AIW Absolution 7/21/17

Dominic Garrini v. The Duke

PAS: This was kind of an odd match. Duke is a heel manager who looks like a Illinois High School Defensive Line coach. You would think Garrinni would just squash him, but it was a really competitive match with Duke kicking out of a piledriver, throwing back suplexes, escaping submissions ect. Duke is a big dude, but it is weird to have a manager take 60% of a match with suplexes and not eye pokes. If you were watching the match in a vacuum the work was pretty good, and Garrinni is always worth checking out, still the booking was goofus.

Frankie Flynn v. PB Smooth

PAS: I had seen both of these guys in CWF before but they both looked better here, working with people you are familiar with can be really helpful. Smooth is listed at 7 feet tall and is probably legit 6'9 or so. He had really nice power moves including some nice bodyslams and a great chokeslam. Flynn works over the knee and does a nice job working it over, and Smooth does a nice consistent job selling it. Finish has the ref distracted while Flynn's crew attacks Smooth, while everyone is confused Flynn clips Smooth's knee with the rookie trophy and puts his feet on the ropes for the win. I enjoyed this, basic match, but well done and I would enjoy seeing either guy against Cain Justice in CWF-MA for the RGL belt.

Britt Baker v. Swoggle

PAS: This was a comedy fans bring the weapons match between a midget and a woman with a lot of mishigas, lots of run ins including Dick Justice doing a flip flop and fly and Space Monkey doing a Orihara moonsault. Swoggle took some semi-nasty garbage bumps including going but first into carpet tacks and getting barbed wire up his nose. I was semi amused by Swoggle taking a bump into Lucky Charms like they were thumbtacks. The finish had Adam Cole run in under a mask and clean out the heels so Baker could get the win. I am not a Cole guy, but he seems like a pretty big star to book for a surprise run in on a comedy match.

Eddie Kingston v. Tom Lawlor

PAS: I am always very happy to see a big time Eddie Kingston singles match. Kingston isn't going to grapple with you, so this had less jujitsu rolling then the other Lawlor matches I have watched, but they replaced with grappling with Kingston chops and backfist to the face. This was these guys doing an All Japan main event and Kingston's selling put it at a higher level then most matches of this style.  Every shot was impactful and every suplex was compressing. Lawlor has really good looking suplexes and is willing to take an asskicking. Lawlor does his neck snap move and Kingston sells it like it gave him nerve damage. Even the suplex no sell section had Kingston fighting through adrenaline and both guys collapse on their face. Finish was pretty great with Lawlor turning a Tazmission into a nasty ground and pound into a guillotine. Loved Kingston fighting from the ground until he ate one too many elbows and slumped unconscious.

ER: These two matched up great, and I think they used the right percentage of each man's strength. Kingston is a furious striker who often gets into fights with better strikers, and still brings it even as you can see his life meter draining the whole match. Lawlor comes out looking like Chuck Liddell and messes around by immediately flopping to his back. Kingston is game and I loved this front to back. Kingston tries his luck with some go behinds, lands some shots, and the longer the match goes - as Phil says - Kingston makes this mean so much more with his elite selling. Watching him go for a strike and become aware of numbness in his arm, or watching him take a strap down only to stumble down to a knee, things like that are part of what I love about pro wrestling. Suplex trading is almost always an instant fart noise in a match for me these days, but I love how these two handled it. Lawlor's first two Germans were absolute beasts. I don't know if he was planning this but I love that he played to the camera side with them, showing us the full side angle of the suplex. It really allowed us to see every step of it. Kingston is not a small guy and seeing the lift and the the throw and the landing was awesome.  Both guys throw full strength and I thought it was a big moment once Kingston got up and threw Lawlor. None of this felt like fighting spirit, it felt like typical Kingston not knowing when to quit. Kingston is a guy who quits when his body quits. He's still able to fire off some backfists, and that fist is always his ace in the hole, but you can't hit that backfist when you're on your back getting elbowed in the face. Lawlor locks in a tight standing guillotine and you can see Kingston fighting forward, trying to back Lawlor up, but smartly tapping. Awesome performance from both, killer style clash.

Ethan Page v. Shawn Schultz

PAS: This was a bullrope match, and a pretty well done one. Shultz is a southern guy who I remember enjoying in SAW. He has really nice downward punches, and for a guy billed as the master of the eye rake, he has a great eye rake. This could have used some blood, there were multiple times I assumed Page was about to blade, but he didn't, still Shultz had some really nasty choking with the rope. I also really enjoyed the crowd brawling, mostly fighting through the crowd rather then hair pulling and walking. Finish was slightly anti-climactic as Page just hit three uranages and dragged Shultz around to the corner, although overall the match exceeded expectations.

Chase Oliver/Garrison King/Joshua Bishop/Tre Lamar/AJ Gray  vs. Jollyville Fuck-Its (Russ Myers & T-Money)/Matt Justice/Young Studs (Bobby Beverly & Eric Ryan)

PAS: Man did I love this match. The concept is a group of AIW students challenged team of old school AIW guys. The first section of this match has the Old AIW laying a 75% Kurisu level beating on the rookies. Matt Justice nearly beheads Tre Lamar with a leg lariat, the Jollyville Fuck Its (who are a team I love and I need to seek out more of) have this great spot where T-Money puts Lamar in an airplane spin and Russ just punches him in the face on every spin. Garrison King has light up shoes an awesome secondary nickname (Garry "The King" Baller) and takes an absolute shellacking. After a really long one sided beating the rookies get a bit of an advantage with AJ Gray (who is sort of a ringer) and that leads into this awesome dive train, with Chase Oliver doing a Taka moonsault to the floor, Lamar hitting an insane looking Fosbury flop, Gray hitting a skytwister off the top and Justice Davey Boy Smith style powerslamming King off the top rope into a crowd on the floor. Finish run is pretty bonkers with everyone hitting big moves until the rookies get the big upset win. Batshit spotfest, with the old school team beatdown leading to a real structure that most of these kind of matches lack.

ER: This was the best. I had seen only a few of the guys in this match before, and a couple only because of one-off CWF appearances. The match is like a wrestling school horror story mixed with a prison drama, where 5 guys pay off the guards to look the other way while they lay a beating on the fresh fish. King draws the short straw and gets wasted by all of Old AIW. It never feels as unprofessional as Kurisu shoot KOing a rookie, but we get all sorts of slams and chops, the kind of slams that you know left some tingling fingers, and the kind of chops where they were being held prone and unable to defend. Matt Justice is a guy I'd never seen and came off as badass as Drew Galloway, just a big dude who can move as fast as anyone in the ring, and probably hit harder. His shotgun kick really was decapitating, and his chops to the chest and back played as the best chops in a match filled with sick chops, and his knee drop ranks among the best in wrestling. JFI are a killer team and their tag ins and doubles teams always brought the violence. T-Money came off like Sweet Brown Sugar in some of those violent 80s squashes, using impressive agility and stiff work. I can't believe the top rope didn't snap when he leapt over Myers and crashed full weight onto his opponent, and I loved him catching a Chase Oliver rana and powerbombing him into the buckles. Myers threw a bunch of nice punches, and that airplane spin with Myers throwing a punch to the ear every rotation was a riot! And for good measure he went and punched the rest of the New AIW in the head on the apron. Old AIW was clearly filled with glee at the beating they were delivering.

But the strength of the match was how genuinely and appropriately they sold New AIW's offense. This wasn't some Japanese match where the veterans puff out their chests and no sell every shot from the rookies, not even close. When Bobby Beverly got hit with a huge pop up double stomp to the chest it felt like a huge moment. And as Beverly lay on the mat we got a great shot of the beaten and tired New AIW standing on the apron, rooting him on, with King pulling himself up from the floor and slowly up each rope to root on his team. The dives really were a spectacular bunch of dives, with Lamar's super high leap Fosbury Flop being a standout, but that powerslam winning on craziness. Each dive was reckless and felt big, like New AIW had just taken their beating like men, and here we are STILL doing crazy shit. The spots in this were great, but there was real meat on these bones, the story an old and simple one, but one that almost always delivers. Every bit of this ruled.

Mia Yim vs. Shayna Baszler

PAS: These ladies had a very good match in the Mae Young Classic, that was more of a sprint, this was more a slow building title match, I am a bit torn to which I liked more. Shayna was great here, taking apart Yim's leg, low kicks to the thigh, nasty ankle joint manipulations, methodical and nasty, like if Ole studied ju-jitsu. Loved how the legwork came into play in the finish with Yim unable to fully lift Shayna for the package piledriver (which had beaten Shayna in their previous AIW matchup) she only got a close two count. When she goes for a second piledriver, Baszler slinks out hits an awesome gutwrench, and transitions into a brutal looking ankle lock for the tap. I am not sold on Yim's offense, but she did a great job selling and this was a really nifty match.

ER: I like how these two match up so it wasn't much of a shock that I enjoyed this. I loved Baszler going after Yim's leg the whole match, and thought Yim sold it nicely. After Yim misses an axe kick Baszler takes her down by grabbing her plant leg and we don't really look back. Baszler starts twisting at Yim's leg, kneeling on the inside of her knee, standing on her knee, stomping at her ankle, and I loved Yim trying to butt scoot away. Things peak when Yim attempts a cannonball in the corner, and Baszler leaps out of the corner with a knee. The knee looked flat out devastating, timed perfectly. It looked so damn good it was almost a shame that they had more match in them. But we still got cool moments the rest of the way, and I dug the shifting momentum gutwrench, thought Yim had a nice high knee of her own, always like that short clutch piledriver, super fun match.

Alex Daniels v. Joey Janela

PAS: Pretty fun Absolute title defense. Shortish spotfest sprint which is what Daniels does best. I haven't been following this fed, but out of context Gregory Iron as a heel is really weird. It just doesn't feel right to be cheering Janela beating the shit out of a guy with Cerebral Palsy. Iron takes a whooping too, big bumps and some nasty kicks to the face. I don't get why Daniels uses that brutal looking brainbuster throw into the corner as a set up move, but at least it lead right into a second slam and a two count here. Liked the finish, earlier in the match Iron rang the bell when Janela had Daniels in the crossface, here Janela puts the crossface on both of them until Daniels passes out. Nifty match which didn't wear out it's welcome.

Crazy Pain (Gringo Loko/Steve Pain) v. DJ Z/Laredo Kid v. NES (Facade/Flip Kendrick) vs. To Infinity and  Beyond (Cheech/Colin Delaney)

PAS: This reminded me of one of those IWRG school v. school ciberneticos, bunch of nuts just trying every insane move they can dream up. Delany does a baseball slide to the floor while german suplexing the guy in the ring, Facade does a rope walk Canadian destroyer, Flip hits a Code red into the turnbuckles, and on and on. Love Steve Pain, he is one of the best rudo bases in the world and he just flies with every rana and armdrag. Match really falls apart unfortunately as Flip does a 630 to the floor and cracks his skull either on the ringapron or floor. Everyone understandably freezes and they never really get their rhythm back. Finish has Loko faking another heart attack, and it is tough to do a worked injury angle moments after a real injury. This was apparently a rematch of an earlier match, and it did really make me want to check that one out.

Josh Prohibition v. Louis Lyndon v. Tim Donst v. Tracy Williams

PAS: I really enjoyed the opening sections of this match, which were mostly spirited crowd brawling. Lyndon was nuts, armdragging Williams into a row of chairs and hitting a rana off the merch table. I also enjoyed the Prohibition v. Donst brawling with Prohibition dumping an entire garbage can full of wet garbage on Donst's head, there was a moment where the moist garbage water cascades down his legs that was a disturbing as any death match bump. The match unfortunately really falls apart when everyone gets back into the ring Donst brings in a bunch of plunder and just kind of stands around for a bit until he is attack. Prohibition handcuffs him and they do this bad section where everyone is about to hit him but gets cut off (this included Williams preparing to chair shot Donst and then for some reason placing the chair against his own cheek to get dropkicked, painfully bad looking). There is then a long set up of chairs and fight on the top rope between Prohibition and Donst while I assume Lyndon and Williams went and got dinner or something. Just a mess. Post match Nick Gage comes out as a surprise to challenge Donst, and Nick Gage is always an awesome surprise.

PAS: Overall this was a really great show, three matches that make our MOTY list, two really high, and only the main event was actively bad. I wish AIW was a little easier to get, but I think I will be sending some more dough to SMV.

ER: Any time a show lands 3 matches on our Ongoing MOTY List, you know it's quality. I came away really impressed by some people I had never watched before, and that's always quality wrestle watching.