Jimmy Korderas Weighs-In On RAW Underground, RETRIBUTION And WWE ThunderDome

Former WWE referee Jimmy Korderas returned to The Wrestling Inc. Daily podcast to chat about Renee Young reportedly leaving WWE as well as the current WWE landscape. Korderas first gave his thoughts on the recently introduced RAW Underground concept.

"I'm still on the fence with it," Korderas admitted. "The thing I don't like about it, and I think Justin [LaBar] touched on this as well recently, is you have this aspect of RAW Underground where, hey, we've got this dark looking 'shoot fight style' presentation on a show where you have pro wrestling, sports entertainment. It's almost like a disconnect if that makes sense where you're saying, OK, this stuff is real fighting, and this stuff is sports entertainment.

"You're blurring two lines that I think kind of shouldn't be intersecting. If it was its own entity, its own show, let's say for example, you do two hours of RAW, where it's in the ring, pro wrestling, and then you say OK, the final hour RAW is gonna be nothing but fights in this back room. I could kind of live with that. I hate to say it, but I think it's going to be a trivia question in the future."

On the same night RAW Underground was introduced, RETRIBUTION also debuted with the mystery as to their members and their motivations still up in the air. Korderas admitted that he isn't a big fan of RETRIBUTION so far but is willing to reserve judgment until the members are revealed.

"I'm not digging really this presentation of them so far because first of all, to me, they look like a bunch of young fellas just trying to get some attention for lack of a better term," Korderas described. "But at the same time, it all depends on the big reveal. I'm gonna reserve judgment until the big reveal because if the big reveal is not something that makes me go holy, you know what, then it's a big disappointment. It has to be something big, and if it's not something big, oh boy."

Given the chance to fantasy book members of the RETRIBUTION, Korderas offered the idea of wrestlers that were released back in April to be part of the faction. He did preface that they would have to be led by a big name of some sort and noted that it should be made to a big deal.

"If it's possibly the COVID releases, the releases back in April, if it's a bunch of those guys who are fighting back and saying, 'hey, we got let go unfairly. We weren't given a fair chance,' depending, again, on who the people are, I'm cool with that,'" Korderas explained. But I would like it to be maybe those guys led by somebody currently on the roster, a big name or something like that. But again, it better be a big deal. That's all I gotta say. It's got to be a big deal."

WWE ThunderDome is set to debut soon with WWE premiering a new live experience for fans. Korderas said he's taking the wait and see approach with ThunderDome but pointed out that WWE typically takes big concepts and pulls it off well.

"I'm excited to see what it looks like and see how it works out. Again, waiting to see before pass judgment on it, but it sounds like it's going to be interesting and different, and hopefully, it is. Let's put it this way, they have been, in the past, very creative with new concepts. Hopefully, that continues with this ThunderDome concept. I hope they can pull off a good one here."

Wrestling Inc.'s Nick Hausman brought up the concern that fans connecting virtually to serve as a live audience may cause some trouble. Korderas acknowledged that might happen since fans have been known recently to "take over shows".

"That's a very valid point," Korderas agreed. "We have seen recently in recent years where fans tend to 'take over a show,' and who's to say that this will not continue with this ThunderDome concept. I think you're right. I think there is going to be an element of that happening. So it's definitely going to be interesting."

You can following Jimmy on Twitter @JimmyKorderas. Jimmy's full interview aired as part of a recent episode of our podcast, The Wrestling Inc. Daily. Subscribe to get the latest episodes as soon as it's released Monday – Friday afternoon by clicking here.