Paragon Pro Wrestling 11/14/15 Review

We only got two of these babies left! That's only 21 weeks total. It feels like I've done more. Maybe after this I go back to NXT reviews, going ALL the way back to the beginning of what's on WWE Network. Yeah that will put me far behind everybody with zero chance to catch up, but I want to see how shit develops. But that's for the future, for now I'll remain barely focused on PPW.

1. Amerikan Gunz vs. Wes Brisco & Jessy Sorensen

This was a match. Jessy got jumped backstage the previous week. Or so they say. I have zero actual recollection of this happening. Apparently it was a mystery assailant. Something tells me this mystery won't be wrapped up by next week's final episode. So Sorensen works a knee injury the whole match, and he does a good enough job, limping all around and fighting the odds, you know. That stuff. Gunz alternate weeks looking forgettable one week and like the surest hands in the fed the next. This was somewhere in the middle. Possible that it depends on the opponents, but I've seen them look good against bums before. So yeah. This happened.

2. Chamberlain vs. The Man They Call Exile

Exile is wearing a duster on the way to the ring. Of fucking course Exile is wearing a duster. Just a duster, wifebeater and pleather pants. Good name for Exile's nemesis: "Network elects to not extend contract to Paragon Pro Wrestling - Effective Immediately". I just can't wrap my head around why a man is named Exile. It would be halfway amusing during a battle royal, if every time he eliminated somebody he told them that they were exiled from his ring, the ring of Exile. But his name cannot be more straightfaced than they're using it. "The Man They Call Exile". Who are They, and Why are They calling this man Exile? Is there a definition of the word that I don't know? Vocabulary isn't my strongest suit but it doesn't seem like a word that can be simply misunderstood. Did he just think the name sounded cool? Mysterious? Dangerous? If a friend was to get a new dog, and name them Exile, you can bet that most people who heard the dog's name would first respond by saying, "Exile??", as if they possibly misheard the name, to which the dog owner would reply "Exile," and the friend would then reply, "Oh," and then likely follow it up with, "Why?" or "What does that name refer to," or ,"Oh that's what I thought you said before, but I assumed I had heard wrong due to what a stupid name for anything needing a proper noun." But no, the announcers just call him Exile. They've even talked about other places where he has worked! But never mention if he was exiled from those places or not.  Chamberlain's strikes looked lousy. Exile just kinda lied there. A real cold fish. He hits a nice powerslam, so that's not nothing.

3. Hammerstone vs. Gangrel

 According to the announce crew, Hammerstone "lived up to his name" in the last match. I...have no clue what that could possibly mean. Hammerstone made Gangrel look really good in this match, planting himself on the Impaler, dumping himself on a German suplex, splatting on a bulldog. Gangrel is fairly slow now but Hammerstone made him look like he had effortless strength. This was oddly one of Hammerstone's better showings, although maybe it was a bit too generous of a performance. Remy Marcel interferes leading to Gangrel's win, meaning they're building to the FIFTH showdown between Whirlwind Gentlemen and Hammerstone/Chamberlain. Will we get that as our final match of the show's run? Seems only fitting.

4. Caleb Konley vs. Wes Brisco

Brisco has the ribs taped up and is doing a halfway decent job of selling them. And this match is actually really good! Maybe the best singles match in PPW's long illustrious history. Konley goes after the ribs the whole time and Brisco is a curiously strong salesman. Kicks, punches, bearhugs, body vices, all targeting Brisco's ribs. Brisco has some nice moments of fighting back from his knees, desperately lashing out to try to stop the onslaught. The only explanation I can think of is that Brisco is a method actor, and he drew upon the expressions of all of his numerous victims, with their pained faces, bodies damaged in innumerable ways, making last gasp desperation attempts at escape from their knees, fighting back against a violent, creepy attacker.

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Paragon Pro Wrestling 10/24/15 Review

1. Espiritu vs. Remy Marcel

This worked as a fun 5 minute Marcel showcase, who normally just gets a scant amount of time as the Whirlwind Gentlemen hot tag. Espiritu doesn't really do tons here, locking on two separate chinlocks. For a guy who hasn't been on TV for 2 months you'd think he'd try to go out of his way to impress. I liked his missed senton? Anyway, the beginning was real cool with all their standing wristlock exchanges. I especially liked Espiritu rolling through the wristlock, but Marcel rolling with him at the same time so both ended up back on their feet where they started. Looked cool. Espiritu hits an okay vertical suplex, Marcel hits an okay crossbody, really liked Marcel's out of control frog splash. Marcel looked good in this, and that was the point.

2. Greg Romero vs. Jack Manley

Now Manley gets his 5 minute showcase, and it's also fine. Other WG showcase match was better, but this was good enough. The important thing is the fed is actually establishing hierarchy, showing two members of one of their top tag teams easily beating two guys who aren't on TV that much. That seems like a super obvious thing, but this fed is obsessed with presenting every worker as a very accomplished mat grappler who is one step away from the title! Romero works a Danny Zuko gimmick in 2015 which is...pretty annoying and very pointless. He's also not that good, throwing slo mo punches, attempting complicated roll-ups he saw on TV once, taking slow back bumps, just a pretty big bleh. Manley works better as a FIP and here he was more aggressor, but I like his back elbow so that's something. This was what it was.

3. Mike Santiago vs. Mikey O'Shea

It's weird that the fed pushes every single match as if it's going to be an incredible match. Seriously, before every match starts they'll say something like "this is going to be an incredible match", or one minute into a match they'll talk about what an amazing match we're experiencing. But they never ever put guys into position to actually have an "amazing match". Matches usually run 4-7 minutes, most of them are worked in a vacuum, and things usually just don't stand out. But they keep talking about how incredible the matches are, and they say it during almost every match. Here they talk about what an amazing match this 3 minute match was, and then talk about the main event which is "sure to be an incredible high stakes match". Everything is super important, everything is super incredible, it's just misguided and tiresome. O'Shea is morphing into a Bigelow rip-off, and Santiago tries bumping around for him but O'Shea just isn't that interesting. Incredible match though.

4. Tyshaun Prince & Caleb Konley vs. Gangrel & Exile

Hey, I liked this! It was probably the best I've seen Prince look. Gangrel matched up nicely with Konley, Prince was a good bully and did a good job trapping and punching Gangrel in the corner, the announcers kept referring to Exile as "mysterious" but really how mysterious can a guy wearing pleather pants be? Konley adds speed to the match that would have otherwise been completely absent. I kinda like Gangrel's short straight right hands, and Exile/Gangrel make a good team. This whole thing didn't really have the "high stakes" the announcers promised, and I am beyond tired of Prince matching up with Gangrel, but this worked.

And after the match we get a huge pull apart brawl with the boys from the back all separating Hammerston, Chamberlain and the Whirlwind Gentlemen. WG each do big running dives off the entranceway ramp into the big schmoz of people, and the far away shot of it looked really cool.

Also, Joey Ryan - new champion - is missing.

And I found out this show is getting bumped off Pop! in favor of TNA (blecch) so we'll just ride the rest of these shows out (4 more?) and then sit in satisfaction that I wrote up every PPW broadcast. Maybe we'll do some kind of rundown of the best matches or something? I don't know.

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Paragon Pro Wrestling 10/10/15 Review

1. The Amerikan Gunz (Ethan HD & Mike Santiago), Hammerstone & Chamberlain vs. The Whirlwind Gentlemen, Gangrel & Mikey O'Shea

Well this is strange and/or pointless. This was set up as Amerikan Gunz (ugh. spelling.) vs. Whirlwind Gentlemen for the #1 sontendership to the tag titles, and then Hammerstone & Chamberlain run in, and then Gangrel and O'Shea, and the commissioner makes it an 8 man, still for the #1 contender spot on the line....but....the tag champs are now IN the match. Gangrel and O'Shea have teamed up one time, so I'm not really sure what place they have in a #1 contender match. Ethan HD has teamed with O'Shea as many times as Gangrel has. So right out of the gate this is a pretty terribly conceived idea for a match. You would think Ethan HD or Santiago would never tag out, as it wouldn't benefit them if H&C get the pin for their team. The only way to get the #1 contender is to get the pinfall so why would you tag someone who wasn't your partner? Match itself is basically good until it wasn't. It's hard for a match to be good when the general psychology of the whole thing makes no sense. Manley was a fine FIP, liked his comeback top rope clothesline and he hit a whip fast fivearm. Of course the announcers put over every Manley comeback as a "desperation move". I'd love an explanation on how a guy going to the top rope to do a clothesline is desperate in any way. Anyway, I was enjoying this with the heels cutting off the ring, but then they did that lame telegraphed ending where 6 guys all fall to the floor at the same time, guaranteeing the match will end moments later. So now we're going Whirlwind Gentlemen vs. H&C round 4. I really hope H&C continue to retain by cheating against stupid, stupid babyfaces.

2. Caleb Konley vs. Gentleman Brawler Eric Right

I like how these two match up, and here we get an actual match where both guys aren't equally talented, we have Right fighting admirably until just plain getting beat. It's important to actually establish a hierarchy in this kind of weekly episodic TV. This was one of the more satisfying PPW matches they've aired, with some nice engaging mat stuff to start before Konley starts dishing some nice short elbows, and Right is a guy who's now shown he has no problems leaning into a beating. Right's comebacks are always good and I like his strikes too, and then lo and behold, Konley wins because he's better (and yeah there might have been a weapon involved, but thems the breaks). It's weird that such a result is shocking, but I'm so used to everybody in this fed treading water around each other that this felt like an important step (so I fully expect Right to just get a random unannounced title shot in like two weeks).

3. Kevin Kross vs. Mercurio Jr.

I really liked this too. Kross looked like a beast throughout, tossing Mercurio with a couple deadlift suplexes, doing nasty things like stomping Mercurio's calf and ankle, kicking him in the back of the neck while lying prone on the apron. Mercurio goes for an ill-advised Asai moonsault and Kross posts him for his troubles. Mercurio hits a tornado DDT on the floor that Kross doesn't really do justice to, taking it really gingerly. But he does threaten an old man by staring him down for way too long. The old man played along, but also deserved to be smacked. Back in and Kross catches a rana attempt and dishes more beating. I like Kross not caring about getting the pin over some scrub like Mercurio and instead locking a nasty can opener on him in the ropes until he gets DQ'd. This show hasn't been too shabby.

4. Joey Ryan vs. Jessy Sorensen

You'd be shocked to know, that both men are "excellent mat grapplers". Jessy holds a loose north-south choke and does some gator rolls, and that looks pretty silly. Joey takes it to the mat and that looks better. And this really doesn't go long, but that's for the best . Sorensen is just the blandest, while also not being good. A real double threat! Brisco is bad but at least he has the whole rapist without remorse vibe to set him apart. Ryan hits a great close fist hidden weapon punch on Sorensen and gets the pin as the announcers moan "Noooooo not like thisssssss". And we get an excited unexpected title change.....until the we get a second ref down to explain what happened so Jessy could retain his title. Maaaaan I hate second referees. It's such a lazy crutch.

But I still can't complain much as I liked Kross in his match, and liked Konley/Right. That's a decent episode of TV.

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Paragon Pro Wrestling 10/3/15 Review

Okay so I fell a bit behind on this once I lost my man Dean's support, and also because of all the Wes Brisco eyeball assault that was happening weekly.

1. Mikey O'Shea vs. Kevin Kross

"O'Shea could be the Harvestor of Sorrows for Kross" and "It's all about for Whom the Bell Tolls for Kross".....okay? Apparently the two announcers just got their first taste of speed metal and gotta shoehorn it into conversations? Neither man has any sort of connection to Metallica that I can see. I mean shit I love Ride the Lightning as much as the next guy but this just came off like Awful Announcing and two guys pulling each other's puds. O'Shea is finally starting to work MORE FAT with senton attempts and corner avalanches and belly to belly slams. Also dug O'Shea's corner body blows and big chops. Kross usually comes off better and he seemed to be holding back a bit on O'Shea. Wasn't expecting O'Shea to come away with the clean pin here, but this fed has also backed themselves into an annoying little win trade/parity corner.

2. Ethan HD vs. Mercurio Jr.

The announcers have a real annoying habit of pushing every single wrestler in the fed as a "real student of the game" and saying things like "Mercurio has a proclivity to start fast". They use just so many unnecessary words, really filling every single bit of empty space with just WORDS. Every single guy is a "student of the game" or a "ring general" or a "technician" with no regard to what those words mean. Mercurio can just be the resident luchador, he doesn't need to also be a student of the game who is a technician who is in the middle of having a phenomenal see-saw match up. Every goddamn match is a "incredible match up" or a "phenomenal match up". This got called both of those things within the first three minutes. They are just so terrible. HD is a guy I like, always leans into offense, and Mercurio doesn't have great offense so he really works hard to make Mercurio look somewhat competitive. YES that's problematic because not every worker deserves to look competitive, but again this fed is obsessed with every worker splitting every match 50-50, every win getting paid back, every guy looking like he has a shot in every match, so HD fits the fed's needs. He also takes a real nice delayed bump over the top to the floor. Mercurio has lousy faux lucha (faucha?) offense, dropkicks that don't land flush, slow arm drags. They do a silly rolling cradle section with a bunch of nearfalls counted despite nobody's shoulders ever being down, and then the match terribly ends in a double KO, despite neither taking anything that should keep either down for a dual ten count. This was just all around poorly conceived. But sometimes that's what happens with real students of the game.

3. Gangrel vs. Darin Corbin

We get an amusing pre-match vignette of Darin Corbin celebrating out on the town with his American Title, eating dinner with it and dancing down the streets with it. Tim Sylvia would wear his UFC belt to the grocery store, so this seems more believable by comparison. This match furthered Corbin as a guy who keeps his title by either fluke or nefarious means, as Gangrel controlled the whole match until Corbin bailed, looked at his shiny belt with adoration, and clocked Gangrel with it for the DQ. Corbin looked good bumping around for Gangrel, and Gangrel threw some nice punches and was able to do non-stop offense for a few minutes without gassing out or taking a chinlock break. That sounds backhanded, but it's important. Gangrel has been a guy with decent offense but no perfect way to tie it together, so really this was a fine use of his structure. And I am starting to dig Corbin as goofus who knows how to keep a belt.

4. Jessy Sorensen & Wes Brisco vs. Hammerstone & Chamberlain

I keep getting scared they're gonna load Sorensen and Brisco up with title belts, and yet H&C keep awesomely retaining the belts by cheating! I love it. It provides actual drama for me, since I don't want Brisco walking around as a champ, and they regularly have authority call out H&C for cheating (actually had a funny pre-match promo where the Paragon president or CEO or GM or booker or whomever calls them out on how they win matches, and they sheepishly say they do it through hard work, watching tape, etc.). A key to why their cheating works so well for me, is that they aren't really portrayed as guys who cheat because it's their only way to win, they clearly cheat because they just like to cheat. The other week there was a No DQ match where they tried to cheat, and then it threw them when cheating wasn't called out by the refs. It seemed stupid at the time, but seeing how much they love to win by cheating, it kind of works within their characters. Nobody in the match is necessarily GOOD, though Hammerstone has potential. I liked his low clothesline on Brisco and an even cooler deadlift pumphandle fallaway slam. Brisco has a lousy crossbody block. But I just kinda love H&C controlling a lot of the match, and the first moment things start going wrong they just hit a guy with a belt or - in this case - hold down Brisco's legs so he can't kick out of a pin. What will the federation do to stop it?? It's weird and good that I actually care about the answer to that.

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Paragon Pro Wrestling 9/26/15 Review

Tonight, we apparently have "Championship Action"...well, of course we do. This fed has multiple title matches on every single show.

1. Joey Ryan vs. Wes Brisco

Tons of Wes Brisco fans near the entrance ramp, all in the same handwriting. One of them is held by a sweet little girl who then has to be touched by Brisco due to her losing the "who gets to hold the Brisco sign" lottery. That girl will look back on this day as the day she was forced to prematurely grow up. I think Brisco somehow has more tattoos. Maybe he thinks that if he keeps getting more that he'll look like less of a nightmare? Maybe it's the same logic people use when they have a baby to save their marriage? Ewwww. Brisco does a flapjack and one of the announcers yells "put some syrup on him!" Wes Brisco: No stranger to putting syrup or some sort of jelly on men. Match wasn't much. Ryan controlled a lot with headlocks and a decent cravate. The problem with that is you're building babyface sympathy for a man who I believe is actually sponsored by Megan's Law. Brisco threw a decent spinebuster, so that's something. He wins with a schoolboy and then celebrates after like 123 Kid beating Razor Ramon. That's...weird.

2. Gentleman Brawler Eric Right vs. Darin Corbin

This is for Corbin's AMERICAN title, which Right won but then had the decision reversed as apparently a sleeperhold is an illegal choke. And here Corbin gets a clean win over Right. It's kind of strange to establish Corbin as a guy barely holding onto his title, only winning matches by cheating or fluke reverse decisions, and then have him dominate a rematch with the guy who previously beat him. Right got very little here, as it was mostly Corbin working over the leg, Right eventually fighting back and going to the miracle tonic, but then Corbin just slips out of the airplane spin and hits the Ginger Snap. No shenanigans, just put Right down.

3. Mike Santiago vs. Crash Test Cody

So many promotion-made signs in the crowd. Must have been a new set of tapings or something. And this was disappointing. I like these two more than most people in the fed, but they have a real short match, CTC does a spit take a full two seconds after taking an elbow, match is kind of oddly constructed with Santiago playing underdog face until Ethan HD interference, and it was just all disappointing. Nobody looked bad, just a weird structure and no time to do anything.

4. Caleb Konley vs. "The Man They Call" Exile

Eesh. Exile is a big tall shaved head guy ("completely stacked" according to the announcers), with one of the worst pro wrestling names I've heard. I don't understand it. Edge isn't a good name, but at least you can justify it with some sort of "he's on the..." or "he lives life on the...". Exile is just...I don't get it. Where is he exiled from? Was he a political criminal on the run? It would be like a member of a Border Patrol stable being just called "Deport". They say he is playing "judge, jury and executioner", but don't try and make any statements like "He just exiled Konley from the ring" when he tossed Konley to the floor, or "Konley has been exiled from his equilibrium". Nope, just talking about Exile as if his name was Scott or something. And Exile goes over Konley real clean here, with Konley only getting a tiny bit of offense. Exile didn't look bad, I liked his northern lights, his kick combos could use some work. But it's weird seeing Konley go down clean without much fight, as he's been previously established as a title contender. This was clearly a new set of tapings as a lot of guys have new gear, but it's weird that they've also seemed to treat them like a bit of a restart for the fed.

5. Tyshaun Prince vs. Gangrel

Kiiiiinda ready for this feud to just end. Prince is not good and somehow keeps getting long matches, the longest on the show. The longer his matches go the more things go wrong. Here he showed he has no clue how to take a bulldog, uncomfortably taking a back bump, so you get the hilarious visual of both men running and taking back bumps at the same time. Earlier there was a moment where Gangrel took a bump after running the ropes. Nothing happened to him. Not sure what was supposed to happen. But he ran into the ropes, took a couple steps and then just fell over. There...seemed to be some miscommunication throughout. Gangrel threw several nice right hands, cool straight shots to Prince's jaw. So that's something. Prince wins after Gangrel gets distracted by interference, meaning this feud probably will not end.

This fed is really, really bad about building feuds and setting up long term rivalries. Matches happen because matches happen. Gangrel and Prince feuded, they had a "pine box" match because...well apparently Tyshaun is deathly afraid of having a wooden lid shut on him. But here they are, two weeks later, back to fighting in regular singles matches. The way this fed builds matches is just...lazy.

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Paragon Pro Wrestling 8/29/15 Review

1. Tyshaun Prince vs. "The Gentleman Brawler" Eric Right

So Tyshaun Prince got a pretty long TV match, and it wasn't actually that bad! This felt like the best possible singles match to have against Prince. Right outruns him for a bit, and it actually gets good when Prince gets ahold of him. Prince threw some cool body shots in the corner, loved him holding up Right's arm before dealing a shot to the ribs. Then Prince does some elbow drops and while he doesn't drop the best elbow, he lands close to the body and that's at least half the look. He loses the point of the elbow as maybe he's scared of the landing or something, but it's a big body smashing into another body so it looks fine. Right fought out of a backbreaker with some knees to the side of the heard, and this was fine! It was fine. It was a long Tyshaun Prince match and it was fine.

2. Fruit Loops vs. Hammerstone

Ohhhhhhh boy we got Fruit Loops. Fruit Loops is a chubby masked guy in pajama pants and tie dye shirt, billed from the Haight Ashbury district. Ugh. But we can't just have a character named after a cereal, because REAL sports has to be integrated. Marvel as the announcers put over Fruit Loops' STRONG amateur wrestling background, and really Fruit Loops does not come off as somebody who has done anything athletic in his life. It's like when Jim Ross would talk about Rico Constantino being a cop. Who could possibly care? Are we trying to get a guy named Fruit Loops over as a game competitor? I'm not the one who decided to throw a chubster in tie dye. Your company is the ones who chose to use this character. It's like they did this and went "You know I'm getting worried people aren't going to take the guy with a handmade necklace made out of the cereal he's named after seriously enough...adding in some amateur credentials will surely make people realize that Hammerstone has his hands full." Hammerstone proceeded to have plenty of room on his hands. Match is notable for seeing Fruit Loops take a clothesline bump for the first time in his career (presumably. I hope that wasn't something he had actually practiced).

3. Mike Santiago vs. Gangrel

Surprisingly competitive match for (Portland area worker) Santiago's debut. The announcers talk about how Gangrel is "fangin' and bangin'" and how fangin' and bangin' is apparently a 24/7 lifestyle. Yeesh. Santiago doesn't bring anything noteworthy to the proceedings, but he has polish and knows where he needs to be in the ring and that goes a long way in this fed. Gangrel does his cool corkscrew elbow (including an even nicer bump for a missed one), and there's some satisfying little things in this like a nice back elbow from Santiago, and Santiago going up a bit early on the Impaler but Gangrel recognizing that and delaying a bit, making it looked like Santiago was really fighting it. The whole match they keep building to a casket match between Gangrel and Tyshaun, but WWE must own the rights to "casket match" as they have to call it a "Pine Box" match here. They said the words "Pine Box" so many damn times during this match.

4. Caleb Konley vs. Mikey O'Shea

O'Shea needs some fat guy offense. He's tall and fat (or "stacked" as the announcers refer to him. Yuck.) but always ends up working FIP during his matches, no matter the size of his opponent. I liked all of Konley's knees to work over O'Shea's back, liked O'Shea's missed somersault senton, but I just need more fat guy. I mean O'Shea won with a fucking schoolboy. A guy billed as 350 lb winning with a roll up? This is a problem. O'Shea needs to start working fat and stop working like babyface Torie Wilson.

5. Jessy Sorensen vs. Joey Ryan

I literally remember nothing about this. Watched it, remembered nothing writer afterwards. It was short. Jessy Sorensen was most likely one of the guys in it...that's the most information I can comfortably recollect.

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Paragon Pro Wrestling 9/5/15 Review

We start with a...not good...Hammerstone LIVE interview, who suggests Wes Brisco is only getting his opportunities because of that last name of his. That Gerald Brisco name carries some mean heft at Sam's Town Casino, I suppose. Was Hammerstone making a vague dig at Native Americans and casinos? I'll keep you posted.

1. Hammerstone vs. Wes Brisco

Good ol' clean cut babyface Wes Brisco. This man seems like somebody who - after sexually assaulting somebody - starts red face screaming about how his victim just main evented Weslemania. He also throws the worst body blows you've seen, and that's before you get a chance to see his awful stomach kicks! The announcers inform me that "Wes Brisco is working on a whole 'nother level" and I assume that means he has already conquered Sexual Assault Level 1 and is looking to graduate to Level 2 or maybe even Level 3 (Level 4 is presumably maiming your victim while also having full leg tattoos). This stunk.

2. Ethan HD vs. Darin Corbin

This probably should have been a bit better. It went on longer than it needed. Corbin knows how to jaw with Vegas tourist crowds. But he also has lousy clubbing forearms. But he also knows how to bump for Ethan HD's offense. HD comes out to arguably the greatest Prince song, Controversy. That shows some good taste. Working in Vegas he should know that the only Prince song that every girl digs is Raspberry Beret, but he cuts a little deeper and delves into the early funk side of Prince, the panties and high heels Prince, and it guarantees that nothing else in his matches will be as good as his entrance music.

3. Mikey O'Shea vs. Kevin Kross

Easily the best O'Shea match, even though he still showed he has no idea how to work fat, trying to end the match with a freaking sunset flip. What 300+ pounder is going to use a sunset flip?? You can just FALL on your opponent. USE YOUR FAT. But the rest of this was good, sometimes really good. O'Shea starts with nice body shots and chops in the corner, and then Kross shows off his own nice body shots (including shaking out his fist after, which is a quick way to my heart) and does neat little things like hold on to neckbreakers until impact. The back and forth in this was good, O'Shea hits an awesome fat guy spinebuster (that I don't remember him using before) with a nice sloppy roll through that kinda steamrolls Kross. Kross works over the body mostly with nice knees and slams. Kross is good, probably the best regular in the fed. But man that finish was stupid. O'Shea, large fat guy, tries a sunset flip from the apron, Kross blocks by holding the ropes and gets the pin. Last week O'Shea won with a roll up, now he's building to sunset flips? This is a misguided fat wrestler right here.

4. PINE BOX MATCH: Tyshaun Prince vs. Gangrel

Fidel Sierra comes out and says this won't be a pine box match, but then Interim Commissioner Matt Striker comes out in his wide leg jeans and says it WILL be. Well. That was easy. The rules are weird, as you have to pin or submit your opponent, and that gives you the right to place your opponent into the pine box. Tyshaun acts very scared of that box, regularly running away from it when he happens to wander close. And I mean...it's a box. I wasn't aware that being afraid of boxes was a black person stereotype. We can't just go inventing new stereotypes for black people. This is not a very intimidating box. It would make just as much sense for Tyshaun to be afraid of desks or clawfoot bathtubs. The whole match the announcers talk about Prince needing to face his fears. I'm just having a hard time getting too scared about a generously sized wooden box inside of a very well lit and well attended room. Outside of the silliness I actually enjoyed the match. Prince worked over Gangrel's body (lot of decent body work in this match) including bending him around the ringpost in a nasty way and dishing out a rough uranage on the metal entrance ramp while a guy in a wheelchair right next to the ramp tried to stay out of the way. For his part Gangrel took a nice bump on the wood floor.  Fidel Sierra gets tossed in the box, Prince cannot save him due to his fear of wood.

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Paragon Pro Wrestling 8/22/15 Review

1. Hammerstone & Chamberlain vs. Mercurio Jr. & Ethan HD

H&C are now being called Murder By Muscle which I don't think they've been called before. The announcers are smartly and casually acting like that's always been their name. Man is this fed generous with title shots. Not really sure what Mercurio/HD did to earn a title shot, other than be a part of a fed who needs to have three title matches every episode. HD hits the cool old Erin O'Grady apron flip rana into the ring, and Chamberlain does a nice little SUWA bump off a Mercurio rana. Buuuuut this overall wasn't very good. It doesn't help the ending has some time standing still moments thanks to Mercurio. Hammerstone tries to save it the moment by just kneeing Mercurio in the balls. And I can't unsee H&C's weird matching/not matching trunks ever since Dean pointed them out.

2. Espiritu vs. Suede Thompson

This is Suede's debut and I dug him. He had a couple nice go behinds, some weird southpaw jabs, high cradles. He keeps things moving too and doesn't seem to get lost like some of these guys. Espiritu kinda stinks and is officially the worst and least subtle guy in the fed when it comes to getting into position for moves, but Suede drug this one out and made it work. I wouldn't mind seeing more of him.

3. Crash Test Cody vs. The Challenger

So, I'm not sure how good Cody is, but he's a guy I want to like. He's got a weird milky eye, looks like an old young guy, and his name is Cody. You'd think with the Crash Test moniker he would be a reckless bumper or something but you'd be a disappointed human if you thought that. Watch as he grabs a chinlock on the tubby masked Challenger. But CTC has nice running forearms and you just can't underestimate the character depth that one, weird, pigment-free milky eye brings to things. Challenger wins and will certainly challenge other challengers in the coming weeks. It's a shame his backdrop finisher is not called The Challenger Disaster*.

4. Tyshaun Prince, Caleb Konley, Kevin Kross vs. Gangrel, Gentleman Brawler Eric Right & Mikey O'Shea

This coulda been so much more, but I guess it didn't overstay its welcome. Kross is the guy I wanted to see most in the match, so naturally he didn't get any time in the ring. We're building more Tyshaun/Gangrel long term PLANS which does not excite me. Konley is a perfectly fine chest out/butt out modern indie worker and I like Right more every match I see him. He leans into things and bumps big and throws a couple nice punches. That'll get you far with me. O'Shea finally does one cool thing with his fat by doing a pensive-but-still-fat cannonball off the apron into everybody. Fat being fat is always a win.


*Feels like a joke I've used before. If so, apologies, and feel free to tinker around with some joke-in-progress where Challenger ducks a clothesline, and how together we can call it a Dodge Challenger.

Warmest Regards, Eric.

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Paragon Pro Wrestling 8/15/15 Review

Magical Flames Rainbow Logs sure are a weird product. There are several commercials for them throughout an episode of Paragon, and I love the marketing. The first shot of the commercial is a couple about to fuck in front of a fireplace. They both start out of screen and then almost sit up into each other, man sitting up on the left, woman on the right, sitting up into view, sitting up into a kiss that gets cut off far too soon. You can only imagine what's happening underneath the camera, their legs entangled in some sort of epic kama sutra scissor, bodies entwined, pleasure soaring, the woman thinking "Not only am I 43 and having the best sex of my life, but the rainbow colors coming out of this guy's fireplace wood are fucking hypnotic."

I think a dad in the front row is wearing a shirt that says "Bear Jew".

1. "The Gentleman Brawler" Eric Right vs. Darin Corbin

You know we were gonna get some title matches on this show, and you KNOW you gotta get behind an AMERICAN CHAMPIONSHIP MATCH. Sorry, Mexicans! Man Corbin doesn't even get to hold this for one defense. After Corbin's loving promo to his American Championship last week I feel bad it's already in the hands of another man. That, slutty, slutty American Championship. Match wasn't much. I was kinda plagued by Right already doing death selling just a couple minutes into the match. Right throws decent punches and I like his sleeper. Corbin's cartoonish bumping kinda works for this fed. And somehow the sleeper hold is an illegal move in Paragon so the decision gets reversed and Corbin is still AMERICAN CHAMPION. Illegal sleeper? That's...weird. And also dumb.

2. Greg Romero vs. Azul Angel

Nothing timelier than a Grease gimmick in 2015. This is the TV debut of each guy. I was digging it until it ended with interference 2 minutes in. Azul had a couple cool things like catching a Romero punch in a t-shirt and armdragging him by it. It had a cool Finlay feel to it. Azul did throw some wimpy Mil Mascaras chop blocks and a silly backcracker, though. Romero has not been told that no human beings have sideburns anymore. When was the last time you remember seeing sideburns on anybody?

3. Joey Ryan vs. Gangrel

Gangrel comes out to a hip hop remix of his old WWE theme. It...kind of works. And this match also kind of works. It was worked faster than I anticipated, although Gangrel appears to work sloppier the faster he works. I get it. The math on that adds up. Gangrel still took an okay bump to the floor, threw out his nice corkscrew elbow drop, and matched Ryan's pace. Ryan tossed out a nice short arm clothesline and solid headbutt counter. We end in a DQ. Nothing is solved. We are all nothing.

4. The Shadow vs. Sugar Brown

Sugar Brown comes out in a baller letterman jacket with gold sleeves and "Mr. Kayo" on the back. The Shadow is some goober in all black under a black mask and comes out to the theme from Halloween. The announcers talk about his eerieness and how uneasy he makes them, but how eerie can a man in cargo pants really be? That is like calling a man in ankle socks "mysterious". And Sugar gets the motherfucking SQUASH WIN and I love it. Brown breaks out his completely awesome 360 corner clothesline and Shadow does a nice knee wobble after Brown's Kayo Blow. Fuck yeah. 'Bout time Brown picks up a win. Straight to the top baybay!

The announcer loves to add "Uhs" to proper names. He always says Paragon Pro Wres-uh-ling. Or Caleb Kon-uh-ley. I heard it once and now notice it constantly.

5. Caleb Konley vs. Wes Brisco vs. Jessy Sorensen

I will give the fed some credit, they always keep me guessing as to who's going to come away with a title. I would not have guessed Konley winning the title here and Konley is clearly the best of these three, so I support this. The match was pretty pointless as it barely goes 5 minutes, 3 way spots always look goofy (they did one of those superplex/powerbomb spots and this one was extra gross as Brisco was the one doing the powerbomb portion so you had him and his gross legs just burying that face in CROTCH) and nobody could possibly like triple threat matches anymore. Without thinking too hard about it, if I could eliminate one thing from modern wrestling it would be triple threat matches. I've seen more indy matches get fucked up because of triple threat matches. Bring in a big name? Let's have him give the rub to TWO of your guys by setting up a three way! They just can't help themselves. PLEASE just ban the triple threat.

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Paragon Pro Wrestling 7/25/15 Review

1. Joey Ryan vs. Ethan HD

One of the commentary guys refers to Ethan HD as "perhaps a quintuple threat" and does not explain what any of the actual 5 threats are. Singing, dancing...maybe an acquaintance taught him how to do some entry level welding? Match goes barely over two minutes and ends with a Ryan feet on ropes cradle. He at least hooked a nice high cradle. HD bumps a couple punches really nicely, buckling his legs and kinda going down forehead first. Looked nice. Ryan bumps a springboard roundhouse from HD nicely as well. Ryan seems to be maybe the only guy in the fed who knows how to bump to the hard camera. HD starts to get crossed up on a couple spots so it might have been for the best that the match ended when it did.

2. Tyshaun Prince & Graves vs. Gangrel & Mikey O'Shea

Another disappointingly short match ending with Caleb Konley running in for the DQ. O'Shea is a disappointing big fat guy, as none of his stuff has much impact. Tyshaun is a disappointing large black guy as he has these light little stomps but scowls like he'll be a monster. Graves is a really cool worker who was pretty wasted here, used as cannon fodder mostly. This seems to be setting up a 6 man adding Eric Right to one side and Konley to the other, so hopefully that gets some time as I could see that being good.

3. Espiritu vs. Mercurio Jr.

These two have already matched up on this show and I have no clue who they are, whether they are actually Mexican or not, or if they wrestle under other names. Espiritu bumps around in front of dozens of tourists, old white men sitting with legs crossed and packs fannied, one of them pumping a solitary fist as Mercurio Jr. hits a big splash.

4. Sugar Brown vs. Caleb Konley

Sugar Brown is officially my favorite jobber, and I'm glad Paragon is bringing back the jobber (even if it's only Sugar Brown). He's got nice little worked boxing punches, nice snap to his bumps, and easily the best 360 clothesline into the corner that I've seen. This doesn't get much time but Konley hits a big shoulderblock, puts Sugar's punches over, and shows nice professionalism. I wanna see more Sugar. He deserves better than this, with some of the chumps getting pushed in this fed.

5. La Rosa Negra vs. Riea Von Slasher

This was supposed to be Negra vs. Lisa Marie, but Marie came out and taunted her a bunch by calling her Mami in an exaggerated Rosie Perez voice, leading to Negra getting jumped by Slasher. Slasher and Negra clicked nicely here as Slasher's power offense worked much better here with Negra bumping for it. Negra can ragdoll really nicely, especially as she bumps a clothesline off the back of her head. I don't totally buy her comeback offense against Slasher, some combo of Slasher not taking offense very well, and Negra's impact not having enough oomph.

6. Hammerstone & Chamberlain vs. The Whirlwind Gentlemen (Jack Manley & Remy Marcel)

Well I would have bet on the WG winning the tag titles here, so I will applaud the promotion for showing a little restraint. For the first few weeks WG are the only team to get regular hype videos, promo time, clearly treated like the kingpins of the fed. And I'm not totally sure why as other than their appropriate Peter Gabriel entrance they don't bring a whole lot to the table. They work long extended FIP segments and work as undersized RnR types, even though they haven't appeared to be smaller than any of their opponents. So their matches come off like them getting dominated and then just winning in the end anyway. So for the bulk of this match we get Chamberlain taking apart Manley, keeping him confined to their corner (the commentary made me smile with a line at one point, where they go "now the rings is actually twice the size of what we're seeing right now, you'll have to take our word for it as we've only seen half of it."), adding a few mocking touches like holding Manley in a pumphandle slam, walking him over to Marcel and letting him allllmost tag out but throwing him overhead. After this long FIP we get Marcel's hot tag, they do a nice double team where Marcel goes for the Code Red and Manley boots Hammerstone in the face to send him over. Hammerstone takes an awkward bulldog by taking it with a somersault bump. That's dangerous. I thought the title switch was projected with how how much they've been hyping WG, so I was fully expecting the win after Marcel's nice frog splash...and didn't actually see Chamberlain pulling the ref out of the ring and decking him. So I could see people not liking that finish but I really think it was for the best. WG got to power back against a tough team, get a visual win, Hammerstone/Chamberlain get to establish that they'll stop at nothing to keep their titles, and we eventually get to build to some sort of blowoff match. So this really felt like the best finish they could have done.

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Paragon Pro Wrestling 7/18/15 Review

We start with a real clunky backstage segment with a guy who is the owner? Management? Authority? Chubby guy in a suit? talking with his hands a LOT about how he needed to be here because with a main event like Gangrel vs. Tyshaun Prince, "a LOT of people are here". He then cuts to a video of Hammerstone & Chamberlain winning the tag titles, and then comes back and talks with his hands a lot while missing his cues and trying not to look at the camera.

1. Mikey O'Shea & Ethan HD vs. Hammerstone & Chamberlain

I had never seen any of these guys before. O'Shea is a large bald Irish fat guy, like Will Sasso with Smashmouth facial hair. I wish his fat guy offense had more heft. For some reason fat guys throwing chops looks weird. Like...just club them with your giant fat body. He also worked from under too much. I wanted to see him steamroll. Ethan HD is your indy workrate guy, doing flipping slingshot ranas and kickpad offense. As most of these modern workrate guys he bumps a clothesline well and occasionally has decent strikes. The flipping rana did look nice, and keenly set up Hammerstone catching him with a powerbomb from it later. Hammerstone mostly looked bad. He's a Thor looking guy who has the lamest missed strikes you've seen. He worked HD a lot (who is smaller) so it was a lot of cat mouse with Hammerstone having to miss a lot of strikes, and all of them would have missed by a mile even if HD hadn't been dodging. They all looked horrible. Chamberlain really didn't get in much but ironically was my favorite in the match. Threw a nice falling clothesline and did some real nice apron work. At one point he choked out HD behind the refs back and it was a glorious cheat to win from the apron choke. It was pro wrestling. Match was fine, meant to put over tag champs Hammerstone and Chamberlain.

2. Joey Ryan vs. "The Gentleman Brawler" Eric Right

Right gives out a fake handlebar mustache to a child at ringside. That's actually a nice little touch. This match was a nice little TV match. Right is a little schticky but makes it work better than I would have guessed. He throws nice uppercut punches, works in moves I miss like atomic drops and a good aggressive headlock (say 0.5 on the Dundee scale). Joey Ryan is a good guy for this fed, comes off so much better on TV than a lot of the waxed/oiled short brown hair WWE types. This was simply worked with Ryan controlling with stomps and decent punches, feeding into Right's comebacks. Ryan won with a spear, which was odd. I'm not a big fan of that as a finish, let alone with two guys the same size.

3. Nick Price & Kevin Kross vs. The Whirlwind Gentleman (Remy Marcel & Jack Manley)

A lot of gentlemen in this fed, apparently. Whirlwind Gentlemen are basically your Vegas LMFAO types with bad suits and bad big hair and colorful sunglasses, coming out to Peter Gabriel's "Steam" (which admittedly fits great with douchebag babyface charisma, almost like the FBI coming out to that BeeGees remix). They aren't very good, and it's a bummer they're being pushed as a big deal when a guy like Kevin Kross is cooler in every way. This was really strange as they've been hyping the Gentlemen with 3 weeks of video packages, and then the match was worked with Price and Kross dominating the whole match, and WG only winning by banana peel roll up after Lisa Marie's botched interference. I mean, if you want to push a team, actually DO IT. Don't make them look like total weenies in their first televised match. All the match made me want was more Kross throwing dudes at awkward angles.

4. Gangrel vs. Tyshaun Prince

Disappointing match that ends in a DQ. Instead of doing a heavyweight brawl they worked it cat and mouse with Gangrel dodging the larger Tyshaun's attacks. Except Gangrel is not very fast, so it was a very lethargic cat and very tired chubby mouse, with a hands on the ref finish. Bleh.

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Paragon Pro Wrestling 7/11/15 Review

Paragon Pro Wrestling is like Too Many Cooks, in that there are about 9 false starts before the show actually starts. There are several commercials for Paragon Pro Wrestling that air successively, and each time you think you're just seeing the intro for the actual show, but then there's another commercial for the show, and suddenly you're two White Russians deep and you're wondering when the fuck the actual show is going to start. There are just an endless amount of PPW commercials featuring every wrestler on the roster, set to AC/DC's Thunderstruck, and you're like "Well surely the show is starting NOW" and then it's just another trick and another video package advertisement for the show airs and just when you think you've had enough..........you get presented with a Darin Corbin match against a 45 year old vampire (but what's 45 years when you're immortal amirite!?).

1. Darin Corbin vs. Gangrel

Presently Gangrel looks like what RATT's dead guitarist would have looked like present day, if he hadn't died of AIDS. I love the announcers here as they really capture the vibe of off-strip Vegas, saying that they saw Corbin earlier in the day loading up on garlic pasta at the Italian buffet "but it doesn't appear to be helping him against the Vampire Warrior Gangrel". You gotta know your characters, you gotta know that you tape all your shows in front of 85 people in Sam's Club Casino, and these guys understand every wrinkle of this dry fucking desert town.

Just like last week the audio sync is off, so the thud thud thud of men stomping across a mic'd ring don't come close to matching up to the footwork of the actual match, so instead we get the appearance of two men fake fighting while an avant garde drummer just hammers out of time beats. Gangrel throws a great corkscrew elbow drop. Corbin has nice form on a missile dropkick. Gangrel catches a crossbody off the top and swings Corbin into the Impaler DDT for the shockingly satisfying finish.

2. Nick Price vs. "The Gentleman Brawler" Eric Right

Eric Right is the hipster mixologist I mentioned from last week's battle royal. Recently I had to serve MY COUNTRY and do jury duty for two whole days (didn't even get to interview, just had to sit through everybody else getting interviewed), and there was a hipster also waiting to be interviewed as well, wearing suspenders and sporting a delicately styled handlebar mustache, while reading a book on how to home brew. That felt a little too on the nose to me. It felt like a Chuck Lorre adaptation of a hipster waiting to serve on jury duty; the kind of guy who brings his vintage Royal typewriter to the coffee shop to work on his screenplay. Eric Right is not quite there, but it feels like he should strive to be there. Go all the way with it. Right does less modern hipster dressing vintage, and aims for more "guy working at 1920s printing press who enjoys himself an occasional scrap". He has a bottle of cure-all tonic that he uses for an amusing hulk up spot. That kinda thing.

And I dug this. Right throws nice punches which is a good trait for a "Gentleman Brawler" to have. His hooking rights look good and his left jabs look nice. Price is more of a Caleb Konley type in a fed that has Caleb Konley, but he worked a nice heel routine here, choked Right nicely (at one point hanging him in a tree of woe and really laying in his boot under Right's chin). They do an actual nice double clothesline spot, Price commits on a missed elbow drop, the announcer allude to Right's finisher being a top rope fist drop (which would skyrocket Right up my list of personal favorites) and Right takes a nice bump after Price yanks his leg mid fist drop attempt. This ends in a DQ which is meh, but I liked everything that happened between the bells.

Joey Ryan is doing another hotel room promo when he's again interrupted by housekeeping. He throws down moves on her (while wearing trunks and a towel) and when she says "look I'm just here to clean the towels" he takes his towel off, tosses it over her head and says "Then wash this. It's FILTHY." Hilarious.

3. Riea Von Slasher vs. La Rosa Negra

Von Slasher is Canadian and built like Mickie Knuckles, Rosa is from Puerto Rico and has been around for awhile, wrestled a bunch for WWC and IWA but has been working stuff like Shine the last few years. This wasn't bad but it didn't really feel like they had much of a plan. Slasher has size and a good large build, but doesn't really work as nasty as it looks like she would. Her strikes weren't too impressive but watching it FELT like they should be. I dunno. They work a really fun wristlock/monkey flip chain sequence, but things fall apart a bit when Rosa way overshoots on a sunset flip (and really why go for a sunset flip on someone who has 80 lb. on you anyway?), then we get a Lisa Marie Varon run in that leads to a roll up finish and it just kinda petered out. Rosa has good energy and showed some polish (really liked that twitch speed she showed on her avalanche) but this felt like it should have been better.

4. Jessy Sorensen vs. Caleb Konley

This was a serviceable workrate kickpad modern indy main event. This was probably the best I've seen Konley look, but sadly Sorensen had a real clunky showing. It's like he kept literally tripping over his own feet, and forced Konley to have to freeze time a few different times. Example: Konley gets tossed into the corner and Sorensen charges, Konley gets the boots up, Sorensen is supposed to catch them and spin Konley's legs through the ropes, but Sorensen whiffs on the catch so that Konley has to leave his legs stuck forever out, until Sorensen finally grabs them and does the spot as planned. There were other moments like that, with Konley hung out to dry waiting for Sorensen to get his act together. But Konley held this together nicely and really deserves credit for making this as watchable as it was. He threw some fun strike combos and mixed them up nicely to avoid the whole "I forearm you, you forearm me, we both make screaming double jack off poses". Instead Konley would throw a snug left forearm, mix in a nice body shot, spin with a nice back elbow, etc. All his shots looked good. At one point he caught Sorensen with some great body shots as Jessy was getting back in the ring. But it looks like this fed has chosen Sorensen as their guy, which I kind of get. He has a build, he's young, he's clean. But he also appears to be very much not good.

This week's show was a massive improvement over the debut show. This was a plenty entertaining, quick moving hour of wrestling right here.

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Paragon Pro Wrestling 7/4/15 Review

Came across this show almost completely by accident. It airs on the Pop! network, which I only knew about because we recently watched a TV show called Schitt's Creek on the network. I checked yesterday on the off chance they were showing repeats of the show, and saw the next morning they were airing a pro wrestling show. Looked it up, and as fate would be it is the first show that has aired.

This fed runs out of Las Vegas and does shows at the Sam's Town Casino. This may be the first time that Casino wrestling has aired on TV since death days AWA. The crowd looks awesomely touristy. There really does not appear to be many actual wrestling fans out there. It's all older white men in golf shirts, fanny packs and cameras around their necks. This truly looks like a 1996 WorldWide audience and it's glorious.

1. #1 Contender Battle Royal

Woof. First match of your first episode of TV, and you start with a battle royal. And it determines the #1 contender to the title, no less! During most of the entrances they show how Jessy Sorensen won the title from Caleb Konley in a lumberjack match, so then we get back to the ring and suddenly 15 nameless guys are standing around. I recognize Gangrel, Joey Ryan, Konley, Darin Corbin, nobody else. There is a large black guy they call Tyshaun Prince, he threw a nice punch at one point, big overhand right. There's a big fat white guy wearing a neon green singlet, but he gets effortlessly tossed to my eternal disappointment. There is another guy with a handlebar mustache who I assume is working some sort of babyface mixologist gimmick. Konley ends up winning this thing. I guess it got all of the talent on TV, but pretty pointless since nobody gets to look good in a battle royal, and everybody got eliminated too fast to learn many names. That was a rough start to your first episode of TV.

2. Darin Corbin vs. Crash Test Cody

The announcers inform me that "we are STILL reeling over that epic battle royal". I mean, it was a 6 minute long battle royal. Cody has a weird milky right eye. His left eye is brown, and then the right eye appears to be reallllly light blue. It looks creepy. Now, when a guy comes out working a crash test gimmick, I would expect him to be a wild and reckless bumper, but Cody hardly bumped at all. He did throw some ugly forearms, though! Corbin is a guy you know. He's a guy you've seen turning up on indy cards for over a decade. And he still isn't a guy you get excited about seeing. He didn't look offensive at all, but outside of his finisher amusingly being called the Ginger Snap, he offers nothing. CTC misses a nice cannonball into the corner. That was the most interesting thing that happened here.  Naw I take that back, Corbin took a drop toe hold into the bottom turnbuckle really nicely, really went mouth first into it. So two interesting things.

We get a bad Jessy Sorensen promo and then an amusing Joey Ryan interview where he grooms his impossibly lush beard and talks to himself in a mirror and then gets a towel delivery from room service.

3. Espiritu vs. Mercurio Jr.

This is clearly not CMLL's Mercurio, nor is it AAA's Espiritu. I have no idea who either man is. I do know, however, that the ring audio is off and appears to be about 3 seconds ahead of what's actually happening in the ring. The commentary is synced up properly, but yeah you can hear crowd reactions and them thumping around on the mat when nothing is going on. Espiritu looked fine here, I wouldn't mind seeing more of him. Mecurio did some slow mo lucha-ish spots and looked pretty low rent. Espiritu at least knew how to engage a crowd and had some polish.

Lisa Marie Varon does an in ring promo to hype up Kevin Kross, calling him the most vicious shooter and that anybody who faces him will DIE.

4. Kevin Kross vs. Sugar Brown

Sugar Brown looks like Bad News Allen and wears boxing shorts with fringe so I'm already liking Sugar Brown. Kross has some size and works some nice strikes, threw a good running knee, really great deep scoop overhead belly to belly, nasty Saito suplex to end the match. Sugar was here more to put over Kross, but got to do a fun tornado avalanche in the corner (that got no sold, but whatever). This at least established Kross as a tough dude, and made him look good in the process. He's really the first guy this whole show who actually came off as important.

5. Joe Graves vs. Jessy Sorensen

Graves is a guy I really like, and Sorensen is a guy who broke his neck in TNA, got told they would pay his medical bills, and then never paid his medical bills because TNA. If I had serious medical bills to pay I'm pretty sure "continuing to professionally wrestle" would not be one of the ways I would choose to pay them off. Graves looked really good in this, throwing some real fine knee variations, like his nice knees from the clinch and an even better sliding knee. Sorensen looked okay, threw a nice neckbreaker, seemed to be in position for everything. I loved Graves working him over with knees, and choking him out with his wrist tape. To my surprise, Graves wins the title with a choke....ohhhhh but then another ref comes out and reverses the decision to give the title back to Sorensen. Well. Nothing like having your babyface champ get dominated and lose the title on your first show, only to get it back on a technicality.

Well, okay. First show. Things moved along at a quick pace, so that's a plus. The wrestling was not inoffensive. The production was surprisingly slick. They aren't really bringing anything unique to the table, but there were a couple guys I dug. This is a strange show to be on TV in 2015.

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Uprising: Lucha Libre Workrate Report, 9/22/13

Another week of Paid Programming late Saturday night lucha libre that apparently even Cubsfan was not aware of. I'd be pretty stunned if it had been on his radar, as these matches also appear to be from a 6/26/09 show and are now airing on a local paid time slot. Neither of the matches on this show even have a hint of actual lucha, soooo...

1. Rain vs. Cheerleader Melissa

I vaguely remember Rain from her cup of coffee with AAA (which was probably right around the time this show actually took place) and I've always been a big Cheerleader Melissa fan (and pretty sure I saw most of her earliest matches live). Both women seem pretty familiar with each other so it's possible they worked each other a few times in Shimmer. Rain works a decent heel schtick for the crowd, making Kevin McCallister faces whenever Melissa would kick out of a pin. Rain also brings a real 2010 indy lucha feel to things when she breaks out a lungblower. Crowd was way into Melissa here, especially her rapid fire pump kicks in the corner. This was a perfectly fine womens match. Not much drama as things were somewhat rushed through, but comparable to something like Mona vs. Little Jeanie from Worldwide.

2. Gangrel vs. Mr. Wrestling IV

I...can't imagine a crowd that appears to be 90% hispanic and attending a show billed as lucha libre getting too into MW4's butt wiggling move escapes, but then again I can't see most crowds being too into it. This match is particularly anal-centric with 4 wiggling his butt constantly at the crowd, patting his butt after move breaks, really obnoxious stuff. He's the tecnico here but he presents ass here more often than any exotico rudo I've ever seen, so his desired reaction falls pretty flat. Once we get past the interminable 7 minute long feeling out process we only have a couple minutes of actual match beyond that, which was plenty good. I am not a man opposed to bullshit feeling out processes in matches. Fucking John Tatum is one of my favorite workers for gods sake! But it has to be a brand of bullshit that I actually am amused by. Mr. Wrestling IV's bullshit is really hacky and obnoxious and counter-productive.

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Dick Togo is Up and Down With the Price, The Corner's Playing Pogo

Dick Togo vs. Gangrel WWF Sunday Night Heat 9/6/98 - FUN 

PAS: Short semi competitive squash, but a nifty one. Togo gets a couple of moves early including a nice spin kick, but Gangrel takes over and just chucks Togo around the ring with suplexes. I had no memory of the period where Gangrel worked as Taz, but he was a fun Taz, and Togo is an awesome Pablo Marquez. 

PAS: Dick Togo v. Rui Hiugaji MPRO 12/16/10 - EPIC 

PAS: Another excellent 2010 Togo singles match, and one worked dramatically different from either the Billy Ken Kid or Hikaru Sato matches. This really reminded me of a 80's Lawler v. Austin Idol match. The first part of the match is all about Hugaji trying to stall and avoid a punch and Togo finally landing it. Then Hiugaji takes him to the floor and busts him up with a chair shot, and then works a really simple effective beatdown based around opening up a cut. Hiugaji doesn't do anything flashy, but he is a nasty fucker, and his bumping when Togo punches his way to a comeback is great. They also exchange some really solid haymakers. Togo has been unleashing a great superkick lately and he obliterates Hiugaji with one here, and I loved the rolling around for the crossface finish. No Togo dive (outside of a flip off the apron) and no big senton, this was a match built on selling and timing not athleticism. It's a match Togo could work into his 60's, so Dick, if you are reading this, no need to retire. 

COMPLETE AND ACCURATE DICK TOGO

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