Found Footage Friday: 1998 IWA MID-SOUTH TV~! BULL PAIN~! IAN~! TRAILER PARK~! DUNN~! FAIRWAY~! SMOTHERS~!

MD: We don't usually do full episodes of TV but four episodes of 1998 IWA Mid South TV have popped up and they're full of matches. We'll do the first two now and double back for the rest later.

IWA Mid-South Hardcore TV 1/31/98

Steven Dunn (with Kenny Bolin & Rico Beatty) vs. Bobby Martin

MD: Super competent TV squash. I wasn't expecting comfort food on this thing, but here it was. I kept waiting for Dunn to pull Martin up instead of just lackadaisically covering him and I was happy when he finally did. The hope was fairly minimal as it should be. Really this was just a mauling with one power move after the next. Even when we see a squash on ROH TV now it doesn't quite look like this. It's either more rushed or more 50/50. On a show with a ton of matches, this had time to breathe. It's supposed to feel just a little excessive (but not too excessive). That's how Dunn gets heat. When Jones fast-counted at the end, I wasn't sure if it was a heel move or a bit of mercy for Martin.

ER: Strongly worked squash from Steven Dunn. Look at Dunn getting on the gear after WWF, just in time for All Japan and eventually the Derby Sports Arena. He looks great. He looks like geared up Jim Powers but everything he does is better than the best thing geared up Jim Powers could do (running clothesline?). Dunn is dominant and keeps it moving the whole time, giving us a full 5 minute squash without filling time by trash talking the audience. Dunn throws great punches, stomps Martin's hands, pokes the man in the eyes when he's on his knees, despicable tough guy stuff. The escalation of everything was strong, including the way he slowly worked Martin into the match. Martin gets punched in the head trying a sunset flip and I assume that's the most "offense" he would get, until Dunn runs into a boot in the corner. Then runs into it again. Then again. I'm not sure I've ever seen that. Dunn just kept running into that boot, like a guy still playing paper when his opponent only throws rock. Great gag to work Martin into the match, and Martin looks good punching Dunn across the ring. I also love that Dunn finished the match almost right after, dropping to his knees with a powerbomb to stop a rana attempt. 

IWA Mid-South Television Title Three Way: Chip Fairway (c) vs. Cash Flo (with Billy The P) vs. Rollin' Hard 

MD: I will give Thatcher credit. On commentary, he was pushing the idea of variety hard, noting that Dunn had worked a more 70s/80s classic style and here he was pushing that each of these three worked a different style. And it more or less worked as a promotional tool. I bought into it at least. I'd say this overachieved but only because I had my doubts coming in. It's still a three-way. Rollin' had some issues hitting some things and there was weird leg selling that felt almost legit and then went away in the middle. The alliances shifted though Flo and Chip worked against Rollin more often than not. They always betrayed one another and came back to it. Rollin felt like a de facto face at best. I'm not sure the crowd was ever particularly behind anyone here. They did keep things moving. The TV title felt like it was being used to highlight these younger guys with less time in the business and this was champ vs two former champs. Chip won it by hitting a cheapshot off the top after Flo hit the Alabama Jam. Like I said, despite some issues, it probably overachieved but in a very "all things considered" sort of way.

ER: I enjoyed this a lot even if the match structure is brutally bad. Three ways stink, for reasons on vivid display, namely the last half of a too long match (why did this go 15 minutes!?) comprised of constant pinfall break ups and pins for things that would never win a match. Rollin' Hard has the most in ring experience of the three and looks like he has the least. Hard was such dead weight, it's hilarious. He cannot get up for anything. It takes Chip working with Cash just to get Rollin' over for a back body drop, which has no lift whatsoever. This man would not float in the Dead Sea. 

The big takeaway here is what a phenom Chip Fairway was just a few months into his career. This match would have somehow been much worse as a singles match between Flo and Hard, as Fairway does his best to glue this growing mess together. It probably wouldn't have been a mess had it gone 8 minutes instead of 15, but it goes 15 and desperately needs Fairway. He's a great bumper, great at taking offense, great at working hard heel offense, honestly looks like someone with as much polish as anyone on this show who worked in major feds. He bumps hard to the floor, and when he makes his way back in he does an expertly timed low bridge that sends Cash over the top backwards. His bumps have great punch to them, jumping into the impact, not overselling after hitting the mat, just focusing on the impact. 

Fairway has better stomps than anyone working on US TV right now, and his lariat to Cash was finisher worthy. When he breaks up a pin (and there are a lot of broken up pins!) he's the only one making it look like he's using the opportunity to land a shot on one of his opponents. He throws great lefty punches with snap, his chops have loud sound and louder impact. He reminded me a lot of Adam Priest, only larger and wrestling in a t-shirt. The finish itself looked great, even if the several minutes leading us there were not. Cash Flo's Alabama Jam looked fantastic, and Fairway getting the win by breaking up Flo's pin with a top rope elbowdrop across the back of the head looked like a real finish. 

We've written about a lot of IWA Mid-South, but I don't know that we've written about Fairway before now. We should do that more often. 

Paul Diamond vs. Adam Flash

MD: Diamond felt about equivalent to Dunn so it made sense that they were on a collision course of sorts. He still had a lot of gas in the tank though, even if it was used in odd ways at times. Flash took much more of this than the guy in the opener and even won it after Dunn interfered (and a fast count from Jones; so not mercy in the first match). They kept it mostly tight with arm drags and hip tosses and reversals. Flash hit a low dropkick at one point and Diamond a pumphandle slam for a nearfall. He also hit this pretty bizarre back leap off the top into what I think was supposed to be a DDT but just sort of flattened Flash instead. Still, for the most part, Diamond looked like he belonged on TV and if he was on a card in 1998 I'd probably shrug and say sure, I'd go see him.

ER: I didn't like this as much as the Dunn squash, but it had similar strong qualities. I actually think Steven Dunn had more major fed potential than Diamond, but Diamond had the height that Dunn didn't and wrestled more like a heavyweight. Dunn worked a strong Memphis style and had an excellent sense of pacing. Paul Diamond wrestles more like a late 90s heavyweight like Wrath-but smaller, for the good and bad that entails. He had great force on his backbreaker and his awesome corner crescent kick hung on Flash's body. That corner spin kick is my favorite piece of Jerry Flynn's offense, Diamond's looked just as good. Flash was starting to gain confidence, getting the timing of his punches down and too afraid to throw them from distance, but I remember him eventually becoming a guy I liked rather than Not Good Kidman. 

Tracy Smothers vs. GQ Masters III (with Kenny Bolin)

MD: Smothers, unsurprisingly, looked like a million bucks. Bolin came out to start to work with Masters on a trial basis, more to get at Smothers than anything else. Bolin was all over the show, of course. Tracy was babyface and had a few FBI gestures but was mainly just his walking on water Southern Boy self. Masters got in a bit after a racket shot in the corner but Smothers cameback with an awesome flurry of offense, winning it with his cool fall forward cradle slam that I'm not sure I've ever seen anyone else really do. Looked great though. Bolin was foiled on this day. 

ER: Damn you talk about underrated guys we haven't written enough about, GQ Masters is an underrated guy that I love. I don't even know that he worked a hundred matches, he was just incredible at getting in there and taking a stooging ass kicking. I think this whole match could have been worked with Smothers just standing in the dead center of the ring, because GQ kept rushing headlong into everything, then would get his ass kicked and scramble to the ropes every time. When Bolin finally hit Smothers in the knee with the racket, GQ got to punch Smothers across the ring, and had that same excited look on his face like when Duane Gill would land something before getting his neck crunched with a DDT. GQ sold that DDT like Tenryu, neck damaged but the top of his hairline still smarting from the impact. Smothers has a tremendous belly to belly and really rag dolls Masters on his finishing slam. Masters just had a great knack for making offense painful. I wish GQ Masters III was someone who was wrestling now, in a place where I could book him to throw punches and get his ass beat, the way wrestling should be. 

Shark Boy vs. Mad Man Pondo

MD: Pondo bumped all over the ring for Shark Boy for the first few minutes. I don't think it actually served either of them because it didn't feel earned. There was no resistance to it. No weight to any of it. I get why they did it as it was almost all Shark Boy for a minute or two before Pondo nailed him off the top with the stop sign for the win. Still, it was one of those cases where doing what intuitively led to making Shark Boy good actually didn't make him look as good as if he had to earn it.  

ER: I cannot believe Shark Boy took 90% of the match while sporting the most low budget indy ass look in indy wrestling. The whole time I was waiting for Pondo, this dirtbag ass looking superstar, to kick this jabrone's ass and instead it was all Shark Boy offense. Shark Boy hit a clothesline that landed much harder than I expected for a guy who was much smaller than Pondo. He had a nice elbowdrop, nice punch, but did not have enough material - or size - to run so much of the match. I don't think Pondo landed a single piece of offense, just hit Shark Boy with a stop sign and needed a Jeff Jones fast count to win. Why was Shark Boy being presented so strong? He had no look to speak of and looked more like a non-wrestler who was wearing someone's leftover tights, but they worked this like Hogan vs. The Genius, only with freaking Mad Man Pondo in the Lanny Poffo role. 

Axl Rotten vs. Trailer Park Trash

MD: "Trash a long wiry wrestler" as Thatcher let us know. It is fun that Thatcher has to say Trailer Park or Trailer Park Trash over and over. Axl is pretty over here. Trash does a good job taking a punch (or even teasing it) and running. Solid heatseeking before he can get a cheapshot. When he's leaning on him, the crowd's happy to chant Axl. Pretty smart match for this crowd overall. Trash almost looks too together and with it, more like a perfect slimy used car salesman than a guy called Trailer Park Trash. He misses an Alabama Jam (which is probably not something he should be doing if it's Cash Flo's big move) and Axl hits a great reverse exploder that probably has a name I should know but don't. Then Pondo hits the ring and Ian makes the save and this all builds to something bigger.

ER: Talk about a trend, us not writing about underrated guys who we should be writing exclusively about, because Trailer Park Trash - like GQ Masters, like Chip Fairway - also perfectly fits. TPT is a perfect Wrestler-as-Bad Boyfriend, getting his ass whooped around the trailer park after coming home too late too drunk. He's wiry, he's not so much a scumbag, he just looks like a good ol boy who loves watching The Intimidator and hates pretty boy racers like Daryl Waltrip. He is an excellent stooge, but I appreciate the ways Rotten sold for him (even before I knew they were setting up a tag for next week). Rotten hit the turnbuckles and rolled away holding his back so convincingly that he looked like a guy with a slipped disc. 

The post-match was excellent and made me - and anyone watching I assume - excited to see the tag next week. This is how you set up a hot match in one quick angle. Ian comes out to beat Pondo's ass around ringside while Trailer Park beats Axl in the ring. When Trailer Park Trash is throwing mounted punches at Axl's face, he looks like the best wrestler on these shows, which are filled with great wrestlers. Ian shoves Pondo into the ringpost and swings a chair off his head right one foot away from some teenagers. Ian looks like a damn fighter in the brawl, to the point where his punches and arm strikes look more damaging than his unprotected chairshot.  

IWA Mid-South Hardcore TV 2/7/98

Loser Leaves Town For 30 Days: Steven Dunn (with Kenny Bolin & Rico Beatty) vs. Paul Diamond

MD: On paper, at least, this show gave a bunch of payoffs to the previous one, so that's great. Honestly, this would have been really good with an extra five minutes. I think either in shocking people or leaning into the times or just protecting Diamond in the loss, they just completely left out the heat. Dunn ran to start and caught Diamond as he came back into the ring but between that and the false finishes after a ref bump, that was it. Diamond took over quickly and hit a bunch of stuff (a dangling kick to the gut followed by an inverted atomic drop, that move he tried the previous week off the second rope (it's a twisting bulldog, not a DDT), a spin wheel kick in the corner, and even chairshots on the outside (which blunted the finish because why should we care about Bolin/Beatty interfering if he can just do that?). Then the ref bump, a false finish after Diamond got Beatty and a phantom Pin after Bolin hit Dunn by accident (and the spin wheel kick), before the powder and the DDT on the chair to send Diamond packing for 30 days. There was a great conventional match in here, or even a heated no DQ match, but unfortunately, we're in February 1998.

ER: You know this was going to be hot because Diamond waits the entirety of Van Halen's "Right Now" piano intro before running out during the guitar intro, and the music shuts off like 5 seconds into the guitar intro because it's not a very big building and Diamond runs to the ring pretty fast. Kenny Bolin looked great last week in his black Member's Only jacket but the white Member's Only looks incredible this week. I'm with Matt that part of this seems to be worked No DQ but acknowledging that would make other parts of the match meaningless, so it's those loose ECW rules where Anything Goes but also we want to get heat with interference and traditional comebacks so we just have to compartmentalize things, focus on all the good parts about the work. Like, the way Diamond stops short of a Dunn leapfrog and punches him upon Dunn's landing, or how Dunn didn't want to just take out the referee, he dropped an elbow right on the back of his neck. I will always love a ridiculous powder finish. Salt in the eyes works so well, but powder leaves the ring looking like a building was just imploded. Dunn throws powder and DDTs Diamond on a chair, and the ref crawls over to make the count while the ring looks like the aftermath of the Onita/Funk exploding cage match. 

Flash Flanagan (with Kenny Bolin & Rico Beatty) vs. Adam Flash

MD: This was pretty well put together with a couple of solid transitions, the hope spots you'd expect, and a good finish. Flanagan looked crisp in mostly everything he did. (Adam) Flash did not, which did hurt this. Still pretty good overall though. They had some nice kip up bits in the feeling out. Flash took over with the high octane stuff including a dive. Flanagan caught him in the corner with a power bomb and then really went to work with measured offense. The ropes (which he used a few times to choke) seemed... best way I can explain it is that the covering for the rope was too long for the rope/cable itself so it was bunched up at points that gave the ring a permanent look of distortion. I've rarely seen ring ropes like that before. Anyway, Flanagan went for a flipping legdrop and Flash moved. Then he went for a big moonsault and missed allowing Flanagan to hit his back leap neckbreaker, which was pretty slick actually. This felt, again, very much of its time, with someone polished up against some eager and the two of them trying to find some sort of middle ground that worked.

ER: Not great, but how else is Adam Flash going to learn? This feels like something stupid we would book for a DEAN~! show, entertaining ourselves by getting two of wrestling's Flashes into a match and then it's just a 12 minute match where one guy is over their skis. If we do a Bay Area show I'm not sure it's worthwhile to put Cheerleader Melissa under her Alyssa Flash persona, and if we book Scorpio it won't make sense to use him as Flash Funk. AEW didn't let use use Sting under his Blade Runner persona, so we're left with Flash Flanagan vs. Adam Flash and it's fine. 

Flash is just a bit too tentative in a lot of his offense, like he has good intentions but he's too scared to actually hit someone in the chest with a dropkick, too scared he's going to make a misstep, too scared he's going to throw a potato so he throws his punches with the shortest windup possible. A 10+ minute match with a tentative opponent needs a guy like Flanagan in there running things, making things make sense, bumping big for Flash when it's appropriate. Flash was good at working around Flash's shortcomings. Flash was hitting bad standing dropkicks all match, so I appreciated that Flash makes him miss a bad one and it leads directly to him transitioning to offense. When Flash hits the most tentative jackknife pin I've seen, Flanagan uses it to roll to his feet into a sick powerbomb. Also, for as bad as Flash's standing dropkicks looked, his seated dropkick and a kind of nuts one he did off the apron were much better. This is IWA Mid-South, you can hit guys! 

I like how Flanagan's offense is good at setting him up for potential misses, as he escalates moves he's already established. He hit a nice legdrop off the middle buckle for 2, and later he escalates by attempting a big somersault legdrop off the top (looks like it was nice and squared up, too). I don't know that Flanagan needed to take such a high back body drop for a guy like Adam Flash, but he's a pro. It's appropriate that Flash missed his moonsault. Chalk it up to those janky ring ropes Matt mentioned. You truly have not seen ropes like this before. It's like every inch of the ropes was fighting to get out of its casing, so the ropes were all twisted and took strange right angles. They looked like our old rotary dial phone cord, which was 20' long and impossible to uncoil. 

IWA Mid-South Heavyweight Title: Bull Pain (with Billy The P) (c) vs. Tracy Smothers

MD: Another good one with some goofy booking at the end. Watching Smothers, especially after a certain point in his career, is always engrossing, always engaging. He has a way of just being constant motion, of redefining how we think of action. He does a bunch of relatively tricked out offense (Reverse DDT, Flatliner of sorts, his pump handle front slam, the jumping superkick), but that's not what I mean. He has that Roddy Piper ants-in-his-pants way of just never stopping. He never stands still. He never primes up and waits for the next thing. He never thinks of his next spot. He's just always fluid. There's also something he does that I never quite noticed until now but feels so unique: Most people will do a ten punch or strike exchange with the same hand over and over, but he switches sides. It's so visually different from everyone else. 

Pain made for a good foil for him. We're in an era where if you put your head down, you'll get power bombed instead of kicked and that was the transition with Tracy having to fight his way back (and get cut off a couple of times with belly to back suplexes). Finish was all about Billy the P feuding with Bolin. Pain went for a Superplex and Bolin held Tracy's legs. They went another minute or two before Tracy won the belt. Billy the P then went on the mic and said that Tracy shouldn't win that way and they restarted the match leading to Tracy's leg getting grabbed and Bull hitting the DDT. Big problem with it was that they worked a normal finishing stretch after the interference the first time. It made it seem like Tracy did earn it. If they had gone to the finish more quickly you could have bought it all more maybe? That's part of the point I guess.

ER: What a monster of a Bull Pain performance. I love Tracy, he was one of those guys who I sought out just about every match of his until the man passed. New Tracy was something I would always try to watch. But Bull Pain shows up and he's such a merciless ass kicker that he brings even more of the IWA-MS flavor that I want, even more than Tracy. Bull Pain is the quintessential IWA wrestler, because he throws so much force behind every kick, every punch, every chop and every blistering arm strike...but will also work abdominal stretch top rope leverage horseshit and take a crazy back body drop bump on the floor to start the match. He's nuts, he hits hard, he'll waste you with a falling clothesline if you run into his boot. 

He's great at taking Smother's best offense. Smothers had a big offensive tool bag and wasn't always in with guys who could take it well. I mean that for simple things and complicated things. Tracy's corner 10 count punches look real good bouncing off Bull's bald white head, and his back elbow off the top looks decapitating, like something Ospreay would do (complimentary). Tracy does an actual good version of a reverse STO, hooking his arm around Bull's neck before hopping back with it, locking Bull into only one kind of bump. I thought it was amusing how Bull transitioned back to offense by just powerbombing Smothers, like he decided he wasn't taking any more. Tracy ducks and Bull just powerbombs him, then starts headbutting him in the stomach. I liked the restart, if only because it gave us more involvement from the truly bizarre Billy The P. Wrestling needs more weird little guys. It's one of pro wrestling's great deficiencies. The small weird guys get run off, back to being a paying customer, because Wrasslers don't want to be associated with them. But IWA was in no position to run anyone off so we get this weird little guy dressed up like a Star Search tap competitor, grabbing Tracy's leg so Bull can spike him with a DDT. 

Bad Breed (Axl Rotten/Ian Rotten) vs. Mad Man Pondo/Trailer Park Trash

MD: This was a tornado tag and I have to give them credit. This was absolutely of its time but it still left everyone satisfied and ended definitively. They went around the ring, used chairs. At one point Ian hit a spin wheel kick in the corner (not sure where the agenting was there as it was a big Diamond move earlier, but again, sign of the times... granted, that'd happen today on a PPV too so I guess it's just the chaos of having wrestlers drive the ship to a degree). I don't ever really get the sense that they were in danger, except for when Bolin came in with the racket, but then Billy the P came in to stop that and they kept that churning. There was ref hooha with Jeff Jones running out after a bump but refusing to count 3 (checking on the other ref instead). Then they tore his neckbrace off and the good ref DDT'd him. Finish was a nice reverse double suplex. This absolutely accomplished what it was trying to do. The value of what they were trying to do is subjective, sure, but you can't say they didn't nail it.

ER: This rocked, a great kind of mess with tons of moving parts, Ian gets fantastic color while Pondo has gross diseased blood pooling out under his bangs, the whole thing is a great fight. Paul Diamond takes a double unprotected chairshot in a truly This is 1998 way. I'm expecting Pondo to take something stupid like that but Diamond really was wrestling a When in Rome style and that meant he too was going to seek brain damage. This just got better the longer it went and the bloodier it got. I laughed loud when Ian hit the same corner spinning heel kick that Paul Diamond hit earlier. Jerry Flynn started doing it on TV in 1997 and now every heavyweight in IWA wants to jack it. Diamond's looks strong, but I appreciate Ian doing it in Flynn's style, so he falls but first to the apron. The fact you can no longer see his face skin through the darkest red blood makes it better. 

The breakdown of the match is fantastic. Axl is trying to get Pondo in a katahajime while Ian and Trailer Park are just punching each other on the floor in the foreground. The punches get better as Axl grabs Pondo by his bangs and headbutts him a half dozen times. It all builds to an unexpectedly gigantic pop, as fans lose their absolute minds when ref Eric Moore hits a DDT on Jeff Jones. I mean people were leaping up and down on bleachers after this DDT. Trailer and Pondo were getting dumped on their heads to normal reaction, but Jeff Jones taking a DDT got a reaction so much louder than anything else on these two episodes of TV. They're still feeling that high when the Rottens dump Trailer Park on his head again with a reverse suplex. It's a testament to the fans in Louisville that they respond biggest to angle payoffs and not just brutal headshots.