MGP: Paul Heyman highlights big time performances in the Big Apple

Welcome to another edition of the ‘Monday Gorilla Position’! A weekly column here at Cageside Seats that dissects the latest shows and reports in the world of WWE & AEW. In addition to interviews with your favorite professional wrestlers.

Apologies for missing last week, but feel free to get the word out that we’re back up.

The wrestling world is buzzing after a big weekend in New York — capped off by a spectacular night for the performers of AEW, NJPW and CMLL at the third annual Forbidden Door.

Was the show a little on the long side? Of course it was. It’s an AEW PPV. It’s always going to be a marathon of fast-paced, hard-hitting action. Put on a pot of coffee and call in sick to work the next day if need be. Tony Khan is going to make sure you get your money’s worth. That’s something that can and should be appreciated until the company can retire the antiquated pay-per-view model.

Was the show perfect? Eh… speaking bluntly there was some fat that could have been trimmed off the card, but when it came to the money cuts of that porterhouse that TK served up, those who charged up their credit cards were not left disappointed.

Hopefully Mina Shirakawa will be sticking around for a while longer because the trio of herself, ‘Timeless’ Toni Storm and Mariah May is an absolute moneymaker. Everything about Sunday night’s match and presentation — right down to Mariah giving off Miss Elizabeth at WrestleMania V vibes at ringside — just absolutely worked.

Stephanie Vaquer made some new fans this weekend. The stage was not too big for the CMLL star, who not only impressed, but controlled a long stretch of the match. Mercedes Moné was always going to get her hand raised at the end of the night, but Vaquer got over without going over.

The CEO meantime, finally has her hands on the NJPW Strong Women’s Championship that was quite literally made for her. She also has a new challenger. How about that pop for the good doctor?

Go ahead and print the marquee posters now because the C.E.O vs. the D.M.D sells itself. Britt Baker looks to be in phenomenal shape. She appears to be healthy. And now the former AEW Women’s Champion joins a star-studded Division that is nearly firing on all cylinders.

On the men’s side of things Bryan Danielson and Will Ospreay continued to cement themselves as two of the best in-ring performers going today. The night however, belonged to Swerve Strickland who solidified his own rise to the top of AEW with another excellent World Title defense.

Ospreay’s reluctance to pull out all the stops in pursuit of the AEW Championship was about as nuanced as in-ring storytelling gets. It further drives a wedge between the International Champion and Don Callis, continues to sell the devastation of the Tiger Driver 91 and solidifies the Billy Goat as one of AEW’s top babyface competitors.

Those critics who claim there’s no storytelling in All Elite Wrestling just need to know where to look. There’s obviously room for improvement — as there is with any company – but when it comes to the top end of the card, Tony Khan and those on his creative team are churning out some really compelling programming.

On the subject of storytelling, wrestling fans across the globe should be tipping their cap to Paul Heyman. The Wiseman — or now former(?) Wiseman — to the Tribal Chief gave a Hall of Fame worthy performance Friday night in front of nearly 18,000 of his fellow New Yorkers.

“I’m just getting started… You ain’t seen nothing yet.”

Turns out that Paul Heyman wasn’t lying during his Hall of Fame speech during WrestleMania weekend.

Inside of a sold out Madison Square Garden on Friday — the very same arena that 14 year-old Paul Heyman received his first press credential as a photojournalist — the now 58 year-old gave us something we’ve never seen from him before.

Obviously we’ve seen Heyman take bumps in the past, sure, but not like this. This was an all out assault that in years prior was usually stopped by somebody, whether that be a Brock Lesnar, Roman Reigns or CM Punk.

Not this time. There would be no white knight rushing to the Wiseman’s aid.

With tears streaming down his face — fully knowing that his actions were going to have dire consequences — Paul Heyman passionately refused to acknowledge Solo Sikoa as his Tribal Chief.

The massive roar of the crowd was almost immediately silenced as Sikoa laid out the Bloodline’s Special Counsel with a Samoan Spike. The punishment would only escalate from there as Jacob Fatu climbed to the top rope to deliver a big diving headbutt. Heyman would then be dragged out of the ring and triple powerbombed through the announcers desk.

Having built his name in the business as a storyteller and a disrupter, a young Paul Heyman would be proud that after 44 years in the business he essentially main evented a sold out show at the Garden as an in-ring performer. Heyman was folded up like an accordion and stretchered out of the building all for the sake of adding the finishing touches to the masterpiece he’s been painting since the closing seconds of WrestleMania XL.

With Roman Reigns taking a post-‘Mania hiatus, Heyman has taken over as the key cog in the Bloodline story arc. He’s done more to put over Solo Sikoa as an unhinged Samoan assassin than Sikoa’s decisive win over John Cena at Crown Jewel last year.

Week in and week out, Heyman has been brilliantly selling the disruption and disfunction of the Bloodline with Solo Sikoa at the helm. Frantically searching for a lifeline to drag him out of harm’s way. Doing so with less subtlety on each passing episode of Friday Night SmackDown.

Heyman was smart enough to realize what was going on, but didn’t have the means of stopping or escaping the changes being made around without his Tribal Chief around to keep the family in check.

The hostile takeover of the Bloodline is now complete. The viscous assault on Heyman proves exactly what he’s been saying for weeks. Tama Tonga, Tango Loa and Jacob Fatu are dangerous men with no limits. Fully ready to decimate anyone and everyone at the behest of their Tribal Chief — Solo Sikoa.

The real test for this new Bloodline begins now. Paul Heyman is expected to be off of television for at least the next several weeks selling his injuries. The ball is now firmly in Solo Sikoa’s court to continue the build to his inevitable showdown with Cody Rhodes at SummerSlam next month.

A win for the Bloodline this Saturday over Rhodes, Randy Orton and Kevin Owens at Money in the Bank would go a long way toward presenting this new group as a legitimate threat to everyone in WWE. A company-wide coup that perhaps can only be prevented by Roman Reigns himself.

The door has now been opened for the Head of the Table to return. Imagine the incredible scenario of Reigns making his dramatic comeback in Cleveland to align himself with Cody Rhodes — the very man who ended his historic reign as WWE Champion — to battle against his own family members.

A possible pathway to reconciling with and reuniting the Usos also emerges, as the original Bloodline trio can come back together in an effort to destroy the monster they helped create.

If and when it happens, Reigns is going to receive a massive ovation, but remember to give Paul Heyman his flowers for setting the table. It was the love, respect and loyalty for his Tribal Chief— Roman Reigns — that led Heyman to do what he never does. He stood up in the presence of danger instead of cowering to avoid physical altercation.

The first shot fired in the next Bloodline Civil War.

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