CWF Mid-Atlantic Worldwide Episode 151

Episode 151

Aric Andrews vs. Matt Houston

ER: I'm all for Houston getting some TV singles matches, just as I'm all for Andrews now that he has facial hair again. Houston is a 0.4 on the "Dick Murdoch abilities" scale, but a 0.8 on the "Dick Murdoch physical likeness" scale. And that's a pretty decent combo. He gets a lot of room to work opposite Andrews, Andrews is a little like Stevie Richards, tall and lanky and without a lot of offense. So Houston gets to show off his surprising agility spots, hits a gorgeous heavy dropkick, drops both atomic drop varieties (atomic drops are missing from wrestling today, and that's a shame as it also robs us of atomic drop selling), and misses a guillotine legdrop with conviction. I liked Andrews going after the leg, whipping it into the mat, yanking on it, hyperextending it with some stump puller type moves, working a long compelling figure 4 with a nice simple reversal moment that fans universally get behind. Houston has these great skinny white legs, looking like a million dads at a million summer cookouts, and Andrews hits a whale of a mule kick low to end this cookout. I'd love to see more Houston in the Sportatorium, and Andrews has purpose again.

PAS: Glad to see Andrews back looking like a total sleaze, he is really good, doesn't have a lot of fancy offense, but everything he does looks good. This is the most I have enjoyed Houston, tubby guy with a good right hand is right up my alley and I loved his pair of atomic drops. Andrews is really good at using his length as an attack, everything is thrown from distance, and his figure four looks great with such long legs. Short match, but very entertaining, CWF really knows how to run undercards.

John Skyler vs. Trevor Lee

ER: I've been a big fan of the Trevor Lee title run. Eight of his title matches landed on our 2017 Ongoing MOTY List, three of them in the top 20. And this match had me hooked, as I actually thought there was a chance that Skyler could win the belt. I'm not sure the last time I actually thought there was a chance Lee would lose the belt. Maybe the 2017 CWF Rumble? If not that, probably the Nick Richards match from June 2017. I've loved a lot of matches that weren't those matches, but I never thought Lee was losing the title. And after this match I don't see him losing the title. It seems more likely now that they retire this specific title if he ever opts to sign elsewhere, and rename it the Trevor Lee Title, or that he loses it in an Ogawa/Akiyama way to someone like Cain Justice. They've now built up this potential moment for so long, that I think my interest peaked and has since been dipping. I'm sure the right contender would get me interested in a big title fight, but this was the first match where I got Hulk Hogan vibes out of Lee, where you can do all the damage you want, but at some point he's just going to get up, superkick, finger break, and STF you.

I really loved the first 2/3 of this, with Skyler stalling, being the first to strike (and then amusingly rolling to the floor) but building to a strong, focused attack on Lee's ribs. Skyler had a bunch of great stuff focused right at Lee's midsection, and I love a heel with a nice focused body part specific attack, with also a couple of moves that can be established and reversed later. He hits a couple of his big spears, dropped these cool falling headbutts into Lee's side, great kitchen sink knee to the guts, kneedrops to the ribs, heavy senton, a couple of brutal Finlay rolls, and a Boston crab that made my back sore. Just a nonstop centered attack that gave Lee a couple openings (catching a spear, shifting position to catch an armbar on a senton attempt), but Skyler would go right back on the attack. But at a certain point I think my core hurt more from watching Skyler's attack than it actually hurt Lee. I don't think Lee did a great job of putting over the damage that was being done. Once we were through the targeted body attack portion and moved into the "big moments" (ref Charles eating a punt, big belt shot from Sklyer) portion of the match, there was just no service of any kind paid to it. As I was enjoying all the body work done by Skyler, not only was I thinking a Lee loss was possible, but I was excited for all the neat stuff they could do with Lee winning with an injured core. I was excited for Lee locking on the STF, or an armbar, but not being able to hold it because his core couldn't stay flexed long enough to get Skyler to tap. I always love a match where someone with established moves and killshots, suddenly has to find new ways to win when those are taken away from him. But those tools never really felt like they were taken away, we just hit a point where it was in homestretch Lee mode. There were still engaging moments down the stretch, and finish was clever and well executed, with Skyler aiming for a belt shot, eating a drop toehold, hitting his face on the belt, allowing Lee to lock on a painful as hell Regal stretch. But the danger of the opening 2/3 was gone, the match that was looking potentially special was turned into something more expected. For a 42 minute investment, I was hoping for special, and it looked like we were really getting special.

PAS: I liked this a lot more then Eric, I thought all of the early work was interesting and they did some very cool reversals. Loved Lee countering the Senton with an armbar, countering the second spear with a brutal knee, and kicking out the back of Skyler's knees and locking on a sleeper hold. I think Eric is booking a match in his head that wasn't on the screen, Skyler worked the body over to tire out Lee, take his wind from him, just like a fighter will bank body shots for later. Lee sold fatigue fine, but there was never any cracked rib selling he ignored later. This was more a traditional long heavyweight title match, then a match built around body part selling (outside of the vicious late match arm attack which Skyler sold great.) The elbow stomp and finger break is so nasty, it seems so unnecessary when Lee does it against Donnie Dollars or Ethan Sharpe, I like him breaking it out in a desperation flurry during a match he is losing. I thought the couple of near falls on Lee were really good, he will lose this belt eventually, and the ref bump, belt shot STF KO seemed like a plausible way, and I thought Lee's desperation roll through was really cool. I didn't love Skyler going back to the belt in front of the ref like that, but that final Regal stretch was epically painful looking, Lee is one of the better stretchers around. I think they could have easily shaved 10 minutes or so from this, but I thought overall this was very good.

PAS: We are going to throw the Lee vs. Skyler match on our 2018 MOTY List, and we are back on our CWF grind.

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CWF Mid-Atlantic Worldwide Episode 149

Episode 149

Ethan Alexander Sharpe/Cain Justice vs. Michael McAllister/Nick Richards

ER: This starts out as a fairly genial, crowd pleasing house show match, the kind where you can see it continuing this way and being a match where Cain and E# show ass the whole match, or one that has a turn in the middle with the heels finally taking it to our 90s Create-A-Wrestler-Singleted duo. So we start amusing, with Sharpe not getting anything rolling, and we have fun house show moments like Richards booing Sharpe from the crowd. I should note that I also really love not just the Chapel Hill crowds, but the giant mural on the wall that often shows up in shots; front and center is a little girl smiling and reading a book, but she's wearing something bright white, and the design always tricks my eyes into thinking it's a big white beard. So this girl looks like Black Jesus holding a giant tome, or Grady from Sanford and Son. It brings joy every time I see it. Anyway, match gets really fun once Cain and Sharpe isolate Richards. Those two are so good at working a crowd like this, and Sharpe keeps adding fun new simple offense that fits his personality (the wind-up elbow drop that ends with him posed over Richards is a keeper), and his 12-6 elbows while standing over a seated Richards looked nasty. Cain throws a bunch of nice kicks, makes me laugh by sticking out his foot for Sharpe to tag in, and always impressed me with how quickly he can get from the ring out to the floor. I also like how he kind of cockily rubs his belly while trash talking opponents. Once you see it you can't unsee it! McAllister trips on his hot tag, so makes up for it by pasting our heels with forearms, hard lariats, and a big back elbow. Sharpe misses his KO uppercut, really swung hard for McAllister's jaw, and Cain makes the cutter look like a worthy finish. Fun match.

PAS: Great example of a formula southern tag, and what a great formula that is. Both Cain and Ethan are great as shit stirring heels. Cain can really stir up a crowd, and is great at flipping the switch between bumbling and vicious. He had some great kicks and stomps. I really dug McAllister's hot tag, he tripped going into the ring, but makes up for it, by throwing some really spudsy clotheslines. I also really dug McAllister's STO which planted Sharpe on Cain. Hargraves Community Center crowds are the best in wrestling and it was fun to watch them do this dance in front of this crowd.

Aric Andrews vs. KL3

ER: Andrews has some facial scruff back and there's no sign of that ponytail wearing smooth faced weirdo who was hanging around CWF for several months pretending to be Andrews. And I'm sorry to KL3 and his family, but Andrews needed a TV win like this. We get GOOD Andrews, dropping high elbows down across KL3's neck, knocking over ref Charles and pointing at Charles to watch it, hitting a great classic kneedrop, holding those hands over the head and then bringing that whole body into a crunch as his knee drops onto KL3's temple, and finishing things off with a couple of big uranage slams. Sinister Aric Andrews is back, and he's got that Golden Ticket!

PAS: Total squash for Andrews, and he looked good, that knee to the temple was brutal. KL3 looked awful, his 15 seconds of offense had no impact at all, including one of the worst kicks to the stomach I can remember, he also bumps really awkwardly on the Asphalt Spike. I am all for Andrew's squashes, but KL3 needs another couple of months in the training center before going back on TV.

Chapel Hill Street Fight: Arik Royal vs. Snooty Foxx

ER: I'm already well beyond hyped just watching the entrances of both men. Royal entrances are maybe my favorite in wrestling (and I'm the guy who writes about Metalico), a real crowd worker. I remember a Norm MacDonald story where he worked the WHCD while Clinton was president, and after his set he was backstage eating a pickle. Clinton comes in and works the room, one person at a time, saying something different to each person, and gets to Norm, shakes his hand and says, "I see you have a pickle" and keeps on going to the next person before Norm can even process what was said. It's not groundbreaking stuff, but it's a person to person unique touch. So Royal goes around the ring, he's waving his big Duke flag (so I know Phil is into this, big Duke supporter, not their sports teams, just their general vibe), he's getting into it with individual fans, mocking one guy with baller motions, making bug eyes at a little girl, purposely whiffing a high 5 with an even smaller kid, making fun of a woman's hair, simple making the rounds stuff you can tell he loves. Snooty comes out and it's night and day, people are overjoyed just to slap hands with him. The fans in Chapel Hill treat Snooty likes he just showed up at the cookout thrown in honor of him finishing his tour of duty serving our country. It's the best.

And this brawl totally delivered. Both guys brought it and were able to work a full 30 minute match without any drag, all while giving us a detailed site map of the Hargraves Community Center. And the cool thing about this brawl was that I dug the in-ring stuff as much as the wild crowd brawl. If it hasn't happened already, this just might be the official Snooty Foxx coming out party. Dude is here, he keeps getting better, and I get the feeling crowds anywhere would have been going bananas for him. Royal stalls to start, leading to Foxx rushing him with a hard forearm shiver, slingshots him into the ring, and then puts on a show by hitting turnbuckle 10 count punches on him all around the ring. Foxx has genuinely great 10 count punches, which is by far one of the hardest punches in wrestling to perfect. Snooty even hits a super early powerslam, with a great battle over whether Royal would slip out of it or not. We go through the crowd and it's all good stuff, love these two hitting each other hard in front of kids, Royal gets tossed through some chairs and kids are running up trying to touch him, merch table gets messed up, and you know we're going to go outside. They fight up on the trailer they use to haul the ring, and it should be noted that Cecil Scott and Smith Garrett were really great on commentary for the duration of the match, but really excelled during the outdoor portions. "Pretty sure we're getting shoplifted while we're out here, not for nothing." "That's a sturdy 1983 vehicle too, that thing is hard as hell" "That's the heartbeat of America right there." "So here's a recap, Arik Royal just hit a child with another human being." Royal throws Snooty off the flat bed just right into the huge crowd of fans that had gathered around. Foxx looked like he was stage diving, just a low fast dive right through a bunch of people, totally crazy looking. They both take great bumps into the fence around the baseball diamond, Royal finds an old hose and does some great chokes on Snooty, even drags him back into the building with that damn hose. Snooty takes a great beating, eats a couple shots with a shovel that Coach brought in, gets one of Coach's batting helmets busted over his head, and we should also note that Royal is someone who understands how to dress for a street fight. I want an action figure of "Street Fighter Arik Royal", complete with Duke flag. Snooty's comebacks are all excellently spaced out, and we get a great near fall that ended with Coach diving onto Redd Jones with his whole body to stop the count. Snooty clearing ring on the All Stars was primo fan stuff, taking them out with a huge dive off the top, hitting his nice one armed spear (so many guys would make that look trash, and he makes it look like a kill shot), and Royal gets perfectly in position to take a top rope bulldog face first into a chair. You know the knux come into play, and while I wish Snooty really waylaid Royal with the final blow, both sold it perfectly. Awesome, awesome match. These Chapel Hill shows are always a big ol' bank full of money. They're the heartbeat of America.

PAS: This is the way wrestling used to be, hot crowd disinterested in seeing MOTY candidates, instead totally invested in watching a beloved babyface beatdown a group of cheating jerks. Foxx is an all time great ticket seller, as he has packed the crowd with his entire neighborhood, there are multiple black ladies in their sixties who might be Snooty's great Aunt. Royal is world class at firing up the crowd too, taunting kids, stealing folks hats, talking trash, one of these days a drunk cousin of Snooty is going to take a swing at him. The Duke flag is a classic troll move, but the batting helmet signed by Coach K is another level. Of course that Coach K signed batting helmet gets busted on Snooty's head. The outside stuff was really great, I loved Snooty getting his head slammed in the truck door, and both guys really flew into all the fencing. Arik Royal tossing Snooty into a 4 year old girl could have gone badly, but instead it ended up being great. Everything didn't land as cleanly as you would hope, Snooty is still clearly early in his career, but the old school heatseeking greatness of this match made up for any execution issues.

PAS: We put the street fight pretty high on our 2018 MOTY List and added the tag match to our C+A Cain Justice

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CWF Mid-Atlantic Worldwide Episode 143

Episode 143

Aric Andrews vs. Cam Carter

PAS: Yes! Andrews is growing back his facial hair! These guys have really good chemistry with each other, with Carter being really great at being elusive and kind of climbing Andrews like a tree fort. Andrews is great, I loved how he sets pace, the violence of all of his moves and how well he uses height. I loved Carter's missed superkick that he spun right into another one, it felt like how a boxer would throw combos with only the last shot being meant to land. One thing that is weird, is they kept talking about Andrews and Carter having a TV title match, and how close Carter came, and then they made a huge deal about his upset win, "That might be the biggest win of Carter's young career" but they already did this match. Carter already had his big non-title upset win over Andrews a couple of months ago. It almost felt like when WCW would have Terry Taylor turn on Dustin Rhodes on Worldwide, The Pro and Main Event. For a fed that normally pays such attention to its history, this felt weirdly off.

ER: I've liked the other two Carter/Andrews matches quite a bit, love how they match up, but Phil nailed it here. Carter has had his big moment against Andrews, and they really rubbed it in because they easily just could have had Carter have his big moment by actually taking the TV title off him. This felt more like Andrews' status getting lowered than it felt like Carter's status getting higher. But the match in a vacuum was a good one, maybe their best, and if not their best then definitely their most straight ahead match. Their other matches had Lee Valiant running distractions, this was just the two of them. This also might be the most Andrews offense we've seen in a match, and I dug that. The stuff I like most from him is his close game, twisting a guy's neck and jaw, dropping a heavy elbow, planting a knee in Carter's back, and he's always good at stumbling into Carter's offense. Carter, for his part, has nice offense, snaps off a 450 from the middle rope, lands a couple nice kicks, this was a great WorldWide match. Andrews needs that facial hair back. It is his Samson hair feature.

Dirty Daddy vs. Donnie Dollars

PAS: Doesn't really get started, as Ray Kandrack comes out and basically squashes both guys. Kind of a bummer as I like both dudes, and it is especially weird that Daddy has been turned into a member of the Bad Breed for 911 to chokeslam. He was a real highlight of last year, but with Snooty Foxx seemingly set up to team with Aaron Biggs, and him getting punked like this, I am not sure where he has to go.

ER; Yeah Daddy really feels like he's getting shuttled down the card, which I don't understand. He was always reliable last year, then suddenly lost the RGL title in 2 minutes (that he spent the year building towards winning), and now he looks like that level of jobber who doesn't even get to look pissed after his match is interrupted and he's attacked; he's one of those guys who just lies there while the cool guy hits his spots and cracks jokes while leaving. Kandrack throws a great headbutt and is a guy who can still actually make a Frye/Takayama stand and trade look compelling in 2018, but I wanted to see Dollars/Daddy. I don't think I've seen a Dollars match on CWF TV in 6 months, and this looked like a compelling match-up for both guys. The little we got was more compelling than the Kandrack run-in.

Jesse Adler vs. Cain Justice

PAS: This was clearly an attempt to do a big young lions, future of the company showdown, and it was a truly tremendous performance by Cain Justice, in basically a broomstick match. Cain was just great, unhinged, vicious, crafty and violent. I loved how he got the advantage on the floor and just hurled Adlers arm into the ring post a half a dozen times. Just brutal looking, it really looked like he might have broke Adler's wrists. Justice screaming at the announcers when they were talking about how he felt overlooked was a great character moment, as was spitting and flipping off Adler to lure him into a dive, which Justice met with a kick. Adler just wasn't close to holding up his end of the bargain. Not a single bit of his offense looked passable, he threw the worst shoulder blocks I have ever seen, none of his high flying moves looked like they landed with force, I am blaming him for that embarrassing hockey fight spot too. Cain was up for it, he wanted a classic, I just wished he got a more game opponent.

ER: I liked this more than Phil, but thought it wasn't as good as it could have been, and overstayed it's welcome a bit. Adler was the same as he has been, although I think he's looked worse in other matches. He's at his strongest when he's selling damage, which was most of this match. His offense rarely looks good, and that was consistent here. Both of them are to blame for the hockey fight spot, it's okay to call Cain out on stuff that was a bad idea, and really that spot just came off silly within the context of the match (and before the hockey fight, I thought Adler's slaps looked better than Cain's). But the meat of the match is all about Cain taking apart Adler's arm. Adler isn't a very interesting salesman to be sure, and I don't think his selling ever matched the savagery of Cain's attacks, but watching Cain find different ways of killing an arm was awesome. Everything centered around that ringpost was killer, thought Adler took a great shoulder first bump into it from the apron (nudged by Cain's foot), and ye gods Cain wrapping that arm around the post was just beyond painful. It looked violent enough that it almost tanked the rest of the match, as someone really shouldn't be able to last that long with their wing being put through the ringer like it was. All of Cain's twisting looked tough, and then he's kicking it, dropping knees on it, and expertly (and cruelly) bending it before quickly dropping an elbow on it. But I don't love the direction the last quarter of the match went, with Adler still attempting flippy offense. Now it could have been worse and he could have fought back against all odds and won, so I like the end result, but getting there could have been smoother in spots. Still, an excellent Cain Justice performance, and an overall good match.

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CWF Mid-Atlantic Worldwide Episode 138

Episode 138

Mike Mars vs. Dirty Daddy

ER: I thought Mars had a big chance to win, but I wasn't expecting this! Daddy came out in the serious title defense braids, and started the match super aggressive. I like the story of the brief match, that Daddy came out hot and went toe to toe, realizing too late that a more defensive approach might have been better. He got caught up in defending HIS belt, and it cost him. All of Daddy's elbows looked great, flying into Mars and almost seeming like it would work, but Mars caught him twice with big, jarring slams. Surprising result, loved the frustration showed by Daddy after the match, but very curious where it goes. Daddy is clearly good enough that he's beyond a rising talent.

PAS: I really enjoyed Daddy coming out ready to brawl and paying for it. Those elbows were great, and all of the big slams felt like match finishing moves. Still a two minute title loss did feel like a bit of a burial for Daddy, the kind of thing Watts would do if a guy was moving on (maybe Watts did this to Dirty Daddy when he left for Continental). Was he riding with Jesus the Pimp in a '79 Grenada last night?

Lance Lude/Rob Killjoy/Matty de Nero vs. White Mike Jordan/Timmy Lou Retton/Ethan Alexander Sharpe

ER: This was a blast, and it seems that the Ducklings and the Gymnasties can't really have an uninteresting match against each other. White Mike gets in a good joke about BattleCade now being 18 years old, and therefor legal. I feel like such a boob for not being into White Mike from the first time I saw him a year + ago. I think I just wasn't expecting him, because by this point he's someone who regularly fills me with joy. His comedy works for me, his athleticism constantly still surprises me, and he's just got this great assured charisma. He's got a build like tiny Akebono with round body and skinny arms, but he's so good! He knows what he's doing. I was also really in the weeds on Matty D. I saw he showed up last BattleCade but nothing else for CWF, and I don't get him. There were a couple of times where he was staring into the camera like someone who didn't know what a camera was. He has the eyes of a new roommate you catch watching you sleep, or like someone who is trying to imitate human skin. I would personally burn him with fire, but I'm all for Sharpe just throwing a his big uppercut at him instead. Launchpad McQuack is one of my favorite tag moves, love how Lude gets launched like a projectile, and Ducks are just a super fun team. I dug Sharpe throwing Retton to the finish, and then getting caught post match and eating White Mike's awesome neck snap can opener, love that we get to see these guys back for Kernodle.

PAS: This was pretty fun stuff, the Gymnasties and Ducks work each other so much that they really have their shtick down pat. I am not sure what Matty D is about, he seemed more like a package of quirks then any real character. He feels like a guy who shows up to college and starts wearing a colorful scarf and smoking a pipe to be an individual, like he hasn't figured out his Chikara gimmick so he is doing 10 at a time,  I did like his diving punch though. White Mike is super entertaining, and it is always crazy to watch him work athletic workrate wrestling, he looks like such a slug and can move like Juventud Guerrera.

Tracer X vs. Cam Carter vs. John Skyler vs. Mace Li vs. Michael McAllister vs. Ray Kandrack vs. Aric Andrews vs. Snooty Foxx

ER: This is a pinfalls/over the top rumble for the Golden Ticket, winner gets to challenge for any belt in any kind of match, which feels like a way to work some fun shenanigans. If I had a Golden Ticket couldn't I could theoretically challenge Trevor Lee in a "Winner Must Be Eric" match. But anyway this was good, although I wish they chose a firm direction, either do a full violent battle royal with a couple monsters dishing beatings (like they had Kandrack doing), or do a wacky AJPW battle royal and have multiple guys pinning one big name at a time to eliminate them, and get us to surprise finalist. But I'm glad we got a big return from Kandrack, treated as a real big deal, building him up like Andre tossing around three men. I do wish McAllister got more of a showing as I loved him in the Nick Richards match. Here he kind of gets run over. But Kandrack plows into people with his body, throws a cool headbutt, leans way into kicks and strikes, catches a crossbody off the top from Tracer X (and catches him low to the mat which is some impressive strength) and slams him, just a cool performance. It comes down to Andrews and Skyler and we get some nice punch exchange, a couple decent nearfalls, good enough for its purpose. Between facing Royal and then potentially facing Andrews if he somehow gets past Royal, I don't see Adler holding the TV title much longer. His reign of terror will be over!

PAS: Fun match, I really enjoy Kandrack as the CWF Undertaker, old guy who is semi-retired, but still comes in an wrecks everyone. It makes me want to go back and watch old Kandrack matches when he was more active. Tracer X is pretty flippy, not my favorite type of wrestler, but man does he take a nasty spear, Snooty just demolishes in mid air. I liked Andrews working full on babyface in this match, and then turning on the crowd during his heartfelt speech. Now just grow the beard back and go get Lee Valiant.

Zane & Dave Dawson vs. The Sandwich Squad

ER: This was a tough concept on paper, a Last Man Standing tag match. I don't know if I've ever seen one before, and it's probably because the execution and booking of one is difficult. You either need to get both men down for a 10 count at once, which seems incredibly difficult, or count men down individually and wind up with an awkward handicap match which should theoretically end shortly after (one man shouldn't be able to last long against two when there are no rules). So there was a little bit of awkward, mainly in the "I'm going to verrrry slowly get ready to hit you with a chair" spots, where one guy would slowly raise a chair and slowly walk toward his opponent, only to get kicked into the stomach or have the chair knocked away. Those spots could have been smoother. But there was some real pain in this match, and that made it work. We got a lot of painful chairshots, and since we rightly don't see many chairshots to the head anymore, we see the different violence brought from chairshots to awkward parts of the body-not-head. So guys take stinging shots to the shoulderblade and the elbow and Biggs gets a chair kicked into his freaking hand, and this little kid chants EAT! EAT! EAT! in a squeaky little cartoon voice. Biggs and Mecha each get chairshotted out of the air on crossbodies, and that looked tremendous. The Squad do a great fireworks spectacular to take out Zane, with Biggs hitting a superplex, Mecha dropping a couple of his great elbowdrops (and Mecha was really awesome this whole match, loved his sharp elbows to jaws and big headbutts), and Biggs hits a big splash while holding a chair. Great way to put a guy down for 10. The finish is some inspired bullshit, with all 4 men getting counted down all at once, looking for sure like nobody is going to respond, and Zane's (on the apron) legs fall over the side and land on the floor, leaving him in a standing position for the win at the 9 count. Pretty great way to have the Dawsons retain, that could have easily come off as cheap.

PAS: I liked this a bunch, and it was the best of the multiple Dawsons v. Squad matches we have seen over the last couple of months. Some of those chairshots were really nasty looking while not causing any brain damage.  I loved Mecha in this, he took and delivered a big time beating, and I loved his big Abdullah style elbow drops. I agree that the finish was really clever, it kept the belt on the Dawson's while still keeping the Sandwich Squad strong (although Pimpgate meant that this was their last appearance.)

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CWF Mid-Atlantic Worldwide Episode 137

Episode 137

Aric Andrews vs. Mace Li

PAS: Li comes out to interrupt Andrews and they appear to have turned Andrews face, which is a move I can't support. You can't turn the most hateable guy in your fed babyface, it is just a waste of that scuzzy hair and punchable face. This match took a couple of minutes to get going, but I ended up enjoying it. Loved Andrews using his long legs to push Li off and hit a big boot, and the finishing roll up was neat.

ER: Maybe this is just one of those Arena Mexico "rudo against other Mexicans, tecnico against an invader" type deals? Like people will still hate Andrews but just hate Mace Li more? I do love the reaction Li gets in the Sportatorium. It's beyond heel heat, but it's not indifference either; people just seem really, really annoyed by him. The match and moment did feel like it was intended to turn Andrews face, and I think that would be a damn shame. I feel like a long tag run with Lee Valiant would be far more productive, but I will say I'm happy that it appears he's growing back some facial hair. Not a fan of beardless Andrews. The match was fine but didn't have much to it. Li has never looked bad to me, but he also hasn't done a lot to make his matches stick out much in my mind right after watching them. Maybe it's me.

Cain Justice vs. Joey Lynch

ER: I realize one of my favorite things about Cain Justice is that his matches are tight, focused, and have a nice narrative thread. And I didn't really think about it too much until this match. A lot of stuff in this looked good, but I had to keep asking myself why I wasn't getting into it at all. It was overly long, unfocused, and the only narrative seemed to be "Lynch is going to use every piece of offense and every thigh slap he knows, and everyone is going to forget about every move immediately after it happens". This could have really killed if it was maybe 9 minutes instead of 16. I liked all of Cain's attacks on the arm, bending it around the corner buckle and kicking at it, a nice Pele kick that I didn't see coming (with Cain holding Lynch's arm and essentially pulling the arm into a falling kick), but Lynch doesn't pay it much attention. I mean, after the match he hilariously acts like he needs to desperately hold his arm or risk losing it, but during the match he seemed more focused on stringing together his next indy combo. Potentially cool moments like Cain dropping in with an armbar were immediately ignored, and it made it seem like Lynch hitting all his offense was the most important thing to him in the match. I don't like how it makes the guys in other Justice singles matches look, either. All those prior matches showed that Justice is prone to cockiness and rookie mistakes, but his subs and strikes are lethal, here Lynch treated every strike the same, treated an armbar like no big deal, it was just annoying. I liked some of Lynch's work, particularly his bridges, like when he bridged out of the armbar and almost got a flash pin, but he was too go go go when the match would have been more interesting with him throwing out half as much offense. It's a specific style of indy work that I don't care for, right down to waiting in the ring for the post-match 'We Had a War' 'Please Come Back' applause.

PAS: I did think Cain had a fun performance, but I agree with Eric that this match was completely overstuffed. Lynch felt like a guy who was going to have one wrestling match ever, and wanted to get in every bit of cool offense he ever saw or thought up. Some of the stuff did look pretty cool, Lynch has a nasty german suplex, and I liked his clothesline into the ropes, but there was just so much stuff I had a hard time caring about it. Felt like Lynch took control of the match and it ended up being Cain working a Lynch match, rather then Joey working a Cain match. I did think Cain had a bunch of cool ideas, and I love how deadly the twist ending is, but this was real bloaty

ER: Arik Royal gets drawn to face Jesse Adler at BattleCade and...I just cannot see any kind of plausible way that Adler does not get absolutely demolished by Royal. Adler is so much smaller and has not looked the least bit credible in any of his wins against similarly sized guys. On paper this just looks like Royal should completely run over Adler. In singles matches alone this year Royal has beaten Chet Sterling, Snooty Foxx, Dirty Daddy, took Trevor Lee over a half hour, and none of those guys should have trouble beating Jesse Adler. This should lead to Royal holding the TV title, which would be an awesome and welcome addition to my weekly CWF viewing. I really love Royal and seeing him defending a belt against randomly drawn challengers sounds amazing.

Arik Royal/Roy Wilkins vs. Chet Sterling/Ric Converse

ER: Good long tag match with nice performances for all involved. Converse and Sterling are a good babyface tag team and seeing how much I like Converse right now makes me really want to go back and check out all the "peak" Converse that I've never actually seen. He sells damage well for a bigger guy, always surprised me with stuff (like his heavy crossbody early in the match) and always brings nice punches. Sterling is good in a tag setting like this, and he ramps up the crazy here with a huge flip dive way past the ringpost into the All-Stars. Wilkins was good at bumping for Sterling's hot comeback offense, and Royal is the total king, knowing when to bail to the floor and when to toss in great dick moves (like stepping onto Sterling's back instead of just over him to get where he needed to be). The match never settled down, and the restlessness was part of the fun. You got the sense the match could end soon, or go another 20 minutes. and I love the All-Stars go to knux shot, such a great ace constantly looming up the sleeve of all their matches. Royal always makes the knux shots counts and Sterling really took a spill off the top from it.

PAS: I loved Royal in this, great shit talking, cool bodypunches in the corner, great cutting off of both guys. All-Stars are a great old school heel team, and this was a good fired up babyface performance by Sterling and Converse. Sterling is at his his best when he is selling, so a long tag match like this works to his strengths. Also he can just tag out rather then have to do a forced hulk up which always mars his long singles. I loved the knux shot as a body shot instead of to the head, Sterling really sold it like he cracked a rib.

ER: The show closing angle between CW and Converse was a great one. After costing Converse the match CW handcuffs Converse to the ropes and lays out the ref with an all time spinebuster and then pulls up a seat to have a chat with Converse. The build throughout the promo was great, with Anderson playing condescending and dominant champ, wanting that title vs. career match, and Converse - still cuffed to the ropes - able to able to finally get under CW's skin by agreeing to the match...as long as it's I Quit. CW showing vulnerability to that was great, even though his opponent was cuffed to the ropes he was visibly rattled, and the fans were trying to get to him the whole time as well. Awesome segment leading into what looks to be an absolutely stacked BattleCade.

PAS: Yeah it was really great, I loved how Converse pulled out the I Quit match as CW's achilles, mentioning the ECW Tommy Dreamer I Quit he lost. I loved Converse getting the upper hand even though he was cuffed to the top rope.

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CWF Mid-Atlantic Worldwide Episode 134

Episode 134

ER: We get Pop-Up Video running throughout the episode, bringing me back to some Chikara tape I bought 15 years ago.

Mace Li vs. Jesse Adler

PAS: This match happened before Adler won the TV title, on the same show as Arik Royal v. Snooty Fox. These guys train together and clearly have some stuff worked out, but it is still the same Adler match which has been boring me for a couple of months now. He does some good bodypart selling, and if he could develop some decent offense he could do something with that, but as of now his TV title reign is dragging down the show each week.

ER: Yeah I'm beyond over this. Every freaking week with these Adler matches. That standing shooting star is easily one of the worst looking finishers in wrestling. There are plenty of guys doing the same kind of stuff, only gracefully executing it and landing it without looking like they're dragging themselves out of a creek. And that spinning back elbow/fist to the mid section has to go. I am so in the weeds on Adler.

Trevor Lee/Ric Converse vs. Lee Valiant/Aric Andrews

PAS This is an impromptu tag after Andrews interrupts a Lee promo. This is before the Andrew gimmick change, and I loved the sleazy Andrews and Valiant tag team. There is some fun crowd brawling to open including Lee dumping Valiant head first into a garbage can. Converse and Valiant have had a long history (one of the cool things about the pop up video gimmick is all of the history stuff, Valiant and Converse worked a one hour iron man!) and worked well with each other. Fun energetic tag with plenty of shtick.

ER: Man I miss bearded Andrews. It's cruel showing us this older match, with skeezy bearded Andrews, in his great team with Valiant. Man I'd love to see these two with the tag belts. But as cruel as it was, they could give me a hot 7 minute tag like this every week and I'd keep coming back for more. Valiant was awesome here, and he's a guy who needs to be featured more (and was clearly a bigger name in the "pre-TV" era of CWF). He knew just how to work to every age level of this hot Chapel Hill crowd, knew to comically kick his legs a bunch when Lee dumps him in a trash can as kids squeal with delight, but knows how to throw hard shots and bump big to get the adults into everything. Valiant takes a huge spill to the gym floor from the ring, and then gets awesome height on a big time Sky High from Converse, and really sticks himself on a DDT. Trevor Lee is in full gym shorts and tiny boots and I always like that Lee, and teaming with Converse is a natural fit. I second Phil with enjoying all the pop up history, really helps me fill in blanks and backstory. And finding out Lee was only 15 in 2009 made me feel old. as. hell.

Nick Iggy vs. Chet Sterling

PAS: This was fine, both guys are solid wrestlers, it was a bit hammy though. Iggy is a really expressive heel and Sterling is really expressive babyface and having two guys on 10 like that, got a little theatre kidish, I need one guy to play it a bit cool. I did enjoy the Pop Up Video run down of all of Iggy's terrible pun nicknames, Grin Balor? CM Hunk? Oof.

ER: I liked the running gag of half the match being taken up by Iggy's nicknames. And I really want to see Dandy Orton now. Just a foppish powder wig upper crust dandy, but with sinister date rape eyes. It would be difficult to pull off. Not many people have Orton's naturally rape-y brand of charisma, and of those people I'm sure even fewer of them would be caught dead in powder makeup, a trim blouson, or knickers. But it's right there for the taking. The Pop-Ups take a darker turn as they reveal that Iggy has an obsession with Jeffrey Dahmer, which is probably something to keep off your Tinder profile. You don't see Uber drivers listing Ted Bundy as someone they admire. The match itself I thought was good, really fun, and I didn't really notice a lot of the hammy aspects. Iggy takes a great DDT on a show where I thought Valiant was guaranteed to have taken the nastiest DDT, his fishhook camel clutch was nasty, and I thought Iggy especially was really lacing in shots down the stretch. I thought he looked great during the strike exchange, throwing a few different great strikes (nice big punch, sharp elbow, big slashing overhand chop), although Sterling has a habit of pulling away from his own strikes, whiffing on a couple of elbows that were meant to be cut-off spots, and holding back on a yakuza kick. Iggy was great at getting into people's faces, a gal who no sells him and a little kid that jumps, and we build to a great dive from Sterling that levels Iggy (after he had just bumped big to the floor) and threatens to crash into the front row, but damn if every person in CWF is great about keeping their fans safe. Fun match, fun concept show.

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CWF Mid-Atlantic Worldwide Episode 129

Episode 129

1. Mike Mars vs. Metallicon

ER: Ugh Metallico? I hated his pants (with belt!), hated his stupid soft flipping bumps. He should have left in a body bag. I think Mars was too kind. But I like Mars' look and presence and really look forward to him having a hoss war with someone. Mars vs. Mecha or a match-up with Justice sound really good right now.

PAS: I had no problem with Metallico (or is it Metallicon? Youtube has it one way, Stuttsy said it another), he took a horrid bump on the big boot and landed unfortunately on that spinebuster, he is no Cool J, but I love that CWF-MA has a stable of jobbers willing to die.

2. Otto Schwanz vs. Chris "TNT" Taylor

ER: I had never seen Taylor before, and he seemed to tire out pretty early into this match. It's fine, as the match wasn't very long, but it didn't do much to make me want to see more of him. He did an ugly famouser and looked like he was breathing heavy getting up on the second turnbuckle. The headlock sequences were fun and I love the facials Otto makes while giving and receiving headlocks. Him administering a headlock is the best as he'll throw in rabbit shots to the back of the head and look crazed, and then while Taylor turns the tables Otto gets this funny distant look in his eyes like "this guy is trying this on ME?" We build to Otto catching an axe handle with a bearhug, and he plants him with a nice spinebuster to finish (Stuck him!).

PAS: I will pretty much enjoy Otto in anything, but this tested the limits. Taylor is in the bottom tenth of guy on CWF, those second rope axehandles looked terrible, and his cardio was pretty bad. Schwanz was fun, and he cracked him with that spinebuster. Nothing to see here, keep moving.

ER: Andrews and Valiant come out to try and bully Stutts and a kid dressed as Randy Savage into giving him his title shot rematch. Stutts says that it was actually Andrews who said that Stutts shouldn't decide who gets TV title matches, and I don't think I realized that the "name out of the hat" defense was because of Andrews. We get some fun back and forth with Valiant and Andrews jawing about how their names probably aren't even in the bucket, and the best part was easily Andrews silently mean mugging the kid when he didn't draw his name. I need to learn how to make GIFs just to get Andrews stoic reaction while staring at the kid. Though this just further illustrates how much more I'd rather see regular Andrews/Valiant appearances instead of what they got replaced with.

3. Jesse Adler vs. Ethan Alexander Sharpe

ER: This was another in a continuing trend of awesome Sharpe performances, and in the first actual full match I've seen from Adler I was still left underwhelmed. Adler has a lot of  that offense that requires his opponent to run at him in just a certain way. Sometimes the stuff looks good (I liked his little sliding kick in the corner), other times it looks phony. But luckily, Sharpe is a real son of a bitch here, and it makes the match mostly work. Once Sharpe starts attacking the leg we get gold, starting with him grabbing those knees and slamming them patella first into the apron. Man that looked painful. Sharpe was really great with the knee work, I especially loved this low dropkick he did off the ropes: It was so fast and low and precise and violent, genuinely looked like it upended Adler. The longer this went the more I wanted a Sharpe victory. I mean, I wanted a Sharpe victory the moment his name was pulled and he told Andrews to "take his tall ass to the back". But man the brief Adler comeback was really awful, with Sharpe missing a telegraphed elbow and Adler hitting one of those standing shooting star presses that barely make any contact, and look more like Adler slipped on icy steps and landed on his face. This TV title reign is a huge mistake so far.

PAS: I actually thought most of Adler's performance in this was fine. The match mainly called for him to sell a bad knee and he did a nice job. A lot of the cool offense by Sharpe depended on Adler taking creative bumps on the knee, I loved how he dropped knee first on Sharpe's low dropkick. Unfortunately Adler's dated highflyer offense kills matches dead, if you are going to work as an indy highflyer in 2017 you need more then Queenan Creeds move set and execution, that kick/shooting star press combo is rough. Adler should really watch some Kyle Matthews matches, focus on simple stuff and selling and execute it well, he would be much better off with a second rope splash and a dropkick then that goofus kick and no height shooting star. Sharpe has really turned a corner, he is such a fervent asskicker now, he honestly should shave the look at me moustache and dump the "I'm a rich guy" gimmick and just be an asskicker, he has moved past the bush league stuff.

4. Arik Andrews vs. Cam Carter

ER: Fun match with some nice moving parts. You had Lee Valiant cheating on the floor while avoiding Adler. Carter is a good babyface and would have been a more interesting choices as TV champ. We could make a pretty substantial list of CWF guys who would have been more interesting. Carter hits a big flip dive on Andrews and Valiant, later Valiant sweeps his legs on the apron. Andrews isn't a guy with a lot of offense,being capitalizing on guys missing moves or grabbing them by the tights to throw them through the ropes or into a turnbuckle, things like that. I seem to always like those guys. Though I really wish if they were fine with Andrews getting beat, that they would have just actually let the person winning the title beat him in a competitive match. I always hate the surprise flash pin title change. Anyway, we get more great "Are you fucking kidding me?" Andrews face after the match, which almost makes up for this.

PAS: It was a mistake to have a Cam Carter match right after pushing Adler as a highflyer. Everything Carter does has so much more explosion and height then anything Adler does. These guys match up really well, I liked the pace shifts with Carter wanting to go fast and Andrews slowing it down, it is like watching a fast break team like the Warriors play the Memphis Grizzlies. Really liked the way Carter kept escaping the asphalt spike and the finish was really well executed.

5. Mace Li/Arik Royal vs. Sandwich Squad

ER: Quality main, with the Squad chopping and squishing Mace Li. At one point Mecha goes to chop him and you can hear Mace go "Not again!" before his chest gets caved in. Mecha is really great, arguably the best big fat guy we get to see on a regular basis (as sadly the big fat guy appears to be dying off in pro wrestling, which is beyond stupid), he throws big meaty shots and gets good speed on avalanches, and when he bumps you really see his body settle and the ring shake. Arik Royal plays this match with a great detached cockiness, so it totally works when he makes bugged out faces taking a backdrop, drops a smirking elbow on Biggs' side, or he's coldly uppercutting Biggs with a brass knux shot to the back of the head. I've never seen Mace Maeda so I didn't get any of the clear inside jokes about Li/Maeda, but I liked Li's bat shots on the floor as a way to get Mecha out of the match. Finish was good, involving everyone, with Biggs hitting an awesome crossbody to get what probably could have been a 30 count, Gemini distracts the ref and the knux get thrown in, CLvira gets the knux, but Royal gets them (or another pair?) and clocks Biggs. The Squad hasn't really had any classic tags yet, but I don't think there's a match they've had that I haven't fully enjoyed.

PAS: Man did I love Royal in this, he is one of the best guys in the world at combining stooging and violence, he really reminds me of a prime Arn Anderson. He is great at furiously complaining about the match and cringing as Li gets smacked, and then he flips the switch and lays into the Sandwich Squad, his running tackle right into Mecha was awesome, it was like a compact car running into a aquarium full of jello. Also the uppercut with the knuckles was as good a knuckle shot as I can remember seeing. Li was their to take a beating, and he was great at wincing at every huge open hand chop, and brutally eats a Mecha clothesline which was almost Hansenesque.

ER: Also, shout out to CLvira Party. This was a pretty big role for her to have throughout the show and I thought it was consistently amusing. The Elvira intro was good, and I liked her during the apple bobbing segment. If this ever builds to some kind of mixed tag with her and Jarray Caray on opposing sides, I'm game.

PAS: That was a really great Elvira impression, which is kind of strange. How old is CL Party? I am 41 and Elvira was really a reference that was a little old for me, seems strange for a girl in her 20s to have such a pitch perfect Elvira impression in her tool box

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CWF Mid-Atlantic Worldwide Episode 127

Episode 127

1. Dirty Daddy vs. Cain Justice

ER: Cain comes out with Young Boys! Really, just make Cain the punk leader of a dojo and watch them lay waste to CWF. Gi entrance with Young Boys, match was already 7 stars before the bell. These two obviously always match up well, and this is their final match over the RGL title. These two are always on top of each other, never letting up, and know each other's next move. There's a lot of that in wrestling, but these two actually know how to keep it tight and not spiral into a self-conscious epic. The matches are always 10 minutes or under, and they know how to craft cool little sagas in that time. There has never been one whisper of overkill with these two. Here they break out some things that are tired indy tropes at this point, and make them actually work, like that running back and forth buckle to buckle routine: Dirty was dishing it to Cain in the corner, landed a few shots, went to get a running start and as he turned around Cain was running it to blast him. Usually that spot just looks like guys running back and forth because that was the plan and it looks kewl. Daddy went for the twist ending submission, failed quick, and never went back to it. That's smart, and a cool touch to these matches where guys constantly go for their opponent's finisher. Daddy's elbow shots all looked good, and I love how he mixed up their landing spot, working the jaw and the back. Cecil Scott was great on commentary bringing up a Cain back injury, nothing overblown, but mentioning that he's definitely dealing with an injury; Daddy goes after the back and Cain sells it like a guy who slept wrong and has been dealing with picking things up off the floor differently the last couple weeks. It's enough to make me buy that Cain's reaction time was slowed just enough to have lesser reaction time, and lent credence to Daddy's two vertical suplex/brainbusters as the finish. My only (minor) complaint was that this was a blowoff, and didn't really feel like a blowoff. It just felt like another one of their very good matches. I'm okay with that, but it would have been elevated anymore if it felt like something major was at stake.

PAS: It is amazing how these guys can do stuff I would normally hate, and I enjoy here. There is nothing more tired in indy wrestling then an elbow exchange, here they vary the speed and force nicely and end with Daddy landing body shots and Cain cleaning his clock with a front kick, took a cliche and mixed it up just enough. These guy know how to add just a little spice to a basic match.

I loved their work on the flood with Cain trying to smash Dirty's arm into the ring post (even kissing the post before the slam which is a beautiful bit of wrestling assholeness), Dirty blocks it once, Cain yells "Gimmie that arm" Dirty blocks it again, and smashes Cain spine first into the ringpost, setting the bad back story for the rest of the match. I slept weird on my back last week, so I feel Cain's suffering as he tries to work through a tender back. I loved how he hit the TBD (which should be a kill move in any fed, but especially here) and how the back wouldn't let him pin him quick, spamming that move was my only complaint in their Battlecade match and I liked how they dealt with it here. I agree that the finish felt a little weak for the end of a feud. I thought Cain did an awesome job selling fatigue, but the two brainbusters weren't brutal enough to close out the feud. Still a hell of match, and if they keep these guys apart for a while, I can imagine their match over the Mid-Atlantic title is going to be awesome.

2. Ethan Alexander Sharpe/Dr. Daniel C. Rockingham/Frankie Flynn vs. Ian Maxwell/KL3/Bobby Ballentyne

PAS: Kind of a messy trios match. A lot of the RGL stuff I have really liked, and AIW's kids 10 man is one of my favorite matches of the year, but the flip side with young wrestlers is that sometimes things won't click. Everyone seemed off here Maxwell slipped off the top rope, Dr. Dan nearly killed him with a botched finisher, some of the rope running was hinky. I continue to like Flynn as he might have been the smoothest guy in the match.

ER: That's funny, as outside of Maxwell's slip on the ropes I thought this was really good, especially for a quick trios. I thought it was one of the better Sharpe performances, and it feels like we've been saying that a lot over the last couple months. He had a bunch of big strikes that all landed great: his standing clothesline had tons of power for something that's basically all upper body, his sliding lariat looked good, real nice shotei, and bumped big for Ballentyne. Ballentyne didn't look good in his other CWF appearance, and looked much better here. His flying back elbow reminded me of Corey Edsel (but Ballentyne will need another 100 lb. before it looks that good). Flynn is good at working fast ropes exchanges, a good guy to be opposite someone like Maxwell. I didn't like a lot of Maxwell's stuff in here (seemed too focused on the dance rather than the contact) but I get the sense that it wouldn't have looked even as good as it did without Flynn opposite him. Rockingham's finish was probably supposed to be a backbreaker, but he straightened his leg so it just looked like a weird Dr. Bomb. And the man is a fucking doctor, why isn't he just using a Dr. Bomb? The move that looked like it should have put Maxwell in traction was the lawn dart he gave him to the middle rope, the angle and landing looked gross. Really, outside of the springboard slip (which was passed by easier than normal since it came at a point where everybody was gonna fill the ring anyway) and the Classic Indy Match Finisher ("I don't know what it was, but it may have been botched, and both men may have gotten hurt") I really liked this.

3. Sandwich Squad vs. Zane & Dave Dawson

ER: A match that I think worked a bit better as a concept than it did in execution. The Squad wait by the lobby curtain to jump the Dawsons, but the Dawsons sneak in from behind and just waste Mecha with a chairshot. Biggs has to go it alone, and I like how seriously they treated the chairshot. It appeared to be safely delivered to Mecha's (very broad) back, but it was treated like a huge deal. Cecil and Stutts turned in another good show talking about how Biggs has noticeably lost weight over the last several months, and how he might not have the strength to go it alone for very long against the Dawsons. Biggs is good in this, especially liked his big full arm shots to the gut. Dawsons (specifically Dave) can be lazy on strikes and missed clotheslines, and there is that, but the match progressed nicely thanks to Biggs' selling. Mecha coming back was the big moment of course, and I thought his selling was great throughout, hitting some big moves and swinging his clubbing arms, and always showing how his neck was affecting him. I was into it. But I thought the ending was a total flop, manufacturing what felt like phony drama wrapped around a rarely enforced rule. Zane and Biggs are down, ref is counting them both down, Biggs is crawling towards Zane to pin him...but the ref counts to 10 and that's the match. It felt pretty damn stupid to count a guy down who was actively crawling towards his opponent to pin him. I've never seen that in a match before, and it immediately became apparent why. It felt cheap, and this fed is way better than cheap.

PAS: That chair shot at the beginning of the match was super nasty, I loved how the back of the chair flew off when it landed. ECW et al have desensitized me a bit to chair shots, but that one felt like it should have felled a giant man like that for the entire match. I thought the match was really made with Biggs and Mecha's selling, as both guys really felt like they were gutting their way through a war. I loved the huge superplex as a double knock out spot. I agree the crawling count out seemed weird. Still that is the rule, if you aren't on your feet by 10 you get counted out, I certainly didn't hate it as much as Eric, and thought it was a semi-clever BS finish. I am still waiting for a Dawsons v. Sandwich Squad match to blow me away, it is always slightly worse then it feels on paper.

4. Aric Andrews vs. Jesse Adler

ER: Whoa, this was not what I was expecting. I am mostly unfamiliar with Adler, only knowing what the announcers tell me and what I saw from him in his return a couple weeks ago (which I didn't care for). So my gut reaction is that I really don't like this move. I guess I'm always more of a fan of a heel champ with a strong babyface chasing him, and in one episode we just shifted to the three singles titles all being held by babyfaces. I'm really bummed, just because I really liked both Justice and Andrews lording those belts over people. Obviously you can't keep everyone champ forever, but I really liked the dynamic we had. Based on the match I've seen, there are a few guys in this fed (and tons more throughout the rest of indy wrestling) who do Adler's style better than Adler, and I'm not exactly going out of my way to seek out more of that style match. These title changes really feel like they could completely change the tone of the program going forward, in a way I'm not as excited for. Obviously it opens up more challengers, but I'm knocked down a peg at the end of the episode. My favorite moment was Cecil Scott calling Lee Valiant a bag of piss.

PAS: Yeah I am out on this, Andrews and Valiant are a great act with the belt, and Adler doesn't show me much. Both of his big highflying moves didn't look that great and highflying babyface is a completely over done act.  I mean this fed still books Andrew Everett, and Adler's stuff doesn't even come close to what Everett can do. Maybe if I see more Adler, I'll learn to like him, but this fell completely flat for me.

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CWF Mid-Atlantic Worldwide Episode 123

Episode 123

1. Joshua Cutshall vs. Aric Andrews

PAS: This was very fun. It is basically a battle between a pair of Justified villains, with Cutshall being the crazy cousin that keeps taunting Raylan and imperiling their gun running operation. This is a pair of long lanky hard hitting dudes pounding on each other. I really like Cutshalls jump kick and his slappy right hands, while Andrews has more of downward fist punch, both are really effective looking shots. Nifty finish too with the despicable Lee Valiant loading Andrews elbow pad and Andrews KO's the KO master with Cutshalls own elbow smash

ER: Phil crushed it with his new Justified villains storyline, and really there are probably more people than not in this fed who come off like tertiary Justified characters. And that's obviously a great thing. Really we could probably do a post titled Justifying CWF Mid-Atlantic and flesh out the entire eastern Kentucky area with the whole roster. Logan Easton Laroux would be a local Todd Chrisley real estate metrosexual, Michael McCallister feels like someone who would work at the police station bagging evidence and making people sign the check out sheet,  Slade Porter can be a guy who gets robbed  while trying to buy weed for friends. It's a post that can happen. And there's a reason we've written up 37 episodes of TV and have no intentions to stop, because we dig this show. Shoot we've even talked about going back and cherry picking earlier episodes.

Andrews works such a simple, toned down style, and a guy like Cutshall complements that nicely with crazy. I like Cutshall's strikes, and like how his elbow is portrayed as a big deal, and how Andrews had it scouted. It still leaves openings for him to be surprised (like by that great legdrop lariat, a move I really love). Valiant has been great as Andrews' second, and when was the last time you saw an honest to god loaded elbow pad? I'd love to see the rematch that this clearly sets up, and post match the fans alert the ref that chicanery had gone on (and that woman who blasted the Dawsons with her nachos is yelling the loudest. How long until that woman is brought in as Rob McBride's Sapphire-esque manager, White Gold?), but that elbow pad is empty! It's really hit me the last couple episodes, filled with Andrews and Lee matches, just how big a deal these titles in CWF come off to me. I don't remember the last time I watched a fed and actually cared about the belts (probably not since I was 10 or 11 and would draw the WWF champs in my notebook. I wonder if my notebook with Money Inc. drawings is somewhere at my folks' house). But Phil and I have been watching since late 2016 and only the tag belts have changed hands, and among Lee, Andrews and Justice you have three guys in the middle of awesome title runs. A true testament to this promotion and their talent that they got someone like me to actively care about wins and losses and title shots and title defenses in 2017.

2. Bobby Ballentyne vs. Michael McAllister
PAS: This is McAllister's first redemption match since losing his HIM mask, and was a fine short big guys hit each other scrap. Ballentyne is a guy they brought in from the Charlotte scene, and they might have been better off using a student. Ballentyne kind of wanted to shoehorn some of his shtick in what was basically a short squash.

ER: Yeah I'm not sure what Ballentyne's shtick was even supposed to be. At one point he kind of dropped McCallister on a sloppy bodyslam and then just looked up and shrugged. C-Student Bobby Ballentyne? 75% Bobby Ballentyne? But I liked him getting hit by McCallister. This was easily my favorite stuff from McCallister since we've been watching. He throws nice punches right at his eye level, cracked Ballentyne with a shot to the back of the neck, threw a nice fast elbow drop, and I liked the no-knee atomic drop (just dropping Ballentyne butt first on the mat). CWF treats its veterans properly and uses them properly, so I'm curious to see more of him (minimal pun intended).

3. Mike Mars vs. Number Boy

PAS: This was the right kind of squash. Mars throws Number Boy around and he lands in painful looking ways. Mars pop up headbutt is pretty nasty looking and a fun variation on a really popular wrestling set up. I like that Number Boy's only offense is the punches in the corner, counting gives him power.

ER: I think I actually liked Mars more in that brief 6 man tag a couple weeks back. I think some big guys work better matches against big guys, other impressive squash match workers aren't as compelling against guys their size. Mars looked totally fine in this squash, but I think he looked better against the big dudes that were in that match. Maybe he plays up to the opponent? Tough to tell with just two quick looks at him. I thought Number Boy's standing punches looked good, and not to stomp all over Phil's (funny) joke, but he also had numerous dropkicks. The pop up headbutt from Mars was unexpected, I was just expecting a flapjack or something. A headbutt will always add intrigue. Also, part of me hopes that Number Man became Number Boy, and soon Number Boy will beget Number Child with his choice of Number Partner.

4. Logan Easton Laroux vs. Tracer X

PAS: Ultra J titles is sort of the CWF Worldwide version of the X Division so we get some indy style juniors matches. Not my favorite style of work, but this was a fine version of it. X is a really good athlete and has some fun fancy offense, I liked his diving into the ring version of the stroke, shocking no one every used that in WCW back when every third guys finisher was a facebuster. Finish was clever with Laroux sneaking in an un foul while the ref wasn't looking. I appreciate he is bringing in some dirtbag cheating into the spotfests.

ER: I thought this was an okay match with a great finish, and probably another new peak for the Laroux character. I thought he was great in the culmination of the Smith Garrett angle (which, no matter how much the angle itself might have made your head hurt the longer you thought about it, also featured far and away Garrett's best character work) and here - as Phil said - someone is finally bringing dirtbag cheating to spotfests. And, importantly, it's not in a winky funny "cool heel" way. Laroux isn't out there to be liked by the fans, and that goes a long way for him. The match was what it was: some of the exchanges were cool, the dance-y stuff looked dance-y (getting tired of the "kick a guy to perfectly spin him into position for him to throw an elbow, which spins you into the perfect position to land a spinning heel kick" kind of stuff). X is very quick and moves impressively (his cartwheel out of a wristlock was awesome) but sometimes gets too far ahead of himself with this athleticism, focusing more on his landings than the actual move he's doing; so he'll do a cool wipeout on an elbow, mostly whiff on the elbow, but the wipeout will look cool. BUT, we had that great finish, with Tracer hitting a nice high kick from the apron and Laroux stumbling behind the referee before slyly booting Tracer right in the balls as he was getting back in the ring. The timing and execution were great, and I loved the way Laroux smugly left the ring, took off his wrist tape and tossed the crumpled tape aside without even looking where or who he was throwing it to, and walking off with his belt.

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CWF Mid-Atlantic Worldwide Episode 120

Episode 120

1. Smith Garrett vs. Logan Easton Laroux

ER: I had no idea where the Garrett KO angle was going, and I actually thought this was a pretty good payoff for it. Laroux obtaining Garrett's medical records that show a fractured C6, therefore getting him on a medical suspension, is a pretty great rich guy dickhead play. Using your wealth to obtain blackmail instead of to buy off opponents is an interesting twist to the rich jerk gimmick. Some of the logic doesn't totally add up ("Garrett has been beating opponents in 10 seconds because he can't wrestle for more than 10 seconds!" Wait, so Garrett could just choose to win quickly whenever he wanted to and wasn't!?), and I didn't love the use of shoot name, but I thought the realism was handled well. Garrett tearing up was legit and I bought wanting to compete, saying he'd sign any waiver, and I love the care showed for him by the staff, saying they don't want him paralyzed in this ring, "It's just not worth it", and Garrett getting into Laroux's face and telling him he's coming after him the second he's healthy. I thought this was all effective as hell, and much better than a guy announcing he'd be leaving due to an injury, or the fed just announcing he was injured. But this made me far more interested in an eventual Garrett/Laroux showdown. This angle could have been done terribly, and I thought they knocked it out of the park.

PAS: I will give credit to them for execution, I thought Laroux was a really smarmy prick, he totally came off like a right wing twitter troll who just posted the perfect gas chamber gif.  Garrett looked appropriately distraught, and I thought William Cross was great in the role of promoter who cares too much, but has to do what is right, it had a very Eddie Marlin feel to it and that is a huge compliment. Still the underlying logic of the angle is straight Vince Russo worked shoot orangoutang shit . The idea of Garrett being too hurt to wrestle longer then 10 seconds implies that either "the office" booked the matches to only go 10 seconds, or Garrett decided to "shoot" on his first two opponents because he couldn't go longer, either way BOOOOOO!!!. CWF is really great at keeping its internal logic straight, which makes stuff like this (or dumb Chikara shit like the Mime) stand out even more.

2. Ethan Alexander Sharpe vs. Chet Sterling

ER: I was rooting for EAS as I'm a fan of his more serious persona, bought into all of Stutts' bracket buster hype, but assumed with no shenanigans that Sterling was probably going to be advancing (and probably deserved to be the one advancing). Sharpe got crossed up a couple times during this one, but I still liked both guys. Sterling snapped my eyes open with an early back elbow, and I'm a big fan of nice back elbows. This one really looked jaw dislocatingly hard. I'm surprised Sharpe didn't make a bigger deal out of trying to hit the uppercut, which was his killshot in his prior two matches, but I don't think he went for it once, which is odd. Still I really like his over the shoulder jawbreaker, and thought he leaned into Sterling's stuff nicely. Sterling hit a nice dive into the crowd, took a mean ring post shot, and effectively worked boots and elbows into the match, unloaded a flurry of strikes on Sharpe that I liked, did the little things like get a high cradle on the finish roll-up. A satisfying match.

PAS: This was a perfectly entertaining bit of television wrestling, which is more then I would have guessed from this matchup on paper. There were a couple of weak spots (Sterling really has some hit or miss punches) but most of this was pretty solid. Really liked Sharpe countering the dive with his jawbreaker, and I loved the roll-up finish.

3. Aric Andrews vs. Isaiah Santero

ER: We saw Santero briefly before in that messy Hardy Boyz tag scramble episode many months ago, and I really didn't like how much of the match he took here. Andrews just went toe to toe with Trevor Lee, now he barely edges out this clown with a bunch of Lee Valiant interference? Santero is okay, though I prefer more stiffness from my exoticos (phrasing?) or big bumps. He doesn't seem to have either, getting up awkwardly for moves and not really landing anything with a thud. My favorite parts were Andrews' stomps to the head, but I think this needed a lot more Andrews control.

PAS: I liked Innocent Isaiah in NOVA pro, but this was mostly shtick, and the actually wrestling in it wasn't great.  This did feel a little like Andrews prison girlfriend showing up to his favorite bar after they both get released. "Why didn't you call me Aric we were supposed to be together"

4. Lee Valiant vs. Rob McBride

ER: Oh my gosh I forgot about McBride! I love McBride! No bumps, meaty strikes with no wind up, minimal body selling but great sympathetic facial selling. He's gotta be a tough opponent to work, and also an easy opponent to work. You're not going to get any of your stuff in, you're going to take a full weight elbow drop, but you know the match won't go too long and the crowd will be into it. McBride would be a fun #500 candidate if Phil and I had enough free time to do an SC500. Valiant is good eating heavy chops and flying into McBride (even leaping off the top to essentially powerbomb himself), McBride splats him with a great elbow and finishes with a big one off the middle rope, and McBride is the kind of guy who feels like he's featured just the right amount of time. There are some guys I want to see more, some I want to see less, but I always like McBride showing up every 3 months.

PAS: Yeah this was totally fun. The commentary went over both guys history and I really want to see Lee Valiant as fake Jimmy Valiant relative. Lee Valiant as a beloved babyface totally doesn't compute. McBride has some really great open hand chops and for a guy who doesn't take bumps (Boogie Woogie taught him well) it is pretty crazy for him to do a second rope elbow, that is a lot of weight landing on a well seasoned hip bone.

5. Logan Easton Laroux vs. Chet Sterling

ER: I really disliked their prior match, but I enjoyed this whole presentation. I thought the match itself was good, disliked the DQ as it happened...but the old school angle that unfolded sucked me in and got me even more hyped for the restart. Both guys were bringing it, Laroux especially just blasted Sterling with a few elbows right to the chin, real nasty shots. I also loved Sterling shoving some kid out of the way so he could stand on his chair and pose. I noticed Laroux telling the ref that he was using an elbow and not a closed fist, and I assumed it was just heel behavior. When the finish happened I kind of eye rolled, but quickly noticed how Cecil and Stutts were reacting. They were just as upset, annoyed and incredulous as I was. The two of them are great vessels for the viewer, not telling us how we should be reacting, but reacting with us. Once I began hearing that they thought the decision was bullshit, I got excited for what was unfolding. A referee ringer? "But if I didn't hire him, and YOU didn't hire him..." I loved how the restart unfolded, Michael McCallister taking out and beating the phony ref, and loved Sterling chasing Laroux down and stiffing him up in the lobby of the Sportatorium. I loved the little twist they threw in once Sterling had dragged him back to the ring, with Laroux immediately hitting his cutter. I really wanted that to be it, just because it would have been a crushing sudden end to the rollercoaster. Once Sterling kicked out of the cutter at one you kinda knew he was taking this all the way, and sure enough Laroux is finished in short order. I thought the overall package of this was a really fun 15 minutes, with little storyline twists that CWF is very successful at. I don't really trust any other modern feds with these kind of angles, but CWF understands the intricacies of them. They easily could have just had these two work a 10 minute match ending with Sterling getting the title shot. But they added extra character, extra motivation, shifting consequences, things that make someone like me care far more about this result than I otherwise would have. Although, my 1999 wrestling brain can't be completely turned off, as Trevor Lee was being so friendly with Sterling during the congratulations that I kept waiting for a cheapshot. But, something tells me they knew someone like me would be thinking that.

PAS: Yeah this was a really fun bit of pro-wrestling shtick. I loved how they didn't have the ref work Tirantes heel stuff, just call it straight right up until the DQ, that is the way Tim Donaghy would do it. I also loved the cutter near fall after Sterling dragged him back, that would have been an amazing way for Laroux to steal a win. Work itself was solid stuff, I liked their first match more then Eric did, and both guys clearly have worked each other a ton and have their timing down pat. I do think the whole angle made the promotion look a little bush league, they don't know a guy has a broken neck, and they have ref's just showing up and reffing matches? They need an office manager.

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CWF Mid-Atlantic Worldwide Episode 119

Episode 119

1. Aspyn Rose vs. Kaci Lennox

ER: I really like Aspyn Rose's look, but she probably works best as a second at this point. This was just about the most not ready for prime time performance I recall seeing. She's new to this, things will get better. But this was rougher than rough. She threw a nice running knee in the corner. That's not nothing. But literally every other moment just shouldn't have been on TV. That kick combo didn't help either gal, as Rose threw bad kicks and Lennox didn't help much on her end, and from there it just looked like Rose had no clue what to do next. We got bad bumps, stumbling moves, and a finisher sub that looked like she wasn't sure how to lock on. For her part, Lennox hit some nice shoulderblocks in the corner, but couldn't do a whole lot with Rose. I like seeing new talent, but I don't think we need to see talent that's THIS new.

PAS: This was the worst match they have put on the show by far. You don't need to air everything you tape. Rose looked first day of wrestling camp bad, that kick combo was cringe comedy. After that the whole thing fell apart badly, I imagine Rose and Lennox drove up with Aaron Epic and there is nothing wrong with giving them a chance, but this should have been left on the cutting room floor

2. Frankie Flynn/Brian Carson/Evan Adams vs. Cain Justice/Dirty Daddy/Movie Myk

ER: I was hoping for more from this one, as I love the inter-promotion feuding dojo grads angle. But it wasn't given a lot of time, and it never got much momentum. Flynn's section with Daddy looked good, really liked Flynn surprising him with fast strikes. Justice looked good the one time he was in, exactly the kind of cocky badass you want in an inter-promotion feud, the kind of guy who just reacts without thinking of consequences. He goes after Flynn's eye a couple times, even reaching in for an eyepoke to break up a pin. "Weird Body" Evan Adams ("built like Angus Young"~Cecil Scott) doesn't seem very good, but with his super tiny build and Toki Wartooth appearance I couldn't help but enjoy him. Carson's over the shoulder backbreaker looked good, Myk had a really nice pinfall save, Cain takes a big (barefoot!) bump to the floor, but I wanted more of a match.

PAS: I enjoyed this, it wasn't at the level of WAR v. New Japan or anything, but I did enjoy Cain bringing out the nastiness with the eye gouges. Most of the match was built around heating up Daddy v. Justice again, and I am excited for another round of that feud. Flynn is a guy I have seen a couple times before and was underwhelmed by, he was nasty here, sharp shots, which were sold especially well by Dirty Daddy, he has gotten so good, and I can't think of a better sympathetic babyface tag worker in wrestling right now.

3. AC Hawkes/Carlos Gabriel vs. Sandwich Squad

ER: Oh man, once these two came out with an open challenge I KNEW we were getting the always hungry Sandwich Squad. Biggs hits a big Samoan drop and then a stiff arm right clothesline on Gabriel that bounces him vertically on his head. Let's get a GIF of that, someone! Ever generous, Biggs and Mecha both gift Hawkes with lariats later, so he can understand what Gabriel went through. We get a big Mecha assisted elbow drop, and I like how Hawkes and Gabriel are at least bringing action to the Squad, not just setting up their offense. I really love the Sandwich Squad.

PAS: Sandwich Squad squashes are one of the most fun things in wrestling. Got to give the pair of rookies credit for really taking the appropriate amount of beating necessary to get over. Gabriel trying the clothesline bump that killed Oro seemed a little much for a internet TV show, but do you. That assisted elbow drop was grimey. They should have either a Squad or Donnie Dollars squash on every show.

ER: I don't know much about Michael McCallister pre-HIM, so I'm not sure what to think of his redemption, as I'm not sure what he needs redemption from, what lead him to put on a mask, I don't even have much of an opinion on him as a worker as his team with SIS always felt like more of a SIS show. So we'll see where this goes.

4. Aric Andrews vs. Cam Carter

ER: I really liked how this was handled. liked Cam Carter in it, and liked the use of interference. I was bummed Carter didn't get more of a showing in the Weaver Cup, and he's a guy who shakes his fist out after punches so I'm automatically on Team Carter. The opening nearfall was really well done, with Andrews' second Lee Valiant hitting a great accidental spear on Andrews (aiming for Carter) and I totally would have bought a title change off it. I like Andrews needing his bacon saved throughout this, the guy came off a tough match with Lee a couple weeks back, needs his boy out there so he can defend his title at 70%. Carter gets run into the post nicely and even with the loss in a 4 minute match I thought he had a nice showing.

PAS: This was one of the more exciting Andrews TV title matches, Carter really brought the energy and we had some really close nearfalls with Andrews doing a good job of stumbling into two counts. Andrews and Valient are a great sleazeball duo, they look like a couple of guys who ended up in county jail for siphoning gas.

5. Logan Easton Laroux vs. Alex Daniels

ER: Daniels cuts the shit and comes out with no Affleck shtick and just jumps Laroux. THAT is a pleasant surprise. This whole thing was a nice hot 6 minute sprint that went some nice directions. I loved Laroux getting surprised and playing catch up, and Daniels was good as an aggressive punk. Once Laroux attacked the knee I liked that direction, his stomp to Daniels' inner knee was especially nasty, and he had several great mocking and condescending attacks to a hurt Daniels. Daniels had some nice nearfalls and kept that aggression up the whole match, really illustrating how much better aggressive Daniels is than chuckle hut Daniels. The misdirection ending worked well, loved Laroux hitting the surprise cutter. This was a real quality Velocity match.

PAS: Daniels is best at these kind of sprints, he has good execution and ideas for a spotfest, and is too busy to try to shoehorn in his hack jokes. The kick to the knee by Laroux was really nasty looking and I liked how focused his attack was. Finish was really great with Daniels going for his finisher, almost getting thrown into the ref and getting caught with a cutter. I liked Laroux as the contemptuous prick who is such a dick that he can even turn the second biggest dick in the fed face.

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CWF Mid-Atlantic Worldwide Episode 117

Episode 117

1. Snooty Foxx/Dirty Daddy vs. Zane & Dave Dawson

ER: Killer match up, easily my favorite Dawsons match and I think definitive proof that So' Time are legit and among the best tag teams in indy wrestling. They complement each other perfectly, come off genuine, unabashed babyfaces, and that's important. Snooty has some of my favorite current hot tags in wrestling, always treating it like the hot tag was the thing he wanted most in the world. It's hard to look convincing when running back and forth corner to corner hitting moves on both opponents, but he makes it convincing. This was the meanest I've seen the Dawsons, and it was great to see. It felt like every spare moment one of them had was jamming their thumbs into eyes. They cut off the ring nicely, ate Snooty's comeback really well and really committed to some of their strikes. The clothesline to set up a german suplex was a fitting ending; it had this slight reckless or sloppy feel to it that made it read more effectively. Also, a negative note: Dirty Daddy has genuine skill and is a naturally likeable babyface. He does not need a fake winky Chikara back story of being a 30 year ver starting over. He doesn't need a gimmick of "worked Carlos Colon in 1982". We don't need to make up a fake title tournament he won in Rio de Janeiro in future episodes. He's doing just fine as Dirty Daddy, 2017 babyface. But I still loved this tag, and would like to see more of this match-up.

PAS: I enjoyed the Kernodle Cup match between these two teams, and they have had some fun interactions in battle royals and things, these are just guys that match up well. Dawson's were appropriately nasty in this match, cheap shotting, hitting hard, punishing Daddy. Loved the hot tag section, especially Daddy's wreckless dive over the top to cut off Dave. Finish was cool, with So Time setting up their elbow/spear double team, Foxx getting cut off, and the Dawson's hitting their double team lariat and german finisher. Man does CWF have a lot of great tag teams, Dawson's may be the least of the big teams and they are pretty great.

2. Priscilla Kelly vs. SIS

ER: I liked their other match against each other, and I like that at the bell Kelly goes back to that low running kick to the patella. She used it later in the first match and I like it a lot as an ambush or evasive move. This match doesn't go very long, and it doesn't really need to go very long, because they both go at it hard. Once Kelly kicks the legs out from SIS she comes in with more low kicks, until SIS catches one from a seated position, drags her to the mat and starts firing off brutal looking side control elbows to the head. And when SIS takes over a match it's always fun, and these two stay close almost the whole time. Everything felt like a struggle. SIS chokes Kelly in the ropes but in a neat twist Kelly is facing the ring, so her neck is being bent back over the middle rope, and this sets up the awesome SIS crossbody. Kelly escapes this time with a win and already - even though their two matches have been less than 9 minutes total - this feels like a good feud. I hope we get a big rubber match showdown. Without Ethan Sharpe coming out unfurling a stack of rubbers.

PAS: This was a nasty stiff fight. Kelly has won a SHINE title since their last match and seems to have really improved. Her kicks really looked like they were really cracking SIS here, and I remember them being a bit more flash then substance before. This felt a little like a southern fried Yamada v. Aja.  SIS is just so great at using her bulk, I loved her in the ropes cross body, and the second rope stomp to the head. I didn't love Kelly semi-no selling the german suplex and the end, but besides that, this was good stuff.

3. Aric Andrews vs. Trevor Lee

ER: I've seen Andrews work over a dozen times now, and my favorite - and first - match of his involved him taking apart a guy's knee, so once I saw him targeting Lee's knee I was game. Now, I assumed it was going to go the way of a lot of the Trevor Lee main events, but they flipped it and totally surprised me with the direction the match took. The build was really unique and avoided any of the predictable back and forth. Andrews did his stalling routine to start and seemed hesitant to lock up with Lee. When they did finally lock up, Lee tooled him on the mat a bit and frustrated him. It wasn't surprising when Andrews went after the knee. What WAS surprising was that The Leg was the whole match. There were no valiant comebacks and convenient lapses in selling, it was Andrews beating the shit out of Lee's knee, and continuing to beat the shit out of it until he tired himself out beating the shit out of it, and got exhausted and frustrated. Andrews was good at ramping up the attacks, and I'll always flip for a guy ripping off a kneepad or bandage or something. Andrews stomps it, locks on a rough kneebar, and then locks Lee into the STF, a move Lee has used to dispatch tons of guys. Andrews locks it on just as mean as Lee, arching him in all sorts of painful ways. And he keeps trying to wrench it in, and Lee somehow never quits. It looked like he should have quit, but he never did. And Andrews sold the equivalent of a fighter who has punched himself out, only this is pro wrestling, so he up and grabbed his belt, grabbed Lee's belt, and threatened to just walk out. But he goes back into the ring with the belts, trash talks Lee, and gets surprised by a great spin kick. Lee locks on a brutal STF and that's all she wrote. This match took some awesome and unexpected turns and made for a great journey, totally class.

PAS: I knew Eric liked this match a lot going in, and I figured I would like it a bunch too, but I was shocked at how great it was, right up there with Richards and Attitude matches, and this didn't have the same tricks and shortcuts those had. I have been waiting to see the breakout Aric Andrews performance and here it was. He was just excellent here, as a vicious nasty prick who was going to do permanent, serious damage to Trevor's knee. The opening amateur mat scrambling looked great, as good as any mat rolling I have seen this year. The Andrews chop block which set up the long knee work was really violent looking as was all of the simple work on the knee. I loved Andrews punching the side of the kneecap, him really twisting on the kneebar, just the focus of what he was doing. Lee's selling was great too, at no point did he shrug off the knee to get his shit in, and he used counters to Andrews knee attacks to mount offense. I loved how he dodged the third cut block attempt, Andrews hit him with it twice, but the third time he dodged it and hit a german suplex. I also loved his sell when he stomped Andrews elbow, that is a typical early match Lee spot, here he didn't get to it until late and when he did it looked like it did more damage to his knee then it did to Andrew's elbow. Loved the finish, Lee has such an awesome STF, he never applies it the same way twice and is always looking for different ways to alter it and crank it in better, he he figure foured the leg first and hooked the arm behind his back. Most wrestlers always apply a move the exact same way each time, and I appreciate him mixing it up.

ER: Andrews/Lee was some choice wrestling, landing easily (and quite high) on our 2017 Ongoing MOTY List. This one was right up there with the best episodes of wrestling TV this year.

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CWF Mid-Atlantic Worldwide Episode 114

Episode 114

1. Garrison King vs. Carlos Gabriel vs. Pat Monix vs. Tracer X

ER: Short and sweet 4 way scramble with enough cool spots thrown out that it didn't really matter than some of them didn't totally work. I hadn't seen three of these guys before (only Tracer X) and came away enjoying Monix, and appreciating King and Gabriel's willingness to slip a disk in a showcase match. Monix had some fun combos that land with some thump, is able to work these kind of fast sequences with guys on every side without getting crossed up, and will hit a crazy tope con hilo through the middle ropes and into the front row. They eventually get to one of those stupid "four guys hitting each other at once" spots that always happen in these matches, but I gotta say, at least these guys were clunking each other with hard elbows during that moment. I also thought Cecil and Stutts were in peak form here, tossing out jokes, covering up some dodgy spots, attempting to add substance to a spotfest. Cecil starts talking about Garrison King's "kicks" and how "hype" and "lit" they are, Stutts calls him out for using words he saw on Twitter, Cecil takes the hit and without missing a beat he covers for a botched rana by saying "King went for a rana but shifted to turn it into a legdrop!" which was a quick and convincing cover. They're a good team and matches like this benefit from them.

PAS: This was a bunch of young guys breaking out all of their crazy spots to try to get booked again and it worked for that. Tracer X seemed like the most polished of the four although King's top rope cutter won the battle of craziest spots. I would be fine seeing any of these guys again, although the roster is already super overloaded, and they seem to be bringing in a whole mass of new guys again for the Weaver cup.

2. Boar of Moldova vs. Joshua Cutshall

ER: This one fell short for me. It was one of those big slugfests where none of the slugging really reads. If Boar's chops were lighting up Cutshall, they didn't seem to be. Cutshall throws some nice shots, but also throws some hinky open handed punches that soar over Boar's head. If they were Japanese and in the Tokyo Dome, maybe we could pretend that the bad strikes were there on purpose to cover for injuries and it was actually some next level striking, but few people are stupid enough to actually believe that. Boar needs to tighten things up as I like the look but his execution just comes off weak. Props to Cutshall setting up his elbow to the back of Boar's head by pulling him into it by the tail.

PAS: Boar is a new guy I would rather not see anymore of it. Nothing worse then a big guy working a clubbering gimmick who doesn't clubber. I didn't think Cutshall looked great either but I have liked plenty of Cutshall before so I am blaming the Boar. I did like the birdcage on Cutshall's head and the tail yank into the elbow, but this was forgettable.

3. Aspyn Rose vs. Jessica Troy

ER: Troy is from Australia and seems pretty new, but probably not nearly as new as Rose. So they both seemed a bit green (Rose extra green, what with her mermaid scales and all), but they both showed some promise. They probably bit off a bit too much here, but they went at a fast pace and threw a bunch of things at the wall. Rose hits a corner elbow that lands right in Troy's throat, and Troy tries some World of Sport knucklelocks and go behinds that Rose stooges amusingly for, also liked Troy tripping Rose up on a drop down, with Rose falling into the ropes. Troy had a high bridge northern lights and a nice fisherman's suplex, and I liked Rose selling things like missing a face wash in the corner and jamming her knee. Cecil adds to things by squeezing in little bits of character, like putting over Troy's running double knees by mentioning that Rose had previously injured her clavicle. I do think both have a ways to go, Troy threw a couple lariats awkwardly below Rose's chest, and Rose seems like she actually has no idea how to run, she seemed like she was powerwalking into all over her rope running spots, it looked really strange (a lot of rope running looks really odd in ladies matches, why is that? Do they not have enough weight to get spring off the ropes? Serious question), but I liked what they were going for here.

PAS: I thought this was kind of a mess and went too long. With the Mae Young Classic I have watched more US women's wrestling this month then I have in my life before, so I really didn't need to see more of it. Both of these ladies would be in the bottom 10th of MYC competitors (while SIS for example would be in the top fourth easily), and the match suffered from not having anyone to tie it together.

4. Zane Dawson/Dave Dawson/Cain Justice/Aric Andrews vs. Snooty Foxx/Dirty Daddy/Chet Sterling/ Smith Garrett

ER: Satisfying, crowd pleasing 8 man with a kinda bummer finish. Even with the finish we got 20 minutes of good action, even starting before the bell with Dawsons/Andrews getting in a strategy huddle and boxing out Justice. I could have stopped watching the match then and left happy, as Cain's irritated faces while trying to get in the huddle were hilarious to me. Totally nailed the little brother "You guyyyyyys, let me playyyyyy!" vibe. His opening scramble was also some of the best work in the match, but we also got two nice FIP segments with Snooty and Sterling. I thought Fox was surprisingly adept at being in peril, and the heels were all good at keeping the tags fresh. Later we get a fun comeback run from him, with he and Daddy doing synchronized leaps off the apron, and a great Daddy elbow/Fox spear combo (and Fox has a real nice spear). Finish is kinda wonky, as Sterling is getting the pin and Garrett is letting him get the pin, but Justice shoves Garrett into Sterling to break it up...even though Garrett looks like he barely grazes anybody. Then we get some standing around time as Sterling is in disbelief, before Andrews gets the roll up. I guess that Andrews' TV title was on the line here? But I didn't realize that while the match was going on. And even so, the execution of the finish was lacking. Side note, got a brief - maybe unintentional - glimpse post match of heel Sterling, and I think I could really like him as a heel. I say unintentional because he merely looked frustrated, and any guy is allowed to be frustrated. But in the moment I could see him turning hard on Garrett, and I would have been down. Intentional or not, it's a thought.

PAS: The gimmick of this match is that if any of the heels lost they would have to defend their titles against anyone who pinned them. That is why Justice is sent out there and invites Garrett to pin him, if Garrett or Sterling pinned Cain, they couldn't get a title shot because they were aged out of the RGL. That also explains why Garrett and Sterling were arguing, Sterling though Garrett wanted the pin. It was a clever bit of booking and led to some fun twists to a normal 8 man. I really loved Cain in this, he had some great character moments, and had a ton of cool wrestling moments as well. That opening bit of mat wrestling with Garrett was totally boss, and I loved his nasty armbar. This match also got me excited to see the Dawsons v. So Time and I have been pretty down on the Dawsons lately.

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