Talk is Jericho Recap w/ Jinder Mahal – Becoming Number One Contender, Relationship with Great Khali, Origins of 3MB, More!

Jericho welcomes Jinder Mahal to the show.

Jericho mentions that Mahal appeared to come out of nowhere to become the new number one contender for the WWE Championship. He says he was told the day before winning the 6-pack challenge on Smackdown Live that he was going to become the number one contender. Concerning his run as an enhancement talent prior to this, Vince McMahon told him that WWE’s audience has a short memory and Mahal says, “I guess we’ll all find out about that”.

Mahal says he got pretty down on himself emotionally after being released from WWE a couple of years ago. He was drinking a lot and his weight ballooned to 260 lbs. He realized that he needed to change his lifestyle, so he began dieting and getting into shape, and soon enough WWE came calling. He says that Impact Wrestling actually called him about coming to work for them as well, but he chose to come back to WWE.

He says that during those two years he was very negative and was working the indie scene and just didn’t care. As soon as he started to care about himself and his wrestling again, everything changed and opportunities started to arise again. He says he’s remaining very positive now, and he keeps a daily planner of his goals. One of his goals is to have the best body in WWE, and another is to win the WWE Championship.

Vince Russo’s The Brand Recap – Triple H Working Vince McMahon, Safety Concerns in Wrestling, Booker T’s Commentary, More!

Russo is joined on today’s show by his co-host Jeff Lane and Glenn Gilbertti (Disco Inferno).

Russo comments on the dynamic at the top of WWE between Vince McMahon, Stephanie McMahon and Triple H. Russo says a fan wrote him a letter this past week suggesting that Triple H is ‘working’ his father-in-law, Vince McMahon, in an attempt to ascend to the top of the mountain that is WWE.

Russo truly believes that Triple H is working Vince McMahon, and although he had a lot of pleasurable experiences with Triple H in the past, he also remembers times when he wasn’t as easy to deal with. He recalls one time when Triple H refused to do the job for D-Lo Brown, who had put Triple H over for months upon months. This really aggravated Russo because the creative team wanted to keep D-Lo Brown strong and the one time they asked Triple H to return the favour, he refused to do so.

The fan who wrote Russo suggested that Triple H has convinced McMahon that social media is WWE’s most important statistic at this point, ahead of television ratings and things of the sort. Since social media is compiled mostly of hardcore fans, WWE’s product has skewed towards a niche fanbase in an attempt to get positive reinforcement from their social media target base.

The Taz Show Recap – The Rock for President, Universal Title Picture, Strowman’s Surgery, More!

Block 1:

Taz comments on the news from yesterday, when The Rock said he wouldn’t count out a run for the Presidency at some point in the future. Taz thinks it’d be awesome if The Rock ran for the Presidency. He says that The Rock is a huge star who is almost universally liked by everyone. He’s also a very intelligent man, who Taz would support if he announced his candidacy.

Taz says that while it’s no secret that The Rock is one of the most gifted talkers in the history of professional wrestling, he was no slouch in the ring either. Rock is a big, strong guy who could really work in the ring, and Taz has the upmost respect for him.

A listener calls into the show and asks Taz if WWE performers have any form of insurance through the company, or if you need to have your own insurance policies. Taz says that WWE performers are independent contractors, and this means that you’re responsible for your own insurance policies.

However, if you get injured working for WWE, Vince McMahon and the company always takes care of you. If your kids or spouse needs a medical procedure, the company will not cover that. He says that some former employees take shots at the company for their policies in this regard, but Taz will never do that. From his experience, Vince McMahon does whatever he can to take care of his employees.