Going Ringside With The Local Station

Seldom do people last in an industry that most wash out of in a few years. Then, there’s Jimmy Hart.

The legendary pro wrestling manager started in the late 1970s and has been relevant in the industry ever since.

In fact, Hart was on WWE programming as recently as last month for Saturday Night’s Main Event on NBC.

The nation really learned who Jimmy Hart was in the mid-1980s when he was one of the top managers in the newly nationalized World Wrestling Federation (WWF).

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In any relationship, things can turn toxic. But pro wrestling has seen very few relationships that have turned as toxic as the one between AEW megastars Adam Cole and MJF (Maxwell Jacob Friedman).

The two will face off this Saturday at AEW’s “World’s End” pay-per-view, which is being held in Orlando at Addition Financial Arena. Their match will be one of the main events.

The famous song from the band REO Speedwagon “Can’t Fight This Feeling” has a memorable line in it: “What started out as friendship has grown stronger.” That line is the opposite of what’s happened between Cole and MJF.

They were the best of friends in 2023 but that changed, and they are now mortal enemies.

In fact, they got so personal over the weekend that the two came to blows.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

She’s one of the hottest stars on Smackdown who will be in Jacksonville for the WWE Holiday Tour Dec. 26 at VyStar Veterans Memorial Arena. We’re talking about Michin (also known as Mia Yim). The popular superstar will be there for thousands of fans but not only in Jacksonville, the tour will hit multiple cities.

And along the way Michin is in the middle of her own personal journey, pursuing the U.S. title.

Frustratingly, she was unsuccessful when WWE returned to NBC for Saturday Night’s Main Event earlier this month and lost to Chelsea Green. Something she plans on fixing in weeks to come.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

When your legacy is perfection, success is a natural. That was reality for Joe Hennig or as wrestling fans knew him better: Curtis Axel. The son of “Mr. Perfect” Curt Hennig and the grandson of Larry “The Axe” Hennig it wasn’t a surprise when Joe Hennig first arrived in the squared circle.

To fans nationally it happened around 2010 when he arrived in the WWE “Nexus” stable. It was the hottest heel stable at the time in company, filled with “bad guys” looking to dethrone the veteran WWE heroes. With perfect genetics (get it) it was no surprise he was a success in the global company where his dad was argued to be the greatest pure wrestler of his era if not all time.

But his journey into wrestling wasn’t as guaranteed as you might think.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

She has gone from one of the hottest stars in WWE to one of the hottest stars of all time. The icon Bayley joins us to discuss numerous things, including the WWE Holiday Tour. The tour stops in Jacksonville on Dec. 26 at VyStar Veterans Memorial Arena.

In this interview, I’m joined by Going Ringside regular guest Victoria Crawford, who wrestled in WWE under the name Alicia Fox and was one of Bayley’s first matches when she was in NXT.

Our interview came days after Bayley and her team were victorious in WWE WarGames, which is one of the most brutal matches in existence.

“I feel good,” she said while taking a much-needed rest from the road. “Luckily I didn’t have to go to Raw. I didn’t have to do like a Netflix appearance in L.A. I didn’t have to do that. So I got to stay home and lick my wounds.”

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A reality in pro wrestling is fans by nature wonder whether they could beat the wrestlers in a fight. They wonder whether the performers are truly gifted athletes.

But no one asks that question about Jake Hager. No one.

The former football, amateur wrestling and mixed martial arts star is a genetic freak of nature. He has excelled in everything he’s tried and WWE noticed that when he was first brought in during 2006. He didn’t keep his real name in WWE and went by Jack Swagger.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Grayson Waller is back on “Going Ringside.” The cocky and brash WWE Star is returning to preview the WWE Live Holiday Tour. It will be in Jacksonville at the VyStar Veteran’s Memorial Arena on Dec. 26.

In this interview, Waller discusses his future in WWE and how he expects big things in 2025. He also talks about his partnership with Austin Theory.

And you won’t want to miss what he says about the struggling Jacksonville Jaguars. It’s brutal.

Then, Going Ringside is turning the tables on me.

Show regular Victoria Crawford (formerly Alicia Fox in WWE) returns to interview me about how Going Ringside became a thing. It started as a rough idea in a Jacksonville TV station in 2022 and became one of the hottest wrestling talk shows on Earth in 2024!

We’re also joined again by Deseree Joson with the up-and-coming “Shoots and Ladders” Podcast to break down Waller’s career.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On this packed episode of Going Ringside we’re joined by Mayor Glenn Jacobs or as wrestling fans know him better Kane. Jacobs joined us on episode 75 and is back with a lot of newsworthy updates we discuss in this episode.

First, we talk politics following the election of President-elect Donald Trump. Jacobs is an outspoken supporter of Trump and made headlines when he appeared in a social media video along with Trump and The Undertaker. This came when Trump appeared on Undertaker’s podcast shortly before the election.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On this packed episode of Going Ringside we’re talking a lot of politics. We start with the question of whether Dwayne Johnson is the best option for the Democratic Party looking to rebrand itself in the 2028 race for president.

As the party searches for a way to improve its standing with male voters, we analyze whether Johnson might be the best alternative for the party.

Going Ringside has followed Johnson’s flirtation with running for president for more than a year.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

There are very few wrestlers who took off out of the gate and enthralled the planet: Hulk Hogan, Steve Austin, The Rock ... and Bill Goldberg.

When he entered the pro wrestling scene for WCW in 1997, Goldberg’s unprecedented 173-match undefeated streak was like nothing the industry had ever seen.

Not only was a star born, but he has remained shining brightly three decades later. We caught up with Goldberg in Jacksonville where he was inducted into the Georgia-Florida Hall of Fame. He was a defensive tackle for the Bulldogs before being drafted in 1990 by the Los Angeles Rams.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices