Lose Yourself

I’m sincerely impressed with you, Zion.

That’s no bullshit. No swerve coming there, even though I know you’re expecting it. No “gotcha moment”, even though I know you’re expecting that, too. Really, this isn’t going to be anything that you’re expecting, even though I know you’re expecting a lot from me. So much so, in fact, that you pulled up your big boy panties and did something that very few people have the balls to do these days.

You dropped first.

Fucking kudos, Zion. And yeah, I’m gonna keep right on calling you by your slave name, and maybe we can get into that later, but I have a lot to say and to be honest with you, I don’t know how long it’s going to be before we get there. Right now, I wanna talk about that promo. I wanna talk about how you sincerely and seriously impressed me with your effort. I want to talk about the fact that if I end up putting half as much energy into preparing for this match as you put into establishing that you belong in this match, I’m in for a hell of a night on Saturday. I want to talk about the fact that you are legitimately and truly a threat to become the new HOW World Champion on Saturday night. Because after all these years, I think you’ve earned that.

I think you’ve earned some real fucking honesty from me.

I think you’ve earned more than the usual Great Value brand B-material that we throw at you, because we know you’ll take it. I think you’ve earned more than ignored Twitter DMs, and asshole buttoned phone calls, and the eye rolling that I do when you hit me up looking for advice on how to tune up your game in the ring. After all the years that you have gotten back up when we’ve knocked you off the horse, all the hours of abuse you’ve taken with a smile on your face, and everything that you have done for High Octane Wrestling, a company that I FUCKING LOVE… you deserve an honest conversation. And if we’re gonna have a real honest conversation, Darin, then it sure as shit isn’t coming from Michael Lee Best.

It’s going to come from Mike Polowy.

I like you, Darin. Let me get that out there front and center, because I don’t know if I’ve ever told you that before. You have done more for this company behind the scenes than any of the fans will ever know, and more than the boys in the back will ever appreciate. It’s like my Dad said during your roster review– you’re an annoying motherfucker, but you’re always there in a pinch. Always there when we need you. You talk too much much, and every word that comes out of your mouth makes my balls itch, but at the end of the day, I fucking like you.

You talked a lot about our history, Zion. You made a lot of really good points, and I’m not going to argue with them. Mike Best would, you’re right about that– he takes statistics and shock humor and twists them and turns them until his opponents look like fucking idiots. That’s absolutely my M.O., and I’m sincerely amazed that you’re the first person to point it out in ten years. And no, I’m not being sarcastic– in my decade in HOW, no one has ever boiled me down so elegantly to a single sentence. If anyone knows it, it’s me… the best way to emasculate and trivialize your opponent is to sum them up in a sentence, and let the world see how fucking underwhelming they actually are. Fucking bravo, man. Well done.

You’re waiting for a swerve.

It’s not coming.

Thing is, you “Mike Bested” me. You lined me up like the three black guys at the end at 8 Mile, hoping I’d choke. Hoping that all the vicious things I’d lined up to say about you would fall flat, as long as you said them first. And God DAMN if you didn’t do a hell of a job at it, too. It would look really silly now if I pulled a Stevens and started dropping days and times on you, after you called your shot first and called it hard. You can’t see me, but right now, I’m giving you the old chef’s kiss. Perfection. No, not that one. The good kind.

But now it’s my turn to talk.

You said a lot of things, and a lot of them were true, but you also told a lot of lies. You probably didn’t know they were lies, of course— you just didn’t know any better at the time. See, you DID beat me in 2015, that’s true. But you didn’t beat me because I took my eyes off the prize. You didn’t beat me because I didn’t take you seriously. You didn’t beat me on a fluke. I took you serious as cancer, Zion… you beat me because you were fucking good.

Because you are fucking good.

See, your history was a little revisionist.

When you came to HOW in 2014, I called you the next coming of Mike Best. I recognized something in you that no one else did. I could see the fire and the spirit in you, and while the diamond was indeed rough, it was a diamond nonetheless. I got on a podcast and told the world that you were the next best thing. Of course, the sentiment only lasted a couple of weeks– I don’t know if you know this about me, because I keep it oh so well hidden, but I’m a jealous, petty piece of shit most of the time. You, and Hollywood, and Noah… you guys were riding high on the wave of New Guy Shine™, and all of the sudden, everyone was talking about Sex & Money. Was it one of the dumbest tag team names in history? Absolutely. Did you guys come from an overhyped penguin fed? ABSOLUTELY. But did you deserve to be berated, mocked, and ripped apart every single day of your life for the next six years because of it?

Absolutely you did.

Hey, I said I was going to be honest, Zion. Not all of it is going to be pretty. You walked into my company with your dick out, and I shit tested you from the moment you opened your stupid mouth and started using it to say words like “legend”. You didn’t feel like you had any dues to pay, you didn’t feel like you needed to show your proper respect, and you didn’t pay any heed that the road you were power-walking across had been painstakingly laid by men like me who came before you. You didn’t want to earn your spot, so I decided to MAKE you fucking earn it. I decided to ride you, and mock you, and torment you until you showed a little fucking humility. I decided that you were to be weighed and measured, and do you know what you did?

You fucking failed, Darin.

You had shitty little meltdown after shitty little meltdown. You pouted and cried to Lee Best that “me and my boys” were mean to you. I gave you a chance to use the balls that came with that dick you dropped on the table, and instead of manning up, you zipped your cock up in the zipper and then blamed it on me. Since you’re dropping some history on me, Zion, let me be honest with you about yours— you told me you never took your ball and went home, and you took your cute little shot about running off to UTAH. You know what you probably didn’t know?

You’re the catalyst for us leaving in the first place.

See what I did there? See, because that was one of the ninety serious nicknames you’ve had for yourself over the course of six years. But we’ll get to that, too— put a in “nicknames” right next to the reasons I’m never gonna call you Matthews, because we aren’t there yet. We’re talking about THE GREAT SCHISM, right? The day that the Chicago Six split for the United Toughness Alliance, and “turned our backs on HOW”. Oh, and how it was because of you, Darin.

Since we’re being honest.

There were a million reasons we left, and a million more that we came back, but you, my friend, were the assassination of the archduke. You and the Hitman Gang. Because my father told me that I could play nice with Club Penguin or I could find a new playground to play in. Because for all the talent you had in the ring, you were a disrespectful jackass backstage who didn’t know how to shut his fucking mouth and know his place. Because there wasn’t enough room on the roster for both of our egos, and I resented Lee Best for taking the side of the newcomer who hadn’t earned the right, over his flesh and blood who had.

So you’re right, Zion.

I took my ball and went to UTAH.

I bailed on my father, my friends, my company and my legacy, and I buried HOW to anyone who would listen. Buried it in ways that would make even Eric Dane blush. I called it a cult and a pyramid scheme and I didn’t speak to my father for over six months. And the second I was out that door, your career flourished in a way that it never had before and it never has since, so you can fuck smooth off with your battlecry “YOU QUIT” virtue signaling bullshit, because the day I left HOW was the best day of your career.

And it only got better after that.

We love to throw shade that everything you accomplished was during the thinnest roster in HOW history, but you know what? Fuck that– you won the ICON Championship, and you beat Jace Parker Davidson and John Sektor to do it. YOU FUCKING DID THAT, and no one can ever take it away from you. You beat two guys who have beaten me on multiple occasions, and you did it the second I walked away from HOW. You did it after pinning me, clean, in the middle of the ring– you’re one of the last people in the world who can say that, because I haven’t been fucking pinned since 2016.

So why am I telling you this?

It’s too good to be true, right? Here comes the swerve, you’re thinking. Because that’s what you do, Zion. You think, and you think, and you think, until your brain turns to fucking burnt toast and everyone in a thirty block radius can smell your gluten riddled brain farts. There’s no swerve, Zion, the fact is that you DID ALL OF THAT. You flew as close as you could to the sun without burning your little wings off, and you have credits to your name that some people in HOW can only dream of. The reason I say it isn’t to swerve you, Darin. It’s to call you out on your absolutely insufferable bullshit.

You aren’t a fucking underdog.

From the second HOW restarted in 2019, you’ve been wearing this stupid little boy scout mask and saying “by gosh, by golly” and telling everyone who would listen that you’re a changed man. That you’re just trying to learn every single day and be the best that you can be. Little Dandy Darin who emerged from his cubicle and just wants to serve his 97Red country. But that’s not who you are, just the same as “who you are” isn’t Darin fucking Matthews. Darin Matthews is a lie you’ve made up to justify your eternal guilt for being a cunt to the people who paved the way for you, and it’s years too late to go back to being Darin Matthews now, buddy.

Take it from Mike Polowy.

Take it from the guy who made his bed a decade ago, but at least has the decency to lay in it. You shit on my floor in 2014, and now 2019 Zion thinks he can just get a clean slate because he “got out of the business and learned to type”. Fuck your own face, you disingenuous douchebag. We all got out of the business, doofus– HOW closed, and nobody wanted to play on Fisher Price plastic playgrounds, so we all hung up our fucking boots. We ALL had rust to knock off. We ALL had to run the ropes a few times, the only difference is that you never came more than halfway back. So don’t you dare preach to me, because I’m the one who dragged your temping ass out of the cubicle and told you to come back to HOW.

Because I grew up, and you didn’t.

That’s gotta be a tough pill to swallow, coming from a man with “Adult Toddler” written in his Tinder profile, huh? I grew up, and you stayed a fucking manchild. You put on your good boy hat and said your “BY GOLLY GEES”, and then the first time you sniffed victory like a yip dog with his whole snout up a human asshole, the old Zion started to leak in through the crevices. You started talking shit, and then I slapped you the fuck down. You crossed your arms and threw a three month vow of silence pity party, and then Max slapped you the fuck down. You stopped winning matches and stopped putting in effort and stopped wrestling at a high level, and then Lee Best himself slapped you the fuck down. So what did you do?

You took YOUR ball and went to MVW.

When the “underdog of HOW” was at his greatest underdog moment, he didn’t tough it out and keep marching down to the ring. You could have served your time and gotten back onto the card, like Stevens did. You could have taken it on the chin, like Eric Dane is right now. But you didn’t do that, Darin. You didn’t act like a fucking underdog then, and you shouldn’t pretend to do it now. Because when the chips were down, what did you do? You went down to the indies and you bullied a bunch of guys who were lower on the card than you, because you’re a jealous little bitch with a mean competitive streak.

You know, Zion… just like I did to you.

No matter how many nicknames you adopt, no matter how many times you change your last name, and no matter how how you try to revise history, it all comes back to what I said about you in 2014 and what I’ll say about you now. And maybe you thought it was a compliment back then, and maybe you think it’s a compliment now, but I can promise you that it isn’t.

You’re the next coming of Mike Best.

Maybe that’s why I decided we needed to talk, Zion. Because five years ago, Darin Zion pinned me clean in the center of the ring and made me hate him so much that I left my FUCKING HOME. Because he made me go scorched earth and throw a pissbaby tantrum that nearly tore HOW in two. Darin Zion did that— what the FUCK has Darin Matthews done for me lately? Cause I’ll be honest with you, buddy.

Mike Polowy was a shitty little bitch.

Mike Polowy came into HOW swinging his dick, and he disrespected the legends that came before him. He tore down Jatt Starr and Chris Kostoff and Max Kael, and he had his whole asshole torn open by them for his efforts. But instead of throwing a little pissbaby tantrum and crying about it to the boss, he fought back, and he became something more.

He became Mike Best.

He became a man worth beating, and a man you won’t beat on Saturday night until you flush this Matthews shit out of your system clean enough to beat a piss test. Not just the name, Darin— the MINDSET. Because underdogs don’t fucking beat me, and you aren’t even that. You’re cosplaying at one, because you think you lose less face if you call YOURSELF a loser before anyone else does. Fuck that, and fuck you. I don’t buy it, because underneath that bag of ass you’re wearing like a Halloween costume, there is a fucking assassin.

Not literally.

Put the sniper rifle down.

On Saturday night, you’re either going to hold the HOW World Championship over your head for the first time, or I’m going to cave your skull in with my kneecap and watch you fall back to the bottom of the ladder. You’re either going to steal the main event of No Remorse, or you’re going to watch it from catering and wonder what could have been. So what’s it going to be, Darin? Am I right? Or are you a fucking loser?

It’s time to grow up, Zion.

It’s time to back up the shots you fired by dropping first. It’s time to shut the fuck up and put your Big Money where your mouth is. It’s time to prove to me that I wasn’t wasting words when I put you over as the next coming of Kneesus Christ, because I don’t like to be fucking wrong, and the hell on Earth I will rain down on you at Refueled will be all the proof of that you need.

I will NOT take it easy on you.

I will NOT suffer your egregious bullshit boy scout routine. I will NOT FUCKING CODDLE YOU. And I need you to take those words very seriously, because this isn’t just a match. This is a match for the HOW World Championship, and I am very, very possessive over the things in this world that belong to me. This title belongs to me, and don’t you dare think that because you’re in your try hard feels that I’m going to take it easy on you. Because Mike Polowy likes you a hell of a lot, Darin, but Mike Polowy has been dead and buried for a long, long time, and Michael Lee Best will fucking kill you.

Now here, Marshall Matthews…

Tell these people something they don’t know about me.