Monday, June 8, 2015

I Listen So You Don't Have To: Art Of Wrestling Ep. 253

Dreamer was part o the latest live AOW
Photo Credit: WWE.com
If you're new, here's the rundown: I listen to a handful of wrestling podcasts each week. Too many, probably, though certainly not all of them. In the interest of saving you time — in case you have the restraint to skip certain episodes — the plan is to give the bare bones of a given show and let you decide if it’s worth investing the time to hear the whole thing. There are better wrestling podcasts out there, of course, but these are the ones in my regular rotation that I feel best fit the category of hit or miss. If I can save other folks some time, I'm happy to do so.

Show: Art Of Wrestling
Episode: 253 (June 3, 2015)
Run Time: 1:16:15
Guest: Freight Train (5:55); Magnus (8:52); Marty DeRosa (20:40); Brian Myers (33:44); Eugene (46:55); Tommy Dreamer (59:45)

Summary: This is the first of two live episodes Colt Cabana recorded during WrestleMania weekend in San Jose. He doesn’t speak to any of his guests for very long (Dreamer gets the “main event” spot), and Freight Train is on the panel for the duration. Myers is interviewed primarily as himself and less so Curt Hawkins (which is odd, because it’s a different story in last week’s episode 252, presumably recorded since this session). Nick Dinsmore seems mostly in character as Eugene. Tommy Dreamer just tells Balls Mahoney stories.

Quote of the week: Myers: “The business is so exposed. I’m like, ‘You’ve never seen one documentary or anything? You have no idea what goes on or what goes into this?’ It’s scary. There’s these kids that come in, they still think the ring’s a trampoline, which I still can’t believe people think in this day and age, it’s insane. Just people who think they can train for like two or three months and be on RAW, like it’s that easy.”

Why you should listen: Never been to a WrestleCon event? Well, here’s like 3 percent of what goes on (or so I imagine). The highlights are the parts of the Magnus interview where Cabana has an idea the direction he’d like the chat to take, Myers talking about memorable fans and praising Mikey Whipwreck and Dreamer.

Why you should skip it: Magnus doesn’t get enough time to be interesting, DeRosa is miscast on the panel (a game of FMK with Freight Train is especially ill conceived), Myers just did an hour on Art Of Wrestling last week and the Eugene segment is mostly flat. Freight Train seems poorly suited to play second banana in this context, and the end result is a feeling of being overwhelmed yet also underserved.

Final thoughts: My biggest takeaway is fear for what part two will bring next week. The idea of sitting in on a live podcast at such a setting is to have Cabana draw out information the average attendee wouldn’t be able to elicit during a meet-and-greet session, yet aside from the completely insane Balls Mahoney stuff, it’s hard to imagine any of what’s discussed being a wrestler-to-wrestler exclusive. I guess the upside for podcast listeners is not having to pay their way to Northern California just to listen. Other than that, it’s a jumble of confusion.