Jon Moxley on Talk Is Jericho
 

John Moxley "went off" on WWE on Talk is Jericho.

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Oh snap! Can’t wait to listen.

Based on the interest on /r/SC, this deserves a thread!

My fave part at the beginning of the podcast is he was like "no hard feelings I love WWE" before tearing them apart.

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It's kind of a fun listen but will amount to nothing but a ripple in the ocean. WWE will see themselves as the victims of an unappreciative employee.

Some cliffnotes from Moxley:

-He knew he wanted to leave the company in July 2018 when he was out with an injury

-Refused to read a scripted promo because he believed it was idiotic/ridiculous whilst Vince believed it was great

-Talks about the promos he read whilst feuding with Seth late last/early this year, and how they made no sense, tried to rewrite them and got frustrated when he couldn't

-Says he thought him cutting the promo talking about Roman's cancer was distasteful

-Says he felt like walking out on the Raw where he got shots/vaccinated during a promo, and that was the day he 100% knew he was leaving and not coming back

-Vince tried to talk him into saying another cancer remark about Roman, says it was so bad they could have lost sponsors, refused to say it (34 minutes into the podcast)

-Says he was excited to return to wrestling when he was injured, but not excited to return to WWE

-Says if there was no other promotion other than WWE, he still would have left and done something else

-Vince "didn't know" he was unhappy, even with Moxley being open with his frustrations to Vince about scripts

-Was happy to take bumps from Nia, but felt like it was them punishing him for leaving

-They offered him a new contract, he didn't even look at it

-His goal in AEW is to be the best version of himself, looking forward to creative freedom

-Says Tony Kahn is the exact opposite of Vince, likes him and the fact hes a huge wrestling fan

-Talks about using social media now that he's out of WWE and it isn't being forced

-His payday for the Shield's Final Chapter was $500, which is in line with what background extras typically receive

Wait, he cut a promo about Reigns' cancer?

Ya he referenced it. There was a promo where he basically told Seth that all of the members of the Shield, himself included, were paying for their previous transgressions as part of the group. "Just look at what happened to Roman"

Ah, cheers.

Stay classy, Vince.

He flew himself to New York to meet with Vince away from TV to pitch ideas for his return and got the good shit from Vince

Wonder how many of the men/women are gonna hear this and have 2nd thoughts now...

lol too funny. All these attitude guys are like 'take risks and fight for your character.' WTF else could Dean do? Seems like he fought every day.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">&quot;Says he felt like walking out on the Raw where he got shots during a promo, and that was the day he 100% knew he was leaving and not coming back&quot; <a href="https://t.co/C3ffSIUgvf">pic.twitter.com/C3ffSIUgvf</a></p>&mdash; rovert (@SoDuTw) <a href="https://twitter.com/SoDuTw/status/1133650708820123648?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">May 29, 2019</a></blockquote>
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The attitude era guys don't seem to get that, in their time, Vince was desperate, and in his desperation was more open to the talent coming up with ideas and gimmicks to help get them over.

He's got zero reason now to let any of the roster have creative freedom as he's raking in the dough doing things his way.

They even hinted at paige and her porn tape, one promo with the usos i believe said something about Xavier being rated R soon after it was "leaked" online.

Found the clip

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About halfway thru the Moxley pod, and my fave part so far is, upon returning to Raw and anticipating/craving the pop he was to get once his music hit as a surprise return, Seth having give it away and Moxley responding "they ruin everything!". Legit lol'd on my way to workupon hearing that.

lol i like how at the beginning of Jericho's podcast before getting into the interview he threw in some kayfabe. what a guy.

Lmao YAYASS! Forgot about that. Pretty funny stuff. Jericho is a gift to us all.

OMFG! Jericho's commercials are the worst.

Hit the FF 15 second button 4 times

Haha...that’s a wonderful suggestion, Inno. But before I go ahead and fast forward, let me take this moment to talk about our sponsor Me Undies and how micro modal coverts those pesky pee stains into renewable and sustainable energy.

lol at Jericho acknowledging Renee

They're fucking awful. And really long.

I realize it's a hindsight thing, but this must be the universal look to the camera of "disgruntled and wheels turning to leave". This is pretty much the same look CM Punk had in that one interview right before he was gone where he was kinda towing the company line, but was looking at the camera like "I'm really not feeling this and you clearly know that was a line of bullshit, right?".

So weird that there is videotaped evidence of a point you can see a spirit being crushed and it is screencapable.

And with that said, I wonder at what point in the future we will have a side by side picture of Velveteen Dream going from "the sky is the limit for my career" rocking the "Call Me Up, Vince" tights in NXT, to a dejected "this is bullshit, I want to go" look on his face?

NY Post now covering Moxley/Vinny Mac story


<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Jon Moxley torches Vince McMahon and cancer script that pushed him to WWE edge <a href="https://t.co/tsck9t7t52">https://t.co/tsck9t7t52</a> <a href="https://t.co/ZdcNRhcyJF">pic.twitter.com/ZdcNRhcyJF</a></p>&mdash; New York Post (@nypost) <a href="https://twitter.com/nypost/status/1134097275846832129?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">May 30, 2019</a></blockquote>
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I wonder if the podcast might affect Renee Young's position in the company. I remember Jericho thanking her towards the end of the episode.

I'm sure she wants out as well. I have nothing but logic to state that, but I doubt she'd want to stay there without Jon, and especially with how fucking weird shit is there.

Vince is gonna do an angle where Renee gets covered in actual poo

I wish Hunter and Vince were above this shit. "Burying someone" just because they're leaving seems petty and outdated.

I think Renee is really miscast in the broadcast booth. She is a great interviewer and she shined on Talking Smack. Covering matches though just hasn't been her forte...with one, single exception being her and Tom Phillips/Saxton at the opening bout of MITB. She gelled really well with those two.

That would necessitate Vince moving with the times...so that's a no.

I bet she ends up in the booth at AEW.

Not in my eyes, why hype someone that isn't going to be with your company in 6 months?

I think there's a difference between getting someone to do the favors on the way out and completely skullfucking their credibility.

Or they could have had Seth murk him and have him off TV for months before he leaves, cooling him off

I hope not. Maybe it's Vince's fault but she's just not very good. At all.

Renee is going to discover her DP fetish on air

DP? You think so small, at least TP

She'll start with Cole and Graves, but RAW is 3 hours long

That's true, but as the owner of the now competition, you are going to err on the skullfucking side moreso to the favors side....

Which is why is seems like Dean Ambrose lied to them about what he was going to do. Pure bad faith bullshit.

Wish Moxley would've said what the cancer line was that he refused to say.

Sounds like he didn't want to say it out of fear that it would get a writer fired even 6 months later.

Just read the comment about Vince encouraging the 'cancer' comment.
I think I'm going to be sick. I'm not sure if I'll ever watch the WWE again after reading that comment. Just disgusting. Kudos to Ambrose for leaving for greener pastures.

When he talked about having to take the words "pooper scooper" out of a script before showing it to Vince because he knew if Vince saw it he would fall in love with it... :lol:

My fave bits were his Vince impressions "this is good shit". Just hammers home the fact Vince is writing tv strictly for himself and his own enjoyment.

Considering the report a while ago about how much Ambrose hated constantly doing corny comedy, this interview really hammered the point of how much he despised Vince's style of comedy. If Vince just toned it down, Ambrose very likely is still in the company.

Also yikes at the cancer thing Vince wanted him to say but he refused because of how terrible it was. It had to be something worse than stating Reigns is faking having cancer or possibly even hoping he dies if the fear was someone would get fired and them losing sponsors.

It sounds like he was just tired of the entire process. Vince being Vince didn't help. But it seems Jon was running outta gas as far as being in the company goes and was ready to leave anyways.

The way he paints the picture of constantly having to go to Vince to try and creatively assert what he thinks will work best, only to have Vince overrule everything and make into him a comedy heel doing goofy, nonsensical shit, sounds so damn exhausting.

And it's all probably going to lead to Vince going "Well damn, we put a lot of time and effort into those Shield boys! We won't make that mistake again!"

or he'll spend extra time on Roman, Corbin, and Lashley so this won't happen again.

I listened to this and it’s really excellent and I loved it but man did it bum me out. Specifically the part about not letting Vince know you’re funny because he’ll turn you into a joke. That hurt.

Just thinking back to Austin, Rock, Foley, Angle, Jericho, HBK, HHH who all had great comedic timing but were allowed to have multi layered characters who could turn it on when necessary. Ugh.

Thinking about Rollins/Corbin and Roman/Drew. So flat. Zero fun.

Finn Balor, though.... he just likes to have fun

Maggle!

Would really like to know what guys like Bryan, Orton, and Styles think about Vince’s process. They all seem like guys who would get pissed at stupid writing like Moxley but they’ve all been pushed to the moon.

Mox suffered from also having the potential to be "cool" mixed with "edgy" which from what he said was a bad combo for Vince. Orton and Styles are bland enough that Vince won't kill them with idiocy (though he's fucked Orton over a few times) while Bryan is almost bullet proof in that he'll take something assinine and make it amazing.

To sum it up, I have no idea, but it seemed from what mox was saying that being the "lunatic" got him special creative attention that only served to ruin him.

I get that the "disgusted by fans" and inoculations and all that was "not Ambrose's cup of tea" and some fans also thought it was really dumb... Remember Noid getting really pissed off about it...

But was it really that bad... like seems more interesting than 90% of all the other boring shit WWE does... I admit that I was barely paying attention to it but the gimmick itself doesn't seem like that bad of an idea to me... It was "over the top" but it seems like standard wrestling heat where you insult the fans and town, etc...

I'm sure it's different if you're Ambrose and you have a different vision for yourself and you hate "prop comedy" or whatever... but from an outside perspective it doesn't seem like "that bad" of a gimmick

It was probably a dumb gimmick to give to Ambrose at the time since I think it was right after he turned on Rollins on the night Reigns he announced he had cancer... adding the over the top gimmick on top of the feud was probably unnecessary and prob did hurt the feud a lot... but as a gimmick for someone else maybe, I don't think it's that bad is what I'm saying I guess...

probably would have suited Iron Mike Sharpe a little better

Nah he explained why he was pissed at that pretty well “on the pod”

The shots and gas mask thing did absolutely nothing to further his blood feud with Seth which should have been the hottest program in wrestling. They made him a joke.

BUT WHAT ABOUT WHAT I SAID GOD DAMMIT :rant:

Like it’s one thing for Jerry Lawler or Ric Rude to come out and be like hey your town sucks, I’m a jerk, please boo me. That’s their thing.

But Ambrose had literally just turned heel because he was so mad at Rollins, and then he’s just randomly like oh also I hate germs and I built the Spruce Moose. Hop in. It made no sense.

Didn't help that it was also on top of him looking like a knockoff Bane character and them adding the annoying siren sounds to his entrance them.

Just WWE piling more and more terribleness to the gimmick and that feud when neither were needed at all.

Yeah man. Iron Mike Sharpe. Wicked.

you sonnova...

All I want is for Rusev and Big E to be treated like the large chested monsters they are who also happen to be funny. Is that so wrong?

Rusevhas unlimited potential. Funny, good looking, good in the ring, has charisma, etc. He's been completely wasted.

This is actually a long standing beef I have with WWE. Push your heavies dammit. They fucked Rikishi up. They fucked Big Show up. They fucked Vader up. They fucked Kane up. They even fucked Ryback up. All of them could’ve been bigger than they were. And it’s happening again.

Vince has ruined far more than he's made.

If she wants out just violate the wellness policy 3 times

Apparently someone recently tried doing that and WWE closed that potential loophole.

Meltzer suggested that there are numerous individuals who've inquired about leaving the company recently.

This is just speculation on my part, but I think the reason why she isn't great in the booth is the in-ear micromanagement. She started out okay when she first got there, but the quality has declined. How do you get "worse" with practice?

That's actually an across-the-board problem with main roster commentary. Vince should just take his ass back out there in the blue sportcoat and "whatamaneuver" his way through the broadcast. If not, let them breathe and become their own broadcasters. Remember, with Talking Smack, everyone there was in full DILLIGAF mode, since it was clear nobody important in the company watched it, and half of the promos were like 80s style "just go out there and talk them into the seats" natural speaking instead of some contrived, prewritten, overproduced, nonsense script.

Right. It also isn't neccessarily a precident that she absolutely needs to go where her husband is, either. There are people under contract right now that have significant others working elsewhere. It doesn't need to be an all or nothing thing. If the talent you have is happy to stay where they are, there isn't a reason to be petty and shitty to spite their partner. This is the same company that pretty much got snowed into Mike Bennett because they were so hard up to hire Maria back for some reason. If bringing her husband wasn't a condition of her being hired, I'm pretty sure he'd still be in TNA or back in Ring of Honor.

And lest we forget, his WWE push stopped immediately after she announced her pregnancy. My personal feelings about what kind of draw he is aside, that is a bit shitty that him knocking up his own wife fucked over his career path. Totally petty nonsense. Rusev outing his relationship with his now wife screwed both him AND her... sorta (the whole plan for her to be Ziggler's valet and Rusev to just be generic foreign heel that was never going to really go anywhere because lolWWE writing). Eden Styles was relegated to back burner from both her in-ring and announcer duties until her contract ran out after Cody Rhodes left. And of course, AJ Lee got shit on as a fuck you to Punk. There is no reason for any of that. If I am sideways with a company that my wife is completely happy with, there is no reason to take out any frustrations with me on her, because we're two different people. And if she is talented in whatever she does, your feelings about me shouldn't poison her well.

I guess what I'm trying to say is they don't have to go out of their way to make her feel unwelcome. If she's an asset, treat her like one and let her be her own person. If she wants out, too, don't make a giant on-camera government issue out of it or bury her to the pits of hell.

This is Vince McMahon, dammit! We're talking full DVDA!

I found that funny as well. Remember when they amended the Wellness Policy because it looked like they were going to lose Orton? They didn't want to have to irrevocably fire a highcard draw so they could keep him while simultaneously not making their own policing look like a joke.

Now, they are doing essentially the same thing to punitively punish people who want to leave.

None of his points are really surprising. Of course they think what they are doing is good shit. The place sounds awful and like it's only getting worse.

Actually in Jericho's case, I believe this hurt him in 2000/2001. Although Jericho was way over with the fans and was primed and ready to be the heir apparent to The Rock and Austin, the WWE never fully gave Jericho the ball. Jericho's win over Triple H was made to be forgettable, and Jericho's entire heel run as Undisputed Champ actually made him look less credible since he was made to look like a fluke champion. In 2000, Jericho spent a lot of time being made to look inferior to both Angle and Benoit when he should have been going over both guys convincingly.....which would have then put him in a legit position to take the torch from Rock and/or Austin.

Wrestlemania 18 should have had Triple H and Austin switching places.....with Austin doing the clean job and passing the torch to a face Jericho. Triple H (face) should have done his thing with Scott Hall and the nWo. Jericho being the 'alpha' between 2002 and 2005 would have been the perfect transition from the Attitude era to the John Cena era.

PWTorch's Wade Keller also held a recent big interview with Moxley discussing more on the issues with Vince and Creative backstage in WWE. Also goes into a bit more details on why he thinks WWE will be better off once Triple H takes over.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">There's some nice audio dropping just past 1 ET ... Part one of nearly 2.5 hours of a newsmaking interview. Second half drops Sunday. Wade Keller Podcast is free for everyone, or ad-free for VIP members. <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/WKPWP?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#WKPWP</a></p>&mdash; Wade Keller (@thewadekeller) <a href="https://twitter.com/thewadekeller/status/1134674917079879680?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 1, 2019</a></blockquote>
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<a class="spreaker-player" href="https://www.spreaker.com/user/pwtorch/20190601wkpwp-int-mox1" data-resource="episode_id=18139913" data-theme="light" data-autoplay="false" data-playlist="false" data-cover="https://d3wo5wojvuv7l.cloudfront.net/images.spreaker.com/original/3a500050fcd3e5a82d6f109e6eaa3e46.jpg" data-width="100%" data-height="400px">Listen to "WKPWP - Interview - Jon Moxley a/k/a Dean Ambrose (pt 1 of 2): Follow-up to podcast with Jericho talking WWE creative process, more (6-1-19)" on Spreaker.</a><script async src="https://widget.spreaker.com/widgets.js"></script>

I think Triple H respects certain fundamentals, but I don't think he gets making stars nor that his principles are going to remain steadfast when his television is exposed to public barometers. He's not going to be able to tell long arcs with five hours of television each week to fill. It'll also be interesting to see what he does when the guys he pushes (that aren't him) don't work the way he wants them to.

But we might not ever get there, because Vince doesn't seem to want to go anywhere, and I can see Vince selling before Triple H gets anywhere near that level of power.

Maybe Ambrose just isn’t as good as he thinks he is.

Hard to say.

His one appearance in AEW was fucking bonkers so we'll wait and see.

Been saying this for years.

I don’t think Ambrose thinks he’s all that. He described being WWE champion as “cool”, not that he felt he was owed a reign.

Just that he knows his character would’ve been more compelling had he been alllwed to write his own stuff. He got signed mostly because of his promo abilities and they took the creative aspect away from him.

In-ring Dean isn't exactly perfect. But I think his character work will shine in AEW. I don't know if he's a "top guy" but he can be an important player IMO.

It’s pretty obvious to me they will make him the top guy.

To start with for sure. I mean more in the long run. We'll see if he can run with the ball at this point.

He's certainly not HBK in the ring, nor The Rock on the mic, or anything, but, 1. I think his promo work when he's more or less unscripted and his promos are allowed to actually make sense and have a purpose puts him at the top of the industry currently, and 2. I think his in ring work is good enough to be a major main event AEW player and I'm really interested to see his in ring work when he's allowed to work outside of WWE's "same match every night/week" in ring style, especially with the other non-WWE talent he's going to get to potentially work with in the ring.

Ambrose definitely comes off as a star. Especially in a world where Adam Page is probably gonna be the top guy.

Yeah - compared to a lot of those guys, his charisma comes across as big league.

MOX was "emancipated?"

What's next, the "Connecticut compromise" (to speak-of where WWE is headquartered) and the "Underground Railroad" (to speak nothing-of Lucha Underground, which is anti-emancipation)?

Yes, but diplomatically. Made his case, but then still did want Vince wanted.

Austin, Hogan, 90's Shawn Michaels, they would told Vince they aren't doing it and that would be it.

Not saying they were more professional than Dean, walking out clearly is not, but when they say they fought, that is the difference.

Hell, even good found Jesus Shawn Michaels didn't like how they booked his match with Hogan, so he bumped like a total assailed during their match, which was amazing btw.

I used to really love Ambrose. Those Shield six-men tags were great. He had this cool charisma about him. He felt like a lead presence on the shows. At some point, he just fell off this massive cliff for me. It was probably around 2016 when he got demolished by Brock and then had that shitty program with Chris Jericho.

He has never captured my imagination again. Some of the clips I saw him in with Seth Rollins were kind of endearing, but he's just been...dull. And I mention 2016 as being his falling off point, but I can't tell you anything he did in 2015.

It could be a motivation problem, and WWE clearly micromanages and had this "zany, wacky" outline for him. But I'm not immediately stoked to see Jon Moxley anywhere. I don't care. His hype videos washed away a lot of the stigma I had towards him, but it's weird how up-and-down I feel about this guy I used to be a really big fan of.

He doesn't know how to sell

The difference now being - as explained by Dean on Wade Keller's podcast - that if he or other guys go off script or take that kind of risk, a producer or writer will lose their job. So, like decent people, they stay on script. In Austin's day, he didn't have to worry about that. With Michaels bumping for Hogan, you had to be a "smart" fan to understand what he was doing and I don't think Vince cared.

It's not the same landscape. Austin has even said he couldn't succeed in this environment.

He is not great at anything, but Becky Lynch isn’t either and she is the most over person (or at least was) in WWE despite them doing their best to ruin it.

Fact is, he is the biggest story in wrestling right now. If he is anywhere near as good at the creative side as he seems to think he is, he could smash this out of the park.

Up to him now to prove that it was “all them”

I get what you're saying there, Maluco, but just because one person isn't the best at anything doesn't mean that someone else that also isn't the best at anything is going to be able to succeed. It just doesn't disqualify them from truly connecting.

Exactly. That, and Vince literally had no option but to more or less work, or at least compromise, with the top talent he had. Otherwise, he would've been really screwed. He doesn't have that issue anymore, at least not currently, thus the current product we see.

PWTorch revealed the topics to be discussed during their part 2 interview with Moxley

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Here's the set list for part two of my nearly 2.5 hour interview with Jon Moxley (formerly Dean Ambrose). This part drops Sunday later afternoon or early evening on the <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/WKPWP?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#WKPWP</a> blue feed, Saturday afternoon for VIP members... (Fewer topics, longer rants, than in part one!) <a href="https://t.co/IPAu85cidM">pic.twitter.com/IPAu85cidM</a></p>&mdash; Wade Keller (@thewadekeller) <a href="https://twitter.com/thewadekeller/status/1134696145178025985?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 1, 2019</a></blockquote>
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I do think he needs to be careful making the rounds with his complaining about how bad Vince is.

It was ok for the first time he talked on Jericho's show.
I haven't listened, but if Wade asked him about the stuff he said in Jericho's show and to elaborate, I still think that is ok.

I think that is enough though, you don't want to make your entire narrative that Vince is dumb because he didn't use you like you would have liked and you are so good that he messed up and blah blah.

Going forward, forget WWE and Vince exist, and just make your narrative that you are taking over AEW.

He's doing a few podcasts after years of being silent and even being criticized for such. It's fine for him to get stuff off his chest and bring people closer to him with honesty. I doubt he's still doing this same thing forever.