XCW Midwest 5/5/09

Rob Fury v. Chris Michaels

TKG: I don’t know who Rob Fury is, but I think there is a guy wrestling as “Rob Fury” in every state in the country. Really had he feel of a guy who would be wrestling in ECWA tagged with Inferno Kid. He has good height on his dropkick and is able to do energetic foot stomping to get crowd behind him. But this is the kind of really impressive heel performance where you leave with no impression of the face at all.

PAS: Fury has short hair and blue trunks and really looks like a random John Paul tag partner in late 80’s Memphis. Michaels ruled in this taking a bunch of really great signature bumps, including a backflip over the top and the Waltman corner bump. Finishing super kick was awesome looking too. Fun but ultimately forgettable match.

Sexy Sean Casey v. Mitch Ryder

TKG: Sean Casey is a really generic heel in the same way that Fury was a really generic babyface. They may both be trainees. I don’t know if Ryder was working as guy working opponent below him (in wrestling hierarchy) or if that’s just what it feels like when you match up a good babyface v. generic heel. This felt like inverted version of the heel underestimates opponent type match.

PAS: I have no idea why you bring in Sexy Sean Casey when your show is being semi mained by Sexy Shawn Cook. They either have to feud, or Casey has to change his gimmick. This seemed to set up a Ryder v Michaels match, and in that sense the matches did their job. You watch Ryder work a generic heel and Michaels work a generic face, and you really want to see them against each other

Bull Pain v. Lash Gibson/Convict

TKG: I can’t make out any of the mic work which is a pain considering this is a fed filled with guys who are good on the mic. The impression I get is that Todd Morton is claiming injury so Bull Pain gets these two guys instead. Lash Gibson is a XCW trainee who I’ve seen twice before and liked. This whole show may be XCW regulars v trainees. I need to start watching the all trainee shows. I expected this to be a total disgusting ass beating. Instead it was Bull Pain beating on the trainees, followed by moments of Bull Pain being distracted by Morton or Flash Flannigan and the trainees getting in little bits of stuff. This disappointed as you kind of want it to be either more competitive or more non-competitive. This was in some in-between place and just there.

PAS: I was expecting this to be a brutal Bull Pain beating and there were moments of that, but I wanted more moments.

Shawn Cook/Cody Hawk v Irish Airborne

TKG: This went really long, maybe too long. First ten minutes of this were flashy face stuff and heel stooging, followed by Shawn Cook pulling down the top rope while one of Irish Airborne was running the ropes leading to a big bump and a FIP section. I liked the first FIP section, and then second member of Irish Airborne tagged in and got his stuff stopped for second FIP section. Heels are really good at stopping the faces from getting stuff in and have lots of nasty ways to knock a guy in his head, but second Irish Airborne guy was sloppier as FIP then first one, They go for a really cool variation of the standard Fantastics lose a match finish (Rogers has opponent in roll up and gets hit with clothesline/DDT etc). Here instead Shawn Cook goes for the clothesline only to have it ducked and fly out the ring. A couple neat spots and variations on a basic formula, neat things that I hadn’t seen before…but this got lost a couple times in it’s length.

PAS: I liked some of the flashy Irish Airborne stuff, the springboard headlock takeover was cool and I liked some of the Cook and Hawk stooging, the face catapulting the heels head into his partners nuts. However it didn’t feel like either guy had enough cool stuff for the length of the match. This was a 20+ minute match that would have been a really great 14 minute match.

L.T. Falk v. Flash Flanagan

PAS: This is a whole show kind of based around higher ranked guys wrestling lower ranked guys and this was the best of those matches. Falk is the son of Cowboy Tony Faulk and is better then anyone in Legacy. This had Flanagan rip apart Faulks leg with some really nastily applied basic offense, and Falk firing back with nice enthusiastic babyface offense. I especially liked his punch, chop combo. Falk did a bunch of really cool sells of the leg, including flipping out of a headlock and his leg collapsing under him. Pretty much a touring Ric Flair match done really well, which is always cool to see in the 21st century.

TKG: Yah a lot of this show felt like an 80s WWF Superstars episode. I got the sense that I would enjoy the battle of the underdogs between all the trainees but here for the most part I didn’t by the underdogs as being competitive. Here this really did feel like underdog hugely stepping up and you bought his enthusiasm at having this opportunity. He wasn’t going to let it go to waste. Flannigan’s leg work all looked really good and was paced well. Flannigan’s had a pretty nice year in the ring and always manages to have neat original finishes to his matches.