A new study published today in the Journal of Gastropsychology suggests a significant linkage between the consumption of Mountain Dew and the inability to provide adequate commentary to professional wrestling matches.

The study, conducted by a team of researchers at Abudadein University in Tehran, indicates that some ingredients in the fizzy, peculiar beverage — perhaps the citric acid, or perhaps the plutonium purported to give the drink its green fluorescence — causes wrestling commentators to make bad puns, outdated references, and incessant product plugs.

“Our research shows that prolonged exposure to Diet Mountain Dew can turn a wrestling commentator into a catchphrase-spewing simpleton, ” said Dr. Robert Ponovich, lead author of the study.

“Sooner or later, a chronic Mountain Dew drinker is capable of only saying the phrase ‘nine-ninety-nine” over and over again.”

The deleterious effects of Mountain Dew (and Diet Mountain Dew) on wrestling commentary are most noticeable in World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE), as evidenced by the babble spewed by commentators Jerry Lawler, John Bradshaw Layfield and Michael Cole, who seem to be hopelessly addicted to the product.

Asked for his opinion on the controversial study, Michael Cole took a sip of Diet Mountain Dew and replied: “WWE Network WWE App 9.99 longest running episodic Legends House vintage Total Divas WWE Network 9.99.”