julia's US yeah , okay , so yeah . So it looks like , if you don't know anybody , you would think Baker was a world champion . Yeah , but she's the intercontinental , but she's been elevated to world championship status .

Speaker 1 9:36

Yeah .

Speaker 2 9:37

Just by her heel work being with Sif , him being a world champion , both of them had belts on their shoulders . I mean her heel work has been amazing so far . Yeah , I mean she's been selling it . You know she was big , bad . All kinds of AJ Lee comes and the thing about it too . I don't know if you don't remember this , but Becky was brought up for AJ Lee . Now yeah .

Speaker 2 10:03

They brought Becky , they brought Sasha Mercedes now , but Sasha's back in some time . Then Charlotte's up . All three of them came up when Nikki with the Bellas and AJ Lee was all you know , was all doing . Good you know , but yeah , so it should be a good match . We'll see how much AJ Lee has , how much ring rush he has . I'm sure it won't take much to knock it off . I'm sure she's been training for a while . The last time I saw her she was on a TV show . Was it called Heels ? I've never seen that before . It's about wrestling .

Speaker 2 10:44

I've never seen it , but I've seen clips of it , yeah she played a little role in that where she didn't live in wrestling . Yeah , she played a little role in that where she didn't live in a wrestling . Yeah , you know . And uh , so yeah , she's been wrestling , not in the like , not in front of you know , 20,000 people and millions on TV live , but she has , you know , she has a little . She had a little um a little gig on um Women's Wrestling . She had a little gig on that . I think she was a commentator or something like that .

Speaker 1 11:09

Commentator .

Speaker 2 11:09

Something like that . Yeah , but she was on for like one season and that was it , and she lived up to that .

Speaker 1 11:13

There's seasons on that show . Oh .

Speaker 2 11:16

But yeah . So she's been around wrestling since she left . She hasn't been completely out of it . You know she's been doing it , but I like seeing Punk . I was seeing Punk with AEW have a few matches there and there that came down to me . She hasn't won anywhere . This is her first match back period .

Speaker 1 11:32

Yeah .

Speaker 2 11:33

You know , and so we'll see how her ring rest stuff holds up . But it should be a good match . I mean , becky and Steph are two of the best workers in business , female and males by far . Mm-hmm , you know , according to Becky she's the greatest female ever . According to Sports Illustrated yeah .

Speaker 2 11:51

You the greatest female ever , according to Sports Illustrated . Yeah , you know , she says it all the time and Steph is up there too . It's one of the greatest , you know . But yeah , it should be a good match regardless . So , yeah , I'm excited to see AJ Lee back in the ring now . Seeing Punk back in the ring I wish they had done more promo work for both of them . Against them too . Yeah , you know , but you got to do a slow burn . You know you got to start back slow and getting back into it slowly , but yeah , I'm looking forward to it . I got Sam Pup and AJ Lita to win that .

Speaker 1 12:16

Mm-hmm , yep . But for the next match on the card it's Eos Kyra and Stephanie Viqueira for the vacant Women's World Championship , because Naomi , she was out for pregnancy , yep , so she's not the champion

Women's World Championship Match

Speaker 1 12:32

anymore .

Speaker 2 12:32

She's going to be out at least a year .

Speaker 1 12:35

Yeah , so the title is vacant now . And then it's Io versus Stephanie , which Io was the champion a couple months ago . She lost it . Oh , at Evolution to Naomi , yeah , and Naomi cashed in .

Speaker 2 12:51

Yeah , and Naomi cashed in .

Speaker 1 12:52

Yeah , yeah , but yeah , so knowing that , and she just lost .

Speaker 2 12:58

And Stimpy posted a wrestling . She posted a wrestling only at Clash in Paris , anyways , mm-hmm . So , but yeah , they moved the match .

Speaker 1 13:04

They could have just done this match at Clash in Paris .

Speaker 2 13:07

Yeah , but now you have a match on Resoluplusa .

Speaker 1 13:15

I mean , there's like , well , like , there's a big tag .

Speaker 2 13:20

Yeah , but you got four women champions . One of them's in that match with CM Punk . Julia's not wrestling right now for some reason . She's wrestling a little bit . She's in a tag team with .

Speaker 1 13:34

Keanu James .

Speaker 2 13:35

Yeah , keanu James against you know .

Speaker 1 13:38

Meechan at B-Fab yeah Meechan and B-Fab yeah Meechan . And .

Speaker 2 13:40

B-Fab . So they got a tag team match first and then I'm sure Meechan is going to get a title match , which they can't do that right now because they're in the air , so they're going to get something else right now yeah . And then and it looks like Tiffany had a a little slight head injury , maybe concussion or something like that , so that's why she wasn't on NXT yeah , and also why she , why she didn't get physical on Smackdown and why it's moved to the next Smackdown , not on this card exactly , which is why she didn't get involved in doing too much because the way it was set it up , it was definitely going to be on this card .

Speaker 2 14:15

The way it looks , the triple threat match was probably going to be on this card more than it looks .

Speaker 1 14:18

What's a triple , especially of that big superstars . Why would they put a triple threat on a random episode of SmackDown ?

Speaker 2 14:25

Yeah , it definitely probably be on this card the way it looks , but because she had her , it looks like . I'm not sure if it was a concussion or whatever it was , but whatever it was , she wasn't able to wrestle on NXT at homecoming and she didn't do too much on Smackdown . She not gonna be at Razzle Palooza at least not wrestling anyways , and it was saved until next week . So you have to , you have to get them , you have to put the match on this . I mean , you know . So that's where you at least they got a women's match on here . There was a lot of times back in the day where there was no women's matches on there , or if there was , there were five minutes and that was it .

Speaker 1 15:06

But so who are you going to pick ? I'm picking Stephanie to win because she hasn't had the title yet .

Speaker 2 15:14

Yeah , I'm not going to say it's too early because Stephanie is a veteran . She's been wrestling for a while . She's not like a new person to wrestling . She's new to WWE and if people hadn't watched her in AEW or Stardom or New Japan or whatever down in Mexico , whatever AAA , if they hadn't watched her in there , they're not going to be familiar with her too much , since she's been WWE NXT and now main roster . But if you watch her for a while you know she's been a solid wrestler all the way across .

Speaker 1 15:48

Yeah .

Speaker 2 15:48

You know . So we can't say she's new , it's too early for her . No , it's not , she's been wrestling for a while .

Speaker 1 15:56

Yeah .

Speaker 2 15:57

You know , she's not . She's not new to wrestling . She's new to WWE , but not wrestling Right . So , with that being said , I'm going to also pick Stephanie McHare to win Mm-hmm . Like I said , she's a fan favorite and this is this is , when you pull , give her the belt . You know , I mean , io's a fan favorite too , but Io just had the belt earlier this year . You know , let's see Stephanie get it for a while and let her hold it for a minute and see what she can do with it . You know , not sure who her next few to be , maybe Rhea Ripley or somebody , but Io or Stephanie .

Speaker 1 16:33

I mean Rhea Ripley , Definitely Rhea Ripley . And when Liv Morgan comes back , it's probably going to be Liv Morgan . They're probably going to put her right back in that division .

Speaker 2 16:41

She should be coming back soon . She should be about healed from her injury .

Speaker 1 16:44

Yeah .

Speaker 2 16:46

She's been out for a few months because she missed Evolution , so she should be getting ready to come back in the next month or two , depending on how good she's healing .

Speaker 2 16:53

Mm so and how bad the injury was originally yeah so , yeah , yeah , I got Stephanie winning that one . It should be a pretty good match . Though this may be the best match on the card , I would say we got two two of the best female wrestlers in the world period yeah so it should be a pretty good match right here , if not a match , a match on the card , a match at night rather at your night rather yeah so , but yeah , so , that's what you're going to say for that .

Speaker 1 17:22

Yep , that's it . And for the main event , it's Cody Rhodes and Drew McIntyre for the Undisputed WWE Championship .

Rhodes vs McIntyre Main Event

Speaker 2 17:29

Grudge match .

Speaker 1 17:30

Yeah , so which Cody Rhodes said on SmackDown ? They tagged him . When did that happen ? I ?

Speaker 2 17:38

Cody Rhodes said on SmackDown they tagged him . When did that happen ? I can't remember . I know I heard too it was in WWE . I don't know . They were in TNA around the same time . It could have been TNA , it could have been WWE . I'm not sure If it had been years ago when he said that it would have been WWE .

Speaker 1 17:55

Yeah .

Speaker 2 17:55

But because now they acknowledge other wrestling companies , now it could have been WWE or it could have been TNA or it could have been any other independent wrestling company . It wasn't AEW , because Drew McIntyre never went to AEW , but he did go to TNA around the same time . Cody was there , I think he was there around the same time , anyways , I think . But anyways , maybe it was early WWE when they were both younger Could they have run the same major thing anyways .

Speaker 1 18:24

But if this was what it was like , if he was deep into his reign , I would say Drew McIntyre honestly , because the way that the feud has been built , I think it favors Drew McIntyre honestly . But also there is a factor in this match Randy Orton . Is he going to get involved for Cody Rose or Drew McIntyre ?

Speaker 2 18:49

Yeah , true .

Speaker 1 18:51

Because he could turn on Cody honestly . But I don't know , I don't see that , so I'm going to say Cody Rose .

Speaker 2 19:00

Yeah , yeah , it was , it was . Drew had to hold himself together on SmackDown because he wanted to play more back into the table again .

Speaker 1 19:10

Yeah .

Speaker 2 19:11

But he knew , if he did that last time he did that Cody Rose was out for a few weeks before he came back , and so he stopped himself because he knew if he did that there's no match .

Speaker 1 19:21

There was a loser .

Speaker 2 19:24

So he stopped himself , composed himself , didn't do it . Um , with that being said , drew McIntyre's going to win .

Speaker 1 19:33

Because of .

Speaker 2 19:37

I mean for one . We know Cody's not going to be on TV for a while . He's from Street Fighter . Yeah , I'm surprised he even came back for this match . But not just that . Drew McIntyre is there so he can hold the belt for a little bit . I mean , I like when belts change hands , you don't have a belt for two , three , four , five years , you know , or a year or so . Like change belts every now and then , you know , like make it to where you know a guy has a belt for a little bit of time . Okay , then somebody else gets it , because after a while people get bored of the same champion , unless they're doing something different with their character yeah , like every single title , reign doesn't have to be roman reigns or gunther level title yeah , but that's what I'm saying .

Speaker 2 20:17

Like he became more interested when he changed himself to the tribal chief yeah you know , when he got with paul hayman and all that you know , then he aligned himself with paul hayman , he changed his character up and then he had paul hayman out . Then he started , he had the bloodline and changed his character from the big dog to tribal chief , which people started liking that . I mean they started they didn't like him , but then they started liking that .

Speaker 1 20:37

Yeah .

Speaker 2 20:37

You know Gunther , he's just a solid wrestler period . You know young guy like him , but when he gets in that ring you know what he can do . You know Drew same way . You get in that ring . You don't have to like him , but you got to respect him for what he does in that ring . Seth Rollins same way . You know all those guys like that who are heels . You get respect for people because , especially real wrestling fans , you get respect for them because they're good wrestlers . You know what I mean . Yeah , and so with that , like I said , that's why I got Drew winning , because he's hungry for it . He needs that belt right now . You know I mean that's why I got Drew winning , because he's hungry for it . He needs that belt right now . You know I mean the way he lost it . What he wanted to see in Punk . Let him get his redemption .

Speaker 1 21:20

Yeah .

Speaker 2 21:21

You know , I mean seeing Punk came , not him losing to Punk , but you know , seeing Punk cause him to lose it . Yeah , because he , you know he caused it and they cashed in on him . But yeah , so now this is the time to get his redemption and get his title back and see what he can do with it . Now , you know , Because now you have other people he can wrestle against . You know , at least while Cody's not on TV right now . Yeah , so , but yeah .

Speaker 1 21:48

But yeah , so you're going to say Drew McIntyre , drew McIntyre , yeah , yeah , I going to say Drew McIntyre .

Speaker 2 21:53

Drew McIntyre , yeah .

Speaker 1 21:54

I'm saying Cody Rose , I don't know , I just think he's going to retain Because it's his first defense . You think he would lose in his first defense . I get he's going to Street Fighter , but you think he's going to lose in his first defense .

Speaker 2 22:07

It's a dress with Drew McIntyre , though . So your thing is that he came back just to lose to Drew McIntyre . No , not just came back just to lose to him , but Drew McIntyre kicked him through the , through the table yeah he had to come back and get his gig back . It's not gonna work cause Drew McIntyre gonna come out on top , but yeah , he had to come back and get his gig back , though , just to you know .

Speaker 1 22:28

Yeah .

Speaker 2 22:30

But yeah .

Speaker 1 22:33

Yeah , yep .

Speaker 2 22:35

You just answer that .

Speaker 1 22:38

Not really . It's going to be a good card , though .

Live Stream Plans & Wrap-up

Speaker 2 22:40

Yeah , it's going to be a good card . We also are going to try to live stream as well , our first live stream , going to try to see how it works out with it .

Speaker 2 22:50

So , yeah , I think we're going to try to do it on twitch and youtube possibly yeah we'll see how it goes , though I know I know twitch for sure , and we'll see if we can try to get on youtube too . But , um , yeah , twitch for sure . Maybe youtube just depends on how that works first time doing it . So we'll see how it works the first go around . But , yeah , uh , kind of see what this card's about , you know , see what the whole rest of it looks , looks like , see how ESPN production does . Or if you got Netflix , internationally , watch it on Netflix . But , yeah , anything to add to it ? Nope , all right . So , that being said , I'm Ben , I'm Ben .

Speaker 2 23:24

And this has been an episode of Tag Team Talk .