Hey guys, this is Denise Salsato with the world's strongest man, Mark Henry, and welcome to the

Busted Open podcast. To kick off the show, Mark and I react to Carmelo Hayes becoming the new

U.S. champion. This is the Busted Open podcast. So let's talk about that. Carmelo Hayes, a brand

new United States champion. I'm so happy for him, man.

Wow.

This has been, this has been, like, the last couple of months, he's had a string of just

like fantastic matches, fantastic showing. It kind of feels like things are starting to go

right by him, right? Because here's the thing like car um

i i hate saying oh he's had a string of good matches because carmelo never had any bad matches

like i hate saying that right but i also mean it word important yes okay i would say maybe more

important matches there you go okay he had a string of more important matches. More important matches. There you go.

Okay, he had a string of more important matches, but that's the thing like Carmelo.

The reason he got where he's at right now is because of his in-ring work, right?

That was the reason why he got like what?

He was like the first draft that year that he got drafted to SmackDown.

He had that big confrontation with Cody Rhodes.

I'll never forget that.

And that felt like a massive moment.

It felt like, okay, this guy, he's up next.

He's going to be the future.

And then it felt like that future didn't come that fast yet.

It felt like he had to sort of remind people why he was there,

...