New Footage Friday: SLIM J~! AZRAEL~BRYAN~! KOFI~! BIFF~! LEE~! JAGGED EDGE~!

NWA Anarchy (Hate Junkies (Dany Only & Stryknyn)/ Azrael/Slim J/Mikael Judas/Nemesis) vs. NWA Elite (Jagged Edge/Bro Newsome/Se7en/John Johnson/Shawn Tempers/Jacoby Boykins) NWA Anarchy 6/30/12 - GREAT

MD: You have to love how many stories they pack into a match like this, each and every time we see one of these big multimans. This one was all action the whole way through but never felt like meaningless noise. Slim J and Azrael working together at the start; the build to Jagged Edge vs Judas (and the payoff in a way that made people want more); Nemesis getting quickly rolled up after wanting to be in there for a chunk of the match (which would theoretically pay off at the end); the John Johnson goofiness which they closed off quickly and with satisfaction; Stryknyn's eye being vulnerable; and having it end with a big finishing stretch between Slim J and Tempers where they were able to set up and payoff the cobra clutch in a clever way for a great false finish before having the turns and setting things up for the future. Everyone did well in there, with the monsters protected and nothing seeming out of place. There wasn't that sense of guys eating pins too easily that you often get in elimination tags too. Mostly everything here was earned. I will say that it didn't quite have the sense of chaotic danger around the ropes with hands swiping that you see in some of the multi-man tags I like the best, but really that just let them focus more on whatever story beat they were telling with the wrestlers in the ring. The crowd was hot for the start of this and it's obvious why given the amount of care and thought put into each and every one of these big matches.

PAS: It is really hard to have a match with this many people in it, and give everyone a moment to shine, and have no unearned pins. I mean you got a pretty good sense of everyone in the match, even the guys who weren't in it long. Loved the Jagged Edge vs. Mikal Judas showdown, really teased a big showdown, got a taste of it, and left folks wanting to a buy a ticket to pay it off. Jagged Edge's chokelsam was probably the move of the match he sent Stryknyn into the cheap seats. Slim J gets the big finishing run with Tempers and it was pretty great, I imagine they had a hell of a title match at some point in this. The finish was booking heavy, but these always are, and I do think a heel Urban Assault Squad is a cool idea., and this was leading up to the great War Games later in the year.

Biff Busick vs. Trevor Lee XWA 1/17/15

MD: This was from January 2015 in RI, so not on as big a stage as their Evolve match a few days before. Lee was 21 at this point but he already had so much of it down. The crowd was absolutely game and really eager to see Biff kill someone. Lee gave them the all too rare for mid-2010s indy wrestling stalling to start and it worked huge. My favorite bit of it was a fan on the outside shouting "I thought you were supposed to be good" and Lee shouting back "I am good!" He cycled that right into a picture perfect eyepoke on a handshake attempt and an opportunistic throw to the outside. All great set up to clearly make the crowd against him and for Biff and to rile them up for some violence. They got that in spades with the crowd brawling as they went all around the place, really keeping things moving including a great visual where Biff got his leg caught on a chair off a whip and bumped huge, and then a bunch of nasty revenge shots using the terrain as a weapon. He even let a kid get a shot in on Lee. Eventually it had to get back in the ring and they moved into more of the back and forth you'd expect with a few big suplexes and shots and collisions. Again, I liked Lee's timing a lot here and his body language, overly following through in a believable way when he was about to run into something for a transition. Biff's stuff all looked unsurprisingly great (though I wish he wouldn't do stuff like the running blockbuster, but I get why he did) with the fans into everything. I haven't seen a Lee match in a long time and this made me want to see how he was doing now as Grimes in NXT.

PAS: This was a really well executed indy wrestling match, which hit on all of it's individual points really well, without ever moving fully into special territory. Still I can imagine the crowd was really happy to see this match live, and I dug watching it 6 years letter. Busick is a guy with tremendous explosion and execution, really tremendous at a fiery babyface comeback. Lee really put in the work early to make the crowd dislike him which made that comeback work. Loved the flip powerslam counter by Lee, it came out of nowhere, looked awesome and was a great moment to cut Busick's momentum reloading it for one more big comeback. This would be a fun feud to bring back in NXT, or if both guys end up someplace else.   

Daniel Bryan vs. Kofi Kingston WWE 9/2/19

MD: What a difference a decade-plus makes. This was an entirely different crowd, up for everything, but pretty annoying, down to the CM Punk chant in the middle (though at least that got booed down). It was a sort of crowd Kofi and Bryan were used to by this point, however, and they worked well to it. If you said this was a top 5 Kofi career singles match, I'd believe you, though Bryan drove most of the action and big moments. They worked the first half straight, babyface vs babyface, with just a bit of tension on whether Bryan would turn on him, and it was good, athletic stuff with kip ups and tapitias into surfboards and hesitant handshakes and both guys rallying the crowd and what have you. It felt a little like a mid-2000s indy affair to be honest. Midway through the match, Kofi following some major clowning of Bryan by taking a big bump out and Bryan feigned concern before turning on him with a hard whip into the post. He amped up the aggression after that but didn't really heel it up enough to get the crowd to turn on him, which sort of put a cap on how good the match would ultimately be. The battling over the yes lock towards the end was really good though, especially how Bryan finally got it on Kofi (which is something they probably used in their PPV matches too but I barely remember those); Kofi jumping into it from the top was a great visual. Finish was a bit too big on Kofi escaping Bryan's big stuff without one more rotation of Bryan dodging something of Kofi's but in general it was excellent house show fare that would have been better still if they led the crowd instead of following it.

PAS: The Mania match between these two is an all timer, and it was fun to see how they ran it back on tour. I liked all of the early feeling out sections on the mat, and Bryan turning more vicious. You don't really think of Bryan as an all-time puncher, but he really lays it in here, with those almost Bret Hart overhand loopers. Kofi was fine, he hit his stuff mostly, got height on his dives and didn't get outclassed. Of course this is Brynn's match. He looked great as the wounded ex champ who is plotting to get back on the top of the mountain, only to fall victim to a great looking spinning kick to the face. 

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2014 Ongoing MOTY List: Thatcher/Busick in China!

38. Biff Busick vs. Timothy Thatcher WWN Live in China 11/16

PAS: This was the least of their matches against each other this year, although that is a pretty high bar. They were clearly working a little simpler and with more standup, I assume because they were working in a bigger arena in front of an audience unfamiliar with wrestling (for those that don't know, this was worked in Beijing in front of like 8,000 people). This actually felt like what a RAW match between the two guys would look like. Thatcher looked great, with some really nasty arm twisting, and Busick took a big beating, threw some bombs and took a cool looking over the top rope bump. The dive into the uppercut was brutal looking, and seemed to pop the crowd too. So crazy that EVOLVE pulled this tour off, a real a cool bit of history.

ER: I had never seen any footage from the WWN China tour, a genuinely impressive feat for them to pull off and probably a genuine high point for a lot of the wrestlers involved. I thought this was real great, managing to be a broad strokes version of their best material, but worked so stiff that it played all the way to the back row with its realism. Nobody on this card had ever worked a stadium show before, and these two got a large crowd of mostly non-wrestling fans to cheer for matwork and get loud for hard chops and uppercuts. It was great. I'm sure the dark seating and brightly lit ring made it easier on the fans' sightlines, but I would have loved to see shots of the crowd during the match. They clearly got into this and I wish I could have seen those reactions. The match starts with a lot of Thatcher wrecking Busick's arm, cranking different stages of an Americana for the first couple minutes. Busick sells it compellingly for the length of the match, switching up his striking to the other side without being showy about it. They get great reactions off of big loud chops and it really seemed like they fed off those reactions and just kept trying to make louder noise with their bodies. I loved when they had a back and forth battle over ugliest back elbow, the match crescendoing with Thatcher hitting a brick wall of a back elbow leaping into the corner. Busick tumbled off the top rope to the apron and into darkness after getting uppercutted off, and the big suplexes down the stretch played big. Thatcher's delayed gut wrench to set up the finish was so cool, and this all felt like a match that could easily play to any wrestling crowd in history.


2014 MOTY MASTER LIST

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2017 Ongoing MOTY LIst: Lorcan v. McIntyre

13. Oney Lorcan v. Drew McIntyre WWE NXT 4/5 (Aired 4/12/17)

PAS: Great 4 minute sprint which reminded me of some of the great WCW syndie matches, kind of a new age version of Raven v. Kaz Hayashi or Finlay v. Villano V.  Just a boatload of great spots, McIntyre throws some insane overhead belly to belly suplexes which hurls Lorcan 3/4rs of the way across the ring, the spot where he catches the plancha in a gutwrench was a spot of the year contender. I really loved Lorcan in this, his tenacity is one of the things I loved about him on the indies, and he is constantly coming forward here, huge uppercuts, crazy slaps, he felt like a rabid dog trying to grab the last turkey leg.


ER: Yeah yeah yeah!! This is my kind of jam. I've been missing the hot 4-5 minute match. Best we've gotten this year has been Braun/Henry (and before that the unexpectedly great Curtis Axel/Bo Dallas 4 minutes from 10/24/16 Raw), but this match was the stuff! Lorcan was like a feral animal, like Sonny Boy let out of his cage. He flew into McIntyre with fast and forceful uppercuts and hit an out of control flip dive, then got caught on a plancha off the top because of course Drew is fucking ridiculous and slams Lorcan on the apron. Ye gods that whole sequence. But Lorcan can't be put down and keeps coming, really liked all the running spots in this, the constant movement, Lorcan evading Drew by somersaulting off the top, Lorcan about to grind Drew's knee up top before McIntyre tosses him off by the ears, Lorcan paying him back with some devastating cupped slaps, then a cool finish with Drew catching a big boot to trap Lorcan over his shoulders and whiplash him face first to his doom. Glorious classic syndie action. This was Renegade/Sick Boy good.


2017 MOTY MASTER LIST

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PWG From Out Of Nowhere 2/27/15 Partial Review

ER: Phil wrote up a couple of these matches 9 months ago, and usually if a card has two matches that look really good I'll go ahead and watch the rest of the card. So I started doing that, but once I got through the last match I really wanted to see (Hero/Gulak), I didn't really feel like watching three more 20+ minute PWG epics. So blame that on me for willingly watching a Chuck Taylor match. A bad choice to be sure, but not the worst choice I've ever made. For we are men. We are all just men. We are all just canceled fall CBS replacement sitcoms.


1. Speedball Mike Bailey vs. Biff Busick

PAS: Really fun spotfest intro match for Bailey. Felt kind of like the first Rey Jr. v. Psicosis matches in ECW, where you had a crazy impressive athletic guy show off his stuff with an opponent he is really familiar with. Bailey has a lot of Tae Kwon Doe training and throws these awesome looking spin kicks which he mixes in well with fast high spots, he did 10 crazy things in this match, and my favorite was a loony looking springboard headlock takeover. This was Busick as a power highspot guy, not a mat wrestler, and he really throws Bailey around. Fast food kind of match, but unlike a lot of PWG spotfests it hit the spot for me.

ER: Man this match was awesome! This might have actually been my favorite Bailey/Busick match and we've been collective fans of all of them. Bailey does neat little twists on a bunch of spots you're used to (the handspring headlock takeover was a wonderful momentum shifter, and Busick was great at looking like he was bracing for an elbow and then getting caught in the headlock) and throws these cool misdirection kicks where you think they're going to land one way and then loop under and hit you in the chin. Busick's power offense is sick and these two were practically made to work each other. Busick tossed Bailey in all sorts of great ways, battered him with mean uppercuts and shoulderblocks, and latched on with the best headlocks in the business. I could watch most of a match made up of Busick finding ways to get a guy in a headlock. Then he starts throwing his nice palm strikes while locking in the headlock?? His low bulldog, his accurate blockbuster?? Forget it, Busick just hits all the right notes. Finish probably went on a bit too long (this is PWG, after all) as they started kicking out of some pretty devastating moves (brutal lariat from Busick, shooting star kneedrop from Bailey, massive sleeper suplex from the floor to the ring by Busick) but I love these guys doing moves to each other so can't complain too much. I still love Busick's rear naked choke being treated like death, and this match was the best highlight reel match so far for me this year. Awesome stuff.

2. Cedric Alexander vs. Tommaso Ciampa

ER: Hey we're 2 for 2 on this show! Cedric Alexander (previously listed by us as one of the obvious better Lucha Underground black wrestler choices instead of Shane Strickland) has fun offense and so does Ciampa, and they string them together here in a satisfying way. Cedric throws a nice dropkick, can take a big bump and knows how to belly flop in an impressive way (seems like a lot of Ciampa's moves see his opponent falling at kind of a dangerous angle, and Cedric manages to take all of it in a painful way, but while protecting himself). Ciampa has some nice throws and I dug his cannonball off the apron. They worked around some really fun reversal-of-reversal spots and everything built into a nice little spotfest. I hadn't seen both men in awhile and they've both improved since my last viewing. That's always a nice thing.

3. Beaver Boys (John Silver & Alex Reynolds) vs. Best Friends (Chuck Taylor & Trent?)

ER: Well, we all knew what this would be. There are obviously many people who adore Taylor's shtick. The crowd was alive and way into this the entire time. They responded to every single thing he did in the match. He knows how to perfectly work in front of this audience. It just does nothing whatsoever for me. It is possible that I am a joyless shit sack, and in this instance I'd be okay with that. We get the grenade gag, some slow motion moves sold as high impact, some pause for photo gags, some Ace Ventura mannerisms, the whole shebang. My mouth was in a straight horizontal line the whole time. Trent is a guy who I think is an okay wrestler, who because of the shtick does very not okay things. Whereas Taylor is a guy who is a poor wrestler kind of saved by his shtick. I think Trent is capable of straight wrestling, whereas Taylor just looks bad no matter the circumstances. Trent has good timing, nice follow through on stuff like back elbows and running forearms, and knows how to take offense way better than Taylor. I had not seen the Beaver Boys before. I ended up liking Silver who is one of those short spark plug types. Reynolds was horrendous, like the worst possible version of Taylor. He had one long embarrassing comedy bit where he mimed jerking off on Trent, before "finishing" and throwing invisible jizz in Taylor's face, leading to Taylor desperately wiping it off with a rag. And you know that rag comes back multiple times the rest of the match. If you giggled at all while reading those last two sentences, that may be some insight into how much you would personally enjoy the match. Maybe it works better live. Maybe it works better while drunk. Maybe it works better if you're a teenage boy. I don't know. I don't think I have a very high brow sense of humor. But whatever brow level this is, it isn't for me. I think this could have been an actual good match, as once we got past the opening 12+ minutes of yuks there was plenty of the actual wrestling that I enjoyed. Beaver Boys in particular had an awesome run of timing based double teams, the kind where one guy does a move, immediately followed by the next guy, and so on. Silver had some cool deadlift suplexes and good energy (like to see more of this guy) but overall this match was close to 20 minutes of stuff that isn't meant for me. C'est la vie.

4. ACH vs. AR Fox

ER: Another one to file under "just not for me". Both guys do some things I like (although I would like ACH more if he cut down on the yuks, but there's me being a joyless shit sack again since obviously what he was doing worked fine for this audience), but both do stuff I don't like. ACH's comedy doesn't really blend with his actual wrestling, so we're left with starting off the match getting all his comedy spots in, and then eventually we transition to the "actual" match. This of course results in a neverending 22 minute match, and jesus why are PWG matches all so damn long? It really feels like they're long because each guy has shit and routines that they have to get in. "The fans are expecting the grenade bit, gotta fit it in" "The fans are expecting my Stone Cold routine, gotta fit it in". We bring back the jizz rag from the previous match, and really if you're working a jizz to the face spot you might as well work with a professional like AR Fox. We get a lot of intricate reversal sequences, and good timing is intrinsic in these things or else the curtain lifts a bit and you realize you're watching too much dance off, not enough wrestling. Stuff like ACH rushing, ducking a Fox kick, catching the kick around the back of his neck, then using that leverage to suplex Fox. But there are always little wrinkles like ACH not catching the kick flush, so having to place it there while Fox waits to be suplexed. There were things I liked about this, Fox had an awesome weird springboard cannonball to the floor, where he was facing the ring and sprung backward while tucking forward. It looked killer. Also really loved a giant swing that ACH did, where he grabbed Fox in a Texas Cloverleaf, did the swing while holding the Cloverleaf, and then set him down and locked in the sub. It looked great. We had a cool Fox dive over the turnbuckles, some of the worst 10 count punches you've ever seen (from both!), and overall this just didn't click for me.

5. Chris Hero vs. Drew Gulak

PAS: Really happy to see Hero mixing it up with the next generation of Indy mat guys, one of the cooler things in wrestling this year. This was the first of these match ups with EVOLVE running them in March. I really liked the beginning of this, with Gulak showing himself a step ahead, catching and dumping Hero with some fast german suplexes. Hero turned the tables with a killer elbow KO and landed some nasty kicks to the head and elbows. Finish run had Gulak going after the leg and even ripping off Hero's boot, it got a little discombobulated at the finish although I loved the jumping piledriver by Hero. Looking forward to checking out all of these.

ER: Classic great 16 minute PWG match, that goes 22 minutes. As they go, things keep building, and peaking, and building....and then still peaking....then more building....then an ending. These guys beat the holy hell out of each other but it's crazy how PWG matches so often overshoot that peak excitement and then kind of drift into mindless slog territory. The guys still look great, the work is still high end, you just want the match to end every single move past the point you mentally think it should have ended. I love how these two work around each other though. You can tell Hero is kinda like Kraneo, as he's put on a bunch of weight but still prides himself on agility and shutting up the naysayers by working as hard as ever. I loved his rolling ankle picks on Gulak and loved how the evolved during the match, how Gulak would get wiser to them and Hero would switch them up and go for fakeouts. And then Gulak would bait him and try and work his own ankle lock. But before long these two are railing into each other with kicks and elbows to the face. So, so many kicks and elbows to the face. Probably too many elbows and kicks to the face. But they aren't your standard issue your turn my turn growl strikes, because each guy is always looking for an opening, each guy is always waiting to catch a limb. And there are some damn cool sequences and reversals and some fun silly spots. I loved Gulak grabbing the ankle lock and Hero slipping out of his boot, kicking Gulak a bunch and but then getting leveled by Gulak swinging his own boot at him. Is it silly that a loose boot does more damage than a boot with a foot in it propelled by the force of a leg? Most definitely, but this is wrestling physics.


***Bailey/Busick and Hero/Gulak were both clearly awesome and easily made our 2015 MOTY List. So really I can't talk poorly about a show that had two great matches on it. Maybe it had more! The final three could be real killers, for all I know. I heartily encourage you to watch them and fill in the rest of the review in the comments section. All I know is if you add up my time spent watching this show, it was spent watching more good wrestling than bad wrestling. Believe in yourself.***

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PWG Battle of Los Angeles Night 2

Marty Scrull v. Rich Swann

This was fine indy juniors wrestling. Scrull had a lot of shtick which I began to tire of, I liked the finger breaking spots, but it didn’t really lead anywhere. Still this was short enough and didn’t have a ton of things I hated. Would get the full Worldwide point

Angelico v. Jack Evans

Well if you are going to do a goofy indy comedy match, I much prefer this kind of thing to stupid shit like slow motion or hypnotizing. Jack Evans is talking shit to the audience and goes to grab a beer, he drinks it and breaks out Drunken Kung Fu, which he was totally awesome at, so much fun to watch him and Angelico do Jackie Chan spots. The rest of the match was fine, but they probably should have made that the apex of the match.

Chris Hero v. Timothy Thatcher.

This was really great, and the kind of change of pace night one really needed. Less grappling then EVOLVE Thatcher matches, as this was more of a FUTENish slugfest. Hero was absolutely blitzing Thatcher with kicks and elbows, which Thatcher would do a great stunned sell of. Thatcher meanwhile would fire back with uppercuts and grabbing ankle picks, including one in the ropes which looked like it might shred Hero’s achilles. Lots of great violence here, including a Hero short snap piledriver which Thatcher sold like it paralyzed his arm, and a headbutt counter by Thatcher which looked like it dislocated Hero’s jaw. I didn’t love the finish, which had Hero hit a sick tombstone, and have Thatcher grab a Fujiwara  but get countered to a Hero’s welcome for the pin. Hero’s welcome is a real Novaish finisher to end a slugfest like this, should have just had Hero get the pin after the tombstone. Still this was a blast.

Fenix/Aeorstar v Drago/Pentagon Jr.

Hyped up version of a Nitro Lucha tag. None of these guys are prime Juventud Guerrera, but this was a blast. Fenix especially looked good, hitting a really insane dive really fast. I thought Aerostar was a bit botchy, but outside of him everything was hit cleanly and Pentagon continues to look like a total badass.

Drew Gulak v. Tommy End

I enjoyed this, it was worked as sort of a bankrupt man’s Ikeda v. Ishikawa. Gulak would control with takedowns and grappling, while End would spring out and land a big punch or kick.  I liked End’s spin kick a lot, which is a great looking strike which Gulak sold great. There was a silly spot with End selling a knee by falling down hokeyly and getting clotheslined, and I thought the finish was a good idea that wasn’t executed properly. Still this was mostly pretty good, and I like how this show is mixing up the styles of matches, much better then night one which was very samey.

Speedball Mike Bailey v. Drew Galloway

Bailey has gotten to be a master at this kind of workrate indy match. Galloway is just a monster compared to most indy wrestlers and this was almost Rey v. Big Show.  Really liked how nasty all of Galloway’s simple stuff looked, he had really nasty stomps including some right on Bailey’s insteps. Galloway set up some very realistic near falls, and made Bailey look overmatched but credible. Felt this went a little long, and would have been better if they cut a near fall or two.

Zach Sabre Jr. vs. Ricochet

Pretty entertaining stuff, with Ricochet looking perfectly comfortable working Sabre’s WOS tribute act stuff. Ricochet even breaks out the Cerebro special which will endear me to you. Sabre has a bunch of fun ways to snatch someone out of midair. This seemed like it was raring up to go long, but I actually liked the point it ended at. Good stuff.

Mt.. Rushmore 2.0 (Super Dragon/Young Bucks) v. Andrew Everett/Trevor Lee/Biff Busick

Super Dragon returns after a four year absence, which was preceded by a three year absence, so it has been seven years or so since he has been a regular active wrestler and he comes in killing people like he hasn’t missed a beat. He takes an Alabama Slam on a ladder, does a flip dive and takes a bunch of chair shots to the head. Busick and he just rip into each other all match. Busick feels like a guy who grew up watching Super Dragon and was super amped to have a chance to have one of these crazy brawls. Bucks are fine in this kind of nutjob brawl (my favorite Bucks match ever is their Guerrila warfare match against Dragon and Steen), they aren’t afraid to take big bumps and they make you want to see them suffer.  Everett has had a great tourney so far, his big fake out dive was one of my spots of the year, and his lunatic springboard shooting  press was incredible. Did care about the stuff with the ref, and the thumbtack shoes were cooler in theory then in execution, but this was the most lunatic match of the year, and I loved it.

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2015 Ongoing Match of the Year List

18. Biff Busick v. Andrew Everett PWG 8/28

PAS: I really enjoyed this. Busick is great as a bully against highflyers, he has had a series of good matches against Mike Bailey and this was in that style, Everett would hit some big time highspots inbetween Busick muderizing him with suplexes, clotheslines and uppercuts. There were point where it felt a little formless, but the big stuff was big. At one point Everett went back on offense with this leaping one motion backwards rana which was one of the prettiest highspots I have seen in a while, really shouldn’t have been thrown out in the middle of the match. Finish run of Busick offense looked awesome as Everett takes stuff so crazy that all of Busicks moves look deadly.

ER: Busick is so awesome. He's the perfect foil for flippers, especially fearless ones like Everett who have no problem getting obliterated by strikes. And Busick threw out some brutal strikes here, including the best clothesline I've seen in ages. I want someone to gif it so I can just watch it on a loop several dozen times in a row, like Buster Posey's grand slam off Mat Latos in the 2012 NLDS. Busick charges an unsuspecting Everett who turns right around into a nasty yet gorgeous falling lariat. Everett gets turned inside out and everything about it was perfect. Busick controlled much of this with nasty strikes and his great headlock choke (my favorite finisher of the year). I love the Busick headlock choke takeover. Everett would pepper in comebacks (including a real great Pele kick) but would always bite off more than he could chew, like a nutty Phoenix Splash that turned into a weird Phoenix elbow drop. Like the moment of Everett thinking he can go strike for strike with Busick, throwing nice right hands with Busick getting hands up, but it was always inevitable Busick would grab ahold of him, toss him with some nasty suplexes, and then peaking with him nailing an uppercut off a shooting star. I cannot even imagine the trust that goes into pulling something like that off. Good lord, guys.


2015 MOTY MASTER LIST

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PWG Battle of Los Angeles Night One

PWG BOLA has gotten some great reviews, and I figured I would check it out, let see if I can get through a whole show.

Brian Cage v. Aerostar

One of my fears about this tourney was the dreaded PWG bloat, this is a fed in the past that has had 14 minutes matches drag to 25, so I was happy this was a compact 9 minutes. Both guys had some cool ideas, that they only hit sometimes,  I liked Cage doing curls with Aerostar's body, and that finish hanging Steiner screwdriver was uncalled for. Cage is good in Lucha Underground 4-Ways, and this felt like it could have used two more guys to do some stuff in between their big spots. If they had included Big Ryck and Drago this might have been something great.

Biff Busick v. Andrew Everett

I really enjoyed this. Busick is great as a bully against highflyers, he has had a series of good matches against Mike Bailey and this was in that style, Everett would hit some big time highspots inbetween Busick muderizing him with suplexes, clotheslines and uppercuts. There were point where it felt a little formless, but the big stuff was big. At one point Everett went back on offense with this leaping one motion backwards rana which was one of the prettiest highspots I have seen in a while, really shouldn’t have been thrown out in the middle of the match. Finish run of Busick offense looked awesome as Everett takes stuff so crazy that all of Busicks moves look deadly.

Will Ospreay v. Mark Andrews

This first round placed guys together who had worked each before or worked similar styles. It hurt a little on the dream match aspect of a tourney like this, but it did allow new guys to avoid awkwardness and show their stuff. This was a total blast, both guys are hitting very high difficulty flips and arm drags, I know my man Robert Bihari must have been losing his shit live, Andrews especially was just contorting his body in mid air with a variety of crazy takedowns, reminded of a taller Mascarita 2000, including one of the prettiest springboard ranas I have ever seen. Osprey was also really fast, and got crazy height on everything he did, his twirling kick looked like something out of a wire kung fu movie. Exactly the kind of opening round tourney debut showcase match you want to see.

Jack Evans/Angelico v. Rich Swann/Ricochet

Took a while to get going, as they did a lot of dance contest horseshit which didn’t do much for me. Had a fun finishing run, including a great dive by Angelico, but the problem with tourneys like this is, is that you get inured to all of the high spots, there has been a reverse rana in every match so far, so when Rich Swann does one, it is hard to care, same with 450s and 630s, just the same kind of spots over and over again. I liked this fine, but I could see having a problem watching all three nights of this tournament.

Trent ? v. Trevor Lee

Trent ? is the former Trent Barretta and an ex Chuck Taylor partner, and he has the same junior college improv troupe approach to wrestling. After his early shenanigans he tries to have a serious indy wrestling match, and he isn’t particularly good at that either. We get the 43rd reverse rana of the tourney, and some german suplexes and shit. Lee is a guy I have liked in other matches (He had an awesome sprint with Bailey in PWG earlier this year) but he couldn’t do much here

Pentagon Jr. v. Drago

This was a bummer, I like both guys a lot and you figure they would have lots of experience working each other, but lots of this felt off, and even the big spots weren’t as big or interesting as stuff that was hit earlier in the tourney. Pentagon Jr. has a lot of charisma but this wasn’t good.

Matt Sydal v. Fenix

This was pretty much a popcorn match, with both guys breaking out all of their spots until there was a finish. For that type of match it was pretty good, although nothing I will remember later (unlike the British match earlier which was a similar style but with more pizzaz) . I liked how Fenix brought a little extra to all of his kicks and chops, there was one point where he toed Sydal in the eye, which was brutal looking.  Sydal is good at playing the outclass veteran who used to be able to jump as high as these kids, but now is a step slow, kind of like a Grizzlies era Vince Carter. Still the match ending on a reverse rana,, into a SSP after every nearly every other match on the show through out a reverse rana as a nothing mid-match move, really hurt the finish, this show really needed someone backstage producing this tourney.

Mt. Rushmore 2.0 (Roderick Strong/Young Bucks) v. Marty Scrull/Zach Sabre Jr./Tommy End

This was the most PWGish match on the show. Mt. Rushmore 2.0 has some fun triple teams, and I loved ZSJ using a Breaks special as a hot tag move, but this match just went forever. It felt like it had two or three crescendos, and then the match would slow down with the Bucks doing shtick. It this had seven minutes or so cut, it might have been pretty good, but I just lost interest as it just kept going. I did think this set up Sabre Jr. v. Strong pretty well, and made Rushmore look badass going into the next two days.

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2015 Indy Stuff That Caught My Eye

You know how it goes: You're on YouTube watching something, and then something in the corner scrolling menu catches your eye so you follow that link, and then you see something else that sounds good, and you realize you've been watching wrestling on the toilet for 2 hours and you're legs have gone numb. Wait.

Biff Busick vs. Colin Delaney (Empire State Wrestling 5/16/15)

This immediately leapt out at me as I love Busick, and hadn't seen a Colin Delaney match in several years. Delaney has to stand as one of the weirdest WWE signings in history, definitely one of the weirdest guys to get his own action figure. I don't even think he had 30 matches in the company. Okay, I looked it up and his action figure is certainly weird, but in the *same* series that his action figure was in, there was a Cherry action figure. Cherry is probably a weirder person to get a WWE action figure. So goddamnit, Delaney isn't even the weirdest person in his own series to get a figure. Wow. I would have loved to see the marketing roll out for that action figure series. "We're expecting a big quarter, we got action figures coming out for Festus, Katie Lea AND Paul Birchill, Colin Delaney.....Cherry......At this time we're going to skip all questions regarding this quarter's action figures." And hey this was fun! It wasn't quite up to Busick's normal level, but it was fun seeing Delaney in the Busick style, working over headlocks (all the front facelocks, side headlocks, and all the fighting over them) and getting battered with uppercuts. I loved Busick's big uppercuts to cut off Delaney. He had one like a missile as Delaney was coming off the ropes, and another as Delaney was coming off the top rope. I wish things hadn't ended on a Malenko/Guerrero roll-up sequence - even if theirs looked more plausible than most - but I dug this.

Jeff Cobb vs. Vito Rea (Wrestling For Charity 6/14/15)

This was a catch style match and the match (show?) had the bottom rope removed. I had never heard of Rea before but he is apparently an Italian who has represented Italy several times at the FILA World Championships for Grappling, Pankration and Amateur MMA (most commonly known throughout the nation and by your parents as the WCGPAMMA, one can only assume). So you have two guys with legit amateur experience and we get 10 fun minutes of them battling over leglocks. We get some fun hard-earned reversals and we build to a nice butterfly suplex from Rea, but Cobb fights for a waistlock on the mat and turns that into a completely flat out great deadlift German. He fought it all the way from the ground to a low crouch, all the way up and over. Looked so awesome. For whatever reason the match is a 10 minute time limit so ends in a draw. I really would have liked to see this build to a finish, but what we got was fun.

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2014 Ongoing Match of the Year List

54. Biff Busick vs. Speedball Mike Bailey CZW 7/12

PAS: Not a real mat based match like the Thatcher or Gulak series, but more of spotfest indy title match. Really fun example of that match though. Busick does a nice job of mauling Bailey and is a pretty good base for some of Bailey's highspots, and Bailey has really great looking highspots. I liked his spin kicks and his rapid fire switch leg kicks. His big run of offense including catching Busick in mid air and hitting a backflip powerslam, a spinning splash and a top rope shooting star double knee, it is hard to be impressed by spots in 2014, but that was impressive. Cool finish run by Busick too, and that head throw choke by Biff is one of the best finishers in wrestling

ER: The more I see Bailey the more I really dig his kicks, and as much as I love those matches it's awesome to see Busick in against non-Thatcher/Gulak types. The guy really has a nice adaptable arsenal and can hop into any match type. Phil is right that Busick's headlock takeover slam is one of the best things in wrestling today. Every time I see it I keep imagining the guy's head getting popped off like a grape. Busick is a real bully to Bailey and it was a great visual to see him holding one side of Bailey's face while smacking him down with the other. Big, rough 45 degree downward smacks. Phil also mentioned my favorite spot (easily one of the coolest wrestling moments of the last year), when Busick runs full speed at Bailey with that old gigantic Mike Knox crossbody, but comes in too high, and Bailey uses the natural momentum to flip over into a kind of moonsault powerslam for an awesome near fall. I'm really getting used to these "Bailey vs. indy asskicker" matches.


2014 MOTY MASTER LIST

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EVOLVE 41 4/17/15 Review

ER: Show starts with the Premier Athlete Brand (Nese, Conley, SoCal Val, Andrea, Su Yung) coming out, and Nese running down Yung for his losses at the WM weekend shows, even though she wasn't there. Val is always amusing in her chief bitch role, but this can't really go anywhere that interesting to me. Are we building to a Yung/Andrea feud? Is the payoff going to be Yung triumphantly leaving the team to go stand ringside for a different team?

1. Anthony Nese vs. Martin Stone

ER: I liked this more than I thought I would. Martin Stone is a guy I hadn't seen much and I came away really wanting to see more. His dedication to little things means his matches have a higher floor than most matches. When you fly into everything, cut low on clotheslines, have a snug side headlock,  hit firm shoulderblocks, miss like you mean it, take opponents' offense great, etc. I will want to see more of you. Stone seems like a guy that would match up great with Busick/Thatcher/Gulak and I'd be excited for any combo of that. Nese is...trickier. I don't think he's bad, and a lot of things he does has a nice crispness to it. The guy is very athletic (if you didn't notice that on your own, just wait a minute and you're bound to hear the announcers fawn all over his body. Their affections play as if they learned commentary from listening to Kal Rudman call Tony Garea matches. "Look at the body on Nese. These aren't just 'show muscles' either, they're functional. The fucking camera lens steamed up at one point.) and has a similar snap to his stuff as Stone. But it's when he reverts back to his old life as "athletic indie wrestler" that he starts kind of sucking. If he was just a grounded asskicker who worked more like a black trunks young boy, I like that guy. A mean dropkick and a wrenched half crab, sure, gimme that shit. It's when we get into those stupid athleticism for the sake of athleticism spots that plague your workrate indies that makes me not like him, so we'll occasionally get a springboard moonsault that overshoots and sees his arms barely graze his opponent. He seems to be getting away from that mumbo jumbo and has been better for it. He's moving in the right direction. But yes, I enjoyed this. Nice tight work from Stone, no overkill, mostly good performance from Nese, fine opener.

2. Caleb Konley vs. Rey Horus

ER: Well this one didn't do much for me, especially with the time allotted. It was not bad. But it went too long and neither guy's offense is something I'm into. I've seen Horus look better, I've seen Konley look worse. A lot of Horus' offense kind of reeked of dated early 2000s indy lucha spots, a lot of "hold my hand while I scale on the ropes and then bounce on them a bit before my armdrag!" or both guys going up top for a move but at a certain point they're just standing up there for way too long trying to help the other guy get balanced, instead of actually looking like guys that want to fight. I mentally prepared for Konley to have to hold himself balanced over the middle rope while Horus did a legdrop, but it never came. Horus needs to watch some more Scoot Andrews tapes. Konley throws a nice left elbow but both guys kind of get a little too cute with a lot of spots. Konley is part of the new wave of do-si-do indy workers, where so many of their reversals and reversals of reversals and scouting of the opponent is so up inside their own ass that it no longer resembles wrestling at a certain point, it looks more like pairs square dancing. Just hooking elbows and do-si-doing around each other.

3. TJ Perkins vs. Biff Busick

PAS: Perkins is a fun addition to the grappler EVOLVE crew. He throws in a really luchaish vibe to the matwork, lots of cool headscissors, and cartwheel counters out of Busick takedowns. Perkins is just silky smooth, really reminds me of El Hijo Del Santo in the effortlessness of his movements. Busick is a bulldozer as usual, he really has some cool throws and shots when he could get his hands on Perkins, finish was very cool as TJP avoids and avoids until he slaps on a cross armbreaker with heel kicks to get the tap. Makes me excited to watch Perkins v. Gulak and Thatcher.

ER: Perkins is a guy I've been seeing live since at least 2001. One weekend in 2007 we saw him in 4 matches in 3 days for 4 different feds while working 4 different gimmicks. He is a guy I'm quite familiar with. He's also arguably one of the most hit and miss workers that I watch semi-regularly. It is never a shock to see him in a meh match, just as it is never a shock to see him in a really really good match. I saw him live twice WM weekend, on an Evolve show and on the WWN show and did not think he looked great in either match. He looked better in the WWN match. I was disappointed in the Gulak match. So I tell Phil how I was disappointed in Gulak/Perkins and Phil is bummed because he liked the sound of that on paper. And now we have this match where Perkins looks really great and now Phil thinks I'm just a liar. Phil thinks many awful things about me, but he normally doesn't think I'm a liar. Perkins flaws are tough to work out, because they can also be his strengths. Sometimes I think he tries to do too many styles: lucha, workrate indy, grappling, faux-mma stuff, etc. Sometimes all those things jammed into a match doesn't work. Sometimes the execution isn't there. And then there's a match like this where he gels wonderfully with Busick and it's precisely because of his different styles. The opening was a really great mixture of Perkins' lucha mat stuff with Busick's more stretching style. At one point Perkins went for an armdrag and Busick rolled through and flawlessly rolled into a hammerlock. It looked outstanding, like something you could try and do several more times to make it look so natural and just never be able to. Both men managed to do a reversal style of wrestling without making things seemed rehearsed to the extreme. Little sequences like Busick blocking a kick, throwing an uppercut that gets caught into a backslide attempt, which Busick reversed into his great side headlock came off so naturally, these two just really gelled together. Ending was even cooler than Phil described it as Perkins rolled through into an armbar with Busick trying to reverse, so Perkins hammers down on Busicks face with his calf and heel until Busick starts to go out, his arm flopping on the mat, and the ref stops the match. Busick immediately comes to and has no idea why the match ended, as he didn't tap. Sometimes the MMA winks can get a little too cute, but I thought this finish was a cool use of it.

4. Ethan Page vs. Rich Swann

ER: You have never heard a quieter crowd than during Ethan Page's entrance. Even the crowd at WM weekend when he turned on Gargano was not this quiet. That weekend was my first time seeing Page, and I did not love what I saw. Nothing he does ticks any of my boxes in what I look for in wrestling. Swann I like more, but like him more in tags than singles. This match had a couple moments I liked, but didn't really care for the structure and pacing. So lets hit the things I liked: I liked Page's low angle leap Ace Crushers, starting from low and leaping up into it, delivering more of a spike. I loved Swann reversing one of them by hooking his feet on the ropes, sending Page crashing. It looked kind of freaky, but plausible. I also dug Swann's no hands pop up rana when Page went to the top. So those are some good things. The rest? I didn't care for the looooong Page control section, just stomping and slowly controlling Swann. Swann came out swinging before the bell with some nice punches, but from there the action slowed waaaaay down. All of Swann's comebacks came after taking some theoretically rough stuff, like a Gotch piledriver on the floor. We even went one worse than the standard forearm exchange portion, as instead we get a trade off of kicks to the head. The finish run seemed false with the tacked on long control stuff. If big kickouts were what they wanted they kind of wasted their time and everybody's time by having Swann sell so much so early. He sold far more when he was taking meager stomps from Page than when he was taking finishers. Overall just didn't work for me.

5. Davey Richards vs. Johnny Gargano

ER: For reasons none of us will ever know or understand, 22 minutes of my feed for this show were missing.

6. 2/3 Falls: Timothy Thatcher vs. Roderick Strong

ER: Thatcher has been my boy for quite a few years as he was a nice little well kept secret out here in the Bay Area. So seeing him get gigantic reactions WM weekend was super exciting. That Hero match really felt like it took him from crowd favorite to big star, and it was such a great moment seeing him win while the people who he came up training with were screaming their heads off across the aisle from me. This guy is way over now and it's exciting. I don't get to be in on the "ground floor" of many things, people.

This was a really really good match, my favorite on the show. Strong is a guy I kinda put in the same bucket as AJ Styles, as he's a guy I like, who is also sometimes trapped in a bad promotional style which leads to matches I don't care for. There always seem to be Strong matches that I dig, but also long stretches where he's working a certain style or certain opponents that I don't care for at all. But I think it's safe to say that the last 6 months of Roderick have been the best of his career. All of his cute offense has been dropped and now he's all about mat work struggle, nasty knees and elbows, and logical nearfalls. The first fall was almost all mat stuff and it ranked up there with any of the best Busick/Thatcher/Gulak stuff we've seen so far. I loved little things like Thatcher holding a go behind and trying to shift his hips to toss Thatcher over, but Thatcher just dropping down and widening his base to prevent it. Strong wins Fall 1 with a nice crucifix roll up, which sprang nicely from Thatcher going after Strong's arm with the blinders on. There was a nice moment where Thatcher uses Strong's leverage against him to grab the arm in the first place, but Strong uses it right back to hold onto the snug crucifix. 2nd and 3rd see us move into some nasty strikes. Strong throws some mean elbows and his leaping knee from a standing position is one of the best things in wrestling today. Outside Strong chops a post and even though it's a spot that gets used more now, the sound of a hand clanking off a metal pole always makes me gasp. Thatcher smells blood on that arm and it sets up the eventual armbar finish for the 2nd. We get some nice near falls in the 3rd. You know that leaping knee I mentioned as being one of the best things in wrestling? Well, Thatcher's momentum cutoff headbutt is even better. I never see it coming and it always looks great. Here Strong nails a pick left, spins around for a roaring back elbow, only to be met with a short thrust headbutt to the chin. Strong goes down great, and Thatcher drops to his butt. The whole match was filled with all sorts of awesome struggle. These two went great together, awesome stuff.

PAS: Very good match, I am concurring with Eric about how good Strong has looked lately, he really puts weight into everything he throws, he just lands some crushing looking stomps, elbows and knees here. Watching Roderick stomp Thatcher in the chest might have been one of my favorite spots in wrestling all year. The chopping the post spot in the second fall was great as Thatcher possums him in and has this great shit eating grin on his face when he slides down and Strong cracks the ring post. Thatcher did some nasty hand work right after that, although it got forgotten later in the match. Third fall was good too, although it got a little indy wrestling at the end for me with big moves and two counts. I also thought the ending was bit sudden which is strange for a match that went this long. Still all over a great match and a nice addition to both guys resumes for 2015.


2015 MOTY MASTER LIST

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Evolve 37 1/10/15 Review

1. Shane Strickland vs. Anthony Nese

ER: So earlier in the week I watched a CZW show from late last year which had a Strickland match (vs. Flip Kendrick) that is one of the worst matches I've seen this decade, just a sloppy, poorly laid out mess. Both guys looked awful. Now Flip Kendrick is a guy I've always enjoyed, and had that been the first match I'd seen him in I would not be excited to see him again. So he had an off night. Maybe Strickland also had an off night and is usually somewhat better? Well, he's still not very good, but he didn't look nearly as bad as in that CZW match. He didn't look great, but better. He basically works like the worst version of CMLL wrestler Titan. Does a few of his spots, but worse. His front flip rana to the floor is impressive in theory, but it's set up a mile away and goes really slow. Some of his stuff can look good, but he's really really bad at going through planned sequences. He cannot make them look more rehearsed. His face just goes completely blank and you can practically see him mouthing the steps. None of the stuff comes off looking natural in the least. Nese is a guy with some polish and some good execution. The match didn't really go in a direction that interested me, but Nese has been around long enough that I can see him having good matches with better opponents.

2. Timothy Thatcher vs. Roderick Strong

PAS: Really enjoyed this, as this was a grittier more violent match then Thatcher often is involved in. The matwork was less trading holds and more really aggressive amateur rolling. They roll to the ground and Strong firemans carries Thatcher and smashes his head into the post. Then you have Strong throwing big bombs and Thatcher, glassy eyed trying to grab holds while he still had his wits about him. It actually felt a little like a Fujiwara performance, down to the cool flash finish.

ER: Really loved this match up. Strong is a guy who I like, who does a lot of stuff that I don't like, a guy who has always done good stuff, in between the stuff I hate. But this right here seems like the best possible version of Strong. He was a real ass kicker in this and I love that it brought out aggression in Thatcher. And as Phil said this was less about transitions and holds and reversals, this was two guys not wanting to let up position on the ground, like a spar that turned real nasty. At one point Strong as a can opener locked on while Thatcher is just forcing his elbow into Strong's jaw. Not elbowing him, put holding one side of Strong's head with his left hand, so he can dig into that jaw with his right elbow. And the whole time Strong kept yanking Thatcher's head more and more forward. Awesome spot. Strong had a few nice knee strikes that Thatcher leaned into, and I'm loving more and more the sudden finishes that can happen with Thatcher, Gulak and Busick. Here Thatcher grabs a sweet arm bar that I didn't see coming for the finish. Excited to see more 2015 Strong.

3. AR Fox vs. Trevor Lee

ER: This finished after just a few minutes because Trevor punts Fox right in the eyeball and legit KOs him, or at minimum concussed him. I was starting to think that Fox was just a real good salesman. Match before that was kind of dorky, but kind of amusing. Both guys do really questionable rope running/reversal/one step ahead of your opponent type of stuff, and sometimes that looks good and other times it looks ridiculous and mapped out for miles. I liked all of their cool early armdrag reversals, with a couple blocked armdrags (which is a spot I love) and some real neat variations. But with those cool spots come a lot of needless flips. One spot saw Fox go for a dive, Lee backflip off the apron while Fox does a Misawa feint to the apron, then Fox backflipping off the ring post to the floor which led to him getting his eye socket punted in by Lee. We also get plenty of ambitious strikes that whiff, and would probably look better if they didn't add a spin to everything. Announcers pushed real hard how Trevor Lee is real "over" in PWG but the fans haven't quite taken to him the same way here, saying they aren't sure what to make of how he acts and how he dresses. Wellllll….color me confused as I have never seen Lee before but he acts totally normal and he was wearing black trunks with black boots/kickpads. It's not like he was wearing crotchless chaps and wrestling on his hands or anything. Until they started babbling about how he looked I never would have thought he looked odd. Am I missing something?

4. Biff Busick vs. Uhaa Nation

ER: Well Uhaa has the best theme song in wrestling. And I loved the announcers going the full Kal Rudman while talking about him. "Just eat a cheeseburger why don't you, get up to 1% body fat. Muscle on top of muscle. Jacked." I love that they're just going for it, looking at Uhaa and getting choked up like John Boehner talking about America. Overall I liked this match, really liked Busick in this and Uhaa had some moments. Uhaa's problem seems to be that he really focuses on the "athletic" portion of his offense, even if the follow through of said offense suffers. You can't go 30 seconds in this match without hearing the dual Rudmanning of Uhaa's athleticism. Every time he left his feet was met with orgasmic moans, followed by more fawning over his abdominal muscles. But he seems way too inside of his athletic self. He'll leap up real high for an elbow drop, but the elbow drop doesn't look very good. He'll get an insane leap on a flying clothesline, but the clothesline itself won't look great. So it's obvious he has impressive leaping ability and looks very light on his feet in general, but when you look at his offense from the angle of what is actually being done to his opponent it does not seem as impressive. But it's very easy to get blinded with the athletic portion of the move and the actual impact portion gets kind of swept under as you're still reacting to "athleticism". I liked how the story began, with Busick working over his ribs, tossing out some of the nastiest knees you've seen (which led to a nice reversal by Uhaa when he did a forward roll over a knee for a roll up) and a nice abdominal stretch, followed by a cool half nelson suplex reversal (which Uhaa popped up for to hit a clothesline, blecch). Busick looked great throughout, always seems to have a good match planned for his opponent. I think he fed into Uhaa nicely, bumping big on suplexes and clotheslines, large bumps but appropriate for what was being done. I love his headlock takeover into a choke submission finisher, and while there were faults to the match this was plenty good.

5. Drew Galloway vs. Ricochet

PAS: Great match, the best I have seen from either guy. Galloway has grabbed the early pole position for wrestler of the year. We start out with some outside of the ring brawling which delivered a couple of crazy athletic spots by Ricochet, he gets thrown in the air, grabs a basketball hoop and twists his way into a rana, it is something Gerald Green and Juventud Guerrera should steal for the dunk contest. Ricochet then tries a wall walk moonsault, gets caught and thrown brutally into a concrete wall. When the match gets back into the ring, Ricochet goes after the finger Galloway injured in his Strong street fight, and Ricochet makes a surprisingly effective Fuchi. Finish was great, Galloways splint comes off and catches Ricochet in the eye, and after waiting a split second Galloway jumps him and hits a couple of big moves for the finish, fun subtle heel turn in the spirit of Tommy Rich v. Bill Dundee in early 80's Memphis.

ER: Well this match was great. I loved loved loved all of this. The early spots that Phil mentioned were insane. Ricochet getting tossed into the hoop and then fluidly swinging back with a rana is something that could easily come off like an overused winking Human Tornado kind of spot, but here it almost comes off organic, as if Galloway tossed him into a wall not knowing there was a hoop there and Ricochet pulled off the ultimate ad lib. It's like when a guy goes through a table that wasn't actually set up by his opponent, just so much more satisfying when you don't see the spot coming. The run-up-the-wall moonsault, caught by Galloway and ending with Galloway chucking him into the wall was flat out brutal, Ricochet's body splayed out in a fantastic thud. Back in and Ricochet gets all Finlay on us by ripping off Galloway's finger splint and ripping apart at his fingers. He even does amusing indy spots like a standing moonsault onto the bad hand. Ricochet bumps like wild on Drew's comebacks, not just that earlier spot getting tossed into a wall. He gets suplexed into the corner, leans into strikes, and then the spot of the match with Drew obliterating Rico with literally the greatest top top clothesline in the history of this great sport. I've wracked my brain trying to think of a better one. I remember Ikeda hitting a great one off the top in NOAH. But this one. This was the best. Drew's follow through was immaculate and the way Ricochet imploded was perfection. Wrestling spot of the year? Most possibly. They really could have done anything after that spot and I would have given it 8 stars, but the rest of the match is perfectly fine, and the finish is great as Drew accidentally catches Rico in the eye with his splint, and looks genuinely apologetic with the apologies. I bought them. Then sprints out of the corner to blast him with a kick for the pin. Awesome. Great match-up.

6. Johnny Gargano, Rich Swann & Chuck Taylor vs. The Bravado Brothers & Moose

ER: Well, this was...okay? But not really my cup of tea. One of those matches where for every thing I like about it, there's something that takes me out of it. None of these 6 are guys who I will actively seek out, or get excited about if they're an opponent of somebody I like. But 6 mans can be a kind of magic for average wrestlers, where they can hide all their flaws and come out the other end with a nice tidy 15 minutes of pro wrestling. And this wasn't not that...on a base level the match was fine. No silly overkill and plenty of fun moments. By the end it just didn't add up to much. It's the kind of match that seems fine if you're watching it with buddies, half paying attention to the match and half focusing on chatting about movies you've seen recently or how you can't believe you love Bates Motel as much as you do. But actually watching the match, you see cracks. Dives that whiff, eyeballs trying to remember sequences instead of looking natural, people timing out their steps tap dance style. Gargano is a guy who is pushed hard by Evolve, and even the announcers put over as "the face of Evolve", which just seems wild to me as there are few guys on the Evolve roster who I usually remember less about than Gargano. He's a guy I've rarely been offended by, and has rarely impressed me. Swann I probably like the most of these 6, he adds the most little details to his flash. He can throw in little struggles like he and Harlem fighting over a suplex that he ends up eventually reversing to a small package, and comes off the most natural in rope running exchanges. The Bravados have improved in the last few years and look good when working team spots, less so separately. Lance seems like the clear better one to me. I actually liked some of his punches during brawling portions, and Bravados were never guys I thought "nice punches!" about. Moose is your large Kofi Kingston, doing athletically impressive spots that don't really hit very well, or is dependent on big bumpers. His standing clothesline looked good, or was it Swann leaning into it? His duel fallaway slam/samoan drop looked impressive, but it also required Swann to find a plausible way to set it up. But none of this overstayed its welcome and that counts for a lot, finding the right time to end things is a big deal that a lot of indy wrestling doesn't understand. This match was all perfectly acceptable wrestling, just as equally as it was perfectly forgettable wrestling.


Overall this was a real good card. Two MOTYC on one card will do that. Outside of the excellent Drew/Ricochet and Thatcher/Strong, I dug the Busick match and nothing else was offensive. Definitely going to be doing more Evolve reviews. Linked below is our 2015 MOTY list, since both the Galloway and Thatcher matches were easy inclusions to that:


2015 MASTER LIST

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