MATCH PROMO Don’t Let Jesus Take the Wheel - Showdown Promo #2

[Kirk Redwood]

(The camera fades in on Kirk Redwood sitting in a room full of empty chairs. It seems to be the remnants of an AA meeting. The camera circles around until it rests on him.)

Brother, I’ve seen less insecure morons in AA meetings.

You ever heard the term speculation? See, when there isn’t information available you got to work with what you got. The only information I had going on for me was that Adam Lucas picked me to face you before your big title match. When I said that your probably distracted, I didn’t need a song and dance about how focused you were, but you rolled out the tune anyways. I get it, I’d be getting mad too if I was staring down the barrel of a second title loss in a row. I believe in second chances brother, but third, fourth, and fifth? How many times is it going to take for you to close the deal? I can speculate on your motivations for this match, but I don’t need to speculate on what’s going to happen when you run up against Adam Lucas: he’s going to beat your ass like a drum.​

But I guess you want to keep your mind off that, it’s good. At AA meetings they tell you to find other ways to fill your time; maybe that applies to you too. I’m not a man who dwells so much on the past that it ends being my future and present, but you want to make this about a fight I had nothing to do with? Ok, fine bud. Whatever gives you an excuse. We can sit here all week and go back and forth on the details, but the reality that you seem to be pushing away like an IQ test is this: when you needed to be at the top of your game, you weren’t. You thought the guy who just crucified somebody was going to walk out of that match like nothing happened? The Romans put that boy in a cave and rolled a boulder in front of it when they were done. Since he’s out of your reach though, you want to smash another toy instead. Woody have you rope burn when you tugged the string and now you want to rip the wings off Buzz Lightyear? Get real for a second. This is you focused? Take a Xanax brother, it might help whatever you got misdiagnosed.​

You need to understand something before you step in the ring with me: you aren’t goal I’m trying to meet. For a guy calling himself the city itself, you’re just a Chinatown. Sure, you operate your own little world, but you aren’t the pillar of the community. Hell, you could be replaced by somebody off the street. You didn’t get it the last match you had and you won’t get it against Adam Lucas. You know what they call a king without a crown? Just some guy. And until you win that title Viz, that’s all you are. You have to come up with a reason to be invested in this match? That’s exactly how I felt. I went into that office and asked for an opportunity, a chance to prove that Stane and I are on equal footing in EAW. Instead, Adam Lucas snatched me up and placed me across from you. What’s it say that the world champion is willing to put me up against you? Any way you cut it, it’s a match he doesn’t want you to win which means somehow, he believes that your ass CAN get handed to you. As much as this isn’t the opportunity I wanted, I can see that is one all the same.​

But YOU aren’t the opportunity Viz. you’re just the photo I stapled to the target. The opportunity is the position on the card. The OPPORTUNITY is being the winner selected by the champion. Because with that on my resume, it’d be easy for me to say that I’m on my way out of the ashes. The issue is, as much you want to make this about Stane and then juke out last second to say you’re focused on me, we both know that’s bullshit. Well…it’s either bullshit or you actually feel threatened by the guy who used to spend his days trading cigarettes for Oreos. Either way, it isn’t a good look for you pal. I don’t blame you if you are though, this is the first time in a long time that I’ve felt excited. ​

The way I’ve heard it, you used to be a champion. USED TO is doing the heavy lifting there though. I used to be a tag team champion too remember that? But I got the same prize that every other champion gets the second they start to erode: a big heap of fuck all. When you aren’t the champion, you aren’t the champion. You aren’t the face, you aren’t the biggest dog in the yard, you aren’t the city. What you are is just another guy on the side mumbling that he was a war hero after he shakes a tin cup at you. I have any even hit my stride yet and you’re already treading water. Talking about how I’m still opening the show after two years? My brother in Christ, that’s a recent demotion. And it’s one that I passed up within a month considering I’m about to hand you your own ass. I’ve gone up against the best, and I may not always come up with the win, but I’ve got two years total under my belt. If I can get CLOSE without even going to wrestling school, then you may have to reevaluate what potential means to you.​

The way I see it, I have a long way to go until my body gives out. I got miles left on my engine, but I don’t know if you’re ever going to pick up the speed again. Me? I know that as long as I keep my eyes on making my daughter proud then I could lift a car over my head. But that’s the thing Viz, you think this whole thing is about you. And maybe the stipulation is, maybe the consequence is, but my world doesn’t revolve around a guy who jerks off while making eye contact with himself in the mirror. Sorry pal, but your opinion of me matters as much as much as Stane’s: not one ounce. That might hurt your ego a little bit, but I’m too worried about that. Somebody’s who’s talking shit about alcoholism probably gets all his opinions off the internet anyways. That part of the ADHD slash schizo rant was meant to piss me off a little. Maybe you wanted to try and prove to everyone that despite cutting half the promo on my former partner, you TOTALLY are for real focused. And everybody TOTALLY believes it bud.​

Respect is a nice thing to have. So is an iPhone. But if I don’t have it, I’m not going to die. There is one opinion that matters: my daughter. I know most of the EAW wrestlers spend their lives banging each other and hookers in the back of hotel rooms only to spend a quarter of their check on payoffs, but I’m trying to be a family man. Early in my career, I was running around talking shit about everybody in my bloodline. From my parents to my kid, I didn’t give half a shit. In fact, I was a lot like most of the EAW wrestlers: I didn’t give a shit. And you Viz, you haven’t really SEEN me give a shit have you? No, you got the picture in mind of the dude from the Key and Peele pawnshop sketch. Well that ain’t me man. No matter how many times we’ve faced before, it was under different circumstances. Remember when I said I was excited for this one? That’s because I have the opportunity to put it all on the line. For you, losing means the impending loss to Adam Lucas might as well be the first line in your suicide note. If I so much as hit a finisher, you come out looking like you fell off even more. But that’s your problem. I don’t give a shit if you beat Lucas or die in the ring with him.​

On Showdown, I’m going to beat you like a dog Viz. Kirk Redwood, the bum himself, is going to drag his knuckles across your face and pin you in that ring. You can do the whole “it’s impossible” schtick as long as you want, but I’m afraid you don’t have anything new to say anyways. What you got is cheap insults covered up by mediocre jokes and excuses. I’m Unkillable bud, the little cuts you send out might as well be piss in the wind. Unlike you brother, I see myself for exactly what I am. No delusion needed. I recognize the fact that I’ve made mistakes. I recognize that I’m in a slump. The different is, I know how to change it. I’m able to look at the last year and say to myself “this ain’t it.” Can you do that Viz? Or are you always great in your mind? Either way, you don’t know me. Whereas you, I don’t need to know more than what I’ve seen. Hell, I don’t need to know more than what you say.​

Keep your eyes off Stane bud, that’s not the fight you have on your hands. You have Kirk Redwood and ONLY Kirk Redwood. Maybe that’s no big deal to you, but it’ll be a big deal when you’re staring up at the lights wondering what the fuck just happened. It’ll be a big deal when Lucas picks a stipulation that lets him legally torture you. Hey, we can’t all be lucky Viz. But you? You could stick a horseshoe up your ass and smoke a blunt full of four leaf clovers and it wouldn’t keep you from shooting yourself in the foot.

I’m gonna be the guy who knocks you out, but you’re the guy that’s lining up the shot.​

(Redwood stands up, folds his chair and walks away. The camera fades out as the sound of doors closing echoes loudly.)​