If you were to come up with a list of things that Vince McMahon cares about, what do you think that list would look like?
I think you can safely say that Vince cares about his physique. Whether you think he’s roided to the gills or he obtained his look by years of hard work, he has put forth the effort, one way or another, to look insanely jacked.
Vince and Linda McMahon will be celebrating their 56th wedding anniversary this year. Even with the rumors of possible infidelity, and with all of the women Vince has written himself to be involved with on-screen through the years, they’re still together. That counts for something, so I think you can add Linda to the list of what Vince cares about.
The man has two children. He has the absolute apple of his eye… and he has Shane. At least we know he cares about one of them.
By all accounts, Vince absolutely adores his role as a grandfather. He has three grandsons from Shane and his wife, Marissa, and three granddaughters from Stephanie and Triple H. Go ahead and add six more entries on the list.
If you’re insanely rich, I don’t think it’s ridiculous to assume that you’re quite fond of money and acquiring as much as it as you can.
Somewhere deep, deep, deep down within his heart, I think you could say that Vince McMahon loves wrestling. It has never been an easy business to be rich and successful in, but he’s been involved in the industry for over 50 years now. He graduated from college with a business degree, so he could’ve gone ahead and done just about anything else with his life. The fact that he has stuck with wrestling for so long says something.
Jim Ross has gone on record saying that Vince’s favorite condiment is mustard. Former WWE writer (and current husband to Danielle Fishel aka Topanga Lawrence from Boy Meets World) Jensen Karp has said he would always see Vince eating cut up pieces of steak inside a tortilla. Gotta care about those things, right?
You could go on and on and on creating this long list of things Vince McMahon probably cares about. In the other direction, do you know what Vince doesn’t care about?
Your #FreeAli hashtag.
Calm down. Before I say anything else, I want it to be known that I love Mustafa Ali. He’s such a talented in-ring performer, but he has continued to show that he is able to pour his entire heart and soul into his promos and character work. As an added bonus, you’ll never find anyone who has a negative word to say about Adeel Alam as a human being. He’s a complete package, and I would love to see him have bigger and greater opportunities in WWE or elsewhere.
With that said, this hashtag thing isn’t working, folks. At face value, it makes sense, and I would even say it could be a good idea. You want to make your voices heard. This is someone you feel is capable of so much more than he has been allowed to have, so you want him to have his chance to shine. I get it.
#FreeAli started innocently enough. As is almost always the case with wrestling fans, though, they don’t know when to take their feet off the pedal. The hashtag began trending on Twitter, so you had people who were power hungry, and that took over as their main focus. They saw their names in news articles, or on Reddit, and things of that nature, so now they had to take things to another level to try and keep the hashtag as a trending topic. You’d see them throw the tag onto all of their tweets, even if those tweets had nothing to do with Mustafa Ali, or wrestling, in general. Go ahead and look at any official Twitter account of anything that has to do with WWE, and check out the replies and quote tweets for anything those accounts put out. People will find any way possible to insert #FreeAli into their replies. Some people are actually clever about it, and others are lame as hell, but they’re all trying to keep the tag trending on a daily basis.
A few days ago, some doofus decided to comment on a story about Vince McMahon’s mother passing away, dropping the hashtag in his reply. Look, I don’t give a rat’s ass about your opinion of Vince McMahon, and whether you love him or you hate him. To do something like that is complete loser activity. That guy was ripped to shreds from all corners of Twitter until he eventually had to delete his account to run away from the problems he brought upon himself.
This has become a bigger and bigger problem. It started as a hashtag to support Mustafa Ali, but it has morphed into ways for people to draw attention to themselves and to try and get themselves “over” with a certain demographic of wrestling fans.
Whether or not your intentions are pure, there’s one major hurdle that stands in the way of the #FreeAli people getting what they want.
Vince McMahon.
Above all else, I have no idea why this is all playing out on Twitter. Do you honestly think Vince is reading his replies and checking the trending topics to see what’s hot in these streets? Shit, do you even think Vince is the person tweeting behind the Vince McMahon account? I don’t. Vince McMahon doesn’t give a Kentucky Fried Fuck about your hashtags. He doesn’t care about the positive ones, and he doesn’t care about the negative ones. Chances are, he doesn’t even know the damn thing exists, as he’s pretty notorious for living in a bubble and having no idea about anything that isn’t going on outside of whatever arena WWE is performing in on a given night. Making it worse, #FreeAli has trended, but it’s not as if the tag was setting the world on fire. On Twitter, you’re able to check the trending topics and see how many tweets are currently floating around about that topic, hashtag, etc. With the top trends, you’ll see numbers reach into the tens of thousands pretty easily, moving into the hundreds of thousands mark for big things, and going even further than that for huge stories. I’ve seen #FreeAli trending a bunch of times, and the numbers are usually in the 2,500-5,000 range. As of the moment I type this sentence, some of the current trending topics in the United States and their numbers are:
- Whoopi (187,000)
- The View (190,000)
- Flores (309,000)
- #WWENXT (16,000)
- Commanders (21,000)
What are we supposed to take away from that? NXT often gets made fun of for getting stomped on by AEW on a weekly basis and then for switching to a bunch of “no-name” wrestlers in a focus switch, but even then, there are considerably more people talking about NXT on Twitter right now than Mustafa Ali. The numbers would probably be even worse if you looked at when NXT was actually airing, as I checked the numbers hours after this week’s episode ended.
Let’s actually pull back a bit. Why don’t we talk about what led to the #FreeAli tag in the first place?
Obviously, Ali wasn’t satisfied with his place in WWE. He made his debut for the company during the Cruiserweight Classic in 2016, and has seen plenty of highs and lows since. He has plenty of reason to be dissatisfied. The last match he was on the winning side of was back in August when he teamed with Mansoor to beat Gran Metalik and Lince Dorado on an episode of Main Event. You have to go back to July to find his last victory on television, and that was another pairing with Mansoor, this time defeating MACE and T-BAR. He has had ideas that he pitched to those in charge, and those ideas were all turned down. Unless you’re only doing what you do for the money, of course you’re going to be upset that your creativity and your vision is being stifled. With his frustration reaching a boiling point, he requested his release from the company, and that request wasn’t granted.
Why?
The first thing that comes to your mind is the obvious. If you have no plans to use Mustafa Ali to the best of your ability, why wouldn’t you set him free, ESPECIALLY after you’ve had no problem releasing dozens and dozens and dozens of wrestlers since COVID first changed the world. A lot of those names were bigger stars and higher up the card than Ali, so what’s the problem?
I’ve seen some people say that they feel this is some sort of storyline. You know the deal. Ali uses some real-life frustration and blurs the line to build some sympathy online, eventually getting to turn it into something on television, perhaps in the form of a scathing “worked shoot” promo, and we’ll go from there. Now, the odds of all this being any sort of work are probably slim. It just doesn’t make a lot of sense, but then again, neither does keeping Ali around with no plans of really doing anything with him.
Recently, Booker T was on his podcast and made some comments about how this could be one of those situations where WWE might be letting him “cool down” a bit. Booker felt that, while Ali is sitting on the sidelines, it provides someone with some sort of power in WWE to take another look at Ali, his pitches, his abilities, and everything about him, possibly realizing that they do have something special and seeing what they can do about it. If we’re being honest with each other, that makes a lot of sense. While obviously not on the same scale, we’ve all been in that situation before. You have some sort of relationship with someone, but you get frustrated, so you say something out of anger that you probably wouldn’t have said otherwise. Instead of the other person immediately cutting all ties with you, they give you some space and see if things can get better once everyone has had some time to chill out. If things get better, fantastic, and you continue making things work, but if things don’t get better, that’s when you go your separate ways.
It’s a silly premise, but again, what makes more sense? Would WWE be afraid that Ali would go to, say, AEW and become a big star? It’s a possibility, but they’ve already released people who are big stars now without the apparent fear of them going to AEW, Impact, New Japan, GCW, Ring Of Honor, or anywhere else in the world of wrestling. Ali, as good as he is, isn’t big enough to cause Vince McMahon and WWE to quiver in their loafers. If they’re not granting his release right now, I have to believe that it’s part of a bigger picture, one way or another.
Does that mean we’ll get a resolution to all of this any day now? Not necessarily. This is something that could take a while. I just think you need to be patient. Yes… you. Chill out. Stop trying to use the man’s name for retweets. Your hashtags aren’t going to do anything, because they aren’t moving the needle enough. This isn’t like 2013 and 2014, when the WWE Universe was so upset about the way Daniel Bryan was being treated that they had to stand up for him in every possible way. That’s when you had people hijacking shows because they weren’t getting what they wanted. Now, if you watch Smackdown this week and hear thunderous “Free Ali” chants from the crowd in almost every segment, and then heard those chants again on Raw next week, and so on and so forth… then we might be able to talk. Vince McMahon can’t ignore that. Unfortunately, that’s just not where we’re at. Ali isn’t on 2013-2014 Daniel Bryan’s level. That’s not a shot at Ali whatsoever. It’s just a fact. This also isn’t even like the infamous #GiveDivasAChance hashtag that went viral in 2015, leading to the entire “women’s revolution” in WWE. Back then, the push for some sort of equality in WWE became a huge news story, as numerous non-wrestling media outlets picked up on the story. That hashtag trended for days, with tens of thousands of tweets at any give time.
Sorry, folks. I know some of you really and truly meant well. In a more perfect world, we’d see Mustafa Ali in a main event spotlight, or at least a solid midcard title position, in whatever company would allow it. Maybe we’ll get there one day, and maybe we won’t. Just know that your attempt at making that difference come to fruition on Twitter didn’t work. At all.
Weekly Power Rankings
- Sammy Guevara vs Cody Rhodes: A wild match, as you would expect. Of course, everyone is talking about that Cutter from Sammy, and for good reason. It was picture perfect, and will be one of those spots that will be featured in highlight reels and video packages for years to come.
- Roman Reigns vs Seth Rollins: If this match featured a better ending, I think I would’ve placed it in the top spot this week. As it is, it lands here. I really dug the story being told, with Rollins going above and beyond to get into the head of Reigns, who has been pretty much untouchable since he won the Universal Title.
- WWE Title Elimination Chamber Participants: Bobby Lashley, Brock Lesnar, Seth Rollins, Austin Theory, Riddle, and AJ Styles inside the Chamber? Fuckin’ A. Sure, we can all complain about there even being another WWE event in Saudi Arabia, but at least you know this match has a world of potential to be special. An early Match Of The Year candidate is possible.
- AJ Styles vs Rey Mysterio: It was their first singles match against each other in over two years, and it delivered. Having the added stakes of it being a qualifying match for the Elimination Chamber was simply the cherry on top.
- Kevin Owens vs Austin Theory: Some people are still complaining about Theory’s push, but he continues to be one of the biggest hot streaks in the company as far as match quality is concerned. I’ve been telling you and telling you and then telling you again… this is someone that Vince McMahon has been wanting to push, and we’re seeing that.
- Daniel Garcia: He’s the 2022 winner of Pro Wrestling Guerrilla’s Battle Of Los Angeles tournament. Garcia joins the likes of Kenny Omega, El Generico, Adam Cole, Kyle O’Reilly, Ricochet, and Zack Sabre Jr. as BOLA winners. It remains to be seen if that will translate to a higher position in AEW, where he is mostly on the losing end of matches on television, but his profile has definitely been raised now.
- Brock Lesnar vs Bobby Lashley: Two big, bad motherfathers throwing each other all over the ring. There’s a lot to like about that. Had the match been a little less one-sided, and if we didn’t have the completely unnecessary interference and screwy finish, it would’ve ranked higher here.
- Orange Cassidy vs Adam Cole: If I’m being honest, I was a little disappointed in this match, but the fact that it is still represented in my weekly rankings says how high my expectations might have been. I think putting it on the same episode of Dynamite as the Sammy vs Cody match hurt it, as well, especially with that being the show opener and this being the main event.
- Jon Moxley vs Anthony Bowens: I’ve seen a lot of complaints along the lines of “Moxley should’ve squashed Bowens instead of having this longer, more competitive match” all over the place, but I disagree. In a normal situation, yes, Moxley is on an entirely different level and shouldn’t take this long to defeat Bowens. However, this isn’t a normal situation. Moxley just returned after being gone for months. He’s going to be rusty. That story is told quite easily here, and it allows for Bowens to look impressive in the process.
- The Diamond Mine vs Imperium: Like Cassidy vs Cole, I was slightly disappointed with this match, but it was still a lot of fun. Imperium work so, so well together. The Creed Brothers look like future WWE Tag Team Champions. Roderick Strong got to be a ring general (no Gunther). Good stuff.
This Week’s Playlist: “Backseat” by Juicy J, Wiz Khalifa & Project Pat… “Midnight Hour” by Maoli & Morgan Heritage… “How Long” by Tove Lo… “Wrist” by Logic & Pusha T… “You Are My Lady” by Freddie Jackson… “On The Wings Of Love” by Jeffrey Osborne… “Sensitivity” by Ralph Tresvant… “Do What I Gotta Do” by Ralph Tresvant… “Money Can’t Buy You Love” by Ralph Tresvant… “The Best Things In Life Are Free” by Luther Vandross, Janet Jackson, Bell Biv DeVoe & Ralph Tresvant… “I Adore You” by Caron Wheeler… “Forever Love” by Color Me Badd… “Breakin’ My Heart (Pretty Brown Eyes)” by Mint Condition… “Silhouettes” by Smile Empty Soul… “Shoot Outs” by Jadakiss & Styles P… “What’s The Time Mr. Wolf” by Southside Of Bombay… “Triumph” by Wu-Tang Clan… “With You” by Tony Terry… “Till I Collapse” by Eminem & Nate Dogg… “Amaranth” by Nightwish… “Noise” by Nightwish… “Storytime” by Nightwish… “While Your Lips Are Still Red” by Nightwish… “Breathe” by The Prodigy… “Come Fly With Me” by Frank Sinatra